"He's not in uniform, then?"

"No, sir; he has a round hat."

"A round hat!"

"His sash—"

"A sword and sash. This is too bad. I'm determined to find him out."

"How d'ye do, General?" cried Webber, as he rode towards the trees.

"Stop, sir!" shouted Sir George.

"Good-day, Sir George," replied Webber, retiring.

"Stay where you are, Lucy," said the general as, dashing spurs into his horse, he sprang forward at a gallop, incensed beyond endurance that his most strict orders should be so openly and insultingly transgressed.

Webber led on to a deep hollow, where the road passed between two smooth slopes, covered with furze-trees, and from which it emerged afterwards in the thickest and most intricate part of the Park. Sir George dashed boldly after, and in less than half a minute both were lost to my view, leaving me in breathless amazement at Master Frank's ingenuity, and some puzzle as to my own future movements.

"Now then, or never!" said I, as I pushed boldly forward, and in an instant was alongside of Miss Dashwood. Her astonishment at seeing me so suddenly increased the confusion from which I felt myself suffering, and for some minutes I could scarcely speak. At last I plucked up courage a little, and said:—

"Miss Dashwood, I have looked most anxiously, for the last four days, for the moment which chance has now given me. I wished, before I parted forever with those to whom I owe already so much, that I should at least speak my gratitude ere I said good-by."

"But when do you think of going?"

"To-morrow. Captain Power, under whose command I am, has received orders to embark immediately for Portugal."

I thought—perhaps it was but a thought—that her cheek grew somewhat paler as I spoke; but she remained silent; and I, scarcely knowing what I had said, or whether I had finished, spoke not either.

"Papa, I'm sure, is not aware," said she, after a long pause, "of your intention of leaving so soon, for only last night he spoke of some letters he meant to give you to some friends in the Peninsula; besides, I know," here she smiled faintly,—"that he destined some excellent advice for your ears, as to your new path in life, for he has an immense opinion of the value of such to a young officer."

"I am, indeed, most grateful to Sir George, and truly never did any one stand more in need of counsel than I do." This was said half musingly, and not intended to be heard.

"Then, pray, consult papa," said she, eagerly; "he is much attached to you, and will, I am certain, do all in his power—"

"Alas! I fear not, Miss Dashwood."

"Why, what can you mean. Has anything so serious occurred?"

"No, no; I'm but misleading you, and exciting your sympathy with false pretences. Should I tell you all the truth, you would not pardon, perhaps not hear me."

"You have, indeed, puzzled me; but if there is anything in which my father—"

"Less him than his daughter," said I, fixing my eyes full upon her as I spoke. "Yes, Lucy, I feel I must confess it, cost what it may; I love you. Stay, hear me out; I know the fruitlessness, the utter despair, that awaits such a sentiment. My own heart tells me that I am not, cannot be, loved in return; yet would I rather cherish in its core my affection, slighted and unblessed, such as it is, than own another heart. I ask for nothing, I hope for nothing; I merely entreat that, for my truth, I may meet belief, and for my heart's worship of her whom alone I can love, compassion. I see that you at least pity me. Nay, one word more; I have one favor more to ask,—it is my last, my only one. Do not, when time and distance may have separated us, perhaps forever, think that the expressions I now use are prompted by a mere sudden ebullition of boyish feeling; do not attribute to the circumstance of my youth alone the warmth of the attachment I profess,—for I swear to you, by every hope that I have, that in my heart of hearts my love to you is the source and spring of every action in my life, of every aspiration in my heart; and when I cease to love you, I shall cease to feel."

"And now, farewell,—farewell forever!" I pressed her hand to my lips, gave one long, last look, turned my horse rapidly away, and ere a minute was far out of sight of where I had left her.



CHAPTER XXII.

THE ROAD.

Power was detained in town by some orders from the adjutant-general, so that I started for Cork the next morning with no other companion than my servant Mike. For the first few stages upon the road, my own thoughts sufficiently occupied me to render me insensible or indifferent to all else. My opening career, the prospects my new life as a soldier held out, my hopes of distinction, my love of Lucy with all its train of doubts and fears, passed in review before me, and I took no note of time till far past noon. I now looked to the back part of the coach, where Mike's voice had been, as usual, in the ascendant for some time, and perceived that he was surrounded by an eager auditory of four raw recruits, who, under the care of a sergeant, were proceeding to Cork to be enrolled in their regiment. The sergeant, whose minutes of wakefulness were only those when the coach stopped to change horses, and when he got down to mix a "summat hot," paid little attention to his followers, leaving them perfectly free in all their movements, to listen to Mike's eloquence and profit by his suggestions, should they deem fit. Master Michael's services to his new acquaintances, I began to perceive, were not exactly of the same nature as Dibdin is reported to have rendered to our navy in the late war. Far from it. His theme was no contemptuous disdain for danger; no patriotic enthusiasm to fight for home and country; no proud consciousness of British valor, mingled with the appropriate hatred of our mutual enemies,—on the contrary, Mike's eloquence was enlisted for the defendant. He detailed, and in no unimpressive way either, the hardships of a soldier's life,—its dangers, its vicissitudes, its chances, its possible penalties, its inevitably small rewards; and, in fact, so completely did he work on the feelings of his hearers that I perceived more than one glance exchanged between the victims that certainly betokened anything save the resolve to fight for King George. It was at the close of a long and most powerful appeal upon the superiority of any other line in life, petty larceny and small felony inclusive, that he concluded with the following quotation:—

"Thrue for ye, boys!

'With your red scarlet coat, You're as proud as a goat, And your long cap and feather.'

But, by the piper that played before Moses! it's more whipping nor gingerbread is going on among them, av ye knew but all, and heerd the misfortune that happened to my father."

"And was he a sodger?" inquired one.

"Troth was he, more sorrow to him; and wasn't he a'most whipped one day for doing what he was bid?"

"Musha, but that was hard!"

"To be sure it was hard; but faix, when my father seen that they didn't know their own minds, he thought, anyhow, he knew his, so he ran away,—and devil a bit of him they ever cotch afther. May be ye might like to hear the story; and there's instruction in it for yez, too."

A general request to this end being preferred by the company, Mike took a shrewd look at the sergeant, to be sure that he was still sleeping, settled his coat comfortably across his knees, and began:—

Well, it's a good many years ago my father 'listed in the North Cork, just to oblige Mr. Barry, the landlord there. For,' says he, 'Phil,' says he, 'it's not a soldier ye'll be at all, but my own man, to brush my clothes and go errands, and the like o' that; and the king, long life to him! will help to pay ye for your trouble. Ye understand me?' Well, my father agreed, and Mr. Barry was as good as his word. Never a guard did my father mount, nor as much as a drill had he, nor a roll-call, nor anything at all, save and except wait on the captain, his master, just as pleasant as need be, and no inconvenience in life.

"Well, for three years this went on as I am telling, and the regiment was ordered down to Bantry, because of a report that the 'boys' was rising down there; and the second evening there was a night party patrolling with Captain Barry for six hours in the rain, and the captain, God be marciful to him! tuk could and died. More by token, they said it was drink, but my father says it wasn't: 'for' says he, 'after he tuk eight tumblers comfortable,' my father mixed the ninth, and the captain waived his hand this way, as much as to say he'd have no more. 'Is it that ye mean?' says my father; and the captain nodded. 'Musha, but it's sorry I am,' says my father, 'to see you this way; for ye must be bad entirely to leave off in the beginning of the evening.' And thrue for him, the captain was dead in the morning.

"A sorrowful day it was for my father when he died. It was the finest place in the world; little to do, plenty of divarsion, and a kind man he was,—when he was drunk. Well, then, when the captain was buried and all was over, my father hoped they'd be for letting him away, as he said, 'Sure, I'm no use in life to anybody, save the man that's gone, for his ways are all I know, and I never was a sodger.' But, upon my conscience, they had other thoughts in their heads, for they ordered him into the ranks to be drilled just like the recruits they took the day before.

"'Musha, isn't this hard?' said my father. 'Here I am, an ould vitrin that ought to be discharged on a pension with two-and-sixpence a day, obliged to go capering about the barrack-yard, practising the goose-step, or some other nonsense not becoming my age nor my habits.' But so it was. Well, this went on for some time, and sure, if they were hard on my father, hadn't he his revenge; for he nigh broke their hearts with his stupidity. Oh, nothing in life could equal him! Devil a thing, no matter how easy, he could learn at all; and so far from caring for being in confinement, it was that he liked best. Every sergeant in the regiment had a trial of him, but all to no good; and he seemed striving so hard to learn all the while that they were loath to punish him, the ould rogue!

"This was going on for some time, when, one day, news came in that a body of the rebels, as they called them, was coming down from the Gap of Mulnavick to storm the town and burn all before them. The whole regiment was of coorse under arms, and great preparations was made for a battle. Meanwhile patrols were ordered to scour the roads, and sentries posted at every turn of the way and every rising ground to give warning when the boys came in sight; and my father was placed at the Bridge of Drumsnag, in the wildest and bleakest part of the whole country, with nothing but furze mountains on every side, and a straight road going over the top of them.

"'This is pleasant,' says my father, as soon as they left him there alone by himself, with no human creature to speak to, nor a whiskey-shop within ten miles of him; 'cowld comfort,' says he, 'on a winter's day; and faix, but I have a mind to give ye the slip.'

"Well, he put his gun down on the bridge, and he lit his pipe, and he sat down under an ould tree and began to ruminate upon his affairs.

"'Oh, then, it's wishing it well I am,' says he, 'for sodgering; and bad luck to the hammer that struck the shilling that 'listed me, that's all,' for he was mighty low in his heart.

"Just then a noise came rattling down near him. He listened, and before he could get on his legs, down comes' the general, ould Cohoon, with an orderly after him.

"'Who goes there?' says my father.

"'The round,' says the general, looking about all the time to see where was the sentry, for my father was snug under the tree.

"'What round?' says my father.

"'The grand round,' says the general, more puzzled than afore.

"'Pass on, grand round, and God save you kindly!' says my father, putting his pipe in his mouth again, for he thought all was over.

"'D—n your soul, where are you?' says the general, for sorrow bit of my father could he see yet.

"'It's here I am,' says he, 'and a cowld place I have of it; and if it wasn't for the pipe I'd be lost entirely.'

"The words wasn't well out of his mouth when the general began laughing, till ye'd think he'd fall off his horse; and the dragoon behind him—more by token, they say it wasn't right for him—laughed as loud as himself.

"'Yer a droll sentry,' says the general, as soon as he could speak.

"'Be-gorra, it's little fun there's left in me,' says my father, 'with this drilling, and parading, and blackguarding about the roads all night.'

"'And is this the way you salute your officer?' says the general.

"'Just so,' says my father; 'devil a more politeness ever they taught me.'

"'What regiment do you belong to?' says the general.

"'The North Cork, bad luck to them!' says my father, with a sigh.

"'They ought to be proud of ye,' says the general.

"'I'm sorry for it,' says my father, sorrowfully, 'for may be they'll keep me the longer.'

"'Well, my good fellow,' says the general, 'I haven't more time to waste here; but let me teach you something before I go. Whenever your officer passes, it's your duty to present to him.'

"'Arrah, it's jokin' ye are,' says my father.

"'No, I'm in earnest,' says he, 'as ye might learn, to your cost, if I brought you to a court-martial.'

"'Well, there's no knowing,' says my father, 'what they'd be up to; but sure, if that's all, I'll do it, with all "the veins," whenever yer coming this way again.'

"The general began to laugh again here; but said,—

'I'm coming back in the evening,' says he, 'and mind you don't forget your respect to your officer.'

"'Never fear, sir,' says my father; 'and many thanks to you for your kindness for telling me.'

"Away went the general, and the orderly after him, and in ten minutes they were out of sight.

"The night was falling fast, and one half of the mountain was quite dark already, when my father began to think they were forgetting him entirely. He looked one way, and he looked another, but sorra bit of a sergeant's guard was coming to relieve him. There he was, fresh and fasting, and daren't go for the bare life. 'I'll give you a quarter of an hour more,' says my father, 'till the light leaves that rock up there; after that,' says he, 'by the Mass! I'll be off, av it cost me what it may.'

"Well, sure enough, his courage was not needed this time; for what did he see at the same moment but a shadow of something coming down the road opposite the bridge. He looked again; and then he made out the general himself, that was walking his horse down the steep part of the mountain, followed by the orderly. My father immediately took up his musket off the wall, settled his belts, shook the ashes out of his pipe and put it into his pocket, making himself as smart and neat-looking as he could be, determining, when ould Cohoon came up, to ask him for leave to go home, at least for the night. Well, by this time the general was turning a sharp part of the cliff that looks down upon the bridge, from where you might look five miles round on every side. 'He sees me,' says my father; 'but I'll be just as quick as himself.' No sooner said than done; for coming forward to the parapet of the bridge, he up with his musket to his shoulder, and presented it straight at the general. It wasn't well there, when the officer pulled up his horse quite short, and shouted out, 'Sentry! sentry!'

"'Anan?' says my father, still covering him.

"'Down with your musket you rascal. Don't you see it's the grand round?'

"'To be sure I do,' says my father, never changing for a minute.

"'The ruffian will shoot me,' says the general.

"'Devil a fear,' says my father, 'av it doesn't go off of itself.'

"'What do you mean by that, you villian?' says the general, scarcely able to speak with fright, for every turn he gave on his horse, my father followed with the gun,—what do you mean?'

"'Sure, ain't I presenting?' says my father. 'Blood an ages! do you want me to fire next?'

"With that the general drew a pistol from his holster, and took deliberate aim at my father; and there they both stood for five minutes, looking at each other, the orderly all the while breaking his heart laughing behind a rock; for, ye see, the general knew av he retreated that my father might fire on purpose, and av he came on, that he might fire by chance,—and sorra bit he knew what was best to be done.

"'Are ye going to pass the evening up there, grand round?' says my father; 'for it's tired I'm getting houldin' this so long.'

"'Port arms!' shouted the general, as if on parade.

"'Sure I can't, till yer past,' says my father, angrily; 'and my hands trembling already.'

"'By Heavens! I shall be shot,' says the general.

"'Be-gorra, it's what I'm afraid of,' says my father; and the words wasn't out of his mouth before off went the musket, bang!—and down fell the general, smack on the ground, senseless. Well the orderly ran out at this, and took him up and examined his wound; but it wasn't a wound at all, only the wadding of the gun. For my father—God be kind to him!—ye see, could do nothing right; and so he bit off the wrong end of the cartridge when he put it in the gun, and, by reason, there was no bullet in it. Well, from that day after they never got a sight of him; for the instant that the general dropped, he sprang over the bridge-wall and got away; and what, between living in a lime-kiln for two months, eating nothing but blackberries and sloes, and other disguises, he never returned to the army, but ever after took to a civil situation, and drive a hearse for many years."

How far Mike's narrative might have contributed to the support of his theory, I am unable to pronounce; for his auditory were, at some distance from Cork, made to descend from their lofty position and join a larger body of recruits, all proceeding to the same destination, under a strong escort of infantry. For ourselves, we reached the "beautiful city" in due time, and took up our quarters at the Old George Hotel.



CHAPTER XXIII.

CORK.

The undress rehearsal of a new piece, with its dirty-booted actors, its cloaked and hooded actresses en papillote, bears about the same relation to the gala, wax-lit, and bespangled ballet, as the raw young gentleman of yesterday to the epauletted, belted, and sabretasched dragoon, whose transformation is due to a few hours of head-quarters, and a few interviews with the adjutant.

So, at least, I felt it; and it was with a very perfect concurrence in his Majesty's taste in a uniform, and a most entire approval of the regimental tailor, that I strutted down George's Street a few days after my arrival in Cork. The transports had not as yet come round; there was a great doubt of their doing so for a week or so longer; and I found myself as the dashing cornet, the centre of a thousand polite attentions and most kind civilities.

The officer under whose orders I was placed for the time was a great friend of Sir George Dashwood's, and paid me, in consequence, much attention. Major Dalrymple had been on the staff from the commencement of his military career, had served in the commissariat for some time, was much on foreign stations; but never, by any of the many casualties of his life, had he seen what could be called service. His ideas of the soldier's profession were, therefore, what might almost be as readily picked up by a commission in the battle-axe guards, as one in his Majesty's Fiftieth. He was now a species of district paymaster, employed in a thousand ways, either inspecting recruits, examining accounts, revising sick certificates, or receiving contracts for mess beef. Whether the nature of his manifold occupations had enlarged the sphere of his talents and ambition, or whether the abilities had suggested the variety of his duties, I know not, but truly the major was a man of all work. No sooner did a young ensign join his regiment at Cork, than Major Dalrymple's card was left at his quarters; the next day came the major himself; the third brought an invitation to dinner; on the fourth he was told to drop in, in the evening; and from thenceforward, he was the ami de la maison, in company with numerous others as newly-fledged and inexperienced as himself.

One singular feature of the society at the house was that although the major was as well known as the flag on Spike Island, yet somehow, no officer above the rank of an ensign was ever to be met with there. It was not that he had not a large acquaintance; in fact, the "How are you, Major?" "How goes it, Dalrymple?" that kept everlastingly going on as he walked the streets, proved the reverse; but strange enough, his predilections leaned towards the newly gazetted, far before the bronzed and seared campaigners who had seen the world, and knew more about it. The reasons for this line of conduct were twofold. In the first place, there was not an article of outfit, from a stock to a sword-belt, that he could not and did not supply to the young officer,—from the gorget of the infantry to the shako of the grenadier, all came within his province; not that he actually kept a magasin of these articles, but he had so completely interwoven his interests with those of numerous shopkeepers in Cork that he rarely entered a shop over whose door Dalrymple & Co. might not have figured on the sign-board. His stables were filled with a perfect infirmary of superannuated chargers, fattened and conditioned up to a miracle, and groomed to perfection. He could get you—only you—about three dozen of sherry to take out with you as sea-store; he knew of such a servant; he chanced upon such a camp-furniture yesterday in his walks; in fact, why want for anything? His resources were inexhaustible; his kindness unbounded.

Then money was no object,—hang it, you could pay when you liked; what signified it? In other words, a bill at thirty-one days, cashed and discounted by a friend of the major's, would always do. While such were the unlimited advantages his acquaintance conferred, the sphere of his benefits took another range. The major had two daughters; Matilda and Fanny were as well known in the army as Lord Fitzroy Somerset, or Picton, from the Isle of Wight to Halifax, from Cape Coast to Chatham, from Belfast to the Bermudas. Where was the subaltern who had not knelt at the shrine of one or the other, if not of both, and vowed eternal love until a change of quarters? In plain words, the major's solicitude for the service was such, that, not content with providing the young officer with all the necessary outfit of his profession, he longed also to supply him with a comforter for his woes, a charmer for his solitary hours, in the person of one of his amiable daughters. Unluckily, however, the necessity for a wife is not enforced by "general orders," as is the cut of your coat, or the length of your sabre; consequently, the major's success in the home department of his diplomacy was not destined for the same happy results that awaited it when engaged about drill trousers and camp kettles, and the Misses Dalrymple remained misses through every clime and every campaign. And yet, why was it so? It is hard to say. What would men have? Matilda was a dark-haired, dark-eyed, romantic-looking girl, with a tall figure and a slender waist, with more poetry in her head than would have turned any ordinary brain; always unhappy, in need of consolation, never meeting with the kindred spirit that understood her, destined to walk the world alone, her fair thoughts smothered in the recesses of her own heart. Devilish hard to stand this, when you began in a kind of platonic friendship on both sides. More than one poor fellow nearly succumbed, particularly when she came to quote Cowley, and told him, with tears in her eyes,—

"There are hearts that live and love alone," etc.

I'm assured that this coup-de-grace rarely failed in being followed by a downright avowal of open love, which, somehow, what between the route coming, what with waiting for leave from home, etc., never got further than a most tender scene, and exchange of love tokens; and, in fact, such became so often the termination, that Power swears Matty had to make a firm resolve about cutting off any more hair, fearing a premature baldness during the recruiting season.

Now, Fanny had selected another arm of the service. Her hair was fair; her eyes blue, laughing, languishing,—mischief-loving blue, with long lashes, and a look in them that was wont to leave its impression rather longer than you exactly knew of; then, her figure was petite, but perfect; her feet Canova might have copied; and her hand was a study for Titian; her voice, too, was soft and musical, but full of that gaiete de coeur that never fails to charm. While her sister's style was il penserono, hers was l'allegro; every imaginable thing, place, or person supplied food for her mirth, and her sister's lovers all came in for their share. She hunted with Smith Barry's hounds; she yachted with the Cove Club; she coursed, practised at a mark with a pistol, and played chicken hazard with all the cavalry,—for, let it be remarked as a physiological fact, Matilda's admirers were almost invariably taken from the infantry, while Fanny's adorers were as regularly dragoons. Whether the former be the romantic arm of the service, and the latter be more adapted to dull realities, or whether the phenomenon had any other explanation, I leave to the curious. Now, this arrangement, proceeding upon that principle which has wrought such wonders in Manchester and Sheffield,—the division of labor,—was a most wise and equitable one, each having her one separate and distinct field of action, interference was impossible; not but that when, as in the present instance, cavalry was in the ascendant, Fanny would willingly spare a dragoon or two to her sister, who likewise would repay the debt when occasion offered.

The mamma—for it is time I should say something of the head of the family—was an excessively fat, coarse-looking, dark-skinned personage, of some fifty years, with a voice like a boatswain in a quinsy. Heaven can tell, perhaps, why the worthy major allied his fortunes with hers, for she was evidently of a very inferior rank in society, could never have been aught than downright ugly, and I never heard that she brought him any money. "Spoiled five," the national amusement of her age and sex in Cork, scandal, the changes in the army list, the failures in speculation of her luckless husband, the forlorn fortunes of the girls, her daughters, kept her in occupation, and her days were passed in one perpetual, unceasing current of dissatisfaction and ill-temper with all around, that formed a heavy counterpoise to the fascinations of the young ladies. The repeated jiltings to which they had been subject had blunted any delicacy upon the score of their marriage; and if the newly-introduced cornet or ensign was not coming forward, as became him, at the end of the requisite number of days, he was sure of receiving a very palpable admonition from Mrs. Dalrymple. Hints, at first dimly shadowed, that Matilda was not in spirits this morning; that Fanny, poor child, had a headache,—directed especially at the culprit in question,—grew gradually into those little motherly fondnesses in mamma, that, like the fascination of the rattlesnake, only lure on to ruin. The doomed man was pressed to dinner when all others were permitted to take their leave; he was treated like one of the family, God help him! After dinner, the major would keep him an hour over his wine, discussing the misery of an ill-assorted marriage; detailing his own happiness in marrying a woman like the Tonga Islander I have mentioned; hinting that girls should be brought up, not only to become companions to their husbands, but with ideas fitting their station; if his auditor were a military man, that none but an old officer (like him) could know how to educate girls (like his); and that feeling he possessed two such treasures, his whole aim in life was to guard and keep them,—a difficult task, when proposals of the most flattering kind were coming constantly before him. Then followed a fresh bottle, during which the major would consult his young friend upon a very delicate affair,—no less than a proposition for the hand of Miss Matilda, or Fanny, whichever he was supposed to be soft upon. This was generally a coup-de-maitre; should he still resist, he was handed over to Mrs. Dalrymple, with a strong indictment against him, and rarely did he escape a heavy sentence. Now, is it not strange that two really pretty girls, with fully enough of amiable and pleasing qualities to have excited the attention and won the affections of many a man, should have gone on for years,—for, alas! they did so in every climate, under every sun,—to waste their sweetness in this miserable career of intrigue and man-trap, and yet nothing come of it? But so it was. The first question a newly-landed regiment was asked, if coming from where they resided, was, "Well, how are the girls?" "Oh, gloriously. Matty is there." "Ah, indeed! poor thing." "Has Fan sported a new habit?" "Is it the old gray with the hussar braiding? Confound it, that was seedy when I saw them in Corfu. And Mother Dal as fat and vulgar as ever?" "Dawson of ours was the last, and was called up for sentence when we were ordered away; of course, he bolted," etc. Such was the invariable style of question and answer concerning them; and although some few, either from good feeling or fastidiousness, relished but little the mode in which it had become habitual to treat them, I grieve to say that, generally, they were pronounced fair game for every species of flirtation and love-making without any "intentions" for the future. I should not have trespassed so far upon my readers' patience, were I not, in recounting these traits of my friends above, narrating matters of history. How many are there who may cast their eyes upon these pages, that will say, "Poor Matilda! I knew her at Gibraltar. Little Fanny was the life and soul of us all in Quebec."

"Mr. O'Malley," said the adjutant, as I presented myself in the afternoon of my arrival in Cork to a short, punchy, little red-faced gentleman, in a short jacket and ducks, "you are, I perceive, appointed to the 14th; you will have the goodness to appear on parade to-morrow morning. The riding-school hours are——. The morning drill is——; evening drill——. Mr. Minchin, you are a 14th man, I believe? No, I beg pardon! a carbineer; but no matter. Mr. O'Malley, Mr. Minchin; Captain Dounie, Mr. O'Malley. You'll dine with us to-day, and to-morrow you shall be entered at the mess."

"Yours are at Santarem, I believe?" said an old, weather-beaten looking officer with one arm.

"I'm ashamed to say, I know nothing whatever of them; I received my gazette unexpectedly enough."

"Ever in Cork before, Mr. O'Malley?"

"Never," said I.

"Glorious place," lisped a white-eyelashed, knocker-kneed ensign; "splendid gals, eh?"

"Ah, Brunton," said Minchin, "you may boast a little; but we poor devils—"

"Know the Dals?" said the hero of the lisp, addressing me.

"I haven't that honor," I replied, scarcely able to guess whether what he alluded to were objects of the picturesque or a private family.

"Introduce him, then, at once," said the adjutant; "we'll all go in the evening. What will the old squaw think?"

"Not I," said Minchin. "She wrote to the Duke of York about my helping Matilda at supper, and not having any honorable intentions afterwards."

"We dine at 'The George' to-day, Mr. O'Malley, sharp seven. Until then—"

So saying, the little man bustled back to his accounts, and I took my leave with the rest, to stroll about the town till dinner-time.



CHAPTER XXIV.

THE ADJUTANT'S DINNER.

The adjutant's dinner was as professional an affair as need be. A circuit or a learned society could not have been more exclusively devoted to their own separate and immediate topics than were we. Pipeclay in all its varieties came on the tapis; the last regulation cap, the new button, the promotions, the general orders, the colonel and the colonel's wife, stoppages, and the mess fund were all well and ably discussed; and strange enough, while the conversation took this wide range, not a chance allusion, not one stray hint ever wandered to the brave fellows who were covering the army with glory in the Peninsula, nor one souvenir of him that, was even then enjoying a fame as a leader second to none in Europe. This surprised me not a little at the time; but I have since that learned how little interest the real services of an army possess for the ears of certain officials, who, stationed at home quarters, pass their inglorious lives in the details of drill, parade, mess-room gossip, and barrack scandal. Such, in fact, were the dons of the present dinner. We had a commissary-general, an inspecting brigade-major of something, a physician to the forces, the adjutant himself, and Major Dalrymple; the hoi polloi consisting of the raw ensign, a newly-fledged cornet (Mr. Sparks), and myself.

The commissary told some very pointless stories about his own department; the doctor read a dissertation upon Walcheren fever; the adjutant got very stupidly tipsy; and Major Dalrymple succeeded in engaging the three juniors of the party to tea, having previously pledged us to purchase nothing whatever of outfit without his advice, he well knowing (which he did) how young fellows like us were cheated, and resolving to be a father to us (which he certainly tried to be).

As we rose from the table, about ten o'clock, I felt how soon a few such dinners would succeed in disenchanting me of all my military illusions; for, young as I was, I saw that the commissary was a vulgar bore, the doctor a humbug, the adjutant a sot, and the major himself I greatly suspected to be an old rogue.

"You are coming with us, Sparks?" said Major Dalrymple, as he took me by one arm and the ensign by the other. "We are going to have a little tea with the ladies; not five minutes' walk."

"Most happy, sir," said Mr. Sparks, with a very flattered expression of countenance.

"O'Malley, you know Sparks, and Burton too."

This served for a species of triple introduction, at which we all bowed, simpered, and bowed again. We were very happy to have the pleasure, etc.

"How pleasant to get away from these fellows!" said the major, "they are so uncommonly prosy! That commissary, with his mess beef, and old Pritchard, with black doses and rigors,—nothing so insufferable! Besides, in reality, a young officer never needs all that nonsense. A little medicine chest—I'll get you one each to-morrow for five pounds—no, five pounds ten—the same thing—that will see you all through the Peninsula. Remind me of it in the morning." This we all promised to do, and the major resumed: "I say, Sparks, you've got a real prize in that gray horse,—such a trooper as he is! O'Malley, you'll be wanting something of that kind, if we can find it for you."

"Many thanks, Major; but my cattle are on the way here already. I've only three horses, but I think they are tolerably good ones."

The major now turned to Burton and said something in a low tone, to which the other replied, "Well, if you say so, I'll get it; but it's devilish dear."

"Dear, my young friend! Cheap, dog cheap."

"Only think, O'Malley, a whole brass bed, camp-stool, basin-stand, all complete, for sixty pounds! If it was not that a widow was disposing of it in great distress, one hundred could not buy it. Here we are; come along,—no ceremony. Mind the two steps; that's it, Mrs. Dalrymple, Mr. O'Malley; Mr. Sparks, Mr. Burton, my daughters. Is tea over, girls?"

"Why, Papa, it's nearly eleven o'clock," said Fanny, as she rose to ring the bell, displaying in so doing the least possible portion of a very well-turned ankle.

Miss Matilda Dal laid down her book, but seemingly lost in abstraction, did not deign to look at us. Mrs. Dalrymple, however, did the honors with much politeness, and having by a few adroit and well-put queries ascertained everything concerning our rank and position, seemed perfectly satisfied that our intrusion was justifiable.

While my confrere, Mr. Sparks, was undergoing his examination I had time to look at the ladies, whom I was much surprised at finding so very well looking; and as the ensign had opened a conversation with Fanny, I approached my chair towards the other, and having carelessly turned over the leaves of the book she had been reading, drew her on to talk of it. As my acquaintance with young ladies hitherto had been limited to those who had "no soul," I felt some difficulty at first in keeping up with the exalted tone of my fair companion, but by letting her take the lead for some time, I got to know more of the ground. We went on tolerably together, every moment increasing my stock of technicals, which were all that was needed to sustain the conversation. How often have I found the same plan succeed, whether discussing a question of law or medicine, with a learned professor of either! or, what is still more difficult, canvassing the merits of a preacher or a doctrine with a serious young lady, whose "blessed privileges" were at first a little puzzling to comprehend.

I so contrived it, too, that Miss Matilda should seem as much to be making a convert to her views as to have found a person capable of sympathizing with her; and thus, long before the little supper, with which it was the major's practice to regale his friends every evening, made its appearance, we had established a perfect understanding together,—a circumstance that, a bystander might have remarked, was productive of a more widely diffused satisfaction than I could have myself seen any just cause for. Mr. Burton was also progressing, as the Yankees say, with the sister; Sparks had booked himself as purchaser of military stores enough to make the campaign of the whole globe; and we were thus all evidently fulfilling our various vocations, and affording perfect satisfaction to our entertainers.

Then came the spatch-cock, and the sandwiches, and the negus, which Fanny first mixed for papa, and subsequently, with some little pressing, for Mr. Burton; Matilda the romantic assisted me; Sparks helped himself. Then we laughed, and told stories; pressed Sparks to sing, which, as he declined, we only pressed the more. How, invariably, by-the-bye, is it the custom to show one's appreciation of anything like a butt by pressing him for a song! The major was in great spirits; told us anecdotes of his early life in India, and how he once contracted to supply the troops with milk, and made a purchase, in consequence, of some score of cattle, which turned out to be bullocks. Matilda recited some lines from Pope in my ear. Fanny challenged Burton to a rowing match. Sparks listened to all around him, and Mrs. Dalrymple mixed a very little weak punch, which Dr. Lucas had recommended to her to take the last thing at night,—Noctes coenoeque etc. Say what you will, these were very jovial little reunions. The girls were decidedly very pretty. We were in high favor; and when we took leave at the door, with a very cordial shake hands, it was with no arriere pensee we promised to see them in the morning.



CHAPTER XXV.

THE ENTANGLEMENT.

When we think for a moment over all the toils, all the anxieties, all the fevered excitement of a grande passion, it is not a little singular that love should so frequently be elicited by a state of mere idleness; and yet nothing, after all, is so predisposing a cause as this. Where is the man between eighteen and eight-and-thirty—might I not say forty—who, without any very pressing duns, and having no taste for strong liquor and rouge-et-noir, can possibly lounge through the long hours of his day without at least fancying himself in love? The thousand little occupations it suggests become a necessity of existence; its very worries are like the wholesome opposition that purifies and strengthens the frame of a free state. Then, what is there half so sweet as the reflective flattery which results from our appreciation of an object who in return deems us the ne plus ultra of perfection? There it is, in fact; that confounded bump of self-esteem does it all, and has more imprudent matches to answer for than all the occipital protuberances that ever scared poor Harriet Martineau.

Now, to apply my moralizing. I very soon, to use the mess phrase, got "devilish spooney" about the "Dals." The morning drill, the riding-school, and the parade were all most fervently consigned to a certain military character that shall be nameless, as detaining me from some appointment made the evening before; for as I supped there each night, a party of one kind or another was always planned for the day following. Sometimes we had a boating excursion to Cove, sometimes a picnic at Foaty; now a rowing party to Glanmire, or a ride, at which I furnished the cavalry. These doings were all under my especial direction, and I thus became speedily the organ of the Dalrymple family; and the simple phrase, "It was Mr. O'Malley's arrangement," "Mr. O'Malley wished it," was like the Moi le roi of Louis XIV.

Though all this while we continued to carry on most pleasantly, Mrs. Dalrymple, I could perceive, did not entirely sympathize with our projects of amusement. As an experienced engineer might feel when watching the course of some storming projectile—some brilliant congreve—flying over a besieged fortress, yet never touching the walls nor harming the inhabitants, so she looked on at all these demonstrations of attack with no small impatience, and wondered when would the breach be reported practicable. Another puzzle also contributed its share of anxiety,—which of the girls was it? To be sure, he spent three hours every morning with Fanny; but then, he never left Matilda the whole evening. He had given his miniature to one; a locket with his hair was a present to the sister. The major thinks he saw his arm round Matilda's waist in the garden; the housemaid swears she saw him kiss Fanny in the pantry. Matilda smiles when we talk of his name with her sister's; Fanny laughs outright, and says, "Poor Matilda! the man never dreamed of her." This is becoming uncomfortable. The major must ask his intentions. It is certainly one or the other; but then, we have a right to know which. Such was a very condensed view of Mrs. Dalrymple's reflections on this important topic,—a view taken with her usual tact and clear-sightedness.

Matters were in this state when Power at length arrived in Cork, to take command of our detachment and make the final preparations for our departure. I had been, as usual, spending the evening at the major's, and had just reached my quarters, when I found my friend sitting at my fire, smoking his cigar and solacing himself with a little brandy-and-water.

"At last," said he, as I entered,—"at last! Why, where the deuce have you been till this hour,—past two o'clock? There is no ball, no assembly going on, eh?"

"No," said I, half blushing at the eagerness of the inquiry; "I've been spending the evening with a friend."

"Spending the evening! Say, rather, the night! Why, confound you, man, what is there in Cork to keep you out of bed till near three?"

"Well, if you must know, I have been supping at a Major Dalrymple's,—a devilish good fellow, with two such daughters!"

"Ahem!" said Power, shutting one eye knowingly, and giving a look like a Yorkshire horse-dealer. "Go on."

"Why, what do you mean?"

"Go on; continue."

"I've finished; I've nothing more to tell."

"So, they're here, are they?" said he, reflectingly.

"Who?" said I.

"Matilda and Fanny, to be sure."

"Why, you know them, then?"

"I should think I do."

"Where have you met them?"

"Where have I not? When I was in the Rifles they were quartered at Zante. Matilda was just then coming it rather strong with Villiers, of ours, a regular greenhorn. Fanny, also, nearly did for Harry Nesbitt, by riding a hurdle race. Then they left for Gibraltar, in the year,—what year was it?"

"Come, come," said I, "this is a humbug; the girls are quite young; you just have heard their names."

"Well, perhaps so; only tell me which is your peculiar weakness, as they say in the west, and may be I'll convince you."

"Oh, as to that," said I, laughing, "I'm not very far gone on either side."

"Then, Matilda, probably, has not tried you with Cowley, eh?—you look a little pink—'There are hearts that live and love alone.' Oh, poor fellow, you've got it! By Jove, how you've been coming it, though, in ten days! She ought not to have got to that for a month, at least; and how like a young one it was, to be caught by the poetry. Oh, Master Charley, I thought that the steeple-chaser might have done most with your Galway heart,—the girl in the gray habit, that sings 'Moddirederoo,' ought to have been the prize! Halt! by Saint George, but that tickles you also! Why, zounds, if I go on, probably, at this rate, I'll find a tender spot occupied by the 'black lady' herself."

It was no use concealing, or attempting to conceal, anything from my inquisitive friend; so I mixed my grog, and opened my whole heart; told how I had been conducting myself for the entire preceding fortnight; and when I concluded, sat silently awaiting Power's verdict, as though a jury were about to pronounce upon my life.

"Have you ever written?"

"Never; except, perhaps, a few lines with tickets for the theatre, or something of that kind."

"Have you copies of your correspondence?"

"Of course not. Why, what do you mean?"

"Has Mrs. Dal ever been present; or, as the French say, has she assisted at any of your tender interviews with the young ladies?"

"I'm not aware that one kisses a girl before mamma."

"I'm not speaking of that; I merely allude to an ordinary flirtation."

"Oh, I suppose she has seen me attentive."

"Very awkward, indeed! There is only one point in your favor; for as your attentions were not decided, and as the law does not, as yet, permit polygamy—"

"Come, come, you know I never thought of marrying."

"Ah, but they did."

"Not a bit of it."

"Ay, but they did. What do you wager but that the major asks your intentions, as he calls it, the moment he hears the transport has arrived?"

"By Jove! now you remind me, he asked this evening, when he could have a few minutes' private conversation with me to-morrow, and I thought it was about some confounded military chest or sea-store, or one of his infernal contrivances that he every day assures me are indispensable; though, if every officer had only as much baggage as I have got, under his directions, it would take two armies, at least, to carry the effects of the fighting one."

"Poor fellow!" said he, starting upon his legs; "what a burst you've made of it!" So saying, he began in a nasal twang,—

"I publish the banns of marriage between Charles O'Malley, late of his Majesty's 14th Dragoons, and ——— Dalrymple, spinster, of this city—"

"I'll be hanged if you do, though," said I, seeing pretty clearly, by this time, something of the estimation my friends were held in. "Come, Power, pull me through, like a good fellow,—pull me through, without doing anything to hurt the girls' feelings."

"Well, we'll see about it," said he,—"we'll see about it in the morning; but, at the same time, let me assure you, the affair is not so easy as you may at first blush suppose. These worthy people have been so often 'done'—to use the cant phrase—before, that scarcely a ruse remains untried. It is of no use pleading that your family won't consent; that your prospects are null; that you are ordered for India; that you are engaged elsewhere; that you have nothing but your pay; that you are too young or too old,—all such reasons, good and valid with any other family, will avail you little here. Neither will it serve your cause that you may be warranted by a doctor as subject to periodical fits of insanity; monomaniacal tendencies to cut somebody's throat, etc. Bless your heart, man, they have a soul above such littlenesses! They care nothing for consent of friends, means, age, health, climate, prospects, or temper. Firmly believing matrimony to be a lottery, they are not superstitious about the number they pitch upon; provided only that they get a ticket, they are content."

"Then it strikes me, if what you say is correct, that I have no earthly chance of escape, except some kind friend will undertake to shoot me."

"That has been also tried."

"Why, how do you mean?"

"A mock duel, got up at mess,—we had one at Malta. Poor Vickers was the hero of that affair. It was right well planned, too. One of the letters was suffered, by mere accident, to fall into Mrs. Dal's hands, and she was quite prepared for the event when he was reported shot the next morning. Then the young lady, of course, whether she cared or not, was obliged to be perfectly unconcerned, lest the story of engaged affections might get wind and spoil another market. The thing went on admirably, till one day, some few months later, they saw, in a confounded army-list, that the late George Vickers was promoted to the 18th Dragoons, so that the trick was discovered, and is, of course, stale at present."

"Then could I not have a wife already, and a large family of interesting babies?"

"No go,—only swell the damages, when they come to prosecute. Besides, your age and looks forbid the assumption of such a fact. No, no; we must go deeper to work."

"But where shall we go?" said I, impatiently; "for it appears to me these good people have been treated to every trick and subterfuge that ever ingenuity suggested."

"Come, I think I have it; but it will need a little more reflection. So, now, let us to bed. I'll give you the result of my lucubrations at breakfast; and, if I mistake not, we may get you through this without any ill-consequences. Good-night, then, old boy; and now dream away of your lady-love till our next meeting."



CHAPTER XXVI.

THE PREPARATION.

To prevent needless repetitions in my story, I shall not record here the conversation which passed between my friend Power and myself on the morning following at breakfast. Suffice it to say, that the plan proposed by him for my rescue was one I agreed to adopt, reserving to myself, in case of failure, a pis aller of which I knew not the meaning, but of whose efficacy Power assured me I need not doubt.

"If all fail," said he,—"if every bridge break down beneath you, and no road of escape be left, why, then, I believe you must have recourse to another alternative. Still I should wish to avoid it, if possible, and I put it to you, in honor, not to employ it unless as a last expedient. You promise me this?"

"Of course," said I, with great anxiety for the dread final measure. "What is it?"

He paused, smiled dubiously, and resumed,—

"And, after all,—but, to be sure, there will not be need for it,—the other plan will do,—must do. Come, come, O'Malley, the admiralty say that nothing encourages drowning in the navy like a life-buoy. The men have such a prospect of being picked up that they don't mind falling overboard; so, if I give you this life-preserver of mine, you'll not swim an inch. Is it not so, eh?"

"Far from it," said I. "I shall feel in honor bound to exert myself the more, because I now see how much it costs you to part with it."

"Well, then, hear it. When everything fails; when all your resources are exhausted; when you have totally lost your memory, in fact, and your ingenuity in excuses say,—but mind, Charley, not till then,—say that you must consult your friend, Captain Power, of the 14th; that's all."

"And is this it?" said I, quite disappointed at the lame and impotent conclusion to all the high-sounding exordium; "is this all?"

"Yes," said he, "that is all. But stop, Charley; is not that the major crossing the street there? Yes, to be sure it is; and, by Jove! he has got on the old braided frock this morning. Had you not told me one word of your critical position, I should have guessed there was something in the wind from that. That same vestment has caused many a stout heart to tremble that never quailed before a shot or shell."

"How can that be? I should like to hear."

"Why, my dear boy, that's his explanation coat, as we called it at Gibraltar. He was never known to wear it except when asking some poor fellow's 'intentions.' He would no more think of sporting it as an every-day affair, than the chief-justice would go cook-shooting in his black cap and ermine. Come, he is bound for your quarters, and as it will not answer our plans to let him see you now, you had better hasten down-stairs, and get round by the back way into George's Street, and you'll be at his house before he can return."

Following Power's directions, I seized my foraging-cap and got clear out of the premises before the major had reached them. It was exactly noon as I sounded my loud and now well-known summons at the major's knocker. The door was quickly opened; but instead of dashing up-stairs, four steps at a time, as was my wont, to the drawing-room, I turned short into the dingy-looking little parlor on the right, and desired Matthew, the venerable servitor of the house, to say that I wished particularly to see Mrs. Dalrymple for a few minutes, if the hour were not inconvenient.

There was something perhaps of excitement in my manner, some flurry in my look, or some trepidation in my voice, or perhaps it was the unusual hour, or the still more remarkable circumstance of my not going at once to the drawing-room, that raised some doubts in Matthew's mind as to the object of my visit; and instead of at once complying with my request to inform Mrs. Dalrymple that I was there, he cautiously closed the door, and taking a quick but satisfactory glance round the apartment to assure himself that we were alone, he placed his back against it and heaved a deep sigh.

We were both perfectly silent: I in total amazement at what the old man could possibly mean; he, following up the train of his own thoughts, comprehended little or nothing of my surprise, and evidently was so engrossed by his reflections that he had neither ears nor eyes for aught around him. There was a most singular semi-comic expression in the old withered face that nearly made me laugh at first; but as I continued to look steadily at it, I perceived that, despite the long-worn wrinkles that low Irish drollery and fun had furrowed around the angles of his mouth, the real character of his look was one of sorrowful compassion.

Doubtless, my readers have read many interesting narratives wherein the unconscious traveller in some remote land has been warned of a plan to murder him, by some mere passing wink, a look, a sign, which some one, less steeped in crime, less hardened in iniquity than his fellows, has ventured for his rescue. Sometimes, according to the taste of the narrator, the interesting individual is an old woman, sometimes a young one, sometimes a black-bearded bandit, sometimes a child; and not unfrequently, a dog is humane enough to do this service. One thing, however, never varies,—be the agent biped or quadruped, dumb or speechful, young or old, the stranger invariably takes the hint, and gets off scott free for his sharpness. This never-varying trick on the doomed man, I had often been sceptical enough to suspect; however, I had not been many minutes a spectator of the old man's countenance, when I most thoroughly recanted my errors, and acknowledged myself wrong. If ever the look of a man conveyed a warning, his did; but there was more in it than even that,—there was a tone of sad and pitiful compassion, such as an old gray-bearded rat might be supposed to put on at seeing a young and inexperienced one opening the hinge of an iron trap, to try its efficacy upon his neck. Many a little occasion had presented itself, during my intimacy with the family, of doing Matthew some small services, of making him some trifling presents; so that, when he assumed before me the gesture and look I have mentioned, I was not long in deciphering his intentions.

"Matthew!" screamed a sharp voice which I recognized at once for that of Mrs. Dalrymple. "Matthew! Where is the old fool?"

But Matthew heard not, or heeded not.

"Matthew! Matthew! I say."

"I'm comin', ma'am," said he, with a sigh, as, opening the parlor-door, he turned upon me one look of such import that only the circumstances of my story can explain its force, or my reader's own ingenious imagination can supply.

"Never fear, my good old friend," said I, grasping his hand warmly, and leaving a guinea in the palm,—"never fear."

"God grant it, sir!" said he, setting on his wig in preparation for his appearance in the drawing-room.

"Matthew! The old wretch!"

"Mr. O'Malley," said the often-called Matthew, as opening the door, he announced me unexpectedly among the ladies there assembled, who, not hearing of my approach, were evidently not a little surprised and astonished. Had I been really the enamored swain that the Dalrymple family were willing to believe, I half suspect that the prospect before me might have cured me of my passion. A round bullet-head, papillote, with the "Cork Observer," where still-born babes and maids-of-all-work were descanted upon in very legible type, was now the substitute for the classic front and Italian ringlets of la belle Matilda; while the chaste Fanny herself, whose feet had been a fortune for a statuary, was, in the most slatternly and slipshod attire, pacing the room in a towering rage, at some thing, place, or person, unknown (to me). If the ballet-master at the Academie could only learn to get his imps, demons, angels, and goblins "off" half as rapidly as the two young ladies retreated on my being announced, I answer for the piece so brought out having a run for half the season. Before my eyes had regained their position parallel to the plane of the horizon, they were gone, and I found myself alone with Mrs. Dalrymple. Now, she stood her ground, partly to cover the retreat of the main body, partly, too, because—representing the baggage wagons, ammunition stores, hospital, staff, etc.—her retirement from the field demanded more time and circumspection than the light brigade.

Let not my readers suppose that the mere Dalrymple was so perfectly faultless in costume that her remaining was a matter of actual indifference; far from it. She evidently had a struggle for it; but a sense of duty decided her, and as Ney doggedly held back to cover the retreating forces on the march from Moscow, so did she resolutely lurk behind till the last flutter of the last petticoat assured her that the fugitives were safe. Then did she hesitate for a moment what course to take; but as I assumed my chair beside her, she composedly sat down, and crossing her hands before her, waited for an explanation of this ill-timed visit.

Had the Horse Guards, in the plenitude of their power and the perfection of their taste, ordained that the 79th and 42d Regiments should in future, in lieu of their respective tartans, wear flannel kilts and black worsted hose, I could readily have fallen into the error of mistaking Mrs. Dalrymple for a field officer in the new regulation dress; the philabeg finding no mean representation in a capacious pincushion that hung down from her girdle, while a pair of shears, not scissors, corresponded to the dirk. After several ineffectual efforts on her part to make her vestment (I know not its fitting designation) cover more of her legs than its length could possibly effect, and after some most bland smiles and half blushes at dishabille, etc., were over, and that I had apologized most humbly for the unusually early hour of my call, I proceeded to open my negotiations, and unfurl my banner for the fray.

"The old 'Racehorse' has arrived at last," said I, with a half-sigh, "and I believe that we shall not obtain a very long time for our leave-taking; so that, trespassing upon your very great kindness, I have ventured upon an early call."

"The 'Racehorse,' surely can't sail to-morrow," said Mrs. Dalrymple, whose experience of such matters made her a very competent judge; "her stores—"

"Are taken in already," said I; "and an order from the Horse Guards commands us to embark in twenty-four hours; so that, in fact, we scarcely have time to look about us."

"Have you seen the major?" inquired Mrs. Dalrymple, eagerly.

"Not to-day," I replied, carelessly; "but, of course, during the morning we are sure to meet. I have many thanks yet to give him for all his most kind attentions."

"I know he is most anxious to see you," said Mrs. Dalrymple, with a very peculiar emphasis, and evidently desiring that I should inquire the reasons of this anxiety. I, however, most heroically forbore indulging my curiosity, and added that I should endeavor to find him on my way to the barracks; and then, hastily looking at my watch, I pronounced it a full hour later than it really was, and promising to spend the evening—my last evening—with them, I took my leave and hurried away, in no small flurry to be once more out of reach of Mrs. Dalrymple's fire, which I every moment expected to open upon me.



CHAPTER XXVII.

THE SUPPER.

Power and I dined together tete-a-tete at the hotel, and sat chatting over my adventures with the Dalrymples till nearly nine o'clock.

"Come, Charley," said he, at length, "I see your eye wandering very often towards the timepiece; another bumper, and I'll let you off. What shall it be?"

"What you like," said I, upon whom a share of three bottles of strong claret had already made a very satisfactory impression.

"Then champagne for the coup-de-grace. Nothing like your vin mousseux for a critical moment,—every bubble that rises sparkling to the surface prompts some bright thought, or elicits some brilliant idea, that would only have been drowned in your more sober fluids. Here's to the girl you love, whoever she be."

"To her bright eyes, then, be it," said I, clearing off a brimming goblet of nearly half the bottle, while my friend Power seemed multiplied into any given number of gentlemen standing amidst something like a glass manufactory of decanters.

"I hope you feel steady enough for this business," said my friend, examining me closely with the candle.

"I'm an archdeacon," muttered I, with one eye involuntarily closing.

"You'll not let them double on you!"

"Trust me, old boy," said I, endeavoring to look knowing.

"I think you'll do," said he, "so now march. I'll wait for you here, and we'll go on board together; for old Bloater the skipper says he'll certainly weigh by daybreak."

"Till then," said I, as opening the door, I proceeded very cautiously to descend the stairs, affecting all the time considerable nonchalance, and endeavoring, as well as my thickened utterance would permit, to hum:—

"Oh, love is the soul of an Irish dragoon."

If I was not in the most perfect possession of my faculties in the house, the change to the open air certainly but little contributed to their restoration; and I scarcely felt myself in the street when my brain became absolutely one whirl of maddened and confused excitement. Time and space are nothing to a man thus enlightened, and so they appeared to me; scarcely a second had elapsed when I found myself standing in the Dalrymples' drawing-room.

If a few hours had done much to metamorphose me, certes, they had done something for my fair friends also; anything more unlike what they appeared in the morning can scarcely be imagined. Matilda in black, with her hair in heavy madonna bands upon her fair cheek, now paler even than usual, never seemed so handsome; while Fanny, in a light-blue dress, with blue flowers in her hair, and a blue sash, looked the most lovely piece of coquetry ever man set his eyes upon. The old major, too, was smartened up, and put into an old regimental coat that he had worn during the siege of Gibraltar; and lastly, Mrs. Dalrymple herself was attired in a very imposing costume that made her, to my not over-accurate judgment, look very like an elderly bishop in a flame-colored cassock. Sparks was the only stranger, and wore upon his countenance, as I entered, a look of very considerable embarrassment that even my thick-sightedness could not fail of detecting.

Parlez-moi de l'amitie, my friends. Talk to me of the warm embrace of your earliest friend, after years of absence; the cordial and heartfelt shake hands of your old school companion, when in after years, a chance meeting has brought you together, and you have had time and opportunity for becoming distinguished and in repute, and are rather a good hit to be known to than otherwise; of the close grip you give your second when he comes up to say, that the gentleman with the loaded detonator opposite won't fire, that he feels he's in the wrong. Any or all of these together, very effective and powerful though they be, are light in the balance when compared with the two-handed compression you receive from the gentleman that expects you to marry one of his daughters.

"My dear O'Malley, how goes it? Thought you'd never come," said he, still holding me fast and looking me full in the face, to calculate the extent to which my potations rendered his flattery feasible.

"Hurried to death with preparations, I suppose," said Mrs. Dalrymple, smiling blandly. "Fanny dear, some tea for him."

"Oh, Mamma, he does not like all that sugar; surely not," said she, looking up with a most sweet expression, as though to say, "I at least know his tastes."

"I believed you were going without seeing us," whispered Matilda, with a very glassy look about the corner of her eyes.

Eloquence was not just then my forte, so that I contented myself with a very intelligible look at Fanny, and a tender squeeze of Matilda's hand, as I seated myself at the table.

Scarcely had I placed myself at the tea-table, with Matilda beside and Fanny opposite me, each vying with the other in their delicate and kind attentions, when I totally forgot all my poor friend Power's injunctions and directions for my management. It is true, I remembered that there was a scrape of some kind or other to be got out of, and one requiring some dexterity, too; but what or with whom I could not for the life of me determine. What the wine had begun, the bright eyes completed; and amidst the witchcraft of silky tresses and sweet looks, I lost all my reflection, till the impression of an impending difficulty remained fixed in my mind, and I tortured my poor, weak, and erring intellect to detect it. At last, and by a mere chance, my eyes fell upon Sparks; and by what mechanism I contrived it, I know not, but I immediately saddled him with the whole of my annoyances, and attributed to him and to his fault any embarrassment I labored under.

The physiological reason of the fact I'm very ignorant of, but for the truth and frequency I can well vouch, that there are certain people, certain faces, certain voices, certain whiskers, legs, waistcoats, and guard-chains, that inevitably produce the most striking effects upon the brain of a gentleman already excited by wine, and not exactly cognizant of his own peculiar fallacies.

These effects are not produced merely among those who are quarrelsome in their cups, for I call the whole 14th to witness that I am not such; but to any person so disguised, the inoffensiveness of the object is no security on the other hand,—for I once knew an eight-day clock kicked down a barrack stairs by an old Scotch major, because he thought it was laughing at him. To this source alone, whatever it be, can I attribute the feeling of rising indignation with which I contemplated the luckless cornet, who, seated at the fire, unnoticed and uncared for, seemed a very unworthy object to vent anger or ill-temper upon.

"Mr. Sparks, I fear," said I, endeavoring at the time to call up a look of very sovereign contempt,—"Mr. Sparks, I fear, regards my visit here in the light of an intrusion."

Had poor Mr. Sparks been told to proceed incontinently up the chimney before him, he could not have looked more aghast. Reply was quite out of his power. So sudden and unexpectedly was this charge of mine made that he could only stare vacantly from one to the other; while I, warming with my subject, and perhaps—but I'll not swear it—stimulated by a gentle pressure from a soft hand near me, continued:—

"If he thinks for one moment that my attentions in this family are in any way to be questioned by him, I can only say—"

"My dear O'Malley, my dear boy!" said the major, with the look of a father-in-law in his eye.

"The spirit of an officer and a gentleman spoke there," said Mrs. Dalrymple, now carried beyond all prudence by the hope that my attack might arouse my dormant friend into a counter-declaration; nothing, however, was further from poor Sparks, who began to think he had been unconsciously drinking tea with five lunatics.

"If he supposes," said I, rising from my chair, "that his silence will pass with me as any palliation—"

"Oh, dear! oh, dear! there will be a duel. Papa, dear, why don't you speak to Mr. O'Malley?"

"There now, O'Malley, sit down. Don't you see he is quite in error?"

"Then let him say so," said I, fiercely.

"Ah, yes, to be sure," said Fanny. "Do say it; say anything he likes, Mr. Sparks."

"I must say," said Mrs. Dalrymple, "however sorry I may feel in my own house to condemn any one, that Mr. Sparks is very much in the wrong."

Poor Sparks looked like a man in a dream.

"If he will tell Charles,—Mr. O'Malley, I mean," said Matilda, blushing scarlet, "that he meant nothing by what he said—"

"But I never spoke, never opened my lips!" cried out the wretched man, at length sufficiently recovered to defend himself.

"Oh, Mr. Sparks!"

"Oh, Mr. Sparks!"

"Oh, Mr. Sparks!" chorussed the three ladies.

While the old major brought up the rear with an "Oh, Sparks, I must say—"

"Then, by all the saints in the calendar, I must be mad," said he; "but if I have said anything to offend you, O'Malley, I am sincerely sorry for it."

"That will do, sir," said I, with a look of royal condescension at the amende I considered as somewhat late in coming, and resumed my seat.

This little intermezzo, it might be supposed, was rather calculated to interrupt the harmony of our evening. Not so, however. I had apparently acquitted myself like a hero, and was evidently in a white heat, in which I could be fashioned into any shape. Sparks was humbled so far that he would probably feel it a relief to make any proposition; so that by our opposite courses we had both arrived at a point at which all the dexterity and address of the family had been long since aiming without success. Conversation then resumed its flow, and in a few minutes every trace of our late fracas had disappeared.

By degrees I felt myself more and more disposed to turn my attention towards Matilda, and dropping my voice into a lower tone, opened a flirtation of a most determined kind. Fanny had, meanwhile, assumed a place beside Sparks, and by the muttered tones that passed between them, I could plainly perceive they were similarly occupied. The major took up the "Southern Reporter," of which he appeared deep in the contemplation, while Mrs. Dal herself buried her head in her embroidery and neither heard nor saw anything around her.

I know, unfortunately, but very little what passed between myself and my fair companion; I can only say that when supper was announced at twelve (an hour later than usual), I was sitting upon the sofa with my arm round her waist, my cheek so close that already her lovely tresses brushed my forehead, and her breath fanned my burning brow.

"Supper, at last," said the major, with a loud voice, to arouse us from our trance of happiness without taking any mean opportunity of looking unobserved. "Supper, Sparks, O'Malley; come now, it will be some time before we all meet this way again."

"Perhaps not so long, after all," said I, knowingly.

"Very likely not," echoed Sparks, in the same key.

"I've proposed for Fanny," said he, whispering in my ear.

"Matilda's mine," replied I, with the look of an emperor.

"A word with you, Major," said Sparks, his eye flashing with enthusiasm, and his cheek scarlet. "One word,—I'll not detain you."

They withdrew into a corner for a few seconds, during which Mrs. Dalrymple amused herself by wondering what the secret could be, why Mr. Sparks couldn't tell her, and Fanny meanwhile pretended to look for something at a side table, and never turned her head round.

"Then give me your hand," said the major, as he shook Sparks's with a warmth of whose sincerity there could be no question. "Bess, my love," said he, addressing his wife. The remainder was lost in a whisper; but whatever it was, it evidently redounded to Sparks's credit, for the next moment a repetition of the hand-shaking took place, and Sparks looked the happiest of men.

"A mon tour," thought I, "now," as I touched the major's arm, and led him towards the window. What I said may be one day matter for Major Dalrymple's memoirs, if he ever writes them; but for my part I have not the least idea. I only know that while I was yet speaking he called over Mrs. Dal, who, in a frenzy of joy, seized me in her arms and embraced me. After which, I kissed her, shook hands with the major, kissed Matilda's hand, and laughed prodigiously, as though I had done something confoundedly droll,—a sentiment evidently participated in by Sparks, who laughed too, as did the others; and a merrier, happier party never sat down to supper.

"Make your company pleased with themselves," says Mr. Walker, in his Original work upon dinner-giving, "and everything goes on well." Now, Major Dalrymple, without having read the authority in question, probably because it was not written at the time, understood the principle fully as well as the police-magistrate, and certainly was a proficient in the practice of it.

To be sure, he possessed one grand requisite for success,—he seemed most perfectly happy himself. There was that air degage about him which, when an old man puts it on among his juniors, is so very attractive. Then the ladies, too, were evidently well pleased; and the usually austere mamma had relaxed her "rigid front" into a smile in which any habitue of the house could have read our fate.

We ate, we drank, we ogled, smiled, squeezed hands beneath the table, and, in fact, so pleasant a party had rarely assembled round the major's mahogany. As for me, I made a full disclosure of the most burning love, backed by a resolve to marry my fair neighbor, and settle upon her a considerably larger part of my native county than I had ever even rode over. Sparks, on the other side, had opened his fire more cautiously, but whether taking courage from my boldness, or perceiving with envy the greater estimation I was held in, was now going the pace fully as fast as myself, and had commenced explanations of his intentions with regard to Fanny that evidently satisfied her friends. Meanwhile the wine was passing very freely, and the hints half uttered an hour before began now to be more openly spoken and canvassed.

Sparks and I hob-nobbed across the table and looked unspeakable things at each other; the girls held down their heads; Mrs. Dal wiped her eyes; and the major pronounced himself the happiest father in Europe.

It was now wearing late, or rather early; some gray streaks of dubious light were faintly forcing their way through the half-closed curtains, and the dread thought of parting first presented itself. A cavalry trumpet, too, at this moment sounded a call that aroused us from our trance of pleasure, and warned us that our moments were few. A dead silence crept over all; the solemn feeling which leave-taking ever inspires was uppermost, and none spoke. The major was the first to break it.

"O'Malley, my friend, and you, Mr. Sparks; I must have a word with you, boys, before we part."

"Here let it be, then, Major," said I, holding his arm as he turned to leave the room,—"here, now; we are all so deeply interested, no place is so fit."

"Well, then," said the major, "as you desire it, now that I'm to regard you both in the light of my sons-in-law,—at least, as pledged to become so,—it is only fair as respects—"

"I see,—I understand perfectly," interrupted I, whose passion for conducting the whole affair myself was gradually gaining on me. "What you mean is, that we should make known our intentions before some mutual friends ere we part; eh, Sparks? eh, Major?"

"Right, my boy,—right on every point."

"Well, then, I thought of all that; and if you'll just send your servant over to my quarters for our captain,—he's the fittest person, you know, at such a time—"

"How considerate!" said Mrs. Dalrymple.

"How perfectly just his idea is!" said the major.

"We'll then, in his presence, avow our present and unalterable determination as regards your fair daughters; and as the time is short—"

Here I turned towards Matilda, who placed her arm within mine; Sparks possessed himself of Fanny's hand, while the major and his wife consulted for a few seconds.

"Well, O'Malley, all you propose is perfect. Now, then, for the captain. Who shall he inquire for?"



"Oh, an old friend of yours," said I, jocularly; "you'll be glad to see him."

"Indeed!" said all together.

"Oh, yes, quite a surprise, I'll warrant it."

"Who can it be? Who on earth is it?"

"You can't guess," added I, with a very knowing look. "Knew you at Corfu; a very intimate friend, indeed, if he tell the truth."

A look of something like embarrassment passed around the circle at these words, while I, wishing to end the mystery, resumed:—

"Come, then, who can be so proper for all parties, at a moment like this, as our mutual friend Captain Power?"

Had a shell fallen into the cold grouse pie in the midst of us, scattering death and destruction on every side, the effect could scarcely have been more frightful than that my last words produced. Mrs. Dalrymple fell with a sough upon the floor, motionless as a corpse; Fanny threw herself, screaming, upon a sofa; Matilda went off into strong hysterics upon the hearth-rug; while the major, after giving me a look a maniac might have envied, rushed from the room in search of his pistols with a most terrific oath to shoot somebody, whether Sparks or myself, or both of us, on his return, I cannot say. Fanny's sobs and Matilda's cries, assisted by a drumming process by Mrs. Dal's heels upon the floor, made a most infernal concert and effectually prevented anything like thought or reflection; and in all probability so overwhelmed was I at the sudden catastrophe I had so innocently caused, I should have waited in due patience for the major's return, had not Sparks seized my arm, and cried out,—

"Run for it, O'Malley; cut like fun, my boy, or we're done for."

"Run; why? What for? Where?" said I, stupefied by the scene before me.

"Here he is!" called out Sparks, as throwing up the window, he sprang out upon the stone sill, and leaped into the street. I followed mechanically, and jumped after him, just as the major had reached the window. A ball whizzed by me, that soon determined my further movements; so, putting on all speed, I flew down the street, turned the corner, and regained the hotel breathless and without a hat, while Sparks arrived a moment later, pale as a ghost, and trembling like an aspen-leaf.

"Safe, by Jove!" said Sparks, throwing himself into a chair, and panting for breath.

"Safe, at last," said I, without well knowing why or for what.

"You've had a sharp run of it, apparently," said Power, coolly, and without any curiosity as to the cause; "and now, let us on board; there goes the trumpet again. The skipper is a surly old fellow, and we must not lose his tide for him." So saying, he proceeded to collect his cloaks, cane, etc., and get ready for departure.



CHAPTER XXVIII

THE VOYAGE.

When I awoke from the long, sound sleep which succeeded my last adventure, I had some difficulty in remembering where I was or how I had come there. From my narrow berth I looked out upon the now empty cabin, and at length some misty and confused sense of my situation crept slowly over me. I opened the little shutter beside me and looked out. The bold headlands of the southern coast were frowning in sullen and dark masses about a couple of miles distant, and I perceived that we were going fast through the water, which was beautifully calm and still. I now looked at my watch; it was past eight o'clock; and as it must evidently be evening, from the appearance of the sky, I felt that I had slept soundly for above twelve hours.

In the hurry of departure the cabin had not been set to rights, and there lay every species of lumber and luggage in all imaginable confusion. Trunks, gun-cases, baskets of eggs, umbrellas, hampers of sea-store, cloaks, foraging-caps, maps, and sword-belts were scattered on every side,—while the debris of a dinner, not over-remarkable for its propriety in table equipage, added to the ludicrous effect. The heavy tramp of a foot overhead denoted the step of some one taking his short walk of exercise; while the rough voice of the skipper, as he gave the word to "Go about!" all convinced me that we were at last under way, and off to "the wars."

The confusion our last evening on shore produced in my brain was such that every effort I made to remember anything about it only increased my difficulty, and I felt myself in a web so tangled and inextricable that all endeavor to escape free was impossible. Sometimes I thought that I had really married Matilda Dalrymple; then, I supposed that the father had called me out, and wounded me in a duel; and finally, I had some confused notion about a quarrel with Sparks, but what for, when, and how it ended, I knew not. How tremendously tipsy I must have been! was the only conclusion I could draw from all these conflicting doubts; and after all, it was the only thing like fact that beamed upon my mind. How I had come on board and reached my berth was a matter I reserved for future inquiry, resolving that about the real history of my last night on shore I would ask no questions, if others were equally disposed to let it pass in silence.

I next began to wonder if Mike had looked after all my luggage, trunks, etc., and whether he himself had been forgotten in our hasty departure. About this latter point I was not destined for much doubt; for a well-known voice, from the foot of the companion-ladder, at once proclaimed my faithful follower, and evidenced his feelings at his departure from his home and country.

Mr. Free was, at the time I mention, gathered up like a ball opposite a small, low window that looked upon the bluff headlands now fast becoming dim and misty as the night approached. He was apparently in low spirits, and hummed in a species of low, droning voice, the following ballad, at the end of each verse of which came an Irish chorus which, to the erudite in such matters, will suggest the air of Moddirederoo:—

MICKEY FREE'S LAMENT.

Then fare ye well, ould Erin dear; To part, my heart does ache well: From Carrickfergus to Cape Clear, I'll never see your equal. And though to foreign parts we're bound, Where cannibals may ate us, We'll ne'er forget the holy ground Of potteen and potatoes. Moddirederoo aroo, aroo, etc.

When good Saint Patrick banished frogs, And shook them from his garment, He never thought we'd go abroad, To live upon such varmint; Nor quit the land where whiskey grew To wear King George's button, Take vinegar for mountain dew, And toads for mountain mutton. Moddirederoo aroo, aroo, etc.

"I say, Mike, stop that confounded keen, and tell me where are we?"

"Off the ould head of Kinsale, sir."

"Where is Captain Power?"

"Smoking a cigar on deck, with the captain, sir."

"And Mr. Sparks?"

"Mighty sick in his own state-room. Oh, but it's himself has enough of glory—bad luck to it!—by this time. He'd make your heart break to look at him."

"Who have you got on board besides?"

"The adjutant's here, sir; and an old gentleman they call the major."

"Not Major Dalrymple?" said I, starting up with terror at the thought, "eh, Mike?"

"No, sir, another major; his name is Mulroon, or Mundoon, or something like that."

"Monsoon, you son of a lumper potato," cried out a surly, gruff voice from a berth opposite. "Monsoon. Who's at the other side?"