r, some of them, a few evenings before
their turn came to leave, when the remark was made that "the little
corporal" would never have another chance, but was driven into a hole at
last.

"Think you so?" replied Poivre; "I am not so sure of that. It must be a
curious hole that man cannot get out of sooner or later. He has the
cleverness of the devil, if there be one."

"Would you fight again for him, Poivre, if he did come out of his hole?"

"Not I," said he, "if I could help it. Some of us have had enough of
him. We begin to think we have not been fighting for "France and glory,"
but for him, and he does not care two pins for us. But there are
thousands of fellows who are such fools that, if the emperor were only
able to shew himself again, they would flock to him, and be ready to
become food for powder the next moment. I am going to prophecy, my
friends. Mark what I say. When all our countrymen have been set free,
Napoleon will have an army, a grand army, ready to hand. Depend on it,
he has his eye on this, and will make use of the opportunity; but he will
not find Marc Poivre in the ranks!"

Human prophecies are acute guesses, and when they come true, correct
guesses. Such was Poivre's prophecy. But was it not a fatal mistake,
though, perhaps, one that could not be avoided, to place an army within
Napoleon's grasp, even as we had given him back the sailors that manned
his navy by the bogus peace of Amiens?

This at least is certain, that the volcano which had desolated Europe for
so many years but had become quiescent when Napoleon abdicated at
Fontainebleau, burst forth again with an awful blaze in 1815, and was
only extinguished for ever at Waterloo. So, some at least of the
prisoners at Norman Cross may again have fought gallantly against us.

Captain Tournier, like the rest, was longing to see once more his old
home, but had first to pay a farewell visit to his friends at the Manor
House. He was with them only a couple of nights, and Villemet was
invited to stay also. The meeting could not be otherwise than mingled
with sadness to each of them. They had known each other now for nearly
six years, and those years had been made interesting by intercourse of no
ordinary kind.

At dinner, Cosin was the most cheerful of them all. He was really very
sorry to part with his friends, especially with Tournier, whom he loved
as a brother; but he could not for the life of him make out why two men
who ha