"There's coolness for you, Tiernay," said the colonel; "think what the 22d are made of when their vivandiere dares to do this."
"They'll not astonish him," said Lela, looking steadily at me.
"And why not, ma belle?" cried De Barre.
"He was a Tapageur, one of the 'Naughty Ninth,' as they called them."
"How do you know that, Lela? Have we ever met before?" cried I eagerly.
"I've seen you, sir," said she, slily. "They used to call you the corporal that won the battle of Kehl. I know my father always said so."
I would have given worlds to have interrogated her further; so fascinating is selfishness, that already at least a hundred questions were presenting themselves to my mind. Who could Lela be? and who was her father? and what were these reports about me? Had I really won fame without knowing it? and did my comrades indeed speak of me with honor? All these, and many more inquiries, were pressing for utterance, as General Massena walked up with his staff. The general fully corroborated De Barre's opinion of the "22d." They were, as he expressed,
a "magnificent body." "It was a perfect pleasure to see such troops under arms." "Those fellows certainly exhibited few traces of a starved-out garrison." Such and such like were the jesting observations bandied from one to the other, in all the earnest seriousness of truth! What more terrible evidence of the scenes they had passed through, than these convictions! What more stunning proof of the condition to which long suffering had reduced them!
"Where is our pleasant friend, who talked to us of the Black Forest last night?"
"Ah, there he is; well, Monsieur Tiernay, do you think General Moreau's people turned out better than that after the retreat from Donaueschingen?"