mr. calvert sees a short campaign under lafayette
the project which calvert had formed for joining the army he was able to put into execution within a couple of weeks. the fever which had attacked him having entirely subsided and his wound healing rapidly, he was soon well enough to feel a consuming restlessness and craving for action. the painful experience through which he had just passed, the still more painful future to which he had to look forward, aroused an irresistible longing for some immediate and violent change of scene and thought. his vague plan for joining the army was suddenly crystallized by the situation in which he found himself, and though this resolution was strongly opposed by mr. morris, who, with keen foresight, prophesied the speedy overthrow of the constitution and the downfall of lafayette with the king, he adhered to it. d'azay being safely out of the country—he had retreated to brussels and joined a small detachment of the emigrant army still there—and adrienne protected by his name, his one desire was to forget in action his misfortunes and to remove himself from the scene of them. it was this desire, rather than any enthusiasm for the cause in which he was engaged, which impelled him to offer his services to lafayette. indeed, it was with no very sanguine belief in that cause or hope of its success that he prepared to go to metz. although he believed, with mr. morris, that the only hope of france lay in the suppression of internal disorder and the union of interests which a foreign war would bring about, yet he could not regard with much horror the threatenings of the proscribed émigrés and the military preparations making by the allies to prevent the spread of the revolution into their own territories. indeed, so great was his contempt for the ministers of louis and for their mad and selfish policy that he confessed to himself, but for his desire to serve under his old commander, he would almost as soon have joined d'azay at brussels, or taken a commission with the austrians under marshal bender, who commanded in the low countries. this division of sympathies felt by calvert animated thousands of other breasts, so that whole regiments of cavalry went over to the enemy, and officers and men deserted daily. berwick, mirabeau, bussy, de la chatre, with their commands, crossed over the rhine and joined the prince de condé at worms. the highest in command were suspected of intriguing with the enemy; men distrusted their superiors, and officers could place no reliance on their men. of the widespread and profound character of this feeling of distrust mr. calvert had no adequate idea until he joined the army of the centre at metz in the middle of april. although lafayette had, since january, been endeavoring to discipline his troops, to animate them with confidence, courage, and endurance, they had defied his every effort. indeed, what wonder that an army composed of the scum of a revolutionary populace, without knowledge of arms, suspicious, violent, unused to every form of military restraint, should defy organization in three months? perhaps no sovereign ever entered upon a great conflict less prepared than did louis when he declared war against the king of hungary and bohemia—for francis was not yet crowned emperor of austria. but that unhappy monarch found himself in a situation from which the only issue was a recourse to arms. confronted on the one hand by a republican party of daily increasing power and on the other by an aristocratical one openly allied with sovereigns who were suspected of a desire to partition his dominion among themselves as poland had been, his one hope lay in warring his way out between the two.
that louis should be the advocate and leader of this war was the one inspiration of narbonne, and, had the king persevered in this, he might have saved himself and his throne. but, with his fatal vacillation, after having entered upon military preparations and committed himself to narbonne's policy, he suddenly abandoned him as he had abandoned so many of his advisers. grave replaced the dismissed and chagrined young minister, and dumouriez, the minister of foreign affairs, took into his hands all the power and glory of the war movement. he developed and supplemented the plans which narbonne had already formed, and, by the new year, a vast army was assembled and the frontier divided into three great military districts. on the left, the territory from dunkirk to philippeville was defended by the army under rochambeau, forty thousand foot and eight thousand cavalry strong; lafayette, with his army of the centre, of more than a hundred thousand men and some seven thousand horse, commanded between philippeville and weissenberg, while luckner, with his army of the rhine, stretched from weissenberg to bale. dumouriez's diplomatic negotiations were apparently nearly as successful as his military operations. though he could not dissolve that "unnatural alliance" formed the year before at pilnitz and enthusiastically adhered to by prince henri and the duke of brunswick with the young king of hungary and bohemia, yet, by the assassination of the king of sweden, that country was no longer to be feared, england remained neutral by virtue of pitt's commercial policy, and many of the petty german principalities openly approved of and aided the french revolutionists.
with military and diplomatic affairs in this state and with austria still holding out for her impossible conditions, 'twas easy for dumouriez and the war party to browbeat the wellnigh desperate king into a declaration of hostilities that was to convulse the whole of europe for nearly a quarter of a century. this was done on the 20th of april, three days after mr. calvert had joined lafayette at metz, and was almost instantly followed by orders from dumouriez to that general to advance with ten thousand men upon namur and thence upon brussels and liège.
'twas dumouriez's policy (and surely a wise one) to strike the first blow against austria through her dependency, flanders, which country, but two years before, had shown the strongest disposition to throw off austrian rule. how strong that disposition was, dumouriez himself knew fully, for he had been sent by montmorin on a secret mission into belgium, and he felt assured that the brabant patriots would rally to the standards of the french army. had that army been what he supposed, his plans might have succeeded and the humiliations and defeats of the spring campaign averted.
as has been said, calvert joined the army at metz a few days before the formal declaration of war was made, and so was there when general de lafayette received orders to advance upon namur. he was much touched by the reception which lafayette accorded him.
"i will give you a regiment, calvert, but i need you near my person. there is no one upon whom i can rely—i wish you could be my aide-de-camp again. it would be like old times once more," he said, looking at the young man with so harassed and despondent a glance that calvert was both surprised and alarmed.
"i could wish for nothing better," he replied, "but surely you do not mean what you say—you have many others upon whom you can count."
"almost no one," replied lafayette, briefly. "i distrust my officers and am myself suspected of intriguing with the enemy. i know not what day i may be forced to fly across the frontier. no one is safe, and i dare not count upon my troops to obey commands. although there are only thirty thousand austrians in flanders, i am not sure that we can beat them," he said, bitterly.
on the 27th of april, lafayette, who had moved his camp to givet, received despatches from dumouriez detailing the plan of campaign against belgium. according to this plan, lafayette, with ten thousand picked men, was to advance by forced marches upon namur. he was to be supported by two divisions of the army of the north, one of four thousand men under general dillon, which was to move from its encampment at lille upon tournay, and the other of ten thousand troops under general biron, which was to advance from valenciennes upon mons. before daybreak on the morning of the 28th lafayette had his army in motion and, as they rode out of the city gates together, calvert noted that the depression and anxiety which had weighed upon the general so heavily had disappeared and that he had regained something of his old fire and intrepidity.
this renewal of confidence was cruelly dissipated three days later when, on reaching bouvines, half-way to namur, after a fifty-league march over bad roads, lafayette was met by frightened, breathless couriers with despatches detailing the humiliating disasters which had befallen both biron's and dillon's divisions. the former, who had advanced upon quiévrain and succeeded in occupying that town, was utterly routed on arriving before mons, and fled with the loss of all his baggage. dillon met with even a more tragic and shameful fate. moving upon tournay, where a strong body of austrians was ready to receive him, his men were seized with a sudden panic and fled back to the gates of lille, where, mad with fear and crying that dillon had betrayed them, they brutally murdered him. this disastrous news being confirmed the following day by further despatches, lafayette was forced to fall back to maubeuge without striking a blow, and thus ended calvert's hopes of seeing a campaign which had promised most brilliantly. the news of these defeats creating the greatest sensation both at the front and in paris, rochambeau resigned his command, grave was replaced by servan in the ministry, and the army was reorganized.
during the entire month of may lafayette and his army remained inactive at maubeuge awaiting orders which the distracted ministers at paris were incapable of giving. 'twas a pretty little place near the belgian frontier, lying on both sides of the sambre, and which had been ceded to france by the treaty of nymwegen. mr. calvert spent much of his leisure time—of which he had more than enough—admiring and studying the fortifications of this town, which had been engineered by the great vauban. much of it he also spent with lafayette, who, in the intervals of disciplining his troops and attending to his increased military duties—rochambeau's command had been divided between himself and luckner—conversed freely with his young aide-de-camp. sometimes, too, at lafayette's urgent request, calvert would sing as he had used to do around the camp-fires in the virginia campaign. during those days and evenings of inactive and anxious waiting, the old friendship between the two was renewed. lafayette had heard of calvert's marriage through mr. morris and, with the utmost delicacy, touched upon the subject. calvert told him frankly as much of the story as he intended to reveal to anyone, and this confidence became another bond of friendship between them. the years of separation and disagreement somehow melted away. the lafayette of maubeuge was like the lafayette whom calvert had first known and admired; he noticed how much of his rabid republicanism had vanished—indeed, lafayette himself owned as much, for if he was impetuous and extreme, he was also courageous and was not afraid or ashamed to confess his faults.
"i have learned much," he said to calvert one evening when they were alone in the general's quarters, "and am beginning to have radically different opinions upon some subjects from those i entertained but a short while ago. sometimes i ask myself if my call for the states-general did not open for france a pandora's box of evils. what has become of all my efforts?" he said, pushing away a map of the austrian netherlands which they had been studying together and beginning to pace the room agitatedly. "instead of the wise ministers prevailing at paris, a horde of mad, insensate creatures are ruling the assembly, the city, the whole country! if only there were some man courageous enough to defy the jacobins and their power—to meet them on their own ground and conquer them! what can i do at this distance, overwhelmed with military duties, restricted by my official position? i have been thinking of addressing a letter to the assembly," he went on, suddenly turning to calvert, "a letter of warning against the jacobin power, of reproach that they should be ruled by that ignoble faction, or remonstrance against their unwarrantable proceedings, and as soon as i can find the time to write such a letter, i shall do so, and despatch it to paris by my secretary, let the consequences be what they may."
this design was not accomplished until the middle of june, for, at the beginning of the month, a number of skirmishes and night attacks took place between the austrians, who had encamped near maubeuge, and lafayette's troops, and the general was too much occupied with the military situation to busy himself with affairs at paris. these attacks culminated in a bloody and almost disastrous engagement for the patriot army on the 11th of june.
the austrians, reinforced by the emigrant army which had been left at brussels and in which calvert knew d'azay held a captain's commission, advanced during the early afternoon of june 11th and attacked the vanguard of lafayette's army, encamped two miles from maubeuge, farther up the sambre, and commanded by gouvion. although the french occupied a formidable position, being securely intrenched on rising ground fortified by a dozen redoubts and batteries arranged in tiers, the enemy advanced with such fierceness and intrepidity that gouvion had all he could do to keep his gunners from deserting their posts. the infantry, too, behaved ill, and when ordered to advance, wavered and were driven back at the very first charge from the austrians. their cavalry pursued the advantage thus gained and pressed forward, advancing in three lines and driving the disordered french troops before them up the hill. at this juncture, lafayette, with six thousand men and two thousand horse, arrived, having been sent for in hot haste by gouvion when the action first began, and, attacking the austrian and émigrés from the flank, after a sharp and bloody struggle, succeeded by nightfall in putting them to flight. although the forces engaged in this action were small, the slaughter was terrible and the little battle-field by the sambre presented a ghastly sight in the moonlight of that june night. gouvion himself was killed leading the last attack, and the austrian and emigrant forces suffered severely. the regiment which calvert commanded was in the thick of the engagement the whole time, once it arrived on the scene of action, and no officer of either side more exposed or distinguished himself than did the young american. indeed, it was not from reckless bravery that he offered himself a target for the bullets of the enemy, but from a feeling that he would not be sorry to end there, to close forever the book of his life. and, as usual with those who seek, rather than avoid, death in battle, from this action, which was the only one he was destined to engage in, he came out unscathed, while many another poor fellow who longed to live, lay quiet and cold on the bloody ground.
so close was the fighting during the late afternoon that calvert once thought he caught a glimpse of d'azay and, with a strange presentiment of evil, he determined to look for him among the slain. accompanied by an orderly bearing a lantern—though the moonlight was so bright that one could easily recognize the pallid, upturned faces—he began his search an hour after the firing had ceased, with many others engaged in the same ghastly work of finding dead comrades. he had looked but a short while, or so it seemed to him, when he came upon d'azay lying prone upon a little hillock of austrian slain. as calvert looked down upon him, grief for this dead friend and an awful sense of the futility of the sacrifice which had been made for him, came upon him. he knelt beside him for a few minutes and looked into the quiet, dead face. he had never before thought that d'azay resembled adrienne, but now the resemblance of brother and sister was quite marked, and 'twas with the sharpest pang calvert had ever known that he looked upon those pallid features. it might have been that other and dearer face, he thought to himself. at length he arose and, helping the orderly place the body upon a stretcher, they bore it back to the camp, where, next day, it was buried with what military honors calvert could get accorded it. he sent a lock of d'azay's hair, his seals and rings, back to paris to adrienne (he kept for his own her miniature, which he found in d'azay's pocket and which he had first seen that night at monticello), and the letter she wrote him thanking him for all he had done were the first written words of hers he had ever had. though there was not a word of love in the note—not even of friendship—calvert re-read it a score of times and treasured it, and at last put it with the miniature in the little chamois case that rested near his heart.
the check which lafayette had put upon the austrians on the 11th of june having produced a cessation of hostilities, he wrote and despatched to the assembly the letter which he had had in contemplation for some time and of which he had spoken to calvert. this courageous letter—the authenticity of which was fiercely denied in the assembly—not only did not produce the effect lafayette so hoped for, but was followed by the outrage of the 20th of june. who does not know the shameful events of that day?—the invasion of the tuileries by hordes of ruffians and the insults to helpless royalty?
when lafayette heard of the uprising of the 20th he determined to go in person to paris, affirm the authorship of his letter, and urge upon the assembly the destruction of the jacobin party. he sent calvert to luckner's head-quarters to ask of the maréchal permission to go to paris and, placing his troops in safety under the guns of maubeuge, he departed for the capital, whither he arrived on the 28th. after two days spent in incessant and fruitless efforts with the assembly and national guard, in audiences with the king and consultations with friends, he sped back to the army, more thoroughly and bitterly convinced than ever that the revolution which he had led and believed in was now fast approaching anarchy; that the throne was lost and his own brilliant popularity vanished. he took with him to calvert the news of the sudden death of the old duchesse d'azay—she had failed rapidly since hearing of the death of d'azay, and had passed away painlessly on the morning of lafayette's arrival in paris—the escape of st. aulaire to canada, and a letter from mr. morris.
"he desired me to give you this," said lafayette, gravely, handing the letter to calvert. "the message is of the greatest importance. we had a long interview. i am at last come to the same opinion on certain subjects as himself," he said, with a gloomy smile, "and we want your co-operation. he will explain all when he sees you. as for myself, i must say no more," and he went away, leaving the young man to read his letter alone.
