“When we came upon your party we were not over clear whether you were English, Portuguese, or French, and that was the reason I called out to you, ‘God save all here!’ in Irish. Your polite answer was a shot, which struck the old horse in the knee, and although we wheeled about in double-quick, we never could get him out of his professional habits on the road. He had a strong notion he was engaged in another funeral,—as he was very likely to be,—and the devil a bit faster than a dead march could we get him to, with all our thrashing. Orderly time for men in a hurry, with a whole platoon blazing away behind them! But long life to the cavalry, they never hit anything!”
While he continued to run on in this manner, we reached our watch-fire, when what was my surprise to discover, in my newly-made acquaintance, the worthy doctor I had seen a day or two before operating at the fountain at Talavera.
“Well, Mr. O’Mealey,” said he, as he seated himself before the blaze, “What is the state of the larder? Anything savory,—anything drink-inspiring to be had?”
“I fear, Doctor, my fare is of the very humblest; still—”
“What are the fluids, Charley?” cried the major; “the cruel performance I have been enacting on that cursed beast has left me in a fever.”
“This was a pigeon-pie, formerly,” said Dr. Quill, investigating the ruined walls of a pasty; “and,—but come, here’s a duck; and if my nose deceive me not, a very tolerable ham. Peter—Larry—Patsy—What’s the name of your familiar there?”
“Mickey—Mickey Free.”
“Mickey Free, then; come here, avick! Devise a little drink, my son,—none of the weakest—no lemon—-hot! You understand, hot! That chap has an eye for punch; there’s no mistaking an Irish fellow, Nature has endowed them richly,—fine features and a beautiful absorbent system! That’s the gift! Just look at him, blowing up the fire,—isn’t he a picture? Well, O’Mealey, I was fretting that we hadn’t you up at Torrijos; we were enjoying life very respectably,—we established a little system of small tithes upon fowl, sheep, pigs’ heads, and wine skins that throve remarkably for the time. Here’s the lush! Put it down there, Mickey, in the middle; that’s right. Your health, Shaugh. O’Mealey, here’s a troop to you; and in the mean time I’ll give you a chant:—
‘Come, ye jovial souls, don’t over the bowl be sleeping,
Nor let the grog go round like a cripple creeping;
If your care comes, up, in the liquor sink it,
Pass along the lush, I’m the boy can drink it.
Isn’t that so, Mrs. Mary Callaghan?
Isn’t that so, Mrs. Mary Callaghan?’
“Shaugh, my hearty, this begins to feel comfortable.”