"Probably at the beginning of next month. Fancy leaving England in November—just at the most hideous time of the year—and in a week or two getting out into summer again, with the most beautiful climate and foliage and what not all around you! I can tell you a man makes a great mistake who settles down to a sort of vegetable life anywhere: you don't catch me at that again."
"There's some old women," observed the general, who was so anxious to show his profundity that he quite forgot the invidious character of the comparison, "who are just like trees—as much below the ground as above it. Isn't that true, eh? They're a deal more at home among the people they have buried than among those that are alive. I don't say that's your case, Roscorla. You're comparatively a young man yet: you've got brisk health. I don't wonder at your liking to knock about. As for you, young Trelyon, what do you mean to do?"
Harry Trelyon started. "Oh," said he with some confusion, "I have no immediate plans. Yes, I have: don't you know I have been cramming for the civil service examinations for first commissions?"
"And what the devil made the War Office go to those civilians?" muttered the general.
"And if I pull through I shall want all your influence to get me gazetted to a good regiment. Don't they often shunt you on to the First or Second West Indians?"
"And you've enough money to back you, too," said the general. "I tell you what it is, gentlemen, if they abolish the purchase of commissions in the army—and they're always talking about it—they don't know what they'll bring about. They'll have two sets of officers in the army—men with money who like a good mess, and live far beyond their pay, and men with no money at all, who've got to live on their pay; and how can they afford the regimental mess out of that? But Parliament won't stand it, you'll see. The war minister will be beaten if he brings it on—take my word for that."
The old general had probably never heard of a royal warrant and its mighty powers.
"So you're going to be one of us?" he said to Trelyon. "Well, you've a smart figure for a uniform. You're the first of your side of the family to go into the army, eh? You had some naval men among you, eh?"
"I think you'd better ask my grandmother," said young Trelyon with a laugh: "she'll tell you stories about 'em by the hour together."
"She's a wonderful woman that—a wonderful old creature!" said the general, just as if he were a sprightly young fellow talking of the oldest inhabitant of the district. "She's not one of them that are half buried: she's wide enough awake, I'll be bound. Gad! what a handsome woman she was when I saw her first! Well, lads, let's join the ladies: I'm none of your steady-going old topers. Enough's as good's a feast—that's my motto. And I can't write my name on a slate with my knuckles, either."