possessed of during the Boer War, naturally came in for considerable chaff and ridicule.

As a specimen of the senseless jokes that abounded at the time, I may quote what was generally mooted in military messes, that at a recent levée the volunteers who had attended had shown so much esprit de corps that Her Majesty had ordered the windows to be opened; and it is, I believe, an absolute fact that on one occasion an inspecting officer nearly had a fit when the major of a gallant corps appeared with the medal his prize sow had won pinned upon his breast.

It was the Volunteer review in Hyde Park in 1860 that was responsible for my first appearance in uniform.  Determined that the review should lack nothing of military recognition, stands had been erected, for which officers in uniform were entitled to tickets for themselves and their relations.  In an unlucky moment the announcement had caught the eye of a sister, with the result that, terribly nervous, nay almost defiant, I was marched boldly down to Bond Street on the day of the review, and, nolens volens, dressed at Ridpath and Manning’s in my brand new cast-iron uniform.

Conceive, kind reader, a wretched youth—dressed inch by inch by a ruthless tailor in broad daylight on a sunny afternoon, incapable of deceiving the most inexperienced by his amateur attempts of appearing at home—huddled into the clothes, and then hustled into the street by a proud sister and father, and some idea of my abject misery will be apparent to you.

It was at the moment, whilst waiting on the pavement to enter our carriage, that a huge Guardsman passed and thought fit to “salute.”  My first instinct was to wring him by the hand and present him with a sovereign; then all became indistinct, and I tumbled into the carriage.

The excitement was too much for me—I almost fainted.

A splendid specimen of the Hibernian type in my regiment was a man called Madden (and by his familiars “Payther”), who, as a character, deserves special mention.  This giant had not long previously been “claimed” by an elder brother whilst serving in a Highland Regiment, and it was reported that on one occasion, when on sentry at Lucknow, the general officer impressed by his six feet three in full Highland costume, having pulled up and addressed him with, “What part of the Highlands do you come from, my man?” was considerably nonplussed by being informed, “Oi come from Clonakilty, yer honour, in the County Cork.”  Our colonel, too, was an undoubted Irishman by birth; but had succeeded, after forty years’ service, in being capable of assuming the Scotch, Irish, or English dialect as circumstances seemed to require.  In addition, moreover, to an excessive amount of esprit de corps, he had the reputation of being the greatest liar in the Army; not a liar be it understood in the offensive application of the term, but incapable of accuracy or divesting his statements of exaggeration when notoriety or circumstances gave him an opening.  This failing of “Bill Sykes,” as he was called, was so universally known throughout the Army, that one evening a trap was laid for him by some jovial spirits in the smoking-room of a famous Army club.

“Here comes old Bill,” was remarked by Cootie, of the Bays, as the Colonel sauntered in with a toothpick in his mouth.  “I’ll bet a fiver I’ll start a yarn he’ll never be able to cap.”

“Done!” cried Kirby, “and if he doesn’t keep up his reputation I’ll pay you on the nail, and send in my papers in the morning.”

“Good evening, Colonel,” began Cootie.  “I was just relating a most extraordinary coincidence that was lately told me by a man whose veracity I can vouch for—Shute of ours.”

“Indeed,” replied the Colonel, filling a pipe—Bill invariably smoked a dudeen at the head of the regiment.  “By all means let me hear it.”

“It is simply this.  Coming home on sick leave in a P. and O. not long ago, the look-out man descried half a mile out at sea what appeared to be a huge box; a long boat was immediately lowered, and when the derelict was brought on deck, conceive the astonishment of everybody in discovering that it was a hencoop, and a live man inside.  It was a case of shipwreck it appears, and the man saved was the only survivor of some 180 souls.  Rum thing, wasn’t it? but some people have infernal luck.”

“Yes,” replied the Colonel.  “I believe I was horn under a lucky star; perhaps you will be surprised to hear that I was the man.”

A roar of astonishment greeted this admission, whilst Cootie, hastily thrusting a fiver into Kirby’s hand, whispered, “I presume you won’t send in your papers to-morrow?”

But, despite his peculiarity, old Bill was universally popular.  A splendid billiard player, he had in India created such excitement in a match for £500, that even Lord Faulkland, the Governor of Bombay, who never parted with a sixpence without looking at it twice, was said to have put a gold mohur on it, and in later times I can remember the Club House at Aldershot being crammed to suffocation when the same redoubtable warrior licked Curry the Brigade Major, who till our arrival had no compeer.

One curious experience he had had which he never tired of narrating: “I was once waiting for the d— packet at Dover to take me over to Calais, and at the hostelry I met a d— Frenchman, who asked me if I could ‘parley vous,’ and I said ‘no,’ but offered to play him a game of billiards.  We had a fiver on it, but I soon discovered that no matter where I left the balls the d— fellow made a cannon.  I was only about three ahead of him, so when next I played I knocked a ball off the table.  The first time the d— fellow sympathised with me, and picked up the ball; after two or three repetitions the coincidence appeared to puzzle him.  ‘I can’t play if Mooser does this,’ he said angrily.  ‘I can’t help that,’ I replied, and ran out with a break.  He declined to go double or quits, so I pocketed the fiver, and often found myself laughing over it in the d— boat, where I was d— ill.”

This persistent swearing may sound curious to the student of to-day, but in those halcyon days everybody swore.  The Iron Duke, it is well known, never opened his mouth without a superfluous adjective, and General Pennefather, who commanded at Aldershot in my time, literally “swore himself” into office.  On one occasion, when the Queen was on the ground, he wished every regiment so vehemently to the “bottom of the bottomless pit” that it frightened the gracious lady, who sent an equerry to remind him of her presence.  The monition had the desired effect for ten minutes, when the bombardment commenced afresh, and brought the field-day to an abrupt termination.  The Queen had bolted in sheer trepidation of an earthquake.

Military examinations for direct commissions in those long-ago days were held at Chelsea Hospital, and extended over a week.  On the occasion of my public appearance an extraordinary incident occurred.  Every precaution, it was stated, had been taken against the papers getting into unauthorised hands, but hardly had the first day passed when every candidate was aware that the tout of a sporting tailor was prepared to sell the paper of the day correctly answered at £2 a head.  The conspirators met at the “Hans Hotel,” and donkeys incapable of spelling, and with no knowledge of any language but their own, passed examinations worthy of a senior wrangler.

The miscreant who thus tampered with Her Majesty’s stationery was one Pugh, and his employer (if I remember rightly) was one Cutler; but the golden shower came