Ouida's Books
/0/9460/coverbig.jpg?v=0fdc855dad194f74a378f949555a2e8d)
Cecil Castlemaine's Gage, Lady Marabout's Troubles, and Other Stories
This 1867 collection contains: "Little Grand and the Marchioness," "Lady Marabout's Troubles," "A Study a la Louis Quinze," "'Deadly Dash,'" "The General's Match-making," "The Story of a Crayon-head," "The Beauty of Vicq d'Azyr," "A Study a la Louis Quatorze," "A Line in the 'Daily,'" "Vitz's Election," "'Redeemed,'" "The Marquis's Tactics," and "Sir Galahad's Raid."
/0/2778/coverbig.jpg?v=18c4399882a448de81530f8a3a8a4340)
Under Two Flags
The novel is about The Hon. Bertie Cecil or Beauty of the Brigades. In financial distress because of his own profligacy and the loss of an important horse-race on which he has bet extensively, and falsely accused of forgery, but unable to defend himself against the charge without injuring the "honour" of a lady and also exposing his younger brother (the real culprit), Cecil fakes his own death and exiles himself to Algeria where he joins the Chasseurs d'Afrique, a regiment comprising soldiers from various countries, rather like the French Foreign Legion. After Cecil's great childhood friend and the friend's beautiful sister show up in Africa, and after a series of melodramatic self-sacrifices by Cecil and by the young girl Cigarette, a "child of the Army" who sacrifices her life saving Cecil from a firing squad, the main conflicts are resolved and the surviving characters return to England to fortune, title, and love.
/0/1383/coverbig.jpg?v=c222446ad04345088d93d4f86968a57c)
Under Two Flags
Avis au Lecteur. This Story was originally written for a military periodical. It has been fortunate enough to receive much commendation from military men, and for them it is now specially issued in its present form. For the general public it may be as well to add that, where translations are appended to the French phrases, those translations usually follow the idiomatic and particular meaning attached to these expressions in the argot of the Army of Algeria, and not the correct or literal one given to such words or sentences in ordinary grammatical parlance. Ouida.