"General," said an officer, who was half drunk, "Marchand has just
told me the particulars of that execution down there. I will bet you
never ordered it."

"Do you forget, messieurs," cried General G--t--r, "that five hundred
French families are plunged in affliction, and that we are now in
Spain? Do you wish to leave our bones in its soil?"

After that allocution, no one, not even a sub-lieutenant, had the
courage to empty his glass.

In spite of the respect with which he is surrounded, in spite of the
title El Verdugo (the executioner) which the King of Spain bestowed as
a title of nobility on the Marquis de Leganes, he is a prey to sorrow;
he lives in solitude, and is seldom seen. Overwhelmed with the burden
of his noble crime, he seems to await with impatience the birth of a
second son, which will give him the right to rejoin the Shades who
ceaselessly accompany him.