k, maddened by excitement, seized the bit in his teeth
and joined him in the melee. I got three wounds and he had two, but
happily he has been cured as rapidly as I have, though with no
advantage to the appearance of either of us."

"Will the scars on your face always show as they do now?" Thirza
asked.

"I am sure I hope not," he said. "At present they are barely
healed; but in time, no doubt, the redness will fade out, and they
will not show greatly, though I daresay the scars will be always
visible."

"I should be proud of them, Major Drummond," said Thirza,
"considering that you got them in so great a battle, and one in
which you rendered such service to the king."

"You see, I shall not be always able to explain when and how I got
them," Fergus laughed. "People who do not know me will say:

"'There goes a young student, who has got his face slashed at the
university.'"

"They could not say that," she said indignantly. "Even if you were
not in uniform, anyone can see that you are a soldier."

"Whether or not, Countess Thirza, it is a matter that will
certainly trouble me very little. However, I begin to think that I
shall not always be a soldier. Certainly, I should not leave the
army as long as this war goes on; but I have seen such terrible
fighting, such tremendous carnage, that I think that at the end of
it, if I come out at the end, I shall be glad to take to a peaceful
life. My cousin, Marshal Keith, has been fighting all his life. He
is a great soldier, and has the honour of being regarded by the
king as his friend; but he has no home, no peace and quiet, no
children growing up to take his place. I should not like to look
forward to such a life, and would rather go back and pass my days
in the Scottish glens where I was brought up."

"I think that you are right," the count said seriously. "In
ordinary times a soldier's life would be a pleasant one, and he
could reckon upon the occasional excitement of war; but such a war
as this is beyond all calculation. In these three campaigns, and
the present one is not ended, nigh half of the army which marched
through here has been killed or wounded. It is terrible to think
of. One talks of the chances of war, but this is making death
almost a certainty; for if the war continues another two or three
years, how few will be left of those who began it!

"Even now a great battle will probably be fought, in a few days.
Two great armies are within as many marches