Page 241 - A Jacobite Exile

"Well, sir," the count said, smiling, "as his majesty King Charles, although
not yet one-and-twenty, is one of the greatest generals in Europe, I cannot

consider it strange that you, who appear to me to be no older, should be a
captain in his service. But I own that I pictured, to myself, that the officers

of these wonderful soldiers were fierce-looking men, regular iron veterans."

"I am but eighteen," Charlie said, "and I myself feel it absurd that I should

be a captain. It is but two years since I was appointed an ensign, and the
king happening to be with my company, when we had a sharp fight with the

Russians, he rewarded us by having us made into a regiment; so each of us
got promotion. I was appointed captain last May, as a reward for a
suggestion that turned out useful."

"May I ask what it was, Captain Carstairs, for it seems to me that you are

full of happy ideas?"

"King Charles, as you may have heard, speaks freely to officers and

soldiers as he moves about the camp. I was standing on the edge of the
river, looking across at the Saxons, on the day before we made the passage,

when the king came up and spoke to me. He said there was no hope of our
passage being covered--as our advance against the Russians at Narva had
been--by a snowstorm; and I said that, as the wind was at our backs, if we

were to set fire to the great straw stacks the smoke would hide our
movements from the Saxons. The idea was a very simple one, and would

no doubt have occurred to the king himself; however, he put it into
execution with success, and was good enough, afterwards, to promote me
to the rank of captain."

"So it was owing to you that our army--or rather the Saxon army, for but

few Poles were engaged in the battle--was defeated," the count said,
smiling. "Well, sir, it will do you no harm with us, for personally we are
entirely opposed to Augustus of Saxony. But you have not yet explained

how you, an officer in the Swedish service, came to be here."

"I was sent by King Charles to Warsaw, to ascertain the feeling of the
trading classes there. I had an introduction to a Scottish merchant, and I