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Updated: June 19, 2025
The next day, at half-past five in the morning, the bugle-call rang through the barrack-yard at Souvigny. Jean mounted his horse, and took his place with his division. By the end of May all the recruits in the army are sufficiently instructed to be capable of sharing in the general evolutions. Almost every day manoeuvres of the mounted artillery are executed on the parade-ground.
So much the better; there would be fewer people about, and my chances of escape would thereby be all the greater. The first question was, how to get beyond the boundaries of the barracks. The front or barrack-yard was bounded on three sides by lofty buildings and on the fourth by a high wall, with gates in it, it is true, but gates which would be closed and locked at that hour of the night.
Corporals swore and threatened; but to an onlooker the work of packing would have seemed to go by magic. At the end of the ten minutes the barrack-yard was full of men lined up, ready for marching, and soldiers of all nations thanked their gods for finding that the cartridges served out to them from the magazine were not blank ones.
I was waiting for the jaunting car which was to carry me to town, when my ugly friend heaved in sight, and, finding a man in civilian dress with the undeniable air of the barrack-yard upon him, and being, as I guess, a little short-sighted, he saluted me as he would have saluted an officer in passing.
The following morning at seven o'clock Douglas rode into the parade ground, and found his men already drawn up, together with the two field- pieces; and half an hour later the little army clattered out of the barrack-yard into the streets, past the plaza, out of the north gate, and swung into the road which led north-eastward toward Lake Titicaca, reaching La Paz four days after leaving Arica.
As I removed the key, and stood back in the recess to deliberate upon my next steps, I became conscious of the sound of running water; and looking along the passage into the barrack-yard, and the courtyard at the back of the tower, I saw, by the faint light of one or two lamps, that the ground was flooded, and that it was raining heavily.
Hastily drawing on my coat, I put on my shako, and buckling on my belt as dandy-like as might be, hurried down the stairs to the barrack-yard. By the time I got down, the men were all drawn up in line along the square; while the adjutant was proceeding to examine their accoutrements, &c. as he passed down. The colonel and the officers were standing in a group, but no conversing.
Simple, good, frank, cordial, such they had shown themselves the very first day, and delightfully pretty into the bargain a fact which is never insignificant. Jean fell at once under the charm; he was there still! At the moment when he dismounted in the barrack-yard, at nine o'clock, the old priest began his campaign joyously.
They rattled backwards and forwards at full gallop, and made figures of eight, and turned and twisted in a marvellous manner, suggestive rather of a circus than a barrack-yard; but their evolutions served to amuse the crowd, who waited patiently until sunset, when it became evident that the affair would be put off until the morrow.
"I thought I should have had orders before I left the Villa," the General said to his son, "then you could have gone straight there. I suppose he means to see him here: that is why he wanted him brought to the Villa. But he's always the same: he never can make up his mind." And he grunted. "Perhaps there will be something waiting at home," he added in his hoarse barrack-yard voice.
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