Minette, to
think it were thus; I should ill repay all your kindness to me. I must
try and wear a happier countenance."

"Do so, and mine will soon reflect it," said she, laughing. "But,
perhaps, you have cause for sorrow," added she, as she stole a glance at
me beneath her eyelashes.

"You know, Minette, that I am an orphan like yourself," said I, half
evading the question.

"Ah!" cried she, passionately, "if I had been a man, I should like to be
such a one as Murat there. See how his black eyes sparkle, and his proud
lip curls, when the roll of artillery or the clattering of a platoon is
heard! how his whole soul is in the fight! I remember once--it was at
the Iser--his brigade was stationed beneath the hill, and had no orders
to move forward for several hours. He used to get off his horse and walk
about, and endeavor, by pushing the smoke away, thus, with his hand, and
almost kneeling to the ground, to catch a view of the battle; and then
he would spring into the saddle, and for sheer passion dash the spurs
into his horse's flank, till he reared and plunged again. I watched him
thus for hours. I loved to look on him, chafing and fretting like his
own mettled charger, he was so handsome! 'A drink, Minette! Something
to cool my lips, for Heaven's sake,' said he, at last, as he saw me
standing near him. I filled the little cup you see here with wine,
and handed it to him. Scarcely had he raised it to his lips, when an
aide-decamp galloped up, and whispered some words in haste.

"'Ha, ha!' cried he, with a shout of joy; 'they want us, then! The
squadrons will advance by sections, and charge!--charge!' And with
that he flung the goblet from him to the ground; and when I took it up I
found that with the grasp of his strong fingers he had crushed it nearly
together: see here! I never would let it be changed; it is just as at
the time he clasped it, and I kept it as a souvenir of the prince."

She took from a little shelf the cup, as she spoke, and held it up
before me with the devoted admiration with which some worshipper would
regard a holy relic.

"And that," said Minette, as she pressed to her lips a faded cockade,
whose time-worn tints still showed the tricolored emblems of the
Republic--"that do I value above the cross of the Legion itself."

"Whose was it, Minette? Some brave soldier's, I'm sure."

"And you may be sure. That was the cockade of Le Premier Grenadier de la
France,--La Tour d'Auvergne, the cousi