قراءة كتاب Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, No. 681 January 13, 1877
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Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, No. 681 January 13, 1877
strength was given me to act according to my perception. So long as my mother was spared to me, she must be my care, and Philip must remain unfettered. That was my decision; and they could not turn me from it by any amount of persuasion. The following day Philip set forth alone, and I remained with my mother. But if, in his disappointment, he was a little hard with me at the time, his first letter shewed that he blamed me no longer.
I know now it never occurred to him that my mother's income might die with her. He had been content to take a penniless bride; and if he gave a thought to my mother's money, it was only to rejoice that she had enough until he could more amply provide for her. Pride, self-reliance, or perhaps a little of both, prevented my telling him at the last.
She lived nearly eight years after his departure. Philip, with whom I had corresponded all that time, was beginning to write hopefully of being able to return within a twelvemonth, and I tried to struggle on unaided. What I should have done had things come to the worst, I know not. There was Edward Dallas; but he was a hard man, who had taken a great deal more kindly to the delay than he had to our marriage, and I did not choose that he should know his brother's future wife required his charity. And there were the Haddons of Haddon, I told myself, with a forlorn attempt at the old jest.
Meantime, Philip's letters arrived regularly, full of life, and love, and hope. He had succeeded beyond his expectations. The estate had rapidly increased in value under his management. Before he had been there a year, he was able to dictate terms to his brother, and had since acted as managing partner, with everything in his own hands. Before she died, my dear mother had the happiness of believing that Philip and I would soon be united and living in affluence. It was her greatest comfort to know that I never regretted my decision, and that Philip had come in time to say that he loved and trusted me all the more for having kept to it.
As years passed on, there had been observable in Philip's letters just the growth of mind which might have been expected in the man I had known at twenty-one. I on my side did my best to make my mental growth worthy of his. But of late, when I looked at the portrait in my locket of the fair, frank, almost boyish face of my lover, I was conscious of a certain uneasiness slowly but surely taking root in my heart, though I told myself that of course he could not look like that now. Did he also remember the years that had passed, when he looked at the portrait he had of me? Did he reflect that a woman of nine-and-twenty could no longer look like a girl? But these reflections disturbed me only occasionally, and were soon put aside as unworthy of the woman he loved. He loved me, so what mattered my age?
FAMOUS BRITISH REGIMENTS.
THE BRIGADE OF FOOT GUARDS.
This famous band of British soldiers has always played an important part in the annals of this country, and its services afford an example of what our army has been in the past, and what England hopes it will be in the future. The brigade consists of the Grenadier, Coldstream, and Fusilier Corps; the first having three battalions, and the others two each. Each regiment is distinct in itself, and is possessed of its own traditionary records, although the brigade has likewise traditions common to the trio which extend over a period of more than two hundred years; for these splendid corps have ever been inseparable, though each is in possession of an orderly-room of its own at the Horse Guards, where its affairs are conducted, and where are kept, amongst many interesting souvenirs, its records and State colour or flag. The latter is an elaborate standard, used only on special state occasions, such as the coronation, mounting guard on the sovereign's birthday, &c.; and is of crimson silk, richly embroidered with gold, and edged with gold fringe, and bearing in the centre of its silken folds the names of the battles in which the regiment to which it belongs has been engaged.
The oldest of the three regiments is the Coldstream, which, when the brigade is paraded, takes up its position as such on the left of the line; the Grenadier regiment comes next in point of seniority, and occupies the right; while the Fusilier—the youngest regiment—forms up in the centre. This formation may appear mysterious to non-military readers, as, according to popular notions, the oldest regiment always occupies the right of the line; but this is not so, for the true reason is, that the Grenadiers occupy the right because of the particular service which their title signifies, the grenadier company of every regiment being the first company.
The proper designation of the three corps is as follows: 1. The Grenadier or First Regiment of Foot Guards. 2. The Coldstream Guards. 3. The Scots Fusilier or Third Regiment of Foot Guards. This is the order in which they stand when on the right of the army, and it will be seen that although there is a first and third regiment of Foot Guards, there is, nominally, no second, the Coldstreams never being officially designated by any number. The reason for this will presently appear; and in the meantime we will take the regiments in regular order, and narrate, as briefly as possible, the history of each, together with some deeds of daring performed by individual members of them, and the collective achievements of the brigade.
The Grenadier Guards, as just mentioned, takes the right of the British army when in line. It is looked upon as the premier corps of our infantry, and was raised under the following circumstances. In the year 1655, Cromwell having allied himself with Louis XIV., Charles (II.) quitted the French coast and joined the Spaniards in the Netherlands against the king of France. The loyal English who shared the prince's exile were enrolled in 1657, and formed into six regiments. The first of these was called the 'Royal Regiment of Guards.' There after a time it became disbanded, through the inability of the exiled prince to maintain it intact; and its members were compelled to wander about the continent, many of them being reduced so low as to beg for their daily subsistence.
On the Restoration of Charles II. the regiment was again assembled, and returned to its native land, where, under circumstances which will be narrated in connection with the Coldstreams, it became the First Regiment of Foot Guards.
At Waterloo, this regiment particularly distinguished itself by totally defeating the Grenadiers of the French Imperial Guards, and thus won a chaplet which will for ever be associated with its name, for after the battle the Prince Regent conferred upon it the title of 'Grenadier Guards' in honour of the event. Every Briton must remember with pride the glorious charge of the Guards on that occasion, when, lying down (to avoid the galling fire of the French artillery) until their opponents were within a few yards of the supposed breach in the British line, they sprang up at the magic and heart-thrilling words of 'Up, Guards, and at them!'—ascribed to the Duke of Wellington; and after pouring a tremendous volley into the devoted ranks of Ney's followers, rushed madly forward to a splendid and complete victory.
The Duke of Cambridge is the present colonel of the regiment, and its colours bear the words Lincelles, Corunna (at which battle it was the only regiment of the Guards present), Barrosa, Peninsula, Waterloo, Alma, Inkerman, and Sevastopol. The badge of the regiment is a grenade, which is likewise borne on the colours, together with the royal cipher within the garter, and the words, 'Honi soit qui mal y pense.'
The Coldstream Guards was raised in the year 1650; but it was in 1660 that it marched from the little town of Coldstream (from whence it derives its