CIVIL GRO>YL OF AX OLD SPOETSMAX. 47 



should have had good sport with the red-legged par- 

 tridges. WTien the colonel gave me his sword he 

 appeared very dejected, and said, " L'Empereur ne me 

 ixirdonnera jamais." I inquired his reason, to which 

 he replied that Napoleon had given a positive order 

 that no place should be surrendered until it had stood 

 one assault. But fortunately during the night one of 

 our shells blew up the magazine, which left him no 

 alternative but that of hoisting the white flag. I had 

 been ordered by Colonel Prevost to take the command 

 of the detachment that was to storm the breach at day- 

 light and to say the truth, I was not sorry to see the 

 white flag hoisted, as it saved an effusion of blood. A 

 friend of mine, a general officer, at that time a captain 

 43rd light infantry, told me that after the capture of 

 Badajos by the Duke of Wellington, the country 

 being very open and corn lands, the officers amused 

 tliemselves on sultry days, when there w^as little or 

 no wind, in riding down the red-legged partridges, 

 which, when tired, they wounded wdth their w^hips, 

 and frequently captured several brace of them. This 

 I can readily imagine, for when much alarmed they 

 become stupefied. 



The civil growl from an old sportsman in the 

 " Pleld " newspaper I have found so amusing I cannot 

 help inserting it : — 



" Ay, a}^, ay ! It's all very well, your days of breech- 

 loading and patent cai'tridges, machines for killing birds 

 at a hundred yards off, and capable of firing off as much 

 ammunition in an hour as a man can carry, so that ere 

 long you will want three or four men to carry j^our 

 powder and shot for you. But your guns, 3^our breech- 

 loaders, and all that, don't make a bit better target, as 



