Strong's chief business.
He had grumbled about Altamont's companionship in the Shepherd's Inn
chambers; but he found those lodgings more glum now without his
partner than with him. The solitary life was not agreeable to his
social soul; and he had got into extravagant and luxurious habits,
too, having a servant at his command to run his errands, to arrange
his toilet, and to cook his meal. It was rather a grand and touching
sight now to see the portly and handsome gentleman painting his own
boots, and broiling his own mutton chop. It has been before stated
that the chevalier had a wife, a Spanish lady of Vittoria, who had
gone back to her friends, after a few months' union with the captain,
whose head she broke with a dish. He began to think whether he should
not go back and see his Juanita. The chevalier was growing melancholy
after the departure of his friend the colonel; or, to use his own
picturesque expression, was "down on his luck." These moments of
depression and intervals of ill-fortune occur constantly in the lives
of heroes; Marius at Minturnae, Charles Edward in the Highlands,
Napoleon before Elba.
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