I joined my regiment at Hounslow, where, to my inexpressible delight, I found the man who, in former years, used to be my comrade. The greeting was on both sides the more hearty, that in our own troop there was not one in ten whom I could recognise. Indeed, I do not think that out of the five hundred men, from whom the fortune of war had separated me three years previously, one hundred continued to wear the uniform of the 11th Light Dragoons. Among the officers, likewise, great changes had occurred, though of them a considerable portion remained. Yet they all received me as if I had had some personal claim upon their attentions, and gave me every indulgence which I could reasonably desire. I was here equipped in new clothing,--I got a fresh charger assigned me,--and, in due time, found myself once more engaged in the common routine of military life.

At the period of which I now speak England was rejoicing, in all her towns and villages, over the restoration of peace. In London, the Prince Regent kept open house for the monarchs and great warriors of Europe; whilst, at Windsor, Queen Charlotte feasted the poor on the fat of the land. As I happened to be present at one of these noble festivals,--for noble they certainly were, at least, in design,--it may not, perhaps, prove altogether uninteresting to the reader, if I treat him to a description of what passed under my own observation.

Having spent so much time in private service, I became, as was to be expected, a sort of marked man in the corps, and soon found that among the officers there was considerable competition as to which should get me. It ended in my joining my fortunes to that of a young lieutenant, who, possessing a handsome income, and being besides a man of family, was, during this season of universal jubilee, permitted to do pretty much as he liked. Him I accompanied to Windsor; and, as he was much more in the metropolis than present with the corps, my time became to a great degree my own property. It happened, one day, that I strolled in my fustian undress, into the old guard-room of the castle, where tables were spread for two thousand persons at the least. They literally groaned under a profusion of choice morsels, such as haunches and saddles of mutton, sirloins of beef, fillets of veal, hams and tongues, rounds, barons, and I know not all what,--with vegetables, salads, bread, and plum-pudding in proportion. I was amazingly struck, as may easily be conceived; and, having formed a strong wish to become a sharer in the festivities, I laid myself out--as the result proved, not unsuccessfully--to carry my point.

There were a variety of little offices or closets, adjoining the guard-room, in which women busily employed themselves in working tickets for the favoured individuals who were to be admitted to the dinner. Into one of these I wandered, just, as it happened, when the lady on duty had expended her entire stock save one, and of that one I was immediately rendered the possessor. I stuck it in my hat forthwith,--the men carried the badges there, the women and children on the breasts of their robes,--and soon found myself seated at a table, which accommodated, besides myself, fifty-nine diners. I came, however, under circumstances far more unfavourable than those around me; for they, one and all, brought with them their knives, forks, and drinking-cups,--whereas, I not having so much as read any of the handbills which set forth the programme of the day's entertainment, sat down profoundly ignorant that any such precautionary measures had been requisite. This was a source to me partly of vexation, partly of extreme amusement. The vexation arose from the natural pressure of appetite, which I was not without apprehension I might find myself unable to appease; the amusement was furnished by the behaviour of my next neighbour, who seemed determined to make the most of the opportunity that was presented to him. The individual in question followed the respectable calling of an itinerant fiddler. Many a penny I had given the rogue; yet he was dressed on this occasion so smartly, that I knew him not, at least till after his excessive predilection for number one induced me to scan him closely. But that was the least of it.

We had all been seated perhaps a couple of minutes--every eye being turned keenly towards the viands, that spoke to more senses than one; and my musical neighbour had sneered at my lack of preparation, and more than insinuated that I had no business where I was, when a flourish of trumpets announced the approach of royalty, and we all stood up to welcome the queen and the courtly cortège that attended her. She walked, followed by her train, along the several tables, the company greeting her with repeated cheers, and then, after expressing at each a hope that we would do justice to the cheer provided, she withdrew. Then followed the "Roast Beef of Old England," from a band that was appointed to attend; and then such an onslaught as in modern times has rarely, on any one given spot of earth, been witnessed. For my own part, having neither knife, nor fork, nor cup, I felt for a brief space as if I were destined to be a mere spectator. But my cross-grained fiddler supplied me with an opportunity of playing my own part in the game, and I did not fail to take advantage of it.

"I wish you would cut me a good slice of that fillet of veal," said he. "It is too far for me to reach, and lies handy to you."

"By all means," was my reply, "but you must lend me your knife and fork."

He did so; and I very coolly helped myself, taking care to cut up the morsel into pieces, and keep them ready for consumption by the hand. I shall never forget the rage of my right hand neighbour while this process was going on; neither did the enormous extent to which I proceeded to help him quite allay it. And by-and-by, when he gave me his jug, that I might fill it with beer for his use, and I, instead of handing it back, drank out of it, and drank to his health, I really thought the minstrel would have gone mad. Nevertheless, in the end, he and I became excellent friends. I plied him, especially with strong beer, to such a degree that he did not know whether his head or his heels were uppermost; and if he did not die of absolute repletion, the fault was neither mine who loaded his trencher, nor his, who most voraciously cleared it.

If the progress of the dinner astonished as well as amused me, much more amusing, as well as astonishing, was the scene with which it terminated. The queen, it appeared, had given orders that not a fragment of that enormous feast should fall to the share of any others than those who partook in it; and the consequence was that, on a second roll of the drums, such a scramble began as I have never witnessed either before or since. The women, having provided themselves with capacious aprons, came for the most part best off in that mélée. They swept whole joints--with puddings, potatoes, and Lord knows all what besides--into their laps, while the men hastened to stuff their pouches to an extent which was truly marvellous. Among others, my musical neighbour used his best exertions to possess himself of a plentiful share; but the strong beer had so effectually filled his stomach, and clouded his brain, that in attempting to stretch across the table for something which excited his cupidity, the equilibrium failed, and he rolled on the floor, smashing into a confused mass all that he had previously gathered, and mixing the whole with fragments of his quart jug, which, somehow or another, had found its way into a wallet that hung by his side. I plead guilty to the charge of having tossed him with my foot twice or thrice through the mess, and then, amid shouts of laughter, I escaped, not knowing which to admire the most, the hospitality of my royal mistress, or the strange uses to which by her uncouth guests it had been turned. Before I conclude this story I may as well state that I met my fiddler a day or two afterwards, plying his trade in his every-day attire, and at his usual corners. We had a little bandying of half angry, half jocular words, which I cut short by tossing him a penny; and I do not know that we ever met afterwards.

Our next move was to Hampton Court and Twickenham, where similar scenes were repeated--oxen being roasted whole, and all who chose partaking in them; but I need not pause to relate the effect which they produced upon myself. It will be more to the purpose if I state, that being so near London, I found frequent opportunities both of entertaining my relatives at the quarters of the regiment, and of visiting them in their own homes; during the latter of which occurrences an adventure once befel me, which, as it was rather a curious one, may be deserving of a brief notice. I had supped at the house of one of my aunts, and having rather overstaid my time, (for I was for duty at Whitehall on the following morning,) I was hurrying through Piccadilly, in order to reach my quarters, when at the corner of a street I was startled by the sound of fire-arms, accompanied by a noise as of the smashing of glass. A man passed me at the same moment, running, and holding up the skirts of a long surtout, and almost immediately afterwards a second appeared, with a stream of blood flowing from his mouth. He made towards me, put a hand on each of my shoulders, and endeavouring vainly to articulate, deluged me in a moment with gore. There was a lamp close to us, by the light of which I could distinguish that he was a mere youth; but I had no time to do more, for instantly a voice shouted "Watch," and the wounded man, as if alarmed, hurried away, and endeavoured to mount the box of a hackney-coach which drove furiously past. The coachman, however, repulsed him, and he staggered across the street, marking his progress by the sanguine tide which flowed from him. And now the watch began to assemble, who, seeing me covered with blood, demanded whether I were not wounded, while the same voice which had summoned them desired to be informed whether any one were shot. I answered in the affirmative, and, pointing to the track, desired the guardians of the night to follow it up; for I was not the wounded man, as they would find if they made good use of their senses. Away they ran in pursuit, whereupon I, not caring to get further involved in the business, took to my heels, and reached my quarters without molestation. But the issue of the adventure was the most extraordinary of all. Being on guard next day, at Whitehall, a young man happened to pass the Horse Guards, whom I instantly recognised as the individual whom I had seen the night before fleeing with his hands upon his pockets. I stopped him, charged him with the fact, and was answered by a frank confession, accompanied, however, with an earnest entreaty that I would not betray him. It appeared that he was the son of a respectable innkeeper--that he had fallen into bad company, and been persuaded to assist that night in a burglary at the shop of a linen-draper. But the linendraper, either because it was his wont, or having got some intimation of the design, was on the look-out to defeat it, and fired a pistol just as the leading burglar was removing the shutter, and about to cut a pane in the window. I did not disclose what I knew to any one; for the father of the young delinquent was an acquaintance of my own, and I am happy to say that the promises of amendment which he gave were never broken. But his companion, I afterwards discovered, did not live to have his moral principle put to the test. He died of the wound which the linen-draper inflicted, and was buried, I cannot tell where, but very quietly, by his associates.

We remained in the neighbourhood of London about six months, at the termination of which period we marched to Canterbury, where, and at Deal, the back pay was given to such of our men as had been like myself, prisoners of war. Of this the Jews first, and ultimately the publicans, reaped the principal benefit--for, next to a sailor, a soldier is, of all living men, the least regardful of his money. But other work than this was already cut out for us, and Buonaparte's unexpected return from Elba sent us to the place where we were destined to perform it. I never shall forget the effect which the intelligence had upon us. It reached us one morning, and in two hours after came the rout to march for Dover, where transports lay to receive us; and by four o'clock on the following afternoon we were busily engaged swimming our horses ashore, towards the beach at Ostend.

It was about eight o'clock on a summer's evening when our disembarkation was effected. The process had been tedious, inasmuch as the transports were too heavily laden to approach within half-a-mile of the beach; and to swim horses through so wide a waste of waters is an operation that occupies a good deal of time. Nevertheless the regiment formed up as soon as circumstances would allow, and began its march the same evening to Nieuport. It was now that I found my knowledge of the German language greatly avail me. Being sent, with a comrade, to quarter in a farm-house about a mile beyond the town, I so entirely won the hearts of the family, by speaking so as to be understood, that they vied with one another in their eagerness to make us comfortable; and themselves undertaking to clean and fodder the horses, they kept us--no reluctant guests--all night at the supper-table. But this was not the only piece of good fortune that befel me, which I was justified in attributing to my long residence in the Count's family. I was instantly promoted to the office of billet-master for the corps; and, besides obtaining temporary rank as a serjeant, I came in for sundry perquisites, such as the French had taught the Belgians to pay as often as orders were issued for the supply of bread, or meat, or wine, to bodies of troops upon the march.

From Nieuport we proceeded to Bruges, where we halted an entire day, of which I made the best use, by visiting as many of the sights of the place as the opportunities at my command would allow. Our next point was Ghent, a noble city, where we witnessed the entrance of Louis XVIII., for the second time a fugitive from Paris. But as he came without parade, so during the whole of his sojourn there we heard little of him, except that he was a regular attendant at mass. Meanwhile fresh regiments were continually arriving, and we were in consequence carried, on the breast of the living tide, first to Merbeck, and ultimately to Goyek. We were at this latter place on the 29th of May, when the Duke of Wellington reviewed the whole of his cavalry, and a finer military spectacle was never, I venture to assert, submitted to the admiring gaze of the Netherlanders. Unless my memory deceive me, twenty regiments formed in two lines that day, flanked and supported by a force of horse-artillery, such as all Europe besides could not match; and as the horses were in admirable condition, and the men young, healthy, and well-appointed, it is very little to be wondered at if both men and officers experienced but one feeling--an earnest desire to be led against the enemy, and a perfect assurance of success.

We were well supplied both with forage and provisions; yet, somehow or another, money was scarce--for no pay had been issued since we quitted England, and some corps were full three months in arrear. Now a soldier cannot get on--at least in a civilized country, without a little silver in his purse. His allowance of grog or wine by no means contents him; and he cannot hear the sound of the pipe and tabor without desiring to dance. As usually happens in like cases, we were immediately put to our shifts; and the following was the expedient on which we lighted--for a season with marvellous success. There are two coins used in this city, of which the dies are precisely alike; though the one, having a slight intermixture of silver with the copper, passes current for about threepence half-penny--whereas the other is valued at half a farthing. Some ingenious fellow among us discovered, that by rubbing the latter with mercurial ointment it assumed at once the appearance of the former; and many a pint of gin, I grieve to say, was paid for with the half farthing. I can offer no justification of a procedure which was certainly dishonest--unless, indeed, the exorbitancy of the prices demanded from us can be received as such. But I know that we laughed very heartily when the trick began to be discovered; and were the more free of our mirth that the very same day we quitted Merberk, never to return to it again.