rked at one
thing and another, doing anything I could turn my hands to, for
four or five months. That is how I got to pick up Swedish. Then
some people told me that Russia was a place where a doctor might
get on, for that they had got no doctors for their army who knew
anything of surgery, and the czar was always ready to take on
foreigners who could teach them anything. I had got my diploma with
me, and some of my friends came forward and subscribed enough to
rig me out in clothes and pay my passage. What was better, one of
them happened to have made the acquaintance of Le Ford, who was, as
you may have heard, the czar's most intimate friend.

"I wished myself back a hundred times before I reached Moscow, but
when I did, everything was easy for me. Le Ford introduced me to
the czar, and I was appointed surgeon of a newly-raised regiment,
of which Le Ford was colonel. That was eight years ago, and I am
now a sort of surgeon general of a division, and am at the head of
the hospitals about here. Till the war began I had not, for five
years, done any military work, but had been at the head of a
college the czar has established for training surgeons for the
army. I was only sent down here after that business at Narva.

"So, you see, I have fallen on my feet. The czar's is a good
service, and we employ a score or two of Scotchmen, most of them in
good posts. He took to them because a Scotchman, General Gordon,
and other foreign officers, rescued him from his sister Sophia, who
intended to assassinate him, and established him firmly on the
throne of his father.

"It is a pity you are not on this side. Perhaps it isn't too late
to change, eh?"

Charlie laughed.

"My father is in Sweden, and my company is commanded by a man who
is as good as a father to me, and his son is like my brother. If
there were no other reason, I could not change. Why, it was only
yesterday I was sitting round a bivouac fire with King Charles, and
nothing would induce me to fight against him."

"I am not going to try to persuade you. The czar has treated me
well, and I love him. By the way, I have not given you my name
after all. It's Terence Kelly."

"Is not the czar very fierce and cruel?"

"Bedad, I would be much more cruel and fierce if I were in his
place. Just think of one man, with all Russia on his shoulders.
There is he trying to improve the country, working like a horse
himself, knowing that, like every other Russian, he is as igno