d then turning to
one of the staff, said--

"I spoke to Berthollet about this boy already--see that they take him in
the 9th. I say, my lad, what's thy name?"

"Tiernay, sir."

"Ay, to be sure, Tiernay. Well, Tiernay, thou shalt be a hussar, my man.
See that I get no disgrace by the appointment."

I kissed his hand fervently, and the staff rode forward, leaving me the
happiest heart that beat in all that crowded host.

CHAPTER VII.

A PASSING ACQUAINTANCE.

If the guide who is to lead us on a long and devious track, stops at
every by-way, following out each path that seems to invite a ramble or
suggest a halt, we naturally might feel distrustful of his safe conduct,
and uneasy at the prospect of the road before us. In the same way may
the reader be disposed to fear that he who descends to slight and
trivial circumstances, will scarcely have time for events which ought to
occupy a wider space in his reminiscences; and for this reason I am
bound to apologize for the seeming transgression of my last chapter.
Most true it is, that were I to relate the entire of my life with a
similar diffuseness, my memoir would extend to a length far beyond what
I intend it to occupy. Such, however, is very remote from my thoughts. I
have dwelt with, perhaps, something of prolixity upon the soldier-life
and characteristics of a past day, because I shall yet have to speak of
changes, without which the contrast would be inappreciable; but I have
also laid stress upon an incident trivial in itself, because it formed
an event in my own fortunes. It was thus, in fact, that I became a
soldier.

Now, the man who carries a musket in the ranks, may very reasonably be
deemed but a small ingredient of the mass that forms an army: and in our
day his thoughts, hopes, fears, and ambitions are probably as unknown
and uncared for, as the precise spot of earth that yielded the ore from
which his own weapon was smelted. This is not only reasonable, but it is
right. In the time of which I am now speaking it was far otherwise. The
Republic, in extinguishing a class had elevated the individual; and now
each, in whatever station he occupied, felt himself qualified to
entertain opinions and express sentiments, which, because they were his
own, he presumed them to be national. The idlers of the streets
discussed the deepest questions of politics; the soldiers talked of war
with all the presumption of consummate generalship. The great operations
of a