“My good boy, I know him well. The knowledge has cost me something; but I have it. A soldier's enthusiasm!” said he, in irony,--“bah! Shall I tell you a little incident of my boyhood? I detest story-telling, but this you must hear. Fill my glass! listen, and I promise you not to be lengthy.” It was the first time in our intimacy in which Duchesne referred distinctly to his past life; and I willingly accepted the offer he made, anticipating that any incident, no matter how trivial, might throw a light on the strange contrarieties of his character. He sat for several minutes silent, his eyes turned towards the ground. A faint smile, more of sadness than aught else, played about his lips, as he muttered to himself some words I could not catch. Then rallying, with a slight effort, he began thus--But, short as his tale was, we must give him a chapter to himself. CHAPTER XIV. A BOYISH REMINISCENCE “I believe I have already told you, Burke, that my family were most of them Royalists. Such as were engaged in trade followed the fortunes of the day, and cried 'Vive la République!' like their neighbors. Some deemed it better to emigrate, and wait in a foreign land for the happy hour of returning to their own,--a circumstance, by the way, which must have tried their patience ere this; and a few, trusting to their obscure position, living in out-of-the-way, remote spots, supposed that in the general uproar they might escape undetected; and, with one or two exceptions, they were right. Among these latter was an unmarried brother of my mother, who having held a military command for a great many years in the Ile de Bourbon, retired to spend the remainder of his days in a small but beautiful château on the seaside, about three leagues from Marseilles. The old viscount (we continued to call him so among ourselves, though the use of titles was proscribed long before) had met with some disappointment in love in early life, which had prevented his ever marrying, and turned all his affections towards the children of his brothers and sisters, who invariably passed a couple of months of each summer with him, arriving from different parts of France for the purpose.