196 TEAVEL, ADVENTURE, AND SPORT. 



Though the shot fell around and over us, they seldom 

 took effect. The French marines were on our left, 

 keeping up the communication with the sea. It was 

 arranged that the French battery should be established 

 south-west of the Tsee fort, ours on the ridge betwixt 

 it and Nortike, so that the guns once up, it might be 

 turned without much difficulty against either. So 

 much for the military plan. And now, as our guns 

 cannot be brought up for two days, and there can be 

 no work for us till then, let us gather a few pictures 

 which present themselves. Many are the subjects. 

 The pastoral scenery of the country, smiling in its 

 simple prettiness, and seeming, even amid war, the 

 seat of peacefulness ; the people so calm and undis- 

 turbed, so rustic in appearance and character, follow- 

 ing their usual occupations, apparently fearing noth- 

 ing, hoping nothing ; the camps, with their warlike 

 aspects, their moving masses, their striking action 

 and strange picturesqueness ; the fortresses gloomy, 

 stern, and defiant, showing no symptom of life or 

 habitation, save when a flash came from the em- 

 brasures. All these suggest pictures and thoughts 

 enow. Let us turn to our camp and the life thereoi 

 Here, sitting in the sunshine, with its little world 

 spread out before us, it is no bad time or place to 

 study the philosophy of a soldier's life, to watch the 

 traits of robustness, childishness, docility, wayward- 

 ness, fun, earnestness, and constancy, which weave 

 their different shades in the character of the English 



