The Life of the Moselle. Octavius Rooke
And he was drawn; his friends begged him to let them purchase a substitute—he, with his ambition and his love for them combined, would not allow that they should thus impoverish themselves; but, being strongly urged, he turned to where Adèle silently was grieving, and left the choice to her.
Poor Adèle, knowing well his secret heart, and fearing that he would only fret and chafe at home—perhaps, too, being herself a little tainted with his love for glory—wept, but said, “Go, then, dear Gustave; never shall a French girl counsel her lover to desert his country.”
So, while many a tear and secret prayer are poured out for his welfare, Gustave goes.
The land rings with martial preparations; on all sides is the excitement of the coming war: the eagles and the banners are raised high; and all the air is filled with the grand anthem, “Partant pour la Syrie.”
Part II.
Gustave wrote often: first he was learning his drill, then he had finished his initiation and was in favour with his superiors, often being able to assist with his clear head and ready pen.
Soon after these, a letter came to say the regiment was to hasten to Marseilles, there to embark for Eastern service.
A long silence, and a battle had been fought upon the plains of Alma: his name was not in the lists of killed and wounded—those fearful lists that break the hearts of many; it is not those fighting, but those left behind we ought to pity.
Then came a day of joy: Gustave had performed one of those daring feats of which the Russian war gave so many instances—he had been promoted; and Adèle’s eyes sparkled, and her bosom heaved, as friends came flocking in offering their congratulations.
The long winter was rolling on; still the enemy, with desperate courage, defended the beleaguered city; and men died fast of fatigue, and cold, and want, both within and without the walls.
Gustave was strong and healthy, never sick or suffering; but, alas! a day came when, after a night sortie gallantly repelled by the French, who followed the enemy nearly into the very town, it was found that he had not returned; and his men reported that he had fallen mortally wounded close to the city walls: they had endeavoured to bring him off, but the task was too difficult, and he was left to breathe his last where he had fallen.
The Colonel himself wrote to his friends, and a decoration was forwarded; but did those words of praise, did that cold cross, repay Adèle for her lost lover? Often, when no eye but that of God was on her, she sat with these treasures in her lap, but from her eyes the tears would flow, and the cross and words were dimly seen through the descending drops—no, Adèle was not consoled, though he had died for France; hollow were to her the words, “Mourir pour la Patrie.”
Part III.
Peace was with the earth again; the dear-bought peace, that found parents and children, wives and sisters, mourning for those the war had snatched from their embrace.
Around the walls of Toul the harvest had been gathered; the last few sheaves were loaded on the carts as the declining sun sank down; the horses or oxen, gaily decked, moved slowly towards the city; round the waggons the children danced, and thus the maidens sang as in the olden time:—
THE HARVEST SONG.
Our labour all is done;
We’ve finished with the sun,
Who now, in the far west
Low sinking, goes to rest.
The golden grain is stored;
The Great God be adored,
Who sent the sun and rain
To swell the golden grain.
The stalwart oxen strong
Drag the great wain along;
The last ray from the sun
Shines on our work now done.
Twine, then, the garlands gay;
Let, then, the music play;
And gaily dance till morn,
And fill the flowing horn:
For now the grain is stored,
The Great God be adored,
Who sent the sun and rain
To swell the golden grain.
Adèle entered not into their joy, her heart was like her lover—dead. As they go with the last waggon towards home suddenly a shout is heard—a crowd comes on—she hears her name called—many voices seem to say “Gustave!”—the crowd gives way.
Well-known eyes are looking into hers as she awakes to consciousness—his arm is round her, and his heart is beating against hers.
Alive, though grievously wounded, he had been taken care of by a noble foe; and at the termination of the war, released, he had come back; one empty sleeve was pinned against his breast, but there she placed the cross—he smiled fondly on her, but looking at it sighed, thinking perchance glory may be bought too dear.
And now by the Moselle’s banks Adèle nurses her invalid husband, and peace for the moment reigns in France. But, alas and alas! many another Adèle will mourn many another Gustave, before mankind have learnt to fulfil the wish contained in Jeanette’s song, and be content to
“Let those that make the quarrel be
The only ones to fight.”
Reaping.
Toul contains little to detain us except its fine cathedral; it is “dullest of the dull,” no movement in its streets; a railroad hurries past her gates, but few of the passengers enter them; her history alone is interesting: built before history for this portion of the globe began, she was, when visited by the Roman eagles, the capital of the warlike Leuci.
Erected at a very early period into a bishopric, its Bishops were its rulers; nominally subject to these Bishops and the Counts of Toul, the burghers seem actually to have enjoyed all the rights of a free city, and eventually the town was reckoned one of the free Imperial cities.
In a quarrel which arose between these burghers and their bishop, Gilles de Sorcy, in the thirteenth century, three arbiters were named to settle the dispute. It appeared, that formerly the townspeople had been obliged to find food for the Bishop’s table during the month of April; this custom had fallen into disuse, but now Gilles claimed arrears and its continuance: the burghers, in their turn, claimed certain gifts from the Bishop on his entrance into the city.
It was agreed that the town should pay to the Bishop sixteen pounds, money of Toul, each year; and he, on his part, was to distribute, on his solemn entry into the city, forty measures of wine, eight hundred pounds of bread, and an ox boiled (?) whole, with parsnips.
By this award it would appear that neither party had the upper hand, but that the power was nearly equally divided.
At the death of Gilles dissensions broke out, and in A.D. 1300 the people placed themselves under the protection of the King of France. Disputes now arose between the French monarchs and the German emperors, as Toul was an Imperial free city; but the French were the more active, and the city was considered under their protection.
Occasionally the citizens had to be recalled to a sense of their allegiance by burning their suburbs or occupying their town. Finally, in the sixteenth century, Toul was formally ceded to France, and in A.D. 1700 Louis XIV. pulled down the old walls, and erected the fortifications within which the town now stagnates.
The great canal connecting the Rhine and Marne runs parallel with the Moselle to