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The Young Dragoon: Every Day Life of a Soldier

by Alfred W. Drayson · English · Gutenberg #37255 · 412,680 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The Young Dragoon: Every Day Life of a Soldier

Author: Alfred W. Drayson

Illustrator: R. Huttula


        
Release date: August 29, 2011 [eBook #37255]

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/37255

Credits: Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YOUNG DRAGOON: EVERY DAY LIFE OF A SOLDIER ***




Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England




The Young Dragoon
Every Day Life of a Soldier
By A.W. Drayson
Illustrations by Richard Huttula
Published by Ward, Lock, and Tyler, London.

The Young Dragoon, by A.W. Drayson.

________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________
THE YOUNG DRAGOON, BY A.W. DRAYSON.

CHAPTER ONE.

  Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease,
  Seats of my youth, when every sport could please;
  How often have I loiter'd o'er thy green,
  Where humble happiness endeared each scene!

  Goldsmith.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

I am a soldier, Frederick Trenchard, at your service.  The prospect
before me in my early days was, that instead of following the drum I
should have followed the plough.  My father was a farmer, living in the
Midland counties; and I am the only one of a numerous family and a wide
circle of family friends who ever took the Queen's Shilling, and turned
the ploughshare into a sword.  My grandfather was a farmer; my uncle was
a farmer; my cousin who married the heiress was a gentleman farmer; my
cousin who fell in love with beer and skittles was a farm labourer.  We
were all of us sons of the soil, and it was the popular opinion in our
family, that even sailors were no better than they should be (and,
Heaven help us all, I suppose we none of us are), but that soldiers were
utter outcasts--Sawney Beans in her Majesty's livery--vultures in red
coats and pipeclay--at which even Job Chequers, of the Green Man, shook
his head, objecting strongly to the billet, and assuring everybody whom
it concerned, or did not, that he would sooner pay the billet twice than
lodge a soldier once.

There was a tradition in the village of a certain young Meadows who had
gone for a soldier; what became of him I never heard, but always was
taught to imagine the worst; as whenever it happened that any youngster
had been engaged in a frolic, the wiseacres shook their heads, and
said--"Ah! they saw how it would be--just like Meadows."  Now, I would
not for a moment lead any of my readers to suppose that a soldiering
life is the best a man can lead.  Very far from that is the case.  When
I enlisted it was said of me, that I had given up a good home,
sacrificed the esteem of every member of my family for the life of a
vagabond.  This was very far from being the case either.  To be sure I
gave up a good home, exchanging it for a life in barracks to begin with,
and a life of peril to go on with; but I was not a vagabond, neither was
there anything in what I had done to forfeit the esteem of good people.
All sorts are wanted in this world.  When we have all learned to be
peaceable; when there is no foe to withstand, no skulking enemy to
overcome, then I suppose Cincinnatus will return to his cabbages; till
then the soldier is a necessity, and by his good sword and his strong
arm the wealth of our country is preserved from the hand of the spoiler,
and our honour maintained in the face of the world.

I am thinking of that dear old home of mine; the quiet village street,
the little church, the _littler_ clerk (forgive the grammar) who said
Amen on Sundays--I am thinking of the squire's house, encircled by a
brotherhood of ancient elms, of the green pastures that led down to the
river, of the yellow uplands that made the farmer's heart rejoice--I am
thinking of our own quiet homestead.  A middling-sized farm was ours,
but it had been ours for many a long year, and it was not burdened by
mortgage; we were able to pay our way, and if father, when he rode his
old cob "Billy" to market on Mondays, and dined with other farmers at
the "Stag's Head," grumbled, do not all farmers grumble? and I expect
they have done so ever since the first sickle was thrust into ripened
corn.

Well, I was to be a farmer.  I was getting into farming habits.  I was
speculating what I should do when my turn came to ride to market.  To
market, however, I never rode--my style of riding was learned in another
school, and it would rather have startled the steady paced villagers
of--to have seen me, as once on an October day I rode--dashing forward
wildly with a whole body of brave-hearted fellows--right in the face of
destruction, but steadily forward in the name of duty--even though duty
meant death.

And now, apologising for this introductory chapter, let me briefly tell
you why I became a soldier.

CHAPTER TWO.

  Angels and ministers of grace defend us!--
  Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damn'd,
  Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell,
  Be thy intents wicked or charitable,
  Thou comest in such a questionable shape!

  Shakespeare.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Situate about a quarter of a mile from the village near which my father
resided, was the parish church, a venerable structure clad with ivy.
Near by a large yew-tree spread its branches over the centre of the
churchyard.  About one hundred yards from the church stood the cottage
of Nicholas Hartley (more generally known by the name of "Old Nick"),
the sexton and bell-ringer.  He also carried on the business of a
cobbler.  "Old Nick" was by no means so sober a man as he ought to have
been, considering the serious nature of his calling.  He was quite as
often to be found at the Green Man as at his own cottage.  There were
several youths in the village, including myself, who were prone to
practical joking, and one unfortunate night we concocted a scheme to set
the whole of the people in the village in wonder and fright.

It was a dark and stormy night in December, more than twenty years ago,
when our plans were matured and successfully accomplished.  Eight of us
met, by a preconcerted arrangement, in the old churchyard, a little
before midnight.  One of the actors in the drama was the son of the
blacksmith, who had found a key to open the door of the belfry.  With
this we gained admission.  Thence unbolting a door, we were enabled to
reach the roof of the chancel; this was composed of lead, and was quite
flat, with a high stone coping all round it.  Having gone so far we
descended to the churchyard, and tied fast together the legs of the
chimney-sweeper's donkey, that pastured among the grave-stones.
Sheltered under the yew-tree, and binding him so as to prevent his
struggling, we attached a stout waggon-rope, procured from my father's
barn, to Neddy's body.  Leaving one to guide his ascent with a guy rope,
the rest of us hauled him up to the roof of the chancel.  We then untied
the rope that bound his legs, and enveloped him in a snow-white sheet,
tying his long ears down to his neck with a piece of twine, and so
adapting the sheet to his body as to prevent its getting disarranged by
the very high wind.

Thus was his "mokeship" left standing in the middle of the roof,
apparently as contented as where we found him under the yew-tree.  After
this we fastened one end of the rope to the "pull" of the only bell in
use, and passing the other through the grated hole in the wall of the
belfry, carried it over the roof of the chancel and dropped it to the
ground.  The two doors were now made secure as we had found them, and
one of us mounting with the rope to the very top branch of the yew-tree,
we there made it fast; after this final step it was considered the best
policy to move away as fast as we possibly could.

Being placed on rather high ground, the wind swayed the old yew-tree to
and fro without hindrance, the consequence being that the solitary bell
tolled forth its notes with strange, supernatural, and most irregular
tones, all the more astonishing from their occurring at that time of
night.  The inhabitants were soon aroused, as we could distinctly see
from our hiding-place, by the number of lights in the windows, and the
lanthorns flitting about the main street--no gas or oil-lamps existing
in our village.  At length, a strong muster of farm-labourers, with "Old
Nick" and the parish constable at their head, repaired to the church,
the principal instigators of the mischief bringing up the rear.
Knowing, as I did, that there was nothing to be alarmed at, I
volunteered to accompany the sexton and policeman into the belfry.  This
was a job neither of them relished when they found the door securely
locked, for they had at first an idea that some drunken men had broken
the lock and were amusing themselves at the expense of the whole
village.  Just at the moment we reached the door of the belfry, a
piercing shriek was heard from a female in the midst of the crowd
below--an arm was stretched out, with the finger pointed in the
direction of the donkey, enshrouded in the snow-white habiliments as we
had left him.  Sir Moke played his part excellently well; one of his
ears had escaped from under the twine, and moved to and fro in such a
manner as quickly to be designated "one _arm_" of the "ghost" waving to
the crowd to retire--and retire the more timid portion of them did,
helter-skelter; but those with stouter nerves did not leave the
churchyard.  The wind moaned through the old yew-tree, and the ivy that
covered the walls of the church-tower rustled and flapped in the strong
midnight breeze; and the strange, irregular tolling of the bell
continued, to the horror and surprise of the crowd.

There stood the "ghost!"  He had moved from the middle to the corner of
the roof--his "arm" moving backwards and forwards, and the white sheet
flapping in the wind like a pair of huge wings.  Old Howard, whom people
called an atheist, had died in the village about ten days previously.
The minister had refused to bury him in the churchyard, so he was
interred outside the wall by the roadside.  His exit from the world was
said to have been "awful" in the extreme; he left the bed upon which he
had lain for weeks in great agony, was brought down stairs, and died on
the kitchen sofa.  He had been one of Tom Paine's disciples, but he
died, people said, fearfully convinced of his error.

This circumstance had quite prepared the minds of the simple people for
his re-appearance; "he could not rest in his grave," and the excitement
was intense.  I was frightened myself--not at the "ghost," but at the
turn things were taking.  My companions were all on the spot, and quite
as uneasy as myself, with the exception of one Dick Smith, who said that
"if he could be certain that the `ghost' was old Howard's, he would
fetch his gun and shoot at it.  It could not be murder to shoot a fellow
that was already dead."  The proposition was negatived by every one
present old enough to have a voice in the matter.  The minister lectured
Dick, and he slunk back into the crowd.  Hours passed away, nobody was
bold enough to enter the belfry, and the "ghost" stuck to its post on
the roof of the chancel; however, the wind dropped about four o'clock,
and consequently the tolling of the bell ceased, soon after which the
"ghost," being tired of standing, lay down, and its _body_ being
entirely hidden by the high stone coping was effectually concealed.  It
was said to have "vanished;" and the people retired to their homes, but
many neither to bed nor to sleep.

Just as daylight dawned next morning, John Durden, a carrier, on his way
through the village to D--from an adjacent town, had to pass by the
church with his donkey and cart.  The "ghost," recognising the footfall
of an ass and a brother, rose from his hard bed to salute him with a
very long-winded _bray_.

Seeing the apparition on the church at such a time, Durden took to his
heels; his donkey, profiting by the absence of the carrier's cudgel,
stood still, pricked up his ears, and returned the salute after his own
familiar fashion.  The villagers again crowded to the spot; all was
discovered; daylight revealed the rope that connected the yew-tree with
the bell-pull.  The "ghost" had got his other ear at liberty, and his
tail was wriggling, two hundred movements to the minute, with evident
pleasure at beholding one of his race in the roadway below.  With
considerable labour he was lowered from his elevated position.

And now commenced the more serious part of the business for myself and
my fellow-conspirators.  The sheet was marked at one corner in red silk,
with the names of "J. and E. Smith."  Now as there was only one family
of that name in the village, and as they only had one son--the aforesaid
Dick--the constable forthwith took him into custody on _more than_
suspicion of being concerned in the business of the preceding night.  It
was well known that he never could have raised the donkey to the roof of
the church without assistance; therefore Master Dick was induced to give
up the names of his wicked accomplices.  Five of the number, including
Dick, were apprehended.  Myself and two others only escaped by flight.

CHAPTER THREE.

  Roger he swore he'd leave his plough,
  His team and tillage all, by gum;
  Of a country life he'd had enou'; -
  He'd leave it all and follow the drum.
  He'd leave his threshing in the barn,
  To thresh his foes he'd very soon larn;
  With sword in hand he would not parley,
  But thresh his foes instead of the barley.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The names of my companions were Harry and Ned Glover, two brothers, the
sons of the surgeon, or rather village apothecary, aged respectively
sixteen and seventeen.  Avoiding the main road as much as possible, we
trudged on through the wet ground, over hedge and ditch, until we began
to feel hungry.  It was getting dark, and, on counting our coppers, we
made the startling discovery, about which we had never previously
thought, that we had but two shillings and eightpence halfpenny in our
pockets, all counted.  We held a consultation, and decided to sleep in a
cow-shed, sitting under a hayrick adjacent to the shed where we intended
to pass the night until quite dark.  I went over the fields to the
nearest point where I perceived a light, and found a provision shop;
there I purchased three oaten cakes, at a penny each, and a pound of
cheese for eightpence.  I also made out that we were sixteen miles from
our homes.  Unfortunately I lost my way in returning to the place where
I had left the two Glovers.  After rambling among the fields, shouting
and whistling until well-nigh exhausted, I came to a little mud hut
inhabited by a besom-maker, and but for the oaten cake and cheese I
believe I should have been worried by a large dog that resolutely
opposed my approach nearer than about one hundred yards.  Throwing down
the cakes, however, the dog immediately seized them, and the man, coming
out of the hut, warned me, whoever I might be, to "cut off, or he would
put a bullet into me."

Forgetting everything in my fright, I held a parley with him at some
distance in the dark.  The dog having made short work of the cakes,
barked as furiously and appeared as intent upon worrying me as before.
I told him all, and finding that I was a mere lad, he consented, for a
shilling, to let me come into the hut, where a good fire was burning.  I
told him that my companions could not be far off, and described the
place where I had left them.  The good old fellow returned me my
shilling, and placed some barley bread before me to eat to my cheese,
while, he said, he would soon fetch the other two; but as I did not
relish staying in the hut alone, and not feeling comfortable to eat
until my companions were found, I decided on accompanying him.  The
night was pitch dark; but, aided by his dog, the besom-maker was not
long in finding the haystack under which I had left them sitting.  Tired
out with walking, and weary of waiting for me, they were fast asleep on
some loose hay pulled out of the rick.  We had some difficulty in waking
them, after which we all proceeded to the hut, made a hearty supper of
barley bread and cheese and spring water.  Our host placed a log of wood
on the fire, and we slept upon the bed of heather that formed the
working material for his brooms until morning, when the kind-hearted old
man trudged off to the village, and soon returned with a can of nice new
milk and a huge loaf of barley bread, of which we ate our fill; and
after promising him to return to our homes, where, he said, "all would
blow over in the course of a day or two," we left him, and made our way
on to the high road.  We then held a council as to whether we should
return home, or continue our course as far as Sheffield, and enlist in a
regiment that we knew to be quartered there.

Hal Glover was the first to turn tail, and at once commenced his journey
homewards.  Ned bid him good-bye and called him "chicken-hearted," and
trudged on with me in a contrary direction.  However, he frequently
turned round to look at Harry's fast receding form.

At last we came to a sharp turn in the road.  A tear stood in the boy's
eye as he came to a standstill.

"I cannot leave _Harry_ and my _mother_, Fred." said he; "I will go back
to W--, let the consequences be what they may.  Good-bye, Trenchard,"
and as he took my hand in his I could see the big tears rolling down his
cheeks.  He could not speak; but he pulled me towards him, as much as to
say, "Come with me," and if the truth must be told, I would rather have
returned with him than have gone on; but I thought of the taunts and
jeers that I should be sure to experience from the greater part of the
lads in the village.  So I wended my way to Sheffield.

I arrived at Sheffield on the same night, and at once inquired my way to
the barracks.  The Second Dragoon Guards (Queen's Bays) were lying there
at that time.  Entering the gates, I was at once interrogated by the
sentry as to what I wanted.

"I want to enlist," said I.

It was nightfall.  A rousing fire was burning in the guard-room, through
the window of which I could perceive a group of soldiers seated around,
some smoking, some eating, others talking and laughing, more or less.

I saw a slightly-built, gentlemanly looking figure at the door.

"Corporal of the guard," shouted the sentry, and that functionary
instantly appeared.  "This _young fellow_ wants for to join the
reg'ment."

"This way, my lad," said the corporal; and forthwith he entered the
guard-room.

Presently he came out, and I never saw him again.  I learned, however,
that the next day an old limb of the law hunted him up, and induced him
to give up his intention of enlisting, and made all things pleasant with
the Queen's Bays by leaving them a golden medal of their mistress.

It was my turn now.  I walked in.

"Well, my hearty," said one of the soldiers, "come up to the roast," as
he made way for me to be seated near him.  The corporal cast his eye
from my head to my feet as I neared the light.

"Not big enough, nor never will be," he said, folding his arms.

The standard of dragoon guards at that period (more than twenty years
ago) was not less than six feet for full grown, or five feet ten inches
for growing lads whose appearance indicated that they would attain the
desired height ere they had left off growing.  I was under five feet
seven, and was at once pronounced as "never likely to be a six-foot
man," and therefore not eligible for _their_ regiment; however, the
corporal said I could sleep in barracks that night, if I thought proper,
and he would introduce me to the recruiting sergeant of another
regiment--then in the town--on the following day.  To this I consented;
and the guard orderly escorted me to one of the barrack-rooms, in which
there were eight beds ranged side by side.

The bedsteads were of iron, and the beds stuffed with straw.  To one of
these I was shown as belonging to one of the men on guard and therefore
vacant.  There was an air of snug comfort in the room that contrasted
favourably with the cold blustering wind outside.  A good fire was
burning in a large grate, the white belts, black sabretaches, and
burnished scabbards hung around the room and glittered in the fire
light.  The carbines were neatly arranged in the "rack" with a bone
"snapper" in each hammer--placed there in lieu of the flint--for the new
percussion-caps were not in use at that period.  The uniforms--scarlet
coats with swallow-tails, and brass shoulder-scales--were neatly wrapped
up and piled with the kit and spare clothing upon a shelf over each
man's bed.  The men were apparently as happy as a family--some were
smoking and chatting, one was reading a newspaper, another writing a
letter, and one, a "mounted orderly" just come in from a long ride, was
busy cooking two herrings for his supper.

"Come to the fire," said one of the men.

I walked up and took my seat on one of the wood forms near the grate.

"I feel very dry," said the one who had now commenced to eat the
herrings.

"Divil doubt you, an' so you ought to feel dhry, you murtherin cannibal,
for there you sit ating two as fine fellows of your own spacies as ever
tuk a bath in the salt say," said an old looking soldier.

"Jerry," said the "orderly," "have you any money?"

"Niver a farden," said Jerry--the man who had jokingly called him a
"cannibal."

"I've got some," said I, displaying one shilling and fivepence--all I
had left.

"Bravo, youngster," said the orderly, "will you pay for a quart of ale?"

"Yes, for two quarts if you like," said I.

"Might as well have a gallon while we are about it, that'll jist be a
pint apiece," said a big lump of a fellow rising from one of the beds,
where he had been lying and smoking a dirty short pipe without speaking
a word until now.

"Mind your own business, you moon-snuffing omedhaun, and let the lad do
as he plases," said the Irishman.

"I've only this one shilling and fivepence in copper, or I would pay for
two or three gallons of beer," said I.

"Do you live in Sheffield?" inquired the orderly.

"I came here from W--, to enlist, but they say I'm not tall enough,"
said I.

"And what are you going to do next?"

"'List in another regiment," said I.

"S'pose you don't pass the doctor, what shall you do then?"

I had never thought of that, and therefore could only say I didn't know.

I now began to see the extent of my folly in leaving home in such a
pitiable plight, without money or friends.  If I did not enlist and
_pass the doctor_, only fivepence would stand between me and absolute
starvation.  The orderly no doubt perceived my embarrassment.

"I'll not hev any ale to-night.  Hand me that pitcher of water there
beside you," said he.

"Faix an' you must be a foolish young gossoon to lave home widout money.
You'll be in a purty fix if you don't pass the doctor widout aither
money or frinds, an' thirty miles from home."

My spirits were lowering fast.  But, after all, I could _walk_ home
again; my seventeen pence would be enough to prevent me from starving by
the way.  Therefore, though I was not a little vexed and humiliated that
the soldiers would not accept my treat, I was glad when I considered
that the expenditure of my money would have reduced me to beggary, and I
soon after retired to my bed of "long feathers" as the Irishman
designated it.  So long as the soldiers were up and moving about the
room I never thought of home, but after the last trumpet had sounded, a
little after nine o'clock, and the men were all in their beds, I began
to think of my mother, brothers, and sisters, one of the latter being
particularly attached to me, and I wished in my heart that I had
returned to W--with Harry and Ned.  Being very tired, however, I soon
fell asleep, and did not awake until the morning.

CHAPTER FOUR.

  "Who'll serve the King?" said the Sergeant, aloud,
  Loud roll'd the drum, and the fife played sweetly.
  "Here, Mr Sergeant," says I from the crowd,
  "Is a lad that will serve your turn completely!"

  Old Sons.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

I was aroused by the sound of the reveille at six o'clock on the
following morning.  The soldiers all arose, rolled up their beds, or
rather straw palliasses, turning up the bedsteads--made with a hinge in
the middle--placed the roll of bedding upon it, folded the sheets,
blankets, and coverlid neatly one by one, and arranged them on the beds
in such a manner that the room presented the appearance of a draper's
shop in less than five minutes.  They then went to stables, leaving me
in bed.  I soon got up and dressed myself, making a sorry attempt to put
my bedding in the same state as the rest, and sauntered through the long
passage down a flight of stone steps into the barrack-yard, until it was
getting daylight.  By this time I had made up my mind to return home at
all risks, and in pursuance of this resolve, I started for the front
gate, but having to pass the guard-room, I again came in contact with
the corporal who had so kindly volunteered to find me a night's lodging.
He beckoned me towards him, and said that he had just sent for his
friend the recruiting sergeant, of whom he had spoken the previous
night, and that he expected him up every minute.

Wishing to avoid him, I said that I would go out and get breakfast, and
might come back in the course of an hour.  But the corporal probably
suspected I might _not_ return, and managed to keep me in conversation
until the arrival of his friend the recruiting sergeant of a regiment of
hussars.

Sergeant Brailsford, for that was his name, was a man eminently
calculated for the duty to which he had been appointed.  His splendid
uniform, evidently got up for the purpose of dazzling the eyes of the
unwary, was decidedly the handsomest suit of clothes I had ever seen.

He asked me to breakfast with him at an adjacent public-house: we had
ham, eggs, and coffee, after which he invited me to have a walk with
him.  I felt quite proud of being seen in his company, as I trudged
along the street in my blue smock-frock, round white hat, strong
hob-nailed boots, and thought little of how my countrified gait
contrasted with his fine soldierly bearing.  The sergeant was in the
full dress of his regiment, termed "review order" when mounted; but I
afterwards found that, for the sake of effect, he wore the uniform of a
_commissioned_ officer, with the single exception of the "bars" or
stripes on his arm, to indicate his rank.  A bell-topped shako, the
front of which was emblazoned with gold mountings, surmounted by a huge
plume of cocks' feathers; a dark blue dress jacket literally covered
with gold lace, a handsome sash, blue overalls with broad gold stripes,
and nicely-polished boots and spurs, were sufficient of themselves to
make a country "gawky's" mouth water; but the crowning part of the
dashing sergeant's attire, and one that most took the attention of
passers-by, particularly the girls, was the bright scarlet pelisse--
loose jacket--profusely trimmed with gold lace and bear-skin, hanging
carelessly over his left shoulder.  He had a jet-black moustache, not
then so common as it is now, and no doubt thought no "small beer" of
himself as he stalked majestically over the pavement, glancing in the
shop windows that reflected his figure as he passed them.  On our return
towards the point from whence we started, we met the regiment of
"Queen's Bays," in "complete marching order," a style in which cavalry
frequently turn out and march a few miles, to perfect the men in packing
their kit and being ready to move quickly in case of emergency.  They
were all mounted on bay horses with _docked_ tails; the band was playing
"Paddy, will you now?" and although a dull and foggy December morning,
the black and smoky streets through which the troops marched looked gay
and animated.  Every one admired the soldiers.  My resolution was fixed.
I had never before seen a cavalry regiment mounted and in full dress.
The sergeant probably noticed the effect produced on my weak mind, and
struck while the iron was hot.

"Better 'list and be a soldier," said he.  "I don't mind if I do," said
I.  On arriving at the rendezvous he took me up a narrow staircase, on
the landing of which was a standard, fixed to indicate the height of
intending recruits.  I was one inch below the standard height of the
regiment, he said, but being young and evidently growing fast, _that_
was immaterial.  We descended to a sort of tap-room, where a huge fire
was burning, and several soldiers with dirty-looking female companions
were seated around, smoking and drinking.  The men rose, and proposed my
health.  At a sign, however, from the sergeant they were seated, and
were comparatively silent.  The sergeant, assuming a pompous air, then
put the following questions to me:--

"Are you married?  Are you an apprentice?  Did you ever serve in her
Majesty's army or navy?  Have you ever been cupped or marked with the
letter D?"

To all these questions my answers were an emphatic "No."

"Are you free, able, and willing to enlist in her Majesty's --th
regiment of Hussars?"

"I am," said I.

He then gave me a shilling, and informed me that I was a soldier, and
that in addition to the shilling, he would advance me three or four
days' pay to stand treat to _my comrades_, several of whom--recruiting
parties from infantry regiments--had by this time joined our company.
The sergeant handed me four shillings; this, with the _seventeen pence_,
amounted to six shillings and fivepence, and was soon spent in drink and
tobacco.  It was the beginning of a new era with me, and (shame though
it be) I must tell the truth, and say that I rather liked it.  I,
however, managed to keep the enlistment shilling; and although now more
than twenty years ago, during which I have passed through some strange
scenes, I have still retained that identical coin, through which I had a
hole drilled, and for the most part wore it suspended round my neck
under my shirt by a lock of my youngest sister's hair, sent to me about
six months after in a letter, with a post-office order for five
shillings to pay for its being plaited by the hairdresser.

On the day following my enlistment I was introduced to the doctor
appointed for the purpose, who requested me to strip perfectly naked,
after which I was subjected to a close examination, and declared sound.
Two days after this I was forwarded, with five more recruits, to
Norwich, the head-quarters of my regiment, and on our arrival we were
again examined by the _regimental surgeon_, and we all "passed."  My
companions were mostly labourers, except one, who said he was a cutler
out of work: he afterwards turned out to be a married man with one
child, when he was punished and afterwards discharged.

Being supplied with my regimentals, I was ordered to "make away" with my
old clothing, dealers in which attended the barrack-rooms every morning
in search of plunder.  My suit was rather primitive, and not likely to
fetch much; still it was worth more than that of a fellow recruit who
happened to be domiciled in the same room with me, for he had been a
sort of labouring boy in a tallow-chandlering concern, and the sergeant
had ordered him to take his greasy clothes away out of the room and bury
them in the dung-heap.  He had, however, a good silver watch, and
therefore his _personal_ effects were worth more than mine.

Like mine, his best clothes were at home; he had left home in a "hurry."
Every atom of clothing had to be sold.  I tried hard to keep the blue
worsted stockings which my poor old mother had knitted with her own
blessed hands, and the calico shirt my sisters had made at the village
school, but the hard-visaged, firm-toned sergeant of my squad was
inexorable.

"Bundle 'em up, bundle 'em up, and be handy about it; you will have more
to think about besides yer mother _now_," said he.

I never liked the "old ruffian," as the men frequently designated him,
after that; and it was a relief to the whole troop when he fell one of
the first victims to a fever that broke out in the camp at Chobham a few
years afterwards.

I looked affectionately at my old clothes: the blue smock-frock,
artistically worked with white thread all over the part that covered the
back, breast, and shoulders--the white "Jerry" hat, in the brim of which
stuck a feather from the wing of a rook hatched in the old rookery that
had for many years before I was born stood at the corner of the
bridlepath leading from my father's farm-yard to the hills we called the
"sheep pastures;" but the sergeant was inexorable.  "Bundle 'em up,
bundle 'em up."  I snatched the feather from under the greasy band, and
for years it was deposited in the bottom of my sabretache.  That simple
crow's feather I thought had flown over the old house at home, and I
looked upon it as a sort of connecting link between myself and my
family, and often have I gazed upon it until sick at heart.  It may seem
strange; and those people who have an idea that a soldier has no
feeling--I have often heard people say that soldiers have _no souls_--
may feel disinclined to believe my statement when I say that nothing in
the shape of money, unless it would have insured my discharge, would
have induced me to have parted with that simple _feather_.

But to return to my story.  The hob-nailed boots stockings, shirt,
fustian trousers, and waistcoat--I had no coat--were all sold to an
Irishwoman for four shillings and sixpence: I spent the money among my
comrades.  My fellow recruit kept his watch, but freely assisted to
drink the proceeds of my wardrobe.

I duly received my "kit," which I may here remark absorbed the whole of
the "bounty" (at that period amounting to four pounds, eleven shillings,
and sixpence), and left me upwards of two pounds in debt; this was
deducted from my daily pay of sixteen pence.  The rations consisted of
three-quarters of a pound daily of boiled meat--soup, potatoes, coffee,
and bread--all of good quality; and these only cost eightpence, which,
together with the stoppages, left me in the receipt of a daily income of
threepence.  The obliging corporal of my squad handed me over that sum
every morning at breakfast-time.  One penny of this I generally invested
in a herring, rasher of bacon, or a lump of rancid butter, at the little
chandler's shop adjacent to the canteen in the barrack-yard; the other
twopence was generally expended in beer, for I had not then learned the
expensive habit of smoking.  The cleaning materials--such as Bath-brick,
soap, pipeclay, chrome-yellow, oil, blacking, etc--we could any time
procure on credit from the sergeant-major of the troop, who booked our
account and rendered it monthly.  For these we paid most extravagant
prices; and it was more than _eight months_ before the two pounds, in
which I was indebted at commencement, was paid off.  I had, however, a
new pair of overalls at a guinea, and a pair of Wellington boots at
sixteen shillings and eightpence, during the interval.  It is not, I
believe, generally understood that, in addition to his rations, the
soldier has to pay for a good portion of his clothing.

The regiment was composed of about equal numbers of Irish and English;
and, to give the sons of Erin their due, I found them quite as agreeable
and more obliging in their manner to recruits than their Saxon comrades.
Strange to say, there was only one Scotchman in the corps, and he
volunteered to the 9th, or Queen's Lancers, and embarked with the
regiment for India, in the winter of 184--.

I soon became reconciled to my new life, and entered on my duty with a
determination to excel, if possible, in that most difficult and arduous
duty for a cavalry recruit--riding drills, in which I most erroneously
imagined I should be all but perfect.  I had ridden the cart-horses to
water and pasture; had often trotted, and even galloped, my father's old
cob "Billy" to the shoeing smith's, and had never yet been thrown.  The
first introduction, however, to those tormentors of the poor recruit--
the "rough-riders"--soon convinced me that I was most woefully mistaken,
as I found that all I had practised at home must be abandoned, indeed
forgotten, before I could be properly said to have advanced one step in
the military style of equitation.

The staff of the riding-school consisted of the riding-master, who was
also a lieutenant, a sergeant, one corporal, and a private.  The
riding-master, although an exceedingly clever man, was one of the most
ugly and hard-hearted wretches that ever was born.  He was only excelled
in brutality, to the recruits committed to his charge, by the corporal,
who was more like the being always represented as the "Devil," than any
human creature.  The sergeant was a mild-spoken, kind-hearted man, who
patiently instructed his pupils, whether horses in course of training,
or recruits; and I need not add, that he was idolised by the whole
regiment, especially the "gulpin" class, or raw recruits.  The private
was agreeable enough in the barrack-room, or any where out of the
riding-school, particularly while being treated to drink by a recruit in
the canteen, but being in a subordinate position to the corporal, he was
scarcely less brutal than that fiend in human shape.  Many a poor lad
has been injured for life by this monster, who was one of the most
drunken fellows in the regiment.  He had been three times tried by
court-martial, and reduced to the ranks, for habitual drunkenness.  At
last, five years after I enlisted, he was again confined on the charge
of drunkenness, and assaulting a private soldier in the barrack-room
with a sabre, the private keeping him at bay with some beautiful, but
terrible practice, for ten minutes, during which neither was injured.
Being at length overpowered by numbers, he was carried like a raving
maniac to the guard-room, and there locked up; but on being visited in
half an hour afterwards, was found dead with his throat cut.

CHAPTER FIVE.

  When first I met thee, warm and young,
  There shone such truth about thee,
  And on thy lip such promise hung,
  I did not dare to doubt thee.
  I saw thee change, yet still relied,
  Still clung with hope the fonder,
  And thought, though false to all beside,
  From me thou couldst not wander.
  But go, deceiver! go;
  The heart whose hopes could make it
  Trust one so false, so low,
  Deserves that thou shouldst break it.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

I was fortunate, I have already said, in having the sergeant rough-rider
(a superior man to the corporal in every shape) for my instructor
generally during my "griffinage."

"Well, youngster," he would say, "suppose you give me your serious
attention through this drill."  He fully and most patiently detailed his
instructions in such a manner that I could properly understand both what
he said and what he meant.

"I know," said he, "that it is a very difficult matter for you to
_practise_ the instructions I am giving you.  Yet, by perseverance, and,
above all, a determination to overcome every difficulty, you, like the
rest of us, will ultimately succeed, and, I hope, become a very smart
and well-conducted hussar."

I did persevere, and felt proud to do my best for such a man.  My nerves
were stronger, and my ideas more collected, than when subjected to the
abuse of the corporal; the result being that the sergeant frequently
applauded me.  I soon became the leader of the "gulpin's" ride, a post
always allotted to the most intelligent recruit.

Having passed through the ordeal of riding without saddle, as also in a
saddle without stirrups, I was allowed to ride with a sword.  By this
time I had learnt the sword and carbine exercise on foot--had, in fact,
gone through my "facings," and been drilled to marching, etc, for two
hours every day in the barrack-yard, under the immediate instruction and
supervision of the "drill corporal," "drill sergeant," "regimental
sergeant-major," and "adjutant."  At length, being considered quite
perfect as a rider in the saddle, I commenced my drills with the sword
and carbine on horseback, loading and firing the latter at a fast
canter, "attack and defence," "pursuing practice," etc, with the sabre;
finally being put through all the difficult manoeuvres of the "double
ride," and the high school of equitation, leaping lessons, etc, until I
was considered fit to rank as a soldier, and do my duty as such.

Eight months had now elapsed since my enlistment, and I was much more
reconciled to my soldier's life; and now that I was a full-fledged
hussar, I began to grow conceited.  My appearance had undergone a
complete change for the better: I could both _ride_ and _walk_, and no
mistake.

My moustache was beginning to bud, and the short down was carefully dyed
by the aid of an old toothbrush and a small square of india-ink,
presented to me by a _sweetheart_.  Every soldier must have a
sweetheart: mine was old enough to be my mother, but I did not care,
because I had now dropped all my country diffidence, and grown "cheeky,"
as my comrades designated my impudence.  She courted _me_, and
frequently came to barracks for the purpose of inviting me to her house,
where she carried on a very respectable business as a milliner and
dressmaker.  Strange fancy, perhaps, but she professed to be _very_ fond
of soldiers: she confessed to having had _three_ or _four_ soldier
sweethearts.  I met her in the pit of the theatre, in company with
another _milliner_, to whom one of my comrades, who was with me, had
been paying more than ordinary attention.  I may as well confess that I
did not care a rap for my girl ("Old Dorcas" my comrades used to call
her, when chaffing me); but she was very kind to me at times.  In fact,
her house was my home on all occasions when I could be spared from my
active duties.  Every Sunday, Denis Mulroony (my comrade) and I took
tea, and sometimes supper, with his Nelly and my Dorcas.  We always had
rum in our teas, plenty of ale to our suppers, and more rum _after_
supper.  At last the time came for us to part.  Having learnt that my
father was a well-to-do farmer, and that I had fairish expectations,
"Old Dorcas" conceived the idea of purchasing my discharge, and offered
to lodge the money (30 pounds) at once, if I would "marry her _first_."
Bah!  I never thought of _marrying_--not I; indeed, I had never given
her any cause to harbour such an unnatural design upon me--a mere boy.

I was not partial to soldiering, and glad as I would have been for my
discharge, I sickened at the idea of selling myself.  Only fancy my
going home again, with a woman fastened to me!--what would my father
say?  I shuddered as I thought of the heavy pig-whip, of which I had
more than a slight acquaintance.

I had been led into this dilemma by Denis Mulroony, who was eight years
my senior.

"Denny," said I, after parting with the two women at the barrack-gate,
one night at watch-setting, "what shall I say to `Old Dorcas,' when I go
again?"

"Arrah, now, don't be talking, you great mahoney.  Can't you get the
money first, and marry her when it is _more convanient_?  Shure she'll
give it you, no fear; and if she'll not part wid the whole, no doubt
she'll be after giving you the half of it."

We were at that time under orders to march; in fact, the route had come
for a change of quarters, and I had promised to see her again on the
following night, when, as good luck would have it, Denny was on guard,
and therefore could not go with me.  I went, saw, and told her that I
was too young to marry, and that I must decline her generous offer to
purchase my freedom.  This she took all in good part, and I left her.

When Denny came off duty I told him all.

"Faix, thin," said he, "I wonder would she marry me?  Throth I'll go and
thry her this very night."

"What'll you do with Nelly, for she is sure to be there expecting you,
it being the last night we have to stay here?" cried I.

"Shure I'll send Andy Ryan down to tell Old Dorcas that you want to
spake to her onest more before you lave her for ever."

Andy Ryan was a fine, handsome man as ever stepped.  He had been twelve
years a soldier, and was near upon thirty years of age.  Denny opened
his mind and told him all the particulars, whereupon Andy started on his
mission directly the trumpet had sounded the "dismiss from stables."
That was the last either I or Denny ever saw of Andy.  He deserted, and
most probably went abroad with or without "Old Dorcas."

CHAPTER SIX.

  Bring forth the horse: the horse was brought;
  In truth he was a noble steed,
  A Tartar of the Ukraine breed,
  That seemed as though the speed of thought
  Were in his limbs.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

I think no part of a cavalry soldier's duty is so agreeable to him as a
long march during spring or summer weather.  Apart from the change of
scene and a variation to the dull monotony of barrack life, the ride
through the country to some distant part, frequently of ten to thirty
days' duration, is always looked forward to with feelings of pleasure.
Country people, who seldom see soldiers, look upon the marching of a
squadron of cavalry through the small towns and villages as a sort of
pageant, especially if it be the head-quarters of a corps, which is
always accompanied by the band.

Young and inexperienced as I then was, the prospect of a sixteen days'
march in the merry month of May through the most delightful part of
England held out unusual charms for me.  The dress of a soldier was my
sole weakness--I cared for nothing else; and I cheerfully endured all
the miseries of military slavery and short-comings of a comfortable home
for the sake of being thought something or somebody above the majority
of individuals in my walk of life.  My sole object was to attract the
attention and, if possible, the envy of others--an idea too frequently
indulged by young soldiers, until dear-bought experience teaches them
their mistake.

I have stated before, that the costume of our regiment at the period to
which I allude included a "pelisse" or loose jacket, slung carelessly
over the left shoulder; but no man was allowed to wear this until he had
been dismissed from drill, and deported himself in such a manner as
became a smart, intelligent, and well-disciplined soldier.  Those
recruits who had enlisted about the same time as myself, but who were
not yet proficient in horsemanship, etc, were told off to travel by
railway; but to my great joy, the sergeant of my squad read out my name
in orders at stable time the night before, to assemble with the
detachment in "complete marching order" the following morning at seven
o'clock.

I had a most beautiful, blood-like, dark-chestnut gelding for my
trooper: his coat shone like a mole, and his mane flowed from his
finely-arched neck almost to his knees.  He was known by the general
appellation of "Number Seventeen, D Troop," but I gave him the name of
"Restless," from his habit of capering and prancing at every unusual
noise or object that presented itself.  He was neither nervous nor
vicious, but impatient and anxious to be moving when he ought to stand
still; and though the slightest feel of the rein imaginable would
restrain him, he would champ his bit and throw the foam from his mouth
all over his breast and my uniform in flakes as white as snow.  One tap
of the drum or a blast of the trumpet was a signal for "Restless" to
show off his splendid form in a succession of graceful capers, if on the
move; or if standing on parade, he would soon get up a shower of foam,
and bespatter the horses on each side, all the while paddling with his
feet and scraping the ground continually.

Notwithstanding that I was about the youngest "old soldier" in the
regiment, and but a short time previously only a common "clod-hopper,"
there was none more conceited or perhaps more vain than myself, when
mounted on "Restless."

Not content with the light sprinkling of _down_ which nature had planted
and was nurturing on my upper lip, I spared from my scanty pay a sum of
one shilling and sixpence for a bushy pair of false moustaches, which,
however, all my efforts to make stick proved futile: they only made me
sneeze; so I was obliged to fall back upon the old toothbrush and square
of Indian ink presented to me by Dorcas, wherewith to blacken my young
crop, to make believe that I was more of a man than a boy.  The regiment
was divided into three detachments of two troops each, and I belonged to
the first that marched out of our old quarters, including the band.  A
large crowd had collected to witness our departure.  A deal of
hand-shaking and clinging to the stirrups was going on as we filed out
of the barrack-gate to the tune of "The girl I left behind me;" and many
a tear was shed by those who, having made a short acquaintance with some
of the men while they had been quartered here, were destined never to
see them again; indeed, I recollect that four of the number that marched
with me on that morning died, a few years after, of a fever that broke
out in the camp at Chobham; the bones of eight were left to whiten in
the death-vale, after the battle of Balaklava; and three were killed
during the Indian revolt, whither they had gone, transferred, at their
own request, to other regiments.  Few, however, of the whole regiment
were left when actions, disease, and the short-comings of the
commissariat had done their work, at the conclusion of the Crimean
campaign.  But of this I shall write in due course, and proceed with my
narrative and detachment on our line of march.

As is customary on a regiment leaving quarters, hundreds of the "tag,
rag, and bob-tail" followed us through the streets to the outskirts of
the town, the last to leave us being the girls; and they would have
trudged on, keeping our company as long as they could have held out, but
for the order to "trot," which the trumpet sounded directly on leaving
the street pavement.

"Good-bye, Mary!" "good-bye, Helen!" "farewell, honey, dear!" was
followed by a series of wild shrieks that could be heard for some
distance above the clattering of hoofs and the clanking of sabres.  Our
first day's march was a distance of eighteen miles.  The billeting party
had preceded us in the usual way on the day before, and quarters were
provided for every man, in numbers of from one to half-a-dozen,
according to the accommodation to be obtained at the various hotels and
public-houses in the town where we halted.  All the inhabitants appeared
to have turned out to welcome us, and they lined the roadside for nearly
a mile ere we reached the market-place, where we formed up, surrounded
by a dense crowd, while the band played, after which we were dismissed
to our respective billets.  I was particularly fortunate in having nice
comfortable quarters to myself, in a small public-house near the
outskirts of the town, kept by an aged widow; and she made a great fuss
over me.

"Deary me! why, he is but a child," she remarked, as my gallant
"Restless" capered into her stable-yard.  The neighbours, such as were
left at home, collected about the place.

"Shame on the government for enlisting such a boy!  I wonder how his
poor mother took it!"

Impudent and conceited though I had become, this allusion to my mother
broke through a little of my fortitude.  However, I appeared not to
notice the running fire of remarks these good-natured people made from
time to time, as I dismounted and busied myself in cleaning my horse and
accoutrements, after which my kind hostess invited me into her private
parlour, to a nice dinner she had provided expressly for me, consisting
of a roast leg of lamb, with mint sauce, and a "rhubarb dumpling."

"I always make it a point to treat a soldier to the best I can afford,
because he risks his life to save others and their property," she said,
as she reached me a chair, and told me to be seated.

Now, I was particularly fond of pudding, but I had never tasted any
since I left home, and in reply to her question, as to which I would
prefer first, pudding or meat, I preferred the former.  A little boy,
about six years of age (the old lady's grandson) sat on a stool in the
same apartment, and appeared completely absorbed in my every movement.
I was very hungry--soldiers are invariably hungry, and thirsty too,
after a long march--the nice rich dumpling, turned bottom upwards out of
an earthenware basin in which it had been boiled, was already on the
table, with the syrup oozing from a fissure in the side into the clean
willow-pattern dish.

"Help yourself," said this kind old woman.

I did help myself, with a will too, and she assisted by sprinkling sugar
and pouring rich thick cream over the portion I had taken to myself.
She then took her seat in the corner, and the manner in which her
dumpling disappeared evidently gave her as much pleasure as it did me;
but the little boy--Tommy she called him--appeared, as I thought, rather
spiteful in the frowns he gave me from time to time, as the demolition
of the dumpling continued.

The old lady said that "puddings did not agree with her so well as they
formerly did."  So I took it for granted that she intended the whole of
it for myself, and I forthwith commenced to denude the dish of the lot.
Tommy could hold his thoughts no longer.

"Granny, is the souger goin' to eat it aw?" said he.

I at once dropped my fork, abashed and disgusted with myself for what
might appear selfishness; however, as an act of reparation, Tommy had
the satisfaction of clearing up the remnant, after which he appeared in
better humour.  After doing justice to the lamb and mint sauce, I
completed my stable duty, and dressed for a walk until stable time in
the evening.  For several days nothing occurred that would interest the
reader beyond the usual events incidental to a march, such as a few men
misconducting themselves in being late for roll-call, not cleaning their
appointments to suit the whimsicalities of a sergeant, for which they
were reported to the commanding officer and ordered to _walk_ from town
to town behind the light-baggage cart, under escort of the "baggage
guard," their horses being led by their more fortunate, but in many
instances more culpable comrades.  Walking with high-heeled boots,
leather stock, and tight-fitting clothes, with a heavy dress cap on the
head in a blazing hot sun, is considered heavy punishment for a cavalry
soldier, yet I have known men compelled to walk ten days successively
for no other crime than being two minutes late for parade.  During this
march I came in for my first quota of punishment since I had been a
soldier, which was administered in the form of a couple of days' walking
in the order I have described, twenty-two miles the first day, and
sixteen the next, under a fearfully hot sun; the distance was nothing if
I had not been encumbered with a costume totally unfitted for the
purpose, and under restraint too, kept up to the pace of a horse's walk
so as not to lag behind the escort; and this punishment was awarded to
me through no fault of my own.

It was on the seventh day after leaving barracks.  Thirty of us were
billeted at one house, and the rest upon private houses, in consequence
of there being but one public-house in the village.  The landlord of
this was a farmer and maltster; we had to sleep and stable our horses as
best we could; indeed, many of the animals were picketed in the open
fields, the men were turned into the malt offices to clean their
appointments, etc.  The malting season being over there was plenty of
room for them to do this.  On the day we marched in we were at dinner
all together in a "club room" adjoining the house; a loud report was
heard, which every one knew to be from a carbine, being much louder than
from a common gun.  Every cavalry soldier carries ten rounds of
ball-cartridge in his pouch on the line of march; these pouches and
cross-belts to which they were attached had been left in the places
where we had been cleaning them.

On sallying forth in the direction of the report we found four or five
boys, apparently from ten to fourteen years of age; each was armed with
a carbine, and adorned with a cross-belt.  They had stuck a piece of
white paper on an apple-tree in the garden behind the house, and were
firing away our ammunition at the target, no doubt calculating upon a
fine afternoon's sport.  Every carbine was loaded (one with the
cartridge the wrong end downwards), and when we arrived another
youngster was just taking up a position to "present" and fire in
addition to the one that had already "let fly" and missed his mark.
Whither the ball stopped it was perhaps lucky that no one knew, as both
horses, cattle, and people were moving about within range.

One of these ammunition pouches was found to belong to me, and with the
rest of the owners of carbines and pouches, I was at once taken before
the commanding officer, and we were all ordered to walk a couple of days
each.  One of the men whose duty it became to lead "Restless," came in
for treble the amount of punishment by his failing to keep my horse
within bounds.  On one of these days the route lay along the road that
skirts the ruins of Kenilworth Castle.  Across this road runs a wide
brook, which has to be forded by travellers.  "Restless" seriously
objected to be led through this water, and tugged at the bridle to such
an extent as to pull the man off his horse plump into the middle of the
brook, the result being that both his own horse and "Restless" got
loose, and were with difficulty caught.  For this accident, the man was
ordered to walk the remainder of the march to barracks.  I well remember
the scene that occurred on the arrival of the poor fellow in barracks
after seven days' walk.

"This," said he, "shall be the last day's duty I will ever do in the --
th Hussars; not that I care a straw for the walking, as I can walk as
well as any man in the regiment, but because I have been punished
undeservedly by a man _who is a deserter from another regiment_," this
was alluding to the sergeant who had reported him to the commanding
officer for "carelessness" in letting the horse loose, although the poor
fellow had stuck to his hold on the bridle of "Restless," until actually
pulled out of his seat.  There was a dogged determination about David
Mason (for that was his name, and a better soldier never threw his leg
over a saddle) as he uttered these words, while sitting on the edge of
his bed and stripping his worsted socks from his blistered and bleeding
feet, having limped into the barrack-yard with one hand resting on the
rear part of the baggage cart, about half an hour after the arrival of
the detachment.

"This is the last day's duty I shall ever do in the --th Hussars," he
repeated to a lance-corporal who had heard a portion of his first
ejaculation.

"You had better make haste and get down to stables," said the corporal.

I was grooming my horse when David entered the stable, and he at once
walked up to the sergeant and confronted him.  "Sergeant D--," said he,
"you are a _tyrant_, a _coward_, and a _deserter_ from the 52nd Light
Infantry!"

The sergeant trembled like an aspen leaf, and his face turned as pale as
a sheet: turning to me and a comrade in the next stall, "Take this man
to the guard-room," and poor Mason was at once escorted to confinement.

They were _both_ deserters: Mason from the 82nd foot, and the sergeant
from the 52nd; but by some means or other, never explained to me, Mason
knew the sergeant while the sergeant did not know Mason, although it was
said that he had more than once hinted that the latter had the
appearance of a foot soldier in some peculiarity which he probably
better understood than any man in the regiment.

Both men had joined our regiment in fictitious names, but Mason had the
advantage of knowing the sergeant's real name, and, when taken before
the colonel on the following day, he made a clean breast of it by
telling the sergeant's name and the date of his desertion, also stating
that he was himself a deserter, having enlisted in our corps only two
days from leaving his own, solely because he thought he should like to
be a cavalry soldier better than serving in an infantry regiment.

The adjutant of the 52nd was communicated with at once, and Mason's
story found to be correct.  The sergeant was put under arrest, until an
escort arrived from his own regiment to take him to head-quarters, where
he was tried by court-martial and flogged.  Mason also left our corps
under an escort of the 82nd sent to fetch him; and I afterwards heard
that, although he was tried by court-martial, he got off with a light
punishment.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

  Strengthening fare and a welcoming glance,
  More than rich dainties and pleasures entrance;
  When to droop we begin,
  Mine host joins in,
  Health to the soldier, and health to our land.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Some strange things occur during a soldier's time of service, many
incidents and occurrences which are thought nothing of by the men
themselves, but are nevertheless interesting to civilians.  To these
little incidents, such as I can remember, I shall confine my story, in
the hope that the narration of them will prove more interesting to the
general reader than the dry detail of a soldier's duty and his manner of
performing it.

A comrade of mine was on sentry in Hounslow barracks from eleven to one
o'clock one dark and very wet night in the depth of winter, at a post
where the orders were that _no person_ was to pass after nightfall.
Willie Sherlock was his name, an Irish lad, and, if I remember right, he
was from Galway.  He had been at sea as a mere boy, and enlisted in our
regiment when about nineteen.  From his general smartness at drill and
exceedingly good-tempered disposition he was a universal favourite.  The
post where Willie was placed on sentry commanded the approach to a path
that led to some small cabins in the rear of the barracks, but out of
its boundaries.  These were inhabited by the "hangers-on" of the
regiment (the locality is well known to those of my military readers who
have ever been so unfortunate as to be stationed at Hounslow).  The
commanding-officer determined to put a stop to the egress and ingress of
certain very fast non-commissioned officers, who, avoiding the front
gate, stole out after watch-setting to these cabins for the purpose of
playing cards and indulging in various other objectionable practices.
We had at that time an uncommonly strict regimental sergeant-major, a
regular "tickler," who would confine a man in the guard-room for a mere
twist of the eye in the wrong direction when on parade.

This man was one of the most frequent visitors to the "huts," and on the
night Willie Sherlock was on duty he was making his way stealthily past
the sentry-box, that stood between the riding-school and the end of one
wing of the barracks.  "Who comes there?" sang out Willie; no answer was
returned.  "Who comes there?" again he challenged without receiving a
reply.  "Who comes there?" again repeated Willie, but still he received
no answer.

"Be the mortial frost, I'll fire," said Willie as he rammed a
ball-cartridge home into his carbine.  "Who comes there? answer, or be
the piper that played before Moses, I'll sind a ball into ye."

All this time the figure was stealthily gliding past under the shadow of
the riding-school.  Quick as thought Willie dropped on one knee, by
which he brought the outline of the figure between his sight and the
sky.  Bang went the carbine, and simultaneously a loud yell, succeeded
by another and another, rang through the barracks with a strange
unearthly sound at that hour of the night.

"Number 2, corporal of the guard," sung out Willie from his post.  (All
the sentries are numbered, so that if Anything occurs on their post, as
in this instance, it is known in which direction to send assistance,
should any be required.)

I happened to be in the guard-room at the time, waiting for my turn of
duty on another post, and, with the rest of the guard-relief and the
corporal, we proceeded in double-quick time to the scene of alarm.  The
yells and groans continued as we tramped across the barrack-yard.  By
the time we had reached the post we were joined by the orderly officer
and sergeant of the guard.

"Who comes there?" shouted Willie, in a loud defiant challenge, as we
neared his sentry-box, where he stood at attention.

"Rounds!" was the reply.

"What rounds?" said Willie, according to custom.

"Visiting rounds!"

"Advance, visiting rounds.  All's _not_ well," said Willie, and then
briefly reported the cause of alarm.

The victim of his vigilance had by this time staggered to the
sentry-box.

"Take me to the hospital.  I am badly wounded.  The scoundrel has shot
me."

"Halloo! sergeant-major.  How is this?" inquired the orderly officer.

"Pray let me be taken to hospital, sir, and then I will explain," said
he; and thither he was escorted.

The assistant-surgeon examined him, when it was found that the ball had
passed through the fleshy part of his leg.  He soon got round, however,
but was tried by court-martial, and reduced to the ranks for leaving
barracks at an unseasonable hour of the night by a forbidden way.
Willie, of course, only did his duty.

"Be the piper," said he, "I thought I had kilt him intirely by the roar
he med."

Not long after this occurrence, Willie volunteered with about twenty
mere of ours for service in India, and joined the 9th Lancers in the
spring of 1843, that regiment having embarked in the early part of 1842.

At this period, the regiment was constantly being drained of many
effective men, who volunteered for service in regiments under orders for
or already in India; consequently, we had several recruiting parties
out, among whom were a sergeant and a corporal at Liverpool; but they
both deserted, and, it was supposed, sailed for America.

About nine or ten months subsequent to this, I was on guard at the front
gate--which is always closed at nine o'clock, and all who pass in or out
after that time do so through a small wicket door.  One of the men had
just struck twelve o'clock on a gong that hung in front of the
guard-room of the barracks where we were then stationed.

Some one rapped gently at the wicket.

"Who comes there?" said I.

"A friend!"

The door was opened, and in stepped a tall individual, wearing a curious
conical-shaped cap, apparently made of raccoon skins.

"Don't you know me?" said he, shaking hands with the corporal of the
guard, who was eyeing him over from head to foot; "I am Corporal L--,
who deserted with Sergeant B--from Liverpool," said he, laughing
heartily.

He was immediately placed under arrest; and afterwards informed us that
he had relatives in the United States, to whom he made his way on his
arrival in New York.  He was a medical student at the time he enlisted,
and had wealthy connexions in London.  Corresponding with these, he was
informed that an old uncle had died and left him a princely fortune, and
was advised by the family solicitor to come back to England without
delay, give himself up to his regiment, and when he had undergone the
punishment consequent on his indiscretion, arrangements would be made to
purchase his discharge.

The most noteworthy portion of his examination before the colonel on the
following morning was, that notwithstanding the hints thrown out that he
would probably be flogged if he did not render some account of the
sergeant who had deserted with him, he steadily refused to give any
information.

"I know where he is," said he; "but you may cut me to pieces before I
will tell you anything concerning him."

He was tried by court-martial, and, notwithstanding the intercession of
his friends and the powerful interest employed in his favour, was
sentenced to three months' imprisonment; at the expiration of which he
returned, very much broken down and emaciated, and was put to his duty,
pending the necessary preliminaries for his discharge, which he gained
in the course of a month; and in about three weeks after he left the
regiment he entered the barrack-yard, seated by the side of a lovely
girl--his wife--in a splendid barouche, drawn by a pair of high-stepping
Cleveland bays, coachman and footman in spanking new livery.  He had
brought his wife down from London to show her a specimen of barrack
life.

We were at dinner.  He laughed and chatted with all those with whom he
had been on intimate terms, and left us a five-pound note.  We gave him
three cheers as he left the barracks; and, although once only a common
soldier, he is now a gentleman, residing with his wife and a numerous
family in the suburbs of the West End of London.

We had a youth in the regiment who came from the neighbourhood of
Clonmel, Ireland.  He also had a great sum of money bequeathed to him,
while a private, by a relative who had resided and amassed his wealth in
Liverpool or Manchester--I forget which.  The amount was said to be
upwards of 30,000 pounds, on the receipt of which he purchased his
discharge and married the daughter of a farrier in the regiment.  She
and her relatives indulged in the most extravagant finery and excesses;
the women connected with the regiment had all silk dresses presented to
them; and the keeper of the canteen would have made his fortune, had not
the colonel put a stop to the proceedings by issuing orders that neither
one nor the other of the newly-married couple should be admitted in
barracks.  But the scenes in the public-houses in the vicinity of the
barracks were something extraordinary while the money lasted.  A drag
was purchased, to which was attached a team of four horses, unbroken to
work together, and unmatched in every shape.  The drag being loaded with
a motley lot of his companions, the madcap mounted the box and essayed
the task of driving through the crowded streets; but the leaders turned
completely round, and, facing their driver, commenced to plunge and
kick, finally capsizing the coach, and more or less injuring all the
passengers.  The result of this foolish extravagance was utter ruin, and
not having a shilling with which to bless himself, he was at last
obliged to enlist again.

While the troop to which I belonged was stationed at Hampton Court, the
chief duty at which place is to guard the various approaches to and
about the palace, an incident occurred to one of our men worth relating.

The palace, as many of my readers are aware, is within an easy distance
of London, and is visited by vast numbers of pleasure-seekers of all
grades during the summer months; and at that period there were
frequently families of distinction staying for some time at the Mitre
Hotel, situate within a stone's throw of the front entrance to the
palace.  The soldiers stationed here always mount guard in full dress,
and many a sly leer of the eye is bestowed upon them by the hundreds of
pretty girls that pass in and out during a day.  The front gates of the
palace are always open for visitors to pass without restriction until
nightfall.  The splendid picture-galleries and other works of art and
curiosities are guarded by policemen; but the approaches to the
staircases, corridors, etc, are never without an efficient guard of
soldiers.  One of these posts is termed the "Garden-gate," situate in
rear of the main building, and the entrance to the palace from the
magnificent pleasure-grounds, bounded on one side by the river Thames.
There is a broad flagway, or promenade, along the side of the palace,
where seats are placed, upon which the visitors can lounge, with their
backs to the palace and their faces towards the gardens.  The sentry has
to pace from one end to the other of this promenade, in front of the
company that may be on the seats.  I well remember, one sultry night in
July, it was my turn to relieve a sentry on this post.  It was eleven
o'clock, and all the visitors were supposed to have been cleared out of
the gardens at nine, or soon afterwards.  The guard-relief tramped
through the long and lofty passages from front to rear of the palace in
silence, as far as speech was concerned; but the sound of their
footsteps and the jingle of their appointments was quite sufficient to
awaken a man, had he been sleeping soundly on his post.  We approached
and passed the point where it was usual for the sentry to challenge; but
all was still.  On reaching the promenade, we turned about to look for
the sentry.  There he sat on one of the seats, unbelted and unarmed,
and, as if to keep up the proverbial gallantry of his race, he had his
arm around the waist of as pretty a girl as ever the sun or moon shone
upon.

Lynch--Pat Lynch--I need not withhold his name now--was the gallant
sentinel.  The object that had won him from his duty spoke not a word,
she held down her head, but we could easily perceive that she moved in
superior society.  In this Pat was her equal, for his father was an
extensive landowner in the county of Waterford.

"Boys," said Pat, "this is a bad job, to be caught loitering on my post,
but this young lady is my sweetheart, and how could I help but sit
beside her?"

Pat was marched to the guard-room, and the fair lady tenderly escorted
outside the boundaries of the palace, and she was seen to enter the
"Mitre Hotel."  Poor Pat was brought before the major on the following
day, and sentenced to twenty-one days' "kit drill," namely, carrying all
his "kit," strapped on his back with the surcingle, for four hours each
day, to and fro a prescribed distance marked out in the barrack-yard.

Shortly after he had completed his term of punishment, the young lady,
who had money of her own, purchased his discharge.  They were married,
and for some years, to my knowledge, lived happily together at the
pretty little bathing place, Tramore, in the county of Waterford.

CHAPTER EIGHT.

  For once, upon a raw and gusty day,
  The troubled Tiber chafing with her shores,
  Caesar said to me--"Darest thou, Cassius, now
  Leap in with me into this angry flood,
  And swim to yonder point?"

------------------------------------------------------------------------

While the head-quarters of our regiment lay in Hounslow, and the
out-quarters in Hampton Court, Blackwater, and Kensington, myself and a
number of my comrades went to bathe in a stream not far from Hounslow
Heath, as had been our custom while stationed at Hampton Court.  Whether
this water was public or private property, I know not: it was a kind of
half river, half brook; probably, however, we were trespassers, as I
remember we had to pass over some fields through which there was no
public road before we reached it.  There were seven of us, and we had no
sooner stripped and piled our clothing on the water's edge than four
policemen appeared on the scene.  Suspecting our intentions, they had
followed us from the outskirts of the town, and concealing themselves
behind a hedge, like good generals, they waited until we were undressed
and had entered the water, before warning us that we were doing anything
contrary to the law.  Now, if there is one thing that a soldier detests
more than another, it is to be interfered with in any way or shape by a
policeman.  In this instance the police were striving to take a mean
advantage over us, and as they seated themselves quietly on the brink of
the stream, and collected every vestige of our clothing in a heap beside
them, it appeared very probable that they would remain masters of the
field, and that--as my own comrades remarked--we should be taken to "a
piece of ground with a station-house over it."

The water was no higher than our middles, and we moved down some
distance to hold a parley as to the best means of getting out of the
dilemma: some were for quietly surrendering to the enemy and trusting to
our ignorance of the law to escape punishment.  There were no
notice-boards or anything to warn us that it was illegal, and what was
more natural than that a pure stream of water situated within a mile of
a barrack, should be used as a bath during the summer months?

The idea of surrender was rejected by the majority, who were for making
a sortie on the police, and thus regain possession of our clothes and
secure our liberty at all hazards.  Naked as we were, we numbered nearly
two to one; and although we should be sure to be freely beaten with
their staves, we should ultimately succeed in getting away.  We
therefore agreed to make a semblance of surrender in order to get
possession of our clothes, but arranged that we should all finish
dressing at the same time, taking the initiative as to the donning of
each article from a fugleman, so as not to be taken at a disadvantage
before we were dressed and ready for a run or a fight, as circumstances
directed.  Accordingly we left the water and commenced to dress, during
which one of the policemen produced a book and gruffly asked our names,
the rest surrounding us, apparently ready for action at the same time.
We looked at each other, and it was at once understood that we should
decline to give any such information.  By this time we were attired in
our shirts, trousers, and boots, but were interrupted by each of the
policemen producing a pair of handcuffs.  This was too much: I had never
before engaged in a serious encounter, but I was ready and willing for
anything--indeed, both myself and comrades would have died before we
would have submitted to be handcuffed.  While one of my arms was in my
jacket-sleeve, I was seized by two policemen; the remaining two grappled
hold of another soldier.  With the help of my comrades I managed to
wriggle out of their grasp, but one of the brutes struck me a fearful
blow on my arm with his staff, and one of my comrades was felled to the
ground by a blow on his bare head.

By this time the fight had become general.  Charley Dundas (one of the
best soldiers in the regiment, who afterwards died of fever in Chobham
camp) took hold of one policeman with his left hand on the collar of his
coat behind, and with a firm grab of the right on the back of his
trousers, he ran him before him like a wheelbarrow to the edge of the
stream, from whence he pitched him headforemost into the water; the
other three were thrown bodily into the brook.  Hats, handcuffs,
coat-tails, and staves, were pitched after them, and away we all
started, over hedge and ditch, the nearest way to the barracks--but the
policemen never chased us a yard.

It is very difficult to pick out a soldier that may be wanted by the
police for such an offence as this, from amongst so many men of about
the same height and weight, all wearing moustaches, and attired exactly
alike; and we knew that if we could only reach the barracks, the chances
of detection were very much in our favour; but it was policy to separate
before we reached the gate, and enter it at different periods with
others not of our party, to avoid suspicion, and this we managed very
nicely.

The same evening, however, while reconnoitring from the barrack-windows,
we espied the four policemen, who, having made a report of the case at
the guard-room, were anxiously striving to recognise in the many men
passing to and fro the parties who had left them in so ignominious a
position.  At last they appeared to have found one of the delinquents in
one Barney Camel, who was making the best of his way across the
barrack-yard from the canteen, with a rasher of bacon in his hand, to
his room.  Barney bore a striking resemblance to Charley Dundas, the man
who had so unceremoniously tumbled one of our enemies into the brook.
Like Charley, too, when the police attacked us, he had no jacket on, but
his braces were about his hips, his forage-cap was cocked on "three
hairs," and the chin-strap turned over the crown.  He was, as he
afterwards remarked, "whistling the `Groves of Blarney,' and thinking of
nothing but the bacon;" when the four policemen surrounded him and
forthwith proceeded to take him to the station-house, followed by a
crowd who rapidly gathered from all parts of the barracks.  Now, it so
happened that Barney Camel had but one hour previously returned with a
detachment who had formed an escort of Her Majesty and suite from
Buckingham Palace to Windsor Castle (at that period the railway between
London and Windsor had not been formed).  Barney had groomed his horse,
cleaned his saddlery, and was about to enjoy his frugal meal as he
thought, in peace, when he was marched off to the police-station.  A
sergeant, however, was sent to tender evidence in his behalf, viz, that
he had been on duty as stated, and at the time the alleged assault was
committed on the police, he must have been on the road between Hounslow
and Windsor.  The result was that Barney was discharged, and we never
heard any more of our eventful bathing-excursion, probably because the
police had figured so ingloriously in the contest.

While stationed here, the Earl of Cardigan, who was then
lieutenant-colonel of the 11th Hussars, frequently came down from London
to be present at our reviews and field-days on Hounslow Heath.  The
gallant earl, when Lord Brudenell, held a commission in our regiment,
and he had ever taken a great interest in the corps; indeed, it was said
that soon after his duel with Captain Tucket, which occurred about the
period of which I write, he had offered our colonel 8000 pounds to
exchange commissions.  Much has been written and said in reference to
the public conduct of this distinguished officer, namely, "that he did
not perform his duty at the battle of Balaklava as became a general."
To these scandalous and scurrilous assertions I am in a position to give
a _decided_ and most _emphatic_ contradiction.  The many incidents
connected with the war in the Crimea, and that action in particular,
will form the subject of the concluding portion of these chapters; but I
may here observe that the Earl of Cardigan rode as far and fought as
well as any other man engaged.  The truth is, he never was a particular
favourite with the officers of his own regiment, or any other corps
collectively, although individually he has ever had many friends.  The
reason is plain: he invariably kept young officers to their duty.
Officers and men must be thorough soldiers--not "Miss Nancy" sort of
fellows--to please _him_ at a field-day, through which he can, in my
opinion, put a regiment or a brigade with more quickness and precision
than any other officer in Her Majesty's service.

But it is time to return to my story.  One of our officers had a very
large monkey of the baboon species, which he kept chained in a kennel in
rear of the stables set apart for officers' horses.  It was a favourite
diversion with some of our men to turn "Jocko" loose, and let him
scamper all over the barrack-yard; and this he decidedly enjoyed, until
perceived by the dogs, of which there were always a great number of all
sorts about the barracks.  When once these got sight or scent of Jocko,
they would quickly unite themselves into a pack, and, followed by a
motley crowd of partly-dressed men and the children of the married
soldiers (the most mischievous of all children), Jocko would lead them a
chase round and round the yard, until some of the dogs got unpleasantly
near, when he would turn round on his pursuers and chatter in the most
laughable manner, which mostly kept them at bay until he had got second
wind, and off he would go again.  On one of these occasions he was more
than usually pressed by a new arrival in barracks--a very large Scotch
deerhound, a complete stranger to Jocko.  The monkey dashed round the
barrack-yard at a tremendous pace, looking behind him and chattering to
his enemies at every bound.  It was during the mid-day stable hour, a
period of the day when all the men and officers are supposed to be in
barracks.  On came Jocko at a tearing pace, with the jaws of Bos, the
Highland deerhound, within a yard of his tail, and the rest of the pack
scattered a long way behind, at distances according to their ability to
keep up the pace.  The sergeant-major of my troop, who had been promoted
partly in consequence of his growing too fat to serve in the ranks,
stood at a stable-door, which was open; and Jocko, being more anxious
for a friendly shelter than ever I had before seen him, darted between
the fat non-commissioned officer's legs, followed by Bos through the
same opening into the stable.  The sudden collision sent the
sergeant-major plump on his back.  Jocko jumped on to the back of the
first horse he came near, from whence he sent such a tirade of chatter
as set every horse in the stable capering and kicking at the unusual
row.  Bos was bundled out of the stable, but how to get at Jocko was
quite another thing.  He evidently thought Bos was waiting for him
outside, and, determined not to be moved without a struggle, he stuck
his sharp claws into the back of the horse, who, suffering from the
acute pain and affright of his novel rider, was nearly mad; now rearing
with his fore-feet in the manger, and then lashing out with his
hind-feet, it was dangerous to approach him.  In vain was Jocko
pommelled with the handle of a stable-fork; it only made him stick the
faster.  At last we hit upon the idea of leading out the horse to the
side of Jocko's kennel, which he no sooner perceived than he jumped from
the horse's back and entered it.

CHAPTER NINE.

  Who has done this deed?  All are suspect,
  While yet the guilty one is undiscovered:
  We stand alike condemn'd, alike acquitted--
  The guilty innocent, the innocent guilty.
  Let rigid search be straightway made.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Amidst all the scenes of wild fun which even the life of a private
soldier is at times enlivened, events occasionally occur that have a
depressing effect upon the mind.  We had a "sergeant shoemaker" who was
at the head of the bootmaking department of the regiment; he was the
very soul of "element, divarshun, and fun," as my Irish comrades would
say.  It was his custom to visit the barrack-rooms every morning,
generally while at breakfast, for the purpose of ascertaining whether
any boots wanted repairing, or if any of us required a new pair.  He
always had a kindly word and a joke for such as he was well acquainted
with, having served as a private in the ranks until promoted to his
lucrative position.  Going up to each of our beds, he would take down
the boots from the shelf, and turn them soles upwards with as much
diligence as the troop-farrier daily examined the shoes of our horses.
"Pat," he would say, "you want a new pair of heels on these boots."

"Fred, you are born to be a rich man: your boot-soles are worn out in
the middle, and the sides are scarcely touched."

"Terry, I must speak to Sergeant Williams," (the drill sergeant); "you
are growing Sheffield-knee'd; the soles of _your_ boots are worn down on
the inside and not touched on the outside."

"Denny Smith, your mother must have reared _you_, for shure you must
have been bow-legged from an infant; _your_ boot-soles are worn as much
on the outside as Terry's are on the inside."

"Arrah, now, Tim O'Leary, I wonder you're not ashamed of yourself for
bringing disgrace on our illegant corps by wearing these thundering ould
crab shells wid a patch on the side of each.  Shure I'll go bail there's
never a man in the regiment would wear a patch on his boots but
yourself; I'll report you to your captain, so I will, for the
sergeant-major told me your account has been quite clear these four
months, and there's never a betther-looking dragoon in the service: pity
that you should be spoiled entirely for the matther of a pair of
illegant boots."  In this fashion he would rattle away with his tongue
while examining our boots, and, slinging such as wanted repairs over his
arm, bustle out of one room into another.

The barrack-rooms are approached by a flight of stone steps leading from
the yard, and one morning when our poor sergeant-shoemaker had been more
than usually jocular, he unfortunately missed his footing at the top of
one of these flights of steps, and falling headlong to the bottom, broke
his neck and died on the spot.  There he lay, poor fellow, with his face
turned upwards, until the surgeon was summoned and pronounced him dead,
when he was carried to the hospital.  He was buried in the little
churchyard at Heston with military honours, of which he was richly
deserving.

Soon after this unfortunate incident, another occurred that caused some
commotion in the corps.  There is a powder-mill on Hounslow Heath, where
we went through all our field-drill.  On one occasion, during a
field-day, a waggon was being loaded with powder, to which was attached
a team of four horses: we had just thrown out a party of skirmishers,
who were firing away some distance from the mill.  It was then the
custom for the "squad-sergeants" to visit the barrack-rooms for the
purpose of serving out blank ammunition prior to the troops marching out
to a field-day, and the men were supposed to take their ball-cartridges
from their pouches and replace them with blank, leaving the
ball-ammunition on the shelf above their beds.  On the day to which I
allude, the skirmishers were keeping up a brisk fire on an imaginary
enemy, when one of the horses attached to the waggon standing at the
powder-mill was seen to drop suddenly, struggle for a few moments, and
then lie still.  Those who were not so intent on their duty as to be
able to observe this circumstance, also observed the waggoner making
signs as if something extraordinary had happened, and all the while
pointing to the prostrate horse, while a crowd of workmen collected out
of the mill; the colonel, however, took no heed of the matter until all
the movements were at an end, and the skirmishers recalled to their
places in the ranks; he then commanded the regiment to "sit at ease,"
and the excited waggoner was permitted to explain what had occurred.

He said that one of his horses "there lying dead yonder" had been shot
"clean through the head."  The adjutant rode up to the mill, and found
that a _bullet_ had entered the horse's head just under the eye.  Now,
we had never had an officer in the regiment that was decidedly
unpopular, and, it was _thought_, never a man that would be coward
enough to adopt this manner of retaliation or revenge for any grievance
he might be labouring under.  The ball that killed the horse _might_
have been intended for the breast of a commissioned or a
non-commissioned officer, but the impression was decidedly to the
contrary--that it was the result of some accident or carelessness which
could be explained.  Nevertheless, it was necessary that a searching
investigation should take place, and, whether through design or
carelessness, any man had left a ball-cartridge in his pouch, he would
most assuredly be punished.  Not one of us could be pronounced free from
suspicion, for in the hurry of preparing for a field-day, any soldier
(as these matters were then conducted) might have left one or more
ball-cartridges in his pouch.  The whole regiment was called to
"attention," and we were ordered to divest ourselves of the pouches and
belts, and throw them on the ground in front of our horses; the
squad-sergeants dismounted and made a strict examination of the
remaining rounds of ammunition, but not one round of ball was
discovered, and every man had his proper number of blank.
Notwithstanding this, however, the same uncertainty existed as to which
of us had discharged the round of ball that killed the horse, and a
number of non-commissioned officers were told off to proceed at once to
barracks to examine and count the ammunition left there.  It seemed an
age, though little more than an hour, till they returned.

At last a cloud of dust was seen along the lane that led from the
barracks to the heath, and in a few minutes the messengers halted in
front of the regiment: every man's heart beat--at least, I know that
mine did--as one of them delivered his report in an under-tone to the
colonel.  The adjutant ran his eye along the line until it rested on Bob
Norris, one of the best, the steadiest, and most harmless men in the
corps, who had borne an irreproachable character ever since he had
enlisted.  He was ordered to the front, and commanded by the adjutant (a
man who had risen from the ranks), in a fierce tone and manner, to
account for one of his ten rounds of ball-ammunition found to be
missing, while one round of blank was found on the floor of the
barrack-room close to his bed.  Poor fellow, it was evident that he
could not explain; indeed, he could not speak; all who knew the man's
disposition thoroughly, knew also that he must have made a mistake in
the exchange of the ammunition.  What so easy and so probable?  Other
matters of far less importance in the internal arrangement of a regiment
were scrupulously observed with a fuss and a bother that was positively
sickening to any man of sound common sense: why not have a box with a
lock and key in every room, and let the troop-sergeants collect every
round of ball-ammunition, and place them in this box prior to issuing
the blank for field-firing?

Poor Bob Norris was divested of his arms, and marched off between two of
his comrades, a prisoner to barracks.  The case was investigated in due
course; the owner of the horse was paid for his loss by the Government--
60 pounds; and Bob got twenty-one days' kit drill.  This was said by
some non-commissioned officers to be a lenient sentence, in consequence
of his previous good character and the commanding officer taking a
merciful view of his case.  The ball, he said, "might have been intended
for one of the superior officers or it might not," he was willing to
take the latter view of the case and give the prisoner the benefit.  As
a punishment for carelessness, however, the prisoner would, in addition
to the drill, be kept on the stoppages as long as he remained in the
regiment, and in the event of his requiring to purchase his discharge,
he would not be allowed to do so unless the whole of the money advanced
by Government to recompense the man for the loss of the horse was
refunded.

Thus Bob was placed in a most unfortunate and pitiable position,
positively _nailed to the service_ for sixteen more years, without ever
being allowed to draw a farthing of pay in money, and although he was as
good as gold, and true to his colours as steel, he could not "put up"
with such hardships as these: he had, he said, enlisted solely because
"he thought he should like a soldier's life, and had made up his mind to
deserve, and, if possible, to attain promotion."  This stroke of pure
misfortune had completely crushed all his hopes, he became sullen and
morose, and after wearily plodding in the barrack-yard with the heavy
burden of his kit (about 60 pounds weight) on his back for four hours
during each of six days, he dashed the pack from his back with a heavy
thud on the floor of the barrack-room.  The expression of his fine open
countenance plainly betokened that "something was brewing in Bob's
mind," as old Jem Page remarked while burnishing his spurs.  When the
reveille sounded the next morning at five o'clock, Bob Norris's bed was
empty: he had quitted it and scaled the barrack-wall during the night,
and was heard of no more as a soldier in our regiment.

Now if drunkenness had been the primary cause of this dangerous mistake,
few men in the regiment would have been sorry for Bob Norris; but he was
a _steady, good motif_ and it was generally thought that he had been
most cruelly used; for be it remembered, that notwithstanding he had
deserted and so got rid of his troubles, yet he never could be a happy
man.  A deserter is always in fear of being retaken, and with good
reason, for let him be disguised as he may, one soldier can always
detect another.  Many, very many men who desert give themselves up again
solely because they cannot bear the misery consequent on the constant
fear of being retaken; and a more lenient punishment is administered to
a man who voluntarily surrenders, than if he had given much trouble in
his capture.  A deserter can be taken and placed in any gaol in Her
Majesty's dominions, when the police or military authorities forward the
report of his capture to his regiment, if they know it; if not, they
publish his description in the _Hue and Cry_.

CHAPTER TEN.

  Though we march, or though we halt,
  Or though the enemy we assault;
  Though we're cold, or though we're warm,
  Or though the sleeping town we storm,
  Still the merry, merry fife and drum
  Bid intruding care be dumb;
  Sprightly still we sing and play,
  And make dull life a holiday.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

I was once taken prisoner myself on suspicion of being a deserter, being
on a two months' furlough.  I was visiting a married sister resident in
a village near Derby, and I frequently wore a suit of her husband's
clothes to save my regimentals.  This is very often done by soldiers on
furlough.  Walking up the corn-market one day, I was tapped on the
shoulder by a recruiting sergeant from the 33rd Regiment.

"Have you got a pass?" said he.

"Yes; I have a two months' furlough."

"Show it," said he.

"It is at Mugginton," said I.

"Yes, or somewhere else," said he; "therefore you had better come along
with me to the police-station."

It was market-day, and a crowd soon collected.  Two policemen came up,
and in spite of my asseverations that I had left my furlough in the
pocket of my regimentals at my sister's house, I was marched off a
prisoner to the lock-up; but I was allowed to send a note to my sister,
and she soon made her appearance in a gig, with all my regimentals and
furlough.  This satisfied the superintendent, and he set me at liberty.

Every soldier is, on all occasions (except when a reduction of the army
takes place, which is very seldom), invested with power to enlist
recruits.  In time of peace, however, recruiting is not carried on in
the cavalry to the same extent as in the infantry; the latter being so
much more numerous than the former, and available for service in every
part of the British possessions, where fever and change of climate often
leave a larger vacancy than death in battle from the weapons of a living
enemy.  Many recruits enlist in foot regiments, because there are
generally recruiting parties in every market-town, which is more
convenient for a poor, destitute lad, who is too often compelled to
enlist because he has neither money nor food.  The presence of a dragoon
or a hussar in full regimentals is more of a rarity everywhere than a
foot soldier.  I was anything but pleased with the "starchy" old
sergeant who had interfered with my freedom, and, by way of retaliation,
I was determined to enlist some likely-looking young fellows, who stood
idling around the door of the "Cross Keys," in the market-place--the
recruiting rendezvous,--and who, it afterwards appeared, had made up
their minds to enlist in the 33rd Regiment.

Going to the inn where my sister had put up the horse and gig, I rigged
myself out in a manner that would have passed muster for a parade before
royalty.  We were not allowed to take the two jackets (pelisse and dress
jacket as well) with us on furlough; but, being the winter season, I
wore only the scarlet pelisse, with its many rows of lace and more than
a hundred buttons in front, fantastically trimmed with yellow braid
behind, with fur collars, cuffs, and waistband, when I left barracks.
But I had managed to get hold of a nice dress jacket, which, though cast
into store, was in very good condition, from the quartermaster-sergeant.
This I put on, and slinging the gorgeously trimmed scarlet pelisse
loose over my left shoulder, as in full dress, I sallied out with my
high-crowned, bell-topped shako, and black horse-hair plume, into the
streets, and strutted proudly up to the "Cross Keys."  There I was soon
surrounded by a crowd of growing lads likely to make hussars.  The
crusty old sergeant and his minions looked daggers at me; for, after
all, it is the dress of a soldier that allures many of the recruits from
their homes into the service, and it was easy to be seen that they
fancied my dashing uniform much more than the ruddle-coloured,
beer-stained coatees and shovel-shaped shakos of the foot soldiers.

I called for "a gallon of ale," and asked each of the people in the
room, including the infantry soldiers, to drink.

Now I had fully made up my mind long before this occurrence not to
enlist a recruit, if I could possibly avoid it; and, although I had
entered the public-house in defiance of this resolution solely to
retaliate upon the recruiting-sergeant for his giving me into custody, I
reflected upon the misery I might entail upon the mothers, fathers,
brothers, sisters, and friends of these poor deluded lads, several of
whom looked like the younger sons of farmers; and although I was
constantly importuned to enlist them, I refused, and soon after left
them a prey to the infantry-sergeant, who, I have no doubt, got them
into the meshes of his net before the day was over.

It is often a source of comfort to me to reflect that I never enlisted a
recruit in my life; and I thank goodness that I was never sent on the
recruiting service, for, although I pretend to be not a whit better than
the majority of my comrades in point of morality, I had a particular
aversion to inveigle a youth from his home and friends, perhaps for
ever, by means of the gross deception and paltry untruths so often
practised by recruiting parties both in cavalry and infantry regiments.

While on this furlough I of course visited my home; but although my
mother, sisters, and brothers received me joyfully, and treated me with
great kindness, my father positively refused to see or speak to me, and
even said that he would "horsewhip me whenever he could get a sight of
me;" so, after remaining cooped up in a bedroom for a couple of days, I
returned to my kind sister at Mugginton, and shortly after left for my
regiment, where, in the spirit-stirring incidents constantly occurring,
I soon got over the unpleasant feeling always engendered in the mind of
a soldier by the visit to, and leave-taking of, his relatives and
friends in his native village.  That little word "good-bye" leaves a
very unpleasant sensation after shaking hands and kissing a kind and
indulgent mother, whose heart is well-nigh broken through her son
leaving her, perhaps for ever, to follow the fortunes of war.  My mother
said she never went to bed but she prayed for me, and she never awoke in
the night but her "soldier-son" was uppermost in her mind.  She is dead
now, and I often think that my leaving home to become a soldier might
have hastened her end, for she died at the age of sixty-five.  But after
all comes the balm to my qualms of conscience for any breach of duty I
may have been guilty of to my parents,--I have still done my duty to my
country.

Besides these furloughs granted to well-conducted soldiers, they are
frequently indulged with a few hours or days' "passes" to spend with any
friends they may have in the vicinity of the barracks.  A soldier may be
invited to an evening party, or he may wish to spend a few extra hours
with a sweet heart, go to church or chapel with her, or, more
frequently, take her to a theatre, the admittance to which she generally
pays out of her own pocket-money.  These "passes" may be obtained by a
good soldier about once a week, so that in place of having to be in
barracks by nine o'clock, he may, when furnished with a "pass," signed
by the captain of his troop, prolong his stay until any hour that may be
convenient to him to return; but the time is generally limited to
twelve, one, two, or three o'clock, so as to allow him to have a little
sleep before the reveille sounds, at five o'clock in summer and six in
winter.  Some of these "late" soldiers are fond of playing practical
jokes upon their comrades, who are generally sound asleep when they
return from these passes, and enter the barrack-rooms in the dark, for
lights are not allowed to be struck on any pretence whatever.

We had a very good-tempered, rollicking young Irishman in our room named
Larry Byrne, who often went on pass to meet his sweetheart Nannie
McCarthy, who was cook at a gentleman's house about two miles from
barracks.  Larry generally came to barracks in high spirits; and he
would either disturb every man in the room and keep them awake by a
recital of his "divarshuns" with Nannie and the rest of his friends, or
quietly play off some practical joke invented before he entered the
room.

He had returned from his "coorting" one morning about two o'clock--it
was a beautiful bright moonlight morning, and I happened to be awake and
could see Larry's every movement--when he softly entered the room.  He
was evidently bent on having a lark.  Pulling out of his pocket a ball
of twine, and after undressing himself, he walked stealthily up to the
foot of old Sam Whelan's bed (a man with none the best of tempers, even
when he ought to have been pleased); turning up the clothes, so as to
bare old Sam's feet, he tied one end of the twine round the joint of his
big toe, and then, replacing the bed-clothes, got into his own bed at
the farther end of the room with one end of the string in his hand.
There were eight of us in the room, and it afterwards appeared that,
although not a word had been spoken, there were more watching the
movements of Larry than myself.  All was still for a few moments.  I
could distinctly see, in the moonlight that bore full upon Larry's bed
near the window, his white teeth grinning underneath his jet-black
moustache as he bobbed up his curly head and jerked the string; but
there was no response.  A suppressed titter from some one reached
Larry's ears.  "Whist! whist! ye omedhaun!" said he, in a low whisper;
and then, with twofold vigour, he jerked at the line again.  "Whah!"
sang out old Sam, in a strange, unearthly yell, as he sat bolt upright
in bed and peered anxiously around the room.  All was, however, as still
as the grave; and, thinking it must have been a dream, he lay down
again.  By his snoring, Larry could tell he was asleep, and that he had
not detected the string round his toe.  Seizing the end of the string
again, which he had dropped at his bedside to slacken the tension on the
toe, Larry gave it another regular "twinger."

"Whah! whah! whah!  Murther!  Boys, did ye's see anything in the room?"
Larry and I burst out laughing, the rest of the men were awoke by the
row; old Sam found the string tied to his toe, and, accusing Larry of
the trick, jumped out of bed, seized his sword, and I believe would have
killed Larry had not the latter, knowing the customer he had to deal
with, jumped out of bed, drawn his own sword from the scabbard, and
taken up his position on the defensive, until old Sam could be pacified.

We had a great number of Irishmen in our regiment--brave as lions in
action, at all times clever and smart in the performance of their duty,
and as merry as crickets in the barrack-room or on the line of march;
but some of them, enlisted from the remote country districts, very
superstitious and firm believers in ghosts.

A tale is handed down from regiment to regiment to the effect that the
ghost of a soldier once flogged to death in Hounslow Riding-school
haunts the place every night.  I have been on sentry on what is called
the "Hospital Post," near to the riding-school, very many times, but I
never saw or heard anything of the ghost.

One man I knew, who had been tolerably well educated, and who, I
consider, was by no means short of common intelligence, frequently
declared to me that he has, while on guard on this particular post,
heard noises in the riding-school just after the clock over the front of
the officers' quarters had struck twelve, as though a ride of twenty or
more soldiers were in the school.  He asserted that he heard the regular
beat of the horses' hoofs on the floor, the tinkling of the scabbards on
the stirrup-irons, and the shouts of the rough-riders.  This was
supposed to arise from the ghost of a man who had been killed some years
previously by a horse rearing and falling backwards upon him.  At other
times, both he and many others would say, when they were relieved from
the post and afterwards sat round the guard-room fire, that they had
plainly heard the shrieks of the man's ghost who was flogged to death.

One of our men, who had been little more than a year in the regiment,
having been sent by our Irish recruiting party from the county Mayo, and
rejoicing in the rather funny name of Barney Mulgruddery, created quite
a sensation in the regiment by the apparent sincerity with which he
related an interview with one of these ghosts or some other spectra.

"Shure," said he, "I seen a mighty quare thing coming towards me between
the sintry-box and the hospital; it was all surrounded wid blue lights,
and was like a big dog with a man's head.  Nearer and nearer it came.
`Faix,' thought I to myself, `Barney, me hold fellow, I wish you were
again cutting turf in the bog.'  Well, me jewels, it seemed to grow
bigger and bigger until it was as big as me mother's peat-stack, and
more betoken it had horns too.  I tried to spake for to challenge, as
was me duty, boys; but oh, Meila Murther!  I'd lost the power of spache.
Well, me jewels, it came nearer and nearer, until at last it stood
quite convanient to the sintry-box.  `Bad scan to your impudence!' sis I
(my spache returning all at oncst), `is it clane off me post you want
for to dhrive me, and desthroy me karacther for ever?'  `Hould yer
whist; go along out of that, and show me the back ov yer stockings,
Barney Mulgruddery,' sis the ghost, in a tunderhin' passion.  `Not a
step I'll take for any ov the likes ov ye.  Shure I was placed here by
me supariors, and I've as good a right to be here as you.'  `Be gorra!
if yer not off out of this like a shot, you great nagur, I'll desthroy
your body and soul for ever,' sis the ghost.  `Why you murtherin'
villain! shure you wouldn't be afther killing me?' sis I, keeping me
finger on the trigger of me carbine; for you see, boys, I was not going
to be dhruv off me post widout a struggle.  Oh, blue nagurs! he kem wid
a rush right forenenst me.  I backed a few paces.  `Barney Mulgruddery,
attention!' sis I to meself, aloud; `make ready! prisint!' and I brought
me carbine up to me shoulder.  `Hould yer hand, Barney Mulgruddery,' sis
the ghost, beginning to get smaller and smaller every moment, and
lookin' me sthraight in the face all the while, as impidint as a
tinker's dog.  But, me jewels, it wasn't long before the ghost was
thransmuggrified into as nice a young lady as ever the moon shone on.
`Barney, me bold sodger,' sis she, `you're the bravest man I ever seen
on sintry here.  Shure,' sis she, `Barney Mulgruddery, you're a credit
to ould Ireland, and you're sure to be a giniral;' and wid that she
vanished.  Och! it's _she_ was the Colleen Dhas.  It was right good for
sore eyes to look on her, the darlint.  It may be a quare notion, but
I'm thinking she took it into her head to fall in love wid me.  At any
rate, shure, she gev me the encouragement and the swate look, as if she
was sthruck wid me appearance."

This extraordinary story proved too clearly that Barney had either
invented it from beginning to end; or, what was perhaps as bad, he had
been sleeping and dreaming at his post.

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

  Which of their weapons hath the conquest got
  Over their wits; the pipe or else the pot?
  For even the derivation of the name
  Seems to allude and to include the same:
  Tobacco as "to Bakcho", one would say;
  To cup-god Bacchus dedicated ay.

  [This includes a joke in Greek script, not a very clever one.]

------------------------------------------------------------------------

A few days after this occurrence, Terence Daly, more familiarly called
"Terry," a comrade quartered in the same room as myself, returned from
Ireland, whence he had been on furlough, and brought with him a large
bladder full of whisky.  Now there were few, if any, of us ever
calculated the effect of this ardent spirit so pure and so strong as
Terry had brought it.

"Boys," said he, as he tumbled the bladder from his valise on to the
floor, "this is the raal dhrop of Irish eye-water--not Jamieson's
eye-water, but a betther soort, by rason of its being distilled in the
Bog of Allan, and never paid a farden of duty."

I had never before taken liquor of any description to such an extent as
to make me intoxicated--in fact, I had fully made up my mind to avoid
intemperance (the greatest curse of all, to both soldiers and
civilians); but Terry, with the proverbial good nature of his race,
insisted that I should have "one glass," as all the rest of the men in
the room.  Some, unfortunately, were not content with one, two, or three
glasses.

We were ordered for a "parade under arms" that afternoon, at three
o'clock, and it was dinner-time when Terry produced the whisky.  Now, a
parade under arms, on foot, requires an uncommon degree of steadiness
and precision.  We were all steady enough until required to "form" and
"dress" in troops before taking our place in the ranks with the main
body of the regiment, but it was then discovered that the men who had
partaken of the "eye-water," including myself, could scarcely stand at
all, let alone stand or march steady.  It is a most serious crime in the
army to be "_drunk_ for duty;" indeed, a man who has been four times
convicted of this crime is "drummed out of the regiment" (a process I
shall describe in a future chapter).  The result was that we were all
confined in the guard-room until the following day, when we were
escorted before the colonel.

Each was taken into the office and interrogated separately, and we told
the truth, namely, that we had "no idea the whisky would have such an
effect."  We were then all taken in together, and received a severe
reprimand from the colonel, who ordered us to be "confined to barracks"
for fourteen days.  Terry, whose furlough did not expire until the
evening of the day he returned, did not go to parade, and so he escaped.

Being simply "confined to barracks" is not considered a very severe
punishment, as the soldier is only prohibited from passing out of the
barrack-gate (except he be on duty), and not subjected to any other
punishment.  All soldiers undergoing punishment are "confined to
barracks" in addition to such punishment, whatever it may be, and are
termed "defaulters," a list being kept in the guard-room, pasted on a
board, so that the corporal of the guard, who is supposed to be in or
about the door of the guard-room day and night, can always ascertain
when a soldier presents himself to "pass out" whether he be a
"defaulter" or not.  It is the duty of the sentry at the front gate to
prevent any soldier passing through until the corporal of the guard has
first inspected him, in order to see, in the first place, that he is
properly dressed for walking out in town, namely, that he is clean in
his person and attire, has on a pair of white leather gloves,
well-polished boots, and bright spurs, a whip or cane in his hand, and
his cap "cocked" in that jaunty style that gives him an appearance of
smartness, and a proper display of personal pride, without "puppyism."
This inspection, though always performed, is very seldom necessary, as
the soldier generally possesses a sufficiency of native pride to dress
himself so as to _fancy_ he is a regular "swell."  Most young men,
whether soldiers or civilians, are imbued with a certain amount of
personal vanity; in some instances this amounts to gross foppishness;
therefore the cavalry soldier may readily be excused for any display
that may appear superfluous in the eyes of a civilian; for although he
has few, if any, worldly possessions, and seldom more than a day's pay
in his pocket, yet he is for the most part in the enjoyment of rosy
health and a sound constitution.  Being subjected on his enlistment to
the most skilful surgical examination, in order to ascertain if he be
free from every taint of constitutional disease, and that all his limbs
and the various organs of his body are perfect, he is more excusable for
"showing off" his figure to the best than others, the nature of whose
business directs their ideas into a more profitable channel.

Some of the "swells" in a cavalry regiment are more primitive in their
style and manner of performing their toilets than their brother "swells"
in civil life.  The military "swell" is always his own valet and groom,
and sometimes his own washerwoman.  Rimmel's perfumes, Rowlands'
Macassar and Odonto, and the rest of the toilet paraphernalia that forms
a very considerable portion of the travelling luggage of a civilian
"swell," are all dispensed with in barrack or camp life.  When the
soldier "swell" prepares for parade or a "show off" in town, he first
gives his clothes a thorough brushing, then he "chrome-yellows" the
braid of his jacket and the stripes of his trousers, or applies some
other "reviver" to correspond with the colour of the "facings" of his
uniform, cleans his buttons, spurs, boots, and pipe-clays his gloves; he
then whistles a tune, or sings a scrap of a song, as he sallies down to
the stable with his towel and a piece of common soap, and drawing a
bucket of water at the pump, he gives himself a thorough washing, often
from head to foot, a spare stall in the stable being his bath-room; the
rest of his toilet is performed in the barrack-room.  If he wears only a
moustache, and no beard on his chin, the latter part of his face must of
course be frequently shaven, so as always to appear clean and
respectable; for this purpose there is sometimes a "looking-glass,"
about eight inches long and six inches wide, placed in some conspicuous
part of the room for general use, but more frequently a fragment of a
broken mirror about the size of a man's hand, and mostly a
three-cornered, or some other "cornered" shape, is all the toilet-glass
used or required for the dressing and shaving of eight men.  The
"swells" will sometimes indulge in tooth-powder, and a species of
villainous scented oil purchased at the canteen, but the majority, if
they use oil or tooth-powder at all, will be content with _powdered
Bath-brick_, a coarse but most effective tooth-powder; and the oil used
for cleaning bits, stirrups, swords, and the like, is substituted for
"Macassar," to make the hair glossy.  The "swells" will generally sport
a riding _whip_ during their walks in town, and those of their comrades
who are not so fortunate as to possess one of their own will sometimes
borrow these whips without leave, and then there is a "row in the
island."  Many of these so-called "swells" have been well educated, and
are well connected in civil life, and agreeable, nice fellows they are
too; others are arrogant, conceited, and ignorant; these are termed
"jumped-up swells-out-of-luck," and are often told by the old soldiers
that they are "better off in the army than any of their friends at
home."  The idea that one man is better than another as a private
soldier cannot be entertained, because it is considered that if the one
who fancies himself superior to his comrades could by any means raise
the money, he would purchase his discharge.  The fashion of dyeing the
moustachios, whiskers, and beard black, is quite a process, during which
the barrack-room presents the appearance of a chemical laboratory.  This
toilet operation is performed just before bed-time.  Procuring some
litharge from the chemist's and quicklime from a bricklayer, they mix
these two powders together with salad-oil into a paste, and plaster it
over every particle of the hair intended to be dyed; sometimes the hair
on the head is treated to the process.  Over this mixture they place a
dock or cabbage leaf, and tie over the whole a bandage to keep the paste
in its place, and then retire to rest, presenting, as they lie in bed,
much the appearance of an Egyptian mummy about the head.  If more than a
proportionate quantity of quicklime be used, it will burn the skin;
still, a necessary quantity should be added, as it is the principal
acting ingredient, the oil and litharge only being added to counteract
the burning effect the lime would otherwise have on the skin.  When they
rise in the morning and take off the bandages, the paste is perfectly
dry and crumbles off the hair like dust; the hair is then washed and
oiled, after which it presents a beautiful black and glossy appearance,
which retains its colour for three or four weeks, and never stains the
skin.  As respects myself, I am gifted with a very fair crop of
dark-brown hair, and, save when my moustachios were just beginning to
bud, and I used the old toothbrush and india-ink given to me by my
sweetheart "Dorcas" to make me appear more "manly," and which dyed more
of the skin than the hair, I have always been content with the colour
given it by Nature.

There was little to "dress up" and walk out for in the neighbourhood of
Hounslow, the barracks being a long way from the town, and the town
itself small, dull, and uninteresting to soldiers of the "dandy school,"
whose main object is to "show off," as they fancy that every female they
may meet will be in love with them.

Notwithstanding that the regiment was divided into four detachments,
while the head-quarters was stationed here, we had in the winter season
some "idle time" on our hands; and with the proverbial thoughtlessness
and improvidence of soldiers generally, we sometimes spent it foolishly
enough.  Remaining in barracks for a week or more, and "saving up" our
superfluous pay, we then used to sally out in parties of about a dozen
each, to have what we called a "spree."

About half a mile from barracks, on the road to the town, there was a
public-house, the sign of "The Cricketers," if I remember right.  This
house was frequented by many country people, such as waggoners,
market-gardeners, and others, who called to "bait" and refresh
themselves.  With these people we used to fraternise, and have some fun,
at times.  I remember one cold, frosty day about Christmastime, about
half a dozen of us went to this house for the purpose of having some
"mulled ale," commonly called "egg-flip," from its being made of eggs,
ale, nutmeg, ginger, etc.  When we walked into the room, there was a
very large company of the class I have named above assembled.  A
smoking-match had just been made between two Berkshire waggoners, as to
which could smoke four ounces of tobacco in the east time for a wager of
half-a-crown each.  Nothing was said about the kind of pipes to be used
by either party.

The tobacco and two short clay-pipes were placed on the table, and one
of the competitors, called Sam by his friends, at once commenced smoking
and puffing away at a great rate; the other, whose name was Dick, looked
calmly on, while his tobacco and pipe lay on the table untouched.

"Go on, lad; I shall overtake thee presently," said he.

Sam puffed away, emptied the ashes out of his pipe, and filled it again.
Dick now made a move, walking into the kitchen.  He soon returned with
an old teapot.

"This is _my_ pipe," said he, placing it on the table, and putting the
tobacco, paper, and all into the teapot, and then seizing the tongs, he
selected a red-hot cinder from the fire, placing it on the tobacco, and
then applying his capacious mouth to the spout, he sent forth a perfect
volcano.  This was _smoking_ with a vengeance; we were obliged to open
the door and windows, or we should have been partially suffocated.  In
vain Sam rammed the weed into the small bowl of his pipe and smoked away
with all his might.  A very short time sufficed to settle the business,
and Dick, with his novel pipe, was declared the winner of the five
shillings and the price of the tobacco.  But Sam objected to pay: he had
been _outwitted_, not _outsmoked_.  There was a violent altercation,
and, finally, the "sodgers" were requested to settle the dispute, which
they did by calling upon each person to pay for his own tobacco, and
smoke the wager over again at some future period.

While this uproarious scene was going on, I noticed, sitting in rather a
dark corner of the room, an individual who was evidently not of the same
class as the rest of the party, yet he appeared to be quite at home in
their company, as they called him "Doctor."  He was a tall,
miserable-looking specimen of human kind, attired in a rusty black
surtout coat, buttoned close up to the throat, as if to conceal the
disagreeable fact of his having no shirt on; his trousers, of the same
material as his coat, were greasy and threadbare, and ragged at the
bottoms; his boots were out at the toes: still he appeared cheerful and
happy under the circumstances, and even cracked a joke now and then with
the "Johnny Whopstraws," who sat near him, one of whom, referring to the
dilapidated shoes, asked him if they did not "let the wet in sometimes."
"What of that? they let it out again," said he.  Next to the "Doctor,"
on a sort of wooden-seated sofa, sat another individual, well known in
barracks as "Soapy," who existed chiefly by collecting horse-droppings,
and assisting the forage-carters to unload hay and straw.

"Soapy" was eating something that he appeared anxious to conceal, and,
by the manner he put his hand up to his mouth, I suspected it to be
horse-beans.  He appeared confused whenever his gaze met mine, and
therefore was not a little relieved when the party got up to dance to a
tune that a merry little journeyman shoemaker was whistling and drumming
on the table with his knuckles.

A rough-looking fellow took hold of the "Doctor."

"Come, Doctor," said he, "you must stir your old stumps."

"Now, Soapy," said another; and in a moment "Soapy" and the "Doctor"
were hustled round and round; we preferred to sit still and witness the
fun, otherwise our spurs would have left their marks on the shins of the
clodhoppers.  Tired of dancing, they began to push one another about.
One man had his face blackened, but he was evidently unaware of it; some
one pushed this man against the "Doctor," and they both fell on the
saw-dusted floor together; "Soapy" was pushed on the top of them, Dick
and Sam, the rival smokers, being topmost of all.  "Murder!" shouted the
"Doctor;" the landlord came, and peace was soon restored.

After this row I noticed a lot of little round objects strewed all over
the floor, which on examination proved to be empty pill-boxes.  The
mystery was now unravelled: the "Doctor" was a travelling quack, and
"Soapy" had been eating his pills, to which he had helped himself from
the "Doctor's" pockets.  When asked how he liked the pills, he said they
were "very good," and he thought they were "only comfits" (a mixture of
flour and sugar).  He had abstracted and actually eaten the contents of
seventeen boxes, enough to "kill six horses," as the "Doctor" said, by
reason of their powerful purgative properties.  He felt "Soapy's" pulse,
and talked of the stomach-pump, which did not in the least alarm the
half-wit, who declared that he "could eat a wheelbarrow full of them."

"Well," said the Doctor, "I would not be in your place for all the
world."

We remained over an hour after this, during which no change took place
in "Soapy's" ordinary health, and meeting him in barracks about ten days
after, I asked him whether the pills had made him ill.  He replied, "No,
not yet, but I expect they will do so, before long."

CHAPTER TWELVE.

  _Cassio_.--I will rather sue to be despised than to deceive so good a
  commander, with so slight, so drunken, and so indiscreet an officer.
  Drunk? and speak parrot? and squabble? swagger? swear and discourse
  fustian with one's own shadow?--O, thou invisible spirit of wine, if
  thou hast no name to be known by, let us call thee--devil!

  Shakespeare.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Our visits to public-houses during the winter months must not be
accepted as a sign that we were loose and careless as to our morals, as
we frequently attended church or chapel on such evenings as we could, in
our turns, procure leave from stables, and such of the inhabitants as
were attendants at these places of worship gave us every encouragement
to come more frequently by opening their seat doors, and beckoning us to
sit beside them.  We had a library, too (as provided in every barracks),
for our especial use, in which there was no lack of entertaining and
useful books.

There can be no question that the morals, general conduct, intelligence,
and appearance of a youth are very much improved by enlistment.  I know
that one section, at least, of the public hold a contrary opinion.  I
have, however, carefully observed the habits of men, who in civil life
would have degenerated into drunken reprobates, and contrasted them with
the class from whence they have been enlisted, when the balance is found
immeasurably superior to their companions who prefer to remain
civilians.  The general public imagine, that because a youth is a
"worthless fellow," or a "lazy, drunken blackguard," before he is
enlisted, that he must for ever remain so; and that, therefore, he is a
fair sample of soldiers generally.  Nothing can be more erroneous than
this idea.  A youth who has given himself up to habits of idleness, and,
perhaps, drunkenness in civil life, must reform when he becomes a
British soldier.  He finds a master in the army, if he never had one
before; his whole habits are soon changed, and his general demeanour and
bearing are, in the course of a few days, seen to be such as to
distinguish the effects of order and discipline from the habits and
manners of an untrained rustic, or a village vagabond.  It is imperative
that not only the dress and appearance but the conduct of the soldier
should be such as to create in the minds of all civilians, as well as
the soldier himself, a respect for the military service; and though, in
a few instances, cases do occur where soldiers grossly misconduct
themselves, yet they are at all times most strictly enjoined to avoid
being mixed in broils or disturbances, or in meetings where party or
political subjects may be agitated, or where intemperance may produce
argument and discussion, which lead to no useful result, but too
frequently end in breaches of the public peace.

I have before remarked that drunkenness is the source of almost every
evil that can befall the soldier; and, although he is allowed to
purchase liquor to any extent that his means allow, and his inclination
may prompt him, yet he is so well aware of the severe penalty that any
undue indulgence in liquor will entail upon him, that a confirmed
drunkard is more rarely to be met with in a regiment than is generally
supposed.  Solitary confinement, or confinement in the "black hole," are
at all times reserved for cases of drunkenness; not violence or
insolence to superiors.  The penalty awarded by the articles of war for
"habitual drunkenness" is discharge from the service with ignominy.
Thus the Government prove beyond a doubt, that habitual drunkenness
cannot be tolerated in the army with the same degree that we all know it
to exist in civil life.

When orders have been given, as the result of a court-martial, for
discharging a soldier with ignominy, commonly called "drumming him out
of the regiment," the whole corps is assembled and formed in double
rank, facing inwards (towards each other), one flank of each rank
reaching close up to each side of the front gate, which is generally
besieged by a mob of people (the fact being previously known in the
neighbourhood of the barracks that a man is to be "drummed out"); thus a
sort of lane is formed for the culprit to walk through, so that every
soldier can see him.  He is then escorted by an armed party from the
guard-room; the several crimes and irregularities of which he has been
guilty are read over, as also the sentence of the court-martial for his
dismissal from the service; together with his discharge, in which is
noticed his disgraceful conduct.  The buttons, facings, lace, etc, are
then stripped from his clothing, his discharge is handed to him, and he
is then marched down the ranks, with the drummer behind him, to the
front gate, which is closed behind him for ever; and he is launched upon
society a ruined, disgraced, and broken-down individual.  Soldiers
serving abroad, who have been sentenced to be discharged with disgrace,
are not finally discharged until they reach the depot of their regiment
at home; but they are sent home as prisoners (though not kept in
confinement on the passage) for the purpose of being finally discharged,
in the manner above alluded to, in a few days after their arrival.

Corporal punishment is but seldom inflicted now; indeed, I never saw but
one man flogged, and that was for knocking down a sergeant: he had only
fifty lashes, and bore it without flinching.  We had three men in our
regiment who had received two hundred lashes each, for being drunk on
guard at a post requiring great vigilance; their backs were frightfully
scored with blue ridges, or "wheals," from the neck to the bottom of the
waist.  They each said that they scarcely felt the pain of infliction
after the first fifty lashes; but the greatest agony of all was the
application of a lotion after being taken to hospital.  They were good
soldiers; and, contrary to the general impression, that flogging has the
effect of "debasing the mind of a soldier," they seemed to think that
they deserved it, because they knew how to avoid it.

Generally speaking, soldiers would rather be flogged than handed over to
the civil power, and imprisoned in a common gaol, or sentenced to a long
term of "kit drill" in hot weather--the latter punishment blistering the
feet, and causing as much pain as the lash on the bare back, and it has
to be endured so much longer.

Flogging is, however, after all, a most unfair and degrading punishment
to a man who may at any time be called upon to lay down his life in the
defence of his country.  Sentences of corporal punishment are inflicted
in the riding-school, and always at head-quarters.  A triangular-shaped
frame of timber is placed against the wall; the whole regiment is then
assembled under arms, and with drawn swords; the culprit is brought from
the guard-room, handcuffed, into the hollow square formed by his
comrades; the colonel reads the particulars of his crime and sentence;
he is then conducted to the triangle, and divested of his jacket and
shirt; his hands are tied to the apex and his feet to the base of the
triangle; the surgeon takes his stand, as also the colonel, adjutant,
and other officers.  The instrument of torture (cat-o'-nine-tails--a
whip with nine lashes, made of catgut) is produced by the farrier-major,
under whom are the requisite number of troop-farriers to inflict the
punishment, so many lashes each.  The culprit is considered as having
expiated his offence when he shall have undergone, _at one time_, as
much of the punishment as, in the opinion of the surgeon, he is able to
bear.  The idea, often promulgated by the newspapers, that a soldier who
has been flogged until ordered by the surgeon to be taken down, because
of his physical inability to undergo the punishment the first time, is
again brought out to undergo the remainder of his punishment, is not
correct.  The infliction of corporal punishment a second time, under one
and the same sentence, was never resorted to in the British army.

The punishment of marking a deserter with the letter D is inflicted on
the parade-ground in presence of the whole regiment, and under the
personal superintendence of the surgeon.  The operation is performed
with an instrument made for the purpose, and the punishment is inflicted
in the cavalry by the trumpet-major, a person who is responsible for the
observance of discipline and duty of the troop-trumpeters, and in the
infantry by the drum-major or bugle-major, and these are first
instructed by the surgeon how to apply the instrument or ingredient
(generally gunpowder or ink) properly and effectually.

Flogging is the penalty of the following offences only:

First.--Mutiny, insubordination, violence, or offering violence to
superior officers.

Second.--Drunkenness on duty.

Third.--Sale of, or making away with arms, ammunition, accoutrements,
clothing, or necessaries, stealing from comrades, or other disgraceful
conduct.

In former times, desertion was included in the above crimes, but
imprisonment, and the degradation of being branded for life with the
letter D, is considered a sufficient punishment.

In cases where non-commissioned officers misconduct themselves, they are
not confined in the guard-room, but considered as placed under arrest in
their own room, without a guard over them.  In serious cases, where it
is necessary to hold a court-martial over them, and the offence is
established, they are generally sentenced to be reduced to the rank and
pay of a private, being stripped of their stripes in the presence of a
parade of the whole regiment.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

  Reputation, reputation, reputation!  O, I have lost my reputation!  I
  have lost the immortal part, sir, of myself, and what remains is
  bestial.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The sergeant; to whom I alluded in a former chapter as having deserted
from Liverpool, where he was stationed in command of a recruiting party,
was the first non-commissioned officer that ever I witnessed "broke" and
reduced to the ranks.  It was two years after the corporal with whom he
deserted gave himself up, and the regiment was then stationed at York.
The sergeant had been to the "gold diggings" in California, or part way
there; but, after a great deal of privation and suffering, he resolved
to come to England again and run his chance of being taken as a
deserter.  Landing in Liverpool, spirit-broken, and with but little
money in his pocket, he set out for his native place, somewhere near
Sheffield, travelling by railway; and having to change carriages at
Victoria Station, Manchester, he was recognised by our adjutant (the son
of a Liverpool brewer), who had been on a visit to his friends, and of
course given into the custody of the police until an escort could be
sent to bring him to head-quarters.  He was tried by court-martial in
the ordinary course, and, having made away with all his regimental
clothing, kit, necessaries, and some money belonging to the regiment, he
was sentenced to three months' imprisonment in York gaol, and reduced to
the rank and pay of a private soldier.  Some months after he had
returned to his duty, I was on guard with him one very cold night in the
depth of winter.  We were sitting round the guard-room fire waiting for
our turn to go on sentry.  The ex-sergeant, was dull and morose
generally, and more especially when on guard; "the time above all
times," he used to say, when he reflected the most upon his disgrace,
was as he paced to and fro in the dark and deep stillness of a winter's
night.  We had a gay young Irishman in the same relief, Jerry O'Neil,
who had told several good stories in the course of the night and so got
the party into good spirits.  Singing was not allowed in the guard-room;
and, therefore, story-telling was always the most approved method of
entertainment.  We had each told our story, and it came round to
Brailsford's turn (that was his name); and, now that he was a private
soldier, he was always addressed by his surname, like the rest of us.
The fire was replenished, pipes reloaded, and both the corporal and
sergeant of the guard drew dearer to the hearth, so as to hear the
ex-sergeant relate an incident that occurred to him on his way to the
"diggings," the substance of which I have reduced, and endeavoured to
render in a readable form.

"You are all aware, boys," began the ex-sergeant, "that I deserted in a
moment of temptation, and with Corporal--went to America.  Soon after
our arrival in New York, the corporal left me to go to some of his
friends in the state of Ohio, and I was left to shift for myself,
intending to get some kind of situation in New York.  Having plenty of
money, however, to keep me in idleness for some time, I joined a party
of `gold-seekers,' who were going by the overland route to California.
I formed one of six men.  We had six horses, three pack-mules, and two
dogs; and, although we journeyed for days with the heavy plodding
ox-teams of the main body of our party, and intended to keep their
company more or less all the way, yet we were equipped for, and intended
to have some hunting and sport, diverging from the main track in the
morning, and sometimes returning to it some distance ahead, so as to
fall in with our party in the evening.  Frequently, however, we missed
the track; or, having game in view, we slept away from the main body.

"One bright summer morning we were up and broke camp earlier than usual.
Old Ben Walton, our captain and guide, to whom these wilds were home,
had promised that this day we should strike the great buffalo trail, by
which mighty herds of those animals migrate from their winter pasturage
in the south to fatten on the prairies of Utah and Oregon.  For several
days we had been separated from the rest of the party, and found
ourselves, according to Ben's calculation, on one of those great dry
prairies that skirt the eastern slope of the Rocky Mountains, near the
northern boundary of New Mexico; we were suffering from want of water,
the last quart remaining in my canteen I had shared with my horse in the
morning.  It was now mid-day, and our course lay due east, beneath a
broiling sun; the plain was dry and parched, and it seemed that if we
could not get into the track of our head-quarters, or find water, both
man and beast must soon give way.  Old Ben promised us water within a
few miles, and we jogged on as fast as we could urge our half-famished
horses.  About four o'clock in the afternoon we came upon one of those
singular ravines which the spring floods wash out of the loose soil of
these prairies; the banks were perpendicular, the ravine about twenty
feet deep, and from twenty to thirty yards wide, and in the sand and
gravel bottom we beheld the welcome water, not a running stream, but
standing in small limpid pools.  The sight was very cheering, yet still
it was out of our reach; we turned our course to the south, down the
bank of the ravine; continuing thus for near a mile, we came upon a
deep, wide pathway or gully worn by the hoofs of the buffaloes, and
leading down to the bottom of the ravine.  With a wild shout of joy we
dashed down, and soon man, horse, and dog were regaling themselves at
these delicious fountains of Nature.

"Kettles were swung, and in a few minuted the fragrant coffee, and
boiling pemmican (dried buffalo beef, pounded) saluted our nostrils and
whetted our appetites.  All were busy, some unloading mules, others
gathering fuel--the dried droppings of the buffalo, the only fuel of the
plain, burning like turf.  As we finished our meal, night was coming on,
and Ben had advised us all to prepare for rest, when a low, rumbling
sound, like distant thunder, started us all to our feet.  As the sky was
clear overhead, we were at a loss to account for the strange noise,
until Ben, throwing his ear to the ground shouted,--

"`Buffaloes!  Mount!'

"The order was scarcely delivered before every man was in his saddle,
and following Ben up the gully at full speed.  On reaching the plain we
had not long before crossed, a terrific sight to novices in prairie-life
broke upon our vision.

"Away in the distance was a great brown mass, undulating like a sea, and
extending miles in each direction.  A cloud of dust hung above the
mighty herd of buffaloes, darkening the sky.  Already they snuffed the
water, and were approaching at full speed.  A glance was enough for Ben.
Wheeling his horse again into the ravine, he shouted for all to follow.
His practised eye saw that they were making for the water-course, and
in a few moments, if we remained, we should be trampled to death.

"I thought that the hurried manner in which Ben ordered us to re-pack
the mules and run up the ravine had something of cowardice in it.  It
would have been well for me had I partaken of this fear.  While my more
sensible companions hastened after Ben up the bottom of the ravine, I
spurred my horse up the steep path to have another look--I even thought
of bagging a few buffaloes, to astonish old Ben.  When I reached the
level of the plain, I witnessed such a sight as I shall never forget--a
moving wall of life! and, within a few yards of me, grizzly, shaggy
monsters, with heads to the ground, and tails erect, bellowing like an
earthquake, throwing white froth from their parched mouths, while their
tread seemed to shake the very earth.  With a sudden start my horse
reared, twisting round upon his haunches, and, wheeling round, he dashed
down the pathway; and, before I could regain my presence of mind, he was
galloping at the top of his speed down the ravine, in a contrary
direction to that taken by my comrades, who were now out of sight.  For
nearly a mile he held his headlong course, until a turn in the channel
brought me in sight of a new danger.

"The herd had divided upon the plain, and thousands were crowding down
another pathway below me, choking up the ravine with a dense,
impenetrable living mass.  This new barrier enabled me to control my
horse; turning him round I scanned the high bank on each side for an
opening of escape.  All was vain!  There was not a place for a cat to
crawl up, and here was coming on either side a mass of buffaloes that
would soon crush me between them.  A few stragglers, more speedy than
the rest, came first, crowding their noses into the little pools of
water, and sucking them dry in a moment.  Now the mass behind came
sweeping like a mighty torrent, completely choking up the narrow ravine.
There was no escape; and in less time than it takes me to tell you,
boys, I was forced between the two divisions, and my frantic horse made
a part of the living stream.  The air was filled with sand, gravel, and
froth.  The hot breath from the feverish mass rose like steam, and
sickened me.  I felt that I must fall, not to the ground (there was no
room for that), but upon the backs of the crushing, sweltering, reeking
mass.  A furious old bull gored my poor horse in the flank; again and
again he plunged his short, sharp, strong horn into my dying horse until
his entrails were torn out.  I felt him giving way beneath me, his
strength almost gone; still he was carried along by the crush.  We came
to a slight widening of the ravine and the pressure was relieved, but my
lifeless horse sank to the earth, and was trampled to a jelly in a
moment.  As I felt him going, I sprang from the saddle, and landed erect
upon the backs of the rushing, ramping buffaloes.  I fell, but recovered
myself before I came to the ground.  At last I landed and lay at full
length upon the back of a huge beast; with a feeling of desperation I
twisted my hands into his mane, and on with the heaving torrent, my wild
courser, mad with terror, throws his head wildly about, tearing the
sides of all within his reach, and sprinkling me with a shower of froth
and gore."

CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

  We rustled through the leaves like wind,
  Left shrubs and trees and wolves behind.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

"On went the buffalo, tearing and crushing all before and around him.
How long this lasted I know not; but, although I was very weak, stunned,
and nearly blinded, I still madly clung to him! to fall would be certain
death.  At length he darted up a narrow gully upon the side of the
valley from which we had entered it, and dashed off across the open
plain.  The cold breeze revived me a little, and I began to cherish a
hope of life.  I gradually drew myself into a sitting position, and
began to feel the want of a saddle badly; it required all my nerve,
strength, and skill to retain my seat.  I could not turn to look back,
and dared not slip from the beast for fear of meeting with the fate of
my poor horse--not knowing but the whole herd was close in my wake.  For
miles we held our course, until the silence convinced me that we were
alone.  I began to reflect on the best means of ending the fearful race.
I had bought a revolver and a large bowie-knife in New York, and these
I had stuck in my belt, but to wound and not kill the monster would he
to expose myself to certain death, as nothing is more terrible than a
wounded buffalo.  I decided upon the knife as the surest.  My bowie was
as keen as a razor, with a blade near twelve inches long.  I drew it,
and, twisting my left hand into the brute's mane, I gradually leaned
down over his shoulders, pressed the point of my knife against the side
of his neck, and, with all my strength, thrust it in and down.  Thank
goodness, the monster began to tremble, the blood gushed forth, he
reeled, and with a terrific plunge on his knees, sent me flying over his
head on to the springing turf.  I remained still to see if he was able
to rise.  He once or twice attempted it, but when half upon his legs he
dropped from exhaustion and loss of blood, and the mountain of flesh lay
quivering in the agonies of death.

"I knew not how far I had ridden: my mind was in confusion, and every
joint in my frame seemed as if about to snap asunder.  I stood upon the
body of the dead buffalo and gazed about me.  Night was fast closing in,
and there was nothing in sight but sky and plain.  I felt then for the
first time as if alone in the wide world; not a vestige of man or his
handiwork was visible.  Alone with nature, the stillness to me was
painful; even the carcase of the slain brute seemed company, and I
determined to remain by it until morning, I felt that with the darkness
gathering round, and in my exhausted state, to attempt to reach my
comrades that night, even if I knew the direction, would be useless.
This point decided, I gathered a quantity of fuel, and soon a blazing
fire sent its cheerful glow around me, making the gloom beyond the
circle of its rays still more impenetrable.  I cut some slices of the
buffalo's tongue and broiled them upon the fire, and of these, seasoned
with salt from my pouch, and eaten with some parched corn from the same
receptacle, I made a hearty meal.

"My lodgings gave me no uneasiness; so, after gathering a further supply
of fuel to make up a good fire for the purpose of intimidating the
wolves, that I judged would be drawn by the scent of fresh meat, I
placed myself upon the ground, my feet to the fire, and my head and
shoulders resting upon the body of the still warm animal.  My mind was
easy as to the future, though my conscience pricked me when I reflected
upon the past.  I knew that old Ben had his own reasons for liking me,
as I had more money than all the rest of the hunting party together; and
I felt sure that he would never leave the vicinity until satisfied of my
fate.  With this reflection I fell asleep.

"During the night, I was once awoke by the snarling of a pack of wolves.
My fire had burned low, and they were gathered in great numbers about
me.  I had no fear of them; for Ben had told me that the prairie wolf is
a cowardly animal, and will seldom molest a man, unless driven to it by
famine.  For revenge, however, at being disturbed, I fired my revolver
among them.  A howl of pain followed; then yells and a gnashing of
teeth, tearing of flesh, and crunching of bones, enough to convince me
that I had hit one or more of them.  It is a singular fact, that when
blood is once drawn from one of these animals, the others instantly set
upon and devour it.

"After replenishing my fire and reloading my revolver, I again lay down,
watching the smoke which rose in the stillness of the atmosphere like a
column, then spreading out, it formed the only cloud visible.  I slept
undisturbed until daylight.

"On my awaking, I found myself very stiff and sore, and came to the
conclusion, over my breakfast of broiled buffalo-steak, to remain where
I was until my friends sought me.  I was aware that a smoke would be
visible many miles in the clear air of the plains; and I covered my fire
with grass and soil wet with the morning dew.  Soon a dense white steam
ascended, which I felt sure must attract attention.  And so it did, but
not exactly in the quarter I would have chosen; for, scarce had I
finished my repast, when I saw in the distance a horseman rapidly
approaching.  I felt sure it was Ben, and was inwardly congratulating
myself on a pleasant meeting with my comrades, when the strange
movements of the fast approaching person attracted my attention not a
little.  Instead of coming in a direct line, he took a circular course,
gradually drawing nearer, and lessening the circle around me; and I soon
saw that it was an Indian, mounted on a splendid horse.  The way I saw
him handling his rifle convinced me that his morning call would not be a
very agreeable one to me.  I had lost my rifle with my horse: true, I
had a Colt's revolver--the best weapon ever invented for close quarters;
but against his long range the odds were sadly against me.

"Tearing a piece of white linen from my shirt sleeve, I waved it above
my head as a flag of truce.  While in the very act, the tawny rascal
raised his rifle and fired.  I heard the bullet whistle past my head.
Finding that he had missed his mark, he galloped back some distance to
reload.  This gave me a moment for reflection.  As the scoundrel had
fired upon my flag of truce, I felt justified in killing him if I could.
Throwing myself down behind my barricade of beef, I examined my
revolver and drew my knife, determined to sell my life as dearly as
possible.  Cautiously looking over the body of the buffalo, I saw him
drawing near; he saw the motion, and was about to fire, when I withdrew
my head.  After a few moments' silence I could plainly hear the panting
breath of his horse, and detected the click of his gun-lock.  The rascal
knew very well that to fire on him I must expose myself, and now stood
waiting his prey.  Placing my fur-cap upon the point of my knife, I
gradually raised it above the carcase of the buffalo.  The _ruse_
succeeded: when he fired, I dropped the cap and gave a loud groan.  With
a yell he sprung from his horse, with the evident intention of
transferring my scalp to his belt--a proceeding I had a decided
objection to, and, moreover, I felt that this was the proper time to
urge it.  As I heard his footsteps approaching, I rose, to his very
great astonishment, and pulled the trigger of my revolver; he staggered;
another shot eased him of his pain, and I was again alone.  No, boys,
not alone, for a few yards off stood his horse, tethered to the arm of
his defunct master, by a few yards of buffalo hide.  I had no trouble in
securing him, and a beauty he was.  Gathering up some trifles which the
dead Indian could have no further use for, such as a rifle, tomahawk,
etc, I knocked off a horn from the buffalo as a trophy.  I mounted, and,
turning towards the rising sun, set the horse off at a brisk canter.
Knowing that the instinct of the animal would take him to the water, I
gave him his head, and I was right: an hour's ride brought me to the
ravine.  I soon found a path to descend, but I examined the horizon well
for buffaloes before I trusted myself in the gulf.

"Finding all clear, I rode down to the water, and, after refreshing
myself and my horse, I took my course up stream.  A trot of a few miles
and a turn of the water-course brought me in sight of my friends,
encamped near the mangled remains of my horse, and holding a
consultation as to my probable fate.  I received a warm greeting from
all, and tears ran down old Ben's cheeks as he pressed me to his heart.
Over our evening meal I related my story.  Ben listened to the finish.
`So you shot a Camanche--eh?'  `Yes, Ben,' said I.  `Well,' replied he,
`you that are on duty to-night had better keep your eyes open, for we
shall hear more of this day's work.'  `How could I help doing it, Ben?'
said I.  `Wal, I s'pose you couldn't.'  With this complimentary remark,
he knocked the ashes from his pipe, wrapped himself in his blanket, and
fell asleep.  When the fire was made, and two of the party had been
placed as sentries, and enjoined to keep a sharp look-out for
`Camanches,' I followed his example.

"Nothing occurred to disturb us during the night except the howling of
the wolves, to which we were now getting pretty well accustomed.  And,
after making a hearty breakfast, we considered it advisable to join the
main body of our party as soon as possible; as, on the discovery of the
dead body of one of their tribe, the Camanches would be sure to attack
any detached parties like ours, found in small numbers, in which case we
might probably lose our scalps.  After riding all day, we at length
found the main track, and soon discerned the smoke from their encampment
for the night.  The story was related again after supper, the whole
party anxiously listening to every word.  When I had finished, a tall,
masculine-looking woman, who usually had charge of one of the wagons and
oxen, struck up with a story for our amusement.

"`When I was a gal,' she commenced, and went on in the pure American
dialect, `and even arter I married my man--poor fellow! he's gone long
ago--I used to go out in the woods arter the deer that our hunters had
killed and hung up, so that they could go on killin' without losin'
time; and I used to bring 'em in, skin 'em, and jerk 'em, too.  And that
warn't all: I allers attended the wolf-traps, and all sitch like.
There's but few mortal men livin' now what's seen as much fun a killin'
wolves as I have.  Whenever we got one fast in a trap, me and the dogs,
we was allers good for him in double-quick time; but occasionally we got
a little more than we bargained for.  I recollect one time, little Josey
(that's my oldest boy) and me, we went to a trap, and found the
surliest-lookin' old "bar" (bear) in all creation fast in it by one
hind-leg.  "Turk" and "Rome" (them was our dogs), they mounted him, and
began to do their best to kill him, and Josey and me sick't 'em on, and
slapped our hands, but they weren't no more than fleas in his ear.  He
boxed 'em about hither and thither jest as he liked, till at last he got
'em both in his hug, and I seed he was a squeezin' the life out en 'em;
so I told Josey to stop by a big tree, and then I took the axe (for I
hadn't nothin' else with me), and run up to help the dogs.  By the time
I got up to him he'd laid one of 'em cold, and had t'other in a purty
fair way.  I let drive at his head; but he up with one paw and knocked
the axe out of my hand about ten steps.  This kinder staggered me, so I
felt down like; and the next thing I know'd, the "bar" was a top o' me.
I tusselled with him as hard as I could, you may be sure; but it warn't
of much use.  He squeezed me tighter and tighter, and I begun to think
it was all over with me, and my little Josey screeching like mad, when
up came my ole man, and cut the bar's wozzen from ear to ear.  He'd
hearn the noise the dogs and little Josey made, and knowin' there must
be somethin' more than common, he'd run out.  As soon as the "bar" was
dead, he bust out into a loud laugh, and, said he, "You're a purty woman
to be caught out here in the woods huggin' a bar, ain't you?"  But poor
old Rome! we couldn't fetch him to life any more.  The bar had crushed
all the bones in his body.  I recollect another shindy I had when
attending the traps.  It was some time arter the "bar" scrape.  Just
afore I got in sight of a trap, I hearn Turk, what had trotted ahead of
me, a makin' a dreadful queer kind of a whinin' noise.  I ses, ses I, to
myself, there must be something wrong with Turk; so I hurried up as fast
as I could.  And, shure enough there was too.  The biggest eagle I ever
hearn tell on was a standin' with one claw fast in the trap and t'other
clamp up around Turk's nose so fast that he couldn't no more open his
mouth than he could a whistled if it had been open.  There he stood,
with all his legs poked for'ard, a yankin' back, and a makin' all the
noise he possibly could.  I hunted up a stick, and, after a heap of
trouble, I got the life manted out of it; but even then it wouldn't let
go its hold on Turk's nose, nor could I get him loose till I'd took my
knife and cut its claw off.  Turk was always shy of eagles from that
time.

"`I never was frightened much by any of the backwoods varmint but once,
and then I was but a young gal.  Tom Ennis had gone up to Louisville
with a load of skins, and it was so far he couldn't make it back the
same day; so Sally (that was Tom's wife) she got me to go over to their
cabin and stay with her all night for company.  Sally had a young baby
that weren't very well, so it kept up such a crying that we couldn't
sleep for it.  I recollect we had the bed made up on the floor.  In the
middle of the night we hearn somethin' about on the boards of the roof,
a scrapin' and scratchin' as if a tryin' to get in.  The moon was
shinin' atween the boards, and by the light of it we soon seed, whatever
the thing might be, that it had got the board slipt aside enough so it
could poke a great heavy paw down.  Well, it worked on like a trooper,
and directly we saw a big whiskery-lookin' head, poked through, and two
fiery eyes a glarin' down at us.  A little longer, and the hole was big
enough to admit its body, and in he bounced on to the floor of the
cabin, the biggest kind of an old he-panther.  You'd better believe
there was a couple of folks scart enough then, for we knowed the cries
of the baby had attracted its attention, and it had come on purpose to
make a meal out'n some of us.  We covered up our heads, and laid there
with our hearts a thumping.  The panther sat down by the side of our
bed, and wriggled his tail a bit, and then he begun to pat us gently
with his paws, as if he wanted to play afore eatin' us, like a cat does
with a mouse when she ain't very hungry.  Just then, Sally, who was so
scart that she didn't know what she was at, gave a loud scream, and
flirted the blanket right off'n us on to the panther.  The movement,
being so sudden and so unlooked for, gave the varmint a dreadful scare,
and up through the hole he went, like a kite.  That was the last we saw
or heerd of him, and you may be sartain we were satisfied.'"

The ex-sergeant promised to relate more of his adventures on his way to
and from the gold diggings on a future occasion.  But the corporal with
whom he deserted having frequently written to him since he was taken, at
last purchased his discharge, and started him in business at Sheffield;
so we saw no more of him after he left the regiment.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

  Bid him beside, his daily pains employ
  To form the tender manners of the boy,
  And work him like a waxen babe with art,
  To perfect symmetry in every part.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Story-telling is a very favourite method of passing away spare time on
guard, or after the lights are extinguished in the evenings when we
retire to rest, and as these chapters proceed I shall from time to time
relate such as I can remember, always giving preference to those which I
fancy will be most interesting to my readers.

Meanwhile, I may be allowed to offer some details of the interior
economy of a regiment in barracks.

In reference to the regimental school for the instruction of the
children of non-commissioned officers and soldiers, I may state that
their object is to instil into the minds of the children the duties of
religion; to implant in them early habits of morality, obedience, and
industry; to give the boys that amount of instruction which--may qualify
them for non-commissioned officers, or enable them to become useful
members of civil society.  It entirely rests with the children
themselves, when they arrive at a proper age, to adopt any line of life
to which they give the preference, but it is considered by the proper
authorities to be extremely essential that competent persons be selected
from the ranks or roll of non-commissioned officers for the duties of
schoolmasters and superintendents of the regimental schools.  The boys
are all dressed in regimentals corresponding with the stable-dress of
the men, and very proud the little fellows are of it too, especially on
a Sunday, when they march to church in rear of the regiment and band.

The schools are conducted on military principles, and, as far as
circumstances permit, their establishment is assimilated to that of the
regiment, being formed, I believe, on a system recommended by a Rev
Dr Bell.  In addition to their daily lessons in reading, writing, and
arithmetic, the boys are instructed in various ways of making themselves
useful, and of gaining a respectable subsistence when they grow to
maturity; the trades of armourers, tailors, saddlers, and boot and shoe
makers being the most popular with them, because of their being carried
on in barracks.  The prevalent idea among civilians, that a soldier's
son, born in the regiment, _must_ be a soldier, or that he is claimed by
the Government when he arrives at the proper age, is entirely
fallacious: no such system is tolerated in the British army.  The
education and care of a soldier's child is as much the object of the
sovereign's and the Government's solicitude, as the soldier himself.

The female children of the soldiers also equally partake of the benefits
of this system of education, whenever accommodation and other
circumstances permit, and a liberal allowance for eligible
schoolmistresses is granted by the Government.  The girls are taught
reading, writing, arithmetic, plain needlework, and knitting, so that
they are not only useful to the regiment while at school, but qualified
to earn their own livelihood in after life.

In reference to the particular trades in which the children are to be
instructed, the wishes of the parents are, as far as possible, to be
consulted.  Many of the boys born in the regiment become so attached to
their parents and other individuals serving in the corps, and, moreover,
so accustomed to military routine, that they seldom leave it to become
civilians.  They chiefly enter the band, and many of them attain the
position of trumpeters, in which case they are, for the most part, as
well off as if they had chosen the life of a tradesman; for I am bound
to say that whatever position a man may hold in the army, and however
much he may dislike that position and yearn for his liberty, he is,
after he attains his freedom, either by purchase or desertion, more or
less unsettled by being separated from his comrades.  Numbers who have
purchased their discharge, having a good home and livelihood in civil
life, enlist again, and remain soldiers for the full period of their
service.

I may here state, that whatever time a soldier has served prior to
purchasing his discharge, that time does not count in his favour on
second enlistment: he has still twenty-four years to serve in the
cavalry and twenty-one years in the infantry, from the date of his
second or any subsequent enlistment.

In reference to the bands of music in either cavalry or infantry, they
are supported out of the private purses of the commissioned officers.
Every officer on entering a regiment is required to contribute towards
the support of a band, twenty days' pay on appointment, and an annual
subscription, at the discretion of the commanding officer.  In cases of
promotion, the officer has to give the difference between twenty days'
pay of the rank attained and of that previously held.

The bandsmen are all regularly enlisted and drilled, so as to be
effective as soldiers, and they are liable to serve in the ranks on any
emergency.  They are generally attired in a more gaudy and expensive
uniform than the privates in the ranks.  The number of a band depends
much upon the caprice of the commanding officer, and although the limit
is prescribed by Government to a sergeant as master, and fourteen
privates as musicians, yet the majority of regimental bands are composed
of a band-master, a band-sergeant, a band-corporal, and frequently
upwards of thirty privates as performers.  The band invariably
accompanies the regiment to church.  I remember an attempt being made by
the officiating minister of a church attended by the 16th Lancers, to
prevent that regiment from being accompanied by its band to Divine
worship, but Colonel Smyth, who had led the corps with great distinction
through the Sikh war, was inexorable.  He said, "the band had many times
played his regiment in and out of battle, and so long as he remained its
commander, it should play him and his men to and from church."  It is
only right, however, to observe that the minister did not object to it
in a religious point of view, only that the regiment having but recently
returned from India covered with honours, it attracted such a concourse
of people as to greatly impede the comfort of the regular _habitues_ of
his church, and it was suggested that the withdrawal of the band would,
to a great extent, check the assemblage of such vast crowds, that not
only choked up the thoroughfares and approaches to the church, but
filled the sacred edifice itself.  The men and officers all attend
Divine service in full dress, with swords; and where they have to attend
a church out of barracks, a portion of the sitting accommodation is
especially set apart for their use.  In some barracks, however, a
chaplain is appointed, who preaches a sermon in the riding-school, the
children of the soldiers being seated on forms carried from the schools,
the men and officers standing around them and the pulpit.

In almost every regiment there are a number of Roman Catholics, who are,
of course, free to attend their own place of worship, but the band at
all times accompanies the Protestants to the service of the Church of
England.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

  Hast thou given the horse strength?  Hast thou clothed his neck with
  thunder?

  He paweth in the valley, and rejoiceth in his strength; he goeth on to
  meet the armed men.

  He mocketh at fear and is not affrighted, neither turneth he back from
  the sword.

  He saith among the trumpets, "Ha! ha!" and he smelleth the battle afar
  off.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

My readers will probably be interested in the mode of procuring and
management of troop-horses.  In the first place, the horses which are
purchased for the cavalry are selected of a sufficient height and
strength, so as to be able to carry a man of average weight and four
stone in addition, that being about the weight of a cavalry soldier's
kit and necessaries, which he must always carry with him when on a
campaign or the line of march.  The most favourable season for
purchasing troop-horses is considered the autumn, and the commanding
officers either attend the large fairs themselves, or they leave the
business to a contractor, who has to supply the horses at a stated price
(35 pounds for dragoons, hussars, lancers, and artillery, and 45 pounds
for black horses for the Horse Guards,) subject, of course; to the
inspection of the commanding officer and the professional examination of
the regimental veterinary surgeon.

Except in time of war, when large drafts are required to supply the
places of those killed in action, or that die of disease, exposure, and
want of forage, no horses are purchased for the cavalry at a younger age
than three years, and all must be perfectly unbroken, so that their
instinct is untainted by any manner of training except the one uniform
system in use throughout the entire service.

The trumpeters are generally mounted on grey horses, but the prevailing
colours of troop-horses are bay, brown, and black.  The Horse Guards
(1st and 2nd Life Guards, and Horse Guards Blue, or Royal Horse Guards)
are all mounted on black horses, and the 2nd North British Dragoons, or
Scots Greys, are all mounted on grey horses.  The most scrupulous care
is of course taken of them in barracks.  The veterinary surgeon is
responsible as to their health, as reported to him by the
troop-sergeant-major and the troop-farrier daily, the latter being more
particularly required to examine each foot of every horse in his troop
twice at least every week for any appearance of loose shoes, broken
nails, or any change in the healthy condition of the feet.  The
troop-sergeant-major is supposed to be always present in the stable when
the horses are fed, watered, and groomed; and he is therefore
responsible for their condition, grooming, and general appearance.

Every horse, as a rule, is supposed to be shod once a month; but so
great is the variety in size and formation in feet, and in the degrees
of toughness and rapidity of growth of the hoof and sole of different
horses, and even on different feet of the same horse and at different
parts of the same shoe, that no particular pattern or form of shoe is
prescribed.  This is left to the skill and judgment of the farrier, to
make according to the shape of the foot with which he has to deal.  In
this particular branch of his business he is far superior to the village
blacksmith or the more pretentious shoeing-smiths in large towns, even
London itself, where many veterinary farriers keep a lot of shoes by
them that have been made by machinery; and, as a rule, they pare, cut
down, and model the poor horse's foot to fit _their_ shoe, instead of
making the shoe to fit the peculiar conformation of the foot.  Hundreds
of valuable horses used by civilians are constantly ruined by the
pernicious practice of cutting the hoof and sole of the horse's foot
into a shape quite contrary to that intended by Nature, who has cast it
in a mould necessary and proper to support the horse's weight or the
peculiar shape of its legs, which differ more or less in all animals,
although the basis of their construction is essentially the same.  All
unnecessary loading of the horse's foot with iron is carefully avoided;
and if any farrier is caught in the reprehensible practice of applying a
red-hot shoe to the foot, he is very severely dealt with.

A very important point in the care of troop-horses is the prevention of
predisposing causes of disease, such as exposure to extreme cold and
heat.  Of course this cannot be so well carried out in camp as in
barracks, and the consequence is that disease is much more frequent in
the former than the latter.  I, for one, think it very questionable
policy on the part of our Government to take horses out of warm
barrack-stables and picket them in the open air, as at Aldershot and the
Curragh camp, when there is neither war nor rumours of war.  Such a
course of proceeding only exposes the extreme ignorance of those who
have the direction of these affairs.  Alternately exposing either horses
or human beings to heat and cold is the surest way of bringing on
disease and undermining the constitution.  The horses, at least of those
regiments who are first on the roll for a campaign, ought to remain in
camp, and never be allowed to enter a stable, the atmosphere of which is
much warmer than the open air, and then they would be always in
readiness to proceed to any part, without running the risk of disease
and death by exposure, as occurred in the Crimea, where more than half
the number of our cavalry were rendered non-effective from want of
horses.  This plan would not entail the necessity of submitting the men
of the regiment to which the horses belong to the hardship of remaining
constantly in camp, for there would be nothing to hinder them from being
relieved by soldiers from other regiments, who could march to the camp
with the whole of their kit and necessaries, and the men who are
relieved could pack up their own kit and march out with the horses of
the relieving corps.  This system would be far better than, for
instance, marching our troop-horses from the stables of barracks situate
in the inland towns of England to Ireland, and exposing them to the cold
blasts that, both in winter and summer, sweep through the camp at the
Curragh of Kildare, one of the most bleak and cold parts of either
Ireland or England.  The soldiers themselves are aware of all this, and
it is fast spreading discontent among them, especially those who are
stationed at the latter place, where I have myself witnessed horses
standing at their picket-posts nearly up to the hocks in mud, while a
cold north-east wind was blowing and causing their backs to stick up and
their coats to stare like hedgehogs.  Let us hope that, if not for the
sake of the poor animals, the legislature will, for the benefit of the
service and consideration for the soldiers, see the necessity of
changing so suicidal a policy as exposing our troops and troop-horses to
such sudden changes from barracks (in some places absolutely in want of
ventilation) to the most exposed places they can possibly select
throughout the length and breadth of our proverbially capricious and
changeable climate.

When horses become unserviceable from any cause, they are disposed of by
public auction to the highest bidder.  Many a gallant old trooper is now
dragging out his existence in omnibuses, cabs, and the like, being
generally bought for harness work.  Every troop-horse is marked on the
front of both hoofs of his fore-feet with the number and initials of the
regiment in which he served.  Sometimes these "cast horses" are bought
by dealers, who file out the marks and sell them to novices as young
fresh horses just up from the country; but an experienced man may always
detect an old trooper by the hollow place left by filing out the marks;
and if the horse be mounted, the rider may find out in an instant
whether he has been a trooper if he will feel the off-rein and lightly
press his left leg to the horse's near side, or _vice versa_, when the
animal will commence to cross his legs and move sideways, as if to
"dress" to some imaginary companions in forming line; for whenever a
horse has been taught anything and practised in it he never forgets it,
and needs but the necessary signals to again remind him that the
movement is required.

It is a spirit-stirring sight to witness the embarkation of a cavalry
regiment for a sea voyage.  In the first place, it is considered
advisable, when circumstances permit, for the embarkation to take place
immediately after a day's march, when the horses are more quiet and
manageable, than when brought fresh out of stables, time being always
allowed for wisping them over and picking out their feet to clear them
from gravel or any dirt which may accumulate between the edge of the
shoe and the sole of the foot (a point too often neglected by
gentlemen's grooms after their horses come in from a journey).  When all
is ready for business, a sling is passed under the horse's belly, and
also supports his chest and quarters; the ropes attached to this sling
meet over the middle of the horse's back, and are hitched to the chain
of the windlass or crane.  Two soldiers have each hold of a rein
attached to the head-stall on either side of his head, while they soothe
and allay his fears by hand and voice, or, if he violently resist, hold
him by main force, until he is snatched from the ground and swung over
that portion of the sea which intervenes between the beach and the
vessel.  Some troop-horses fight with all the strength and old-fashioned
tactics for which they are especially famous, and they lead the sailors
a nice dance when they are guiding them over the hatchway, and
conducting them through it into the hold of the vessel.

Once deposited in the hold, however, and released from the slings, a
lock of hay and the voice of his master will soothe the animal's fears
and reconcile him to his new situation.  Horses that are embarked for
Ireland are generally conducted on board by means of gangways, as the
ships are brought sufficiently near to the piers at Liverpool for that
purpose.  Great care is taken that they are not overheated or overfed
during a sea voyage, and, therefore, bran, with occasional doses of
nitre, forms a large proportion of their daily food.  The face, eyes,
and nostrils of each horse are washed with a sponge and sea-water at
every stable hour, and the hold of the vessel is ventilated by means of
wind-sails.  Sometimes, however, in stormy weather, the hatches have to
be closed, or partially so, and it is then very close and hot below, but
great advantage is in such cases obtained by washing the manger with
vinegar and water, and occasionally sponging the nostrils of the horses
with the same.  The use of dumb bells, dancing, and any diversion
calculated for the purpose of daily exercise, is permitted, in fact,
encouraged as much as possible, in order to maintain the health and
strength of the men, and they are put through the sword, carbine, and
other exercises in parties, according to the extent of the accommodation
on deck.

To return, however, to the relation of current events at head-quarters.
While our regiment was lying in York, the country, especially the
manufacturing districts, was much disturbed by what were called
"Chartist riots," or "plug drawing," the latter term being derived from
the rioters drawing the street plugs, so as to allow the water that
supplied the mill with steam and power to escape and run to waste.  The
regiment was divided into detachments, and marched in various directions
to be quartered in towns where the civil power was considered
insufficient to preserve the public peace.  Manchester, Oldham, Bolton,
Bury, Blackburn, Hyde, and all the manufacturing towns in Lancashire,
were in a state of siege for more than a month.  Mills and warehouses
were fired, machinery broken, shopkeepers were pilfered and openly
robbed of their stock in trade, which the lawless mob either destroyed
or consumed, and the peaceable inhabitants were kept in a continual
state of terror bordering on despair.  Nothing but the devoted loyalty
of the soldiers, aided by the superhuman exertions of the police,
preserved the whole country from revolution and the public buildings
from being sacked by the off-scourings of society.

The detachment to which I belonged was despatched to Dudley, so as to be
in readiness to aid the civil power in the Staffordshire Potteries.  We
were there upwards of three weeks, and never slept in bed; some of our
horses were kept ready saddled, and we could have turned out the whole
fully equipped in "field order" any time at a few minutes' notice.  No
part of a soldier's duty is more disagreeable than to be called out to
quell a riot.  To fire upon, ride down, or cut down with the sabre,
indiscriminately, any individual that may come within reach, is a
proceeding exceedingly repugnant to the feelings of a British soldier;
therefore it was with no very pleasureable feelings that we one day
noticed a mounted policeman ride hurriedly up to the Stork Hotel, where
the commanding officer of the detachment was staying, and in a few
moments afterwards the trumpeter sounded "Turn out the whole."  We
rapidly formed; the command was given, "Threes right," and off we
marched at a swinging trot to the place indicated, a town some miles
distant, where we found the house-tops literally swarming with human
beings, who had ripped the tiles from the roofs to throw at the police
and a small troop of yeomanry cavalry, who were totally surrounded by
the mob, and getting by far the worst of it, no orders having been given
by the civil authorities for the yeomanry to fire; which, indeed, it is
questionable whether they could have performed with safety to
themselves.  As fast as the police arrested any of the mob, they were
rescued.  The road, or rather street, by which we approached the
market-place (a wide thoroughfare) was crammed full of the most
lawless-looking ruffians--men and women--it was ever my lot to see
together, before or since, in England; they were all armed with sticks,
pikes, stones, and some had old guns too, which they now and then
fired--more from bravado, I should imagine, than from any intent to
kill.  The sea of human faces and glistening eyes were turned full upon
us as we swept at a rapid trot round a corner into full view of the
yelling, screaming mass.

The shops were all closed, and the timid inhabitants were here and there
peeping from the corners of the window-blinds from the rooms above.
Crash! crash! went the stones at the windows, wherever the mob were
foiled in their attempts to break open the doors and plunder the shops.
Barrels of ale were rolled into the streets and the ends driven in for
the mob to drink out of, many using their hats for drinking-vessels;
flitches of bacon and cheeses were handed to and fro over the heads of
the rioters; loaves were pitched from the bakers' shops among the
people; a draper's shop was on fire, and the contents of a toy-shop were
showered among us, just as we arrived in the _melee_.  The trumpet
sounded "Walk," and the babel of yells and shrieks was hushed as if by
magic; not a stone was thrown, nor a weapon raised to attack us; all
appeared astonished when we came upon the scene, and, with the exception
of an occasional cry of "The regulars! the regulars!" scarce a sound was
heard above a low hum of human voices, as if in conversation with each
other.

The space immediately in our front was soon cleared, as the dense masses
opened out, fell back, and trampled upon the more helpless.  We walked
our horses steadily on, with our sabres still in their scabbards, to the
market-place, where our captain found the chief of police surrounded by
yeomanry and his own men.  An attempt had just been made to break open
the doors and sack the town-hall, and they were all in a terrible state
of excitement.  We rapidly took up our ground and formed in double rank,
with the yeomanry and police in our rear.  Just then a shower of stones
was hurled at us, but they did but little damage; the Riot Act was read,
and the captain in command gave the order, in a clear, ringing voice, to
draw swords; but when those ominous-looking weapons flashed in the
blazing sun, the dense masses scampered off helter-skelter, and, with
the exception of a few rioters, whom the police succeeded in
apprehending, we were soon left alone in our glory.

Such is the amount of fear and respect with which disciplined soldiers
are regarded by an infuriated and misguided mob, and the simple
exhibition of such discipline is generally sufficient to prevent a
collision with those pests of society, who, happily for the peace and
prosperity of England, do not exist in numbers sufficient to endanger
the peace and happiness of its respectable and industrious people.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

  And there was mounting in hot haste; the steed,
  The mustering squadron, and the clattering car
  Went pouring forward with impetuous speed,
  And swiftly forming in the ranks of war;
  And the deep thunder, peal on peal, afar;
  And near, the beat of the alarming drum
  Roused up the soldier ere the morning star.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Notwithstanding the opposition and ill-feeling with which the lower
orders regard soldiers who may at times be called out in aid of the
civil power, it is gratifying to think that, in the event of a war
breaking out, it is extremely improbable that our Government would be
compelled to have recourse to the objectionable practice which has
frequently been pursued by other nations with regard to the draft or
conscription.  The lower classes are ever more ready to voluntarily
enlist in time of war than in peace; and although we are generally
understood to be a peaceable, industrious people, and designated as "a
nation of shopkeepers," no other nation on the face of the earth could
muster more voluntary recruits, able-bodied and enthusiastic, in time of
war, than the British Government.  The civilians, too, during the period
of a popular war, vie with each other in their treatment and general
admiration of the soldier.  Many of our militia regiments volunteered to
a man to serve "wherever Her Majesty should please to direct" during the
Crimean campaign; and should we ever be so unfortunate as to be again
embroiled in another struggle of the same nature, I have no doubt that
the ranks of the regular army will at once be augmented to the required
number from our militia and volunteer regiments.  Though the latter may
only be engaged and required, under their present conditions, to fight
in defence of our homes in case of invasion, they would be sure to be
fired with a desire to participate in the honours and distinctions
always to be attained in a more or less degree by brave and
well-conducted men in the regular army.  I am not, of course, presuming
that all, or perhaps one-fourth, of the volunteers enrolled would
respond to the probable call for men to proceed on active service, in
case of a war breaking out; neither would any stigma of cowardice or
want of loyalty rest upon those who chose to stay at home.  It is at all
times advisable for men to stay at home who really cannot enter upon the
active and arduous duties of a campaign with a full determination to
fight and distinguish themselves, so as to attain not only honour but a
pecuniary consideration in the form of pension on discharge, or such
promotion while living and serving in the army, as will compensate the
respectable civilian for exchanging a comparatively easy life at home
for one of privations, dangers, and hardships in a foreign land.

The majority of our soldiers are enlisted from a different class to
volunteers.  The same restrictions, rigid rules, and discipline to which
the former are subjected would be exceedingly distasteful to the latter,
whose superior knowledge and discrimination between right and wrong
would render them very troublesome to the school of commanding officers
of the present day.  They would grumble and spread discontent to a
degree that might be dangerous to the discipline of the army as at
present constituted.  It is true that very many of our soldiers are
drawn from the strongest, the hardiest, and I may add the most
headstrong class of people in the world: for the most part, they are
given to habits of intemperance, and always taught from boyhood to
consider independence a virtue, and to look upon the higher classes as
their enemies.  When, however, they become soldiers, they are required
at once to abandon all such thoughts, and yield implicit obedience to
the restrictions on their habits and feelings.  I have already stated
that this class of men are really benefited by the change from a civil
to a military life, and also set forth my reasons for so stating.  But
such a change for the majority of our volunteers as they are at present
constituted would be anything but welcome, for it must be remembered
that, however gallant they may be in action, or however well conducted
generally, promotion is very slow in the British army, and, after all,
it is not scrupulously awarded according to merit.  The habits and
manners of the British volunteer in civil life are far different to
those of three-fourths of the regular army before they enlisted.  But
when divested of his clownish manners and rendered obedient to his
superiors, the common labourer is in every point of view (except that of
making him into a non-commissioned officer) a better man for military
purposes than the son of a tradesman.  He is quite as moral, as docile,
and can stand the change of climate better than three-fourths of the
volunteers we see marching so gaily through the streets of our large
towns and cities.  Soldiers are required to march, to fight, to starve,
to encounter storms at sea, pestilence on land, to abandon their native
country, relatives, and friends, for years--often for life.  They have
little pay, few promises of rewards, and still fewer rewards; and when
worn out and miserable, and racked with pain from long hardships and
wounds, they are too often sent in poverty to their native places, and
pine away their lives the lowest of the lowly.  The life of a private
soldier, infantry or cavalry, would be considered on the whole as one
irksome and distasteful to the natural feelings of a great number of our
volunteers.  The duty of the former is to "work at soldiers," and the
latter only to "play at soldiers."  But, rich or poor, educated or
uneducated, they must all be kept in strict subordination in the army,
and do their duty, whatever it may be, with scrupulous exactness and
punctuality.  On the field of battle the one is as good as the other;
and who can say that the national spirit, the vital energy, of the
thorough Englishman, Irishman, or Scotchman, has not always been as firm
on the battle-field with the men descended from poor parents as those
who can boast of the great and rich for their progenitors?

My object in making the above observations is to press upon the minds of
such of my readers as are already or may eventually become volunteers,
that in the event of a war breaking out, and the spirit of patriotism
extending, as it invariably does, to militia and volunteer corps, it
would be the height of folly to enter the regular army, without first
calculating the consequences of so great a change from the "feather-bed
soldiering" at home to that I have described as a matter of imperative
duty to the regular soldier on a campaign.

The maintenance of a large volunteer force at home is as much a matter
of policy with our Government, as it is to send the regular army abroad
to meet the enemy.  Therefore, morally, the volunteer is, considering
his capability, as much entitled to credit as his brethren in arms, who
by nature are better fitted to the post of danger and hardships assigned
to them.  A certain class of civilians (speech-makers at public
meetings, and the like) frequently state that "a better system of
rewards, and a milder discipline, would bring a better class of men into
the army."  No change that could be devised would bring a better class
of men into the army.  The British army has nearly always conquered
every army it encountered: this, therefore, should be proof sufficient
that it is the best army.  But good as it undoubtedly has been, and,
moreover, sorely put to the test, through the incompetency of its
leaders and administrators, it never was in anything like the state of
efficiency it is at the present time; and it doubtless will continue to
improve until engaged in another campaign.  When on the line of march, I
have often heard civilians question soldiers as to their feelings and
individual experience in action.  "Did you not feel frightened?" they
would say; and I daresay that many of my readers would like to hear the
same query truthfully answered.  Now, I am well aware that there are
some enthusiastic people who would almost consider it a "national
crime," so to speak, for any person to assert, or in the most distant
manner insinuate, that at the commencement of a battle a British soldier
feels anything approaching to fear; yet in making a few remarks upon
this subject, I am compelled to admit that all British soldiers are men,
and it is peculiar to the constitution of man to be afraid on the
approach of death, unless he becomes so excited that his passions
overcome his reflection.

The British soldier must have credit, over all others, for steady
unflinching courage and cool discipline in standing still under the
raking fire of an enemy, until his commander sees a proper opportunity
to give the order to advance; but on these occasions the faces of the
bravest often change colour, and the limbs of the most resolute tremble,
as the fatal thud of the enemy's bullets is heard and seen to take
effect upon some respected comrade or favourite officer.  Those who have
not experienced this peculiar feeling can form but little idea of the
effects which it produces on the mind of a soldier at such a time.  On
such occasions no conversation is supposed to be going on, but now and
then a stifled whisper expressing an anxious desire to hear the welcome
sound of the trumpet to "advance" is heard.  Every minute seems an hour,
as bullet after bullet whistles through the ranks, and the round shot,
first ploughing up the ground or scattering the dust in front of the
brigade, comes crashing amongst the men and horses.  Sometimes a huge
shell is seen "whizzing" through the air, and hovering for an instant
ere it explodes and deals death and destruction in every direction.
This appears like cool, unexcited courage, and no troops in the world
have ever displayed it with less flinching than the British.  But it
would be absurd to say that it is done with out fear of death.  It is
hard to stand still or sit still on your horses and be shot at, with a
consciousness that every second of time may be your last, and the next
you may be in eternity.  But when once the order is given to "advance"--
first at a "walk," then a rapid trot, then a fast canter, and finally,
amidst the clash of the sabre-scabbards on the stirrup-irons, and the
rumbling roll of the horses' hoofs, the shrill voice of the commander is
heard as he turns his head to the trumpeter and shrieks out the order
"charge," and the latter turns in his saddle and sounds the blast which
calls many a good soldier to his last account--instantly the horses
stretch out their necks, lay back their ears, and dash into a gallop at
full speed; each man clenches his teeth, drops the hilt of his sabre on
his right thigh, firmly clutched in his hand, and leaning forward in his
stirrups, he is rapidly borne to the ranks of the enemy.  Sometimes he
has to encounter, as at Balaclava, a field-battery, bellowing and
belching forth fire and smoke, first seen, then terribly realised as the
men and horses that happen to be riding in the line of fire tumble heels
over head in a quivering mass of mangled flesh, blood, and ghastly
splinters of bone--seen but for one instant, when seen at all, but long
enough to make you remember it for ever; and it renders you temporarily
insane with excitement for the time being: your only desire is to kill.
On, on, you ride, amidst the fire and the smoke, the blood and the
thunder, until you meet the foe hand to hand: a streak of fire flashes
simultaneously from end to end of the enemy's front.  Many saddles are
emptied, an

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