obtained this enviable post, no less by skill and conspicuous bravery, than by great good luck, and perhaps, though last not least, by an affection of coolness and danger, so exaggerated as to be sublime while it was ridiculous.
The little bugler was waiting for him now. When the ten minutes should have elapsed, and the silver lace on the Captain's uniform come gleaming round the corner, he was prepared to blow his heroic soul into the mouthpiece of his instrument.
Meanwhile he stood aloof from his comrades. He looked so much taller thus than when oppressed by comparison with those full-grown warriors.
The men were grouped about in knots, talking idly enough on indifferent subjects. Presently the majority gathered round a fresh arrival—a tall, forbidding-looking soldier, with iron-grey moustaches that nearly reached his elbows—who seemed to have some important news to communicate. As the circle of his listeners increased, there was obviously a growing interest and excitement in his intelligence.
"Who is it?" panted one, hurrying up.
"Killed?" asked another, tightening his sword-belt and twisting his moustaches fiercely to his eyes.
"It's a credit to the bourgeois!" "It's a disgrace to the corps!" exclaimed a couple in a breath; while, "Tell us all about it, Bras-de-Fer!" from half-a-dozen eager voices at once, served to hush the noisy assemblage into comparative silence.
Bras-de-Fer was nothing loth. A pompous old soldier, more of a martinet and less of a dandy perhaps than most of his audience, he loved, above all things, to hear himself speak. He was a notorious duellist, moreover, and a formidable swordsman, whence the nickname by which he was known among his comrades. He entered on his recital with all the zest of a professor.
"I was sitting," said he, with an air of grave superiority, "immediately in front of the coffee-house, Louis-Quatorze, a little after watch-setting. I was improving my knowledge of my profession by studying the combinations in a game of dominoes. By myself, Adolphe? Yes—right hand against left. Yet not altogether by myself, for I had a bottle of great Bordeaux wine—there is nothing to laugh at, gentlemen—on
