Page:Narrative of a captivity and adventures in France and Flanders between the years 1803 and 1809.djvu/230

 ladies home, and retired to our tavern. On the 21st, under the responsibility of our jovial old aunt, we hired a "cabriolet," left Brussels early for Charleroi, intending to take the cross road thence, to Charlemont, that being, as we thought, less dangerous. Nothing remarkable occurred, but the occasional meeting of a gen d'arme, which had now become so common an event, that it gave me little concern; still, however, I could not help feeling a degree of anxiety at the first sight of two of these fellows, standing at the door of a public-house, where it was necessary that we should stop to bait the horse. Neirinks proposed going on, but as he knew of no other house on the road, it might have created suspicion; I therefore judged it more prudent to brave it out, fully confident in my own powers, should any question be asked, of cajoling them into the belief of our being wine-merchants. We drove up to the door,