One feature struck me in particular through all he said, and gave a character most distinctive to the service he belonged to, and totally unlike what I had observed among the soldiers of the army. With _them_ the armies of all Europe were accounted the enemy,--the Austrian, the Russian, the Italian, and the Prussian were the foes he had met and conquered in so many fields of glory. The pride he felt in his triumphs was a great but natural sentiment; involving, however, no hatred of his enemy, nor any desire to disparage his courage or his skill. With the sailor of the Empire, however, there was but one antagonist, and that one he detested with his whole heart: England was a word which stirred his passion from its very inmost recesses, and made his blood boil with intense excitement. The gay insolence of the soldier, treating his conquest as a thing of ease and certainty, had no resemblance to the collected and impassioned hate of the sailor, who felt that _his_ victories were not such as proclaimed his superiority by evidence incontestable. The victories on land contrasted, too, so strongly with even what were claimed as such at sea, that the sailors could not control their detestation of those who had robbed them of a share of their country's praise, and made the hazardous career they followed one of mere secondary interest in the eyes of France. A more perfect representative of this mingled jealousy and hate could not be found than Paul Dupont, the sous-officier in command of this little party. He was a Breton, and carried the ruling trait of his province into the most minute feature of his conduct. Bold, blunt, courageous, open-hearted, and fearless, but passionate to the verge of madness when thwarted, and unforgiving in his vengeance when insulted, he only believed in Brittany, and for the rest of France he cared as little as for Switzerland. His whole life had been spent at sea, until about two years previous, when from boatswain he was promoted to be a sergeant of the Marines of the Guard,--a step he regretted every day, and was now actually petitioning to be restored to his old grade, even at the sacrifice of pay and rank; such was the impression a short life ashore had made on him, and so complete his contempt for any service save that in blue water. “Come, old 'sea-wolf,'”--such was the sobriquet Paul went by among his comrades,--“thou art dull to-night,” said an old sailor with a head as white as snow. “I haven't seen thee so low of heart this many a day.”