A Servant of Satan: Romantic Career of Prado the Assassin — page 121: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

i $ ¥ as - io -?* ne aie } =. 7 : ‘ . - As - a er oe a ee ee SONNY Lee Eee fe ae Pe ee Cee ee oe eR OS ey gees : o v3 ; : Ae “ 4 | | s *24 - > 7 . y * o* Me » > 4 a ; A SERVANT OF SATAN. : 113 perfect godsend for them, and it is impossible to say what would otherwise have been their fate. Shortly before nightfall, and after providing the two men — with a good square meal, the benevolent stranger accom- panied them to the railway station, and took the train with them to ‘‘ Meester Cornelis,” the great central depot and headquarters of the Dutch Army in the East. On arriving there, an hour later, he conducted them to the bureau of the chief recruiting officer. After undergoing examination by a regimental surgeon, who pronounced them physically fit for active service, they were duly enrolled as soldiers of a regiment of fusileers. Their friend, thereupon, having ob- tained a voucher from the recruiting officer, proceeded to the paymaster’s bureau, where a sum of money was counted out to him on presentation of the document. Of this amount he handed fifty guilders to each of the two men, and then bade them adieu, and left them in charge of the sergeant who had piloted them through the barracks. It is probable that neither Frederick nor his companion would have been so effusive in their protestations of grati- tude toward the stranger, had they been aware of the fact at the time that he had appropiated to himself the major portion of the bounty of three hundred guilders which be- comes the property of every Huropean recruit who takes service in the Dutch Coloniat Army. Lhe latter, which numbers some 27,000 men, is composed of men of almost every nationality. Germans and Swiss form the major portion of the foreign element, which com- prises, however, many Russians, Frenchmen, Englishmen, and Americans. At least half of all these are men who have previously occupied a more elevated rank in life. Ruined clubmen, bankru pt merchants and traders, fugitive | cashiers and dishonest clerks, and a large sprinkling of de- serters from the various European armies, figure largely among the contingent. Among the corporals and simple Eomicbooks €o =) ee eee ee Fe COMES, pce eed a To a ae