42 THE POCKET AND THE STUD. 



bore till he could not have kept his seat, or 

 rather stand, without this fulcrum, and they 

 would not know what to have done without the 

 General as a support for their heads : command 

 of their mouths, of course, he had none, but when 

 he plumped down on his saddle they took it as a 

 signal to stop, and stopped accordingly. Of the 

 General's fencing I have heard him speak loudly 

 himself, but as I never saw anything of it, or 

 any one who had, I can say nothing on the 

 subject. 



I can fancy the indignation of some on reading 

 what I have written, and hear them say, " It 

 requires no ability to tell a man when he has done 

 wrong that he has done so." No one can deny 

 the truth of such an aphorism. I will add some- 

 thing further : it does not require abilities of any 

 high order to tell a man where he has done wrong, 

 though this may be somewhat more difficult : it 

 may also be added, that if any man takes upon 

 himself to tell another when or where he has done 

 or will do wrong, he ought to feel himself compe- 

 tent to tell him how to do right. I allow he 

 ought ; but whether he can is quite another affair. 



If a man wanted such information as was ap- 

 plicable to the general tenor of his conduct in life, 

 he could not fix upon a man less qualified than 

 myself: in short, in fixing on me as a finger-post 

 to point out the right way, his selection would be 

 a most unfortunate one, not having been prominent 



