st unjust in which
your king was ever engaged; but pray, tell me, Sir, what war it is that
you lament?"

The Frenchman frowned, whistled, put out his under lip, in a sort of
angry embarrassment, and then, spurring his great horse into a curvet,
said,--

"That last war with the English!"

"Faith," said I, "that was the justest of all."

"Just!" cried the Frenchman, halting abruptly and darting at me a
glance of fire, "just! no more, Sir! no more! I was at Blenheim and at
Ramilies!"

As the old warrior said the last words, his voice faltered; and though I
could not help inly smiling at the confusion of ideas by which wars were
just or unjust, according as they were fortunate or not, yet I respected
his feelings enough to turn away my face and remain silent.

"Yes," renewed my comrade, colouring with evident shame and drawing his
cocked hat over his brows, "yes, I received my last wound at Ramilies.
_Then_ my eyes were opened to the horrors of war; _then_ I saw and
cursed the evils of ambition; _then_ I resolved to retire from the
armies of a king who had lost forever his name, his glory, and his
country."

Was there ever a better type of the French nation than this old soldier?
As long as fortune smiles on them, it is "Marchons au diable!" and "Vive
la gloire!" Directly they get beaten, it is "Ma pauvre patrie!" and "Les
calamites affreuses de la guerre!"

"However," said I, "the old King is drawing near the end of his days,
and is said to express his repentance at the evils his ambition has
occasioned."

The old soldier shoved back his hat, and offered me his snuff-box. I
judged by this that he was a little mollified.

"Ah!" he renewed, after a pause, "ah! times are sadly changed since the
year 1667; when the young King--he was young then--took the field in
Flanders, under the great Turenne. _Sacristie_! What a hero he looked
upon his white war-horse! I would have gone--ay, and the meanest and
backwardest soldier in the camp would have gone--into the very mouth of
the cannon for a look from that magnificent countenance, or a word from
that mouth which knew so well what words were! Sir, there was in the war
of '72, when we were at peace with Great Britain, an English gentleman,
then in the army, afterwards a marshal of France: I remember, as if it
were yesterday, how gallantly he behaved. The King sent to compliment
him after some signal proof of courage and conduct, and asked what
reward he would have. 'Sir