And well for him I did, for I do not hesitate to say that the
battle WAS GAINED BY ME. I do not mean to insult the reader by
pretending that any personal exertions of mine turned the day,--
that I killed, for instance, a regiment of cavalry or swallowed a
battery of guns,--such absurd tales would disgrace both the hearer
and the teller. I, as is well known, never say a single word which
cannot be proved, and hate more than all other vices the absurd sin
of egotism: I simply mean that my ADVICE to the General, at a
quarter-past two o'clock in the afternoon of that day, won this
great triumph for the British army.

Gleig, Mill, and Thorn have all told the tale of this war, though
somehow they have omitted all mention of the hero of it. General
Lake, for the victory of that day, became Lord Lake of Laswaree.
Laswaree! and who, forsooth, was the real conqueror of Laswaree? I
can lay my hand upon my heart and say that I was. If any proof is
wanting of the fact, let me give it at once, and from the highest
military testimony in the world--I mean that of the Emperor
Napoleon.

In the month of March, 1817, I was passenger on board the "Prince
Regent," Captain Harris, which touched at St. Helena on its passage
from Calcutta to England. In company with the other officers on
board the ship, I paid my respects to the illustrious exile of
Longwood, who received us in his garden, where he was walking
about, in a nankeen dress and a large broad-brimmed straw hat, with
General Montholon, Count Las Casas, and his son Emanuel, then a
little boy; who I dare say does not recollect me, but who
nevertheless played with my sword-knot and the tassels of my
Hessian boots during the whole of our interview with his Imperial