“Well, sir,” said I, “however if a man expects to rise by his valour, he must show it somewhere; and if I were to have any command in an army, I would first try whether I could deserve it.  I have never yet seen any service, and must have my induction some time or other.  I shall never have a better schoolmaster than yourself, nor a better school than such an army.”  “Well,” says Sir John, “but you may have the same school and the same teaching after this battle is over; for I must tell you beforehand, this will be a bloody touch.  Tilly has a great army of old lads that are used to boxing, fellows with iron faces, and ’tis a little too much to engage so hotly the first entrance into the wars.  You may see our discipline this winter, and make your campaign with us next summer, when you need not fear but we shall have fighting enough, and you will be better acquainted with things.  We do never put our common soldiers upon pitched battles the first campaign, but place our new men in garrisons and try them in parties first.”  “Sir,” said I, with a little more freedom, “I believe I shall not make a trade of the war, and therefore need not serve an apprenticeship to it; ’tis a hard battle where none escapes.  If I come off, I hope I shall not disgrace you, and if not, ’twill be some satisfaction to my father to hear his son died fighting under the command of Sir John Hepburn, in the army of the King of Sweden, and I desire no better epitaph upon my tomb.”

“Well,” says Sir John, and by this time we were just come to the king’s quarters, and the guards calling to us interrupted his reply; so we went into the courtyard where the king was lodged, which was in an indifferent house of one of the burghers of Dieben, and Sir John stepping up, met the king coming down some steps into a large room which looked over the town wall into a field where part of the artillery was drawn up.  Sir John Hepburn sent his man presently to me to come up, which I did; and Sir John without any ceremony carries me directly up to the king, who was leaning on his elbow in the window.  The king turning about, “This is the English gentleman,” says Sir John, “who I told your Majesty had been in the Imperial army.”  “How then did he get hither,” says the king, “without being taken by the scouts?” At which question, Sir John saying nothing, “By a pass, and please your Majesty, from the English ambassador’s secretary at Vienna,” said I, making a profound reverence.  “Have you then been at Vienna?” says the king.  “Yes, and please your Majesty,” said I; upon which the king, folding up a letter he had in his hand, seemed much more earnest to talk about Vienna than about Tilly.  “And, pray, what news had you at Vienna?” “Nothing, sir,” said I, “but daily accounts one in the neck of another of their own misfortunes, and your Majesty’s conquests, which makes a very melancholy court there.”  “But, pray,” said the king, “what is the common opinion there about these affairs?” “The common people are terrified to the last degree,” said I, “and when your Majesty took Frankfort-upon-Oder, if your army had marched but twenty miles into Silesia, half the people would have run out of Vienna, and I left them fortifying the city.”  “They need not,” replied the king, smiling; “I have no design to trouble them, it is the Protestant countries I must be for.”