7 Loudoun’s Way of Making war

My first sensation after our arrest was of shame. The major’s stern reproof reached the quick. Somehow I cared much for the old man’s good opinion, and it was mortification to think that I had lost it. Moreover, what he said about our affair coincided so well with the thoughts that had troubled me after the challenge and before the duel that I could not persuade myself by any sort of deceit that he had not spoken the truth.

We were escorted into the camp as if we had been spies taken within the lines. We walked along in a glum silence. The sentinels looked up at us, and an officer or two lounging near regarded us with some curiosity. Culverhouse and I were placed in one tent, and Spencer and Graham were sent to another. What became of the surgeon I did not notice. A red-headed Highlander was ordered to stand guard before our tent door.

“If they try to escape,” said the major to the Highlander, “act as if they belonged to the clan that is the enemy of yours.”

The Highlander showed his wolfs teeth under his red mustache and his eyes twinkled. Looking at him, I had no desire to attempt an escape. Then the major strode away, leaving us to our thoughts and our Highlander.

They had left us a candle, which was sputtering in a little wooden sconce that hung from one of the tent poles. But there was enough light for me to see that Culverhouse’s face as usual was without expression.

“Well,” I said, “our duel has ended for Spencer and me in a manner that neither of us expected—in the guardhouse.”

“It seems to me that both of you ought to think an end in the guardhouse is better than an end down there under the clods,” said Culverhouse, flipping his hand toward the earth.

There was good philosophy in what he said, I was bound to admit.

“You bore yourself very well,” continued Culverhouse, “and showed that you had a good wrist and eye for the sword; better, in fact, than I believed you had. You don’t mind my saying I thought that your life was largely at Spencer’s disposal, and I was as much surprised as he probably was at the result.”

“I thank you for a revision of your bad opinion,” I said.

“It was not your courage, merely your swordsmanship, that I called into question,” he said. “Now if you will kindly excuse me, I think I will go to sleep.”

He lay down on a blanket and in a few minutes was asleep. His words had started me on a new train of thought, and I felt that, after all, I did not have much cause for shame. I, a colonial officer, had been victorious over an accomplished swordsman from the mother country. As I have said, we were extremely sensitive in the colonies to English aspersions on our skill or courage, and my countrymen of my own rank and station would be far from condemning me. That I knew. The thought was so pleasant that I fell asleep.

The next morning Culverhouse was taken away, for what purpose I knew not, though I supposed that he would be released as being less culpable than I. Soon after he had gone the villain of a Highlander thrust his head in at the door and grinned at me. The lump-headed fellow did not speak, but indulged in some amazing pantomime which I supposed he intended as a description by gesture of my arrest the night before. I picked up the wooden sconce which had held the candle and threatened him with it. Then he retired with a grin so wide that it led all the rest, and I caught an occasional glimpse of his bare and unsymmetrical legs as he tramped his little beat in front of the tent door.

Presently I had another visitor, and this time it was Major McLean.

“Major,” I said as soon as I saw his seamed, brown face, “grant me one request. Take away that hideous fellow you have put at my door and give me a new guard.”

“Oh, no,” said the major with a smile. “Sandy is just the man for the place. That’s Sandy McCorkle, whom I have known for a generation, a most honest fellow, and something of a humorist. That is why I put him here. I thought he might cheer you as well as guard you.”

“Possibly the Scotch idea of humor differs from the American,” I said.

“One’s opinion of humor is like the color of the sea,” he said. “It depends on the atmosphere. Your atmosphere just now conduces to serious reflection, or at least it should do so. It is a very grave offense for two of our young officers to be fighting a duel when they ought to be making every preparation to meet the Frenchmen.”

“I do not see how I could have done otherwise,” I said.

“Was it your first duel?” he asked.

“Yes,” I replied.

“Were you not afraid?” he asked.

“I am a soldier,” I replied proudly.

“I have known some soldiers who were very much afraid,” he said.

To this I had no reply to make.

“You have had teaching and practice with the sword?” he said interrogatively.

I answered in the affirmative, though I did not see the drift of his questions.

“You handled your weapon well,” he said meditatively. “That was a peculiar twist you gave to your wrist when you disarmed Lieutenant Spencer. I had not seen its like before. Where did you learn it?”

“It was taught to me by a Frenchman,” I said.

“Then I wish you would teach it to me,” he said with a sudden display of enthusiasm. “It was prettily done, my boy. For a time when I saw his fierce attack I thought he had you, but when you sent his weapon whirling it was like a turn in a play.”

“Why, did you see what had happened before that?” I asked in surprise.

“See it? Of a certainty, of a certainty!” he said. “I could not miss so fine a sight. On my word, you did well for a youngster. I thought once I would have to interfere and make the arrests too soon. It is a pity to mar good sport. But that turn of your wrist decided it, and relieved me of the necessity for premature action. It was prettily done, I repeat, and I have come around to wish you a very good morning.”

Then without another word he departed, leaving me very much surprised, and, in truth, very much pleased also. This pleasure was increased an hour or two later when Culverhouse sauntered unconcernedly into the tent.

“What does this mean?” I asked enviously. “What a fine air you have! Have you been appointed commander in chief in place of the earl?”

“I suppose I could get the position if I wanted it,” returned Culverhouse, “but I am not an aspirant for it. I thought I would tell you that you would not be hanged or drawn or quartered for fighting that duel. In some accidental way, for I can not ascribe it to your merit or your manners, you have made a great friend of that old fire-eater. Major McLean, and he is shouting your praises about the camp. Besides, we are so busy with the preparations against the French that our seniors haven’t time to bother about the delinquencies of subalterns. So if you will make a great effort to be discreet, and to talk very little, they will probably forget all about you before night.”

I found that Culverhouse was a true prophet of good. Late in the afternoon the brusque but friendly major came to the tent and told me to go about my business, which I was very happy to do. No official cognizance of the duel was ever taken, and I have no doubt now that, considering all the circumstances, especially the known ill feeling between the English and the colonial officers, it was the part of wisdom to overlook the matter.

But my good luck in disarming my antagonist gave me quite a reputation among my countrymen, which I sometimes found a trifle inconvenient, for I had no desire to pose as a hero of the dueling ground.

For some days we were in a great state of bustle. An army, like a woman, must make much fuss and preparation before starting on a journey, and the whole camp was in a tumult every day from early morning until long after the sun had slid out of sight over the hills. The generals and the colonels were engrossed in consultations, the captains and the lieutenants were swearing at the sergeants and the corporals, the sergeants and the corporals were swearing at the privates, the privates were swearing at the horses and the oxen, which, being unable to swear at all, had perforce to take it in silence.

But there was a pleasure in all this noise and work. We felt that we were doing something at last, that the enemy no longer had a monopoly of activity and accomplishment. There was an end to dumb sloth, and we talked confidently of victory and glory.

In the course of these activities I saw something of Spencer and Graham. I did not seek them, but in the close quarters of the camp it was not possible to avoid them. Spencer was stiff, but not discourteous. Graham was inclined to be more open. He seemed even to seek my friendship, complimenting me upon my success in the duel, and asking many questions about the colonies in a tone less patronizing than he had assumed at first. Culverhouse told me that despite his faults he was a good soldier, and such I found his reputation to be in the camp.

We were doomed to alternations of hope and disappointment. The days passed, and we were still camped in the city. All our bustle and our toil seemed to come to naught. The army was like a wagon mired deep in the mud. We could not budge it. The fault was with the driver, Culverhouse said. I knew that he meant Loudoun, and I knew also that what he said was true. All this time tales of the bloody atrocities committed by the enemy on the frontier were coming to us, and it seemed that no real effort would ever be made to stop them.

The de St. Maurs stayed on, for Loudoun was as lax in the matter of the prisoners as in other matters, and could not be induced to act. I had some opportunities for seeing mademoiselle, and found her as superior in mind as in appearance. In truth, Marion would twit me about her almost every time we met, but I soon ceased to mind her banter, which I think had a little bit of spite in it, owing to the old truth that a pretty woman likes to keep all the men she knows at her feet.

About a week after the duel I came down into the city in the lack of anything else to do, and spent a half hour at the Royal Exchange watching the merchants and agents, who knew how to make the most of time, and wasted no hours. Martin Groot was there, and perforce I endured his gibes at the military people, knowing that they were so well deserved. Tiring of the place, I walked toward Broadway, and on the way I saw some boys—and a few men, too, for the matter of that—following six British soldiers, who were marching two abreast in very precise style. Knowing that soldiers had ceased to be an object of curiosity in New York, I inquired of one of the civilians why he followed them.

“Why, they are going to be quartered on Herman Snell,” he said, seeming to be surprised that I did not know, “and Herman says they shan’t come into his house.”

I foresaw trouble at once. This quartering of soldiers without law or reason upon private citizens was a very sore subject with our people, and Loudoun, with an affected contempt for the provinces, as he called them, had made himself especially offensive to us by more than once attempting such things.

I followed, though at a distance, out of respect to my uniform, determined to see the end of it, for I knew Herman Snell was not a man to submit easily.

Snell had a square, solid brick house on Broadway, and when the soldiers approached he was sitting in the open doorway smoking his Dutch pipe, his ample proportions filling up all the passage. Though I guessed that some one had given him warning, he paid no attention until they had halted abruptly at his door step and let their musket butts clank upon the stones.

“This is Mr. Herman Snell?” said the leader of the soldiers.

“Since you say so, my friend, it must be so,” replied the Dutchman, taking a long whiff at his pipe.

“Then it is so, is it not?” returned the corporal impatiently.

“It is so,” said Snell.

“We are directed by the commander in chief to quarter ourselves in your house,” said the corporal.

“It’s against the law,” said Snell.

“It’s the earl’s orders,” said the corporal, who seemed to be a stubborn fellow.

“I’m no soldier,” he replied, taking a long whiff at his pipe, “and the earl’s orders don’t apply to me.”

The sergeant hesitated, evidently waiting for Herman to get out of the way. But the broad-bodied Dutchman remained in the passage and smoked on.

“Will you let us in, or must we come by force?” asked the sergeant at last.

“This is my house,” said Snell, “and you have no right to enter it.”

The contention had caused quite a crowd to gather, and one and all were with Snell. They began to groan and hoot, which incensed the sergeant very much, and urged him on to his task. He advanced as if he would enter by force. I saw no way for him to do it except by cutting down Snell, and I hastened forward to prevent bloodshed if I could. I asked the sergeant to go away and report that he had been denied entrance at Snell’s house. He respected my superior uniform, but insisted upon obedience to his orders.

I had drawn him down the steps that I might talk to him, and he turned again to enter, followed by the other soldiers. A great uproar arose in the crowd. Gravel and pebbles were thrown, and I looked for a dangerous riot when a strong voice was heard demanding order, and I saw Mayor John Cruger pushing his way through the crowd. His appearance was in the nick of time, for the crowd could not refuse him respect and the soldiers might listen to him when they would not listen to me.

“What is the matter, Herman?” he asked of Snell, who was holding his fat pipe meditatively in his hand.

“These soldiers wish to take charge of my house contrary to law,” replied Herman.

The mayor looked inquiringly at me, and I explained in detail. He warmly espoused the cause of Herman, who, he said, was entirely within his rights. By taking the burden of the matter upon himself, he induced the sergeant to return with his men to the British camp, and they went away, leaving Snell smoking his pipe in triumph in his undefiled doorway.

I heard of several other such incidents, and they were not calculated to soothe the increasing hatred our people felt toward Loudoun, who was proving himself almost as great a plague as the French, without their excuse. It seemed that he wished to irritate us to the utmost, and to prove to himself and his kind, if not to us, the superiority of the English over their American descendants. This, I take it, is a poor way of treating your allies in war, and, as I have said before, led in the end to great consequences.

Loudoun’s temper was not improved by the sharp comments upon his course which appeared from time to time in the Post Boy and Gazette and Mercury, where one could see now and then some smart epigrams and allusions, the meaning of which no one mistook. Loudoun would foam at the mouth at reading them, so it was said, and would threaten loudly to destroy the presses and type and imprison the editors. But he never dared attempt the execution of his threat, for the liberty of the printing press had been established in the great Zenger trial, of which all people in New York had heard. In truth, I enjoy a good smart gibe myself in the newspapers when it is at the expense of somebody else, and so, I believe, do most other people. Several times did I enter a coffeehouse to see a crowd of a score or more, some of them most substantial citizens, all listening with great enjoyment to the reading of a newspaper which contained a joke or pasquinade leveled at Loudoun or his panders. Now and then the English officers themselves would share in the sport, though those things caused at least seven duels that autumn between Americans and Englishmen.

But Loudoun went on his luxurious way. The report that Montcalm was advancing on Albany proved to be false, and we were saved that disgrace, at least. But it was wholly true that Webb had abandoned the defense of the border. In fact, he came down to New York and joined Loudoun in his dissipations and debaucheries. Every day almost we heard tales of awful atrocities from the frontier, how entire families had been destroyed by the Indians, but Loudoun and Webb and the army stayed on in New York. The two generals played cards and drank wine at a prodigious rate, and the city was gay with concerts, theatrical performances smacking much of the wickedness of the Old World, assemblies, balls, and all other forms of entertainment good or bad that idleness and wealth could devise. On all sides it was said that it was the gayest and most corrupt season ever known in New York.

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