CHAPTER XXIII.
NEW FRIENDS.
"Why unite to banish care?
Let him come our joys to share;
Doubly blest our cup shall flow
When it soothes a brother's woe;
'Twas for this the powers divine
Crowned our board with generous wine."
TANNAHILL.
"The first skirmish, perhaps, and the first general action certainly, will see you an officer; you shall be one yet, my boy, and a gallant one, I hope," said Warriston, shaking Quentin's hand.
The weird sisters' prophecy was not more grateful to the ears of the Scottish usurper than these words were to Quentin Kennedy; but he asked,—
"If I should be disabled before appointment?"
"Ah, the devil! don't think of that; you would get only a private soldier's pension."
"That is not very encouraging."
"'Tis better for the volunteer to be shot outright than merely mutilated. But remember, that many of our best officers have joined the army as simple volunteers. There was Lord Heathfield, the gallant defender of Gibraltar, began life as a volunteer with the 23rd at Edinburgh; and one of our Highland regiments, the 71st, I think, had as many as fifteen such cadets serving in its ranks during the American war, and splendid officers they have all become. I did not serve in America, for our corps was then in the Dutch service. The Prussian army under old Frederick was the Paradise of such volunteers, and I know one instance in which a soldier of my father's regiment was made a general in one year, by Frederick's mere caprice."
"A general!" exclaimed Monkton, who was somewhat soured by the slowness of his promotion.