tice, boast of her
favourites of fortune fitted to cope with her favourites of nature.

Among these showy and high-bred soldiers, the hours passed
delightfully. Anecdotes of every court of Europe, where most of them
had been, either as tourists or envoys; the piquant tales of the court
of their unfortunate sovereign; narratives--sufficiently contemptuous
of the present possessors of power; and _chansons_--some gay, and some
touching--made us all forget the flight of time. Among their military
choruses was one which drew tears from many a bold eye. It was a
species of brief elegy to the memory of Turenne, whom the French
soldier still regarded as his tutelar genius. It was said to have been
written on the spot where that great leader fell:--

"Recois, O Turenne, ou tu perdis lavie,
Les transports d'un soldat, qui te plaint et t'envie.
Dans l'Elysee assis, pres du cef des Cesars,
Ou dans le ciel, peutetre entre Bellone et Mars.
Fais-moi te suivre en tout, exauce ma priere;
Puis se-je ainsi remplir, et finir ma carriere."

The application to the immediate circumstances of those brave
gentlemen was painfully direct. What to-morrow might bring was
unknown, further than that they would probably soon be engaged with
their countrymen; and whether successful or not, they must be embarked
in war against France. But my intelligence that an action was expected
on the next day awoke the soldier within them again; the wrongs of
their order, the plunders of the ruling faction, their hopeless
expatriation, if some daring effort was not made, and the triumphant
change from exiles to possessors and conquerors, stirred them all into
enthusiasm. The army of the Allies, the enemy's position, the public
feeling of Paris, and the hope of sharing in the honours of an
engagement which was to sweep the revolutionary "canaille" before the
"gentlemen of France," were the rapid and animating topics. All were
ardent, all eloquent; fortune was at their feet, the only crime was to
doubt--the only difficulty was to choose in what shape of splendid
vengeance, of matchless retribution, and of permanent glory, they
should restore the tarnished lustre of the diadem, and raise the
insulted name of France to its ancient rank among the monarchies of
the world. I never heard among men so many brilliancies of speech--so
many expressions of feeling full of the heart--so glowing a display of
what the heart of man may unconsc