“Halt! halt! Dismount!” sounded again from front to rear; and in a few minutes we were once more stretched upon the grass, beneath the deep and mellow moonlight, while the bright stream ran placidly beside us, reflecting on its calm surface the varied groups as they lounged or sat around the blazing fires of the bivouac. CHAPTER XLIV. THE BIVOUAC. When I contrasted the gay and lively tone of the conversation which ran on around our bivouac fire, with the dry monotony and prosaic tediousness of my first military dinner at Cork, I felt how much the spirit and adventure of a soldier’s life can impart of chivalrous enthusiasm to even the dullest and least susceptible. I saw even many who under common circumstances, would have possessed no interest nor excited any curiosity, but now, connected as they were with the great events occurring around them, absolutely became heroes; and it was with a strange, wild throbbing of excitement I listened to the details of movements and marches, whose objects I knew not, but in which the magical words, Corunna, Vimeira, were mixed up, and gave to the circumstances an interest of the highest character. How proud, too, I felt to be the companion-in-arms of such fellows! Here they sat, the tried and proved soldiers of a hundred fights, treating me as their brother and their equal. Who need wonder if I felt a sense of excited pleasure? Had I needed such a stimulant, that night beneath the cork-trees had been enough to arouse a passion for the army in my heart, and an irrepressible determination to seek for a soldier’s glory. “Fourteenth!” called out a voice from the wood behind; and in a moment after, the aide-de-camp appeared with a mounted orderly. “Colonel Merivale?” said he, touching his cap to the stalwart, soldier-like figure before him. The colonel bowed. “Sir Stapleton Cotton desires me to request that at an early hour to-morrow you will occupy the pass, and cover the march of the troops. It is his wish that all the reinforcements should arrive at Oporto by noon. I need scarcely add that we expect to be engaged with the enemy.” These few words were spoken hurriedly, and again saluting our party, he turned his horse’s head and continued his way towards the rear. “There’s news for you, Charley,” said Power, slapping me on the shoulder. “Lucy Dashwood or Westminster Abbey!” “The regiment was never in finer condition, that’s certain,” said the colonel, “and most eager for a brush with the enemy.” “How your old friend, the count, would have liked this work!” said Hixley. “Gallant fellow he was.” “Come,” cried Power, “here’s a fresh bowl coming. Let’s drink the ladies, wherever they be; we most of us have some soft spot on that score.” “Yes,” said the adjutant, singing,-- “Here’s to the maiden of blushing fifteen; Here’s to the damsel that’s merry; Here’s to the flaunting extravagant quean--” “And,” sang Power, interrupting,-- “Here’s to the ‘Widow of Derry.’”