“Hoo's that?”
“I was ordthered to put out the light in my barrack-room every night at nine o'clock, an' I did not do it last night—that 's all.”
“But you were doin' a wee bit o' something, I'll warrant, Pat. Ye war a liften yer han' to your muzzle—eh?”
“O! that's nothing at all at all. We had a dthrop to be sure. That fellow over there on the stool—(you, mister Jack Andrews, I mane)—kept a tellin' us such stories, that I forgot the time entirely. Hooh! the divil may care—Jack is here now, and Corporal O'Callaghan to boot; so what signifies a guard, if they'll only tip us a bit of a song: what do you say, Sargeant—eh?”
“Why, Pat, I've no objection to that, if there be no muckle noise aboot it.”
Thus spoke the Sergeant, and his worthy private, Mulligan: the latter, by way of punishment, was ordered to an extra guard, for being a little out of rule, as above-mentioned; but his punishment was given him by an Officer who had fought and bled with him, and who regarded him with kindly feelings. Pat's delinquency was reported to the Captain by the Orderly Officer, and he could do no less. However, there was not a better nor a more respected man in the corps, than Patrick Mulligan, of the grenadier company. Like many other good soldiers, he was fond of society and the all-powerful potyeen. So when the Orderly Officer was going round at nine o'clock, he put the light under a wooden pale, and when all was, as he thought, safe, he returned to the convivial glass with his comrades; but the officer was one of those pipe-clay martinets, just joined from the half-pay of a militia regiment, and although he had never seen in his life as much actual service as poor Pat had done in one month of his existence, (and perhaps knew much less in reality about the duties of a soldier,) he stole back to the barracks, and surprised the party of carousing Peninsulars. His report was made, and the men were punished.
The practice of keeping lights in the barrack rooms, after the proper hour for extinguishing them, cannot be justified; but there are infractions of general rules in the army, which, if not to be tolerated, should not be sought after with too scrutinizing an eye. A good officer knows when to pry and when to keep his eyes shut; but that was not the case with Pat Mulligan's Orderly Officer.
“Weel Jock,” said the Corporal, “ye maun gi' us a lilt—you or the Corporal.”
“With all my heart,” replied Jack Andrews, “if Corporal O'Callaghan is willing to join in with his second.”
“Faith! I've no objection in the world to conthribute to the harmony of the guard, if my voice doesn't frighten you, lads.”