LITTLE BALL O' FIRE

CHAPTER I.

 

My father was a gentleman of small estate in Lincolnshire, whose family possessions, under a race of generous ancestors, had dwindled from splendid lordships to bare competence. His blood, which was derived from as noble a source as that of any in the land, had come down to him pure through a number of knights and nobles, who, though they were little scrupulous as to the means of spending their riches, were very careful not to augment them by cultivating any but the somewhat barren field of war. He made a love match with a daughter of the second Lord Wilmerton; and, in order that his wife might not draw unpleasant comparisons between the station of her husband and that of her father, he frequented the court, and lived beyond his means. He was already in difficulties when I was born; but, like a brave man, he resolved to meet them boldly, and, after some solicitation, obtained a small military appointment, which increased his revenue without adding to his expenses. Loyalty with him was a passion, which, like love in other men, prevented him from seeing any faults in its object; and, of course, as the court well knew that no benefits could make him more loyal than he already was, it showered its favours upon persons whose affection was to be gained, leaving him to struggle on without further notice.

My mother I hardly remember, though my memory is very good; but as her death took place before I was three years of age, her cares of my infancy were never extended even to my boyhood.

Left thus to conduct my education alone, my father, I firmly believe, would have suffered nothing to remain undone which could have contributed to render me a learned man, had not the civil war broken out, and all the royalists hastened to the support of the King. Amongst the first of the volunteers who flocked to the royal standard, when it was raised at Nottingham, was Captain Hall; and having been sent to Worcester with Prince Rupert, he showed himself the foremost in those acts of daring courage which turned the contest between Colonel Sandys and the Prince in favour of the Cavaliers. In every skirmish and in every battle which took place throughout the course of the great rebellion my father had his share. The natural desire of stimulus and excitement, which was originally strong in his character, grew gradually into a habit, and from a habit became a passion. The tidings of an approaching conflict would, at any time, have induced him to ride as far and fast as other men would go for more pacific pastimes; and the commanders of the royal armies perceived a want in their ranks when, on looking along the line, they could not discover the face of Captain John Hall.

During the first year of the civil war I was left at home, under the charge of my nurse, and of the events of that period I, of course, remember but little. But shortly after the taking of Birmingham, by Prince Rupert, a party of Gettes's brigade were quartered at our house for three days, swept the whole estate of everything that it produced, carried off all that could tempt their rapacity, and, on their departure, set fire to the house, as that of a notorious malignant.

My father's home had by this time become the tented field. Houseless and nearly penniless, the nurse carried me away in search of my only surviving parent, whose regiment was quartered at a few miles distance; and being a woman who loved quiet, and hated to see houses burned over head, she resigned her charge of me as soon as she had conscientiously placed me in the hands of my natural protector. But the addition of a child of four years old to his camp equipage was not by any means desirable in my father's eyes; and for some time he talked of placing me with a relation here, or a friend there, where I might remain in security. Two or three months, however, fled without this plan being executed. We had often during that time to change our quarters; passed through more than one adventure; were involved in more than one severe struggle, and encountered as many hardships as a longer campaign could have inflicted. My father found that I bore up stoutly against them all, that I was not so great an encumbrance, in moments of danger and haste, as he had expected; and that in those lapses of inaction which will break in upon a soldier's life, I afforded him amusement and occupation of the tenderest and most engaging kind. Thus I soon became necessary to his comfort and his happiness; and, though he would often talk still, of having me placed in some situation where I could be properly instructed in arts and sciences, and learned lore, it became evident to every one who saw us together that he would never part with me so long as he could keep me with him. To make up for the want of other knowledge, however, he himself began, from my very earliest years, to teach me everything that might render me successful in that way of life which he himself had so ardently embraced. My hands, almost in infancy, were accustomed to the sword, the dag, and the petronel; and I remember, ere I was six years old, being permitted, as a high favour, to apply the match to the touchhole of a culverin that commanded a road by which the Roundheads were advancing.

Many, too, were the dangers through which I passed in safety. Often in times of surprise and confusion have I sat upon the peak of my father's saddle, while he cut his way through the enemy; and often have I stood as a mere child amidst the charging squadrons and the bristling pikes of a general field of battle. Strife and bloodshed became so familiar to my mind, that I could hardly conceive another state of things; and when any occasional pause took place in the dreadful struggle that then desolated our native land, I used to wonder at the space of time such idleness was suffered to continue, and to long for the moment of activity and exertion. It was with joy and satisfaction that my father beheld this disposition in his son, and he strove by every means in his power to promote its growth, and to direct the efforts that it prompted. He taught me to be quick and decisive, as well as bold and fearless: he bade me always think, in the first place, what was best to be done, and how it might best be executed; and then to perform what my reason had suggested without either fear or hesitation. Always keeping his view fixed upon the ultimate advantage of the cause he had espoused, he zealously instructed me to remark and remember every part of the country through which we passed in our wandering life, and the person of every one who was brought into temporary connexion with us in the changing fortunes of those adventurous times.

Besides teaching me to ride and to shoot, and to perform all other military exercises, he did not fail to give me what little education, of a milder kind, circumstances permitted, during the short lapses of tranquillity which occasionally intervened. He was himself, however, obliged to be my preceptor; for he was not only prevented from engaging any other person in that capacity, by our continual changes from place to place, but he was also rendered unable to do so by his pecuniary circumstances, which had by this time been reduced to the lowest ebb. Our own property had been sequestrated: the King had no money to bestow; and, although Captain Hall sometimes enjoyed a moment of temporary prosperity, after squeezing some rich parliamentarian, or capturing some inimical town, his whole property more usually consisted in his horse, his sword, and his son. I acquired, it is true, in a desultory manner, some knowledge of history, geography, and arithmetic; but this, together with a smattering of Latin, and the capability of writing and reading, was all that I could boast of by the time I was ten years old.

Our moments of quiet, indeed, were always of very short duration; and, during all my early remembrances, I scarcely can recollect having passed six weeks without seeing blood flow in civil strife.

It must not be thought, however, that our state was melancholy or painful. To those who thought as little of human life as the persons did by whom I was generally surrounded, this kind of existence was gay and happy enough. When they saw a comrade sent to his long home, or a friend fall dead by their side, a minute's mourning, and a vow to revenge him, was all that the sight excited; and many a cheerful bowl, and a gay jest, would circulate in the evening amongst the Cavaliers who had lost, in the morning, the dearest acquaintances and oldest companions.

Habit is a wonderful thing; and it would be difficult to make other people comprehend how little emotion bloodshed or massacre produces in the minds of men accustomed to be daily spectators of such scenes. It is not at all surprising then, that a boy--born, as it were, and brought up in the midst of them--should feel their awful nature less than others, and should enter with more pleasure into the adventurous excitement which they certainly afford. Such, at all events, was the case with myself; and although I have learned, from after events, to believe that my heart was neither naturally hard nor cruel, yet it is scarcely possible to describe the joy and enthusiasm I experienced on the approach of strife or battle, the triumph that I felt at the overthrow or death of any remarkable foe, or the careless disregard with which I viewed the slaughter of my countrymen, and the fall even of those I personally knew. This military zeal was known and remarked by all my father's comrades; and the amusement and gratification which they derived from my early passion for that course of life, to which they had given themselves up at a more mature age, caused me to be a general favourite with every old soldier in the ranks of the royalists; so that each one vied with the other in exciting me more and more upon the very track which I was already too eager to pursue. Amongst the Cavaliers I was generally known by the name of "Little Ball-o'-Fire;" and I soon learned to be proud of that appellation, and vexed when I was addressed by any other. In times of prosperity I was loaded with presents and caresses; and in moments of defeat and danger there was still some one to think of and protect Little Ball-o'-Fire, the soldier's son. Nor were these good deeds entirely without requital on my part; for, shrewd, active, and fearless, I was often enabled to assist the defeated or pursued Cavalier, to mislead the Parliamentarian by false information, or to gain intelligence of the enemy's movements, and to guide my friends either to security or victory.

Amongst all the comrades and connexions of my father, Goring, afterwards Lord Norwich, was the foremost in his affections; and with him also I was an infinite favourite, although there were several others to whom I was personally more attached. I remember, however, many instances of great favour received from him; and, as difficulties multiplied round the royal cause, and as dangers threatened more and more imminently the head of our sovereign, it was to the exertions and friendship of Lord Goring that we were, more than once, indebted for our existence. With him we served in many a campaign in Kent and Sussex: with him have I aided my father to empty many a flagon when the fight was over; and with him have we lain in concealment for weeks together, when our paths were surrounded by enemies against whom our force was too weak to contend.

At length, when I was little more than ten years old, and a momentary gleam of success brightened the cause of the Cavaliers, my father and Lord Goring unfortunately separated; and with a small but well-appointed troop we hastened across the country with the intention of joining the royal army, which was then marching towards Cornwall. At Bolton-le-Moors, however, while we were marching gaily along, without the slightest idea that there was an enemy in our neighbourhood, we were suddenly surprised by a party of the parliamentarian forces; and, after a rapid but desperate struggle, every man of my father's troop was put to death. He himself fell amongst the last, brought from his horse to the ground by a ball through the neck. I was at the distance of about fifty yards from him, and hastened up to give him aid; but just as I was running forward, I saw one of the pikemen stoop over him, and, while my father held up his hand, in the vain endeavour to ward off the blow, the man drove his weapon through him, and pinned him to the ground. I had a large horse-pistol in my hand, which was instantly directed to the pikeman's head; and, had I but had time to discharge it, he would, most assuredly, have lain beside the gallant officer he had just killed. But, at that moment, one of his comrades struck me across the head, with the staff of his pike, crying, "So much for thee, young viper!" and brought me, stunned and powerless, to the ground.

Fortunate it was for me that the blow, without being sufficiently violent to bereave me of life, had been severe enough to deprive me of all sense or motion, for I was thus passed over as dead, and I found afterwards that no one had been taken to mercy by the victors. It was evening when we began a fight, which, in duration, did not last ten minutes; but when I woke from the sort of sleep into which I had fallen, I found the moon shining bright upon the moors, with my father and five-and-twenty gallant soldiers lying dead around me. In truth, this was the first event that ever made me think of death, even for a moment, as of a thing to be feared, or regard strife as the great destroyer of all dear affections and kindred ties. The sight was horrible enough, to see the bodies of such a number of brave and noble-hearted men now cold, inanimate, and most of them stripped of every thing valuable, lying dead in the pale moonlight, with their faces bearing all the various expressions which the human countenance can assume under different modes of violent death; but it was the sight of my father's corpse which brought it home to my own heart.

When I had recovered my senses completely--which was not for several minutes after consciousness began to return--crept onward to the spot where my father had fallen, which was not above ten paces from that on which I had been lying; and as I gazed on his still, silent face, and thought of all the affection towards myself which I had seen it bear so often, I could not help feeling that death is indeed a horrible thing. I looked at it long, till the moon began to go down, and I knew not well what to do. I had no means of burying the body, and yet there was a feeling in my bosom, not to be defined, which would not let me leave the corpse of my father uninterred for the ravens to make it their prey, or the dogs to mangle it.

Near the spot, however, there was a little copse, with some tall trees rising out of the brushwood; and, after many a painful thought, thither I retreated for shelter. As I knew not who might visit the field from the town, and as I had heard that the people of the neighbourhood were rank Roundheads, I thought it best to climb one of the oaks; and there I watched till the dawn of morning. Hardly was the sky grey with the first light when I saw six or seven people coming over the Downs with spades and shovels, and I soon found that their purpose was to bury the dead. By them that office was performed decently enough on the spot itself; and in about three or four hours it was all over, leaving no trace of the skirmish, but the turf beaten up by the horses' feet, and here and there died with gore, and the long low mound of fresh earth which covered the trench containing the dead bodies. I found, by the conversation of the men employed, that this act of charity had been performed by order of some persons in the little town who had witnessed the affair; and who, partly moved by a sense of decency, and partly with a view to salubrity, had caused the corpses to be thus covered over with earth.

I was now, like many another, alone in all the earth; without friends, or home, or resource; without money, or protection, or expectation; but perhaps I was better fitted for such circumstances than any one who was ever yet cast an orphan upon the world. I was accustomed to rely upon myself alone; to take every event as I found it; and I had been so long in the habit of seeing the sunshine and the shade, the defeat and the triumph, the disaster and the success, succeed each other like April clouds and beams, that though my heart was full of mourning for my father, yet I confidently anticipated that the next cast of the die in fortune's hand would reverse my fate, and bring me back to prosperity again.

I was mistaken, however. A long series of sufferings ensued; and they were sufferings of a nature that I had never encountered before. I had often, indeed, undergone privation, and known poverty. I had often been more than one day without tasting food, and had slept for many a night together on the bare ground; but all these inconveniences were part of the soldier's fate, matters which, however unpleasant at the time, were laughed at and forgotten as soon as they were over. Now, however, I had to endure poverty without one alleviating circumstance, or one consoling reflection.

All that I had on earth, at the moment my father was slain, consisted of two crown pieces, which had been given me by Lord Goring when we parted; but when I came to seek for them, after recovering my senses, I found that they had not escaped the researches of the plunderers who had stripped the dead around me. My clothes, indeed, probably being of little value either in point of size or quality, had been left me; and these, with a pistol and a dagger, which I found upon the ground, constituted my whole property, when at length I left the earth that contained the body of my unfortunate parent, and went forth again into the world.

It would be difficult to give any detailed account of the life I now led. I wandered over almost every part of England, seeking a precarious subsistence by every means that my habits and education permitted. Often I fell in with old comrades of my father; and then I was sure of protection and assistance as long as they had the means of affording it. Often I joined myself to a troop of Cavaliers, and for a few days lived the life to which I had been accustomed in former years. But the power of the Parliament was daily increasing, that of the King daily going down; and, one by one, every force to which I joined myself was dispersed, and I was again obliged to seek my way alone. I never, however, yielded for one moment to despair; and at times,--when I have shared in the stores provided by nature for the birds in the air, when my sole food has been haws and whortle-berries, roots and acorns,--I have hummed to myself

"There's a better time coming!"

and gone on with a light heart to seek a richer meal for the next day.

Although to plunder or to kill a Roundhead in any way that chance happened to present, was, in my mind, at that time, neither sin nor shame, yet I cannot remember ever having done what I should even now consider an evil act on my own account. Nevertheless, I must acknowledge, that, when a wounded or a fugitive companion wanted food or other necessaries, and could not obtain them for himself, I have often ventured beyond any code of morality that I know of, and have gone down to spoil the Philistines with indescribable glee.

Well known to every leader in the royal cause, and almost to every soldier, I was often employed as a guide, and still more frequently as a messenger. In the latter capacity, indeed, I was generally successful, even where others would probably have failed; and when Langdale rose in Wales he intrusted his design to me, for the purpose of having it clearly communicated to Musgrave in the north, and to the Cavaliers in Kent. I received no written document, indeed, although my youth and my knowledge of the country enabled me, in general, to pass unmolested: but Langdale knew that he could trust to my never-failing memory to repeat every word as he had spoken it; and was also aware that the other royalists would trust to my report.

This commission I executed with ease and safety, as far as my journey to the north went; but in making my way towards Kent, I encountered more difficulties and some dangers. The small stock of money with which I had been furnished failed me before the object was accomplished; and at Reading I was recognised by a Puritan whom I had once, about six months before, tripped up into a river, while I ran off with a fat baked pig, which he was carrying out of the town from the baker's oven. Of the pig my share had been small, having performed the feat in favour of three old comrades who were lying concealed in the neighbouring fields, and were half dying of hunger: but, in the present case, the Roundhead made no nice distinctions; and as soon as he set eyes upon me, caught me by the throat, conveyed me to the town prison, notwithstanding my most vigorous resistance, and left me in the hands of a gaoler, whose tokens of affection remained upon my skin for several weeks afterwards. Not at all admiring my fare or treatment in the prison, and having also acquired a strong distaste to remaining long in any one place, the very first opportunity afforded by open doors I made my escape,--not unpursued, it is true; but that mattered little; for at that time it was only necessary to give me the free use of my limbs, and a start of ten paces, and the man would have been swift and strong indeed that could have overtaken me.

Several other adventures also befel me: but at length I made my way into Kent; and here, to my unspeakable joy, I found myself amongst a royalist population, and saw in every part of the county preparations for a great effort in favour of the King. I heard, in every quarter, too, that Lord Goring was to take the command of the forces; and, sure of receiving protection and assistance, I made my way forward to join him, with a feeling in my heart that a change was about to come over my fate. T was half starved by this time, and was all in rags; but many a better Cavalier than myself was in the same state, and I did not fear that my father's old friend would deny me.

Before I could reach the army, however, the royalist force had advanced towards London, and were again in retreat; and when I arrived in Maidstone, I found the Cavaliers pouring in, and learned that the enemy were following fast upon their steps. During the whole of that evening I could not find Lord Goring, (who, by the way, had, before this, become Earl of Norwich,) but I met with many an old acquaintance amongst the officers, and every kindness was shown to the son of Captain Hall. As an attack was expected early the next morning, the troops were under arms before dawn; and as the Earl was riding along the line, I ran up to the side of his horse, and spoke to him. For a moment, in the rags that now covered me, he did not recognise his friend's child, and replied, sharply, "Get along, boy! get along! I cannot speak to thee now!"

It was the first rebuff I had ever received from a Cavalier, and I thought that my heart would have broke; but I still clung to his stirrup, and said, "What, my Lord, have you forgot Little Ball-o'-Fire?" At that name he drew in his rein short, gazed upon my face for a moment, and then stooping down over his saddle bow, he caught me in his arms, and lifted me quite up to his bosom. "Forget thee! no, my boy! no!" he cried; "and now I have found thee again, thou shalt never quit me, for thy good father's sake."

There was little time given for farther conversation. The enemy had been more on the alert than we expected, and were, by this time, rapidly advancing, and the shot of their artillery began to tell upon our line. Every one has heard of the gallant defence of Maidstone: but it soon became clear that we could not maintain the position in which we were first attacked; and Lord Goring, who had laid out his plan the night before, ordered a slow and firm retreat to the ground he had fixed upon, at the back of the town. Before he left the green, however, he beckoned me up, and gave me a scrap of paper, on which he had written something hastily. "Get thee behind that house, Ball-o'-Fire," he said, "and wait there till you see a young gentleman come up with a troop of Cavaliers. Ask if he be Colonel Masterton: give him that paper, and then guide him down by the back of the town to the hollow way, by which the enemy must advance: take him to any point he can best cut his way through, and bring him to me, on the edge of yon hill."

I did as I was bid; and Lord Goring himself remained for about ten minutes longer with the Kentish horse, keeping the green firmly against the enemy, while the other regiments filed off, and took up their position on the slope beyond. At length, he too retreated; and I hid myself while the enemy passed over the same ground. Scarcely was the green clear, when up at the full gallop came a young gentleman, seemingly scarcely twenty, with as gallant a regiment of horse as ever I saw. He halted his men before "The Bush" ale-house, and then rode on a few yards to see what was passing in the hollow way and on the slope.

His countenance was a pleasant one, at least to me; with a broad open brow, and quick fine eyes; and although I saw by the manner in which he looked at some dead and wounded soldiers who were scattered here and there, that he was not so habituated to scenes of death and conflict as myself, yet I could not help thinking that he must be the Colonel Masterton to whom I was ordered to address myself. I watched him for a minute, as his keen rapid glance ran over the confused spectacle that was passing beyond the town; and as I saw him turn his horse, and ride back towards his men, I ran up and spoke to him. At first he did not distinctly hear what I said, but he bent down his head towards me with a good-humoured smile, and I again repeated the words "Colonel Masterton."

"Well, my little man," he replied, with a look of surprise, "what is it?"

I saw at once, from his tone and his look, that I was right, and I gave him the billet from Lord Norwich. He read it attentively; and then asked "Can you lead me by some bypath to the left of the enemy's line?" I answered that I could; and, without more ado, set off before him, and conducted him by the back streets to a point where a lime road led out into the country.

The moment that his eye gained a clear sight of the enemy, I observed it mark every part of their position, rest fixed on one particular spot for an instant longer than anywhere else; and I saw that God had made him a soldier. His plan was evidently formed; his orders were short, clear, and accurate; and, drawing out his regiment from the town, he charged a large body of cavalry, who, together with some pieces of artillery, lay upon the extreme left of the enemy's line, and in a moment drove them to the devil.

I ran on as hard as I could to see what was going forward, and, just as I came up, I found the Roundhead horse forced back into the lines of the pikemen; and, one of the first faces that I beheld, amongst the Parliamentarian foot, was that of the man who had killed my father. I never forget faces, and his I was not likely to forget. The fellow was pike in hand, in front of the young Cavalier; and I had just time to mark him so as not to be mistaken, when Colonel Masterton's horse passed the pike, and at one blow of the rider's sword the Roundhead went down never to rise again.

The battle was like all other battles; but by one means or another I contrived to keep near Colonel Masterton's regiment through the whole affair, till just when they were in some difficulty I offered to guide them up the lime road to Lord Goring, if one of the men would take me behind him on his horse. The young gentleman seemed surprised to find me so near him; and after another charge upon a body of London troopers we made our way forward, and reached the brow of the hill where the Commander-in-chief then stood.

The event of that day every one knows. The enemy were repulsed at all points, but it could hardly be considered as a battle won, for we were ultimately obliged to retreat. After a long, severe march, we halted for the night, and I remained quartered with Colonel Masterton and his regiment, and was treated with the greatest kindness both by officers and men. It was soon found that the army, being chiefly composed of raw and ill-disciplined troops, could not be held together; and the same night Colonel Masterton was ordered to lead his regiment towards the right of the enemy's line of advance, and, if possible, to effect a diversion, while Lord Goring, with whatever veteran troops could be collected, endeavoured to cross the country, and throw himself into Colchester. After having attacked an outpost, against which he was particularly directed, the young officer was ordered to disband a foot regiment which was joined to his cavalry force; and then--making the best of his way back to Devonshire, whence he had come--to disperse his men, and keep quiet till better times. As his family, from particular circumstances, although attached to the royal cause, had not called upon themselves the indignation of the Parliament, in near so high a degree as it had been excited against Lord Goring, that nobleman, on giving me to Colonel Masterton as a guide, made him promise that he would always protect and never abandon me; and well did he keep his word.

CHAPTERS II. III. IV. V. VI.^[1]