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.