The Phantom Regiment; or, Stories of "Ours"

The profession of her father, together with the circumstance of one of her brothers being in the Spanish sea service, and another in the army of Portugal, caused her to view with a favourable eye all who have the honour to live by the sword; and my small smattering of Spanish, which I picked up in those idle hours of a garrison life that otherwise must have hung heavily over me, gave me every facility for cultivating a friendship which had in it everything that might serve to dazzle and charm a young man..

source