The Bride of Fort Edward | Page 3

that turns his coat first, is the best fellow.
_4th Sol_. No?
_6th Sol_. And shall I tell you what else they say?
_4th Sol_. Ay.
_6th Sol_. Shall I?
All. Ay, ay. What is it?
_6th Sol_. That we are a cowardly, sneaking, good-for-nothing pack of poltroons, here in the north. There's for you! There's what you get for your pains, Sirs. And for the rest, General Schuyler is to be disgraced, and old Gates is to be set over us again, and----no matter for the rest. See here, boys. Any body coming? See here.
_3d Sol_. What has he got there?
_2nd Sol_. The Proclamation! The Proclamation! Will you be good enough to let me see if there is not a picture there somewhere, with an Indian and a tomahawk?
_6th Sol_. Now, Sirs, he that wants a new coat, and a pocket full of money--
_3d Sol_. That's me fast enough.
_2nd Sol_. If he had mentioned a shirt-sleeve now, or a rim to an old hat--
_4th Sol_. Or a bit of a crown, or so.
_6th Sol_. He that wants a new coat--get off from my toes, you scoundrel.
All. Let's see. Let's see. Read--read.
_7th Sol_. (Spouting.) "And he that don't want his house burned over his head, and his wife and children, or his mother and sisters, as the case may be, butchered or eaten alive before his eyes--"
_3d Sol_. Heavens and earth! It 'ant so though, Wilson, is it?
_7th Sol_. "Is required to present himself at the said village of Skeensborough, on or before the 20th day of August next. Boo--boo--boo--Who but I. Given under my hand."--If it is not _it_--it is something very like it, I can tell you, Sirs. I say, boys, the old rogue wants his neck wrung for insulting honest soldiers in that fashion; and I say that you--for shame, Will Willson.
_4th Sol_. Hush!--the Colonel!--Hush!
_2nd Sol_. And who is that proud-looking fellow, by his side?
_4th Sol_. Hush! General Arnold. He's a sharp one--roll it up--roll it up.
_6th Sol_. Get out,--you are rumpling it to death.
(_Two American officers are seen close at hand, in a bend of the ascending road; the soldiers enter the woods_.)
* * * * *

DIALOGUE III.
SCENE. The same.
_1st Officer_. I cannot conceal it from you, Sir; there is but one feeling about it, as far as I can judge, and I had some chances in my brief journey--
_2nd Off_. Were you at head-quarters?
_1st Off_. Yes,--and every step of this retreating army only makes it more desperate. I never knew any thing like the mad, unreasonable terror this army inspires. Burgoyne and his Indians!--"_Burgoyne and the Indians_"--there is not a girl on the banks of the Connecticut that does not expect to see them by her father's door ere day-break. Colonel Leslie, what were those men concealing so carefully as we approached just now?--Did you mark them?
_2nd Off_. Yes. If I am not mistaken, it was the paper we were speaking of.
_1st Off_. Ay, ay,--I thought as much.
_2nd Off_. General Arnold, I am surprised you should do these honest men the injustice to suppose that such an impudent, flimsy, bombastic tirade as that same proclamation of Burgoyne's, should have a feather's weight with any mother's son of them.
Arnold. A feather's, ay a feather's, just so; but when the scales are turning, a feather counts too, and that is the predicament just now of more minds than you think for, Colonel Leslie. A pretty dark horizon around us just now, Sir,--another regiment goes off to-morrow, I hear. Hey?
Leslie. Why, no. At least we hope not. We think we shall be able to keep them yet, unless--that paper might work some mischief with them perhaps, and it would be rather a fatal affair too, I mean in the way of example.--These Green Mountain Boys----
Arnold. Colonel Leslie, Colonel Leslie, this army is melting away like a snow-wreath. There's no denying it. Your General misses it. The news of one brave battle would send the good blood to the fingers' ends from ten thousand chilled hearts; no matter how fearful the odds; the better, the better,--no matter how large the loss;--for every slain soldier, a hundred better would stand on the field;----
Leslie. But then----
Arnold. By all that's holy, Sir, if I were head here, the red blood should smoke on this grass ere to-morrow's sunset. I would have battle here, though none but the birds of the air were left to carry the tale to the nation. I tell you, Colonel Leslie, a war, whose resources are only in the popular feeling, as now, and for months to come, this war's must be; a war, at least, which depends wholly upon the unselfishness of a people, as this war does, can be kept alive by excitement only. It was wonderful enough indeed, to behold a whole people, the low and comfort-loving too, in whose narrow