especially poked fun at me and at my charge on the barracks. He called
it a "grand-stand play," and said I was a "gallery fighter." He said
the reason I ran out into the centre of the plaza was because I knew
there was a number of women looking out of the windows, and he
pretended to believe that when we entered the barracks they were
empty, and that I knew they were when I ordered the charge.

"It was the coffee they were after," he declared. "As soon as Macklin
smelt the coffee he drew his big gilt sword and cried, 'Up, my men,
inside yon fortress a free breakfast awaits us. Follow your gallant
leader!' and they never stopped following until they reached the
kitchen. They're going to make Macklin a bugler," he said, "so that
after this he can blow his own trumpet without anyone being allowed to
interrupt him."

I was glad to find that I could take what Aiken said of me as lightly
as did the others. Since the fight his power to annoy me had passed. I
knew better than anyone else that at one time during the morning I had
been in a very tight place, but I had stuck to it and won out. The
knowledge that I had done so gave me confidence in myself--not that I
have ever greatly lacked it, but it was a new kind of confidence. It
made me feel older, and less inclined to boast. In this it also helped
out my favorite theory that it must be easy for the man who has done
something to be modest. After he has proved himself capable in the
eyes of his comrades he doesn't have to go about telling them how good
he is. It is a saying that heroes are always modest, but they are not
really modest. They just keep quiet, because they know their deeds are
better talkers than they are.

Miller and I had despatched an orderly to inform Laguerre of our