Harfleur

“ At present, it is only remarkable for the elegant tower and spire of its church, connected by flying buttresses of great beauty, the whole of rich and elaborate workmanship.
At a short distance from Harfleur, the Seine comes in view, flowing into the sea through a fine rich valley; but the wide expanse of water has no picturesque beauty. The hills around Havre are plentifully spotted with gentlemen's houses, few only of which have been seen in other parts in the ride. The town itself is strongly fortified ”

“ The Earl of Dorset (soon afterwards created Duke of Exeter) , who was in command of the garrison at Harfleur, made a plundering expedition into the adjoining country, and found some difficulty in making his way back. In May the French made a retaliatory expedition against the southern shore of England, and ravaged the island of Portland. Later in the year Harfleur itself was besieged, and though it was twice successfully relieved, the fact made it evident that so far France remained unconquered. ”

“ Citizens invited to reside in Harfleur. Early in October the king caused proclamation to be made in the City, that all and singular knights, esquires and valets who were willing to go with him to Normandy, should present themselves to his uncle Henry, Bishop of Winchester and Treasurer of England, who would pay them their wages. ”

“ So with the might of England at his back Harry crosses the Channel, and his great guns begin to thunder before the walls of Harfleur. Before the town falls his army is fearfully wasted by hunger and disease; nevertheless, he does not mean to return without doing a deed that “will dazzle all the eyes of France.” From Harfleur he writes to the Dauphin and offers to fight him man to man for the kingdom, pleading that the quarrel may thus be settled without the shedding of innocent blood. But the sluggish, mean-spirited Dauphin makes no answer, so Harry cries:——
“The game’s afoot ”

“ When the English were all gone, the king gave the government of Harfleur to the count de Dunois, who appointed the lord de Moy his lieutenant, with one hundred lances and a proportionate number of archers for its defence, and for that of the country around. ”

“ In that year he was entrusted by Henry V with the custody of the castle of Veires in Gascony, then in English hands. In June 1415 he undertook to serve the king in France with ten men-of-arms and thirty archers. After the capture of Harfleur, Thomas Beaufort, duke of Exeter, and Fastolf were constituted governors of the city, with a garrison of about two thousand men. Fastolf distinguished himself at the battle of Agincourt, in the raid on Rouen, in the relief of Harfleur when besieged by the constable of France, at the taking of Caen, and at the siege of Roune in 1417. ”

“ The sea continually loses here, and, without great efforts on the part of man to retard the operation of the elements, Havre may, in process of time, become what Harfleur is. At its origin it stood immediately on the shore; the consequence of which was, that, within a very few years, a high tide buried two-thirds of the houses and nearly all the inhabitants. The remembrance of this dreadful calamity is still annually renewed by a solemn procession on the fifteenth of January. ”

“ There were negotiations to be made, and men to be enlisted, and ships to be procured, and funds to be provided, and appointments to be decided upon, and dresses to be made, and a thousand questions of precedence and etiquette to be considered and arranged. At length, however, all was ready, and the whole company proceeded together to the port which had been selected as the place of embarkation. This port was Harfleur. Harfleur is situated on the coast of Normandy, near the more modern port of Havre. ”

“ His army had been frightfully reduced by illness as well as by the losses in the siege: we are told that 5000 men had to be sent home invalided, besides the large number who died. A garrison was also wanted for Harfleur; altogether the king could not move with above a third of his original force. The accounts given from the English side, which are numerous and unusually circumstantial, vary only slightly: and one French writer, who expressly says that he saw the English army, agrees pretty closely with them. ”

“ As we descended, the ample Seine, here not less than nine miles in width, suddenly displayed itself, and we had not gone far before we came in sight of Honfleur. The mist [Page 94] occasioned by the intense heat, prevented us from seeing distinctly the opposite towns of Havre and Harfleur: we could only just discern the spire of the latter, and the long projecting line of the piers and fortifications of Havre. The great river rolls majestically into the British Channel between these two points, and forms the bay of Honfleur. ”

“ That you are worth your breeding, which I doubt not;
Cry God for Harry, England and Saint George."
The Englishmen answered nobly to his appeal, and Harfleur was taken.
Then the English advanced to a place called Agincourt, a name fated to be linked with splendid glory for ever in the hearts of all English folk. The French had a very large army, and the English soldiers were tired with their long march. Many of them were ill and many were hungry; but they loved the king, and for his sake, and for [45] the sake of their country, they were brave in spite of hunger and cold. ”

“ The cabriolet meeting me at the bottom of the mound upon which the castle is built, (having paid the reckoning before I left the inn) , I had nothing to do but to step in, and push forward for Havre. Retracing the road through which we came, we darted into the Route Royale, and got upon one of the noblest high roads in France. Between Tancarville and Havre lie Hocher and Harfleur; each almost at the water's edge. ”

“ Fortunately, as I was not in the least annoyed by sickness, I had leisure to survey the heights of Honfleur before we landed; and looking towards the course of the River Seine, as it narrowed in its windings, I discovered Harfleur and Hocher nearly opposite; and, a good deal lower down, the little fishing town of Quillebeuf, apparently embedded in the water. Honfleur itself is surely among the most miserable of fishing towns93-- or whatever be the staple commodity that supports it. But the environs make amends for the squalidness of the town. ”

“ The actual amount of booty taken in the town was large, and the harbour was the most important in Western Normandy.71 The loss of it, too, was deeply galling to the French king, who made it the ground of an urgent summons to his nobles that for want of succour his gallant and loyal subjects of Harfleur had been forced to surrender. But the capture of a single town, however important and wealthy, was not an adequate result of an expedition which had aimed at nothing less than the conquest of France. ”

“ It suggests a curious contrast to the conditions of modern warfare to find a skilful general voluntarily ridding himself of his artillery. Five hundred men-at-arms and a thousand archers were left to garrison Harfleur. On October 8th the King commenced his march with such forces as were left. Elmham, his chaplain, who was probably present, puts them at scarcely nine hundred men-at-arms and five thousand archers; Monstrelet estimates the former at two thousand, the latter at fifteen thousand.
Nearly half of his purposed journey Henry seems to have accomplished unmolested. ”

“ Harbury. [Louise Driscoll]
All the men of Harbury go down to the sea in ships,
The wind upon their faces, the salt upon their lips.
The little boys of Harbury when they are laid to sleep,
Dream of masts and cabins and the wonders of the deep.
The women-folk of Harbury have eyes like the sea,
Wide with watching wonder, deep with mystery. ”

“ Barfleur was explaining to me that in order to make my entrance into Paris properly gay and interesting, we were to dine at the Café de Paris and then visit the Folies-Bergère and afterwards have supper at the Abbaye Thélème.
I should say here that of all people I know Barfleur is as capable of creating an atmosphere as any—perhaps more so. The man lives so heartily in his moods, he sets the stage for his actions long beforehand, and then walks on like a good actor and plays his part thoroughly. ”

“ The Duke had fallen into a trap which Harper had laid for him. Turning round he saw Brett, the London captain, with all his men, and with Harper at his side, advancing and shouting, 'A Wyatt! a Wyatt! we are all Englishmen!' The first impulse was to turn the gun upon them; the second, and more prudent, was to spring on his horse, and gallop with half a dozen others for his life. His whole force had deserted, and guns, money, baggage, and five hundred of the best troops in London fell into the insurgents' hands, and swelled their ranks. ”

“ Henry Harper lay down with a feeling of relief and burrowed among the sacks as far as he could get. A mass of aches in body and soul, anything was better than the darkness and damp fog and icy substances cutting into his bare feet. ”

“ I think I have indicated in one or two places in the preceding pages that Barfleur, being an Englishman of the artistic and intellectual classes, with considerable tradition behind him and all the feeling of the worth-whileness of social order that goes with class training, has a high respect for the conventions—or rather let me say appearances, for, though essentially democratic in spirit and loving America—its raw force—he still clings almost pathetically, I think, to that vast established order, which is England. ”

“ JOHN BROWN
Mr. Chairman, and Fellow Citizens: I share the sympathy and sorrow which have brought us together. Gentlemen who have preceded me have well said that no wall of separation could here exist. This commanding event which has brought us together, eclipses all others which have occurred for a long time in our history, and I am very glad to see that this sudden interest in the hero of Harper’s Ferry has provoked an extreme curiosity in all parts of the Republic, in regard to the details of his history. ”

“ They sprang up the next moment; but the duke’s muzzle covered Lafleur, and mine was leveled full at Pierre. A second later Lafleur fell on his knees with a cry for mercy; the little man stood quite still, his arms by his side and the iron box hard by his feet. Lafleur’s protestations and lamentations began to flow fast. Pierre shrugged his shoulders. The duke advanced, and I kept pace with him.
“Keep your eye on that fellow, Mr. Aycon,” said the duke; and then he put his left hand in his pocket, took out a key and flung it in Lafleur’s face. ”

“ The news reached Harold as he lay at York, wounded and resting from his labors, and on the instant, with his victorious army, he set forth, publishing, as he marched along, his proclamation to all the chief of provinces and shires, to arm their followers, and meet him with all speed at London. The western levies came without delay; those from the north, owing to distance, were some time behind ”

“ Lafleur’s prayers died away. The duke, still smiling, set his pistol against the wretch’s head.
“That’s what you deserve,” said he.
And Lafleur, groveling, caught him by the knees.
“Don’t kill me! Don’t kill me!” he implored.
“Why not?” asked the duke, in the tone of a man willing to hear the other side, but certain that he would not be convinced by it. “Why not? We find you stealing—and we shoot you as you try to escape. I see nothing unnatural or illegal in it, Lafleur. Nor do I see anything in favor of leaving you alive.”
And the pistol pressed still on Lafleur’s forehead. ”

“ Whilst reading these words, perused, with such deep anguish and sickness of heart, so many times through the long midnight hours, the blue, cold lips of M. d'Harville appeared convulsively to spell each syllable of this fatal billet.
At this moment the chamber door opened and a servant entered; the man who now made his appearance was old, even gray-headed, but the expression of his countenance was frank and honest. The noise of the man entering disturbed not the marquis from his bitter contemplations ”

“ The regiments which marched into Harwich on the last day of April to await the King were swollen with recruits eager for glory. Addresses of duty and loyalty met his Majesty at every halting-place, and acclamations followed the royal coach throughout the route. The townsfolk of Harwich, in particular, had hung out every scrap of bunting they could find, besides erecting half a dozen triumphal arches, which by their taste and magnificence were calculated to leave the most favourable impression in the Sovereign's mind. ”

“ Like the sentimental Sterne, he loves philosophical digressions which, perhaps, the reader may pardon. Besides, the occurrence took place near enough to Harper's Ferry to give it some little claim on the chronicles of that neighborhood. In the confederate army during the civil war was the scion of a [Pg 138] very respectable house in the lower valley of Virginia. Like other young men, no doubt, he felt that in him was the making of a hero but, in his first battle, he discovered that he had missed his vocation. ”

“ I will see Harbury before the day is over."
"My dear General," said Hubert, looking exceedingly perplexed, "I think that you will hardly find Harbury in town. I heard yesterday that he was leaving London for a few days."
"Nonsense, sir! Leaving London before the close of the session! Impossible! But we can get his address and follow him, I suppose? I will see Harbury to-night!"
"It will be useless," said Hubert, with resignation, "but, if you insist——"
"I do insist! The honor of my house is at stake, and I shall do my utmost to bring that ruffian to the gallows! ”