Chapter Seven.

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 thatno personwas 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’snotwell,” 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.

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.

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 thatno personwas 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’snotwell,” 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, nowLeap 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 adecidedand mostemphaticcontradiction. 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 pleasehimat 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.

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

For once, upon a raw and gusty day,The troubled Tiber chafing with her shores,Caesar said to me—“Darest thou, Cassius, nowLeap 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 adecidedand mostemphaticcontradiction. 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 pleasehimat 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 ofyourboots are worn down on the inside and not touched on the outside.”“Denny Smith, your mother must have rearedyou, for shure you must have been bow-legged from an infant;yourboot-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 abullethad 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 wasthought, 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 horsemighthave 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, positivelynailed to the servicefor 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 réveillé 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 asteady, good motifand 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 theHue and Cry.

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.

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 ofyourboots are worn down on the inside and not touched on the outside.”

“Denny Smith, your mother must have rearedyou, for shure you must have been bow-legged from an infant;yourboot-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 abullethad 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 wasthought, 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 horsemighthave 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, positivelynailed to the servicefor 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 réveillé 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 asteady, good motifand 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 theHue 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 drumBid 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 réveillé 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’sshewas 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.

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 drumBid intruding care be dumb;Sprightly still we sing and play,And make dull life a holiday.

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 drumBid 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 réveillé 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’sshewas 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.

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