A MAIDEN SWASHBUCKLER.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLIII, Issue 106, 3 May 1909, Page 3

A MAIDEN SWASHBUCKLER.

(By Martin Hume.)

One evening late in 1819 the streets of the little Peruvian Andean, city of Ayatucho the clash of aii'-ms and the shouts of angry men was heard. One of those reckless soldiers of King Philip who held his life so cheaply had been summoned to siurendetr by the officers of the law for a murder recently committed by him in. a, gambling brawl at Cuzoo, the ancient Inca capital, a hunda-ed and fifty miles away, and, as was the worst- of such gallamts, he had shown fight

The constables had called for aid in the King's name; the soldiers had summoned to his side all Biscay men within hearing, and scon rapiers flashed aaid pistols cracked o*l both sides, for the ensign, thus mim to earth at last by the iaw was a-notori-ous desperado, who had already shot five of the constables sent hot-foot after him from Cuzco, and this time no quarter was to be shown him. "Kill him! Kill him!" shouted the Corregidor— for this gambler, thief, brawler, and murderer, brave and distinguished soldier though he was, had at last tired out the patience of the law, from whose clutches he had managed to escape numberless times without punishment for his offences. Just when the affray was at its hottest torches flashed, and through the struggling combatants the dignified old Bishop of Guanianga, "with his servitors around him, forced his way. "Peace! Peace!" he cried. "Im the name of the Church, put up your arms! And you, sir ensign," he said to the cause of all the disorder, "give me your weapon, for with me you shall be safe." "But, my lord," cried the malefactor, "I aan surrounded with armed foes. How shall I be safe?" As the bishop was reassuring him, the constables again endeavoured, to seize their prey, but the bishop's household, shocked at such disrespect to the Church, rescued the ensign, wihomi the prelate, hand in hand, led into sanctuary amidst the angry protests of the officers of the law.

His wounds dressed, and1 (refreshed by a good might's sleep, the esitsigin, who for fifteen years had bravely fought the King's battles iai Peru-in the intervalsof the lawless deeds that had made his name a byword, was summoned to the bishop'® (room and exhorted to load a. new life. Thei fear of sudden death dm sin, ih& divine vengeance upon the evildoer, the horrors of hell, were seifc forth by the good churchman in words of burning eloquence, as one human soul speaks to another. The soldier grew graver and paler as the prelate's exhortation went on,, and then suddenly, as if moved by an irresistible impulse, he threw himself upon his knees and avowed that all he had told his protector was a lie; that he was not a man at all, but a woman, who for love of adventure had escaped from her convent as a novice in Spain, and for fifteen years had led the life of a soldier. She gave her name as Catalina De Erauso, of San Sebaistiain, and when, -some time afterwards, she returned to Spain, all Europe mang with her strange story. King Philip. IV. gave her a pension and confirmed' her military rank; the Pop© received her, and allowed her still to wear man's clothing; and books of her military adventures were printed more than once duaung i her lifetime. But the printed stories were, as may be supposed, severely reticent- about the crimes of theft and violence, even to killing her own brother in a brawl, which rumour laid to her charge, and it was not until the end or the eighteenth century that what purports to be a tame autography attracted the notice of scholars.

This story is an almost incredible series of frank avowals of crime of all sorts, and to some extent is almost certainly apocryphal. It is very doubtful, indeed, by a compatrison of dates,, whether the Nun. Ensign, as she was called, was really the Cataliaia De Erauso sfte professed to he at all, for none of heir kin recognised her. But in any case it is certain that, whatever her real name was, the woma.ii herself existed, and that many, if not all, of the astounding adventures related in her autobiography really happened. The autobiography was first printed in Spanish, with notes by Ferrer, in 1829, and! De Quincy wirote .a foolish shallow 'airticle, unworthy of him, upon it. It was »con forgotten., but fourteen yeasns ago the famous Franco-Spanish man of letters, Jose Maria Do Hereclia, repubHshed it in French in a, dainty volume

exquisitely illustrated by the great, Biscayan draughtsman, Daniel Vierge. . Mr Fisher Uinwin. has now issued an ■ English translation of this curious Avork, with, the Vierge plates—.tiny': prints—with line almost a® fime as silver-point etchings, mounted upcai dull blue backgrounds, and bound up with the text. The result is an. Un- . usual but certainly attracive_ bcok, : worth possessingj. even if only for the plates. The photogravure of the Nun Ensign herself, represents heir as a hard-featured, somewhat surly-looking soldier, and the several contemporary , descriptions of her that exist always j

dwjoll.- upon, her extremely masculine appearance. The boojc also contains, as did that of Ferrer, the text in -Spanish of a somewhaifc pooa- play by Pertz De Montalban, the contemporary of the Nun Ensign, founded upon ■some of the incidents of her surprising career.