The Revolt of Man
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‘Oh!’ said Lord Chester. ‘Well … after we are dispersed, we will consider the question of the riding down. Then we need not expect the Horse Guards to-morrow morning?’
‘No; they will come afterwards.’
‘Thank you, Constance; you have given me one piece of intelligence. I confess I was uncertain about the Guards. And now, dear child,’ – he called her, the late Home Secretary, ‘dear child,’ – ‘as this is a solemn night, and we have much to think of and to do … one word before we part. Constance, you have by this act of yours, cast in your lot with us, because you thought to save my life. Everything is risked upon to-morrow’s victory. If we fail we die. Are you ready to die with me?’
She made no reply. The old feeling, the overwhelming force of the man, made her cheek white and her heart faint. She held out her hands.
He took her – before all those witnesses – in his arms, and kissed her on the forehead. ‘Stay with us, my darling,’ he whispered; ‘cast in your lot with mine.’
She had no power to resist, none to refuse. She was conquered; Man was stronger than Woman.
‘Children,’ said the Bishop solemnly, ‘you shall not die, but live.’
Constance started. She knew not this kind of language, which was borrowed from the Books of the Ancient Faith.
‘There are many things,’ said the Bishop, ‘of which you know not yet, Lady Carlyon. After to-morrow we will instruct you. Meantime it is late; the Chief has business; I would be alone. Go you with my daughters and rest, if you can, until the morning.’
The very atmosphere seemed strange to Constance: the young men in authority, the women submissive; this old man speaking as if he were a learned divine, reverend, grave, and accustomed to be heard; and, outside, the voices of men ringing, of arms clashing, of music playing, – all the noise of a camp before it settles into rest for the night.
‘Can they,’ Constance whispered to Grace Ingleby, looking round her outside the tent – ‘will they dare to fight these terrible and cruel Convict Wardens?’
‘Oh, Lady Carlyon!’ Grace replied, ‘you do not know, you cannot guess, what wonderful things Lord Chester has done with the men in the last fortnight. From poor, obedient slaves, he has made them men indeed.’
‘Men!’ Constance saw that she could not understand the word in the sense to which she had been accustomed.
‘Surely you know,’ Grace went on, ‘that our object is more than we have ventured to proclaim. We began with the cry of “Youth for the Young.” That touched a grievance which was more felt, perhaps, in country districts, where men retained some of their independence, than in towns. But we meant very much more. We shall abolish the Established Church, and the supremacy of Woman. Man will reign once more, and will worship, after the manner of his ancestors, the real living Divine Man, instead of the shadowy Perfect Woman.’
‘Oh!’ Constance heard and trembled. ‘And we – what shall we do?’
‘We shall take our own place – we shall be the housewives; we shall be loving and faithful servants to men, and they will be our servants in return. Love knows no mastery. Yet man must rule outside the house.’
‘Oh!’ Constance could say no more.
‘Believe me, this is the true place of woman; she is the giver of happiness and love; she is the mother and the wife. As for us, we have reigned and have tried to rule. How much we have failed, no one knows better than yourself.’
Grace guided her companion to a great marquee, where the company of girls, sobered now, and rather tearful, because their sweethearts were to go a-fighting in earnest on the morrow, were making lint and bandages.
‘I must go on with my work,’ said Grace. Her sister Faith was already in her place, tearing, cutting and shaping. ‘Do you lie down’ here is a pile of lint – make that your bed, and sleep if you can.’
Constance lay down; but she could not sleep. She already heard in imagination the tramp of the cruel Convict Wardens; she saw her lover and his companions shot down; she was herself a prisoner; then, with a cry, she sprang to her feet.
‘Give me some work to do,’ she said to Grace; ‘I cannot sleep.’
They made a place for her, Grace and Faith between them, saying nothing.
By this time the girls were all silent, and some were crying; for the day was dawning – the day when these terrible preparations of lint would be used for poor wounded men.
When, about half-past five, the first rays of the September sun poured into the marquee upon the group of women, Grace sprang to her feet, crying aloud in a kind of ecstacy.
‘The day has come – the day is here! Oh, what can we do but pray!’
She threw herself upon her knees and prayed aloud, while all wept and sobbed.
Constance knelt with the rest, but the prayer touched her not. She was only sad, while Grace sorrowed with faith and hope.
Then Faith Ingleby raised her sweet strong voice, and, with her, the girls sang together a hymn which was unknown to Constance. It began: —
Awake, my soul, and with the sunThy daily course of duty run.This act of worship and submission done, they returned to their work. Outside, the camp began gradually to awaken. Before six o’clock the fires were lit, and the men’s breakfast was getting ready; by seven o’clock everything was done – tents struck, arms piled, men accoutred.
Constance went out to look at the strange sight of the rebel army. Her heart beat when she looked upon the novel scene.
Regiments were forming, companies marching into place, flags flying, drums beating, and trumpets calling. And the soldiers! – saw one ever such men before? They were marching, heads erect and flashing eyes; the look of submission gone – for ever. Yes; these men might be shot down, but they could never be reduced to their old condition.
‘There is the Chief,’ said Faith Ingleby.
He stood without his tent, his Staff about him, looking round him. Authority was on his brow; he was indeed, Constance felt with sinking heart, that hitherto incredible thing – a Man in command.
‘We girls have no business here,’ said Faith; ‘let us go back to our tent.’
But as she spoke, Lord Chester saw them; and leaving his Staff, he walked across the Heath, bearing his sword in his hand, followed by Algernon Dunquerque.
‘Constance,’ he said gravely, ‘buckle my sword for me before the battle.’
She did it, trembling and tearful. Then, while Faith Ingleby did the same office for Algernon, he took her in his arms and kissed her lips in the sight of all the army. Every man took it as a lesson for himself. He was to fight for love as well as liberty. A deafening shout rent the air.
Then Lord Chester sprang upon his horse and rode to the front.
Everything was now in readiness. The cannon, masked by bushes, were protected by the pond in front; on either side were the guards ready to lie down; behind them, the regiments, massed at present, but prepared for open order; and in the trees could be seen the gleaming helmets and swords of the cavalry.
‘Let us go to my father,’ said Faith; ‘he and Clarence will pray for us.’
‘Algy,’ said Lord Chester cheerfully, ‘what are you thinking of?’
‘I was thinking how sorry Jack Kennion will be to have missed this day.’
And then there happened the most remarkable, the most surprising thing in the whole of this surprising campaign. There was a movement among the men in front, followed by loud laughing and shouting; and then a party of girls, some of the Company of women which followed the army, came flying across the Heath breathless, because they had run all the way from Marble Arch to convey their news.
‘They have run away, my lord!’ they cried all together.
‘Who have run away?’
‘The Army of Avengers – the Convict Wardens. They have all run away, and there is not one left.’
‘Run away? What does it mean? Why did they run away?’
Then the girls looked at each other and laughed, but were a little ashamed, because they were not quite sure how the Chief would take it.
‘It seemed such a pity,’ said one of them, presently, ‘that any of our own brave fellows should be killed.’
‘Such a dreadful pity,’ they murmured.
‘And by such cruel men.’
‘Such cruel, horrible men,’ they echoed.
‘So that we … we stole into the camp when they were asleep and we frightened them; and they all ran away, leaving their arms behind them.’
Lord Chester looked at Captain Dunquerque.
‘Woman’s wit,’ he said. ‘Would you and I have thought of such a trick? Go, girls, tell the Bishop.’
But Algy looked sad.
‘And after all this drilling,’ he said, with a sigh, ‘and all our shouting, there is to be no fighting!’
CHAPTER XIV
THE ARMY OF AVENGERS
THE awful nature of the crisis, and the strangeness of the sight, kept the streets in the neighbourhood of the Camp in Hyde Park full of women, young and old. They roamed about among the tents, looking at the sullen faces of the men, examining their arms, and gazing upon them curiously, as if they were wild beasts. Not one among them expressed the least friendliness or kind feeling. The men were regarded by those who paid them, as well as by the rebels, with undisguised loathing.
About midnight the crowd lessened; at two o’clock, though there were still a few stragglers, most of the curious and anxious politicians had gone home to bed; at three, some of them still remained; at four – the darkest and deadest time of an autumn night – all were gone home, every special constable even, and the Camp was left in silence, the men in their tents, and asleep.
There still remained, however, a little crowd of some two or three dozen girls; they were collected together about the Marble Arch. They had formed, during the evening, part of the crowd; but now that this was dispersed, they seemed to gather together, and to talk in whispers. Presently, as if some resolution was arrived at, they all poured into the Park, and entered the sleeping Camp.
The men were lying down, mostly asleep; but they were not undressed, so as to be ready for their early march. No sentries were on duty, nor was there any watch kept.
Presently the girls found, in the darkness, a cart containing drums. They seized them and began drumming with all their might. Then they separated, and ran about from tent to tent; they pulled and haled the sleepers, startled by the drums, into terrified wakefulness; they cried as soon as their men were wide awake, ‘Wake up all! – wake up! – run for your lives! – the rebels will be on us in ten minutes! They are a hundred thousand strong: run for your lives! – they have sworn to hang every Convict Warden who is not shot. Oh, run, run, run!’ Then they ran to the next tent, and similarly exhorted its sleepers. Consider the effect of this nocturnal alarm. The men slept eight in a tent. There were about thirty girls, and somewhat more than a thousand tents. It is creditable to the girls that the thirty made so much noise that they seemed like three thousand to the startled soldiers. To be awakened suddenly in the dead of night, to be told that their enemies were upon them, to hear cries and screams of warning, with the beating of drums, produced exactly the consequences that were expected. The men, who had no experience of collective action, who had no officers, who had no heart for their work, were bewildered; they ran about here and there, asking where was the enemy: then shots were heard, for the girls found the rifles and fired random shots in the air; and then a panic followed, and they fled – fled in wild terror, running in every direction, leaving their guns behind them in the tents, so that in a quarter of an hour there was not one single man of all the Army of Avengers left in the Camp.
The orders were that the march should begin about six o’clock in the morning – that is, as soon after sunrise as was possible.
It was also ordered that the Army of Avengers should be followed by the Head of the Police Department, Lady Princetown, with her assistant secretaries, clerks, and officers, and that they should be supplied with tumbrils for the conveyance to prison of any who might escape the vengeance prepared for them and be taken prisoners.
At a quarter past six o’clock an orderly clerk proceeded to the Camp. To her great joy the Camp was empty; she did not observe the guns lying about, but as there were no men visible, she concluded that the Army was already on the march. She returned and reported the fact.
Then the order of the Police Procession was rapidly arranged; and it too followed, as they thought, the march of the Avengers.
By this time a good many women were in the streets or at the windows of the houses. Most of the streets were draped with black hangings, in token of general shame and woe that man should be found so inexpressibly guilty. The church bells tolled a knell; a service of humiliation was going on in all of them, but men were not allowed to participate. It was felt that it was safer for them to be at home. Consequently, the strange spectacle of a whole city awake and ready for the day’s work, without a single man visible, was, for one morning only, seen in London.
The Police Procession formed in Whitehall, and slowly moved north. It was headed by Lady Princetown, riding, with her two assistant secretaries; after them came the chief clerks and senior clerks of the Department, followed by the messengers, police constables, and servants, who walked; after them followed, with a horrible grumbling and grinding of wheels, the six great black tumbrils intended for the prisoners.
The march was through Regent Street, Oxford Street, the Tottenham Court Road, Chalk Farm, and so up Haverstock Hill. Everywhere the streets were lined with women, who looked after the dreadful signs of punishment with pity and terror, even though they acknowledged the justice and necessity of the step.
These men, they told each other, had torn down Religion, scoffed at things holy, and proclaimed divorce where the husband had been forced to marry; they pretended that theirs was the right to rule; they were going to destroy every social institution. Should such wretches be allowed to live?
Yet, always, the whisper, the suspicion, the doubt, the question, put not in words, but by looks and gestures, – ‘What have we women done that we should deserve to rule? and which among us does not know that the Religion of the Perfect Woman was only invented by ourselves for the better suppression of man? Who believes it? What have we done with Love?’
And the sight, the actual sight, of those officers of law going forth to bring in the prisoners, was a dreadful thing to witness.
Meantime, what were the Army of Avengers doing?
Slaughtering, shooting down, bayoneting, no doubt. No farther off than the heights of Hampstead their terrible work was going on. It spoke well for the zeal of these devoted soldiers that they had marched so early in the morning that no one had seen them go by. Very odd, that no one at all had seen them. Would Lord Chester escape? And what – oh what! – would be done with Lady Carlyon, Professor Ingleby and her two daughters, and the crowd of girls who had flocked to London with the rebels? Hanging – mere hanging – was far too good for them. Let them be tortured.
The Procession reached the top of Haverstock Hill. Hampstead Hill alone remained. In a short time the relentless Lady Princetown would be on the field of action. Strange, not only that no sign of the Army had been seen, but that no firing had been heard! Could Lord Chester have fled with all his men?
Now just before the Police Procession reached the Heath, they were astonished by a clattering of mounted soldiers, richly dressed and gallantly armed, who rode down the narrow streets of the town and surrounded them. They were a detachment of cavalry headed by Captain Dunquerque, who saluted Lady Princetown laughing. All the men laughed too.
‘I have the honour,’ he said, ‘to invite your ladyship to take a seat in a tumbril. You are my prisoner.’
‘Where – where – where is the Army?’
‘You mean the Convict Wardens? They fled before daylight. Come, my lads, time presses.’
They were actually in the hands of the enemy!
In a few moments the whole of the Chiefs of the great Police Department were being driven in the rumbling black tumbrils, followed by the Lancers, towards the rebel camp. They looked at each other in sheer despair.
‘As for you women,’ said Captain Dunquerque, addressing the clerks and constables, ‘you can go free. Disperse! Vanish!’
He left them staring at each other. Presently a few turned and hurried down the Hill to spread the news. But the greater part followed timidly, but spurred by curiosity, into the Camp.
Here, what marvels met their eyes!
Men, such as they had never dreamed of, bravely dressed, and bearing themselves with a gallant masterfulness which frightened those who saw it for the first time. Presently a trumpet blew and the men fell in. Then the astonished women saw that wonderful thing, the evolutions of an army. The regiments were drawn up in a great hollow square. At one corner stood the fatal black tumbril with Lady Princetown and her aides sitting dolefully and in amazement. Bands of music stood in the centre. Presently Lord Chester, the Chief, rode in with his Staff, and the bands broke out in triumphal strains.
‘Men of England!’ he cried, ‘our enemies have fled. There is no longer any opposition. We march on London immediately.’
The shouts of the soldiers rent the air. When silence was possible, the Bishop, venerable in lawn-sleeves and cassock, spoke, —
‘I proclaim Edward, sometime called Earl of Chester, lawful hereditary King of Great Britain and Ireland. God save the King!’
Then the officers of the Staff did homage, bending the knee and kissing the hand of their Sovereign. And the bands struck up again, playing the old and wellnigh forgotten air ‘God save the King!’ And the soldiers shouted again. And Lady Princetown saw, indeed, that the supremacy of women was gone.
Then the march on London was resumed.
After the advance-cavalry came the Guards, preceding and following the King. Before him was borne the Royal Standard, made long ago for such an occasion by Grace and Faith Ingleby. The bands played and the soldiers sang ‘God save the King’ along the streets. The houses were crowded with women’s faces – some anxious, some sad, some angry, some rejoicing, but all frightened; and the wrath of those who were wrathful waxed fiercer when the company of girls followed the soldiers, dressed in ‘loyal’ ribbons and such finery as they could command, and singing, like the men, ‘God save the King.’
The House of Peeresses was sitting in permanence. Some of the ladies had been sitting all night; a few had fallen asleep; a few more had come to the House early, unable to keep away. They all looked anxious and haggard.
At nine o’clock the first of the fugitives from the Police Procession arrived, and brought the dreadful news that the Army of Avengers had dispersed without striking a blow, that Lady Princetown was a prisoner, and that the rebels would probably march on London without delay.
Then the Duchess of Dunstanburgh informed the terror-stricken House that she had ordered out the three regiments of Guards. They were to be hurled, she said, at the rebels; they would serve to harass and keep them in check while a new army was gathered together. She exhorted the Peeresses to remain calm and collected, and, above all, to be assured that there was not the slightest reason for alarm.
Alas! the barracks were empty!
What then, had become of the Guards?
At the first news of the dispersion of the Avengers, the wives of the Guardsmen, acting with one common consent, made for the barracks and dragged away the soldiers, every woman her own husband to her own home, where she defied the clerks of the War Office, who rushed about trying to get the men together. For greater safety the women hid away the boots – those splendid boots without which the Horse Guards would be but as common men. Of the three thousand, there remained only two orphan drummer-boys and a sergeant, a widower without sisters. To hurl this remnant against Lord Chester was manifestly too absurd even for the clerks of the War Office. Besides, they refused to go.
On the top of this dreadful news, the House was informed by the Chancellor that the officers sent to carry out the arrest of Lady Carlyon reported that her ladyship had fled, and was now in Lord Chester’s camp with the rebels.
What next?
‘The next thing, ladies,’ said a middle-aged Peeress who had been conspicuous all her life for nothing in the world except an entire want of interest in political questions, ‘is that our reign is over. Man has taken the power in his own hands. For my own part, I am only astonished that he has waited so long. It needed nothing but the courage of one young fellow to light the fire with a single spark. I propose that a vote of thanks be passed to her Grace the Duchess of Dunstanburgh, whose attempt to marry a man young enough to be her great-grandson has been the cause of this House’s overthrow.’
She sat down, and the Duchess sprang to her feet, crying out that the House was insulted, and that these traitorous words should be taken down.
‘We shall all be taken down ourselves,’ replied the noble lady who had spoken, ‘before many hours. Can we not devise some means of dying gracefully? At least let us spare ourselves the indignity of being hustled down the steps of Westminster Hall, as the unlucky Department of Police has been this morning hustled on Hampstead Heath.’
Several proposals were made. It was proposed to send a deputation of religion. But the Preaching Sisters had been rejected with scorn, when the army was still small and hesitating. What would happen, now that they were victorious? It was proposed that they should send a thousand girls, young, beautiful, and richly dressed, to make overtures of peace, and charm the men back to their allegiance. The young Lady Dunlop – aged eighteen – icily replied that they would not get ten girls to go on such an errand.
It was proposed, again, that they should send a messenger offering to treat preliminaries on Hampstead Hill. The messenger was despatched – she was the Clerk of the House – but she never came back.
Then the dreadful news arrived that the conqueror had assumed the title of King, and was marching with all his forces to Westminster, in order to take over the reins of power.
At this intelligence, which left nothing more to be expected but complete overthrow, the Peeresses cowered.
‘As everything is gone,’ said the middle-aged lady who had first expressed her opinion, ‘and as the streets will be extremely uncomfortable until these men settle down, I shall go home and stay there. And I should recommend your ladyships to do the same, and to keep your daughters at home until they can learn to behave – as they have tried to make the men behave. My dears, submission belongs to the sex who do none of the work.’
She got up and went away, followed by about half the House. About a hundred Peeresses were left.
‘I,’ said the Duchess of Dunstanburgh, ‘shall remain with the Chancellor till I am carried out.’
‘I,’ said the Chancellor, ‘shall remain to protest against the invasion of armed men and the trampling upon law.’
‘And I,’ said young Lady Dunlop, loud enough to be heard all over the House, ‘shall remain to see Lord Chester – I mean, His Majesty the King. He is a handsome fellow, and of course Constance will be his Queen.’
‘Ladies,’ said the Duchess, dignified and austere to the last, ‘it is at least our duty to make a final stand for religion.’
Lady Dunlop scoffed. ‘Religion!’ she cried. ‘Have we not had enough of that nonsense? Which of us believes any more in the Church? Even men have ceased to believe – especially since they were called upon to marry their grandmothers. The Perfect Woman! Why, we are ourselves the best educated, the best bred, the best born – and look at us! As for me, I shall go over to Lord Chester’s religion, and in future worship the Perfect Man, if he likes to order it so.’
The Duchess made no reply. She had received so many insults; such dreadful things had been said; her cherished faiths, prejudices, and traditions had been so rudely attacked, – that all her forces were wanted to maintain her dignity. She sat now motionless, expectant, haggard. The game was played out. She had lost. She would have no more power.