How ill-judged that view was the sequel will show.
After the spies had gone, and Mrs Mackenzie and Flossie had retired for the night, Alphonse, the little Frenchman, came out, and Sir Henry, who is a very good French scholar, got him to tell us how he came to visit Central Africa, which he did in a most extraordinary lingo, that for the most part I shall not attempt to reproduce.
'My grandfather,' he began, 'was a soldier of the Guard, and served under Napoleon.

He was in the retreat from Moscow, and lived for ten days on his own leggings and a pair he stole from a comrade.

He used to get drunk -- he died drunk, and I remember playing at drums on his coffin.

My father -- ' Here we suggested that he might skip his ancestry and come to the point.
'Bien, messieurs!' replied this comical little man, with a polite bow.

'I did only wish to demonstrate that the military principle is not hereditary.