very
indifferent about my own fortunes. I had become half fatalist as to
myself. It was on very different grounds, indeed, that I dared this
danger. It was to tell you, for, if I mistake not, I am addressing
General Massena, tidings of deep importance."

I said these words slowly and deliberately, and giving them all the
impressiveness I was able.

"Come this way, friend," said he, and, assisting me to arise, he led me
a short distance off, and desired me to sit down on the steps in front
of the altar railing. "Now, you may speak freely. I am the General
Massena, and I have only to say, that if you really have intelligence of
any value for me, you shall be liberally rewarded; but if you have not,
and if the pretense be merely an effort to impose on one whose cares and
anxieties are already hard to bear, it would be better that you had
perished on sea than tried to attempt it."

There was a stern severity in the way he said this, which for a moment
or two actually overpowered me. It was quite clear that he looked for
some positive fact--some direct piece of information on which he might
implicitly rely; and here was I now with nothing save the gossip of some
English lieutenants--the idle talk of inexperienced young officers. I
was silent. From the bottom of my heart I wished that I had never
reached the shore, to stand in a position of such humiliation as this.

"So, then, my caution was not unneeded," said the general, as he bent
his heavy brows upon me. "Now, sir, there is but one _amende_ you can
make for this; tell me, frankly, have others sent you on this errand, or
is the scheme entirely of your own devising? Is this an English plot, or
is there a Bourbon element in it?"

"Neither one nor the other," said I, boldly; for indignation at last
gave me courage. "I hazarded my life to tell you what I overheard among
the officers of the fleet yonder; you may hold their judgment cheap;
_you_ may not think their counsels worth the pains of listening to; but
_I_ could form no opinion of this, and only thought, If these tidings
could reach him he might profit by them."

"And what are they?" asked he, bluntly.

"They said, that your force was wasting away by famine and disease; that
your supplies could not hold out above a fortnight; that your granaries
were empty, and your hospitals filled."

"They scarcely wanted the gift of second sight to see this," said he,
bitterly. "A garrison in close siege for four months ma