and made
nothing of scaling walls. He had no equal at bodily exercises, he
played base to perfection, and could have outrun a hare. With a keen
eye worthy of Leather-stocking, he loved hunting passionately. His
time was passed in firing at a mark, instead of studying; and he spent
the money extracted from the old doctor in buying powder and ball for
a wretched pistol that old Gilet, the sabot-maker, had given him.
During the autumn of 1806, Maxence, then seventeen, committed an
involuntary murder, by frightening in the dusk a young woman who was
pregnant, and who came upon him suddenly while stealing fruit in her
garden. Threatened with the guillotine by Gilet, who doubtless wanted
to get rid of him, Max fled to Bourges, met a regiment then on its way
to Egypt, and enlisted. Nothing came of the death of the young woman.

A young fellow of Max's character was sure to distinguish himself, and
in the course of three campaigns he did distinguish himself so highly
that he rose to be a captain, his lack of education helping him
strenuously. In Portugal, in 1809, he was left for dead in an English
battery, into which his company had penetrated without being able to
hold it. Max, taken prisoner by the English, was sent to the Spanish
hulks at the island of Cabrera, the most horrible of all stations for
prisoners of war. His friends begged that he might receive the cross
of the Legion of honor and the rank of major; but the Emperor was then
in Austria, and he reserved his favors for those who did brilliant
deeds under his own eye: he did not like officers or men who allowed
themselves to be taken prisoner, and he was, moreover, much
dissatisfied with events in Portugal. Max was held at Cabrera from
1810 to 1814.[1] During those years he became utterly demoralized, for
the hulks were like galleys, minus crime and infamy. At the outset, to
maintain his personal free will, and protect himself against the
corruption which made that horrible prison unworthy of a civilized
people, the handsome young captain killed in a duel (for duels were
fought on those hulks in a space scarcely six feet square) seven
bullies among his fellow-prisoners, thus ridding the island of their
tyranny to the great joy of the other victims. After this, Max reigned
supreme in his hulk, thanks to the wonderful ease and address with
which he handled weapons, to his bodily strength, and also to his
extreme cleverness.

[1] The cruelty of the Spaniards to