THE STORY OF THE WHITE HORSE

Lafayette was born on September 6, 1757, in the province of Auvergne, now Cantal, Puy-de-DÔme, and Haute-Loire. His birthplace was the ChÂteau de Chavagnac, situated some six miles from ancient Brionde.

Auvergne was celebrated for men of character and honor rather than wealth and distinction—men who deserved to outlive kings, and whose jewels were virtues. It became a proverb that the men of Auvergne knew no stain, and hence the ensigns and escutcheons of the rugged soldiers of the mountain towns were associated with the motto, “Auvergne sans tache.”

These soldiers kept this motto of their mountain homes ever in view; they would die rather than violate the spirit of it.

Lafayette was of noble family, and appeared at court when a boy. But the gay court did not repress the spirit of Auvergne which lived in him, and grew. He was of noble family, and his father fell at the battle of Minden. The battery that caused his father’s death was commanded by General Phillips, against whom Lafayette fought in the great Virginia campaign.

At the age of sixteen, the spirit of the mountaineers of Auvergne rose within him. He became an ardent advocate of the liberties of men, and he seemed to see the star of liberty rising in the Western world, and he was restless to follow it. He heard of the American Congress as an assembly of heroes of a new era—the new Senate of God and human rights. Princes, after his view, should not violate the law of the people.

The heart of the King of France, while France at first professed neutrality in the American struggle, was with the patriots; so was the sympathy of the gay French court. The boy Lafayette knew this; he longed to carry this secret news to America.

He came to America, as we have described, with this secret in his heart.

The capture of Burgoyne in October, 1777, delighted France. The clock of liberty had struck; it only needed the aid of France to give independence to the Americans.

Lafayette became more restless. He had married into a noble family, but the companionship of a beautiful and true woman could not stifle this patriotic restlessness. He saw that he might be an influence in bringing France to the aid of America. To do this became his life.

The Queen espoused the cause of America; let us ever remember this, notwithstanding that there are so many unpleasant things about her to remember. Then the American cause seemed to fail in the Jerseys and France to lose her interest in it.

Young Lafayette’s heart was true to America in these dark hours. He knew that France could be aroused to action. He espoused the cause of America in her darkness, and doubtless dreamed of being able to convey to Washington a secret, that few other men so clearly saw. France would espouse the cause of America when events should open the way.

Never such a secret crossed the sea as young Lafayette bore in his bosom to Washington. It came, as it were, out of Auvergne; it was borne against every allurement of luxury and self; it was an inborn imperative. When a new world was to be revealed, Columbus had to sail; when liberty was to be established among men, Lafayette, the child of destiny, had to face the west; where was there another race of liberty-loving men like those of the Connecticut farmers? In Auvergne. Who of all men could represent this spirit of liberty in America? Lafayette.

He won the heart of America; even the British respected him. His true sympathy was the cause of his great popularity; his heart won all hearts.

In the terrible winter of 1778 the American army with Washington and Lafayette were at Valley Forge; the British were in Philadelphia, spending a gay winter reveling.

No pen can describe the destitution and suffering of the 5,000 or more patriots at Valley Forge. The white snows of that winter in the wilderness were stained with the blood of naked feet. Famine came with the cold.

The men were “hutted” in log cabins. “The general’s apartment is very small,” wrote Mrs. Washington; “he has a log cabin built to dine in, which has made our quarters much more tolerable than they were at first.”

There was no fresh meat there; no sufficient salted provisions. There were no cattle in the neighboring towns or States that could be spared for the army.

But they suffered in silence. They went half-clothed and hungry, but they did not desert.

“Nothing can equal their sufferings,” wrote one of an examining committee. Even the cannon was frozen in, and bitten by the frost were the limbs of those who were commissioned to handle them.

Had General Howe, whose army was dissipating at Philadelphia, led out his troops against the famine-stricken army in the Valley, what might have been the fate of the American cause?

The dissipations of the English army was one cause of its overthrow. That army had been reveling when surprised at Trenton.

With his men wasting and dying around him, shoeless, coatless, foodless, what was Washington to do?

At one of the dismal councils of his generals there came a counsel that made the hearts all quicken.

“Send to Connecticut for cattle. Let us appeal to Brother Jonathan again; he has never failed us.”

“I never made an appeal to Brother Jonathan but to receive help,” said the great commander.

The appeal was made. In his letter to Governor Trumbull, Washington said:

“What is still more distressing, I am assured by Colonel Blaine, deputy purchasing commissary for the middle district, comprehending the States of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, that they are nearly exhausted, and the most vigorous and active exertions on his part will not procure more than sufficient to supply the army during this month, if so long. This being the case, and as any relief that can be obtained from the more southern States will be but partial, trifling, and of a day, we must turn our eyes to the eastward, and lay our account of support from thence. Without it, we can not but disband. I must, therefore, sir, entreat you in the most earnest terms, and by that zeal which has eminently distinguished your character in the present arduous struggle, to give every countenance to the person or persons employed in the purchasing line in your State, and to urge them to the most vigorous efforts to forward supplies of cattle from time to time, and thereby prevent such a melancholy and alarming catastrophe.”

Read these words twice: “Without it the army must disband.”

As soon as Governor Trumbull had received the letter he called together the Council of Safety. He read it to them. They wept.

“An army of cattle might save the cause,” said one.

“Our suffering brothers shall have the army of cattle,” said Brother Jonathan.

He at once aroused the farmers of Connecticut. Horsemen dashed hither and thither, away from Hartford and from the war office to the hillside farms.

“Cattle! cattle!” they cried. “Our army is perishing. Washington has appealed to Brother Jonathan!”

At the head of these alarmists rode Dennis O’Hay, awakening the villages with his resonant brogue:

“It is cattle, an army of cattle, that Washington must have now! His men are going barefooted in the snow. Oh, the shame of it! His men have no meat to warm their veins in the cold. Oh, the shame of it! They fever, they wither, they are buried in clumps and clods. Oh, the shame of it! Arouse, or the heavens will fall down on you! Cattle! Cattle!”

The thrifty hillside farmers had made many sacrifices already, but they responded.

An army of cattle began to form. It increased. Nearly every farm could spare one or more beeves, armed with fat flesh and warm hides.

So it started, armed, as it were, with horns, Dennis leading them under officers.

Three hundred miles it marched, gathering force along the way.

It entered at last the dreary wilderness of the suffering camp. The men saw it coming. There went up a great shout, which ran along the camp, and went up from even the hospital huts:

“The Lord bless Brother Jonathan!”

The officers hailed the cattle-drivers.

“Should we win our independence,” said an officer, “what will we not owe to Brother Jonathan and his army of cattle from the provision State!”

Dennis froze with the others that winter.

In the spring he returned, moneyless, fameless. Half of his face was black, and one hand had gone. The explosion of a powder-wagon which he had been forcing on toward Washington’s army had caused the change in his appearance, but it was rugged work that Dennis O’Hay had done during that past winter for the army.

The Governor heard his story.

“Dennis O’Hay,” said he, “when America achieves her liberty, and her true history shall be written, the inspired historian will see in such as you the cause of the mighty event. It is men who are willing to suffer and be forgotten that advance the welfare of mankind; it is not wealth or fame that lifts the world: it is sacrifice, sacrifice, sacrifice! That means you, Dennis O’Hay.

“Dennis, did you know that they once offered me the place of the colonial agent to London? They did, and I refused for the good of my own people at home. That is a sweet thing for me to remember. The only thing that a man can have in this world to last is righteous life. This is true, Dennis: that the private soldier who seeks all for his cause and nothing for himself is the noblest man in the annals of war, unless it be a Washington.”

“And you, Governor Trumbull.”

Dennis took off his hat and bowed low.

The Governor also took off his hat and bowed twice, and the people who had gathered around took off their hats and shouted.

“The stars will hear ye when ye shout for Brother Jonathan,” said Dennis O’Hay. “I have brought home a secret with me.”

“What may it be?” asked many.

“It would not be a secret were I to tell it.”

Dennis, after driving his army of cattle, with underdrivers, had entered lustily the place of the halted army of desolation. He had remained there until spring. He was greeted there one day by two men, one a tower of majestic manhood, the other a glittering young man of warm heart and enthusiasm; they were Washington and Lafayette.

“Your army will save us, my good friend,” said the man of majestic presence.

“This army will save the cause,” said the younger officer.

There was a look of hope in his face that revealed to Dennis that he had some secret ground for this confidence.

Washington moved away to his marquee.

Dennis, hat in hand, said to Lafayette:

“May I detain you a moment, your Honor?”

“Yes, my honest man; what would you have? I hope that it may be something that I can grant.”

“Do you remember that day when you spoke of a body of men as the bugles of Auvergne?”

“Yes, my good friend, and how do those words impress you?”

“I can never tell. They are words within words. What I want to ask of you is—pardon my bluntness, I was not bred in courts, as you see—couldn’t you induce those men who blow the bugles of Ovan to come here and give us a lift? My heart tells me that they would be just the men we would need. I don’t so much hear words as the spirit of things, and the heart knows its own.”

“I will think of these things, my good friend of the honest heart. I do think of them now. I will entrust you, a stranger, with a secret. Will you never tell it until the day that makes it clear arrives?”

“Never, never, never—oh, my heart dances when I hear good things of the cause of these people struggling so mightily for their liberties—no, no, the tail goes with the kite; I will never tell.”

“I am now writing to the court of France. If I get good news, I will ask for the French mountaineers whose banner is Auvergne sans tache!”

“May the heavens all take off their hats to ye and the evil one never get ye. I can see them coming now, a kind o’ vision, with their banners flying. I have second sight, and see good things. Why do not people see good things now, like the prophets of old, and not witches and ghosts? To Dennis O’Hay the passing clouds are angels’ chariots. Oh, I will never forget you, and I would deem it an honor above honors if you will not forget Dennis O’Hay.”

“One thing more, good Dennis, I have to say to you before we part. If a French ship should come to Norwich from Lyons, you may learn more about Auvergne, which is the Connecticut of France.”

“Then you must be like the Governor, who is so all wrapped up in the cause that he has forgotten to grow old.”

The young French officer drew his cloak about him, and touched his hat and went to the marquee.

Dennis laid down to rest among some wasted men of the army by a fire of fagots. He dreamed, and he saw French ships sailing in the air. He had read the success of the cause amid all these miseries in the heart of young Lafayette.

“That boy general has the vision of it all,” said he.

The Irishman as a bearer of despatches from Governor Trumbull was not without importance.

Dennis lingered to rest by the marquees of the officers under the moon and stars. He listened for words of hope. One night Lafayette talked. He engaged all ears.

“I was born at Auvergne, in the mountain district of France,” said he, “and the soldiers of Auvergne are sons of liberty. They are mountaineers. I would that I could induce France to send an army of those mountaineers to America. They are rugged men; they believe in justice, and equal rights, and equal laws, and for this cause they are willing to die. They have a grand motto, to which they have always been true. It is ‘Auvergne sans tache’—Auvergne without a stain. I love a soldier of Auvergne, a mountaineer of the glorious air in which I was born.”

His mind seemed to wander back to the past.

“‘Auvergne sans tache,’” said he. “‘Auvergne sans tache’—these words command me, they have entered into my soul. Would these men were here, and that I could lead them to victory!”

Dennis caught the atmosphere.

“And sure, your Honor, people find what they seek, and all good dreams come true sometime, and you will bring them here some day. I seem to feel it in my soul.”

The officers shouted.

“And it is from Connecticut I am.”

The young Frenchman may never have heard of the place before.

“And brought despatches to General Putnam from Brother Jonathan.

“May I ask what were these words of the French mountaineers who are just like us—‘Auvergne sans tache’? I wonder if this poor head can carry those words back to Lebanon green—Ovan-saan-tarche! The words ring true, like a bell that rings for the future. I somehow feel that I will hear them again somewhere. Ovan-saan-tarche, Ovan-saan-tarche! I will go now. I must tell the Governor and all the people about it on the green—Ovan-saan-tarche! What shall I tell the people of the cedars?”

“Tell the people of the cedars that there is a young French officer in the camp here that thinks that he carries in his heart a secret that will give liberty to America; that aid will come from a district in France that grows men like the cedars.”

Now the secret of Lafayette haunted the mind of Dennis.

“A spandy-dandy boy told me something strange,” said he to the Governor, on his return. “He was a Frenchman, with a shelving forehead and red hair, and Washington seemed to be hugging his company, as it were; the General saw something in him that others did not see. I think he has what you would call a discerning of spirits. I thought I saw the same thing.”

“Washington, it is likely, relies on this officer, because the young Frenchman believes in him and in the cause,” said the Governor. “Washington is human, and he must have a lonesome heart, and he must like to have near him those who believe in him and in the cause. That is natural.”

There was to be a corn-roast in the cedars—a popular gathering where green corn was roasted on the ear by a great fire and distributed among the people.

Had Lebanon been nearer the sea there would have been a clambake, as the occasion of bringing together the people, instead of a corn-roast.

At the clambakes bivalves and fish were roasted on heated stones under rock-weed, sea-weed, and a covering of sail-cloth, the latter to keep down the steam.

The people gathered for the corn-roast, bringing luscious corn in the green husks, new potatoes, apples, and fruit. The women brought pandowdy, or pot-pies, made of apples baked in dough, which candied in baking, and also brown bread, and rye and Indian bread, and perhaps “no cake,” all of which was to be eaten on the carpet of the dry needles of the great pines that mingled among the cedars.

This was to be a lively gathering, for a report had gone abroad that Dennis had seen a prophet and had received great news from a young French officer, and that he would tell his story among the speeches on that day.

It was in the serene and sunny days of September. The locusts made a silvery, continuous music in the trees. The birds were gathering for migrations. The fields were full of goldenrod and wild asters, and the oaks by the wayside were here and there loaded with purple grapes.

The people came to the cedar grove from near and from far, and every one seemed interested in Dennis.

The Irishman towered above them all, bringing deadwood for the fires.

The feast was eaten on the ground, and the people were merry, all wondering what story Dennis, who had been to the army and seen the great Washington himself, would have to tell.

The people watched him as he brought great logs on his shoulders to feed the fire where the corn was roasted.

Brother Jonathan and his good wife came to the goodly gathering. The people arose to greet him, and the children gathered around him, and looked up to him as a patriarch. He was then some sixty-seven years old.

After the feast he lifted his hands and spoke to the people. The cedar birds gathered around him in the trees, and one adventurous crow came near and cawed. Dennis threw a stick at the crow, and said:

“Be civil now, and listen to the Governor!”

After the Governor had spoken, “Elder” Williams spoke. But it was from Dennis that the people most wished to hear.

They called upon the village esquire to speak.

He was a portly man. He arose and said:

“I will not detain you long. It is Dennis for whom you are waiting.”

He said a few words, and then called:

“Dennis? Dennis O’Hay?”

“At your service,” said Dennis, drawing near, hat in hand.

“Dennis, they say that you met a prophet in the army.”

“That I did, sir, and I mind me the secret of the skies is in his heart.”

“How did he look?”

“Oh, he was a skit of a man, with a slanting roof to his forehead, and lean-to at the back of it. He was all covered with spangles and bangles, and he followed the great Washington here and there, like as if he was his own son. That is how it was, sir.”

The people wondered. This was not the kind of a prophet that Elder Williams had preached about in the Lebanon pulpit for twoscore years.

The elder stood up, and said: “Be reverent, my young man.”

“That I am, sir. I answered the esquire after the truth, sir.”

“And what made you think that such a frivolous-looking man as that could be a prophet? Prophets are elderly men, and plain in their dress and habits, and grave in face. Why did you think that this gay young man was a prophet?”

“Because, your reverence, I could see that Washington believed in him—the great Washington, and the man prophesied, too.”

“To whom did he prophesy?”

“To me, to your humble servant, sir.”

The people laughed in a suppressive way, but wondered more than ever.

“What did he say, Dennis?”

“That I can never tell, sir. He has a woman’s heart, sir, and she has a man’s heart, sir, and both have the people’s heart, sir; and one day there will be fleets on the sea, sir, and strange armies will appear on our shores, sir. They may come here, sir, and encamp in the cedars, sir. Oh, I am an honest man, and seem to see it all, sir.”

“How old is your prophet, Dennis?”

“I would think that he might be twenty, sir; no, a hundred; no, as old as liberty, sir, with all his bangles and spangles.”

“That is very strange,” said the esquire. “I fear that you may have wheels in your head, Dennis—were any of your people ever a little touched in mind?”

“No, never; they had clear heads. An’ why do I believe that this young man carries a secret in his heart that will deliver America? Because he has the heart of the mountaineers of God. He belongs to the sons of liberty in France, and little he cares for his bangles and spangles.”

“But he is too young.”

“No, no; pardon me, sir, he has an ardent heart, that he has. It is all on fire. Wasn’t David young when he took up a little pebbly rock and sent the giant sprawling? Wasn’t King Alfred young when he put down his foot and planted England? Wasn’t Samuel young when he heard a voice?”

The people began to cheer Dennis.

“The true heart knows its own. Washington’s heart does.

“You may laugh, but I have met a prophet. The gold lace on him does not spoil his heart. He comes out of the past, he is going into the future; he loves everybody, and everybody that meets him loves him. Laugh if you will, but Dennis O’Hay has seen a prophet, and you will see what is in his heart some day.

“He has a motto. What is his motto, do you ask? Ovan-saan-tarche!—Ovan without a stain. That is the motto of the soldiers of the place where he was born. That place is like this place, I mind me. He says: ‘America will be free when she shall hear the bugles of Ovan.’”

“What is his name?” asked the esquire.

“His name? Bother me if I can remember it now. It is the same as the boy said. But you will come to know it some day, now heed you this word in the cedars. Lafayette—yes, Lafayette—that is his name. It is written in the stars, but bother me, it flies away from me now like a bird from a wicker-cage. But, but, hear me, ye good folks all, receive it, Governor, believe it, esquire—that young man’s heart holds the secret of America. There are helpers invisible in this world, and the heavens elect men for their work, not from any outward appearance, but from the heart. This is the way God elected David of old.”

A blue jay had been listening on a long cedar bough stretched out like an arm.

She archly turned her head, raised her crown and gave a trumpet-call, and flew over the people.

The men shouted, and the women and children cheered Dennis, and the grave Governor said:

“Life is self-revealing, time makes clear all things, and if our good man Dennis has indeed discovered a prophet, it will all be revealed to us some day. Elder Williams, pray!”

The old man stood up under the cedars; the women bowed. Then the people went home to talk of the strange tidings that Dennis had brought them.

Was there, indeed, some hidden secret of personal power in the heart of this young companion of Washington, who had made honor his motto and liberty his star?