“It is so confoundedly ridiculous, you know. I don’t mind taking him up a little case of a dozen champagne pints, but what do you think I had to take yesterday?”
“I don’t know,” said Bob, laughing; “a pound of candles, perhaps.”
“No, not yesterday,” cried Tom Long; “but I did have to take him a packet of composite candles, one day. Only fancy, you know, an officer in Her Majesty’s service marching with a fatigue party, up to a palm-thatched barn, to take a coffee-coloured savage a packet of candles for a present!”
“Mustn’t look a gift horse in the mouth,” said Bob, philosophically. “Present’s a present, whether it’s a pound of candles or a gold chain.”
“Bah! It’s disgusting,” said Tom Long. “It’s enough to make a man want to part with his commission.”
“What’ll you take for it, Tom Long? I think I should like a change. Or come, I’ll swap with you. I’ll turn ensign, and you take a go at the sea?”
“Don’t be absurd.”
“Certainly not; but come, you didn’t tell me what you took up yesterday.”
“No,” exclaimed Tom Long, flushing with annoyance; “but I will tell you, for it’s a scandal and a disgrace to the service, and Mr Linton ought to be informed against. I actually, sir, had to march those men all along through that jungle with a box.”
“Box of what?” said Bob; “dominoes?”