Words of Command (Hervey 12) (Matthew Hervey) (10 page)

Another quarter of an hour brought them to Queen Anne’s Gate, where a cornet was waiting with an orderly. He made his salutations and led them apace to the exercise ground half a mile to the south.

Hervey was at once intrigued by what he found, B Troop engaged in evolutions not to be found in the drill book. Thirty dismounted dragoons, their horses tethered towards the Star Clump, played the part of a gathering of malcontents, to which twenty mounted dragoons were approaching in line at the walk, in as calm a fashion as they could in the face of jeering and fist-shaking.

There were no regulations for dealing with breaches of the peace, but after the business of St Peter’s Fields eleven years before – ‘Peterloo’ – when the Manchester and Salford Yeomanry had got themselves into a merry mess, the practice had been to halt at a distance from the unlawful assembly, beyond the range of brickbats, then to draw swords and observe the effect. Usually the rasp of metal on metal and the appearance of cold steel was enough to disperse the mischief-makers, but if not, an advance at the trot invariably did the trick. Almost invariably, for it had not been unknown, especially in a great assembly, for the people in the front rank to be held to their ground, if unwillingly, by the press of those behind, until the troops had closed, in which case the flat of the sword gave encouragement. At St Peter’s Fields, the yeomanry, trying to get through a crowd of many thousands to arrest the famous ‘Orator’ Hunt on the platform beyond, had lost their heads and cut with the edge of the sword, and then found themselves in hopeless, bloody disorder, until the magistrates sent in the 15th Hussars to extricate them. The hussars, by all accounts, were scrupulous in using only the flat of the sword, but got no thanks for their restraint from any but the Duke of Wellington (who, in truth, had been none too concerned whether flat or edge) – though the praise of the then Master-General of the Ordnance was nothing to compare with the opprobrium of the newspapers.

Worsley, however, appeared to have devised an alternative. The dragoons still mounted were approaching at the walk in open order, and as they closed with the ‘roughs’ they turned the horses on the forehand, quarters right, and took three or four lateral steps – a solid barricade of horseflesh advancing slowly but determinedly, pushing back all before them. Then, taking the word from the serjeant-flanker on the right, they swung round to face the ‘crowd’ again to give them opportunity to break, before repeating the turn on the forehand and beginning the lateral march once more.

‘I see his purpose right enough,’ said Hervey, nodding with what passed for approval. ‘A very large but peaceable gathering to be dispersed peaceably: but why should a peaceable crowd have to disperse at all?’

‘A crowd may turn into a mob in an instant,’ suggested Fairbrother.

‘And I’d rather it were then that the military were called on, and not before. But be that as it may, I compliment the troop on its horse-mastering.’

‘I think Captain Worsley would wish to acknowledge the compliment as Versailles’s, for he spent the summer there,’ said Malet.

‘Did he indeed? What thinks the RM, I wonder.’

Malet took the question to be rhetorical. The riding-master, schooled as he was in the principles of military equitation at the ‘Cavalry Riding Establishment’ at St John’s Wood, was first and foremost a man of strict regulation (though Hervey had seen little of him before taking command, the RM having exchanged from the 7th Hussars not two years ago); but he was, too, a man of enquiry, perfectly able to recognize advantage wherever he saw it.

‘Captain Worsley was the guest at Versailles of the comte d’Aure, the
maître
of the
Grande Écurie
. Do you know him, Colonel?’

‘I do not,’ said Hervey, maintaining his watch on B Troop (though flattered to be thought likely to know the master of the King of France’s Horse); ‘except by reputation. He is, by all accounts, an advocate of the natural school of equitation. Most refreshing.’

‘There’s little natural about that sideways movement,’ added Fairbrother, equally intent on Worsley’s men. ‘A deal of practice, I’d say.’

‘And useful of itself therefore, whether or not it truly serves any purpose in a throng,’ replied Hervey, though perfectly understanding the doubt implicit in his friend’s observation.

Ten more minutes of ‘Versailles drill’, as he was beginning to think of it, and then Worsley signalled the troop to change – ‘malcontents’ into the saddle, and the ‘aiders of the civil power’ to take their place. Hervey continued to watch keenly. The troop was well aware that he did, but there was an easiness about them that was pleasing: the words of command were few, the harrying of the dragoons by the NCOs even less. This was show, of course – if a troop did not wish to show before its lieutenant-colonel then it must be in want of pride – but it bespoke a confident purpose, a sure discipline; and hardly in the most favourable of conditions. Hervey was content.

And with the drill having reached, so to speak, a point of balance, it was now the moment for Worsley to present his compliments in person. He trotted briskly up to the assemblage, trumpeter at his side, and halted before his erstwhile fellow troop leader. ‘Good morning, Colonel,’ he said brightly, with a smile of both confidence and gratification, and saluting with emphatic correctness.

Hervey smiled back warmly, returning the salute with no less exactness. They were indeed old friends – certainly in terms of late years. He leaned forward and offered his hand. ‘Heartiest congratulations on your marriage, Worsley. You must both come and dine with us – with me – at my quarters presently.’

If the momentary confusion of the plural – and indeed,
which
plural – registered at all with B Troop’s captain, he did not show it. ‘Delighted, Colonel.’

‘And now perhaps you will explain your scheme of things?’

‘Of course. I spent some time last summer in France and was much taken by their new methods.’

‘Yes; Malet has told me.’

‘In particular their exercises in yielding from the leg, and it occurred to me that there was some practical application to be had in dealing peaceably with a gathering, such as we’ve had occasion once or twice to do – one which was threatening no great violence. Versailles used the exercises solely as a means of increasing suppleness.’

‘Admirable,’ replied Hervey, keeping his doubts to himself for the time being (why
would
a magistrate read the riot act, the customary prelude to calling on the military for assistance, if the crowd were peaceable?). ‘How did they correct the tendency to lean towards the leg?’

‘By insisting the rider looked to where he was yielding. Or occasionally an apple on the head.’

‘Perhaps we should have the RM devise some programme of comparison. It would be a fine thing for the officers to think on it. A very proper diversion. Your sar’nt-major: he took to it keenly enough?’

Worsley returned the smile with equal wryness. ‘Yes indeed, Colonel, as I’m sure you may imagine.’

Hervey turned again to observe the object of their unspoken admiration – Collins. It was good to see him restored to his rightful troop after secondment to his – Hervey’s – own at the Cape when Armstrong’s wife had died. He now had – what? – twenty years’ service? As a serjeant-major his authority appeared effortless, his resource limitless and his judgement unfailing, though somehow, to Hervey’s mind, he would remain still the Corporal Collins of that last battle at Toulouse, the year before Waterloo …

No, it was more than twenty years, for Collins had been at Campo Mayor – had cut down the French colonel of dragoons in single combat – and he’d worn a corporal’s stripe then, had he not?

But Armstrong had been a corporal at Sahagun too … The years had passed, and their promotion had slowed with them, just as had his own. ‘Soldiers in peace were like chimneys in summer’ – what an apt saying it was. Yet where had been the peace, truly, since Waterloo? There’d scarcely been a year – if at all – that he himself had not bloodied his sabre.

He realized – and, strangely, for the first time, for he had always thought of Armstrong as the man of mature rank and Collins as the coming young NCO – that the passing years had been the same for the two of them; and that there would not be years enough remaining for both Armstrong and Collins to wear a crown atop their four chevrons. To be
the
sar’nt-major – not of a troop but of the regiment.

They chatted the while, until, roles reversed, the second half troop practised its peaceable dispersal of a peaceable assembly.

It was all done really rather well. Practical or not, Hervey saw nothing but usefulness in having men so handy and troopers so supple.

Eventually Collins and the lieutenant seemed satisfied too, and ordered the troop to rest and make much.

It was now Worsley’s opportunity again. ‘Leave to present the officers, Colonel?’

Hervey nodded. ‘By all means.’

Worsley signalled them forward – his lieutenant and two cornets, and Collins, who came up at the trot and reined to a sharp halt in line.

‘Hep!’

Up went four hands as one in salute.

Hervey acknowledged with a touch to the peak of his forage hat, and a smile. ‘Good morning, gentlemen. Noble work, and smartly done.’ He paused just long enough: ‘Would it beat the French though, Sar’nt-Major?’

The subalterns smiled, and Collins even broader. Being singled out first was a compliment – and it was a good joke too.

‘Might well, Colonel, now that Bonaparte’s dead.’

Hervey nodded approvingly. A good NCO was never in want of an apt riposte. ‘Well said, Sar’nt-Major.’

He was indeed the image of a serjeant-major, as the shine on his leather, despite the exertions of the day, suggested. And beyond that he had the makings of a quartermaster who would not stint himself in all that was necessary to the comfort of all ranks. No, Hervey corrected himself: not merely the makings, Collins had the present qualities. But he could hardly be quartermaster without first holding the foremost non-commissioned rank.

He turned to the unfamiliar face. ‘Cornet James, I presume.’

‘Colonel.’

‘Your father had a troop when I joined as a cornet,’ he said, as James pressed his mount forward to take the extended hand. ‘I’ve not seen him these twenty years. He’s well, I trust.’

‘He is very well, Colonel, yes, thank you.’

‘And Mr Kennett, it is good to see you again too.’

The lieutenant in turn came forward to shake hands.

He was far from being Hervey’s favourite sort of officer. There was about him a certain expression of superiority, something faintly disapproving, an aloofness. Hervey could not suppose that dragoons warmed to him, though he was competent enough – that much was evident merely by watching him this morning. How far he could truly be trusted was a matter for conjecture, but in truth it was perhaps of no great moment to him what was the character of B Troop’s lieutenant, especially with a man like Worsley as captain, and Collins to keep an eye on things from the ranks.

‘And Cornet Jenkinson, Colonel.’

The last of the officers rode forward to shake hands.

It was not the easiest of moments, as Hervey had anticipated, Jenkinson with Agar at Oxford …

‘Your people are well?’

So vague an enquiry was meant purely as a courtesy, Hervey expecting a mere ‘Very well’, like James’s, but the Honourable Charles Jenkinson was somewhat more literal – more curate than cornet, if entirely well-meaning. ‘My sisters are all well, Colonel. My eldest is now out and her younger sister is out this year. My father hopes to be offered a place in the cabinet soon.’

Hervey made an effort to be matter of fact. ‘Indeed? Then we must hope that it is a place in which he may be of assistance to us in the Sixth. And your sisters: I hope we may see them at Hounslow ere long.’

Again, he had imagined the expression to be purely rhetorical, but …

‘In point of fact, Colonel, my elder sister, Catherine, has dined at Hounslow several times, though it was as Cornet Agar’s guest rather than mine.’

Hervey hoped he did not wince. ‘Agar’s loss will be felt by a great many.’ He was about to add a word or so about his dying well, but thought better of it. It was not his to explain these things: he had done so in a letter to the Horse Guards, commending his conduct, and it was for the commander-in-chief to determine if any recognition should be given, at which point the entire army would be made privy to the despatch.

He turned back to Worsley. It was close to noon. ‘What arrangements are there for the rest of the day?’

‘Rations and then pivot drill, Colonel.’

‘Then I’ll take a turn of the park and afterwards watch a little more.’

He said it with, he hoped, more enthusiasm than in truth he could muster, for the day that the regiment – every regiment – was able to manoeuvre freely, without a pivot, would indeed truly be a red-letter day. So much time was wasted turning a line on a fixed point that it astonished him that no better system had been found – or rather, approved. It was all the fault of old ‘Pivot’ Dundas – dead these past ten years, pensioned a good dozen before then, and yet his
Principles of Military Movements
still held as great a sway with the Horse Guards as those of Frederick the Great, whom he had sought to emulate, still held in Prussia. General Sir David Dundas, a crabbed old Scot, had done fine things in his day, not least two years as commander-in-chief during the Duke of York’s penitential absence after the scandal of his mistress’s selling commissions, but the ‘tide in the affairs of men’ had left his pivot drill high and dry – or ought to have. Someone in the Sixth, many years ago, had composed a rhyme in mock-heroic, aping
The Iliad
(‘Come Heavenly Muse, Great David’s wrath disclose …’), and with it appropriate illustrations in the mess’s lines book, which had afforded much amusement to the more subversive officers in the regiment – which in the case of Dundas was practically everyone:

This is the Scotch commander of men
,

Who in spite of his years three score and ten,