“Yes,” said I, half aloud, “this is indeed a realization of what I longed and thirsted for,” the clang of the music and the tramp of the cavalry responding to my throbbing pulses as we moved along.
“Close up, there; trot!” cried out a deep and manly voice; and immediately a general officer rode by, followed by an aide-de-camp.
“There goes Cotton,” said Power. “You may feel easy in your mind now, Charley; there’s some work before us.”
“You have not heard our destination?” said I.
“Nothing is known for certain yet. The report goes, that Soult is advancing upon Oporto; and the chances are, Sir Arthur intends to hasten on to its relief. Our fellows are at Ovar, with General Murray.”
“I say, Charley, old Monsoon is in a devil of a flurry. He expected to have been peaceably settled down in Lisbon for the next six months, and he has received orders to set out for Beresford’s headquarters immediately; and from what I hear, they have no idle time.”
“Well, Sparks, how goes it, man? Better fun this than the cook’s galley, eh?”
“Why, do you know, these hurried movements put me out confoundedly. I found Lisbon very interesting,—the little I could see of it last night.”
“Ah, my dear fellow, think of the lovely Andalusian lasses with their brown transparent skins and liquid eyes. Why, you’d have been over head and ears in love in twenty-four hours more, had we stayed.”
“Are they really so pretty?”