“It came slow, my lord, dooms slow,” replied Dalgetty; “but as my Scottish countrymen, the fathers of the war, and the raisers of those valorous Scottish regiments that were the dread of Germany, began to fall pretty thick, what with pestilence and what with the sword, why we, their children, succeeded to their inheritance.  Sir, I was six years first private gentleman of the company, and three years lance speisade; disdaining to receive a halberd, as unbecoming my birth.  Wherefore I was ultimately promoted to be a fahndragger, as the High Dutch call it (which signifies an ancient), in the King’s Leif Regiment of Black-Horse, and thereafter I arose to be lieutenant and ritt-master, under that invincible monarch, the bulwark of the Protestant faith, the Lion of the North, the terror of Austria, Gustavus the Victorious.”

“And yet, if I understand you, Captain Dalgetty,—­I think that rank corresponds with your foreign title of ritt-master—­”

“The same grade preceesely,” answered Dalgetty; “ritt-master signifying literally file-leader.”

“I was observing,” continued Lord Menteith, “that, if I understood you right, you had left the service of this great Prince.”

“It was after his death—­it was after his death, sir,” said Dalgetty, “when I was in no shape bound to continue mine adherence.  There are things, my lord, in that service, that cannot but go against the stomach of any cavalier of honour.  In especial, albeit the pay be none of the most superabundant, being only about sixty dollars a-month to a ritt-master, yet the invincible Gustavus never paid above one-third of that sum, whilk was distributed monthly by way of loan; although, when justly considered, it was, in fact, a borrowing by that great monarch of the additional two-thirds which were due to the soldier.  And I have seen some whole regiments of Dutch and Holsteiners mutiny on the field of battle, like base scullions, crying out Gelt, gelt, signifying their desire of pay, instead of falling to blows like our noble Scottish blades, who ever disdained, my lord, postponing of honour to filthy lucre.”

“But were not these arrears,” said Lord Menteith, “paid to the soldiery at some stated period?”

“My lord,” said Dalgetty, “I take it on my conscience, that at no period, and by no possible process, could one creutzer of them ever be recovered.  I myself never saw twenty dollars of my own all the time I served the invincible Gustavus, unless it was from the chance of a storm or victory, or the fetching in some town or doorp, when a cavalier of fortune, who knows the usage of wars, seldom faileth to make some small profit.”

“I begin rather to wonder, sir,” said Lord Menteith, “that you should have continued so long in the Swedish service, than that you should have ultimately withdrawn from it.”