"He is prejudiced.

He has been digging a thundering long mine here, and now you are going to make his child useless.

We none of us like that.

But when he gets the colors in his hand, and the storming column at his back, his misgivings will all go to the wind, and the enemy after them, unless he has been committing some crime, and is very much changed from what I knew him four years ago." "Colonel Raynal," said one of the other colonels, politely but firmly, "pray do not assume that Colonel Dujardin is to lead the column; there are three other claimants.

General Raimbaut is to select from us four." "Yes, gentlemen, and in a service of this kind I would feel grateful to you all if you would relieve me of that painful duty." "Gentlemen," said Dujardin, with an imperceptible sneer, "the general means to say this: the operation is so glorious that he could hardly without partiality assign the command to either of us four claimants.
Well, then, let us cast lots." The proposal was received by acclamation.
"The general will mark a black cross on one lot, and he who draws it wins the command." The young colonels prepared their lots with almost boyish eagerness.
These fiery spirits were sick to death of lying and skulking in the trenches.