"Wot yer call it? Sweet spirits o' mitre? Never 'eerd on it afore.
'Ow do you tike it?"
"Oh, you just puts it in 'ot water; but there, I can't 'ave it. Good night, Bill, and thank you for the blanket."
Bill, without a word, tired as he was, left the tent, and half an hour afterwards returned with the medicine.
"Gawd, Bill," said the sick man, "but you ain't a ——"
"Not so much chin music. There, tike it, and go to sleep."
Such little acts of kindness as these were constantly taking place, and they were by no means confined to men who belonged to the better-class but were more frequently seen among the roughest and coarsest.
Bob found out, too, that there was a rough sense of honour among them. Some of them seemed to revel in filthy language, but if a man did a mean thing, or didn't play the game according to their standard, he was in for a bad time. Indeed, he soon found out that, in a certain sense, the same code of honour which prevailed at Clifton, with exceptions, operated in this newly-formed camp.
Day after day and week after week passed, and still Bob knew nothing of what was to happen to him. He had enlisted as a private, but on Captain Pringle's advice had put down his name for a commission. From the first day, however, he had heard nothing more of it. From early morning till late in the day it was nothing but hard, tiring work.
It was all wonderfully strange to him, this intermingling with a mixed humanity, working like a slave for that which he had hitherto hated, and which he still hated. Still, he threw his whole heart into it, and he could not help knowing that he was progressing rapidly. After the first few days his tiredness and soreness passed away, and he could go through the most arduous duties without feeling tired. There was something in it all, too, which inspired him. The military precision of everything appealed to him, and the shouts, and laughter of hundreds of voices made life gay in spite of everything. As the days passed by, moreover, he could not help seeing that the association with clean-minded, healthy-bodied, educated men, was having a good effect upon the coarse-fibred portion of the strange community. They did not indulge so frequently in coarse language, neither was their general conduct so objectionable. It seemed as though they had something to live up to.
"Shut up, mate, and don't be a beast," Bob heard one man say to another one day.