NS BARONIAL VIEWS OF THE PRESENT TIME

Upon the word of honour of Rosamund, the letter to the officers of the
French Guard was posted.

'Post it, post it,' Everard said, on her consulting him, with the letter
in her hand. 'Let the fellow stand his luck.' It was addressed to
the Colonel of the First Regiment of the Imperial Guard, Paris. That
superscription had been suggested by Colonel Halkett. Rosamund was in
favour of addressing it to Versailles, Nevil to the Tuileries; but Paris
could hardly fail to hit the mark, and Nevil waited for the reply, half
expecting an appointment on the French sands: for the act of posting a
letter, though it be to little short of the Pleiades even, will stamp
an incredible proceeding as a matter of business, so ready is the
ardent mind to take footing on the last thing done. The flight of Mr.
Beauchamp's letter placed it in the common order of occurrences for the
youthful author of it. Jack Wilmore, a messmate, offered to second him,
though he should be dismissed the service for it. Another second would
easily be found somewhere; for, as Nevil observed, you have only to set
these affairs going, and British blood rises: we are not the people you
see on the surface. Wilmore's father was a parson, for instance. What
did he do? He could not help himself: he supplied the army and navy with
recruits! One son was in a marching regiment, the other was Jack,
and three girls had vowed never to quit the rectory save as brides of
officers. Nevil thought that seemed encouraging; we were evidently not
a nation of shopkeepers at heart; and he quoted sayings of Mr. Stukely
Culbrett's, in which neither his ear nor Wilmore's detected the
under-ring Stukely was famous for: as that England had saddled herself
with India for the express purpose of better obeying the Commandments
in Europe; and that it would be a lamentable thing for the Continent
and our doctrines if ever beef should fail the Briton, and such like.
'Depend upon it we're a fighting nation naturally, Jack,' said Nevil.
'How can we submit!... however, I shall not be impatient. I dislike
duelling, and hate war, but I will have the country respected.' They
planned a defence of the country, drawing their strategy from magazine
articles by military pens, reverberations of the extinct voices of the
daily and weekly journals, customary after a panic, and making bloody
stands on spots of extreme pastoral beauty, which they visited by coach
and rail, l