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I have a faint recollection of some one coming to me and taking my hand, but nothing further; and it was not till many months afterwards, that I became acquainted with the circumstances which I now relate. It appears that the owner of the cottage was a half-pay lieutenant in the army, who had sold-out on account of his wounds.
England, half-pay and all its attendant horrors, loomed in the near future, and economy had to be practised somehow. Of the late group only Lois and John Stafford remained. They had not spoken, but, as though obeying a mutual understanding, both remained quietly waiting till they were alone. "Shall we walk about a little?" he asked at last. "I missed our morning ride so much.
They collect together their gangs of roughs, five or six thousand terrorists from Paris and the departments, and two thousand officers awaiting orders or on half-pay. In default of Hoche, whose unconstitutional approach was reported and then prevented, they have Augereau, arrived expressly from Italy, and who states publicly, "I am sent for to kill the royalists."
Bunter every Saturday, just to see whether she had any use for my services. It was understood I would do that. She had just his half-pay to live on it amounted to about a pound a week. She had taken one room in a quiet little square in the East End.
Many comparisons between the man, and the recollections of my kind aunt, of old George Constable, who, I think, dangled after her; of Dalgetty, a veteran half-pay lieutenant, who swaggered his solitary walk on the parade, as he called a little open space before the same pool. We went to Preston, and took refuge from a thunder-plump in the old tower.
As most of the soldiers mentioned were used to forest life, from having been long stationed at frontier posts, and had thus become familiarized with its privations, and hardened against its dangers, it was no unusual thing for them to sell out, or go on half-pay, when the wants of a family began to urge their claims, and to retire to their "patents," as the land itself, as well as the instrument by which it was granted, was invariably termed, with a view of establishing themselves permanently as landlords.
There are the early walks through the parks and green Kensington Gardens, which now change their character of resort, and seem rural and countrylike, but yet with more life than the country; for on the benches beneath the trees, and along the sward, and up the malls, are living beings enough to interest the eye and divert the thoughts, if you are a guesser into character, and amateur of the human face, fresh nursery-maid and playful children; and the old shabby-genteel, buttoned- up officer, musing on half-pay, as he sits alone in some alcove of Kenna, or leans pensive over the rail of the vacant Ring; and early tradesman, or clerk from the suburban lodging, trudging brisk to his business, for business never ceases in London.
There are many reasons, it seems to me, why an Englishman who has the tastes of a duke and the means of a half-pay major, should prefer the banks of the Seine to those of the Thames even with the new Embankment.
"This will be a rough night for the money-diggers," said mine host, as a gust of wind howled round the house, and rattled at the windows. "What, are they at their works again?" said an English half-pay captain, with one eye, who was a frequent attendant at the inn. "Aye, are they," said the landlord, "and well may they be. They've had luck of late.
There will be no stars. There will be no moon. The very heavens fight for us, and by sunrise our outposts will be twenty miles inland!" At lunch-time Carl Schultz carefully, obsequiously waited upon the three strangers. He gave them their choice of soup, thick or clear, of gooseberry pie or Half-Pay pudding.
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