d looked fiercely up and down the line, and
went on in a different tone:

"'At the same time, I admit that some allowance is to be made for
the crime, and I can understand that as soldiers you felt sympathy
with soldiers who, although prisoners at the time, did not hesitate
to cast in their lot with you, and to fight side by side with you.
Still, a soldier should never allow private sentiments to interfere
with his duty. I myself should have been glad, when you arrived
here and I heard of what had happened, to have been able to place
these British officers and soldiers in a ship, and to have sent
them back to their own country; but that would have been a breach
of my duty, and I was forced to detain them here as prisoners. Of
course, if I could find out which among you have been concerned in
this affair, it would be my duty to punish them--for there must
have been more than one--severely. However, although I have done my
best to discover this, I am not sorry, men, that I have been unable
to do so; for although these men may have failed in their duties as
soldiers, they have shown themselves true-hearted fellows to run
that risk--not, I am sure, from any thought of reward, but to help
those who had helped them.

"'You can all return to your duty, and I hope that you will, in
future, remember that duty is the first thing with a soldier, and
that he should allow no other feeling to interfere with it.'

"Jacques and his comrades are all satisfied that, although the
general felt it was his duty to reprimand them, he was at heart by
no means sorry that you had got off.

"The gendarmes are still making inquiries, but of course they have
learned nothing. Nobody was about on the wharves at that time of
night, and I don't think that they will trouble themselves much
longer about it. They will come to believe that you must, somehow,
have managed to get through the line of fortifications, and that
you will be caught trying to make your way across the country.

"In another three or four days it will be quite safe for you to go
down the river. For the first two days every boat that went down
was stopped and examined, and some of the vessels were searched by
a gunboat, and the hatches taken off; but I hear that no boats have
been stopped today, so I fancy you will soon be able to go down
without fear."

Although at night Terence and Ryan were able to emerge from their
place of concealment, and walk up and down the little yard