"Still, it was a surprise when we attacked," Charlie said, "for they could not suppose that the small body they saw were going to assail them. Then, we had the cover of that snowstorm, and they did not see us, until we reached the edge of the ditch. Of course, your general ought to have made proper dispositions, and to have collected the greater part of his troops at the spot facing us, instead of having them strung out round that big semicircle, so that, when we made an entry they were separated, and each half was ignorant of what the other was doing. Still, even then they might have concentrated between the trenches and the town. But no orders had been given. The general was one of the first we captured. The others waited for the orders that never came, until it was too late. If the general who commanded on the left had massed his troops, and marched against us as we were attacking the position they held on their right, we should have been caught between two fires."
"It was a badly managed business, altogether," Doctor Michaeloff growled; "but we shall do better next time. We shall understand Charles's tactics better. We reckoned on his troops, but we did not reckon on him.
"Kelly tells me that you would not care to change service."
"My friends are in the Swedish army, and I am well satisfied with the service. I daresay, if Russia had been nearer England than Sweden is, and we had landed there first, we should have been as glad to enter the service of the czar as we were to join that of King Charles. Everyone says that the czar makes strangers welcome, and that he is a liberal master to those who serve him well. As to the quarrel between them, I am not old enough to be able to give my opinion on it, though, as far as I am concerned, it seems to me that it was not a fair thing for Russia to take advantage of Sweden's being at war with Denmark and Augustus of Saxony, to fall upon her without any cause of quarrel."
"Nations move less by morality than interest," Doctor Michaeloff said calmly. "Russia wants a way to the sea--the Turks cut her off to the south, and the Swedes from the Baltic. She is smothered between them, and when she saw her chance, she took it. That is not good morality. I admit that it is the excuse of the poor man who robs the rich, but it is human nature, and nations act, in the long run, a good deal like individuals."
"But you have not told me yet, doctor," Charlie said, turning the conversation, "whether the proposal for an exchange was accepted."
"The general had no power to accept it, Carstairs. It had to be referred to the czar himself."
"I wish his majesty could see me, then," Charlie laughed. "He would see that I am but a lad, and that my release would not greatly strengthen the Swedish army."
"But then the czar may be of opinion that none of his officers, who allowed themselves to be captured by a handful of men at Narva, would be of any use to him," Doctor Michaeloff laughed.
"That may, doubtless, be said of a good many among them," Charlie said, "but, individually, none of the captains could be blamed for the mess they made of it."