Hervey 08 - Company Of Spears

by Allan Mallinson

‘They are. And these are generated…?’

  ‘By stagnant water, rotting matter – by filth, commonly.’

  The veterinarian shook his head. ‘You would be entirely at ease in the Royal College of Physicians, Hervey. And indeed my own. But to my mind it is an insufficient hypothesis. You suffer from remittent fever, do you not, contracted in Ava?’

  ‘Who has told you that?’

  ‘Hervey, I am not so strange to the regiment!’

  Hervey took another sip. ‘Yes, I suffer from remittent fever. What is the connection?’

  ‘Where do you suppose you contracted it?’

  Hervey laughed. ‘I know very well where I contracted it, I assure you! The stinking swamps of Rangoon!’

  ‘Mal aria.’

  ‘Just so.’

  Sam took a longer sip of his brandy. ‘The problem, you see, is that there are marshes without malaria, and malaria without marshes. And if this is so it surely cannot be that the circumstances alone – torpid water, decaying vegetable or animal matter, excreta – it cannot be that these of themselves generate the disease, else it would be invariable. And what might account for the different diseases? Do we suppose, say, that a rotting cat begets an influenza miasma, whereas glanders comes from a dead dog?’

  Hervey looked thoughtful. ‘I had not considered it in those terms, no. What do you say is the progenitor?’

  Sam sighed again, but out of weariness with his own state of knowledge. ‘There is no doubt, from extensive observation, that filthy conditions are associated with disease. But the connection is not for me sufficiently explained by the miasmatists. I am drawn instead to the notion of animalculae, germs – we may call them what we like: the most infinitesimally small creatures, which somehow invade the body. It is but speculation, and some hold it to be perilously wild, and yet I am convinced it is the future, at least so far as specific disease is concerned. For the non-specific I myself believe the cause remains an imbalance in the body’s humours. Oh, not the bile and phlegm and such like; there is much more to it than that. But if we observe a spontaneous growth in the organs of an otherwise healthy horse we may conclude that the microscopical constituents of the animal’s physiology are … un-balanced. So far as I may see, the treatment of non-specific disease must tend to the restitution of that balance – by medication, by surgery perhaps, or by the proper regulation of the animal’s regimen and environment. That is the business of farriery, Hervey – of horse-management as you progressives call it. And what every man in the Sixth should strive to excel in.’

  Hervey drained his glass and held it out for more. ‘That is understood. But are you implying that the other sort of disease, the “specific” kind, is beyond our management?’

  ‘No,’ said Sam, in a tone not altogether certain. ‘Let me explain – so far as we may surmise, for positive knowledge has not yet been vouched-safe to us. What is a germ, animalcula, call it what you will? We do not rightly know. Imagine, however – for I believe the comparison apt, not least for its etymology – a germ is like a seed, wholly aboriginal. No wheat can grow but from a wheat seed, no oak tree but from an acorn. Likewise, no specific disease can be reproduced unless there is a germ of that disease present in the nidus.’

  ‘Nidus?’

  ‘Your Latin?’

  ‘Ah, indeed.’

  ‘Just so: the nest of the infection.’

  ‘Which is situate where?’

  Sam raised his hands. ‘That is the question: in the air, or water, or feculence. That is what science must address itself to.’

  For the moment, Hervey had quite forgotten the troubles of the night and his smarting over the vexed order. He wanted to know more, for it revealed as much about Sam Kirwan as it did of veterinary science. ‘How do these “germs” get into the nest?’

  Sam declared that that was yet another question. He explained that, taking the seed analogy further, in order for the acorn to grow into an oak the climatical conditions must be favourable, otherwise it would lie dormant. He believed it was possible for germs to be present in the horse ab origine, and that if the favourable conditions were understood, germination of the disease could be prevented. But the point was, what should be the treatment of the disease once it had developed? The symptoms must be treated, of course, for they were enervating, even fatal, but – and here he admitted that his analogy was uncertain – it was not known if the germ remained active within the body once the disease had developed. If it did, then only by destroying the germ could the disease be terminated, unless it somehow reverted to dormancy in the natural course of things. ‘This,’ he concluded, ‘is another of the areas in which science must ask impertinent questions.’

  Hervey, tired though he was, followed the reasoning well enough – testimony, he observed, to the veterinarian’s powers of clear thinking. ‘The farriers are well able to ameliorate the symptoms, under your direction, but how is the germ itself to be destroyed? To begin with, are you able to see it?’

  Sam inclined his head. ‘Were I to know where to look, perhaps, and had I a microscope with the power to see so small a thing. But how should I recognize it?’

  ‘It would not be evident? I remember once being told that a bird was best recognized by observing what it did.’

  ‘That is very true. And it would be well therefore to observe the blood of both the diseased animal and the healthy – and the excreta and mucus.’

  Hervey now sat up, as if to say he had other things to be about. ‘Eminently sensible. And that is presumably what you have been able to do in the case of A Troop’s sick?’

  ‘To a point, but, as I said, I do not have a microscope with one hundredth of the power I might need to see a germ at work.’

  Hervey frowned, but with a wry smile. ‘It seems to me therefore that you could never disprove your theory; only demonstrate the need of a more powerful microscope.’

  Sam shrugged. ‘Neither do I think this country is the best place to observe, for all the sick in A Troop’s lines. Which is why, Hervey – and I would have wished to tell you in more agreeable circumstances – I have applied to the East India Company for employment.

  The tropics are the place to observe diseases. The virulence is much more marked.’

  Hervey was on the edge of his chair, dismayed. ‘There’s no doubt the tropics are the place to contract the most wretched of diseases! Sam, I’m uncommonly sorry you want to leave us, and so soon. Your stock will be awful high in both mess and canteen, the way you’ve handled things. Is there nothing will induce you to change your mind?’

  Sam smiled thankfully and shook his head. ‘Believe me, Hervey, nothing would otherwise induce me to leave. The regiment is well-found, and, in truth, I find association with you wholly agreeable. But I have a most determined sense in this: I wish to make my science where it is hot, for heat is the nursemaid of contagion. You will be the first to read of my conclusions, I assure you!’

  Hervey knew there were times when a prudent officer withdrew and let his subordinates carry on, whether they were other officers or NCOs. And now was such a time. Without him in barracks for the regimental staff to consult, or to make the troop officers look over their shoulders, what needed to be done would be done, and much the more expeditiously. Besides, he wanted time to think over a number of matters. As much as anything he wanted to dine with his old friend, Peto. He had no stauncher ally than Captain, lately Commodore, Sir Laughton Peto K.C.B. He enjoyed his company as much as he did Eyre Somervile’s, and it was true beyond doubt that he owed his life – twice – to Peto’s address, which made something particular of their friendship.

  Hervey had but one duty to detain him in barracks, and that was to render a full account of the affair at Waltham Abbey, which both custom and discretion required to be submitted to the district headquarters within the day. Behind the closed doors of his office, therefore, he penned five close-written sides of foolscap, four of which comprised an entirely factual narrative of the night’s events (with various commen
dations), and the last a submission that in his judgement the action of the malefactors was so strange as to make him conclude the enterprise was the work of agents provocateurs. He did not add, though he was sorely tempted, that such work was not unknown, and that perhaps the malpractices of the Home Office in Lord Sidmouth’s time, not a decade before, had not been wholly extirpated.

  When he was finished, he gave the despatch to the adjutant and asked that it be copied and taken by officer’s hand to the Horse Guards. Then he went to his quarters, where Johnson had drawn his bath, and in an hour, refreshed and dressed, he set out for the United Service Club.

  Corporal Denny and the regimental chariot had been engaged on business in connection with the night before, so Hervey had had to send Johnson to the post-house in Hounslow to engage a hack chaise, with four horses at five shillings a mile to make the journey fast in one stage. He was able thereby to dismiss the coachman at the door of the United Service in Charles Street at precisely ten minutes to eight, a mere one hour and twenty minutes after leaving the barracks, although at uncommon cost to his pocket.

  Peto was sitting in the coffee room reading the Edinburgh Review when Hervey entered.

  ‘Would you not be better served by a Tory paper if you are calling on their lordships?’

  Peto lowered his journal. ‘Hah! You’ve heard then: Clarence to be Lord High Admiral! As well make my chaplain pope!’

  Several members – some, officers of high rank – turned their heads, but Peto did not notice; or affected not to notice. He stood, and they shook hands.

  ‘So you are come for admiralty orders?’

  Peto grimaced again. ‘Let us speak of it suitably victualled. Sherry?’

  Hervey nodded, and Peto caught the waiter’s eye.

  ‘A dish apiece of the club Fino if you will.’

  The waiter bowed and shuffled off, and both men sank into the tired-looking leather tubs that would soon be thrown out in the United Service’s move to superior quarters.

  ‘What is that stink?’ growled Peto as he laid aside the Review. ‘Worse than a whaler’s bilge!’

  ‘The gaslight, I imagine,’ replied Hervey, with a shrug. He was quite used to it, for he was lately something of an habitue of the club, whereas Peto’s time was divided between the quarterdeck and the wilds of Norfolk. ‘You should have smelled the old oil-gas, before it was coal.’

  Peto pulled a face. ‘Rank stuff, sperm oil. Not cheap either: eight shillings a gallon at Lynn!’ He huffed. ‘Well, I think ours here are very moderate quarters, I must say. I had rather be at sea in a sixth-rate.’

  Hervey knew full well he would rather be at sea. Peto had spent so little time ashore that even the gentlemanly estate he had taken nearby his childhood parsonage, provenance of two decades’ prize money, could not divert him sufficiently. Not without a wife, at least; and that was an unlikely prospect by all the evidence of a dozen years’ acquaintance. ‘I imagine in Pall Mall we shall be altogether better provided for.’

  ‘Nero’s Palace?’ sneered Peto (the new club was rising on the site of Carlton House, which had been the Prince of Wales’s dissipated residence). ‘Deuced lot of money just to be nearer the Admiralty and Horse Guards!’

  ‘I don’t think that touched on the decision. You’ve seen the rooms upstairs here.’

  ‘I have. Tolerable, I’d say.’

  Hervey pulled a face. He knew when his old friend was being perverse.

  ‘Now, this business at Waltham Abbey: the coffee room was awash with the crack earlier. Talk of cavalry, and fire exchanged. Do you know of it?’

  ‘I’m sorry to say I do. That is why I could not come before. We were most particularly engaged.’

  ‘A pretty kettle of fish, by all accounts. Or rather, by those accounts to be had. And by God there were plenty to be had in the coffee room. None mentioned your gallants, though. I shall be all attention. You were not discomposed greatly, I trust?’

  ‘Discomposed?’ Hervey sighed. ‘One of ours killed, and four more wounded.’

  Peto looked suitably aghast. ‘My dear fellow. Who was your man killed, any I should know?’

  The waiter returned, and they took their glasses.

  Hervey shook his head. ‘A dragoon called Lightowler, not long with us, joined just before Bhurtpore. He had an uncle a serjeant. I always thought it a most pleasant name. A good sort too; never complained said the corporals. He had a blood-red right eye, most strange.’

  Peto looked approving. ‘I have always admired your knowing your dragoons as men.’

  Hervey looked faintly puzzled. ‘You, I recall, knew all your crew.’

  ‘Hervey, do you suppose those fine fellows in red who drill each day over yonder’ (he nodded in the direction of the Horse Guards) ‘are known to anyone but as a number?’

  Hervey’s brow furrowed. ‘That is rather different. To see a company of infantry load and volley is like seeing a machine working, a machine with a deuced lot of parts.’

  ‘You have seen many machines working, have you?’

  He reflected the smile. ‘Now that you mention it…’

  ‘Just so.’ Peto looked solicitous again. ‘Was anyone else hurt?’

  ‘Worsley, one of the troop captains, and Mr Hairsine, the sarn’t-major. You remember him?’ Peto nodded.

  ‘And two others. They’ll all be well in due course says the surgeon, but…’

  ‘The Evening Mail’s saying it was a papist affair.’

  Hervey inclined his head. ‘And very convenient that is for the opposition to the Catholic Association. There’ll be motions in parliament this very week to set the law on them, I shouldn’t wonder.’

  Peto took another sip of his sherry. ‘Damned fine, this, Hervey,’ he said, holding it up to the light to appreciate it fully. ‘But I must say, I had not appreciated you were quite so strong for emancipation. You keep your opinion to yourself, I trust? Not exactly the way to honours with your new commander-in-chief.’

  Hervey raised an eyebrow. The Duke of Wellington had always made plain his opinion, not that that would have made any difference to him. But above all the duke was pragmatic. ‘I think now the Duke of York is dead you may find Wellington is of a different mind. That, at any rate, is what John Howard says. But see, I have no very strong opinion. I only object to being drawn into the game of it. And I very much suspect that last night was such a game.’

  Rather to Hervey’s surprise, for his old friend had never been what could be called circumspect, Peto glanced left and right and lowered his voice. ‘They buy at Berry Brothers, you know, as do I.’

  Hervey was mystified.

  ‘Who?‘

  ‘Our club!’

  Hervey kicked himself. He was out of practice in his friend’s methods of conversation. The signal to change subjects had not been so obscure. ‘You will be laying in more for your next commission, then? Or shall you be able to buy directly whence it’s shipped?’

  But Peto looked suddenly pained. ‘Hervey, my old friend, there will be no more commissions. I shan’t get another ship. They’re being laid up as we speak in every creek between Yarmouth and the Isle of Wight. I shan’t even make the “yellow squadron”. Certainly not now that Clarence is Lord High Admiral.’

  Hervey was taken aback. His old friend was frequently acerbic, but never despondent. ‘I cannot believe it. You were commodore twice. You were made K.C.B. but six months ago. I cannot believe the admiralty would dispense with such a record.’

  ‘The record is by no means singular. And Clarence has no opinion of me.’

  ‘After Ava?’ Hervey was doubly incredulous. ‘Wherefore does Clarence have no opinion of you?’

  ‘Perhaps because I have none of him.’

  ‘Ah.’ Hervey recognized the condition. ‘But Clarence will not be appointing captains, surely?’

  ‘That is his prerogative, and I’m told he intends exercising it. I’d as soon throw in with Cochrane and his Greeks.’

  Hervey nodded thoughtfully
. He had read that Admiral Cochrane had taken command of the Greek navy. ‘And do you see that Colonel Church is to be “generalissimo” of their army? I’d thought at one time to apply to him myself.’

  ‘I don’t know any Colonel Church,’ replied Peto, absently.

  ‘Nor do I, but I’ve read of him. He was with the Corsican Rangers, then raised a battalion of Greeks in our service.’

  ‘What stands in your way, then? You’d have the sun on your back again.’

  Hervey smiled, with a touch of modesty. ‘I believe I shall soon have the regiment. I’ve been left a considerable legacy for the purpose – by Daniel Coates. You remember Dan Coates? He died not a fortnight ago.’

  ‘I do remember. I’m sorry to hear it. Salt of the earth.’

  Hervey nodded. ‘Just so. And ever generous.’

  Peto brightened. ‘But this is good news: lieutenant-colonel! And not before time – long after time, indeed! We must have champagne. When is it accomplished?’ He beckoned the waiter eagerly.

  ‘Wait! It is not accomplished. There are formalities. I have applied to the colonel. I know he wishes me to have it, but there are other irons in that fire and it may be some time. Besides, Somervile’s to be lieutenant-governor at the Cape Colony and has made me a most tempting offer.’

  ‘And you’re disposed to accept?’

  ‘I’m certainly disposed to thinking of it, especially if the alternative is to be more as last night.’

  Peto looked disappointed. ‘I don’t believe you would refuse your regiment even for a brigade of Marines! … We can at least have a good claret?’

  Hervey smiled. ‘I can see no reason why not; there is still your own honour to celebrate.’

  Peto rose. ‘It gets me a table next to the window here, but that, I think, is the extent of its usefulness. But let us go and dine. I hear they douse the galley fire at nine.’

  The house dinner room was full, the window wall lined with KCBs and some more senior honours. They took the last table, in a dark corner but convenient for confidential talk, which Hervey at least was pleased with. A waiter brought the list.