"Yiss; but we had a rale cornel in command that's been through the Amerikin war, they till me."
"Sergeant-major, there are no American soldiers."
"Shure, an' Oi'm thinkin', corporal," said the veteran, feeling a metaphorical thrid on the tail av his coat. "Oi'm thinkin' there's some pretty foine foightin's been done in Ameriky; Oi've sane it, carporal, wid my own two eyes."
"A dog can fight, Sergeant-major, and cats are tantamount to the same thing; but where, I say, is the soldierly bearing, the discipline, the spree-doo-cor, as they say in France? Sergeant-major, you know and I know that a man cannot be a tailor today and a soldier to-morrow, and an agent for pictorial family bibles the day after."
"I dunno, for you see you're a conshtable an' Oi'm a hid missenger in a governmint ahffice in the city."
"A soldier, Sergeant-major, can always serve the country, is, even as a soldier, a government officer; that is a very different thing, Sergeant-major."
"The cornel here was tillin' me there was min in his rigiment that was merchints an' lawyers an' clerks, an' shtudints, as good sowldjers as iver foired a carrboine or drawed a shabre on the inimy."
"That was a case, Sergeant-major, of mob meeting mob. Did these men ever charge as our cavalry charged at Balaclava; did they ever stand, Sergeant-major, as we, myself included, stood at Inkerman? Never, Sergeant-major, never! They might have made soldiers, if taken young; but, as they were, they were no more soldiers than Sylvanus Pilgrim here."
"You shet up yer tater-trap, Consterble Rigby, an' don't go fer to abuse better men nor you aint," angrily interrupted the subject of the corporal's unflattering comparison. Then, seeing the veteran, hopeless of convincing his opponent, retire to the garden to join the children, Sylvanus waxed bold. "A soldier, Trypheeny, a common soldier! Ef I owned a dawg, a yaller dawg, I wouldn't go and make the pore beast a soldier. Old pipeclay and parade, tattoo and barricks and punishment drill, likes ter come around here braggin' up his lazy, slavish life. Why don't he git a dawg collar and a chain at wonst and git tied up ter his kennel. Ef you want a man, Trypheeny, get one as knows
A life on the ocean wave