Philip Rollo; or, the Scottish Musketeers, Vol. 1 (of 2)Grant, James
General
Philip Rollo; or, the Scottish Musketeers, Vol. 1 (of 2)
Grant, James
Thirty Years' War, 1618-1648 -- Fiction
On the 6th day after our landing, Ian and his sergeant, Phadrig Mhor,
with sixty of our pikemen, were on guard in the great tower at the
harbour mouth. After spending the forenoon in lounging with them on
the ramparts of their post, from whence we had an extensive view of
the flat and fertile country, with its houses of bright red brick
roofed with yellow straw, and sheltered by rows of tall elms and
taper poplars; after explaining to them in Gaëlic, some chapters of a
treatise on fortification by Errard of Bois le Duc--for we had all
resolved to become perfect soldiers; after a few glasses of wine with
them an a tavern close by the guardhouse, and having some lively
good-for-nothing chatter with the pretty jungfers, or waitresses,
whose plump round figures, in their short petticoats and spotless
white vests, made them as charming and piquant as the soubrettes or
grisettes of Paris, I returned slowly to our billet, passing through
the evening crowds in the Platz, with my bonnet cocked smartly on one
side, my plaid waving behind me, and my claymore under my arm,
feeling very much satisfied with my own appearance, and proud that I
belonged to a regiment whose fifteen hundred pair of sturdy bare legs
were the admiration of all the women in Glückstadt.
I entered the vast and silent house of Otto Roskilde, and was
ascending the stair, with my head full of ravelins and breastworks,
pretty ankles and counterscarps, waitresses and fortifications,
flying sap and salient angles, when a sound struck my ear; I suddenly
paused--drew breath, and listened.
The notes of a guitar and of a clear female voice, sweetly modulated,
made my heart beat like lightning; for a guitar was in the apartment
of that sleeping beauty, whom I had nearly forgotten.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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