to all. Even in the hour of victory, when the Burmese capital was occupied by British troops, Havelock assembled his soldiers for divine service, after the struggle of the day had ceased. While, then, the usual scenes of revelry and drunkenness, alas! so characteristic of a victorious army, were being enacted in the streets of Rangoon, a little knot of warriors, stained and begrimed with dust and smoke, were found offering up, in the Great Temple of Idols, a hymn of thanksgiving and of praise to God. Havelock's conduct in this his first campaign was marked by bravery and coolness worthy of a veteran soldier, although his bodily weakness was, at times, a source of great anxiety to all who knew him. A long term of peace followed the conclusion of the Burmese war, but Havelock was not idle. He wrote a book upon the campaign, and he fell in love with the daughter of Mr. Marshman, his biographer. The marriage was a happy one, but the book was a failure. It was too outspoken in its criticisms, and gave great offence in high places. But the ability of the work and the exemplary character of its author eventually triumphed. As an instance of our hero's attention to the claims of duty, our readers will, perhaps, remember the story of his wedding morning. He was summoned to attend a court-martial, and he determined that nothing should interfere with his attendance thereat. His friends remonstrated with him, but Havelock was inflexible. The marriage was therefore solemnised at Serampore early in the morning, and noon saw the bridegroom-soldier in council at Calcutta. This devotion to duty was kingly. Havelock had served twenty-three years as a subaltern, when in 1838 the long-wished-for order for advancement came. He had been too poor to buy promotion, and his merit had been but poorly recognised. But now was he captain, and in the Afghan war of 1839 his military reputation was greatly advanced. The campaign was prolonged and disastrous. An English army, victims of Afghan villainy and deceit, was cut to pieces in its retreat from Cabul; one single survivor, depicted so graphically by Miss Thompson, riding back to Jellalabad to tell the awful tale. Havelock was shut up with a small garrison under Sir Robert Sale in that city, and never was a position of almost hopeless difficulty more nobly and courageously defended. Like the Jews of old under Nehemiah's guidance, they laboured with spade in one hand and sword in the other, and they prayed to the God of battles to grant them the favour He had vouchsafed to His ancient people. The walls that a fox might have broken down were rendered impregnable, and for a while the garrison was safe. Havelock's bravery and military genius were never more exemplified than in this siege and in the actions which ensued. The Afghans were beaten back in a series of victories, and the safety of India was for awhile secured. was forced to visit England. Here renewed associations with the friends of youth, and the rest and peace of family life, contributed to the restoration of his shattered constitution and the recovery of all his powers. In 1851 he returned to India, alone. Who could have foreseen the terrible future for England and her great dependency? More wars and more rumours of wars; more trouble and more bloodshed. Men were looking grave and apprehensive in India, and anxious and sad at home. Not a rift in the clouds was there, but darker and darker grew the horizon. The Persian war added to our embarrassments, and it was necessary to strike sharply and decisively. A divisional command was accepted by Havelock, and every nerve was strained by him to justify his selection for the post. Victory crowned the efforts of the British, and again Havelock escaped uninjured from what seemed certain death. he wrote to his wife, "I felt that the Lord Jesus was at my side." No wonder he was such a successful general; with such companionship, who could fail? His confidence in Divine protection was a peculiar feature of his career, and without this faith he must have been crushed by the responsibilities of the next few years, responsibilities as great as ever man incurred. The year 1857 heard the first mutterings of a storm which deluged the plains of India with blood, and whose thunder has scarcely died away to-day. The native troops stationed at Meerut mutinied, and regiment after regiment followed their example. Mutiny was followed by murder, and murder was accompanied by outrages more or less hideous. Panic seized all English residents in the peninsula, and, in the opinion of many, the knell of British influence in India had sounded. Within a month after the outbreak the whole country was in flames, and it needed almost supernatural strength on the part of the tiny English army to quell the conflagra tion. Havelock was summoned from Bombay to Calcutta, and was selected to command the Highlanders, those marvellous troops of whom the world is proud. Never had a leader greater confidence in his men, and never did men more heroically serve a leader whom they adored. The quest was a tremendous one. Havelock and the Highlanders were to co-operate with the gallant Sir Henry Laurence at Lucknow, and Sir Hugh Wheeler at Cawnpore, in "dispersing and utterly destroying all mutineers and insurgents." They did so co-operate, and they smote the insurgents hip and thigh with great slaughter. It is in these two towns that the terrible interest of the story culminates. At Lucknow, Sir Henry Laurence, with 500 English soldiers, was besieged by a force of half-maddened sepoys of twenty times the number. Meanwhile a tragedy of horror was being enacted at Cawnpore, that is exceeded in intensity by no record of old or new world's crime. English men, women, and children were butchered under circumstances of the greatest barbarity by him whose name The difficulties and dangers he had experienced, has become a byword for all that is cowardly, however, were light in comparison with those he was perfidious, and cruel. It was with such foes as Nana yet to overcome. Sahib that Havelock was called upon to deal. In 1849 his health was so enfeebled by the hard-force at his disposal was small, but every man was a ships and privations of incessant campaigning that he hero. Every man, too, was animated by the one The Havelock. thought " "Justice to the murderers of the women When the soldiers of the Queen saw the place of massacre, when they saw how delicate women and children had been cut to pieces as they begged for mercy, when they saw the wells choked with human limbs, when they looked down on their blood-stained shoes, they vowed a fearful vow that no earthly power should stay their avenging hands. Now were their faces turned towards Lucknow, and, with hearts full of righteous vengeance, they commenced their march. Every mile of the road was contested by overwhelming numbers of insurgents. Cholera, too, began to do its fearful work, but undismayed were the leaders and the led. For a while they were delayed by the want of reinforcements, and a change in the generalship was contemplated. Sir James Outram had arrived from Persia, and, as superior officer, was entitled to the supreme command. With noble generosity, however, Sir James refused to deprive Havelock of the honour, and preferred to act as his subordinate and companion, rather than take from him an object so ardently pursued. On the 19th of September, 1857, the Ganges was crossed on a bridge of boats by 2,500 English and Sikh troops, and, four days after, the booming of guns was heard in the direction of Lucknow, telling the weary and exhausted soldiers that their last and fiercest struggle was at hand. The morning of the memorable 25th dawned, and between eight and nine o'clock the march began. Every foot of the journey was contested by the mutineers, and every advance was a battle and a slaughter. All the energies of Havelock and Outram were Position after position was carried at the point of The meeting of the delivered and their deliverers Four days after Sir Colin's arrival Havelock became unwell. Toil and fatigue, exposure and privation had done their worst, and at half-past nine on November 24th he fell back upon the arm of his gallant and wounded son, and gently breathed his last. No fear was there in Havelock's soul as the angel of death smote him; he died as he had lived-a fearless warrior of the Great King. Never unprepared in the sudden emergencies of his profession, the last roll-call found him ready. This is a characteristic of Havelock, and it is a characteristic of the truly kingly. "Ready, aye, ready," must he be who wishes to conquer and to reign. No quackery was there in Havelock; he was earnest and sincere in all things. Not only did he possess that rare gift of personal enthusiasm, but he had the rarer power of communicating his enthusiasm to those around him. He loved, as all great men do, the approbation of his fellows, but he could stand alone and brave reproach and censure at the bidding of conscience and religion. No wonder that the heart of England was heavy at the tidings of the hero's death. No wonder that three Continents gathered in spirit around his soldier's grave to drop their tears of sorrow and of love. No wonder that the nation's gratitude was richly manifested to his widow and to the brave "boy Harry," the inheritor of his name and title. A king had passed away from the people, a king of thought and a king of action, a king of character and a king of influence. Havelock saved a nation, and then he died. N OLD CHALKIE. OT far from Sopem College is a chalk pit, rented from a neighbouring farmer by a man, who, for all we boys knew to the contrary, might have been in existence as long as the chalk had. He was a hardy specimen of humanity, whose dried up visage gave no satisfactory clue to the owner's age. Short in stature, he was yet shorter in temper, and was a species of human dynamite, warranted to explode at the least friction. To "get a rise" out of Old Chalkie was the daily delight of Sopem boys, and instead of growing used to our chaff, he seemed to become more susceptible. He made himself obnoxious to us by petty complaints to the head-master; and while biding our time for a grand fight, we amused ourselves with preliminary skirmishes to keep our hands in. Looking back upon those days, I am obliged to own that we were really very aggravating, but I see also that we had serious grievances. We had held out the hand of friendship one summer, when Old Chalkie had a field full of hay and could get no one to make it. We went to him, by deputation, and gave our word that we would do it for him, but he chose to disbelieve us, and drove our spokesmen from his cottage with his horsewhip. Need I say we determined henceforth to make him uncomfortable, till such time as we should consider we had wiped off the stain on our honour. It was school-boy logic, but I don't know that it was any more unsound than politicians' logic, who draw together some thousands of men, who have no personal enmity, and call upon them to kill and maim each other, to wipe off an imagined stain on the nation's honour! Now, be it known to all who are interested in the fortunes of our war, that Old Chalkie possessed a wife. She was, in everything but temper, the direct opposite of her husband, and stood no humbug from anyone; indeed, it was firmly believed amongst us that Old Chalkie would have surrendered at discretion months before, if he had not been goaded on by his bellicose partner. It was our delight to watch the "happy" couple as they drove towards the neighbouring town. They both looked so sour that chaff was necessarily elicited, and Chalkie has often been obliged to get down and threaten us with his ubiquitous horsewhip. But boys are as lightfooted as they are lighthearted, and he seldom had the pleasure of touching us. Rejoiced as we were to come across the Chalk family in the cart, it was nothing to the rarer pleasure of seeing the old dame take her seat therein. First came Chalkie's assistant, a boy who helped in the chalk pit, in the little carpenter's shop (for Chalkie was a carpenter by trade), and in the boot and knife cleaning department. Report said he sometimes cooked the meals, but the loud-tongued goddess was silent as to whether he ever ate any. He was a very scarecrow of a youth, and many a lump of cake from a Sopemite's pocket found its way into his hungry jaws, for we all liked and pitied him. This Jim had to take his post at the horse's head, lest the gallant steed should attempt to run away; but as the animal was always about three parts asleep, Jim's post for once was a sinecure. Next came Old Chalkie with a couple of chairs and a footstool. One chair was put into the cart, the other on the ground, and the footstool by its side, thus forming an easy gradation for Mrs. Chalkie to obtain her lofty position. In due time she appeared, and, by the aid of hoists from her husband, and gentle pushes from Jim, she arrived, puffing and blowing, at the inside chair, where she jerked out an angry complaint at the tardiness of her poor little husband who had to replace the furniture, lock the door, and remount, before he could give the fiery steed her head. If a contingent from the College happened to be watching the proceedings, a loud and ironical cheer greeted the start, accompanied with various warnings not to let Bucephalus go too fast. One day we had been made very angry by Old Chalkie. Our college has always been famous for the amateur pursuit of knowledge amongst the fellows. We had prizes for the best collection of wild flowers, butterflies, insects, fossils, &c., and naturally the chalk pit was a great temptation to us. Some of the most studious of our number, commonly known as the Zoophytes, had on this particular day braved the perils of Old Chalkie's rage, and set quietly to work in the pit. They found some grand specimens and were so engrossed that they did not hear the approach of Chalkie, who with a great garden hose gave them a good sprinkling, and then flew for his life. The ducking alone would not have angered us much, but when it was followed by a complaint to the master of our trespassing, and the learned Zoophytes were sentenced to five hundred lines, we all vowed vengeance. A half-holiday soon afforded the opportunity we desired, and closed windows and doors announced the joyful fact that Chalkie & Co. were out, and that we had a fair field before us. Shall I confess it? I was a Zoophyte, and had received the greater part of the water down my neek on that luckless day. Water generally quenches thirst, but my thirst for revenge was deeper than it had ever been. I had the very spirit of mischief raging within, and, regardless of consequences, a chosen band of twelve started, under my leadership, for the cottage. Visions of police and burglary laws prevented our breaking into that, so we set to work to paint every window a different colour, while the next-door in all directions for fuel, and a few destructive spirits neighbour, a great chum of ours, looked on with an actually took to pulling down the fence round the occasional chuckle of delight. pit. A rudely-executed design on the street door by our own artist represented Mr. Chalkie syringing the Zoophytes, while a forcible verse below, from the brain of our own poet, pointed out the moral. From the cottage we went to the workshop, which stood at the end of the garden. Here we found a window broken, and we scrambled through it one by one. In a few moments we had literally turned the place out of windows, every plank being carried carefully to the farther side of the chalk pit. Our artist and poet soon decorated the place with fancy sketches of Mr. and Mrs. Chalkie in their youth, while one young scamp (now a learned doctor) took off his coat and shoes and stockings, and putting on an apron, which he had discovered somewhere, personated Jim as he was supposed to be when his master went out. The fun waxed fast and furious till it reached its climax in a solo on the accordion from Charlie, while our poet improvised a song in which the principal feature was the chorus: "Then down with Old Chalkee, my boys! Charlie's coat had been hung across the window to prevent our being seen, but, alas! it did not prevent our being heard. Just as we had given three groans for Old Chalkie and were preparing for three cheers for ourselves, prior to our evacuation of the enemy's camp, the door flew open and Dr. Jay stood before us, with little Chalkie just behind him. It is needless to linger over the shame of that retreat. Old Chalkie had turned the tables with a vengeance, for Dr. Jay was the very last man to deal leniently with such an escapade. All our holidays were stopped for some weeks, and we were ordered to pay for the repainting of the cottage but, far worse than all this, letters were written to our parents complaining of our bad behaviour. For a time, therefore, the warfare ceased on our side, but as the ever-memorable Fifth of November approached, we determined to carry the war into the enemy's country again, for Old Chalkie had by no means ceased his aggressions, and would have denied us the right of walking on the Queen's highway, if it had been possible. So now we resolved that we would veritably "guy" the old fellow, and then wash our hands of him altogether. Accordingly we secured combustibles and fireworks of all kinds on the previous halfholidays, and on the eventful day, a band of a hundred and fifty left the college just as it was getting dusk. A regular war-whoop began the proceedings, and we pelted the window with squibs till Chalkie, half-maddened by the noise without and the fury of his wife within, opened the door, whip in hand, to lash us off as usual. Such a noise as we were making could hardly last long, before bringing down justice on our heads. Just as the fire was blazing at its height and Old Chalkie had closed his door in despair, the junior sergeant appeared from the college. Single-handed, he was powerless to quell the tumult, so he fell back on his old plan of putting down our names on a greasy slip of paper. Next came the village policeman, but even the appearance of the redoubtable arm of the law was unavailing. At last the senior sergeant arrived, his chest swelling with anger, and the various medals which decorated it glinting in the glow of the fire. We all admired him and loved to listen to. his battle stories, so his presence had the effect of subduing a good many of us, but it was not till two or three of the masters appeared, and the bell summoned us to tea, that we gave up our pleasurable task of " guying" Old Chalkie. The next morning, after prayers, we were on the look-out for a reproof from Dr. Jay, nor were we disappointed. The rioters had to stand up, and have their names noted down by the Prefects. The result was, the road was declared "out of bounds for the future, we had to stay in for a certain number of half-holidays, and all pocket-money was stopped till expenses were paid. Soon after this escapade I left Sopem College, but not before Chalkie had assumed a virtue which he did not possess, and left us all in peace. NEGRO FIDELITY. E. M. W. THE negroes seem perfectly happy at getting back to the Told place after the war, and having us there, and I have been deeply touched by many instances of devotion on their part. On Sunday morning, after their church, having nothing to do, they all came to see me, and I must have shaken hands with nearly four hundred. They were full of their troubles and sufferings up the country during the war, and the invariable winding up was "Tank the Lord, missus, we's back, and sees you and massa again." I said to about twenty strong men, "Well, you know you are free and your own masters now, when they broke out with, "No, missus, we belong to you; we be yours as long as we lib." Nearly all who have lived through the terrible sufferings of those who were sold seven years ago. Their good character these past four years have come back, as well as many of was so well known throughout the State that people were very One anxious to hire them and induce them to remain in the " up country," and told them all sorts of stories to keep them, among others that my father was dead, but all in vain. old man said, "If massa be dead, den I'll go back to the old place and mourn for him." So they not only refused good wages, but in many cases spent all they had to get back, a fact that speaks louder than words as to their feeling for their old master and former treatment. One old couple came up from St. Simon's, Uncle John and Mum Peggy, with five dollars in silver half-dollars tied up in a bag, which they said a Yankee captain had given them the second year of the war for some chickens, and this money these two old people had kept through all their want and suffering for three years, because it had been paid for fowls belonging to us. I wonder whether white servants would be so faithful or honest? My father was much moved at this act of faithfulness, and intends to have something made out of the silver to commemorate the event, having returned them the same amount in other money.-Ten Years on a Georgia Planta The door being open was a good chance for us, and we poured in a regular volley of squibs and crackers. The old man for once was bewildered. A hamper was lying near, and the instant it was seen, a shout for a bonfire was raised. Scouts were sentim. By Frances Butler Leigh. |