What the Psalmist said in sorrow, those who witnessed the career of the
Honorable Ensign Spoonbill and his companions might have said, not in
sorrow only but in anger: “One day told another, and one night certified
another.”
When duty was to be performed--(for even under the command of such an
officer as Colonel Tulip the routine of duty existed)--it was slurred
over as hastily as possible, or got through as it best might be. When,
on the other hand, pleasure was the order of the day,--and this was
sought hourly,--no resource was left untried, no expedient unattempted;
and strange things, in the shape of pleasure, were often the result.
The nominal duties were multifarious, and, had they been properly
observed, would have left but a comparatively narrow margin for
recreation,--for there was much in the old forms which took up time,
without conveying any great amount of military instruction.
The orderly officer for the day--we speak of the subaltern--was supposed
to go through a great deal. His duty it was to assist at inspections,
superintend drills, examine the soldiers’ provisions, see their
breakfasts and dinners served, and attend to any complaints, visit the
regimental guards by day and night, be present at all parades and
musters, and, finally, deliver in a written report of the proceedings of
the four-and-twenty hours.
To go through this routine, required--as it received in some
regiments--a few days’ training; but in the Hundredth there was none at
all. Every officer in that distinguished corps was supposed to be “a
Heaven-born genius,” and acquired his military education as pigeons pick
up peas. The Hon. Ensign Spoonbill looked at his men after a fashion;
could swear at them if they were excessively dirty, and perhaps awe them
into silence by a portentous scowl, or an exaggerated loudness of voice;
but with regard to the real purpose of inspection, he knew as little,
and cared as much, as the valet who aired his noble father’s morning
newspaper. His eye wandered over the men’s kits as they were exposed to
his view; but to his mind they only conveyed the idea of a kaleidoscopic
rag-fair, not that of an assortment of necessaries for the comfort and
well-being of the soldier. He saw large masses of beef, exhibited in a
raw state by the quartermaster, as the daily allowance for the men; but
if any one had asked him if the meat was good, and of proper weight, how
could he have answered, whose head was turned away in disgust, with his
face buried in a scented cambric handkerchief, and his delicate nature
loathing the whole scene? In the same spirit he saw the men’s breakfasts
and dinners served; fortifying his opinion, at the first, that coffee
could only be made in France, and wondering, at the second, what sort of
_potage_ it could be that contrived to smell so disagreeably. These
things might be special affectations in the Hon. Ensign, and depended,
probably, on his own peculiar organization; but if the rest of the
officers of the Hundredth did not manifest as intense a dislike to this
part of their duties, they were members of much too “crack” a regiment
to give themselves any trouble about the matter. The drums beat, the
messes were served, there was a hasty gallop through the barrack-rooms,
scarcely looking right or left, and the orderly officer was only too
happy to make his escape without being stopped by any impertinent
complaint.
The “turning out” of the barrack guard was a thing to make an impression
on a bystander. A loud shout, a sharp clatter of arms, a scurry of
figures, a hasty formation, a brief inquiry if all was right, and a
terse rejoinder that all _was_ remarkably so, constituted the details of
a visit to the body of men on whom devolved the task of extreme
watchfulness, and the preservation of order. If the serjeant had replied
“All wrong,” it would have equally enlightened Ensign Spoonbill, who
went towards the guardhouse because his instructions told him to do so;
but why he went there, and for what purpose he turned out the guard,
never entered into his comprehension. Not even did a sense of
responsibility awaken in him when, with much difficulty, he penned the
report which gave, in a narrative form, the summary of the duties he had
performed in so exemplary a manner. Performed, do we say? Yes, once or
twice wholly, but for the most part with many gaps in the schedule.
Sometimes the dinners were forgotten, now and then the tattoo, generally
the afternoon parade, and not unfrequently the whole affair. For the
latter omission, there was occasionally a nominal “wigging”
administered, not by the commanding officer himself, but through the
adjutant; and as that functionary was only looked upon by the youngsters
in the light of a bore, without the slightest reverence for his office,
his words--like those of Cassius--passed like the idle wind which none
regarded. When Ensign Spoonbill “mounted guard” himself, his vigilance
on his new post equalled the assiduity we have seen him exhibit in
barracks. After the formality of trooping, marching down, and relieving,
was over, the Honorable Ensign generally amused himself by a lounge in
the vicinity of the guardhouse, until the field-officer’s “rounds” had
been made; and that visitation at an end for the day, a neighboring
billiard-room, with Captain Cushion for his antagonist or “a jolly pool”
occupied him until dinner-time. It was the custom in the garrison where
the Hundredth were quartered, as it was, indeed, in many others, for the
officers on guard to dine with their mess, a couple of hours or so being
granted for this indulgence. This relaxation was made up for, by their
keeping close for the rest of the evening; but as there were generally
two or three off duty sufficiently at leisure to find cigars and
brandy-and-water attractive, even when consumed in a guard-room, the
hardship of Ensign Spoonbill’s official imprisonment was not very great.
With these friends, and these creature-comforts to solace, the time wore
easily away till night fell, when the field-officer, if he was “a
good-fellow,” came early, and Ensign Spoonbill, having given his friends
their _congé_, was at liberty to “turn in” for the night, the onerous
duty of visiting sentries and inspecting the reliefs every two hours,
devolving upon the serjeant.
It may be inferred from these two examples of Ensign Spoonbill’s ideas
of discipline and the service, what was the course he generally adopted
_on_ duty, without our being under the necessity of going into further
details. What he did when _off_ duty helped him on still more
effectually.
Lord Pelican’s outfit having “mounted” the young gentleman, and the
credit he obtained on the strength of being Lord Pelican’s son, keeping
his stud in order, he was enabled to vie with the crackest of the crack
Hundredth; subject, however, to all the accidents which horseflesh is
heir to--especially when allied to a judgment of which green was the
prevailing color. A “swap” to a disadvantage; an indiscreet purchase; a
mistake as to the soundness of an animal; and such other errors of
opinion, entailed certain losses, which might, after all, have been
borne, without rendering the applications for money at home more
frequent than agreeable; but when under the influence of a natural
obstinacy, or the advice of some very “knowing ones,” Ensign Spoonbill
proceeded to back his opinion in private matches, handicaps, and
steeple-chases, the privy purse of Lady Pelican collapsed in a most
unmistakable manner. Nor was this description of amusement the only
rock-a-head in the course of the Honorable Ensign. The art or science of
betting embraces the widest field, and the odds, given or taken, are
equally fatal, whether the subject that elicits them be a match at
billiards or a horse-race. Nor are the stakes at blind-hookey or
unlimited loo less harmless, when you hav’n’t got luck and _have_ such
opponents as Captain Cushion.
In spite of the belief in his own powers, which Ensign Spoonbill
encouraged, he could not shut his eyes to the fact that he was every day
a loser; but wiser gamblers than he--if any there be--place reliance on
a “turn of luck,” and all he wanted to enable him to take advantage of
it, was a command of cash; for even one’s best friends prefer the coin
of the realm to the most unimpeachable I. O. U.
The want of money is a common dilemma,--not the less disagreeable,
however, because it _is_ common--but in certain situations this want is
more apparent than real. The Hon. Ensign Spoonbill was in the
predicament of impecuniosity; but there were--as a celebrated statesman
is in the habit of saying--three courses open to him. He might leave off
play, and do without the money; he might “throw himself” on Lord
Pelican’s paternal feelings; or he might _somehow_ contrive to raise a
supply on his own account. To leave off just at the moment when he was
sure to win back all he had lost, would have been ridiculous; besides,
every man of spirit in the regiment would have cut him. To throw himself
upon the generosity of his sire was a good poetical idea; but,
practically, it would have been of no value: for, in the first place,
Lord Pelican had no money to give--in the next, there was an elder
brother, whose wants were more imperative than his own; and lastly, he
had already tried the experiment, and failed in the most signal manner.
There remained, therefore, only the last expedient; and being advised,
moreover, to have recourse to it, he went into the project _tête
baissée_. The “advice” was tendered in this form.
“Well, Spooney, my boy, how are you, this morning?” kindly inquired
Captain Cushion, one day on his return from parade, from which the
Honorable Ensign had been absent on the plea of indisposition.
“Deuced queer,” was the reply; “that Roman punch always gives me the
splittingest headaches!”
“Ah! you’re not used to it. I’m as fresh as a four-year-old. Well, what
did you do last night, Spooney?”
“Do! why, I lost, of course; _you_ ought to know that.”
“I--my dear fellow! Give you my honor I got up a loser!”
“Not to me, though,” grumbled the Ensign.
“Can’t say as to that,” replied the Captain; “all I know is, that I’m
devilishly minus.”
“Who won, then?” inquired Spoonbill.
“Oh!” returned the Captain, after a slight pause, “I
suspect--Chowser--he has somebody’s luck and his own too!”
“I think he must have mine,” said the Ensign, with a faint smile, as the
alternations of the last night’s Blind Hookey came more vividly to his
remembrance. “What did I lose to you, Cushion?” he continued, in the
hope that his memory had deceived him.
The Captain’s pocket-book was out in an instant.
“Sixty-five, my dear fellow; that was all. By-the-bye, Spooney, I’m
regularly hard up; can you let me have the tin? I wouldn’t trouble you,
upon my soul, if I could possibly do without it, but I’ve got a heavy
bill coming due to-morrow, and I can’t renew.”
The Honorable Ensign sank back on his pillow, and groaned impotently.
Rallying, however, from this momentary weakness, he raised his head,
and, after apostrophising the spirit of darkness as his best friend,
exclaimed, “I’ll tell you what it is, Cushion, I’m thoroughly cleaned
out. I haven’t got a dump!”
“Then you must fly a kite,” observed the Captain, coolly. “No difficulty
about that.”
This was merely the repetition of counsel of the same friendly nature
previously urged. The shock was not greater, therefore, than the young
man’s nerves could bear.
“How is it to be done?” asked the neophyte.
“Oh, I think I can manage that for you. Yes,” pursued the Captain,
musing, “Lazarus would let you have as much as you want, I dare say. His
terms are rather high, to be sure; but then the cash is the thing. He’ll
take your acceptance at once. Who will you get to draw the bill?”
“Draw!” said the Ensign, in a state of some bewilderment. “I don’t
understand these things--couldn’t you do it?”
“Why,” replied the Captain, with an air of intense sincerity, “I’d do it
for you with pleasure--nothing would delight me more; but I promised my
grandmother when first I entered the service, that I never _would_ draw
a bill as long as I lived; and as a man of honor, you know, and a
soldier, I can’t break my word.”
“But I thought you said you had a bill of your own coming due
to-morrow,” observed the astute Spoonbill.
“So I did,” said the Captain, taken rather aback in the midst of his
protestations, “but then it isn’t--exactly--a thing of _this_ sort; it’s
a kind of a bond--as it were--old family matters--the estate down in
Lincolnshire--that I’m clearing off. Besides,” he added hurriedly,
“there are plenty of fellows who’ll do it for you. There’s young
Brittles--the Manchester man, who joined just after you. I never saw
anybody screw into baulk better than he does, except yourself--he’s the
one. Lazarus, I know, always prefers a young customer to an old one;
knowing chaps, these Jews, arn’t they?”
Captain Cushion’s last remark was, no doubt, a just one--but he might
have applied the term to himself with little dread of disparagement; and
the end of the conversation was, that it was agreed a bill should be
drawn as proposed, “say for three hundred pounds,” the Captain
undertaking to get the affair arranged, and relieving Spoonbill of all
trouble, save that of “merely” writing his name across a bit of stamped
paper. These points being settled, the Captain left him, and the
unprotected subaltern called for brandy and soda-water, by the aid of
which stimulus he was enabled to rise and perform his toilette.
Messrs. Lazarus and Sons were merchants who perfectly understood their
business, and, though they started difficulties, were only too happy to
get fresh birds into their net. They knew to a certainty that the sum
they were asked to advance would not be repaid at the end of the
prescribed three months: it would scarcely have been worth their while
to enter into the matter if it had; the profit on the hundred pounds’
worth of jewelry, which Ensign Spoonbill was required to take as part of
the amount, would not have remunerated them sufficiently. Guessing
pretty accurately which way the money would go, they foresaw renewed
applications, and a long perspective of accumulating acceptances. Lord
Pelican might be a needy nobleman; but he _was_ Lord Pelican, and the
Honorable George Spoonbill was his son; and if the latter did not
succeed to the title and family estates, which was by no means
improbable, there was Lady Pelican’s settlement for division amongst the
younger children. So they advanced the money; that is to say, they
produced a hundred and eighty pounds in cash, twenty they took for the
accommodation (half of which found its way into the pocket of--never
mind, we won’t say anything about Captain Cushion’s private affairs),
and the value of the remaining hundred was made up with a series of pins
and rings of the most stunning magnificence.
This was the Honorable Ensign Spoonbill’s first bill-transaction, but,
the ice once broken, the second and third soon followed. He found it the
pleasantest way in the world of raising money, and in a short time his
affairs took a turn so decidedly commercial, that he applied the system
to all his mercantile transactions. He paid his tailors after this
fashion, satisfied Messrs. Mildew and his upholsterers with negotiable
paper, and did “bits of stiff” with Galloper, the horse-dealer, to a
very considerable figure. He even became facetious, not to say inspired,
by this great discovery; for, amongst his papers, when they were
afterwards overhauled by the official assignee--or some such fiscal
dignitary,--a bacchanalian song in manuscript was found, supposed to
have been written about this period, the _refrain_ of which ran as
follows:--
“When creditors clamor, and cash fails the till,
There is nothing so easy as giving a bill.”
It needs no ghost to rise from the grave to prophesy the sequel to this
mode of “raising the wind.” It is recorded twenty times a month in the
daily papers--now in the Bankruptcy Court, now in that for the Relief of
Insolvent Debtors. Ensign Spoonbill’s career lasted about eighteen
months, at the end of which period--not having prospered by the means
of gaming to the extent he anticipated--he found himself under the
necessity of selling out and retiring to a continental residence,
leaving behind him debts, which were eventually paid, to the tune of
seven thousand, two hundred and fourteen pounds, seventeen shillings,
and tenpence three farthings, the vulgar fractions having their origin
in the hair-splitting occasioned by reduplication of interest. He chose
for his abode the pleasant town of Boulogne-sur-Mer, where he cultivated
his moustaches, acquired a smattering of French, and an insight into the
mystery of pigeon-shooting. For one or other of these qualifications--we
cannot exactly say which--he was subsequently appointed _attaché_ to a
foreign embassy, and at the present moment, we believe, is considered
one of those promising young men whose diplomatic skill will probably
declare itself one of these days, by some stroke of finesse, which shall
set all Europe by the ears.
With respect to Colonel Tulip’s “crack” regiment, it went, as the saying
is, “to the Devil.” The exposure caused by the affair of Ensign
Spoonbill--the smash of Ensign Brittles, which shortly followed--the
duel between Lieutenant Wadding and Captain Cushion, the result of which
was a ball (neither “spot” nor “plain,” but a bullet) through the head
of the last-named gentleman, and a few other trifles of a similar
description, at length attracted the “serious notice” of his Grace the
Commander-in-Chief. It was significantly hinted to Colonel Tulip that it
would be for the benefit of the service in general, and that of the
Hundredth in particular, if he exchanged to half-pay, as the regiment
required re-modelling. A smart Lieutenant-Colonel who had learnt
something, not only of drill, but of discipline, under the hero of
“Young Egypt,” in which country he had shared that general’s laurels,
was sent down from the Horse Guards. “Weeding” to a considerable extent
took place; the Majors and the Adjutant were replaced by more efficient
men, and, to sum up all, the Duke’s “Circular” came out, laying down a
principle of _practical military education, while on service_, which,
if acted up to,--and there seems every reason to hope it will now
be,--bids fair to make good officers of those who heretofore were merely
idlers. It will also diminish the opportunities for gambling, drinking,
and bill discounting, and substitute, for the written words on the
Queen’s Commission, the real character of a soldier and a gentleman.