A few brief
questions were put to me. I answered them, was desired to pass on to an
inner room, where, in a file of some twenty strong, the chosen recruits
were standing before a desk. A man rapidly repeated certain words, to
which we were ordered to respond by lifting the right hand to the face.

This was an oath of allegiance, and when taken we moved on to the
barber, and in a few minutes the ceremony was completed, and we were
soldiers of France.

I had imagined, and indeed I had convinced myself, that I was so
schooled in adversity I could defy fortune. I thought that mere bodily
privations and sufferings could never seriously affect me, and that,
with the freedom of my own thoughts unfettered, no real slavery could
oppress me. In this calculation I had forgotten to take count of those
feelings of self-esteem which are our defences against the promptings of
every mean ambition. I had not remembered that these may be outraged by
the very same rules of discipline that taught us to fire and load, and
march and manouvre! It was a grievous error!

France was once more at war with all the world: her armies were now
moving eastward to attack Austria, and more than mere menaces declared
the intention to invade England. Fresh troops were called for with such
urgency that a fortnight or three weeks was only allowed to drill the
new recruits and fit them for regimental duty. Severity compensated for
the briefness of the time, and the men were exercised with scarcely an
interval of repose. In periods of great emergency many things are done
which in days of calmer influences would not be thought of; and now the
officers in command of depots exercised a degree of cruelty towards the
soldiers which is the very rarest of all practices in the French army;
in consequence, desertions became frequent, and, worse again, men maimed
and mutilated themselves in the most shocking manner to escape from a
tyranny more insupportable than any disease. It is known to all that
such practices assume the characteristics of an epidemic, and when
once they have attained to a certain frequency, men's minds become
familiarized to the occurrence, and they are regarded as the most
ordinary of events. The regiment to which I was attached--the 47th of
the line--was one of the very worst for such acts of indiscipline; and
although the commanding officers had been twice changed, and one entire
battalion broken up and reformed, the evil repute still adhered