It fell, that once upon a time, when the combat was at the thickest, this plebeian champion headed a sudden charge, so rapid and furious that all fled before him.  He was several paces before his comrades, and had actually laid his hands on the patrician standard, when one of our party, whom some misjudging friend had entrusted with a couleau de chasse, or hanger, inspired with a zeal for the honour of the corps worthy of Major Sturgeon himself, struck poor Green-Breeks over the head with strength sufficient to cut him down.  When this was seen, the casualty was so far beyond what had ever taken place before, that both parties fled different ways, leaving poor Green-Breeks, with his bright hair plentifully dabbled in blood, to the care of the watchman, who (honest man) took care not to know who had done the mischief.  The bloody hanger was flung into one of the Meadow ditches, and solemn secrecy was sworn on all hands; but the remorse and terror of the actor were beyond all bounds, and his apprehensions of the most dreadful character.  The wounded hero was for a few days in the Infirmary, the case being only a trifling one.  But, though inquiry was strongly pressed on him, no argument could make him indicate the person from whom he had received the wound, though he must have been perfectly well known to him.  When he recovered and was dismissed, the author and his brothers opened a communication with him, through the medium of a popular ginger-bread baker, of whom both parties were customers, in order to tender a subsidy in name of smart-money.  The sum would excite ridicule were I to name it; but sure I am that the pockets of the noted Green-Breeks never held as much money of his own.  He declined the remittance, saying that he would not sell his blood; but at the same time reprobated the idea of being an informer, which he said was clam, i.e. base or mean.  With much urgency he accepted a pound of snuff for the use of some old woman—­aunt, grandmother, or the like—­with whom he lived.  We did not become friends, for the bickers were more agreeable to both parties than any more pacific amusement; but we conducted them ever after under mutual assurances of the highest consideration for each other.

Such was the hero whom Mr. Thomas Scott proposed to carry to Canada, and involve in adventures with the natives and colonists of that country.  Perhaps the youthful generosity of the lad will not seem so great in the eyes of others as to those whom it was the means of screening from severe rebuke and punishment.  But it seemed to those concerned to argue a nobleness of sentiment far beyond the pitch of most minds; and however obscurely the lad who showed such a frame of noble spirit may have lived or died, I cannot help being of opinion that, if fortune had placed him in circumstances calling for gallantry or generosity, the man would have fulfilled the promise of the boy.  Long afterwards, when the story was told to my father, he censured us severely for not telling the truth at the time, that he might have attempted to be of use to the young man in entering on life.  But our alarms for the consequences of the drawn sword, and the wound inflicted with such a weapon, were far too predominant at the time for such a pitch of generosity.