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CHAPTER LAST

THE TREMENDOUS ADVENTURES OF MAJOR GAHAGAN.

CHAPTER I. —"TRUTH IS STRANGE, STRANGER THAN FICTION"

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III.-A PEEP INTO SPAIN-ACCOUNT OF THE ORIGIN AND SERVICES

PAGE

. 309

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BALLADS.

THE CHRONICLE OF THE DRUM.

PART I.

AT Paris, hard by the Maine barriers,
Whoever will choose to repair,

'Midst a dozen of wooden-legged warriors,
May haply fall in with old Pierre.
On the sunshiny bench of a tavern,
He sits and he prates of old wars,

And moistens his pipe of tobacco

With a drink that is named after Mars.

The beer makes his tongue run the quicker, And as long as his tap never fails,

Thus over his favourite liquor

Old Peter will tell his old tales.

Says he, "In my life's ninety summers,
Strange changes and chances I've seen,-

So here's to all gentlemen drummers
That ever have thump'd on a skin.

"Brought up in the art military

For four generations we are;

My ancestors drumm'd for King Harry,
The Huguenot lad of Navarre.

VOL. I.

B

And as each man in life has his station
According as Fortune may fix,

While Condé was waving the baton,
My grandsire was trolling the sticks.

"Ah! those were the days for commanders!
What glories my grandfather won,
Ere bigots, and lackies, and panders

The fortunes of France had undone!
In Germany, Flanders, and Holland,-
What foeman resisted us then?
No; my grandsire was ever victorious,
My grandsire and Monsieur Turenne.

"He died, and our noble battalions
The jade, fickle Fortune, forsook;
And at Blenheim, in spite of our valiance,
The victory lay with Malbrook.
The news it was brought to King Louis;
Corbleu! how his majesty swore,

When he heard they had taken my grandsire.
And twelve thousand gentlemen more!

"At Namur, Ramilies, and Malplaquet Were we posted, on plain or in trench, Malbrook only need to attack it,

And away from him scamper'd we French. Cheer up! 'tis no use to be glum, boys,'Tis written, since fighting begun,

That sometimes we fight and we conquer,
And sometimes we fight and we run.

"To fight and to run was our fate,

Our fortune and fame had departed; And so perish'd Louis the Great,

Old, lonely, and half broken-hearted.

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