his mother and the colonel, who
overwhelmed him with questions.

The colonel had changed but little, and bid fair to live to a great
age. His eye was bright, and his bearing still erect. He scarcely
looked sixty-five, although he was more than ten years older.

Mistress Dorothy was, Rupert thought, softer and kinder than of
old. Her pride, and to some extent her heart, had met with a rude
shock, but her eyes were now fully open to the worthlessness of her
former suitor, who had lately been obliged to fly the country,
having been detected at cheating at cards.

Colonel Holliday rejoiced when he heard of the pipe of prime
Burgundy, which started from London on the day Rupert left; while
Mistress Dorothy was enchanted with the stomacher, which her son
produced from his trunk.

"Have you ever heard from Monsieur Dessin, grandfather? You told me
that he said he would write and tell you his real name."

"I doubt not that he did so, Rupert; but the carriage of letters
between this and France is precarious. Only smugglers or such like
bring them over, and these, except when specially paid, care but
little for the trouble. That he wrote I am certain, but his letter
has not reached me, which I regret much."

The six months at home passed rapidly. Rupert fell into his old
ways; rode and hawked, and occasionally paid state visits to the
gentry of the neighbourhood, by whom, as one of Marlborough's
soldiers, he was made much of.

"I think this soldiering life makes one restless, Master Rupert,"
Hugh said one day when the time was approaching for their start. "I
feel a longing to be with the troop again, to be at work and
doing."

"I feel the same, Hugh; but you would not find it so, I think, if
you had come home for good. Then you would have your regular
pursuits on the farm, while now you have simply got tired of having
no work to do. When the war is over, and we have done soldiering,
you will settle down on one of the farms of the Chace. Madame says
you shall have the first that falls vacant when you come home. Then
you will take a wife, and be well content that you have seen the
world, and have something to look back upon beyond a six miles
circuit of Derby."

The next campaign may be passed over briefly. The parsimony of
England and Holland, and the indifference of Germany, spoiled all
the plans of Marlborough, and lost the allies all the benefits of
the victory of Blenheim. The French, in spite of their heavy
los