"I believe you are hopeless, captain," laughed Somers. "Hopeless?" "Why, you have told the biggest story that has passed your lips to-day." "What, about the cannon?" "Two hundred or three hundred! Why, your regiment captured all the guns the Austrians had!" "Didn't I tell you I couldn't remember whether it was two hundred or three hundred? You are the most critical young man I ever met in the whole course of my life!" "But two hundred would be an abominable exaggeration. Perhaps you meant muskets?" "No; cannon." "But, my dear captain, just consider for one moment. Of course the batteries were supported?" "To be sure they were." "Six guns to a battery would have made fifty batteries; and----" "Oh, confound your statistics!" exclaimed the captain impatiently. "But statistics enable us to see the truth. Now, captain, at the battle of Bunker Hill, I saw a man----" "You?" demanded Captain de Banyan. "I said so." "Were you at the battle of Bunker Hill?" "Didn't you see me there?" "Come, come, Somers; you shouldn't trifle with the truth. I was not at the battle you speak of." "But I was----" "You! You were not born till sixty years after the battle of Bunker Hill." "But I was--only illustrating your case." "Here comes an orderly with something from headquarters," said Captain de Banyan, apparently as much rejoiced to change the conversation as the reader will be to have it changed. The orderly proceeded to the position occupied by the field and staff officers of the regiment; and, a few moments later, came an order for Lieutenant Somers, with twenty of his men, selected for special duty, to report at the division headquarters. "You are in luck, Somers; you will have a glorious opportunity to distinguish yourself," said Captain de Banyan, whose second lieutenant was ordered to the command of Somers's company. "I don't know what it means," replied our lieutenant. "Don't you, indeed?" added the captain with a smile. "Don't you know what special duty means? On the night before the battle of Solferino----" "Excuse me, Captain de Banyan; but I am ordered to report forthwith," interrupted Somers, who had no desire to hear another "whopper." The young lieutenant marched off, with his little force, to report as he had been directed. He knew his men well enough to enable him to make a good selection; and he was confident that they would stand by him to the last. "Do you know Senator Guilford?" demanded the general, after Somers had passed through all the forms of reporting. "I do, general," replied the lieutenant, with a fearful blush, and with a wish in his heart that the distinguished Senator had minded his own business. "He speaks well of you, Lieutenant Somers," added the general. "I am very much obliged to him for his kindness; but I never saw him but once in my life." "He asks a favor for you."