WHEN THE TIDE WAS GOING OUT.

Tom Brandon, lying upon the green grass where the provincials had halted after the retreat, recalled the events of the day with his fellow soldiers, especially the last struggle.  He had fired away his powder, as had many others.  He had no bayonet, and could only defend himself with the butt of his gun.  He remembered how bravely Doctor Warren behaved, telling the men to keep cool; how he took bandages from his pockets, and bound up the wounds of those disabled at the beginning; how a Britisher shot him down and stabbed him with a bayonet.  As for himself, he hardly knew what he did, except to fight till almost the last of his comrades left the redoubt, when he leaped over the breastwork, and walked towards the British, approaching the western side as if to give himself up, then turned and ran as fast as he could, with the bullets whizzing past him. He wondered if Lieutenant Walden had escaped unharmed.  He walked a little way to Colonel Stark’s regiment to inquire.

“I had fired away nearly all my powder before the last attack.  I fired and was reloading my gun, when I heard a hurrah behind me.  I looked round and saw the redcoats leaping over the breastwork.  I saw a man beat out the brains of a Britisher with the butt of his gun; the next moment they stabbed him.  Seeing I couldn’t get out that way, I jumped over the breastwork and ran towards Pigot’s men, a rod or two, then turned and ran as fast as I could the other way.  The bullets whizzed past me, or struck the ground around me.  I reached a rail fence, and pitched over it.  A bullet struck a rail at the moment.  I fell on the other side, laid still till I got my breath, then up and legged it again, and got away.”]

“I fear,” said Captain Daniel Moore, “that Lieutenant Walden has been killed.  During the day he took a conspicuous part.  He was sent by General Ward to summon us from Medford.  He carried several messages from Colonel Stark to Prescott and Putnam, and was with the men of his company at times.  He was with us just before the last assault, and hastened towards the redoubt a moment before the redcoats swarmed over it.  I fear the worst, for he was very brave.”

The people of Boston never had beheld such a scene as that of the day following the battle.  The sun shone from a cloudless sky, but its rays fell upon the smouldering ruins of once happy homes; upon dying and dead soldiers; upon men groaning in agony as they were transported across the Charles to houses taken for hospitals.  The wounded rebels-­thirty-six in number-­were laid upon the bare floor of the jail.  They were to be treated as felons, and given prison fare.

Although the genial rays of the sun shone into the spacious apartments of the Province House, they gave no comfort to Thomas Gage, commander-in-chief of his majesty’s forces in the Colonies.  He was chagrined over the outcome of the battle, the losses sustained.  His own officers were criticising the plan of attack.  The soldiers said he had slaughtered their comrades.  The people were condemning him for having burned Charlestown.  He was conscious that he had gone down in the estimation of those who had given him loyal support.  He knew that his military reputation had suffered an eclipse.  Women were denouncing him as cruel and inhuman.  The conviction came to General Gage that he was shut up in Boston, and that any attempt upon the position of the rebels at that point, or upon the hills beyond Charlestown, would result in disaster.

It was cheering news to Tom Brandon and all the soldiers of the provincial army, a few days later, to learn that Congress, sitting in Philadelphia, had selected George Washington of Virginia to command them.  His coming was evidence that all the Colonies had united to resist the aggressions of the king.  He fought bravely to drive the French from the valley of the Ohio, and saved the army in the battle near Fort Du Quesne.  General Gage had been with him in that engagement, but now they would command opposing armies.

It was a beautiful summer morning, the 3d of July, when the regiments in Cambridge and some of the troops from Roxbury assembled on the Common at Cambridge to receive General Washington.  Tom Brandon saw a tall, broad-shouldered man, sitting erect on a white horse, wearing a blue uniform trimmed with buff, accompanied by General Putnam, General Ward, and a large number of officers, ride out from General Ward’s headquarters and take position under a great elm-tree.

“Attention, the army!” shouted General Ward.

The officers repeated it, and every soldier stood erect.

“Salute your commander, Major-General George Washington!”

The soldiers presented arms, the fifes began to play, the drums to rattle.  General Washington lifted his hat, bowed right and left, drew his sword from its scabbard, and rode along the line.  The soldiers saw dignity, decision, and energy, yet calmness, in all his movements.  They knew he had a great plantation on the bank of the Potomac River in Virginia; that he could live at ease and enjoy life in hunting and fishing at his own pleasure, but he had left all at the call of Congress to take command of the army.  His coming gave them confidence and made them more than ever determined to drive the redcoats out of Boston.  They kept such a strict guard that the British could not obtain fresh provisions, neither could the inhabitants of the town.  In the home of Captain Brandon, the only meat to be had was the salt pork and beef in the cellar, or the flounders caught by Mark Antony, fishing from the wharves.

Even General Gage could have no great variety of food.  In contrast to this, Tom Brandon and his fellow soldiers were living luxuriously, having fresh beef three times a week, with flour, peas, beans, rice, potatoes, onions, cabbages, turnips, beets, spruce beer, and grog, and plenty of tobacco.

Tom took his turn standing guard, and found pleasure in chaffing the lobsters on picket, telling them what he had for dinner.  A thought came to him,-­to write a letter and hire a redcoat to take it to his father.  He wrote about the battle; how he saw the family on the roof of the house, from the redoubt, just before it began; how he escaped; how Robert Walden went down in the thick of the fight and probably had been buried with the others somewhere on Bunker Hill.  The Britisher gladly agreed to take the letter to Copp’s Hill for the plug of tobacco which Tom gave him.

Mark Antony, the following afternoon, wondered what the soldier who was rattling the knocker on the front door might want.

“Here’s a letter for your master, Captain Brandon.  One of the rebs gave it to me.  Maybe it’s from his son,” said the soldier.

“A letter from Massa Tom,” shouted the negro, dancing into the sitting-room.

Captain Brandon thanked the soldier, and told Mark Antony to mix a toddy for him.

It was gratifying to know that Tom was safe, but sad the information that Lieutenant Walden was numbered among the killed.

The fair brow of Ruth Newville through the summer months had been growing whiter day by day.

“I fear she is not well,” said Mr. Newville.

“The battle, the burning of Charlestown,-­the terrible spectacle was too much for her nerves,” Mrs. Newville replied.

“Ought we not to call in the doctor?”

“No, she is not sick; you know how sympathetic she is.  Don’t you remember what she said when she saw the town in flames,-­even speaking disrespectfully of General Gage, and swooning when the king’s troops won the victory.  The burning of so many houses has unstrung her nerves.  I trust she will soon get over it.  Since the battle she has spent most of her time in her chamber and has pleaded indisposition when gentlemen, especially officers, have called.”

“Miss Ruth wants you to come up de stairs to her chamber,” said Pompey, when Berinthia called at the Newville home to show her the letter Tom had written.

“So you have heard from Tom?”

“Yes, and he says that Robert Walden was killed at the very last of the battle.”

“It is as I said.  I saw him go down and their feet trample him in the dust!”

“Was it Robert you saw?”

“Yes.  With the telescope I had seen him all through the battle, walking unharmed where the bullets were flying thickest.”

“You did not tell us you saw him.”

“No.  I did not want to alarm you.”

“And you saw him when he was killed?”

“I saw his sword flashing in the sunlight as the men in scarlet closed around him.  A half dozen were thrusting with their bayonets, and yet he kept them at bay till they shot him.”

Tears had wet her pillow, but none glistened on her eyelids now.  Through the sleepless hours she had seen the stars go down beneath the western horizon; in like manner something bright and shining had gone out of her life.  The stars would reappear; but that which had made it beautiful to live never would return.  The words “I love you” would never be spoken by a voice forever silent.

Berinthia kissed the tremulous lips.

“I see it now, Ruth, dear; you loved him.”

“Yes, I loved him.  He was so noble and true, how could I help it?  He never said he loved me, and yet I think down deep in his heart he had a place for me.  I never have confessed it before, not even to myself.  I say it to you, because I should die if I could not have some one to whom I could tell my sorrow.  Let it be our secret, ours alone.”

Through the sultry days of August the streets were silent, except the beating of drums as other regiments arrived, or as soldiers dying from wounds or disease were borne to their burial.  The distress of the people could but increase.  The provincials wounded in the battle were still held as felons in the jail.  They were dying very fast.  It was a spirited letter which the British commander received from General Washington, informing him that unless the prisoners were treated more humanely, British prisoners would be dealt with accordingly.

Many times Abraham Duncan asked permission to see the prisoners confined in the jail, that he might minister to their needs and do something for their comfort and welfare, but as often had he been refused by the gruff red-coated sergeant in charge.  Once more, after learning what General Washington had done, he asked permission, received a pass from the provost-marshal, and was admitted.  He saw the floor was covered with prostrate forms, men with sunken eyes, emaciated hands, a few with old quilts beneath them, others upon the bare planks.  There were festering wounds and cheeks hot with the flush of fever.  Some of the sufferers gazed upon him wonderingly, others heeded not his coming.  One, whose uniform was still soiled with the dust of the battlefield, lay with closed eyes, minding not his presence.

“His wound has about healed, but he is going with fever.  He was fine-looking when brought here the day after the battle, but he is about done for.  After to-morrow we shall have one less to exchange with Mr. Washington,” said the sergeant.

Abraham stooped and parted the matted beard from the fevered lips, and laid back the tangled hair from the brow.  The eyes wearily opened, gazed languidly, then wonderingly.

“Do you know me?”

The words were faintly spoken.

“Know you!  What, Robert Walden!”

There was not strength in the arm sufficient to lift the weary hand.  Abraham grasped it, looked one moment at the closing eyes, and hastened from the room.  Breathless with running, he reached the Brandon home, telling the story.

“We must have him brought here instantly; he must not die there,” said Mr. Brandon, who accompanied Abraham to the jail, only to find that the sergeant in charge could not permit the removal.  Sadly they returned.

“I must tell Ruth about it,” said Berinthia, putting on her bonnet and hastening from the house.

Ruth was sitting in her chamber.  A strange, yet sweet peace had come into her soul.  The heart that had struggled so sorely was at rest.  She was repeating to herself the words spoken by the world’s best friend, “My peace I leave you; not as the world giveth, give I unto you.”

The summer birds were no longer singing; the swallows had gone.  The melocotoons were no longer upon the trees, neither the early pears and ripening apples; the soldiers had plucked them.  Her father’s face was growing grave; her mother’s step less elastic.  There was sorrow and desolation around her, and yet she was happy.  She saw Berinthia walking up the path.

“Come right up,” the cheerful invitation from the chamber window.

“Oh, Ruth, I’ve something to tell you.  He’s alive!”

“Who?”

“Robert-­a prisoner in the jail.”

She told the story; he was still breathing, but dying.  Her father had been to get him, but no prisoner could be removed without an order from General Gage.

“We will go to the Province House,” said Ruth quietly, rising and putting on her bonnet.

Her calmness, the manifest quiet, the business-like procedure of Ruth, amazed Berinthia.  They hastened to the governor’s home.  General Gage received them courteously.  He was pleased to welcome Miss Newville to the Province House, and recalled with pleasure the evening when he had the honor to escort her to her father’s hospitable table.

“I have a favor to ask,” said Ruth, “which I am sure your excellency will be pleased to grant.  One of your prisoners, Lieutenant Robert Walden, in the jail, is a cousin of my friend Miss Brandon.  I learn that he is far gone with fever and seemingly has not many hours to live, and I have come to ask if you will kindly permit his removal to her home?”

“Most certainly, my dear Miss Newville; it gives me pleasure to do this little office for you and your friend,” he replied.

General Gage touched a bell and a sergeant entered the apartment.

“Sergeant, take two men of the guard, with a bier, and accompany these ladies to the jail to remove one of the sick prisoners, as they shall direct.  See to it that the man is gently handled.  Here is the order of delivery for the officer in charge.”

“You are very kind, General, and I thank you not only for Miss Brandon, but for myself,” said Ruth.

Never before had the people living along Hanover Street seen such a spectacle as that a few minutes later,-­a sergeant in advance, two soldiers bearing a rebel officer, worn and wasted by disease, his life ebbing away, and two ladies looking anxiously to see if the flickering life would last a little longer.

In Tom’s chamber the soiled uniform was removed, the matted hair laid back, the parched lips moistened, the unconscious invalid clothed in linen white and clean.  A doctor came, bowed his ear to Robert’s breast to catch the beating of the heart, and moistened the parched lips.

“Fever has burned him up.  The tide is nearly out.  It is only a question of a few hours,” he said.

Through the night, Ruth, sitting by his bedside, in the calm and stillness, heard the clock strike the passing hours.  At times she heard, through the open windows, the faint ripple of the surf rolling in from the restless sea.  Soon for him the waves of life would break upon a shoreless ocean.  It was her hand that fanned him; that wiped the death-damp from his forehead; dropped the refreshing cordial on his tongue; held the mirror to his nostrils to ascertain if still, perchance, he breathed.  The tides of the ocean had reached their farthest ebb and were setting towards the flood once more, bringing sweet and refreshing odors from the ever-heaving sea.  The night winds were drying the dampness from the marble brow.  Day was dawning, its amber light flowing along the horizon.  The fluttering heart was beating more strongly; more deep the breathing.

“Oh, ’Rinthia!  He isn’t going; he’s coming back.  God has heard my prayer,” said Ruth.

The sun was rising, and its rays streaming into the chamber.  The closed eyes slowly opened and gazed wonderingly.  Where was he?  What the meaning of this flood of light?  No longer straggling beams through iron-grated windows, no longer the bare floor and earth-polluted garments, but linen white and clean.  Was it an angel bending over him,-­whose eyes of love and infinite tenderness looked into his own?  Was it one of the seraphim that pressed her lips to his, that dropped tears upon his cheeks?  Were there tears in Heaven?  Surely this must be Paradise!  The eyes closed, the vision faded, but the angel still was fanning the fevered cheeks.

As shone the face of Moses, the lawgiver of Israel, when he descended from the Mount of God, so the countenance of Ruth Newville was illuminated by a divine radiance when once more she entered her home.  During the night she had been transfigured.

“What has happened, daughter?” her father asked.

“Where have you been? what is it?” the exclamation of the mother, gazing with wonder and amazement upon the face of her child.

“Sit down, please, and I will tell you.  I must go back to the beginning.  Do you remember a day, six years ago, one September afternoon, when I came into the house greatly agitated? and when you asked, as you have now, what had happened, I would not make reply?”

“Yes, Ruth, and you have been a mystery to me ever since that afternoon,” said Mrs. Newville.

“I would not tell you then that I had been insulted by ruffian soldiers, that a stranger had rescued me from their clutches, for I knew it would trouble you.  Who the gentleman was I did not know.  I only saw he was noble and manly.  I thanked him and hastened away.  Right after that we had our last garden party, to which ’Rinthia brought her cousin, Mr. Walden, when I discovered it was he who rescued me.”

“Mr. Walden!” Mrs. Newville exclaimed.

“A noble young man!  I always liked his appearance,” said Mr. Newville.

“Why didn’t you tell us about it, Ruth, so we could have shown him some attention?” Mrs. Newville asked.

“It is not too late to do it now, mother.”

She told the story, that he was a lieutenant, a prisoner, wounded, hovering between life and death; how she had brought about his removal from the jail to the Brandon home, watched over him during the night, wondering if the next moment would not be the last; that just before sunrise the tide had turned and he was going to live.

“You saving him!  Wonderful!” Mrs. Newville exclaimed.

“It is just like you, daughter,” said the father, clasping his arms around her and kissing her lips.

“I will go and help care for him, even if he is a rebel,” said Mrs. Newville.

“Ruth, daughter,” said the father, when they were alone, “did you keep that to yourself because you thought it would trouble us to hear that the soldiers of King George were vile ruffians?”

“Yes, father; I knew your loyalty to the king, and I would not disturb it.  I did not want to pain you.  And do you wonder I have hated the sight of a redcoat ever since?  But, father dear, it was not the assault of the villains that led me to sympathize with the provincials, as you know I have done, but the conviction that they were in the right and the king and his ministers in the wrong.  I can understand why you and mother do not see the conflict as I see it.  Your high sense of honor, your oath of allegiance to the king, your position as an official, have made you loyal and true to King George, and you cannot see the side espoused by the people.  This attempt of the ministry and king to subdue them by force of arms, by burning their houses, by treating them as felons, as they have Robert Walden, thrusting them into jail, allowing them to die uncared for, will fail; justice and right are on their side.  I know it pains you, father dear, to have me say this, but I could not, even for the sake of pleasing you, be false to myself.”

“I would not have you be false to yourself, my child, but always true to your convictions, no matter what may happen.”  He drew her to him and tenderly caressed her.

“I see it now, daughter.  For a long while I have not been able to comprehend you, but it is plain at last.”

They sat in silence, her head pillowed on his breast, his arm around her.

“Ruth, daughter, I suspect you have not told me all; you need not unfold anything you may choose to keep to yourself, but I can understand that a very tender feeling may have sprung up between Mr. Walden and yourself.”

“He never has said that he loved me.  You would not have me ask him if he does, would you, father dear?” she said playfully, patting his lips with her fingers.

“I understand, daughter.  Things of the heart are sacred and not to be talked about,” he replied, kissing her once more and feeling as never before the greatness and richness of the treasure he had in her.

“Ah!  I see,” he said to himself as he paced the room.  “It is all clear, now, why Lord Upperton and the rest of them have had no chance.”