“Who is the oldest lieutenant?”
“This gentleman, who came last night,” replied the sergeant calmly.
The colonel smiled bitterly.
“Come, sir,” he said to me, “you are now in chief command. Fortify the gorge of the redoubt at once with wagons, for the enemy is out in force. But General C—— is coming to support you.”
“Colonel,” I asked him, “are you badly wounded?”
“Pish, my dear fellow. The redoubt is taken.”
THE VENDEAN MARRIAGE
BY JULES GABRIEL JANIN
Thackeray, writing from Paris to Mrs. Brookfield in 1849, says of Jules Janin: “He has made his weekly feuilleton (the Journal des Débats), famous throughout Europe—he does not know a word of English, but he translated Sterne and I think ‘Clarissa Harlowe.’ He has the most wonderful verve, humor, oddity, honesty, bonhomie ... bounced about the room, gesticulating, joking, gasconading, quoting Latin....” We know that Janin was more concerned in amusing his readers and himself than imparting instruction—though he did both.