“Never mind, Sparks, take the whole fight to your own proper self, and do battle like a man; and here I stand, ready at all arms to prove my position,—that we drink better, sing better, court better, fight better, and make better punch than every John Bull, from Berwick to the Land’s End.”
Sparks, however, who seemed not exactly sure how far his antagonist was disposed to quiz, relapsed into a half-tipsy expression of contemptuous silence, and sipped his liquor without reply.
“Yes,” said Power, after a pause, “bad luck to it for whiskey; it nearly got me broke once, and poor Tom O’Reilly of the 5th, too, the best-tempered fellow in the service. We were as near it as touch and go; and all for some confounded Loughrea spirits that we believed to be perfectly innocent, and used to swill away freely without suspicion of any kind.”
“Let’s hear the story,” said I, “by all means.”
“It’s not a long one,” said Power, “so I don’t care if I tell it; and besides, if I make a clean breast of my own sins, I’ll insist upon Monsoon’s telling you afterwards how he stocked his cellar in Cadiz. Eh, Major; there’s worse tipple than the King of Spain’s sherry?”
“You shall judge for yourself, old boy,” said Monsoon, good-humoredly; “and as for the narrative, it is equally at your service. Of course it goes no further. The commander-in-chief, long life to him! is a glorious fellow; but he has no more idea of a joke than the Archbishop of Canterbury, and it might chance to reach him.”
“Recount, and fear not!” cried Power; “we are discreet as the worshipful company of apothecaries.”
“But you forget you are to lead the way.”
“Here goes, then,” said the jolly captain; “not that the story has any merit in it, but the moral is beautiful.
“Ireland, to be sure, is a beautiful country; but somehow it would prove a very dull one to be quartered in, if it were not that the people seem to have a natural taste for the army. From the belle of Merrion Square down to the inn-keeper’s daughter in Tralee, the loveliest part of the creation seem to have a perfect appreciation of our high acquirements and advantages; and in no other part of the globe, the Tonga Islands included, is a red-coat more in favor. To be sure, they would be very ungrateful if it were not the case; for we, upon our side, leave no stone unturned to make ourselves agreeable. We ride, drink, play, and make love to the ladies from Fairhead to Killarney, in a way greatly calculated to render us popular; and as far as making the time pass pleasantly, we are the boys for the ‘greatest happiness’ principle. I repeat it; we deserve our popularity. Which of us does not get head and ears in debt with garrison balls and steeple-chases, picnics, regattas, and the thousand-and-one inventions to get rid of one’s spare cash,—so called for being so sparingly dealt out by our governors? Now and then, too, when all else fails, we take a newly-joined ensign and make him marry some pretty but penniless lass in a country town, just to show the rest that we are not joking, but have serious ideas of matrimony in the midst of all our flirtations. If it were all like this, the Green Isle would be a paradise; but unluckily every now and then one is condemned to some infernal place where there is neither a pretty face nor tight ankle, where the priest himself is not a good fellow, and long, ill-paved, straggling streets, filled on market days with booths of striped calico and soapy cheese, is the only promenade, and a ruinous barrack, with mouldy walls and a tumbling chimney, the only quarters.