Democratic Sentinel, Volume 12, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 November 1888 — AN AWKWARD GUEST. [ARTICLE]

AN AWKWARD GUEST.

Tl»e Story of the Captain Who Couldn't Keep Quiet. Toward the end of the period of his active service, a certain gallant colonel of a crack French cavalry regiment was overjoyed by finding himself created an officer of the Legion of Honor. To celebrate this very happy and crowning episode of his long career, he decided to give a grand dinner, to which he invited the authorities and principal civilians of the city, as well as the whole of the considerable resident staff officers. But the colonel was not in a state of quite unmixed enjoyment, as he found himself in somewhat of a dilemma. There was a certain Captain Morel in the town who had formerly belonged to his regiment, and who had retired on half pay some three years before, but who apparently could not live without the regiment to which he had been formerly attached, for he always turned up wherever it happened to be stationed. This old soldier was a unique specimen, now happily, extinct, of a grognard (grumbler, literally translated), and an ill-bred and ill-mannered officer. He was wearisome, and barely tolerated, the only excuse made for him being that he had been a brave fellow in his time. The soldiers used say of of him: “That mad fellow, Captain Morel, appears to be never happy except when he is in a dance or a rage. ” Now, as the colonel had included the leading ladies of the neighborhood in his invitation, he determined, after considerable cogitation, to send for Morel to come and speak with him. “Captain, I give a dinner on Monday.” “I know it, Colonel.” “And, as I hold you in much esteem, I have sent you an invitation, but I beg of you not to accept it. ” “May I ask, Colonel, without indiscretion, why you offer me such an affront as this V” “Mon Dieu, Captain, there is no affront in the matter, since the refusal will come from you; but considerations which you will understand ” “All I understand is that I am not considered in the least. ” “Well, then, I must explain myself more clearly. lam afraid that your very military style of conversation will shodk and affront the ladies whom I expect to be present. ” “A thousand thunders! May the devil’s carcass double strangle me if I understand!” “You will go on that way at table. You know that the city dames are a little ” “Stiff and starch, precise and prim; butter won’t med in their mouths. They screw up their lips like— 3 —” “Exactly.” “Very well. Colonel, the thing is settled; of c urse I won't come. lam a mangy, s urvy fellow. It's a pleasant position ” “But, Captiin ” “It’s a pleasant position to be in, after thirby years’service, el.v, n campaigns, ar.d seven wounds!” “If you would only promise me rob to talk?” “As to that, Colonel, I can easily and safe’y promise; even if I had your permission, I would not open my mouth.” “Positively?” “If I u'te • a word, I will spit out my tongue five-and-twenty feet above the level of the sea.” “I had rather have your word of honor.” ' “You hvve it, Colonel; you have it.” On the day of the dinner, the Captarn, in full uniform, presented himself ab the Colonel's and bowed to everybody without saying a word. One gets used to everything. As the dinner progressed, nobody paid any attention to the Captain’s pu.tomime, who ate like an ogre, to make up for his enforced taciturnity. The third course was nearly over, anl about to be succeeded by dess?rh; the Captain was busily engaged on a roast woodcock, while the Colonel was congratulating himself on having escaped humiliating an old brother-in- arms. All at once a horii'ole cry burst from the Captain's lips. One of his grinders had bean broken by a shot lodged in the bird’s thigh. “ Sapristi!” shouted the grognard, who, holding out with one hand the murderous shot, and with the other the woodcock’s head, excla med at the top of his voice: “This infernal brute didn’t die of the measles!”