‘Better still, lad. I was eight years myself in the ranks before they gave me the stripe on my arm. _Parbleu!_ the Germans had given me some three or four with the sabre before that time.’ ‘Do you think they ‘ll refuse me, Tronchon?’ ‘Not if thou go the right way about it, lad. Thou mustn’t fancy it’s like asking leave from the captain to spend the evening in a _guinguette_, or to go to the play with thy sweetheart. No, no, boy. It must be done _en règle_. Thou’lt have to wait on the general at his quarters at four o’clock, when he “receives,” as they call it. Thou’lt be there, mayhap, an hour, ay, two or three belike, and after all, perhaps, won’t see him that day at all! I was a week trying to catch Kellermann, and, at last, he only spoke to me going downstairs with his staff-- ‘“Eh, Tronchon, another bullet in thy old carcass; want a furlough to get strong again, eh?” ‘“No, colonel; all sound this time. I want to be a sergeant--I’m twelve years and four months corporal.” ‘“Slow work, too,” said he, laughing; “ain’t it, Charles?” and he pinched one of his young officers by the cheek. “Let old Tronchon have his grade; and I say, my good fellow,” said he to me, “don’t come plaguing me any more about promotion till I’m General of Division. You hear that?” ‘Well, he’s got his step since; but I never teased him after.’ ‘And why so, Tronchon?’ said L ‘I’ll tell thee, lad,’ whispered he, in a low, confidential tone, as if imparting a secret well worth the hearing. ‘They can find fellows every day fit for lieutenants and _chefs d’escadron. Parbleu!_ they meet with them in every café, in every “billiard” you enter; but a sergeant! Maurice, one that drills his men on parade--can dress them like a wall--see that every kit is well packed, and every cartouch well filled--who knows every soul in his company as he knows the buckles of his own sword-belt--that’s what one should not chance upon in haste. It’s easy enough to manoeuvre the men, Maurice; but to make them, boy, to fashion the fellows so that they be like the pieces of a great machine, that’s the real labour--that’s soldiering indeed.’ ‘And you say I must write a petition, Tronchon?’ said I, more anxious to bring him back to my own affairs than listen to these speculations of his. ‘How shall I do it?’ ‘Sit down there, lad, and I’ll tell thee. I’ve done the thing some scores of times, and know the words as well as I once knew my “Pater.” _Parbleu!_ I often wish I could remember that now, just to keep me from gloomy thoughts when I sit alone of an evening.’ It was not a little to his astonishment, but still more to his delight, that I told the poor fellow I could help to refresh his memory, knowing, as I did, every word of the litanies by heart; and, accordingly, it was agreed on that I should impart religious instruction in exchange for the secular knowledge he was conferring upon me.