Abbe Gaudron, now rector of
Saint-Pauls.

Although Oscar outwardly professed to be devoted to the Bourbons, in
the depths of his heart he was a liberal. Therefore, in the struggle of
1830, he went over to the side of the people. This desertion, which
had an importance due to the crisis in which it took place, brought him
before the eyes of the public. During the excitement of triumph in the
month of August he was promoted lieutenant, received the cross of the
Legion of honor, and was attached as aide-de-camp to La Fayette, who
gave him the rank of captain in 1832. When the amateur of the best of
all possible republics was removed from the command of the National
guard, Oscar Husson, whose devotion to the new dynasty amounted to
fanaticism, was appointed major of a regiment sent to Africa at the time
of the first expedition undertaken by the Prince-royal. The Vicomte de
Serizy chanced to be the lieutenant-colonel of this regiment. At the
affair of the Makta, where the field had to be abandoned to the
Arabs, Monsieur de Serizy was left wounded under a dead horse. Oscar,
discovering this, called out to the squadron:

"Messieurs, it is going to death, but we cannot abandon our colonel."

He dashed upon the enemy, and his electrified soldiers followed him.
The Arabs, in their first astonishment at this furious and unlooked-for
return, allowed Oscar to seize the viscount, whom he flung across his
horse, and carried off at full gallop,--receiving, as he did so, two
slashes from yataghans on his left arm.

Oscar's conduct on this occasion was rewarded with the officer's
cross of the Legion of honor, and by his promotion to the rank of
lieutenant-colonel. He took the most affectionate care of the Vicomte de
Serizy, whose mother came to meet him on the arrival of the regiment at
Toulon, where, as we know, the young man died of his wounds.

The Comtesse de Serizy had not separated her son from the man who had
shown him such devotion. Oscar himself was so seriously wounded that the
surgeons whom the countess had brought with her from Paris thought best
to amputate his left arm.

Thus the Comte de Serizy was led not only to forgive Oscar for his
painful remarks on the journey to Presles, but to feel himself his
debtor on behalf of his son, now buried in the chapel of the chateau de
Serizy.

CHAPTER XI. OSCAR'S LAST BLUNDER

Some years after the affair at Makta, an old lady, dressed in black,
leaning on the arm of