Chapter 12 - Page 2

reflections, the youth wrought himself into something of
a passion, especially as he saw Denbigh enter, after Emily had declined
dancing with himself. There was a gentleman in the corps who unfortunately
was addicted to the bottle, and he had fastened on Jarvis as a man at
leisure to keep him company. Wine openeth the heart, and the captain
having taken a peep at the dancers, and seen the disposition of affairs,
returned to his bottle companion, bursting with the indignity offered to
his person. He dropped a hint, and a question or two brought the whole
grievance forth.

There is a certain set of men in every service who imbibe extravagant
notions that are revolting to humanity, and which too often prove to be
fatal in their results. Their morals are never correct, and the little
they have set loosely about them. In their own cases, their appeals to
arms are not always so prompt; but in that of their friends, their
perceptions of honor are intuitively keen, and their inflexibility in
preserving it from reproach unbending; and such is the weakness of
mankind, their "tenderness on points where the nicer feelings of a soldier
are involved, that these machines of custom, these thermometers graduated
to the scale of false honor, usurp the place of reason and benevolence,
and become too often the arbiters of life and death to a whole corps.
Such, then, was the confidant to whom Jarvis communicated the cause of his
disgust, and the consequences may easily be imagined. As he passed Emily
and Denbigh, he threw a look of fierceness at the latter, which he meant
as an indication of his hostile intentions. It was lost on his rival, who
at that moment was filled with passions of a very different kind from
those which Captain Jarvis thought agitated his own bosom; for had his new
friend let him alone, the captain would have gone quietly home and gone to
sleep.

"Have you ever fought?" said Captain Digby coolly to his companion, as
they seated themselves in his father's parlor, whither they had retired to
make their arrangements for the following morning.

"Yes," said Jarvis, with a stupid look, "I fought once with Tom Halliday
at school."

"At school! My dear friend, you commenced young indeed," said Digby,
helping himself to another glass. "And how did it end?"

"Oh! Tom got the better, and so I cried enough," said Jarvis, surlily.

"Enough! I hope you did not flinch," eyeing him keenly "Where were you
hit?"

"He hit me all over."

"All over! The d---l! Did you use small shot? How did you fight?"

"With fists," said Jarvis, yawning.

His companion, seeing how matters were,