who see the most of both sides of a question. In religious wars, especially, the whole conflict proceeds on the supposition of an opposite point of view on the part of the adversaries; and if they could stand together on either, there would be no more war. Few, of the race of champions, ever see such a transmutation as that of “flax-haired Christian dogs” into hospitable hosts and accomplished gentlemen; and even a Schamyl may well be staggered by the experience. While ignorant of his actual state of mind, we must dwell on the history of his devotedness. His whole life has been pure from personal aims,—which is always the highest praise for the champion, as for the child. He was in earnest; he was faithful; he was wise as he was brave. We may hope that his old age will not be weak, really or apparently: but if it is, the weakness can in no way affect the strength, nor dim the glory of his entire manhood. He is supposed to be now about sixty-five years old. There may be work or experience in store for him yet, leading him forth from his retreat in the interior of Russia.
The parallel between his life and that of Abd-el-Kader is sufficiently close to enable me to describe most briefly the loftiest man of the group. It may be doubted whether he will not always head the glorious train of champions of conquered races. He has Schamyl’s martial qualities, his devotedness and devoutness, his natural princeliness, his gift of commanding reverence and winning adoration. Whether he could, like Schamyl, organise a group of barbaric tribes, so as to raise them into a capacity for civilised life, we have no means of knowing: but, on the other hand, it is certain that he has more enlargement of mind, and is fitter to take his place in counsel among the rulers of men. While all nations, from the Russians to the Americans, revere Schamyl, everybody feels a reverence as lofty, and more tender, towards Abd-el-Kader. Instead of the truculent Paynim knight of our imaginations, he is the Christian knight of the Middle Ages, still, by some accident, a Paynim, but as good as any Christian. We have heard his fame so long, and we enjoyed such enthusiasm about him when we were young, that we are apt to fancy him old; but he is yet only fifty-three; and the events of the day point to the possible opening of a new career for him—and a very great one.
He comes of a holy race; and his hereditary sanctity agrees well with his natural temperament. He saw things in his early childhood which might affect his whole future life. He traversed the deserts of Africa and Arabia with the pilgrim caravan to Mecca; and a second pilgrimage, in early manhood, renewed and revived the strongest impressions that a devout Moslem can receive. He is a man of as much learning as would have made him a dignified priest, if he had not been a soldier. Like Schamyl he was originally of feeble frame; and in his case too it was patriotism that made him an accomplished warrior. Seeing that every hand and eye would be needed to keep out invaders, he exercised himself diligently in riding, and the use of all the weapons of his tribe. His father had laboured to unite the tribes whose independence the French were hoping to devour in succession; and when they were ready to attempt the expulsion of the invaders, the old man presented his third son, Abd-el-Kader, as fit for the leadership which he declined for himself, on account of his years.
For many years from that time the life of Abd-el-Kader was much like Schamyl’s, except in as far as the Atlas and the African deserts differ from the Caucasus and the steppes of the Don. The French were from the beginning as savage in their warfare as the Russians ever became. It will never be forgotten how the commanders smoked a tribe to death in a cave, and carried fire and slaughter among the helpless when the strong were engaged elsewhere. They were visited in their turn. Abd el-Kader haunted them. He hovered round them all day, when on the march; and he was down upon their bivouac at night. If they ever lost their way, he was behind, to prevent their return. If there were storms in the sky, he kept them from shelter till the tempest had done its worst upon them. He was perpetually drawing them on in pursuit of him into fatal places, and then escaping by invisible paths. Sometimes he besieged a town at the head of 10,000 men; and next he was intercepting convoys with a handful of rapid riders whom it was vain to pursue. The enemy treated with him, and acknowledged him as Emir of Mascara, with a considerable territory; and this made him powerful at home. Not even he, however, could for ever cope with the forces of a great military nation. There was once a peace of two years; but he spent it in preparing for fresh warfare, as well as in making a beginning of agricultural settlement. When the conflict was resumed, the French brought larger forces into the field, just as the strength of the Arabs was dwindling away. The Emir’s situation became difficult—then perilous—then desperate; but he underwent everything short of destruction before he would yield. Hunger, wet, cold, exhaustion,—all these were slow in humbling him; but they compelled him at length to surrender. He did so on the strength of a promise of General Lamoricière’s, sanctioned by that of the Duc d’Aumale, then commanding in Algiers, that he should be permitted to retire to Alexandria or Acre. This was the condition on which he came into the French camp. The promise was broken, to the heartfelt grief of the Duc d’Aumale. Abd-el-Kader passed some years of imprisonment at the Castle of Amboise, inspiring awe by his dignity, and admiration by his exquisite courtesy. By strong importunity, and after much delay, the present French sovereign was induced to fulfil the promise of the Orleans prince, and Abd-el-Kader retired to a Moslem country. He lived at Broussa till repeated earthquakes ruined the place. Lately, as the Christian world has good reason to know, he has lived at Damascus. There is no need to tell how he has received hundreds of Christians within his gates, and fed them, to the utter exhaustion of his resources, and protected them at the risk of his influence and good name, and escorted them across the country in peril of his life.
Hence arises the question whether his career is really at an end. The grand difficulty of the