The Cameronians: A Novel, Volume 2 (of 3)

A Novel.
JAMES GRANT,
AUTHOR OF 'THE ROMANCE OF WAR,' 'OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH, ETC.
IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. II.
LONDON: RICHARD BENTLEY AND SON, Publishers in Ordinary to Her Majesty the Queen. 1881.
CONTENTS OF VOL. II.
CHAPTER

THE CAMERONIANS.
Hew resolved, as before, to lose no time in putting Sir Piers on his guard; he would give him an 'eye-opener,' he thought; and, in his ignorance of military discipline and etiquette, almost conceived that the baronet, as full colonel of the regiment, might have power to issue, perhaps, some very stringent and crushing order concerning the culprit.
Hew, among other 'caddish' tastes and propensities, was fond of 'sherry-glass flirtations' at bars and buffets, where sham smiles are bartered for button-hole flowers, amid bantered compliments and honeyed small-talk, not always remarkable for its purity; and while engaged in one of these little affairs, he made the casual acquaintance of Herr Von Humstrumm, the regimental bandmaster, a somewhat obese-looking German, with an enormous moustache and his scrubby dark hair shorn remarkably short; and from the latter he drew—or alleged to Sir Piers that he drew—some account of the family and antecedents of Cecil Falconer; and with these he came home highly elated; and whatever the conversation really was, the communications did not suffer diminution in his relation of them; and he broke the matter to Sir Piers in a cold, hard, and exultant way, that could scarcely fail to strike the latter as being, at least, ungenerous.
'I have discovered who and what our hero is!' said he.