"Gentlemen," he said, "I have great news for you. A vessel has just come in from Plymouth with dispatches. Napoleon has escaped from Elba. He has landed in France, and been received with enthusiasm. The troops have joined him, and he is already close to Paris, which he is expected to enter without opposition. The King of France has fled."
For a moment there was silence, then the major leaped to his feet.
"Three cheers, gentlemen!" and all of those present joined in a hearty cheer.
Then a sudden silence fell upon them. The first idea that had struck each man was that the news meant their again taking the field for another stirring campaign. Then the dismal thought occurred to them that the regiment was under orders for America. It soon found expression in words.
"Why, major, they surely won't be sending us across the Atlantic now this news has arrived. The Powers will never permit all their work to be undone, and Napoleon to mount the throne of France again. Why, in a short time all Europe will be in a blaze, and how is England to take the field again? The greater portion of Wellington's army are scattered over the world—in America, India, and the Colonies. I don't believe there are half a dozen of the old fighting regiments available, and even their ranks are half-filled with raw recruits. Almost all the regiments at home are mere skeletons. Surely they will never be sending us away at such a moment?"
"That I can say nothing about," the adjutant replied. "Certainly no counter orders have reached the colonel this evening. I don't suppose anything will be decided upon for some time. The Powers will all exchange notes and hold councils and spend weeks in talk before they make up their mind whether anything is to be done, and if so what; and long before they come to any decision on the subject we shall be on the other side of the Atlantic, and then, possibly, after all the trials and monotony of perhaps a two months' voyage, we may land there only to be fetched back again. I quite agree with you that England can put nothing worth calling an army in the field, and that it would be madness to send a fine regiment out of the country at the present moment. But everyone knows the lack of wisdom with which we are governed, and the miserable slowness of our military authorities. It is not likely even to occur to any one to countermand our orders, but it will certainly be disgusting in the extreme to have to start just at the present moment."
"Beside," another officer said, "it will be maddening to be two months at sea without news, and to know that perhaps all Europe is in arms and tremendous events going on and we out of it altogether."
"I should think nothing will be done just at present," the major said. "Every country in Europe has been disbanding its armies just as we have since peace was proclaimed, and it will be a long time before any of them are ready to take the field in anything like force. Even Napoleon himself, great organizer as he is, will take some time to put all France under arms again. An army is a machine that cannot be created in a day. The soldiers have to clothed, arms to be manufactured, the cavalry to be mounted, the artillery to be organized, and a field train got together. No, I should say that at least four months must elapse before fighting begins in earnest. With anything like a favorable wind we should be across in America in a month. If orders are sent out a month after we start we may be back in time for the opening ball. Judging from the past, it is likely to be a long business unseating Napoleon again, and if we are not in for the first of it we may be in plenty of time for a fair share of the fighting, always supposing that the authorities are sufficiently awake to the merits of the regiment to recall us."
"How is the wind this evening?" one of the officers asked.
"It was westerly when we came in," Lieutenant Desmond said. "Why do you ask?"