BABY JANE'S ARMY
Baby Jane's first thought when she opened her eyes in the early morning
was of her army, and she scrambled to her feet and stared before her.
It was a splendid sight. The great line, all shining in the new-risen
sun, stretched away from her, regiment after regiment, until it was lost
far away in the morning mist, and before each regiment stood its
Colonel, casting a long blue shadow behind him.
Cheerful shoutings and the fluttering of many flags in the cool air
helped to make Baby Jane feel very elated, and she clapped her hands and
laughed, and took several dancing steps. Sammy must have been up very
early to marshal the army.
At this moment that youth came galloping up mounted on Edouardo, waving
his cap, and, while yet some way off, shouted breathlessly to her:
'Something like an army, isn't it?'
'Oh, Sammy, you are a general!' said Baby Jane. 'I wish I could help
more. Perhaps I could disguise myself and go out as a spy while you are
teaching the army. But, anyhow, let's all have breakfast, and we will
talk as we eat it. Do you know how to drill them?'
'Oh, easy as eating this muffin,'[1] said Sammy, who was always quite
sure about everything. 'Suppose they are all in a line, doing something;
well, you just shout at them, "Ow-row-row, rahee, urra-ub!" and they
suddenly do something else.'
'Why not shout in English?' asked Baby Jane.
'What, and let the enemy know what you are going to do next?' said Sammy
scornfully. 'Not much!'
'But do the soldiers themselves know what you mean?' the puzzled Baby
Jane persisted.
Sammy winked.
'Not a bit of it!' said he. 'When the Colonel shouts, they have got to
do _something_ all together, it doesn't matter what, and the Colonel
has to look as if it was just what he meant.'
'But what is the good of it anyhow?' asked she.
'Well,' said he, 'if they surprise their own Colonel, they're bound to
surprise the enemy much more!'
Breakfast being ended, the manoeuvres commenced. Baby Jane did not
take part herself, but, sitting beneath a palm upon a little knoll, with
the deepest interest she watched her regiments wheel and turn and form
into columns and squares before her.
'If it doesn't frighten that Black Mountain Band,' thought she, 'to see
my army doing these odd things on the sand, they _must_ be brave!' But
here her reflections were painfully interrupted.
The second regiment on the right, a little brown regiment, that had been
performing brilliantly, though rather noisily, and had just at that
moment formed an elegant hollow square, suddenly broke up, and, with
deafening yells, piled itself in a heap, like a swarm of bees, upon its
Colonel.
Then Mary Carmichael, with a terrified face, came galloping up to Baby
Jane, and pulling up on her haunches, panted out the words:
'The Flanagans have mutinied!'
Baby Jane sprang upon her back, and galloped her across the desert
straight at the shrieking pile of monkeys. At her approach they fell
apart, and leaving their Colonel sitting crushed and forlorn, they
rushed at her with a volley of explanations.
'Ah, the spalpeen! He said his poor ould father was a standing disgrace
to the regiment, and, as he couldn't look decent on his feet, he'd make
him do his drills on his head. And as for his mother, poor ould soul,
he's made her a drummer-boy!'
Clearly Patsey had been misusing his military authority to get even with
his parents for past thrashings, and it took some time before Baby Jane,
holding the bruised Colonel in her arms, could make peace between him
and his rebellious regiment. She had to be very severe with them.
'You're not a bit of good as infantry,' she said. 'Just fancy a regiment
that ought to be stretched out in a thin red--I mean brown--line, piled
in a heap on top of the Colonel! No, you are not infantry any
more--you're artillery, and will have to stand in rows and throw
cocoa-nuts for cannon-balls.'
At this moment Sammy came up, and he was charmed with the idea.
'What ho!' he cried. 'Splendid! Talk of batteries of four-inch
field-guns! Just wait till those Black Mountaineers see our batteries of
four-inch field-monkeys!'
It was the Rabbit's regiment of scouts that was being drilled next to
the Flanagans, but he allowed them all to 'stand at ease' to watch the
disgrace of his friend Patsey, and professed to think their new title
exceedingly funny.
'Oh, who'd be a four-inch field-monkey?' he squeaked, and he slapped his
knees and laughed till the tears ran down his whiskers.
'Well,' said Baby Jane, turning sharply upon him, 'you seem very pleased
with yourself, but what can _your_ regiment do?'
The Rabbit dried his tears with his paw. 'Do?' he said shrilly. 'Why,
look at this!'
Truly it was magnificent. Squatting still as statues, at the word of
command five hundred bunnies cocked their thousand ears in unison.
'Up--down--right--left!'
'And that's nothing,' said the Rabbit calmly; 'they can do the same with
their tails!'
'Wonderful!' said Baby Jane. 'And now, as Sammy says that Miss
Crocodile's regiment, and the Lion's, and the Bear's have been doing
wonderful things, every one has done a good morning's work----'
'Except the four-inch field-monkeys,' interrupted the Rabbit spitefully.
'And drill is over for the day,' went on Baby Jane. 'This afternoon my
army shall sit down and keep cool and see a military tournament.'
As to the beginning of this tournament there was a good deal of puzzling
and trouble, for the army sent a solemn deputation, headed by Miss
Crocodile and Mary Carmichael, to Baby Jane during dinner to pray that
proceedings might open with a war-dance.
Now Baby Jane had not the least idea how a war-dance went, and, after a
long consultation with Sammy, she had to tell the deputation so.
'Do you know how it goes yourselves?' she asked.
Miss Crocodile said the niggers always did it before they went out
collecting missionaries. You jumped up and down and waved sticks and
shouted. Here Miss Crocodile made a few shy steps to illustrate her
meaning.
'Of course,' said Baby Jane, upon whom a light had dawned. 'An Irish
jig! The very thing! I danced it in a play once, and I will show you.
Come along. What fun!'
It required but little practice, and, with two pretty hoods for the
ladies and a couple of sprigs of blackthorn for the gentlemen, they were
presently equipped and ready to dance before the army, which was now
spread out in a huge semicircle facing the open desert and the distant
Black Mountains. And they might have stepped straight from the fair at
Coleraine, for the Lion looked the broth of a boy, and even the Bear
threw off his Scottish manner and was for the time a roaring blade;
while as for Mary and Miss Crocodile, no saucier colleens ever peeped
from beneath a hood.
Baby Jane, flushed and smiling, holding a bit or frock in each hand, led
them into the middle.
'Now,' she whispered over her shoulder, 'one--two--three--whistle!'
Then to the romping air of 'St. Patrick's Day in the Morning' five light
figures tripped it gaily up and down, every footfall pat to a note. Now,
with a bang and a yell, dancing defiance at one another, the boys met in
the middle, each with his lady under his lee. Then, shooting roguish
glances right and left, Miss Crocodile and Mary, hand-in-hand, would
trip between the warlike ones and take the floor. And the army marked
time with whoops that must have echoed in the distant mountains.
[Illustration: A little mocking measure.]
It was glorious--worth a month of life--or at any rate it would have
been if the Rabbit and Patsey had not been observed dancing a little
mocking measure of their own device about twenty yards from the real
dancers.
Now it is a difficult thing to look thoroughly arch and roguish while
some one is imitating you, and though Mary and Miss Crocodile struggled
fiercely to keep up their saucy smile, they could not help casting an
occasional glance of bitterness and rage at the Rabbit and Patsey, who
were mincing and curvetting with an artless coquetry twice as winning as
their own.
They could barely restrain themselves until the dance had ended in a
roar of applause, and then, cutting short their graceful curtsey of
acknowledgment in the middle, they sprang after the little beasts, and,
with hoods flying out behind, chivied them round and round until they
took refuge in the skirts of Baby Jane, who had hardly noticed the
mocking dance, and thought that the chivying was merely an innocent
romp.
But Miss Crocodile was not to be put off, and assuming a pleasant smile,
she went up to Baby Jane and suggested a playful combat with wooden
broadswords between herself and Patsey. It seemed rather a good idea,
and as Patsey raised no objection, it was arranged to take place at
once.
Patsey appeared first in the arena, and there he sat on his sword,
looking very small and innocent, like a little brown bumble-bee roosting
on a twig. Miss Crocodile soon followed, with a nasty smile on her lips.
(A three-inch mouth can display a great deal of nastiness; consider,
then, the possibilities of a three-foot mouth!) She wasted no time, and
rushing up, swung her sword to knock the bumble-bee off its twig, but as
the sword reached Patsey, he fluttered a yard into the air, and, before
Miss Crocodile could recover herself, his weapon had whistled twice
round his head and landed--_thwack!_--upon her tenderest row of teeth.
It was cruelly painful, and Miss Crocodile rolled on the ground and wept
aloud, while Patsey skipped chuckling round her, until Baby Jane caught
him and cuffed him severely. If he could not play without being rough,
she said, he should not play at all. She was very fond of little Patsey,
but felt that she must be a stern mother to him.
[Illustration: He fluttered a yard in the air.]
Now the Lion had also observed Patsey and the Rabbit's little mocking
dance, so when the Piccaninny, armed with a lance, was mounted on his
back to engage the Rabbit, who had a sword and rode pick-a-back on
Patsey, he thought it a good opportunity of serving out a little stern
justice on that couple.
It was arranged that the Piccaninny and the Rabbit were to charge
together from a distance and see which could unhorse the other. The
Lion's idea was to take no notice of the sword-and-lance business, but
simply to rush at the offending couple, knock them head-over-heels and
generally maul them. But the Rabbit also had his notions, and contrived
that the course should pass close to a fox-hole, of which there were
several around.
'Nothing like arranging your port in case of a storm,' he remarked to
Patsey.
Well, the course was cleared and the signal given--'Charge!' With a roar
and a rush the Lion came thundering down the line, and, to the
admiration of the whole army, the Rabbit went bravely out to meet him.
But he was watching the Lion's face keenly, and at the last moment he
caught a gleam in his eye. At that instant they were passing the
fox-hole, and the Lion was but a yard away.
[Illustration: The Lion came thundering down the line.]
'Down, Monkey!' shrieked the Rabbit, and down the hole they shot
together feet foremost. The Lion was astounded at the mysterious
disappearance of the couple, and in his struggles to pull up he caught
his foot in the Piccaninny's lance, shot that child twenty yards away,
and himself came bump on his chin. He got up slowly, trying to retain
his dignity, and looked haughtily round.
Two little smiling faces were regarding him from over the edge of the
hole. They nodded pleasantly to him.
'How's your Auntie Lou?' asked the Rabbit, as if to break the ice.
[Illustration: Two little smiling faces were regarding him.]
The Lion had no Auntie Lou, and he stared stonily in front of him
without reply. There was a long pause, and then the Rabbit inquired:
'Say, Mister, are you going to be rough if we come up?'
'Yes,' said the Lion, promptly and gravely.
'How many kicks do you reckon to give us?'
'Ten each,' said the Lion.
'Could you make it seven?'
'No.'
'Eight might suit you?'
'No.'
'How about nine?'
'No!' roared the Lion in a temper.
'Well, now, don't get angry,' said the Rabbit; 'we are only asking for
information. We aren't coming up this way at all.' And with that they
retired below.
Baby Jane had nothing to say in this affair, for the reason that she was
consulting Sammy and the Bear on the very important project of which she
had spoken to Sammy earlier in the day.
'You remember how King Alfred went among the Danes disguised as a
harper,' she said.
Nobody had the faintest recollection of the incident, but they took her
word for it, and she went on:
'Well, I mean to disguise myself and go with you, Bear, to the Black
Mountains to try and coax away the less bad beasts that may be there,
and to find out all the enemy's plans. I shouldn't be afraid with you,
Bear, and Sammy would be left in charge of the army until I came back.'
'H'm, it might be done,' said the Bear, 'and I know of a little black
bearskin not far away that would just cover you, clothes and all.' He
did not mention that at the time there was a little black bear still in
the skin.
'Well, that's settled; and,' said Baby Jane, 'Mary shall come with us
and be our horse.'
It was pitiful to see how Mary's jaw fell on hearing this.
'But--but--but,' she said in a choking voice, 'I want to
be a Major-General--and--and--I've got the cocked hat all
ready--and--and--and--I've been learning lots of things. Just look here!
This is one thing I've learnt.'
And the poor creature went through the motions of preparing to receive
cavalry very creditably. But Baby Jane was stern, and in a little while
Mary Carmichael, carrying the adventurous couple, was slouching off.
Here the cunning old Bear whispered loudly to Baby Jane, 'Perhaps, after
all, perhaps you had better make her a Major-General. She is no good as
a horse--can't trot a little bit.'
[Illustration: Straight for the enemy's country.]
Mary began to hum loudly to pretend she hadn't heard, but her ears grew
very red, and she began stealthily to quicken her pace until she was
slinging out her hoofs in a thundering fourteen-miles-an-hour
trot--straight for the enemy's country, the Black Mountains.