Part 8 (1/2)
”I am, nevertheless, glad to have been of service to you, gentlemen,” he said, courteously; ”at least you are Irishmen, and I have many good friends countrymen of yours. And you have still another claim upon us all, for are you not here to aid us to shake off this French domination? I hope that you are comfortable, but judging from what I see and hear when pa.s.sing I fear that your lodging is a somewhat noisy one.”
”You may well say that, Father; and we do our full share towards making it so; but having the room makes all the difference to us. They have no time to cook downstairs, and it is done by our own servants; but it is handy to have the wine and other things within call, and if we always do as well, we shall have good cause to feel mighty contented; for barring that we are rather crowded, we are just as well off here as we were at home, saving only in the quality of the spirits. Now, Father, we cannot ask you up there, seeing that it is your own village, but if you would like to take a walk through the camps we should be glad to show you what there is to be seen, and can give you a little of the real cratur. It is not much of it that we have been able to bring ash.o.r.e, for the general is mighty stiff in the matter of baggage, but I doubt whether there is one of us who did not manage to smuggle a bottle or two of the real stuff hidden in his kit.”
The priest accepted the invitation, and was taken through the brigade camp, staying some time in that of the Mayos, and astonis.h.i.+ng some of the soldiers by chatting to them in English, and with a brogue almost as strong as their own. He then spent half an hour in O'Grady's tent, and sampled the whisky, which he p.r.o.nounced excellent, and of which his entertainer insisted upon his taking a bottle away with him.
Three days later it was known in camp that two French divisions had been set in motion against them, the one from Abrantes to the east under Loison, the other from the south under Laborde. Junot himself remained at Lisbon. The rising in the south, and the news of the British landing caused an intense feeling among the population, and the French general feared that at any moment an insurrection might break out. The natural point of junction of these two columns would be at Leirya. That night orders were issued for the tents of the division to which the Mayo regiment belonged to be struck before daylight, and the troops were to be under arms and ready to march at six o'clock.
”Good news!” O'Grady said, as he entered the mess-room at four o'clock in the afternoon, after having learned from the colonel the orders for the next morning; ”our brigade is to form the advanced guard, and we are to march at six tomorrow.”
A general exclamation of pleasure broke from the five or six officers present. ”We shall have the first of the fun, boys; hand me that horn, Terence. Here is to Sir Arthur; good-luck to him, and bad cess to the French!”
The toast was drunk with some laughter. ”Now we are going to campaign in earnest,” he went on; ”no more wine swilling, no more devilled ham---- ”
”No more spirits, O'Grady,” one of the group cut in; ”and as for the wine, you have drunk your share, besides twice your share of the spirits.”
”Whin there is nothing to do, Debenham, I can take me liquor in moderation.”
”I have never remarked that, O'Grady,” one of the others put in.
”In great moderation,” O'Grady said, gravely, but he was again interrupted by a shout of laughter.
”Ye had to be helped home last night, O'Grady, and it took Hoolan a quarter of an hour to wake you this morning. I heard him say, 'Now, master dear, the bugle will sound in a minute or two; it's wake you must, or there will be a divil of botheration over it.' I looked in, and there you were. Hoolan was standing by the side of you shaking his head gravely, as if it was a hopeless job that he had in hand, and if I had not emptied a water-bottle over you, you would never have been on parade in time.”
”Oh! it was you, was it?” O'Grady said, wrathfully. ”Hoolan swore by all the saints that he had not seen who it was. Never mind, me boy, I will be even wid ye yet; the O'Grady is not to be waked in that fas.h.i.+on; mind I owe you one, though I am not saying that I should have been on parade in time if you had not done it; I only just saved my bacon.”
”And hardly that,” Terence laughed, ”for the adjutant was down upon you pretty sharply; your coatee was all b.u.t.toned up wrong; your hair had not been brushed, and stuck up all ways below your shako; your sword-belt was all awry, and you looked worse than you did when I brought you home.”
”Well, it is a poor heart that never rejoices, Terence. We must make a night of it, boys; if the tents are to be struck before daylight it will be mighty little use your turning in.”
”You won't catch me sitting up all night,” Terence said, ”with perhaps a twenty-mile march in the morning, and maybe a fight at the end of it. If it is to Leirya we are going it will be nearer thirty miles than twenty, and even you, seasoned vessel as you are, will find it a long walk after being up all night, and having had pretty hard work to-day.”
”I cannot hold wid the general there,” O'Grady said, gravely; ”he has been kapeing us all at it from daybreak till night, ivery day since we landed, and marching the men's feet off. It is all very well to march when we have got to march, but to keep us tramping fifteen or twenty miles a day when there is no occasion for it is out of all reason.”
”We shall march all the better for it to-morrow, O'Grady. It has been hard work, certainly, but not harder than it was marching down to Cork; and we should have a good many stragglers to-morrow if it had not been for the last week's work. We have got half a dozen footsore men in my company alone, and you would have fifty to-morrow night if the men had not had all this marching to get them fit.”
”It is all very well for you, Terence, who have been tramping all over the hills round Athlone since you were a gossoon; but I am sure that if I had not had that day off duty when I showed the priest round the camp I should have been kilt.”
”Here is the general order of the day,” the adjutant said, as he came in with Captain O'Connor. ”The general says that now the army is about to take the field he shall expect the strictest discipline to be maintained, and that all stragglers from the ranks will at once be handed over to the provost-marshal, and all offences against the peasantry or their property will be severely punished. Then there are two or three orders that do not concern us particularly, and then there is one that concerns you, Terence. The general has received a report from Colonel Corcoran of the Mayo Fusiliers stating that 'the transport carrying the left wing of that regiment was attacked by two French privateers, and would have been compelled to surrender, she being practically unarmed, had it not been for the coolness and quick wit of Ensign Terence O'Connor. Having read the report the general commanding fully concurs, and expresses his high satisfaction at the conduct of Ensign O'Connor, which undoubtedly saved from capture the wing of the regiment.'
”There, Terence, that is a feather in your cap. Sir Arthur is not given to praise unduly, and it is seldom that an ensign gets into general orders. It will do you good some day, perhaps when you least expect it.”
”I am heartily pleased, my lad,” Captain O'Connor said, as he laid his hand upon Terence's shoulder. ”I am proud of you. I have never seen my own name in general orders, but I am heartily glad to see yours. Bedad, when I think that a couple of months ago you were running wild and getting into all sorts of mischief, it seems hard to believe that you should not only be one of us, but have got your name into general orders.”
”And all for nothing, father,” Terence said. ”I call it a beastly shame that just because I thought of using that lugger I should be cracked up more than the others.”
”It was not only that, though, Terence; those guns that crippled the lugger could not have been fired if you had not thought of putting rope round them, and that French frigate would never have left you alone had not you suggested to the major how to throw dust into their eyes. No, my lad, you thoroughly deserve the credit that you have got, and I am sure that there is not a man in the regiment who would not say the same.”
”Gintlemen,” Captain O'Grady said, solemnly, ”we will drink to the health of Ensign Terence O'Connor; more power to his elbow!” And the toast was duly honoured.
”It is mighty good of me to propose it,” O'Grady went on, after Terence had said a few words of thanks, ”because I have a strong idea that in another two or three minutes I should have made just the same suggestion that you did, me lad. I knew at the time that there was a plan I wanted to propose, but sorra a word came to me lips. I was just brimful with it when you came up and took the words out of me mouth. If I had spoken first it is a brevet majority I had got, sure enough.”