Page:Books and men.djvu/229

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THE CAVALIER.
219

the loyalists are centred in him alone. For him remain thirteen months of incredible hardships and anxiety, a single stolen visit to his wife and infant son, heart-sick appeals to James for some recognition of the desperate efforts made in his behalf, a brilliant irregular campaign, a last decisive victory, and a soldier's death. "It is the less matter for me, seeing the day goes well for my master," he answers simply, when told of his mortal hurt; and in this unfaltering loyalty we read the life-long lesson of the Cavalier. If, as a recent poet tells us, the memory of Nero be not wholly vile, because one human being was found to weep for him, surely the memory of James Stuart may be forgiven much because of this faithful service. It is hard to understand it now.

"In God's name, then, what plague befell us,
To fight for such a thing?"

is our modern way of looking at the problem; but the mental processes of the Cavalier were less inquisitorial and analytic. "I am no politician, and I do not care about nice distinctions," says Major Bellenden bluntly, when requested to consider the insurgents' side of