"Us Scots!" L'Isle exclaimed. "Why, it was but yesterday you told me
how much you had angered Moodie by calling yourself an English woman."

"What of that? I would have you know that I have two sides to my
natural character. I claim the right to present my Scotch or English
side at will, and then you cannot see the other."

Fort San Christoval, on this side of the Guadiana, rose higher and
higher before them. Gazing on Badajoz and its castle on the other side
of the river, L'Isle thought of the failures before it, and of the
price in blood at which it had been bought at last. "We are not always
successful in our sieges--at times undertaking them rashly, without
the means of carrying them on. The sabre, and bayonet, unaided, take
few walled towns. They need the help of Cranfield's art, and he cannot
work without his tools."

"But we always beat the French in the field," said Lady Mabel.

"Always," said L'Isle. "There has been no instance of a real British
army being beaten by a French one."

"None of late years," said Lady Mabel. "To find a victory over us they
have to go as far back in the last century as Fontenoy."

"That is not a fair instance," said L'Isle eagerly. "We lost that
battle chiefly through the backwardness of our Dutch allies; and
Marshal Saxe, who was no Frenchman, but a German, beat us chiefly by
aid of the valor of the Irish regiments in the French pay."

"That alters the case," said Lady Mabel; "but were we not beaten some