rs,
and the earl remounted: the scattered troops were rallied at the sound of
the trumpet, and again and again, led by their dauntless colonel, were
seen in the thickest of the fray, with sabres drenched in blood, and
voices hoarse with the shouts of victory.

The period between the battles of Quatre Bras and Waterloo was a trying
one to the discipline and courage of the British army. The discomfited
Prussians on their flank had been routed and compelled to retire, and in
their front was an enemy, brave, skilful, and victorious, led by the
greatest captain of the age. The prudent commander of the English forces
fell back with dignity and reluctance to the field of Waterloo; here the
mighty struggle was to terminate, and the eye of every experienced soldier
looked on those eminences as on the future graves for thousands.

During this solemn interval of comparative inactivity the mind of
Pendennyss dwelt on the affection, the innocence, the beauty and worth of
his Emily, until the curdling blood, as he thought on her lot should his
life be the purchase of the coming victory, warned him to quit the gloomy
subject, for the consolations of that religion which only could yield him
the solace his wounded feelings required. In his former campaigns the earl
had been sensible of the mighty changes of death, and had ever kept in
view the preparations necessary to meet it with hope and joy; but the
world clung around him now, in the best affections of his nature, and it
was only as he could picture the happy reunion with his Emily in a future
life, that he could look on a separation in this without despair.

The vicinity of the enemy admitted of no relaxation in the strictest
watchfulness in the British lines: and the comfortless night of the
seventeenth was passed by the earl, and his Lieutenant Colonel, George
Denbigh, on the same cloak, and under the open canopy of Heaven.

As the opening cannon of the enemy gave the signal for the commencing
conflict, Pendennyss mounted his charger with a last thought on his
distant wife. With a mighty struggle he tore her as it were from his
bosom, and gave the remainder of the day to duty.

Who has not heard of the events of that fearful hour, on which the fate of
Europe hung as it were suspended in the scale? On one side supported by
the efforts of desperate resolution, guided by the most consummate art;
and on the other defended by a discipline and enduring courage almost
without a para