How like a heavenly dream it all seemed--the first hopeless courtship, and now the wedding fixed! But it was no dream; he felt her soft words still murmur music at his heart, and the shadow of her velvet lips slept upon his own.
He had strolled about a league when he heard the ring of a horse's hoofs coming towards him, accompanied by a clanking noise; it came nearer and nearer, till it reached a hill that lay a little ahead of Edouard; then the sounds ceased; the cavalier was walking his horse up the hill.
Presently, as if they had started from the earth, up popped between Edouard and the sky, first a cocked hat that seemed in that light to be cut with a razor out of flint; then the wearer, phosphorescent here and there; so brightly the keen moonlight played on his epaulets and steel scabbard.

A step or two nearer, and Edouard gave a great shout; it was Colonel Raynal.
After the first warm greeting, and questions and answers, Raynal told him he was on his way to the Rhine with despatches.
"To the Rhine ?" "I am allowed six days to get there.

I made a calculation, and found I could give Beaurepaire half a day.

I shall have to make up for it by hard riding.

You know me; always in a hurry.