Having obtained leave of absence for fifteen days, the new officer arrived from Toulon by the mail, in time for Ursula's fete, intending to consult the doctor at the same time.
"He has come!" cried Ursula rushing into her godfather's bedroom.
"Very good," he answered; "I can guess what brings him, and he may now stay in Nemours." "Ah! that's my birthday present--it is all in that sentence," she said, kissing him.
On a sign, which she ran up to make from her window, Savinien came over at once; she longed to admire him, for he seemed to her so changed for the better.

Military service does, in fact, give a certain grave decision to the air and carriage and gestures of a man, and an erect bearing which enables the most superficial observer to recognize a military man even in plain clothes.

The habit of command produces this result.

Ursula loved Savinien the better for it, and took a childlike pleasure in walking round the garden with him, taking his arm, and hearing him relate the part he played (as midshipman) in the taking of Algiers.

Evidently Savinien had taken the city.