And both Herbert and Traverse hoped that the designs of their
Colonel would be still frustrated by the self-command and patience
of the young private.
Alas! they did not know the great power of evil! They did not know
that nothing less than Divine Providence could meet and overcome it.
They fondly believed that the malignity of Le Noir had resulted in
no other practical evil than in preventing the young soldier's well-
merited advancement, and in keeping him in the humble position of a
private in the ranks.
They were not aware that the discharge of Traverse Rocke had long
ago arrived, but that it had been suppressed through the diabolical
cunning of Le Noir. That letters, messages and packets, sent by his
friends to the young soldier, had found their way into his Colonel's
possession and no further.
And so, believing the hatred of that bad man to have been fruitless
of serious, practical evil, Herbert encouraged his friend to be
patient for a short time longer, when they should see the end of the
campaign, if not of the war.
It was now that period of suspense and of false truce between the
glorious 20th of August and the equally glorious 8th of September,
1847--between the two most brilliant actions of the war, the battle
of Churubusco and the storming of Chapultepec.
The General-in-Chief of the United States forces in Mexico was at
his headquarters in the Archiepiscopal palace of Tacubaya, on the
suburbs, or in the full sight of the city of the Montezumas,
awaiting the issue of the conference between the commissioners of
the hostile governments, met to arrange the terms of a treaty of
peace--that every day grew more hopeless.
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