Probably not one of us had enjoyed the luxury of a complete wash for a week, and the use of the razor having long been relinquished, our beards rivalled that of Carneydd Llewellyn in size, if not in hue. The scarlet uniforms, with lace and wings[[3]] of gold, in which we had landed, we had marched and fought and slept in for weeks, were purple, covered with discolorations, and patched with any stuff that came to hand. Our trousers had turned from Oxford gray to something of a red hue, with Crimean mud. Each of us had a revolver in his sash (which we then wore round the waist), and a canvas haversack or well-worn courier-bag slung over his shoulder, to contain whatever he might pick up, beg, borrow, or buy (some were less particular) in the shape of biscuits, eggs, fowls, or potatoes. Caradoc carried a dead duck by the legs as he entered, and Charley Gwynne had a loaf of Russian bread hung by a cord over his left shoulder, like a pilgrim at La Scala Santa; while Price had actually secured a lump of cheese from the wife of a Tartar, a fair one, with whom the universal lover had found favour when foraging in the lovely Baidar Valley. We were already too miserable to laugh at each other's appearance, and our tatters had ceased to be a matter of novelty. If such was the condition of our officers, that of the privates was fully worse; and thanks to our wretched commissariat and ambulance arrangements, the splendid physique of our men had begun to disappear; but their pluck was undying as ever.
On this morning we six were to have a breakfast such as rarely fell to our lot in the Crimea; for Evans, my Welsh factotum and fidus Achates, was a clever fellow, and speedily had prepared for us, at a fire improvised under the shelter of a rock, a large kettle of steaming coffee, which, sans milk, we drank from tin canteens, tumblers, or anything suitable, and Gwynne's loaf was shared fraternally among us, together with a brace of fowls found by him in a Tartar cottage. "Lineal descendants of the cock that crew to Mahomet, no doubt," said he; "and now, thanks to Evans, there they are, brown, savoury, appetising, gizzard under one wing, liver under the other--done to a turn, and on an old ramrod."
And while discussing them, the events of the siege were also discussed, as coolly as we were wont to do the most ordinary field man[oe]uvres at home.
"The deuce!" said I, "how the breeze comes under the wall of this wretched tent!"
"Don't abuse the tent, Harry," said Caradoc; "I am thankful to find myself in one, after being on board the Hydaspes. It must be a veritable luxury to be able to sleep, even on a camp-bed and alone, after being in a hospital, with one sufferer on your right, another on your left, dead or dying, groaning and in agony. May God kindly keep us all from the 'bloody hospital of Scutari,' after all I have heard of it!"
"You were with us last night in the trenches, Mostyn?" said I.
"Yes, putting Gwynne's Hythe theories into practice from a rifle pit. I am certain that I potted at least three of the Ruskies as coolly as ever I did grouse in Scotland. All squeamishness has left me now, though I could not help shuddering when first I saw a man's heels in the air, after firing at him. You will never guess what happened on our left. A stout vivandière of the 3rd Zouaves, while in the act of giving me a petit verre from her little keg, was taken--"
"By the enemy?" exclaimed Price.
"Not at all--with the pains of maternity; and actually while the shot and shell were flying over our heads."
"And what were the trench casualties?" asked Gwynne.