These letters, as might have been expected, highly excited Waverley's
indignation. From the desultory style of his studies, he had not any
fixed political opinion to place in opposition to the movements of
indignation which he felt at his father's supposed wrongs. Of the real
cause of his disgrace Edward was totally ignorant; nor had his habits at
all led him to investigate the politics of the period in which he lived,
or remark the intrigues in which his father had been so actively engaged.
Indeed, any impressions which he had accidentally adopted concerning the
parties of the times were (owing to the society in which he had lived at
Waverley-Honour) of a nature rather unfavourable to the existing
government and dynasty. He entered, therefore, without hesitation into
the resentful feeling of the relations who had the best title to dictate
his conduct, and not perhaps the less willingly when he remembered the
tedium of his quarters, and the inferior figure which he had made among
the officers of his regiment. If he could have had any doubt upon the
subject it would have been decided by the following letter from his
commanding officer, which, as it is very short, shall be inserted
verbatim:--
SIR,--
Having carried somewhat beyond the line of my duty an indulgence which
even the lights of nature, and much more those of Christianity, direct
towards errors which may arise from youth and inexperience, and that
altogether without effect, I am reluctantly compelled, at the present
crisis, to use the only remaining remedy which is in my power.
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