Henri
Larochejaquelin is the only man whom all the peasants, all the soldiers,
all the officers, know intimately; and the last duty I can perform in
the service of my King is to implore you to put him at the head of your
troops. He is young, and you will assist his youth with your counsel.
He is diffident of himself, and you will encourage him with your
assurance and obedience; but he is brave, he is beloved, he is trusted;
and above all, he possesses that innate aptitude for war, that power of
infusing courage into the timid and lending strength to the weak, which
is the gift of God alone, and without which no General can command an
army."
Henri had promised his cousin that he would neither interrupt him, or
raise any objection to the proposition about to be made. He kept his
word as long as de Lescure was speaking, but when he had finished he
could not restrain himself from expressing his own sense of his
unfitness for the duties they were calling on him to perform. He came
forward, and leaning against the head of the wounded man's bed, put his
hand upon his shoulder, and speaking almost in a whisper, like a young
girl pleading for delay before her lover, he said, "Charles, you
forget, I am but one-and-twenty.
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