The Young Buglers

Excerpt

I remember that, as a boy, I regarded any attempt to mix instruction
with amusement as being as objectionable a practice as the
administration of powder in jam; but I think that this feeling arose
from the fact that in those days books contained a very small share
of amusement and a very large share of instruction.  I have endeavored
to avoid this, and I hope that the accounts of battles and sieges,
illustrated as they are by maps, will be found as interesting
as the lighter parts of the story.  As in my tale, “ The Young
Franc-Tireurs,” I gave the outline of the Franco-German war, so
I have now endeavored to give the salient features of the great
Peninsular struggle.  The military facts, with the names of generals
and regiments, the dates and places, are all strictly accurate, and
any one who has read with care the story of “The Young Buglers” could
pass an examination as to the leading events of the Peninsular war.