of marechal des logis in the 22nd of the line.  In so far as a brute can be a good soldier, he was a good soldier; the Cross was on his breast, and gallantly earned; but in all things outside his line of duty the man was no other than a brawling, bruising ignorant pillar of low pothouses.  As a gentleman by birth, and a scholar by taste and education, I was the type of all that he least understood and most detested; and the mere view of our visitors would leave him daily in a transport of annoyance, which he would make haste to wreak on the nearest victim, and too often on myself.

It was so now.  Our rations were scarce served out, and I had just withdrawn into a corner of the yard, when I perceived him drawing near.  He wore an air of hateful mirth; a set of young fools, among whom he passed for a wit, followed him with looks of expectation; and I saw I was about to be the object of some of his insufferable pleasantries.  He took a place beside me, spread out his rations, drank to me derisively from his measure of prison beer, and began.  What he said it would be impossible to print; but his admirers, who believed their wit to have surpassed himself, actually rolled among the gravel.  For my part, I thought at first I should have died.  I had not dreamed the wretch was so observant; but hate sharpens the ears, and he had counted our interviews and actually knew Flora by her name.  Gradually my coolness returned to me, accompanied by a volume of living anger that surprised myself.

‘Are you nearly done?’ I asked.  ’Because if you are, I am about to say a word or two myself.’

‘Oh, fair play!’ said he.  ’Turn about!  The Marquis of Carabas to the tribune.’

‘Very well,’ said I.  ’I have to inform you that I am a gentleman.  You do not know what that means, hey?  Well, I will tell you.  It is a comical sort of animal; springs from another strange set of creatures they call ancestors; and, in common with toads and other vermin, has a thing that he calls feelings.  The lion is a gentleman; he will not touch carrion.  I am a gentleman, and I cannot bear to soil my fingers with such a lump of dirt.  Sit still, Philippe Goguelat! sit still and do not say a word, or I shall know you are a coward; the eyes of our guards are upon us.  Here is your health!’ said I, and pledged him in the prison beer.  ‘You have chosen to speak in a certain way of a young child,’ I continued, ’who might be your daughter, and who was giving alms to me and some others of us mendicants.  If the Emperor’—­saluting—­ ’if my Emperor could hear you, he would pluck off the Cross from your gross body.  I cannot do that; I cannot take away what His Majesty has given; but one thing I promise you—­I promise you, Goguelat, you shall be dead to-night.’

I had borne so much from him in the past, I believe he thought there was no end to my forbearance, and he was at first amazed.  But I have the pleasure to think that some of my expressions had pierced through his thick hide; and besides, the brute was truly a hero of valour, and loved fighting for itself.  Whatever the cause, at least, he had soon pulled himself together, and took the thing (to do him justice) handsomely.