At Bayonne, a garrison town on the south frontier of France, two sentinels walked lethargically, crossing and recrossing before the governor's house.

Suddenly their official drowsiness burst into energy; for a pale, grisly man, in rusty, defaced, dirty, and torn regimentals, was walking into the courtyard as if it belonged to him.

The sentinels lowered their muskets, and crossed them with a clash before the gateway.
The scarecrow did not start back.

He stopped and looked down with a smile at the steel barrier the soldiers had improvised for him, then drew himself a little up, carried his hand carelessly to his cap, which was nearly in two, and gave the name of an officer in the French army.
If you or I, dressed like a beggar who years ago had stolen regimentals and worn them down to civil garments, had addressed these soldiers with these very same words, the bayonets would have kissed closer, or perhaps the points been turned against our sacred and rusty person: but there is a freemasonry of the sword.

The light, imperious hand that touched that battered cap, and the quiet clear tone of command told.