XLV. A LAST CHAPTER, WRITTEN BY ANOTHER HAND.

Here terminate the confessions of a coward as told by himself. But I will add some details respecting his after life which his own modesty prevented him from relating. When he says that his “life passed much as the lives of other people,” he should have added, “like the lives of those who, first distinguishing themselves at the college of Saint Cyr, follow a glorious career in the army.”

When sub-lieutenant, Bicquerot was the first to scale the walls of a certain Arab village, and then received a severe sabre cut which helped his promotion to lieutenant.

Lieutenant Bicquerot became captain without any wounds, as he was then with his regiment at Bordeaux, and not near any fighting. As peace prevailed at that time and he had not seen his parents since he left Saint Cyr, he got leave; and then might be observed by the worthy inhabitants of Loches, two Captains Bicquerot walking arm-in-arm about the streets.

Captain Bicquerot did his duty nobly at the siege of Sebastopol. He was wounded by a ball, and became insensible; when he regained consciousness in the hospital he was shown the rosette of the Legion of Honour which now decorated his buttonhole, and was told that he lost consciousness as a Captain, but that he awoke to find himself Major.

At the commencement of the Italian campaign Bicquerot was Lieutenant-Colonel. He was made full Colonel at the battle of Magenta. He owed this promotion to his extreme courage and presence of mind displayed upon the occasion. And he was publicly complimented by the general in command.

On his return to France, Colonel Bicquerot was sent to Tours with his regiment. He often went over from thence to Loches to see his beloved mother and father. Captain Bicquerot called his son “the colonel” with immense pride. His mother did not call him “the colonel,” but how rejoiced she was when “her Paul” came to see her, and on Sunday gave her his arm to take her to church.

Dr. Lombalot’s mind was greatly disturbed while Colonel Bicquerot lived at Tours. He would have liked him to live there always for one reason, and that was because he played chess so admirably, and often had a game with the worthy doctor. But for the sake of his phrenological theories the doctor would have liked to see the colonel start for Cochin China. For after having said that so distinguished an officer was wanting in the bump of combativeness, how could he talk of the truths of phrenology again! However, he did talk of them, though in his heart the obstinate old man could not have believed in them.

At the time when Bicquerot and his friend Marc Sublaine passed that happy holiday at Bois-Clair, there was a little baby sister of Marc’s being carried about by her nurse. Miss Marie Sublaine was then cutting her first teeth. As that young person, at that time of her life, was of a somewhat misanthropical turn of mind, and passed all her time in the nursery, it is not to be wondered at, that “the Coward” omitted to mention her when he recounted his confessions. However, one knows that, in general, young gentlemen of nine or ten profess the most extreme contempt for the society of babies; above all, babies that have a habit, like Miss Marie Sublaine, of crying for nothing, and of scratching and biting the noses and fingers of their friends.

Nevertheless Miss Marie Sublaine became in time the wife of Colonel Bicquerot. And a very happy couple they were.

The End