“Snooker! beer!” said the cadet.
I saw a large jug of beer and a small mug near it, so I tilted up the jug and poured out a mugful of beer and passed this up the table.
When the cadet saw this he said, “What do you mean, sir, by pouring out my beer like that! Put it back and froth it! By Jove! if ever you pour out beer like that again I’ll have you over to my room and give you an angle of forty-five!”
I poured back the beer into the jug, and again filled the mug, this time taking care to froth it.
The meat that we had for our dinner was hard and tasteless, and was of a most inferior description. Our meal consisted only of meat, potatoes, bread, and the thinnest of beer, termed “swipes.” In those days the food of the cadets was scarcely fit to eat, the tea and coffee were most inferior, and the ration of bread and butter allowed us scarcely sufficient for half the number. That an alteration in this particular was much needed was not long after discovered, but, at the time of which we write, the cadets could scarcely have lived had it not been for the additional food they obtained from pastrycooks in the neighbourhood, or that was smuggled into barracks at various times.
After our dinner a quarter of an hour elapsed before we “fell in” for academy. Luckily I found Jenkins, a boy from Hostler’s, who had gone to the Academy a half-year before, who told me that I joined the last squad or division which was now termed “a class,” otherwise I should have made a mistake.
The class I joined was called the fourth class, and on a cadet, who was a corporal, reporting “all present,” we were marched into the class-room where we were to study.
On looking round at my companions I now found that I recognised several cadets as the candidates who came up for examination with me, and one or two nodded to me, but as we were ordered by the corporal who was in charge of the room to take our seats, I had no opportunity of talking to them. I looked round the room to find some of my companions at Hostler’s; I thought it would be great fun to see their surprise at my having passed. I expected to see Fraser high up in the class, and also Fuller and Hunt, and one or two others who at Hostler’s were in the first class, and were always held up to me as examples of learning. Low down in the class I saw a cadet who had been at Hostler’s; he was called Smart, and was considered rather a dull boy; but, seeing none of the others, I concluded they must be in some other room.
As I was re-examining my companions, the cadet in charge called out, “Shepard, look to your front! If I see you locking round again I’ll put you in arrest?”
I now sat looking straight before me, until called by the mathematical master to the octagon, where I was given some work to do, and again took my place at my desk.