Maurice Tiernay, Soldier of Fortune

While I was dressing, a note was handed to me from the curé, apologising for his departure without seeing me, and begging, as a great favour, that I would not leave the château...

Neither the tastes nor the temper of the age we live in are such as to induce any man to boast of his family nobility. We see too many preparations around us for laying down new...

My new acquaintance never ceased to congratulate himself on what he called the lucky accident that had led him to the barracks that morning, and thus brought about our meeting....

All General Masséna’s wise counsels, and my own steady resolves to profit by them, were so far thrown away, that, on our arrival at Abensberg, we found that the Emperor had left...

I followed the soldiers as they marched beyond the outer boulevard and gained the open country. Many of the idlers dropped off here; others accompanied us a little farther; but...

The Duc d’Enghien and his aide-de-camp were forwarded with the utmost speed to Paris; the remainder of us were imprisoned at Strasbourg. What became of my companions I know not;...

When I reached the quarters of the état-major, I found the great courtyard of the ‘hotel’ crowded with soldiers of every rank and arm of the service. Some were newly joined recr...

There was no resisting the inquisitive curiosity of my companion. The short dry cough, the little husky ‘ay,’ that sounded like anything rather than assent, which followed on my...

As I gained the street, at a distance from the Place, I was able to increase my speed; and I did so with an eagerness as if the world depended on my haste. At any other time I w...

As I cast my eyes over these pages, and see how small a portion of my life they embrace, I feel like one who, having a long journey before him, perceives that some more speedy m...

I parted from my friend Eugène at Treves, where he remained in garrison, while I was sent forward to Coblentz to join my regiment, at that time forming part of Ney’s division.

On a hot and sultry day of June I found myself seated in a country cart, and under the guard of two mounted dragoons, wending my way towards Kuffstein, a Tyrol fortress, to whic...

I SAT up all night listening to the soldiers’ stories of war and campaigning. Some had served with Soult’s army in the Asturias; some made part of Davout’s corps in the north of...

We were all occupied with our drill at daybreak on the morning of the 27th of August, when a mounted orderly arrived at full gallop, with news that our troops were in motion for...

When the French army fell back across the Sambre, after the battle of Mons, a considerable portion of the rear, who covered the retreat, were cut off by the enemy, for it became...

I have never yet been able to discover whether General Humbert really did feel the confidence that he assumed at this period, or that he merely affected it, the better to sustai...

I now come to an incident in my life, which, however briefly I may speak, has left the deepest impression on my memory. I have told the reader how I left Kuffstein fully satisfi...

The general was as good as his word, and I now enjoyed the most unrestricted liberty; in fact, the officers of the garrison said truly, that they were far more like prisoners th...

Our voyage was very uneventful, but not without anxiety, since, to avoid the English cruisers and the Channel fleet, we were obliged to hold a southerly course for several days,...

At the time of which I write, there was but one motive principle throughout France--‘Terror.’ By the agency of terror and the threat of denunciation was everything carried on, n...

I had scarcely finished my breakfast, when a group of officers rode up to our quarters to visit me. My arrival had already created an immense sensation in the city, and all kind...

I am at a loss to know whether or not I owe an apology to my reader for turning away from the more immediate object of this memoir of a life, to speak of events which have assum...

In obedience to an order which arrived at Saumur one morning in the July of 1788,1 was summoned before the commandant of the school, when the following brief colloquy ensued:--

Although the passage of the Rhine was but the prelude to the attack on the fortress, that exploit being accomplished, Kehl was carried at the point of the bayonet, the French tr...

I will not weary my reader with an account of our debarkation, less remarkable as it was for the ‘pomp and circumstance of war’ than for incidents and accidents the most absurd...

There is a wide gulf between him who opens his waking eyes in a splendid chamber, and with half-drowsy thoughts speculates on the pleasures of the coming day, and him, who, risi...

To apologise to my reader for not strictly tracing out each day of my history, would be, in all likelihood, as great an impertinence as that of the tiresome guest who, having ke...

About two months afterwards, on a warm evening of summer, I entered Vienna in a litter, along with some twelve hundred other wounded men, escorted by a regiment of cuirassiers....

In looking back, after a long lapse of years, I cannot refrain from a feeling of astonishment to think how little remembrance I possess of the occurrences of that day--one of th...

La Rochelle is a quiet little town at the bottom of a small bay, the mouth of which is almost closed up by two islands. There is a sleepy, peaceful air about the place--a sort o...

I went to bed at night in all apparent health; save from the flurry and excitement of an anxious mind, I was in no respect different from my usual mood; and yet, when I awoke ne...

It is a very common subject of remark in newspapers, and as invariably repeated with astonishment by the readers, how well and soundly such a criminal slept on the night before...

If the natural perils of the expedition were sufficient to suggest grave thoughts, the sight of the troops that were to form it was even a stronger incentive to fear. I could no...

I was destitute enough when I quitted the Temple, a few days back; but my condition now was sadder still, for, in addition to my poverty and friendlessness, I had imbibed a degr...

It was in something less than a week after that I entered upon my new career as orderly in the staff, when I began to believe myself the most miserable of all human beings. On t...

Up a straight street, so steep and so narrow that it seemed a stair, with hundreds of men crowding around me, I was borne along. Now, they were sailors who carried me; now, whit...

I have spent pleasanter, but I greatly doubt if I ever knew busier days, than those I passed at the Bishop’s Palace at Killala; and now, as I look upon the event, I cannot help...

The success which followed this my first enterprise in life had already worked a wondrous change in all my feelings. Instead of looking up to the poor curé for advice and guidan...

I doubt if our great Emperor dated his first despatch from Schönbrunn with a prouder sense of elevation than did I write ‘Komorn’ at the top of my first letter to Marshal Marmon...

From the little creek where we landed, a small zigzag path led up the sides of the cliff, the track by which the peasants carried the sea-weed which they gathered for manure, an...

It would afford me little pleasure to write, and doubtless my readers less to read, my lucubrations as I journeyed along towards Dublin. My thoughts seldom turned from myself an...

To be awakened suddenly from a sound sleep, hurried half-dressed up a gangway, and, ere your faculties have acquired free play, be passed over a ship’s side, on a dark and storm...

The disappointment we had suffered was not the only circumstance adverse to our expedition. The rain had now swollen the smallest rivulets to the size of torrents; in many place...

I found a very pleasant party assembled around the bishop’s breakfast-table at Killala. The bishop and his family were all there, with Charost and his staff, and some three or f...

Poor Mahon’s melancholy story made a deep impression upon me, and I returned to Paris execrating the whole race of spies and _mouchards_, and despising, with a most hearty conte...

The reader will probably not complain if, passing over the manifold adventures and hair-breadth ‘scapes of my little party, I come to our arrival at Ingoldstadt, where the headq...

I will not weary my reader with a narrative of my mountain walk, nor the dangers and difficulties which beset me on that day of storm and hurricane. Few as were the miles to tra...

If the guide who is to lead us on a long and devious track stops at every byway, following out each path that seems to invite a ramble or suggest a halt, we naturally might feel...

If the worthy reader would wish to fancy the happiest of all youthful beings, let him imagine what I must have been, as, mounted upon Aleppo, a present from my godfather, with a...

Whatever opinion may be formed of the character of the celebrated conspiracy of Georges and Pichegru, the mode of its discovery, and the secret rules by which its plans were det...

My duties in the riding-school were always over before mid-day, and as noon was the hour appointed by the young lieutenant to present me to his colonel, I was ready by that time...

Nothing displays more powerfully the force of egotism than the simple truth that, when any man sits himself down to write the events of his life, the really momentous occurrence...

Early the next morning, a messenger arrived from the Cranagh, with a small packet of my clothes and effects, and a farewell letter from the two brothers. I had but time to glanc...

I have been very frank with my readers in these memoirs of my life. If I have dwelt somewhat vain-gloriously on passing moments of success, it must be owned that I have not spar...