him from the height of their compassion, now rivalled each other in amiability. With a well-pleased smile the Count stroked his great beard, led the princess to the quadrille, and danced it in first-rate style." The reader will have recognised our excellent Queen Dowager in the heroine of the charming trait which an old soldier thus bluntly narrates. The kind heart and patriotic spirit of the German Princess were good presage of the benevolence and many virtues of the English Queen. "When, in May 1836," continues Captain Von Rahden, "I was presented, as captain in the Dutch service, to the Princess Adelaide, then Queen of England, at St James's Palace, her majesty perfectly remembered the incident I have here narrated to my readers. To her inquiries after Count Reichenbach, I unfortunately had to reply that he was long since dead." In January 1814, the Baron's regiment left Meiningen, crossed the Rhine, joined the great Silesian army under old Blucher, and began the campaign in France. The actions of Montmirail, Méry sur Seine, La Ferté sous Jouarre, and various other encounters, followed in rapid succession. Hard knocks for the Allies, many of them. But all Napoleon's brilliant generalship was in vain; equally in vain did his young troops emulate the deeds of those iron veterans whose bones lay bleaching on the Beresina's banks, and in the passes of the Sierra Morena. The month of February was passed in constant fighting, and was perhaps the most interesting period of the campaigns of 1813-14. On the 13th, the Prussian advanced guard, Ziethen's division, was attacked by superior numbers and completely beaten at Montmirail. Von Rahden's battalion was one of those which had to cover the retreat of the routed troops, and check the advance of the exulting enemy. Retiring slowly and in good order, the rearmost of the whole army, it reached the village of Etoges, when it was assailed by a prodigious mass of French cavalry. But the horsemen could make no impression on the steady ranks of Count Reichenbach's infantry.