"I entered the service," quoth the Major, "when the Peninsular War was at its height, and my commission was signed by the first gentleman in Europe, then Prince Regent; truly we had queer ideas of what constituted a gentleman in those days,
"'In my hot youth, when George III. was king.'
"I joined our first battalion in Spain, and had more than enough of marching, fighting, and starving in the desolate province of Estremadura, where Marshal Macdonald and General Foy never gave us a moment to spare. I was wounded at La Nava, and at the storming of Almarez. When I scrambled over the palisades, with my sword-arm in a sling, I remember a voltigeur officer rushing upon me with his sabre uplifted; but, on perceiving my wound, he lowered his weapon gracefully in salute, and passed on to encounter another. We took the garrison prisoners, blew up the works, and threw the guns into the Tagus. At night, when we buried the dead, by flinging them into their own trenches, I was shocked to perceive my generous and gallant voltigeur among them—cold and stiff—slain by a shot in his heart, and with his right hand still grasping the hilt of the same sabre with which he had threatened and so chivalrously spared me. I was at the defence of Alba, and with the covering army at Badajoz, and I fought at Victoria, where our colonel, the gallant Cadogan, was killed, and where we put up a statue to his memory; but so unlike him, that I am sure if the good man ever looks at it out of Heaven, he will never recognise himself.
"We had always hard fighting, for I belonged to the light troops; and so far as the head was concerned in those days, I was very well adapted for that branch of the service.
"My regiment, the Highland Light Infantry, belonged to the first brigade of the second division of infantry (Sir Rowland Hill's), and at the time when this little narrative opens was quartered at Aranjuez, a small town of Toledo, about twenty miles south of Madrid, on the left bank of the Tagus. Though we had been for some months in quarters of refreshment on the Portuguese frontier, and had there received several supplies of clothing, &c., from Britain, in consequence of the rapid movements of the army, which, by turning the positions on the Ebro and Douro, had driven back the French under Joseph and Jourdan, making them to traverse the whole length of Spain in one short month, and the incessant activity of the light troops, my uniform was reduced to a mere mass of rags. My cap, a kind of Highland bonnet, checquered, but without feathers (like that still retained by the 71st and 74th Regiments), was worn into many holes, and the rain came through upon my head. My epaulettes, or wings, were reduced to black wire; my coatee, turned to purple and black, was, like my Tartan trews, patched with cloth of every hue; my sash had shrunk to a remnant; the pipeclay had long disappeared from my shoulder-belt, and the sheath of my claymore was worn away until six inches of the bare blade stuck through it And such was the general appearance of the officers of our regiment, as, with our canvas haversacks, our blankets and cloaks slung in our sashes, and carrying wooden canteens, similar to those of the privates, we marched into Aranjuez, and defiled, with pipes playing and drums beating, towards the great summer palace of Philip II., which occupies a little island formed by the Tagus and the Xarama, and is surrounded by the most beautiful pleasure-grounds.
"In one hand I carried my sword, in the other a ham, which I had picked up when overhauling a French caisson. My lieutenant had a small wine-skin, and my ensign a round loaf under his arm; thus, we, the officers of the 1st company, looked forward, to what we deemed, in those hard times, a sumptuous repast, on halting in the quadrangle of the vast and silent palace, from which Joseph and his court had fled but a few hours before, leaving behind many a sign of their hasty departure. Here lay Turkey carpets half torn up; there, velvet hangings but half torn down; in one room were bales of furniture, ornaments, and plate, packed but abandoned; in another lay the remains of a sumptuous feast, the wine was yet in the half-emptied glass; the fork remained in the breast of the turkey; the ashes of a large fire yet smouldered in the vast kitchen, and in each apartment of these long and magnificent suites, which traverse the whole palace of Philip II., were splendid Parisian clocks, with their gilt pendulums yet wagging under crystal shades, and all remaining in statu quo, just as the French fugitives had left them, on the approach of our advanced guard.
"We chose our apartment, seized utensils, and, after a bath in the sandy Xarama to refresh us after our long and dusty march, we sat down to a supper on my ham, the ensign's loaf, and the lieutenant's skin of the country wine. Fresh from the royal gardens we took fruit in abundance; for the season was summer, and the purple grape, the golden apple, and the ruddier orange, with the ripe pomegranate, were all to be had at arm's length from the tall, painted windows. Nor were cigars wanting: for, when investigating the contents of a certain press, I found several boxes, from which we supplied ourselves, and gave the remainder to the men of our company, who were solacing themselves in the adjacent apartments, and lounging on the velvet sofas, down ottomans, and satin fauteuils, on which the fair demoiselles of the usurper's court had sat but the day before.
"The quarter-guards were set; the out-pickets had been posted in the direction of the enemy; in the palace court, our ten pipes had sounded for the tatoo, and, wearied to excess, we lay down, some on beds, and some on benches, but many more on the hard floor, where we slept soundly, and heedless of the advancing, the marching, and skirmishing of the morrow; for we light troops had always our full share of the latter.
"I was in this luxurious state—for dry quarters, and a sound sleep after a hearty meal, are great luxuries to the campaigner—when I was shaken by the shoulder, and I heard the devilish voice of our sergeant-major saying—
"'I beg your pardon, Captain ——; the first officer for duty is required to take convalescents to the rear They march an hour before daylight, and the adjutant sent me to warn you, sir, and say, the piper will blow the rouse in twenty minutes.'