to see the horseman who was galloping towards them at such a furious
pace, and, ensconcing herself in her corner, stared out before her at
the hindquarters of the post-horses, looking as blank as any Breton
peasant listening to his _recteur's_ sermon.

Suddenly a young man riding a valuable horse came out from behind the
clump of poplars and flowering briar-rose.

"It is an Englishman," remarked the Colonel.

"Lord bless you, yes, General," said the post-boy; "he belongs to the
race of fellows who have a mind to gobble up France, they say."

The stranger was one of the foreigners traveling in France at the time
when Napoleon detained all British subjects within the limits of the
Empire, by way of reprisals for the violation of the Treaty of Amiens,
an outrage of international law perpetrated by the Court of St. James.
These prisoners, compelled to submit to the Emperor's pleasure, were
not all suffered to remain in the houses where they were arrested, nor
yet in the places of residence which at first they were permitted to
choose. Most of the English colony in Touraine had been transplanted
thither from different places where their presence was supposed to be
inimical to the interests of the Continental Policy.

The young man, who was taking the tedium of the early morning hours on
horseback, was one of these victims of bureaucratic tyranny. Two years
previously, a sudden order from the Foreign Office had dragged him
from Montpellier, whither he had gone on account of consumptive
tendencies. He glanced at the Comte d'Aiglemont, saw that he was a
military man, and deliberately looked away, turning his head somewhat