And Elfie openly expressed her opinion:
“Justin, you were cut out for a common soldier! I never saw you look so well in my life. But then the closefitting uniform of a private certainly does show off ‘a fine figure of a man,’ as no other dress in the world could. Somehow or other, I think of a gladiator, and of an Apollo, and the Colossus of Rhodes, when I look at you in that tight fit, Mr. Rosenthal.”
“Miss Fielding, I am your slave and your knight. Were it permitted in the ranks, I would pin your glove upon my cap for a feather and bear it through the battle-field to certain victory!” said Justin, laughing and bowing.
“No, don’t! Britomarte would put a spider in my dumplin!”
“Elfie!” indignantly exclaimed Miss Conyers.
“You know you’d poison me if I should dare to—hem—be a friend of Justin’s! Oh, I know! I’ve read the story of the dog in the manger! how the dog couldn’t eat the hay and wouldn’t let the heifer eat it!” laughed the girl.
“You are privileged to jest roughly, I suppose,” said Miss Conyers, coldly.
“I know I am,” admitted Elfie—“privileged to do everything but flirt with Justin. If I was to dare to do that—hush, girls! you know how Britty can hate men, but you will never know how she can hate women until some unlucky woman gives Justin her glove to wear in his cap!—Mercy! there, I’ve done!” exclaimed Elfie, shrinking from Britomarte’s flashing eyes. “And now we’ll change the subject. Justin, mon brave! you look very clean and very nice; your tight suit is such a clear bright blue, and your shirt-collar is as white as the driven snow; but, Justin, mon ami, can you keep clean over there in camp? that is the question! or, when you come to see us, shall we have to put you in soak over night before we can breakfast with you next morning?”
“The river flows below our fort, and the sutlers keep a good supply of brown soap and crash towels, so I have hopes to be able to keep out of the category of the ‘unwashed!’” said the volunteer.
“I am very glad to hear it. For as far as my observation goes, there seems to be the most intimate relationship, and an inevitable connection, between dirt and glory. Why, even my pap, in speaking of the victorious field of Gettysburg, could only describe it as a ‘very dusty’ place.”