A/N: A quite longish chapter today. The last four have been on the heavy side (OK the very heavy side), so how about if I lighten things up just a bit. This is about 2-3 of my normal chapters, and I have no idea if it's Goldilocks or Papa Bear. You tell me – fluff or stuff? Wade

· The Annals of Stupidity

· A Few Thoughts on Stupidity

· Stupidity and Continental War

· The Art of the Stupidity of War

As you can see, I am preparing myself for a new career as a lecturer at Cambridge. I believe I will hold a symposium on the subject of stupidity, of which I am a world renowned expert. I believe it certainly should pay well, and will offer a fair number of advantages over my current occupation, which frequently involves sleeping on the ground in my greatcoat, marching for days, being shot at, being hacked at with swords, being hacked at with bludgeons, being stabbed at with knives, bad food, bad lodgings, worse generalship and routine channel crossings. As you can see, the University life offers certain advantages.

After roughly a decade in the regulars, working my way up to Colonel, I believe I can speak on the subject with true authority. I've seen it all. I've seen the stupid man first into the breach for King and Country and therefore first into the grave; if we even managed to bury him. I've seen stupid men, so timid and afraid of battle that they hang in the back like a child holding his mama's skirt, and get killed because they get separated from the rest of the men. They are last to be buried, if they get buried it all, but just as dead. I've seen the generals who order up one lunkheaded idea after another, each of which gets dozens or hundreds of my fellow soldiers killed; of which the worst part is that one of those killed might be me. I've even occasionally seen Prinny, our Prince Regent – Dumb as a box of rocks.

You may wonder why I am holding forth on this particular subject; aside from they hope that I might change my occupation; and possibly the laudanum in my tea. You see I am currently a part of what is called the "culling of the herd." Any rancher or games-keeper will tell you that you must periodically weed out the sick and the weak to allow your herd to flourish. That's exactly the role predators play in the wild. Human societies have the same problem. When any society finds itself overrun with stupid people, they're hard to get rid of. They are like rats, and infest every part of your society, and no amount of effort will get you down to the last one.

To combat this problem, we have a moderately efficient system known as "war". The principle is very simple, in fact the same principle used to kill large numbers of rats. You gather as many stupid people as you can into one group, and try to kill them. Now just like rats, people like to group together along with others that look similar, so it's ideal if you can shove all of the stupid people into very similar clothing and habits of speech and dress. It helps if you give it a fancy name, so let's go with words like "uniform" and "esprit de corps" and "orders" and "patriotism." It helps if they think they're doing something good and noble, so words like "honor" and "valor" are all in vogue.

Once you have all of your stupids together, you go find somebody who is not really done anything wrong to you, but has their own army of stupids, and you decide to attack them. You can make up the reason such as resources, or trade routes, or they have the wrong gods, or they are the wrong color or talk funny; but really those are just window dressing. In the end, it always boils down to two groups of people trying desperately to cull their herds. They do that they need to kill off some of the stupid people, and the most efficient way to do that is for the two groups of stupid people to fight each other, and see how many they can take out. Open battles are efficient ways to cull, but just gathering them into a siege usually works just as well, what with Cholera, Dysentery and Starvation working in your favor.

There's actually a little bit of genius in it when you get right down to it. The whole system works quite well for society, except for one small insignificant problem. The system works exceedingly well for weeding out stupid people, but unfortunately it also has a weeding effect on unlucky people. You might argue that removing unlucky people from society is a benefit as well, but I'm never quite so certain.

As you can see I get rather voluble when I take just a touch of laudanum, much like my cousin Anne, and I take just a touch of laudanum when I am exposed to excessive stupidity; but I will come to that in a moment.

My second‑to‑last true lesson in stupidity came right before Christmas in the year twelve. I had spent the last fortnight of November in the glorious company of the Bennet sisters, who are everything lovely. Wonderful girls, one and all. A credit to any man smart enough and lucky enough to attract one. Pick one at random and happiness for life is guaranteed.

For any attribute you care to name, you could find it at one time or another, the perfect example amongst the Bennet sisters. Unfortunately I had no time at all to talk to Elizabeth, as she was attacked by the cretin of a husband the very first time I met her. Darcy assured me that not only was she not stupid, but she was scary smart. This coming from a man who is not intimidated by anything when it comes to brains, so if she scared him, I am quite afraid to cross verbal swords of their myself – although I would take the worst beating in the world, if I could just have the privilege of having her pound me into the ground with her sharp wit. However, she remained in bed with an intense fever when I was called back to duty.

Amongst the other girls, you could find nearly any attribute you are looking for in a woman. Looking for a beautiful singing voice: Lydia will make you clap, and Catherine will make you weep. Pianoforte your passion? Mary could present in a London theater without embarrassment. Stick Mary with any of the other three girls, and you have a concert fit for a king. Looking for demure, serene, calm, welcoming countenance; look no farther than Jane. Looking for Attila the Hun or Genghis Khan carrying a giant scimitar intent on lopping off the heads of anyone who happens to annoy her: well, that's Jane as well; or Lydia. When in an angry mood, the two seem nearly indistinguishable. And of course if you're looking for the usual sorts of things: great beauty, pleasing company, good manners, reasonable accomplishments, you could pick any Bennet girl you wanted, get her to the altar, and if on that particular day one of the other sisters decided to switch places, you would still be perfectly content.

Now all of this dross works its way around to my whole thesis, which will earn me fame, fortune and riches beyond imagination as people crowd into my lectures at Cambridge. After more than a decade in the Army, I thought I knew everything there possibly was to know about stupidity. During that winter in 1812, I learned one more thing. I learned, without a doubt, that I could absolutely, positively identify the two stupidest men in England. They were of course my cousin Darcy, and his lunkhead friend Bingley.

Now I have to give my evidence which will be so obvious you will believe I fabricated it, so perhaps I will need to say it twice. For six weeks in the year 11, these two lunkheads were in company with the Bennet sisters, and they left. That is right – they left, unmarried, unbetroth, just gone. Worse yet, they left in a very ungentlemanly manner, and then did not pay the slightest attention to them for a full year. Yes I can tell you, I am now well acquainted with the two stupidest men in England. They are my coup d'etat.

Back at the parsonage, I can tell you that one of these chowderheads has improved on his previous status considerably. Now he has upgraded his condition to thoroughly besotted lunkhead. Still a lunkhead, but a substantial improvement over his previous status. Unfortunately, he got to the status too late to stop a murderous rampage in Elizabeth's dining parlor, so now he gets the moniker of dispirited nearly suicidal besotted lunkhead. His father must be proud.

You may wonder why I have all of these lovely ladies on a given name basis, and perhaps the odd thought has occurred to you that I should be courting one of them; or possibly all of them. I will have to explain it in detail, because it is the most peculiar situation.

My lunkhead cousin insisted we show up at a particular time in a particular place in the last place in the world we generally wished to travel. By us, I mean myself and my cousin Georgiana. We found a happy jovial man, sort of a doppelgänger for Darcy, but as far as I could tell simply Darcy in a different mood. We got ourselves cleaned up, went to the parsonage for supper with our Aunt Catherine de Bourgh and our cousin Anne, and got to know the Bennet sisters. Now I know you think I've been tipping the laudanum too much, but yes, those were the facts: Parsonage, Darcy, Lady Catherine, Anne de Bourgh.

The first thing I noticed is that not a single one of the sisters could really be fooled by my jovial manner of conversation. That was nothing new… Anne was never fooled either, but they would call me on my flowery phrases. A complement that was not well thought out and accurate would be deflected with a single raised eyebrow, as if challenging my ability to construct a complete English sentence that wasn't half balderdash. A statement of fact that made no sense would be jumped on like the last peach on the last tree of the year. I was later told the eyebrow maneuver was originally developed by Elizabeth, and the rest of the sisters adopted it.

A little bit of dinner conversation, and we found that we were apparently part of the culling operation in Kent, because we were attacked by a raving madman – another form of stupid, and we had two of our party who are definitely not stupid injured badly. That meant those two were unlucky, which is a typical part of a culling operation, but not very pleasant up close and personal.

Now comes the odd part of the operation. After the attack, I ended up putting my hands on Lydia, primarily to keep her from bashing in the head of the miserable cretin who had attacked her sister. Note that I did not disapprove of said bashing of head, and probably would have engaged in the activity myself, were it not for Darcy saying we needed him alive. Perhaps he had a quota of stupidity that had to be maintained, or more likely there was some type of inheritance riding on this worthless sod. That was really the primary driver of our ever increasing level of stupidity in society – inheritance. Yes I've said it, inheritance makes for stupidity. Inheritance leads inevitably to war. It's a tangled web, but easy enough to follow. I can offer my eldest brother as a fine example.

Once I had disarmed Lydia, and taken care of cleaning and bandaging Anne's horrid wound; I had a delightful fortnight sleeping in Rosings, and spending my days with the Bennet sisters. It would have felt an awful lot like courting, except for one small, tiny almost insignificant detail; well, aside from them all being beside themselves with worry over their sister. Almost within minutes of meeting the Bennet sisters, they became my sisters. I really have no idea how it happened, and they will in fact be my real cousins sooner or later if Darcy has a say in the matter, but I became a protective older brother without ever coming anywhere close to becoming a suitor.

Now I do not repine this turn of events at all. I love all the girls dearly as sisters, much like Anne and Georgiana; and each of them has an attribute that would make them very worthy of becoming mistress of my – well actually my horse is pretty much my entire fortune, so it hard to attract a wife anyway. But back to my main point!

Living with Lydia would be much like joining the Navy, and setting up my hammock in the barrel of one of the guns. It would be the safest, calmest place in the ship. It would have the benefit of being out of the water, well taken care of, oiled every day, clean, dry and comfortable – until of course it was fired. That was Lydia; you never knew exactly when the explosion was going to come. Sooner or later one of those explosions would be pointed at me, and I am not sure I would survive it.

Catherine on the other hand was the exact opposite. She would be like putting up your room in a farm full of days old piglets. Nothing but cute little piglets running around all the time. Warm, charming, kind and adorable in every way. None of them would ever do you any harm, or even think a bad thought about you. You would lead a quite charmed and easy-going life with nary a cross word. That was Catherine. A good woman, but the life would be just too easy. She would do for Bingley if he wasn't such a lunkhead.

Mary would be a very good fit for my cousin Darcy. She has an acerbic wit, and quite a bit more intelligence than she professes to. Sometimes I think she takes opinions that are not actually hers, just for her own amusement. I am to understand she wasted several of her formative years reading complete claptrap, but in the last year she has started reading things that will make her worthy among any bluestocking group. She and Darcy would sometimes go toe to toe on Shakespeare or something like that, and I'm quite certain he enjoys that sort of thing; but it is not for me. I am told he is just practicing for when Elizabeth comes back, for in reading, Elizabeth is to Mary as a Calvary horse is to a pony.

Now we come to Jane. Probably the most classically beautiful of the sisters; which is not necessarily a good thing. It means she has to spend her whole life dodging rakes, and any man who attaches himself to her will face the same fate. All of that makes her a little bit jumpy. She has a serene countenance, and thinks the very best of everyone in the world, and is calm and reasonable under all provocations – until she is not. Then she is the combination of a charging bull, and a raging demon from hell, and you do not want to be in front of her. To be honest, she frightens me. There you have it: Colonel, veteran of many campaigns, decorated for bravery, afraid of a woman. You would be too if you had ever seen her delivering a setdown. I once saw her… no, I cannot write it.

There you have it – all perfect – all ideal women – all the sort of women that any man would drool over if he had any sense whatsoever; and now all permanently consigned to sisterhood. I do not repent the loss as I love all my sisters evenly and may enjoy their company in ease and pleasure; but I certainly wondered how it had come about.

And so you can see that I am a man eminently qualified to discuss the relative qualities of stupidity at some length. I can have a course lasting at least a year, with optional lectures on odd Saturdays. If I need to, I can pull out a few examples. I don't imagine Darcy and Bingley will get any smarter over the course of the next year, so I can display Exhibit 1 and Exhibit 2 at my leisure.

Now, perhaps stupidity cannot be the only draw, so I can also add a section on luck. You see, I now found myself back in Kent in the middle of January in the year thirteen, for two reasons. The first was that Darcy had send me an urgent summons, indicating that he and Aunt Catherine had cooked up some hare‑brained scheme, or perhaps it was the other way around, involving me leaving the company of my fellow stupids. That was an idea I could get behind, even if it did have the dubious parentage of Darcy and my aunt.

The other reason was that I had apparently consumed my entire stock of luck, as on the last day before my departure, I was shot! By one of my own men! On English Soil! What a trifecta of bad luck, bad timing and bad thinking. Shot by my own men on my last day among the stupids.

That led me to stopping for a fortifying 'tea' in the tea shop in Hunsford before going to Rosings. It was not that I was afraid of my aunt and my cousins and my sisters… not precisely… I just felt some need for… fortification.

Stepping out of the tea shop, I saw the post coach come in, and the world stopped, just as it does in those romance novels read by… er… by… young girls I mean. The world was stopped by a vision of loveliness that stepped down from the post-coach. No man was there to hand down, so I ran across the intervening space to perform the office. That is to say, I hobbled halfway there with my unfamiliar cane and bad leg, fell flat in the mud, jumped back up (well, maybe not jumped), and hobbled the rest of the way, only to find she had exited the coach perfectly well on her own without a second thought.

I looked in the coach for her man, and found nothing but a fourteenish looking girl. She had the look of a farm girl wearing unfamiliar clotting, but she would get used to it sooner or later and my level of awkwardness was sufficient for both of us.

Once everyone had exited the coach, and I looked around for someone to meet the ladies, my vision of loveliness, demonstrated that she was made of sterner stuff than the average gentlewoman, and also may not have been best pleased to being accosted.

"Whoever you are looking for Colonel, does not exist. I would consider it a privilege, or at least less of an annoyance, if you were to stop fretting and staring at me, and get about your own business."

By Jove, that was the most singular introduction of my life, and I thought I must be half in love with this woman already. I had yet to say a single word to her, or give her a single complement; and I thought I had better have a real one before I attempted the office, as she would probably rip me from stem to stern much like Jane Bennet. She also recognized the uniform, which I was still wearing because the rest of my clothing was already at Rosings.

"My apologies madam! That was quite rude! Might I make it up to you by offering my services? May I be of some assistance?"

She looked me up and down, and said, "I believe our supply of both rum and laudanum is entirely adequate, sir. We are fine. Good day!"

This was going far worse than I had anticipated, and I found that thought quite distressing. In a panic, I attempted to redeem myself, "My pardon, madam! I realize this may seem overly forward, but might I introduce myself, and once again offer my services. I am more useful than first impressions would indicate."

She looked at me again as if I were one of the aforementioned rats, and she was wondering how to gather me up with the other rats in some place where she was not in attendance for extermination; possibly France. As I watched, a small collection of trunks come off the top of the stage, and I also saw a young boy go by that I knew had a pony cart.

Trying my best to get a little bit better start, I said "Simon, I believe?"

The boy gave me a knuckle, and said, "Yes sir!"

"If I recall correctly, you have a pony cart. Might you be able to deliver those trunks to where these ladies are going?"

"Of course sir!"

The elder of the two was a obviously a gentlewoman around my age of the type that would be considered "plain" by matchmaking mamas trying to knock her out of the husband hunting competition, but I found her enchanting. Jane Bennet had an ethereal beauty that might last until the end of time, or might not. This woman looked like her beauty would stand up to any rigors or trials we might face. Her hair was done up in a very simple traveling bun, that exactly suited. Her bonnet had just the right amount of adornment to be more than plain and less than excessive. Her dress was practical for travel, not overly ostentatious, but neat and trim and clean and er… well, fitting. In fact, it was very well fitting, and truth be told on the tight side; which did not look deliberate. A closer glance, perhaps more than a glance, showed the likely cause, as she either had a very oddly shaped stomach, or she was a few months with child. Interesting!

Her traveling companion, who looked more like a niece traveling with her then a servant, was clearly in brand-new clothing that she was not used to. She kept fidgeting, and pulling here and there to try to get it to stay put. She was young and as frightened by the environment as a rabbit. She was my ticket!

"Simon, you appear to be a man who knows things; is that correct?"

"Yes sir!"

"A man in your profession would certainly know where to find hard candy for two ladies, no?"

Young Simon did not even deign to answer. He simply caught the pennies I tossed to him, and took off at a run for a shop a few hundred yards down the lane. He came back with a small collection of the hard candies, but did not get the reaction I was hoping for.

"I really would prefer you desist, sir. If we want hard candy, we can perfectly well buy our own!"

I had thought this the perfect ploy, especially since I could see the younger girl eyeing the candy hungrily. The look was not missed by the elder, as she said, "Simon, give the coins back to this… er… gentleman, and take this. I thank you for your service."

With that, she took the candies from Simon, handed him a coin, apparently to be delivered back to me, and without sparing me even a glance, she said, "Try these, Becky. I think you will like them."

Since I had not vacated the area, she did finally deign to look at me and said, "Sir, neither your attentions nor your bribery are welcome. Will you please simply desist?"

I knew at that very moment that this was the woman for me. I had no idea why I knew that, but I felt certain. If she had beat me with my walking stick, I probably would have proposed on the spot, but considering my reception thus far; it probably would have been an ill‑considered idea.

She was not responding to the usual level of courtesy, so I either had to become serious, or descend even farther down the scale of flattery to groveling. With a choice like that, it was obvious that groveling was the order of the day.

I took a knee in front of her, which would have looked very fine and romantic, except I forgot about the bullet hole in my leg and the laudanum in my 'tea', and crashed head over heels into the mud, knocking my hat off and accidentally bonking myself in the head with a sharp edge of my walking stick, while my leg throbbed in pain. I can tell you now, from firsthand experience, that groveling, while lying in the mud, bleeding from the side of your head is not ideal. It may have worked on some women, but not this one.

The younger girl of course was putty in my hands, but my angel looked at me momentarily as if trying to decide whether to help me out of the mud, or pick up my walking stick and finish the job. She eventually decided on the former course, and sighing in exasperation, offered me a hand up while Simon helped on the other side and handed me my cane as I tried to get my leg to work right again. The hand was not the weak, dainty, painted and buffed hand you would get from a lady in the first circles. She seemed more like she allowed me to climb to my feet to assuage my pride, but could just as easily have thrown me over her shoulder and tossed me into a chair, or more likely the coach since it was pulling away now.

When I was standing again, I started my next attack. Keep in mind, that I was a Colonel in the Stupid Brigade.

"My lady, bribery does not work. Groveling did not work as well as I had hoped. Perhaps a simple introduction and some courtesy might get me out of your brown books?"

She looked at me again, not with the look I was hoping for, and said, "That will not be required, Colonel. I believe our business is concluded."

She was a tough nut to crack, but I was not a full… well, formerly full… Colonel… in the stupid brigade for nothing, so I tried one more frontal assault.

"Please, Madam?"

She looked at me again with a sigh of exasperation. Young Becky was somewhat distracted by the sweets, so the elder lady told her to go over by the trunks for a moment where she would not be able to hear.

She looked at me and said, "Colonel, your forwardness and obstinacy leave me few options save candor. I should tell you that I am generally an amiable person, but there are four things I cannot abide."

I thought this seemed like progress, except for the nasty edge she added to that last part. I nodded, finding my words seemed to be failing me.

She continued in a tone that was as empty as most of my more flowery utterances and said, "Firstly, I cannot abide men who look me up and down as if my appearance is any concern of theirs, and look into my affairs without even the courtesy of an introduction."

I knew not what to say, but thought this was not going to end well.

She continued, "Second, I cannot abide intemperance… people who take to drink or… other pleasures… in the public sphere."

I gulped down what was left of my courage, but could not reply.

She said, "Thirdly, I cannot abide a man who will not take 'no' for an answer, who has been asked to desist on four separate occasions, yet is still present."

By now, I wanted to just crawl in a hole with Darcy and die. How had I bungled this introduction so spectacularly… particularly when I could not quite put my hands on what I had done that was so very wrong? I was going to run to my sisters the second this lady left me, and walk them through the whole thing. Maybe Jane would take my head off but explain where I went wrong, while Kitty told me it was all right and everything would work out in the end. Anne… well, best not to tell Anne.

The lady looked like she was just about finished and was turning to leave, so I screwed up my courage and said, "My apologies, madam. I believe myself guilty of all three."

She just nodded and waved to her young charge to join her, and I thought I may as well get the rest of the bad news. Maybe Elizabeth would wake up and save me from myself.

"My pardon, you said there were four?"

She looked back and said simply, "I cannot abide military men", walked over to her trunks; and took out her reticule to engage Simon. At least one of us would end the day better than he started.

The young lady said, "Are we to go now, Miss Lucas?"

So, a Miss with a baby bump! No wonder she was hostile. I would have to plan my campaign carefully, since I had already lost the first battle decisively. I might later wonder why I had started the campaign within five minutes of meeting her; and why I was planning to pursue a woman already with child who was quite close to needing a parchment to keep track of all the things she disliked about me; but it just seemed right, and I had found in battle, just seemed right was frequently the difference between alive and dead. Perhaps I could take careful notes from Bingley, and do the exact opposite of all of his actions… well, come to think of it, I was doing as poorly as him.

My angel, for nothing short of her taking my sword and chopping my head off would convince me she was anything else said, "Yes, Becky. I do not think it is far."

Young Simon was putting their trunks up on his cart, and I looked carefully at the lady again. I had no idea how I would talk to her again, nor how I could gain her favor, but I was determined. How I managed to get to that stage with a woman I had met only a quarter hour ago was beyond me, but I imagine stranger things have happened. I understood Darcy started out almost this badly with Elizabeth and look how that… wait, that was not the example I wanted.

And so, it seemed that I was about to join Bingley and Darcy in the Stupid Club. It remained to be seen which particular flavor of stupidity I was afflicted with and whether or not it would kill me.