He looked carelessly about him for a moment and then at Major Bullbeggor.
"I have to thank you," said he, "for interfering with those farmers, for as you see, I am entirely unarmed and undressed—except for this growth of feathers. But I am no chicken sir, in spite of them. No, sir, I'm hardly classed as a chicken—as these two gentlemen with you might testify.
"If the ugly old duck, there,"—and he pointed to Barron—"would like to continue the argument we were engaged in last night, I think I might persuade him of the fallacy of his ideas concerning his birth and self importance."
"You have most remarkable powers of logic," laughed Barron, "and if reason and sword-play were analogous I doubt not that you could sustain your premise. But there are too many men like you in this world who wish to maintain their point by reason of false analogy. Therefore, I warn you that unless you mend your speech I shall turn you over again to Colonel Gibson's lambs, and they will hardly let you off so easily the next time."
"If they are his lambs," replied the soldier, turning and looking at Colonel Henry, "I take it he is a preacher, and now I mark it, the fellow has a most ecclesiastical mode of speech. One would think him an itinerant minister, holding forth to his flock of"—
"Silence! you dog," growled the Major, "know your betters, or I'll stretch you on the wheel." Then he beckoned to an orderly who stood nigh the steps of the house and in a moment the Corporal was led away to be scraped and scrubbed.
Barron and myself were then introduced to Colonel Henry, Woodford, and other officers in the group, after which we were left to ourselves to discuss more or less learnedly the probable outcome of affairs in the colonies, while the older men went back to their duties. I knew little or nothing about military organization, so when the talk drifted into certain channels I withheld my speech. Before we left, however, Barron and I had been assigned volunteer positions; he as captain of a company of farmers, and I as a lieutenant in it, all under the command of Major Bullbeggor, who, in turn, belonged to Colonel Bullet's regiment. Rank was a pretty hard thing to determine in those days, for nearly everybody was addressed as "Colonel" or "Major," no matter what they were in reality. Besides this, there were several jealous men in the Richmond assembly who pretended to doubt Colonel Henry's military ability, and for a long time I believed Colonel Woodford in command.
The brave and gallant Bullet, however, took the place assigned him without a word, as did Bullbeggor, Barron and myself, and we strove to get some discipline into the hunters and farmers who made up our rank and file.
Gibson's Lambs, as his command of wild men were called, were almost beyond the reach of discipline, and were little better than Indians, so at one time Colonel Woodford was strongly tempted to disband the whole outfit, but later on they began to show signs of intelligence and were kept in ranks.
We drilled and drilled, day after day, until finally we had the satisfaction of heading a poorly armed, but fairly well organized, set of men.