THE COOLEST MAN IN RUSSIA.

(An Old Soldier's Reminiscence.)

By David Ker.

've seen many a brave man in my time, sure enough," said old Ivan Starikoff, removing his short pipe to puff out a volume of smoke from beneath his long white moustache. "Many and many a one have I seen; for, thank Heaven, the children of holy Russia are never wanting in that way; but all of them put together wouldn't make one such man as our old colonel, Count Pavel Petrovitch[1] Severin. It wasn't only that he faced danger like a man,—all the others did that,—but he never seemed to know that there was any danger at all. It was as good as a re-enforcement of ten battalions to have him among us in the thick of a fight, and to see his grand, tall figure drawn up to its full height, and his firm face and keen gray eye turned straight upon the smoke of the enemy's line, as if defying them to hurt him. And when the very earth was shaking with the cannonade, and balls were flying thick as hail, and the hot, stifling smoke closed us in like the shadow of death, with a flash and a roar breaking through it every now and then, and the whole air filled with the rush of the shot, like the wind sweeping through a forest in autumn,—then Petrovitch would light a cigarette and hum a snatch of a song, as coolly as if he were at a dinner-party in the English Club at Moscow. And it really seemed as if the bullets ran away from him, instead of his running from them; for he never got hit. But if he saw any of us beginning to waver, he would call out cheerily: 'Never fear, lads—remember what the song says!' For in those days we had an old camp-song that we were fond of singing, and the chorus of it was this:

"'Then fear not swords that brightly shine,
Nor towers that grimly frown;
For God shall march before our line,
And tread our foemen down.'

"He said this so often, that at last he got the nickname among us of 'Ne-Boisya' (Don't fear), and he deserved it, if ever man did yet. Why, Father Nikolai Pavlovitch himself (the Emperor Nicholas) gave him the Cross of St. George[2] with his own hand (the St. George from the emperor's own hand—think of that!) at the siege of Varna, in the year '28. You see, our battery had been terribly cut up by the Turkish fire, so at last there were only about half a dozen of us left on our feet. It was as hot work as I ever was in,—shot pelting, earth-works crumbling, gabions crashing, guns and gun-carriages tumbling over together, men falling on every side like leaves, till, all at once, a shot went slap through our flag-staff, and down came the colors!

"Quick as lightning, Pavel Petrovitch was up on the parapet, caught the flag as it fell, and held it, right in the face of all the Turkish guns, while I and another man spliced the pole with our belts. You may think how the unbelievers let fly at him when they saw him standing there on the top of the breastwork, just as if he'd been set up for a mark; and all at once I saw one fellow (an Albanian by his dress, and you know what deadly shots they are) creep along to the very angle of the wall, and take steady aim at him!

"I made a spring to drag the colonel down (I was his servant, you know, and whoever hurt him hurt me); but before I could reach him I saw the flash of the Albanian's piece, and Pavel Petrovitch's cap went spinning into the air, with a hole right through it just above the forehead. And what do you think the colonel did? Why, he just snapped his fingers at the fellow, and called out to him, in some jibber-jabber tongue only fit to talk to a Turk in: