that we forced our way upstairs, down
which porters, and sailors, and soldiers were now carrying a number of
heavy trunks and packing-cases. At last we gained an anteroom, where
confusion seemed at its highest, crowded as it was by soldiers, the
greater number of them intoxicated, and all in a state of riotous
and insolent insubordination. Amongst these were a number of the
townspeople, eager to prefer complaints for outrage and robbery, but
whose subdued voices were drowned amid the clamour of their oppressors.
Meanwhile, clerks were writing away receipts for stolen and pillaged
articles, and which, signed with the name of the general, were grasped
at with eager avidity. Even personal injuries were requited in the same
cheap fashion, orders on the national treasury being freely issued
for damaged noses and smashed heads, and gratefully received by the
confiding populace.

'If the wind draws a little more to the southward before morning, we'll
pay our debts with the topsail sheet, and it will be somewhat shorter,
and to the full as honest,' said a man in a naval uniform.

'Where's the officer of the "Regiment des Guides?"' cried a soldier from
the door at the farther end of the room; and before I had time to think
over the designation of rank given me, I was hurried into the general's
presence.

General Humbert, whose age might have been thirty-eight or forty, was
a tall, well-built, but somewhat over-corpulent man; his features
frank and manly, but with a dash of coarseness in their expression,
particularly about the mouth; a sabre-cut, which had divided the upper
lip, and whose cicatrix was then seen through his moustache, heightening
the effect of his sinister look; his carriage was singularly erect and
soldierlike, but all his gestures betrayed the habits of one who had
risen from the ranks, and was not unwilling to revive the recollection.

He was parading the room from end to end when I entered, stopping
occasionally to look out from an open window upon the bay, where by
the clear moonlight might be seen the ships of the fleet at anchor.
Two officers of his staff were writing busily at a table, whence the
materials of a supper had not yet been removed. They did not look up
as I came forward, nor did he notice me in any way for several minutes.
Suddenly he turned towards me, and snatching the letter I held in my
hand, proceeded to read it. A burst of coarse laughter broke from him as
he perused the lines; and