THE ADJUTANT’S STORY.—LIFE IN DERBY.
“It is now about eight, may be ten, years since we were ordered to march from Belfast and take up our quarters in Londonderry. We had not been more than a few weeks altogether in Ulster when the order came; and as we had been, for the preceding two years, doing duty in the south and west, we concluded that the island was tolerably the same in all parts. We opened our campaign in the maiden city exactly as we had been doing with ‘unparalleled success’ in Cashel, Fermoy, Tuam, etc.,—that is to say, we announced garrison balls and private theatricals; offered a cup to be run for in steeple-chase; turned out a four-in-hand drag, with mottled grays; and brought over two Deal boats to challenge the north.”
“The 18th found the place stupid,” said his companions.
“To be sure, they did; slow fellows like them must find any place stupid. No dinners; but they gave none. No fun; but they had none in themselves. In fact, we knew better; we understood how the thing was to be done, and resolved that, as a mine of rich ore lay unworked, it was reserved for us to produce the shining metal that others, less discerning, had failed to discover. Little we knew of the matter; never was there a blunder like ours. Were you ever in Derry?”
“Never,” said the three listeners.
“Well, then, let me inform you that the place has its own peculiar features. In the first place, all the large towns in the south and west have, besides the country neighborhood that surrounds them, a certain sprinkling of gentlefolk, who, though with small fortunes and not much usage of the world, are still a great accession to society, and make up the blank which, even in the most thickly peopled country, would be sadly felt without them. Now, in Derry, there is none of this. After the great guns—and,per Baccho!what great guns they are!—you have nothing but the men engaged in commerce,—sharp, clever, shrewd, well-informed fellows; they are deep in flax-seed, cunning in molasses, and not to be excelled in all that pertains to coffee, sassafras, cinnamon, gum, oakum, and elephants’ teeth. The place is a rich one, and the spirit of commerce is felt throughout it. Nothing is cared for, nothing is talked of, nothing alluded to, that does not bear upon this; and, in fact, if you haven’t a venture in Smyrna figs, Memel timber, Dutch dolls, or some such commodity, you are absolutely nothing, and might as well be at a ball with a cork leg, or go deaf to the opera.”
“Now, when I’ve told thus much, I leave you to guess what impression our triumphal entry into the city produced. Instead of the admiring crowds that awaited us elsewhere, as we marched gayly into quarters, here we saw nothing but grave, sober-looking, and, I confess it, intelligent-looking faces, that scrutinized our appearance closely enough, but evidently with no great approval and less enthusiasm. The men passed on hurriedly to the counting-houses and wharves; the women, with almost as little interest, peeped at us from the windows, and walked away again. Oh, how we wished for Galway, glorious Galway, that paradise of the infantry that lies west of the Shannon! Little we knew, as we ordered the band, in lively anticipation of the gayeties before us, to strike up ‘Payne’s first set,’ that, to the ears of the fair listeners in Ship Quay Street, the rumble of a sugar hogshead or the crank of a weighing crane were more delightful music.”
“By Jove!” interrupted Power, “you are quite right. Women are strongly imitative in their tastes. The lovely Italian, whose very costume is a natural following of a Raphael, is no more like the pretty Liverpool damsel than Genoa is to Glasnevin; and yet what the deuce have they, dear souls, with their feet upon a soft carpet and their eyes upon the pages of Scott or Byron, to do with all the cotton or dimity that ever was printed? But let us not repine; that very plastic character is our greatest blessing.”
“I’m not so sure that it always exists,” said the doctor, dubiously, as though his own experience pointed otherwise.
“Well, go ahead!” said the skipper, who evidently disliked the digression thus interrupting the adjutant’s story.
“Well, we marched along, looking right and left at the pretty faces—and there were plenty of them, too—that a momentary curiosity drew to the windows; but although we smiled and ogled and leered as only a newly arrived regiment can smile, ogle, or leer, by all that’s provoking we might as well have wasted our blandishments upon the Presbyterian meeting-house, that frowned upon us with its high-pitched roof and round windows.
“‘Droll people, these,’ said one; ‘Rayther rum ones,’ cried another; ‘The black north, by Jove!’ said a third: and so we went along to the barracks, somewhat displeased to think that, though the 18th were slow, they might have met their match.
“Disappointed, as we undoubtedly felt, at the little enthusiasm that marked ourentrée, we still resolved to persist in our original plan, and accordingly, early the following morning, announced our intention of giving amateur theatricals. The mayor, who called upon our colonel, was the first to learn this, and received the information with pretty much the same kind of look the Archbishop of Canterbury might be supposed to assume if requested by a a friend to ride ‘a Derby.’ The incredulous expression of the poor man’s face, as he turned from one of us to the other, evidently canvassing in his mind whether we might not, by some special dispensation of Providence, be all insane, I shall never forget.
“His visit was a very short one; whether concluding that we were not quite safe company, or whether our notification was too much for his nerves, I know not.
“We were not to be balked, however. Our plans for gayety, long planned and conned over, were soon announced in all form; and though we made efforts almost super-human in the cause, our plays were performed to empty benches, our balls were unattended, our picnic invitations politely declined, and, in a word, all our advances treated with a cold and chilling politeness that plainly said, ‘We’ll none of you.’
“Each day brought some new discomfiture, and as we met at mess, instead of having, as heretofore, some prospect of pleasure and amusement to chat over, it was only to talk gloomily over our miserable failures, and lament the dreary quarters that our fates had doomed us to.
“Some months wore on in this fashion, and at length—what will not time do?—we began, by degrees, to forget our woes. Some of us took to late hours and brandy-and-water; others got sentimental, and wrote journals and novels and poetry; some made acquaintances among the townspeople, and out in to a quiet rubber to pass the evening; while another detachment, among which I was, got up a little love affair to while away the tedious hours, and cheat the lazy sun.
“I have already said something of my taste in beauty; now, Mrs. Boggs was exactly the style of woman I fancied. She was a widow; she had black eyes,—not your jet-black, sparkling, Dutch-doll eyes, that roll about and twinkle, but mean nothing; no, hers had a soft, subdued, downcast, pensive look about them, and were fully as melting a pair of orbs as any blue eyes you ever looked at.
“Then, she had a short upper lip, and sweet teeth; by Jove, they were pearls! and she showed them too, pretty often. Her figure was well-rounded, plump, and what the French callnette. To complete all, her instep and ankle were unexceptional; and lastly, her jointure was seven hundred pounds per annum, with a trifle of eight thousand more that the late lamented Boggs bequeathed, when, after four months of uninterrupted bliss, he left Derry for another world.
“When chance first threw me in the way of the fair widow, some casual coincidence of opinion happened to raise me in her estimation, and I soon afterwards received an invitation to a small evening party at her house, to which I alone of the regiment was asked.
“I shall not weary you with the details of my intimacy; it is enough that I tell you I fell desperately in love. I began by visiting twice or thrice a week, and in less than two months, spent every morning at her house, and rarely left it till the ‘Roast beef’ announced mess.
“I soon discovered the widow’s cue; she was serious. Now, I had conducted all manner of flirtatious in my previous life; timid young ladies, manly young ladies, musical, artistical, poetical, and hysterical,—bless you, I knew them all by heart; but never before had I to deal with a serious one, and a widow to boot. The case was a trying one. For some weeks it was all very up-hill work; all the red shot of warm affection I used to pour in on other occasions was of no use here. The language of love, in which I was no mean proficient, availed me not. Compliments and flattery, those rare skirmishers before the engagement, were denied me; and I verily think that a tender squeeze of the hand would have cost me my dismissal.
“‘How very slow, all this!’ thought I, as, at the end of two months siege, I still found myself seated in the trenches, and not a single breach in the fortress; ‘but, to be sure, it’s the way they have in the north, and one must be patient.’
“While thus I was in no very sanguine frame of mind as to my prospects, in reality my progress was very considerable. Having become a member of Mr. M’Phun’s congregation, I was gradually rising in the estimation of the widow and her friends, whom my constant attendance at meeting, and my very serious demeanor had so far impressed that very grave deliberation was held whether I should not be made an elder at the next brevet.
“If the widow Boggs had not been a very lovely and wealthy widow; had she not possessed the eyes, lips, hips, ankles, and jointure aforesaid,—I honestly avow that neither the charms of that sweet man Mr. M’Phun’s eloquence, nor even the flattering distinction in store for me, would have induced me to prolong my suit. However, I was not going to despair when in sight of land. The widow was evidently softened. A little time longer, and the most scrupulous moralist, the most rigid advocate for employing time wisely, could not have objected to my daily system of courtship. I was none of your sighing, dying, ogling, hand-squeezing, waist-pressing, oath-swearing, everlasting-adoring affairs, with an interchange of rings and lockets; not a bit of it. It was confoundedly like a controversial meeting at the Rotundo, and I myself had a far greater resemblance to Father Tom Maguire than a gay Lothario.
“After all, when mess-time came, when the ‘Roast beef’ played, and we assembled at dinner, and the soup and fish had gone round, with two glasses of sherry in, my spirits rallied, and a very jolly evening consoled me for all my fatigues and exertions, and supplied me with energy for the morrow; for, let me observe here, that I only made love before dinner. The evenings I reserved for myself, assuring Mrs. Boggs that my regimental duties required all my time after mess hour, in which I was perfectly correct: for at six we dined; at seven I opened the claret No. 1; at eight I had uncorked my second bottle; by half-past eight I was returning to the sherry; and at ten, punctual to the moment, I was repairing to my quarters on the back of my servant, Tim Daly, who had carried me safely for eight years, without a single mistake, as the fox-hunters say. This was a way we had in the —th. Every man was carried away from mess, some sooner, some later. I was always an early riser, and went betimes.
“Now, although I had very abundant proof, from circumstantial evidence, that I was nightly removed from the mess-room to my bed in the mode I mention, it would have puzzled me sorely to prove the fact in any direct way; inasmuch as by half-past nine, as the clock chimed, and Tim entered to take me, I was very innocent of all that was going on, and except a certain vague sense of regret at leaving the decanter, felt nothing whatever.
“It so chanced—what mere trifles are we ruled by in our destiny!—that just as my suit with the widow had assumed its most favorable footing, old General Hinks, that commanded the district, announced his coming over to inspect our regiment. Over he came accordingly, and to be sure, we had a day of it. We were paraded for six mortal hours; then we were marching and countermarching, moving into line, back again into column, now forming open column, then into square; till at last, we began to think that the old general was like the Flying Dutchman, and was probably condemned to keep on drilling us to the day of judgment. To be sure, he enlivened the proceeding to me by pronouncing the regiment the worst-drilled and appointed corps in the service, and the adjutant (me!) the stupidest dunderhead—these were his words—he had ever met with.
“‘Never mind,’ thought I; ‘a few days more, and it’s little I’ll care for the eighteen manoeuvres. It’s small trouble your eyes right or your left, shoulders forward, will give me. I’ll sell out, and with the Widow Boggs and seven hundred a year,—but no matter.’
“This confounded inspection lasted till half-past five in the afternoon; so that our mess was delayed a full hour in consequence, and it was past seven as we sat down to dinner. Our faces were grim enough as we met together at first; but what will not a good dinner and good wine do for the surliest party? By eight o’clock we began to feel somewhat more convivially disposed; and before nine, the decanters were performing a quick-step round the table, in a fashion very exhilarating and very jovial to look at.
“‘No flinching to-night,’ said the senior major. ‘We’ve had a severe day; let us also have a merry evening.’
“‘By Jove! Ormond,’ cried another, ‘we must not leave this to-night. Confound the old humbugs and their musty whist party; throw them over.’
“‘I say, Adjutant,’ said Forbes; addressing me, ‘you’ve nothing particular to say to the fair widow this evening? You’ll not bolt, I hope?’
“‘That he sha’n’t,’ said one near me; ‘he must make up for his absence to-morrow, for to-night we all stand fast.’
“‘Besides,’ said another, ‘she’s at meeting by this. Old—what-d’ye-call-him?—is at fourteenthly before now.’
“‘A note for you, sir,’ said the mess waiter, presenting me with a rose-colored three-cornered billet. It was fromla chèreBoggs herself, and ran thus:—
DEAR SIR,—Mr. M’Phun and a few friends are coming to tea atmy house after meeting; perhaps you will also favor us with yourcompany.Yours truly,ELIZA BOGGS.
“What was to be done? Quit the mess; leave a jolly party just at the jolliest moment; exchange Lafitte and red hermitage for asoiréeof elders, presided over by that sweet man, Mr. M’Phun! It was too bad!—but then, how much was in the scale! What would the widow say if I declined? What would she think? I well knew that the invitation meant nothing less than a full-dress parade of me before her friends, and that to decline was perhaps to forfeit all my hopes in that quarter forever.
“‘Any answer, sir?’ said the waiter.
“‘Yes,’ said I, in a half-whisper, ‘I’ll go,—tell the servant, I’ll go.’
“At this moment my tender epistle was subtracted from before me, and ere I had turned round, had made the tour of half the table. I never perceived the circumstance, however, and filling my glass, professed my resolve to sit to the last, with a mental reserve to take my departure at the very first opportunity. Ormond and the paymaster quitted the room for a moment, as if to give orders for a broil at twelve, and now all seemed to promise a very convivial and well-sustained party for the night.
“‘Is that all arranged?’ inquired the major, as Ormond entered.
“‘All right,’ said he; ‘and now let us have a bumper and a song. Adjutant, old boy, give us a chant.’
“‘What shall it be, then?’ inquired I, anxious to cover my intended retreat by any appearance of joviality.
“‘Give us—
“When I was in the FusiliersSome fourteen years ago.”’
“‘No, no; confound it! I’ve heard nothing else since I joined the regiment. Let us have the “Paymaster’s Daughter.”’
“‘Ah! that’s pathetic; I like that,’ lisped a young ensign.
“‘If I’m to have a vote,’ grunted out the senior major, ‘I pronounce for “West India Quarters.”’
“‘Yes, yes,’ said half-a-dozen voices together; ‘let’s have “West India Quarters.” Come, give him a glass of sherry, and let him begin.’
“I had scarcely finished off my glass, and cleared my throat for my song, when the clock on the chimney-piece chimed half-past nine, and the same instant I felt a heavy hand fall upon my shoulder. I turned and beheld my servant Tim. This, as I have already mentioned, was the hour at which Tim was in the habit of taking me home to my quarters; and though we had dined an hour later, he took no notice of the circumstance, but true to his custom, he was behind my chair. A very cursory glance at my ‘familiar’ was quite sufficient to show me that we had somehow changed sides; for Tim, who was habitually the most sober of mankind, was, on the present occasion, exceedingly drunk, while I, a full hour before that consummation, was perfectly sober.
“‘What d’ye want, sir?’ inquired I, with something of severity in my manner.
“‘Come home,’ said Tim, with a hiccough that set the whole table in a roar.
“‘Leave the room this instant,’ said I, feeling wrath at being thus made a butt of for his offences. ‘Leave the room, or I’ll kick you out of it.’ Now, this, let me add in a parenthesis, was somewhat of a boast, for Tim was six feet three, and strong in proportion, and when in liquor, fearless as a tiger.
“‘You’ll kick me out of the room, eh, will you? Try, only try it, that’s all.’ Here a new roar of laughter burst forth, while Tim, again placing an enormous paw upon my shoulder, continued, ‘Don’t be sitting there, making a baste of yourself, when you’ve got enough. Don’t you see you’re drunk?’
“I sprang to my legs on this, and made a rush to the fireplace to secure the poker; but Tim was beforehand with me, and seizing me by the waist with both hands, flung me across his shoulders as though I were a baby, saying, at the same time, ‘I’ll take you away at half-past eight to-morrow, as you’re as rampageous again.’ I kicked, I plunged, I swore, I threatened, I even begged and implored to be set down; but whether my voice was lost in the uproar around me, or that Tim only regarded my denunciations in the light of cursing, I know not, but he carried me bodily down the stairs, steadying himself by one hand on the banisters, while with the other he held me as in a vice. I had but one consolation all this while; it was this, that as my quarters lay immediately behind the mess-room, Tim’s excursion would soon come to an end, and I should be free once more; but guess my terror to find that the drunken scoundrel, instead of going as usual to the left, turned short to the right hand, and marched boldly into Ship Quay Street. Every window in the mess-room was filled with our fellows, absolutely shouting with laughter. ‘Go it Tim! That’s the fellow! Hold him tight! Never let go!’ cried a dozen voices; while the wretch, with the tenacity of drunkenness, gripped me still harder, and took his way down the middle of the street.
The Adjutant’s After Dinner Ride.
“It was a beautiful evening in July, a soft summer night, as I made this pleasing excursion down the most frequented thoroughfare in the maiden city, my struggles every moment exciting roars of laughter from an increasing crowd of spectators, who seemed scarcely less amused than puzzled at the exhibition. In the midst of a torrent of imprecations against my torturer, a loud noise attracted me. I turned my head, and saw,—horror of horrors!—the door of the meeting-house just flung open, and the congregation issuing forthen masse. Is it any wonder if I remember no more? There I was, the chosen one of the widow Boggs, the elder elect, the favored friend and admired associate of Mr. M’Phun, taking an airing on a summer’s evening on the back of a drunken Irishman. Oh, the thought was horrible! and certainly the short and pithy epithets by which I was characterized in the crowd, neither improved my temper nor assuaged my wrath, and I feel bound to confess that my own language was neither serious nor becoming. Tim, however, cared little for all this, and pursued the even tenor of his way through the whole crowd, nor stopped till, having made half the circuit of the wall, he deposited me safe at my own door; adding, as he set me down, ‘Oh, av you’re as throublesome every evening, it’s a wheelbarrow I’ll be obleeged to bring for you!’
“The next day I obtained a short leave of absence, and ere a fortnight expired, exchanged into the —th, preferring Halifax itself to the ridicule that awaited me in Londonderry.”
FRED POWER’S ADVENTURE IN PHILIPSTOWN.
The lazy hours of the long summer day crept slowly over. The sea, unbroken by foam or ripple, shone like a broad blue mirror, reflecting here and there some fleecy patches of snow-white cloud as they stood unmoved in the sky. The good ship rocked to and fro with a heavy and lumbering motion, the cordage rattled, the bulkheads creaked, the sails flapped lazily against the masts, the very sea-gulls seemed to sleep as they rested on the long swell that bore them along, and everything in sea and sky bespoke the calm. No sailor trod the deck; no watch was stirring; the very tiller ropes were deserted; and as they traversed backwards and forwards with every roll of the vessel, told that we had no steerage-way, and lay a mere log upon the water.
I sat alone in the bow, and fell into a musing fit upon the past and the future. How happily for us is it ordained that in the most stirring existences there are every here and there such little resting-spots of reflection, from which, as from some eminence, we look back upon the road we have been treading in life, and cast a wistful glance at the dark vista before us! When first we set out upon our worldly pilgrimage, these are indeed precious moments, when with buoyant heart and spirit high, believing all things, trusting all things, our very youth comes back to us, reflected from every object we meet; and like Narcissus, we are but worshipping our own image in the water. As we go on in life, the cares, the anxieties, and the business of the world engross us more and more, and such moments become fewer and shorter. Many a bright dream has been dissolved, many a fairy vision replaced, by some dark reality; blighted hopes, false friendships have gradually worn callous the heart once alive to every gentle feeling, and time begins to tell upon us,—yet still, as the well-remembered melody to which we listened with delight in infancy brings to our mature age a touch of early years, so will the very association of these happy moments recur to us in our revery, and make us young again in thought. Then it is that, as we look back upon our worldly career, we become convinced how truly is the child the father of the man, how frequently are the projects of our manhood the fruit of some boyish predilection; and that in the emulative ardor that stirs the schoolboy’s heart, we may read theprestigeof that high daring that makes a hero of its possessor.
These moments, too, are scarcely more pleasurable than they are salutary to us. Disengaged for the time from every worldly anxiety, we pass in review before our own selves, and in the solitude of our own hearts are we judged. That still small voice of conscience, unheard and unlistened to amidst the din and bustle of life, speaks audibly to us now; and while chastened on one side by regrets, we are sustained on the other by some approving thought; and with many a sorrow for the past, and many a promise for the future, we begin to feel “how good it is for us to be here.”
The evening wore later; the red sun sank down upon the sea, growing larger and larger; the long line of mellow gold that sheeted along the distant horizon grew first of a dark ruddy tinge, then paler and paler, till it became almost gray; a single star shone faintly in the east, and darkness soon set in. With night came the wind, for almost imperceptibly the sails swelled slowly out, a slight rustle at the bow followed, the ship lay gently over, and we were once more in motion. It struck four bells; some casual resemblance in the sound of the old pendulum that marked the hour at my uncle’s house startled me so that I actually knew not where I was. With lightning speed my once home rose up before me with its happy hearts; the old familiar faces were there; the gay laugh was in my ears; there sat my dear old uncle, as with bright eye and mellow voice he looked a very welcome to his guests; there Boyle; there Considine; there the grim-visaged portraits that graced the old walls whose black oak wainscot stood in broad light and shadow, as the blazing turf fire shone upon it; there was my own place, now vacant; methought my uncle’s eye was turned towards it and that I heard him say, “My poor boy! I wonder where is he now!” My heart swelled, my chest heaved, the tears coursed slowly down my cheeks, as I asked myself, “Shall I ever see them more?” Oh, how little, how very little to us are the accustomed blessings of our life till some change has robbed us of them, and how dear are they when lost to us! My uncle’s dark foreboding that we should never meet again on earth, came for the first time forcibly to my mind, and my heart was full to bursting. What could repay me for the agony of that moment as I thought of him, my first, my best, my only friend, whom I had deserted? And how gladly would I have resigned my bright day-dawn of ambition to be once more beside his chair, to hear his voice, to see his smile, to feel his love for me! A loud laugh from the cabin roused me from my sad, depressing revery, and at the same instant Mike’s well-known voice informed me that the captain was looking for me everywhere, as supper was on the table. Little as I felt disposed to join the party at such a moment, as I knew there was no escaping Power, I resolved to make the best of matters; so after a few minutes I followed Mickey down the companion and entered the cabin.
The scene before me was certainly not calculated to perpetuate depressing thoughts. At the head of a rude old-fashioned table, upon which figured several black bottles and various ill-looking drinking vessels of every shape and material, sat Fred Power; on his right was placed the skipper, on his left the doctor,—the bronzed, merry-looking, weather-beaten features of the one contrasting ludicrously with the pale, ascetic, acute-looking expression of the other. Sparks, more than half-drunk, with the mark of a red-hot cigar upon his nether lip, was lower down; while Major Monsoon, to preserve the symmetry of the party, had protruded his head, surmounted by a huge red nightcap, from the berth opposite, and held out his goblet to be replenished from the punch-bowl.
“Welcome, thrice welcome, thou man of Galway!” cried out Power, as he pointed to a seat, and pushed a wine-glass towards me. “Just in time, too, to pronounce upon a new brewery. Taste that; a little more of the lemon you would say, perhaps? Well, I agree with you. Rum and brandy, glenlivet and guava jelly, limes, green tea, and a slight suspicion of preserved ginger,—nothing else, upon honor,—and the most simple mixture for the cure, the radical cure, of blue devils and debt I know of; eh, Doctor? You advise it yourself, to be taken before bed-time; nothing inflammatory in it, nothing pugnacious; a mere circulation of the better juices and more genial spirits of the marly clay, without arousing any of the baser passions; whiskey is the devil for that.”
“I canna say that I dinna like whiskey toddy,” said the doctor; “in the cauld winter nights it’s no sae bad.”
“Ah, that’s it,” said Power; “there’s the pull you Scotch have upon us poor Patlanders,—cool, calculating, long-headed fellows, you only come up to the mark after fifteen tumblers; whereas we hot-brained devils, with a blood at 212 degrees of Fahrenheit and a high-pressure engine of good spirits always ready for an explosion, we go clean mad when tipsy; not but I am fully convinced that a mad Irishman is worth two sane people of any other country under heaven.”
“If you mean by that insin—insin—sinuation to imply any disrespect to the English,” stuttered out Sparks, “I am bound to say that I for one, and the doctor, I am sure, for another—”
“Na, na,” interrupted the doctor, “ye mauna coont upon me; I’m no disposed to fetch ower our liquor.”
“Then, Major Monsoon, I’m certain—”
“Are ye, faith?” said the major, with a grin; “blessed are they who expect nothing,—of which number you are not,—for most decidedly you shall be disappointed.”
“Never mind, Sparks, take the whole fight to your own proper self, and do battle like a man; and here I stand, ready at all arms to prove my position,—that we drink better, sing better, court better, fight better, and make better punch than every John Bull, from Berwick to the Land’s End.”
Sparks, however, who seemed not exactly sure how far his antagonist was disposed to quiz, relapsed into a half-tipsy expression of contemptuous silence, and sipped his liquor without reply.
“Yes,” said Power, after a pause, “bad luck to it for whiskey; it nearly got me broke once, and poor Tom O’Reilly of the 5th, too, the best-tempered fellow in the service. We were as near it as touch and go; and all for some confounded Loughrea spirits that we believed to be perfectly innocent, and used to swill away freely without suspicion of any kind.”
“Let’s hear the story,” said I, “by all means.”
“It’s not a long one,” said Power, “so I don’t care if I tell it; and besides, if I make a clean breast of my own sins, I’ll insist upon Monsoon’s telling you afterwards how he stocked his cellar in Cadiz. Eh, Major; there’s worse tipple than the King of Spain’s sherry?”
“You shall judge for yourself, old boy,” said Monsoon, good-humoredly; “and as for the narrative, it is equally at your service. Of course it goes no further. The commander-in-chief, long life to him! is a glorious fellow; but he has no more idea of a joke than the Archbishop of Canterbury, and it might chance to reach him.”
“Recount, and fear not!” cried Power; “we are discreet as the worshipful company of apothecaries.”
“But you forget you are to lead the way.”
“Here goes, then,” said the jolly captain; “not that the story has any merit in it, but the moral is beautiful.
“Ireland, to be sure, is a beautiful country; but somehow it would prove a very dull one to be quartered in, if it were not that the people seem to have a natural taste for the army. From the belle of Merrion Square down to the inn-keeper’s daughter in Tralee, the loveliest part of the creation seem to have a perfect appreciation of our high acquirements and advantages; and in no other part of the globe, the Tonga Islands included, is a red-coat more in favor. To be sure, they would be very ungrateful if it were not the case; for we, upon our side, leave no stone unturned to make ourselves agreeable. We ride, drink, play, and make love to the ladies from Fairhead to Killarney, in a way greatly calculated to render us popular; and as far as making the time pass pleasantly, we are the boys for the ‘greatest happiness’ principle. I repeat it; we deserve our popularity. Which of us does not get head and ears in debt with garrison balls and steeple-chases, picnics, regattas, and the thousand-and-one inventions to get rid of one’s spare cash,—so called for being so sparingly dealt out by our governors? Now and then, too, when all else fails, we take a newly-joined ensign and make him marry some pretty but penniless lass in a country town, just to show the rest that we are not joking, but have serious ideas of matrimony in the midst of all our flirtations. If it were all like this, the Green Isle would be a paradise; but unluckily every now and then one is condemned to some infernal place where there is neither a pretty face nor tight ankle, where the priest himself is not a good fellow, and long, ill-paved, straggling streets, filled on market days with booths of striped calico and soapy cheese, is the only promenade, and a ruinous barrack, with mouldy walls and a tumbling chimney, the only quarters.
“In vain, on your return from your morning stroll or afternoon canter, you look on the chimney-piece for a shower of visiting-cards and pink notes of invitation; in vain you ask your servant, ‘Has any one called.’ Alas, your only visitor has been the ganger, to demand a party to assist in still-hunting amidst that interesting class of the population who, having nothing to eat, are engaged in devising drink, and care as much for the life of a red-coat as you do for that of a crow or a curlew. This may seem overdrawn; but I would ask you, Were you ever for your sins quartered in that capital city of the Bog of Allen they call Philipstown? Oh, but it is a romantic spot! They tell us somewhere that much of the expression of the human face divine depends upon the objects which constantly surround us. Thus the inhabitants of mountain districts imbibe, as it were, a certain bold and daring character of expression from the scenery, very different from the placid and monotonous look of those who dwell in plains and valleys; and I can certainly credit the theory in this instance, for every man, woman, and child you meet has a brown, baked, scruffy, turf-like face, that fully satisfies you that if Adam were formed of clay the Philipstown people were worse treated and only made of bog mould.
“Well, one fine morning poor Tom and myself were marched off from Birr, where one might ‘live and love forever,’ to take up our quarters at this sweet spot. Little we knew of Philipstown; and like my friend the adjutant there, when he laid siege to Derry, we made ourentréewith all the pomp we could muster, and though we had no band, our drums and fifes did duty for it; and we brushed along through turf-creels and wicker-baskets of new brogues that obstructed the street till we reached the barrack,—the only testimony of admiration we met with being, I feel bound to admit, from a ragged urchin of ten years, who, with a wattle in his hand, imitated me as I marched along, and when I cried halt, took his leave of us by dexterously fixing his thumb to the side of his nose and outstretching his fingers, as if thus to convey a very strong hint that we were not half so fine fellows as we thought ourselves. Well, four mortal summer months of hot sun and cloudless sky went over, and still we lingered in that vile village, the everlasting monotony of our days being marked by the same brief morning drill, the same blue-legged chicken dinner, the same smoky Loughrea whiskey, and the same evening stroll along the canal bank to watch for the Dublin packet-boat, with its never-varying cargo of cattle-dealers, priests, and peelers on their way to the west country, as though the demand for such colonial productions in these parts was insatiable. This was pleasant, you will say; but what was to be done? We had nothing else. Now, nothing saps a man’s temper likeennui. The cranky, peevish people one meets with would be excellent folk, if they only had something to do. As for us, I’ll venture to say two men more disposed to go pleasantly down the current of life it were hard to meet with; and yet, such was the consequence of these confounded four months’ sequestration from all other society, we became sour and cross-grained, everlastingly disputing about trifles, and continually arguing about matters which neither were interested in, nor, indeed, knew anything about. There were, it is true, few topics to discuss; newspapers we never saw; sporting there was none,—but then, the drill, the return of duty, the probable chances of our being ordered for service, were all daily subjects to be talked over, and usually with considerable asperity and bitterness. One point, however, always served us when hard pushed for a bone of contention; and which, begun by a mere accident at first, gradually increased to a sore and peevish subject, and finally led to the consequences which I have hinted at in the beginning. This was no less than the respective merits of our mutual servants; each everlastingly indulging in a tirade against the other for awkwardness, incivility, unhandiness,—charges, I am bound to confess, most amply proved on either side.
“‘Well, I am sure, O’Reilly, if you can stand that fellow, it’s no affair of mine; but such an ungainly savage I never met,’ I would say.
“To which he would reply, ‘Bad enough he is, certainly; but, by Jove! when I only think of your Hottentot, I feel grateful for what I’ve got.’
“Then ensued a discussion, with attack, rejoinder, charge, and recrimination till we retired for the night, wearied with our exertions, and not a little ashamed of ourselves at bottom for our absurd warmth and excitement. In the morning the matter would be rigidly avoided by each party until some chance occasion had brought it on thetapis, when hostilities would be immediately renewed, and carried on with the same vigor, to end as before.
“In this agreeable state of matters we sat one warm summer evening before the mess-room, under the shade of a canvas awning, discussing, by way of refrigerant, our eighth tumbler of whiskey punch. We had, as usual, been jarring away about everything under heaven. A lately arrived post-chaise, with an old, stiff-looking gentleman in a queue, had formed a kind of ‘godsend’ for debate, as to who he was, whither he was going, whether he really had intended to spend the night there, or that he only put up because the chaise was broken; each, as was customary, maintaining his own opinion with an obstinacy we have often since laughed at, though, at the time, we had few mirthful thoughts about the matter.
“As the debate waxed warm, O’Reilly asserted that he positively knew the individual in question to be a United Irishman, travelling with instructions from the French government; while I laughed him to scorn by swearing that he was the rector of Tyrrell’s Pass, that I knew him well, and, moreover, that he was the worst preacher in Ireland. Singular enough it was that all this while the disputed identity was himself standing coolly at the inn window, with his snuff-box in his hand, leisurely surveying us as we sat, appearing, at least, to take a very lively interest in our debate.
“‘Come, now,’ said O’Reilly, ‘there’s only one way to conclude this, and make you pay for your obstinacy. What will you bet that he’s the rector of Tyrrell’s Pass?’
“‘What odds will you take that he’s Wolfe Tone?’ inquired I, sneeringly.
“‘Five to one against the rector,’ said he, exultingly.
“‘An elephant’s molar to a toothpick against Wolfe Tone,’ cried I.
“‘Ten pounds even that I’m nearer the mark than you,’ said Tom, with a smash of his fist upon the table.
“‘Done,’ said I,—‘done. But how are we to decide the wager?’
“‘That’s soon done,’ said he. At the same instant he sprang to his legs and called out: ‘Pat, I say, Pat, I want you to present my respects to—’
“‘No, no, I bar that; noex partestatements. Here, Jem, do you simply tell that—’
“‘That fellow can’t deliver a message. Do come here, Pat. Just beg of—’
“‘He’ll blunder it, the confounded fool; so, Jem, do you go.’
“The two individuals thus addressed were just in the act of conveying a tray of glasses and a spiced round of beef for supper into the mess-room; and as I may remark that they fully entered into the feelings of jealousy their respective masters professed, each eyed the other with a look of very unequivocal dislike.
“‘Arrah! you needn’t be pushing me that way,’ said Pat, ‘an’ the round o’ beef in my hands.’
“‘Devil’s luck to ye, it’s the glasses you’ll be breaking with your awkward elbow!’
“‘Then, why don’t ye leave the way? Ain’t I your suparior?’
“‘Ain’t I the captain’s own man?’
“‘Ay, and if you war. Don’t I belong to his betters? Isn’t my master the two liftenants?’
“This, strange as it may sound, was so far true, as I held a commission in an African corps, with my lieutenancy in the 5th.
“‘Be-gorra, av he was six—There now, you done it!’
“At the same moment, a tremendous crash took place and the large dish fell in a thousand pieces on the pavement, while the spiced round rolled pensively down the yard.
The Rival Flunkies.
“Scarcely was the noise heard when, with one vigorous kick, the tray of glasses was sent spinning into the air, and the next moment the disputants were engaged in bloody battle. It was at this moment that our attention was first drawn towards them, and I need not say with what feelings of interest we looked on.
“‘Hit him, Pat—there, Jem, under the guard! That’s it—go in! Well done, left hand! By Jove! that was a facer! His eye’s closed—he’s down! Not a bit of it—how do you like that? Unfair, unfair! No such thing! I say it was! Not at all—I deny it!’
“By this time we had approached the combatants, each man patting his own fellow on the back, and encouraging him by the most lavish promises. Now it was, but in what way I never could exactly tell, that I threw out my right hand to stop a blow that I saw coming rather too near me, when, by some unhappy mischance, my doubled fist lighted upon Tom O’Reilly’s nose. Before I could express my sincere regret for the accident, the blow was returned with double force, and the next moment we were at it harder than the others. After five minutes’ sharp work, we both stopped for breath, and incontinently burst out a-laughing. There was Tom, with a nose as large as three, a huge cheek on one side, and the whole head swinging round like a harlequin’s; while I, with one eye closed, and the other like a half-shut cockle-shell, looked scarcely less rueful. We had not much time for mirth, for at the same instant a sharp, full voice called out close beside us—
“To your quarters, sirs. I put you both under arrest, from which you are not to be released until the sentence of a court-martial decide if conduct such as this becomes officers and gentlemen.’
“I looked round, and saw the old fellow in the queue.
“‘Wolfe Tone, by all that’s unlucky!’ said I, with an attempt at a smile.
“‘The rector of Tyrrell’s Pass,’ cried out Tom, with a snuffle; ‘the worst preacher in Ireland—eh, Fred?’
“We had not much time for further commentaries upon our friend, for he at once opened his frock coat, and displayed to our horrified gaze the uniform of a general officer.
“‘Yes, sir, General Johnson, if you will allow me to present him to your acquaintance; and now, guard, turn out.’
“In a few minutes more the orders were issued, and poor Tom and myself found ourselves fast confined to our quarters, with a sentinel at the door, and the pleasant prospect that, in the space of about ten days, we should be broke, and dismissed the service; which verdict, as the general order would say, the commander of the forces has been graciously pleased to approve.
“However, when morning came the old general, who was really a trump, inquired a little further into the matter, saw it was partly accidental, and after a severe reprimand, and a caution about Loughrea whiskey after the sixth tumbler, released us from arrest, and forgave the whole affair.”
THE VOYAGE CONTINUED.
Ugh, what a miserable thing is a voyage! Here we are now eight days at sea, the eternal sameness of all around growing every hour less supportable. Sea and sky are beautiful things when seen from the dark woods and waving meadows on shore; but their picturesque effect is sadly marred from want of contrast. Besides that, the “toujourspork,” with crystals of salt as long as your wife’s fingers; the potatoes that seemed varnished in French polish; the tea seasoned with geological specimens from the basin of London, ycleped maple sugar; and the butter—ye gods, the butter! But why enumerate these smaller features of discomfort and omit the more glaring ones?—the utter selfishness which blue water suggests, as inevitably as the cold fit follows the ague. The good fellow that shares his knapsack or his last guinea on land, here forages out the best corner to hang his hammock; jockeys you into a comfortless crib, where the uncalked deck-butt filters every rain from heaven on your head; votes you the corner at dinner, not only that he may place you with your back to the thorough-draught of the gangway ladder, but that he may eat, drink, and lie down before you have even begun to feel the qualmishness that the dinner of a troop-ship is well calculated to suggest; cuts his pencil with your best razor; wears your shirts, as washing is scarce; and winds up all by having a good story of you every evening for the edification of the other “sharp gentlemen,” who, being too wide awake to be humbugged themselves, enjoy his success prodigiously. This, gentle reader, is neither confession nor avowal of mine. The passage I have here presented to you I have taken from the journal of my brother officer, Mr. Sparks, who, when not otherwise occupied, usually employed his time in committing to paper his thoughts upon men, manners, and things at sea in general; though, sooth to say, his was not an idle life. Being voted by unanimous consent “a junior,” he was condemned to offices that the veriest fag in Eton or Harrow had rebelled against. In the morning, under the pseudonym ofMrs. Sparks, he presided at breakfast, having previously made tea, coffee, and chocolate for the whole cabin, besides boiling about twenty eggs at various degrees of hardness; he was under heavy recognizances to provide a plate of buttered toast of very alarming magnitude, fried ham, kidneys, etc., to no end. Later on, when others sauntered about the deck, vainly endeavoring to fix their attention upon a novel or a review, the poor cornet might be seen with a white apron tucked gracefully round his spare proportions, whipping eggs for pancakes, or, with upturned shirt-sleeves, fashioning dough for a pudding. As the day waned, the cook’s galley became his haunt, where, exposed to a roasting fire, he inspected the details of acuisine; for which, whatever his demerits, he was sure of an ample remuneration in abuse at dinner. Then came the dinner itself, that dread ordeal, where nothing was praised and everything censured. This was followed by the punch-making, where the tastes of six different and differing individuals were to be exclusively consulted in the self-same beverage; and lastly, the supper at night, when Sparkie, as he was familiarly called, towards evening grown quite exhausted, became the subject of unmitigated wrath and most unmeasured reprobation.
“I say, Sparks, it’s getting late. The spatch-cock, old boy. Don’t be slumbering.”
“By-the-bye, Sparkie, what a mess you made of that pea-soup to-day! By Jove, I never felt so ill in my life!”
“Na, na; it was na the soup. It was something he pit in the punch, that’s burning me ever since I tuk it. Ou, man, but ye’re an awfu’ creture wi’ vittals!”
“He’ll improve, Doctor; he’ll improve. Don’t discourage him; the boy’s young. Be alive now, there. Where’s the toast?—confound you, where’s the toast?”
“There, Sparks, you like a drumstick, I know. Mustn’t muzzle the ox, eh? Scripture for you, old boy. Eat away; hang the expense. Hand him over the jug. Empty—eh, Charley? Come, Sparkie, bear a hand; the liquor’s out.”
“But won’t you let me eat?”
“Eat! Heavens, what a fellow for eating! By George, such an appetite is clean against the articles of war! Come, man, it’s drink we’re thinking of. There’s the rum, sugar, limes; see to the hot water. Well, Skipper, how are we getting on?”
“Lying our course; eight knots off the log. Pass the rum. Why, Mister Sparks!”
“Eh, Sparks, what’s this?”
“Sparks, my man, confound it!”
And then,omneschorussing “Sparks!” in every key of the gamut, the luckless fellow would be obliged to jump up from his meagre fare and set to work at a fresh brewage of punch for the others. The bowl and the glasses filled, by some little management on Power’s part our friend the cornet would bedrawn out, as the phrase is, into some confession of his early years, which seemed to have been exclusively spent in love-making,—devotion to the fair being as integral a portion of his character as tippling was of the worthy major’s.
Like most men who pass their lives in over-studious efforts to please,—however ungallant the confession be,—the amiable Sparks had had little success. His love, if not, as it generally happened, totally unrequited, was invariably the source of some awkward catastrophe, there being no imaginable error he had not at some time or other fallen into, nor any conceivable mischance to which he had not been exposed. Inconsolable widows, attached wives, fond mothers, newly-married brides, engaged young ladies were by somecontretempscontinually the subject of his attachments; and the least mishap which followed the avowal of his passion was to be heartily laughed at and obliged to leave the neighborhood. Duels, apologies, actions at law, compensations, etc., were of every-day occurrence, and to such an extent, too, that any man blessed with a smaller bump upon the occiput would eventually have long since abandoned the pursuit, and taken to some less expensive pleasure. But poor Sparks, in the true spirit of a martyr, only gloried the more, the more he suffered; and like the worthy man who continued to purchase tickets in the lottery for thirty years, with nothing but a succession of blanks, he ever imagined that Fortune was only trying his patience, and had some cool forty thousand pounds of happiness waiting his perseverance in the end. Whether this prize ever did turn up in the course of years, I am unable to say; but certainly, up to the period of his history I now speak of, all had been as gloomy and unrequiting as need be. Power, who knew something of every man’s adventures, was aware of so much of poor Sparks’s career, and usually contrived to lay a trap for a confession that generally served to amuse us during an evening,—as much, I acknowledge, from the manner of the recital as anything contained in the story. There was a species of serious matter-of-fact simplicity in his detail of the most ridiculous scenes that left you convinced that his bearing upon the affair in question must have greatly heightened the absurdity,—nothing, however comic or droll in itself, ever exciting in him the least approach to a smile. He sat with his large light-blue eyes, light hair, long upper lip, and retreating chin, lisping out an account of an adventure, with a look of Listen about him that was inconceivably amusing.
“Come, Sparks,” said Power, “I claim a promise you made me the other night, on condition we let you off making the oyster-patties at ten o’clock; you can’t forget what I mean.” Here the captain knowingly touched the tip of his ear, at which signal the cornet colored slightly, and drank off his wine in a hurried, confused way. “He promised to tell us, Major, how he lost the tip of his left ear. I have myself heard hints of the circumstance, but would much rather hear Sparks’s own version of it.”
“Another love story,” said the doctor, with a grin, “I’ll be bound.”
“Shot off in a duel?” said I, inquiringly. “Close work, too.”
“No such thing,” replied Power; “but Sparks will enlighten you. It is, without exception, the most touching and beautiful thing I ever heard. As a simple story, it beats the ‘Vicar of Wakefield’ to sticks.”
“You don’t say so?” said poor Sparks, blushing.
“Ay, that I do; and maintain it, too. I’d rather be the hero of that little adventure, and be able to recount it as you do,—for, mark me, that’s no small part of the effect,—than I’d be full colonel of the regiment. Well, I am sure I always thought it affecting. But, somehow, my dear friend, you don’t know your powers; you have that within you would make the fortune of half the periodicals going. Ask Monsoon or O’Malley there if I did not say so at breakfast, when you were grilling the old hen,—which, by-the-bye, let me remark, was not one of yourchefs-d’oeuvre.”
“A tougher beastie I never put a tooth in.”
“But the story, the story,” said I.
“Yes,” said Power, with a tone of command, “the story, Sparks.”
“Well, if you really think it worth telling, as I have always felt it a very remarkable incident, here goes.”