to that of the trained, respectful servant.

Well, I must not be proud! I cannot say I found the subject of handcuffs
to my fancy; and it was with more asperity than was needful that I
reproved him for the slip about the name.

"Yes, Mr. Ramornie," says he, touching his hat. "Begging your pardon,
Mr. Ramornie. But I've been very piticular, sir, up to now; and you may
trust me to be very piticular in the future. It were only a slip, sir."

"My good boy," said I, with the most imposing severity, "there must be
no slips. Be so good as to remember that my life is at stake."

I did not embrace the occasion of telling him how many I had made
myself. It is my principle that an officer must never be wrong. I have
seen two divisions beating their brains out for a fortnight against a
worthless and quite impregnable castle in a pass: I knew we were only
doing it for discipline, because the General had said so at first, and
had not yet found any way out of his own words; and I highly admired his
force of character, and throughout these operations thought my life
exposed in a very good cause. With fools and children, which included
Rowley, the necessity was even greater. I proposed to myself to be
infallible; and even when he expressed some wonder at the purchase of
the claret-coloured chaise, I put him promptly in his place. In our
situation, I told him, everything had to be sacrificed to appearances;
doubtless, in a hired chaise, we should have had more freedom, but look
at the dignity! I was so positive, that I had sometimes almost convinced
myself. Not for long, you may be certain! This detestable conveyance
always appeared to me to be laden with Bow Street officers, and to have
a placard upon the back of it publishing my name and crimes. If I had
paid seventy pounds to get the thing, I should not have stuck at seven
hundred to be safely rid of it.

And if the chaise was a danger, what an anxiety was the despatch-box and
its golden cargo! I had never had a care but to draw my pay and spend
it; I had lived happily in the regiment, as in my father's house, fed by
the great Emperor's commissariat as by ubiquitous doves of Elijah--or,
my faith! if anything went wrong with the commissariat, helping myself
with the best grace in the world from the next peasant! And now I began
to feel at the same time the burthen of riches and the fear of
destitution. There were ten thousand pounds in the despatch-box, but I
reckoned in French mon