Volume Three—Chapter Fourteen.

The next morning, as soon as the first streaks of light appeared in the east, the whole assemblage were on foot, all anxious to return to their homes. The division of the booty, an important affair, was first adjusted; the leaders of the different bands shared according to the number of their followers, among whom it was again to be divided; and, as the cattle were driven off by those to whom they were awarded, by degrees the whole of the force melted away.

A curious spectacle was presented, as the different bands wended their way in warlike guise in every direction along the valleys, and up the mountain’s sides, driving the untractable cattle before them.

To some, also, were awarded arms and powder, according to their necessities. The various other objects of booty, (and among them, a few Cossack prisoners, who were destined for slaves), had been thrown into the common stock, to be equally distributed.

The Seraskier, though still treated with the deepest respect by all, was now left without an army, except of his own immediate followers, every man who had composed it considering himself perfectly at liberty to take his departure when he wished, though equally ready to return, for any fresh expedition.

The chiefs parted from their leader with a respectful and affectionate farewell; he returning to his cottage and his farm, like another Cincinnatus, to till his land with his own hands.

A considerable share of the spoils was awarded to Thaddeus, much to his surprise and satisfaction; and the partition being arranged, he, with Selem, and Arslan Gherrei, prepared to accompany the Hadji in his mournful procession towards his home. Their sad journey was, of necessity, as rapid as possible, waiting only at night, to snatch a few hours’ repose, and borrowing fresh horses to proceed. The Hadji’s nature seemed changed by the blow he had sustained; before lively, and full of anecdote and conversation, he now spoke not, nor smiled, and seemed to be dreading the burst of grief and agony, which his arrival with the dead body of his son, would cause among those most dear to him.

As they approached his grounds, the body was taken from the horse, and laid out on a bier, formed of branches cut from the neighbouring trees, over which a cloak was thrown, and the arms of the deceased placed by his side. No sooner did the cavalcade appear at a distance, slowly winding their way down the valley, than the women rushed out to meet and welcome them on their return from victory. Among the foremost came Zara, eager to clasp her young hero to her arms. The chaplet she had woven to crown him fell from her hands; a sad foreboding seized her, and as she saw at a distance, that they bore a bier, her eye wandered anxiously round for Alp. She missed him from among the horsemen. She sprang wildly forward.

“Where is he?” she cried. “Where is my Alp? Why comes he not with you, warriors?” She caught sight of the bier. “Do you bear him there wounded? Oh, speak! Tell me, is he there?”

“Daughter,” said the Hadji, “Allah has taken my son.”

She seemed to hear him not, as she rushed forward. She lifted the cloak from the face, before any one could prevent her. She shrieked not; she did not swoon; but, with a fixed gaze of despair, she stood like a monumental statue, bending over the corpse of her slaughtered husband, as cold and inanimate as he.

At length, she seized a hand; it fell heavily down. She pressed her lips to those cold and lifeless ones, as if to find that breath still animated them. She seemed scarcely conscious what death was. It was long ere she was convinced of the reality; yet no tear escaped her eye, no sob, her heart. Her soft and gentle nature was fearfully changing.

“Who did this?” she cried. “The savage Urus! well I know their work! Alp, you shall be avenged!” Again she stood silently over the corpse, rigid and immovable. None could find it in their hearts to disturb her, until the mother of the slain youth arrived to bewail, with frantic grief, her loss, joined by the other women of their household. Their cries and shrieks rent the air.

“My son! my son!” cried the distracted mother, “why hast thou been torn from me? Could not some more aged warrior have satisfied our foes? Why hast thou been cut off in the prime of thy youth? Wai! wai! wai! Was it for this that thou wast reared, the boldest, the bravest, the most beautiful? No more shall I hear thy joyous laugh resounding through the groves, or see thy graceful form bounding on thy steed, across the green meadows. My son! my son! Curses on the foes who have slain thee! May they, like me, be made childless! Can they give me another son like thee? Bear him along,” she cried to the attendants, “bear my son to our home, that I may mourn over him. Wai! wai!”

The followers of the Hadji carried the bier of their young lord as ordered; the women leading Zara, who seemed like one in a trance, her eye resting alone on the bier; yet she faltered not in her steps, nor did a word escape her. Her grief was too deep for words or cries. Her heart was not broken; gentle and soft, as she seemed, it was of too tough a texture for that; though none, not even she herself, would have deemed it so.

We know not of what nature we are, until we are tried. She would have thought that she could not have borne the sight of blood, or the slightest misery, without sinking beneath the blow: but now, alas! she knew herself. Her heart, in a moment, was seared and blighted, as by the breath of the dark simoon, in an instant, the traveller is overwhelmed and scorched. Her breast was now hardened to feelings of pity, and burnt with vengeance against those who had deprived her of her loved one.

Such are the cursed effects of war. Let the victorious conqueror look around beyond the dazzling scene, and the gorgeous pageant which attends his triumph, and he would shudder, were he to see the agony, the hopeless despair, of one alone out of the thousands, of whose misery he is the cause. The heaps of slain are as nothing; the eye soon grows accustomed to gaze on them: the feelings become familiarised with the sight of blood, which first sickened at the thought. The slain have played their game of life, and are at rest; but it is those who watch anxiously for their return, who suffer: the fond parents, the doting wife, or mistress, the affectionate sister—it is their loving hearts which are wrung with anguish—it is their curses which blast the laurel-crowned brow of ambition!

The Hadji accompanied his son’s body to the door of his home, where he saw it committed to the charge of the youth’s weeping mother; ushering his friends into the guest-house, he insisted on performing the duties of hospitality. After these had been accomplished, he called for his horse, and rode hastily away into the neighbouring forest. There, unseen by the eye of any, he gave way to the grief and torment of his breast. “The boy died for me! Oh! Allah! that I might have been in his place!” he cried, in a burst of agony.

Selem with his father and several other chiefs remained to pay the last sad respects to the gallant young hero. The funeral cry sounded through the woods with a deep and thrilling solemnity; all the women of the neighbouring hamlet assembling to increase the melancholy wail.

In about two hours before the sun sunk low, the Hadji returned; the body of Alp was then brought out from the house, round which a large concourse of people had assembled, to accompany it to its last resting-place.

The cemetery was on a terrace, on the side of the hill; a beautiful spot, where grew the Cyprus and the plane-tree, shading the tombs of the brave warriors who there lay at rest. A venerable bard, with sightless orbs, was led up by his attendants, at the moment the bier, borne by six youths, the companions of the deceased, was brought out. He took his station at the head of the procession. His mother and other women followed weeping; and Zara, in a trance-like state, neither weeping nor speaking, walked on mechanically; her eye not for an instant withdrawn from the body of her betrothed. The Hadji next followed, with a firm step and erect posture; a slight movement of the mouth, and a contracted brow, alone betokening his mental agony. Arslan Gherrei and the other chiefs supported him on either side, followed by the inhabitants of the hamlet.

As the procession moved slowly on, the aged minstrel tuned his lyre to a low and plaintive strain, his voice trembling as he sung: at the end of each verse, the mourners joining in chorus with a melancholy cadence. As they approached the place of sepulture the words were to the following effect, continuing to be chaunted as the mourners stood round the grave:—

Mourn, children of Attèghèi, mourn for the brave,
    Whose heart with true glory beat high.
Weep, weep, as ye lower him into his grave,
    No more to the charge will he cry.
His father to rescue, amid the thick foe,
    He flew as they hemmed him around;
When a treacherous shot from afar laid him low,
    And bleeding he fell to the ground.

Weep, weep, for the hero, the pride of our land,
    Who ne’er from the foemen would fly,
As he fought ’mid a host who outnumber’d his band,
    His falchion was waving on high.
And his battle cry raising, he charged them so well,
    As the dastardly foe pressed around.
His sword drank their blood, and e’er bravely he fell,
    Full many had bitten the ground.

Lay the hero to rest who so bravely hath died.
    ’Mid the clust’ring ranks of the foe,
“And his glittering falchion part not from his side,
    As calmly he slumbers below.”
He was found where he fell, ’mid the heaps of the slain,
    His weapon still grasp’d in his hand,
Which faithfully serv’d him, and there shall remain,
    For who is more worthy that brand?

Weep, weep, for the hero who rests in his grave,
    And ever be sacred the ground,
Nor let it be trod by the foot of a slave,
    While his spirit still wanders around.
And fondly shall ever be cherished his name,
    As his deeds by our minstrels are sung,
With the martyrs who won the bright chaplet of fame,
    O’er his fate shall a halo be flung.

The warrior maidens of Attèghèi mourn.
    Ah sad was the grief of his bride!
When home on his war-steed from fight he was borne,
    As fainting she fell by his side.
Wreathe fair chaplets of flowers to hang round his tomb,
    Weep, weep, for the youth’s early fate,
And when to bewail him, as yearly you come,
    The deeds of the hero relate.

(Note) Vide Poems by T. Moore.

There was a deep and solemn silence as all that remained of the young, the brave, and the truly-loving Alp was lowered into the narrow grave yawning to receive him. As the body reached its final resting-place, this silence was broken by the sobs which burst from his mother’s breast and from the women who accompanied her. Even hardy warriors, who never thought or dreamed of fear, and seemed steeled to all the softer sympathies of our nature, were moved to tears. As the first handful of earth was thrown on the uncoffined body, all present knelt down circling the grave; and the aged bard, his hands raised on high, offered up prayers for the soul of the deceased young warrior. Then, joining their voices, the assembly petitioned heaven for its quick passage to the realms of bliss. The venerable sire now arose from his knees, and in a deep and solemn tone thus addressed the company:

“Men of Attèghèi, another victim has been offered up to the enmity of our hated foes; a sacrifice well worthy of the altars of Liberty; for who more brave, who more noble than he? Gentle as a lamb in peace, daring as a lion in war, loved by his friends, dreaded by his foe, who is here that loved him not? Who would not have been ready to shelter his life with his own? Why then was he taken from us, cut off in the flower of his youth? Why, my countrymen? Because the most noble altar demands the noblest sacrifice; and what altar is more noble than that of Liberty, and where a fitter victim than he for whom we mourn?

“His fate is glorious and happy. Even now his spirit is ascending to the realms of bliss, while we, still loaded with our mortal chains, mourn his loss. Yet still, many, many more sacrifices must be made, before our country can be free from our detested foes; but think not that our warriors will die in vain. Even now I see dimly and indistinctly, an era approaching, when our enemies shall be driven from the confines of our territories, far back to the barren lands whence they came; and our country, freed from oppression, shall rise above her former state and take her place among the nations of the earth.”

The oration being concluded, again they knelt in prayer, while the earth hid the heroic Alp for ever from the sight of those who loved him. A slab of stone was placed on his grave, over which was erected a light building of wood, sufficiently large to shelter those who would come on the anniversary of his death to offer up prayers, and to commemorate the gallant actions of the young warrior.

The bereaved Zara was led to her home; and, for many live-long days, she sat, motionless, regardless of all around her. Stunned and bewildered by her grief, she constantly brooded over her loss.

The Hadji appeared to have recovered from the shock sooner than the rest of his family: but many observed that the elastic spirits of the old man had flown for ever. A change had come over him. His whole thoughts and attention were given to forming plans for defeating the Russians, and defending the country against their attacks in the coming spring.

So different is man’s grief, for a loved lost object, to that of a woman! He has resources whereupon to employ his mind and his energies. The fierce excitement of war, the ardour of the chase, the banquet, the council, and a hundred other objects offer opportunities to distract his thoughts; while she has alone the remembrance of her loss. If she applies herself to her domestic duties, still the thought of her bereavement will intrude; and oft will she stop amid her occupations, a convulsive sob bursting from her heart, as the image of the lost one appears to her mind, and she thinks of that which was, but which now no longer exists.