Thus, ten to fifteen years of struggles, tribulation, obstacles,
humiliations, devotion, dangers, in order to reach the salary of a grocer's
clerk!

But the old Captain, what was he looking for in the columns of the Service
newspaper?

He had nothing to expect. No new promotion could swell his aged breast. He
had completed his career. Like a rejected charger whose ear has been slit,
or whose right flank has been branded, he had been laid aside for ever.
Henceforth he had nothing else to do but to plant his cabbages, until his
legs were seized by anchylosis, absolutely forgotten.

And so with all those who go away.

Amidst the thousand incidents of military life, so filled in its leisure
and so empty in its employments, has anyone the time to give a thought to
the absent one who must return no more? His place is taken; a new face is
seated there where we used to see him, and his is no longer familiar to us.
A few years hence and his name will be known no more. The army is for the
young!

But does he forget? Does a man forget his youth, his glory, his dearest
memories, his whole life? Retired into some country nook, completely buried
in an obscure market-town, or become the modest citizen of some provincial
city, the old officer follows afar off with solicitude and envy the
different fortunes of his brothers in arms, living ever in thought amidst
that forgetful and ungrateful family which he loves as much as his own--the
Regiment.