Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 128.djvu/182

Rh  all the papers and letters which he had thought worth preserving since he entered the service. The contents were not heavy, his correspondence not being voluminous, and were soon examined; but although the impression on his mind was clear that he had not destroyed the note, it was not to be found; and accordingly, he wrote a few lines to Kirke to say that he had not been able to find the note among his papers, and concluded that it must have been lost or destroyed.

Two days afterwards he was again summoned to attend the court of inquiry which was still sitting at the mess-house of the regiment, when the president put the following question to him: —

"You stated. Major Yorke, when last under examination, that you had received a note from your commanding officer, Colonel Kirke, dated on or about the 30th April 1859, to the effect that he had made over the jewels taken from the body of a rebel to the prize-agents. Can you produce the letter for the information of the court?"

Yorke replied that he had searched for the letter, but had been unable to find it.

"Then do you wish to make any statement to the court with reference to the accompanying document?" and so saying, the president placed a letter in Yorke's hands.

It was from Kirke, written the previous day, addressed to the president of the court, and to the effect that with reference to a statement made to the court on a previous occasion by Major Yorke, regarding the receipt of a letter from him, Colonel Kirke, relative to the disposal of the jewels, he had to state that Major Yorke must be labouring under some extraordinary hallucination, to put the most generous construction on his conduct which it could be made to bear, for that no such letter had ever been written by him.

On reading this letter Yorke understood for the first time how matters stood with his unfortunate commandant; everything that had before seemed doubtful or confused now became clear. This letter was evidently the last resource of a desperate man.

Yorke remained silent for a space, the letter in his hand, and then returning it to the president said that he had nothing further to state at present. Kirke's case now was bad indeed, but he would at least do nothing to make it worse.

It was soon after this, and while the court were still deliberating, that the bankers' affidavits and the prize-agents' letters already referred to were received. Kirke's object in denying that he had written the letter was now apparent, and the report of the court was much more unfavourable than it would have been if the inquiry had been closed at an earlier stage. There was extreme disinclination at headquarters to take proceedings against so distinguished an officer as Colonel Kirke; but it was felt that even if the other matters could have been condoned in consideration of his eminent services, the suspicion of falsehood now attaching to him could not be passed over. General Tartar received orders to place him under arrest, and the judge-advocate-general of the division was directed to frame charges against him on all the different allegations.

Hitherto the proceedings had been nominally secret, although the nature of them had naturally leaked out; but there was now no longer any concealment about them, and the coming "Kirke court-martial" occupied public attention fully as much as the advance on Pekin, and was discussed in every station from one end of India to the other; and while there was a general sentiment of regret that so dashing a soldier should have fallen into such trouble, there were not wanting prophets after the event to say that it was no more than what they had expected from the man's antecedents; while most people felt that, even if acquitted, the very fact that it should have been necessary to bring him to trial must leave an indelible stain on his character. The list of charges was indeed a formidable one: drawing pay for men not on the muster-roll; withholding prize property; and lastly, conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman, in having stated in a letter, and so forth, he knowing the same statement to be false.

Happily for poor Olivia, the state of her health during the course of these proceedings prevented her from going into society, and so she escaped the allusions and questionings, and possibly the slights, which her husband's present position might have occasioned. She had indeed but a very imperfect knowledge of what was going on, for latterly she had seen no one but her husband, who professed to make light of the inquiry; and although it was plain to her, notwithstanding his efforts at concealment, that he was labouring under great anxiety, she ascribed it to the cause he assigned — the worry arising out of the misconduct of one of his native