CHAPTER XXVI.
COLCHESTER BARRACKS.
"Hail, sweet recruiting service, pleasing toil,
Ball-room campaigns, tea-parties, dice and Hoyle!
Ye days when dangling was my only duty,
Envied by cits, caressed by every beauty;
Envied by cits, so scared by every glance,
Shot at their daughters, going down the dance."
Military Magazine, 1812.
Faithful to his promise, before embarking, Quentin Kennedy wrote from Edinburgh to his friend the old quartermaster, informing him of the step he had taken, of the lucky chance that had turned up for him in the Queen Anne's Head at Ayr, and that he was off to join the army as a simple volunteer; but being resolved to owe all to himself and to his own spirit, courage, and energy, and to prevent his old friend, Lord Rohallion, from doing anything, strange to say, he did not mention what regiment of the line he had chosen, though he knew well that the mystical No. 25 would have made the hearts of the veteran general and the quartermaster leap within them, while poor old Jack Andrews would be certain to get helplessly groggy in honour of the occasion.
He sent no messages or memories to any one, for the letter was indited amid the hurly-burly of Poolers gay and then well-known military coffee-house in Princess-street, nearly opposite the North Bridge; and Captain Warriston, who was standing fully accoutred with a group of other officers of various Scottish regiments, all talking, laughing, and smoking, urged him "to be sharp," as they had not a moment to lose before the mail started, and that the smack, Lord Nelson, had her topsail loose; so he sent no remembrance to his dear Flora Warrender, though he sealed his letter with a sigh, and his soul seemed to go with it to her.
Sailing in an armed Leith ship, without convoy, Captain Warriston's detachments of recruits, after beating against a head wind for two weeks, but without encountering a storm, a gale, or an enemy's ship of Avar, made the coast of Essex, landed at Harwich, and marched to Colchester Barracks, where each subaltern reported himself to his commanding officer, and handed over his detachment of recruits, doubtless glad to be rid of them.
How often were the last scene with Flora, those last words and those last kisses, under the old sycamores in the avenue, rehearsed over and over again.
"Ah," thought he, "could I but persuade myself that she will not entirely forget me; that some tender recollections, some soft memory of the poor lonely and friendless lad, who loved her so well, will remain in her heart, now that I am far away—gone she knows not where, but gone for ever! For ever!—then what will love or memory avail me?"
The novelty of his situation, the sudden and remarkable change of scene, the short sea voyage, the crowded and somewhat noisy barracks of Colchester, then filled with troops, preparing by hourly training, prior to their departure for the seat of war; squads undergoing manual, platoon, and pacing-stick drill, others worked up in companies, battalions, and brigades, the general bustle and light-heartedness of all around him; the new occupation, new faces and new episodes, all so different from his former monotonous life in that old castle by the Firth of Clyde—a life that seemed like a dream now—soon weaned Quentin from his sadder thoughts, and he was startled to find that, after a time, instead of brooding over Flora's image and idea perpetually, he could only think of her occasionally, and ere long, that he began to take an interest in the crowds of ladies who came to view the evening parades, to promenade with the officers who were not on duty, and to hear the bands play. "Love sickness, according to our revised medical code, is nothing more than a disarranged digestion," says a writer; so, in this year of the world—five thousand and odd, according to Genesis, and Heaven knows how many more according to geology—no one dies of love, and, in the jovial barracks of Colchester, our friend Quentin showed no signs of the malady.
But we are anticipating.
The battalion of the 25th, or the King's Own Borderers, to which he was attached, occupied a portion of the stately and spacious barracks, which were built for the accommodation often thousand infantry, and had a fine park of artillery attached to them. These have all been since pulled down by an absurd spirit of mistaken economy, so that there are barely quarters for a single regiment in the town.
On the day after his arrival, anxious to create a good impression, he made a most careful toilet, and with a throbbing heart was introduced by Monkton to the officer commanding, the irritable Major Middleton, of whom he had heard so much, and to whom he presented the letter of introduction and recommendation given by his good friend Captain Warriston, who unfortunately was compelled to be absent elsewhere.
The major was a fine-looking old man, who had entered the service from the militia somewhat late in life, and hence the extreme slowness of his promotion, for he was now near his sixtieth year. He had a clear, keen, and bright blue eye; a suave, but grave and decided manner, with a deep and authoritative tone of voice. He still wore his thin hair queued, though after being reduced to seven inches in length, by the general order of 1804, by another order in 1808, the entire army was shorn of those appendages.
Fearing a mutiny, or something like it, the obnoxious mandate was countermanded the next day, but, Ichabod! the glory had departed. The regimental barbers had done their fatal work, and not a pigtail remained in the service, from the Life Guards to the Shetland Volunteers, save among a few privileged men of the old school, who stuck to it in defiance alike of taste and authority, and one of these was Major Middleton, who now appeared in full uniform, with his snow-white shirt-frill peeping through his gorget,—a badge retained till 1830—and a spotless white waistcoat covering the comely paunch, while his queue, seven inches long, with its black silk rosette, wagged gracefully at the back of his fine old head, which was powdered by time to a whiteness his servant could never achieve with the puff.
He cordially shook hands with Quentin and with Monkton, and welcoming the latter back to head-quarters, bowed them to chairs with great formality, his sword and pigtail going up and down like pump-handles the while, and then with his sturdy back planted against the chimney-piece, he proceeded to read over the letter of Warriston, Quentin in the meantime undergoing the pleasant process of being occasionally eyed askance with those clear, keen eyes—and a steady glance they had—the glance of one who had often been face to face with death and danger, in the East Indies and the West, in America, and wherever conquests were to be added to Britain's growing empire.
"My old friend Warriston recommends you highly, Mr. Kennedy—very highly indeed," said the major, as he folded the letters and again shook Quentin by the hand; "but I hope that the step you are taking has the full concurrence of all who are interested in your welfare?"
With a heightened colour, Quentin begged the worthy major to be assured that it had.
"I need not tell you, my young friend, that no ordinary bravery is required of the gentleman volunteer, for something more dashing than mere service in the ranks is necessary to win the notice of those in authority and to obtain a commission in His Majesty's service. I trust, therefore, that you have weighed well and examined your mind, and are assured that you possess the qualifications necessary for the profession—I may well say, the perilous career—on which you are about to enter."
"Qualifications, sir?" stammered Quentin, who was somewhat oppressed by the major's exordium, and began to think of Dominie Skaill's Greek and Latin roots.
"Yes; for the task before you requires a daring spirit, and a most stoical indifference to privation, to suffering, and to death, as you will have to bear a voluntary part in every dangerous or arduous enterprise, on every desperate duty; and have to volunteer for every forlorn hope and reckless adventure."
"I have weighed well, major, and I shall shrink from nothing! I long only for the opportunity of showing that I shall be—shall be what my father was before me," said Quentin, with flashing eyes and quivering lips, while he felt that these were not the kind of men to boast before.
The old major regarded the lad attentively, and said—
"Give me your hand again; I like your spirit, and hope ere long to wet your commission and welcome you as a brother officer. I enforce the strictest obedience, and some term me severe, yet I hope you will like me; for, if pleased with you, your future prospects shall be my peculiar care."
"I thank you, sir," said Quentin, with a very full heart.
"I like to regard the regiment as one large family; and when we consider the manifold clangers we dare, and the sufferings we endure together, all soldiers—officers and men alike—more than any other human community, have reasons for strong mutual attachment, and for feeling themselves indeed brothers. There are some of the brotherhood, however, over whom I have, at times, to keep a tight hand—yourself, for instance—Dick Monkton, eh!"
"True, major, the adjutant has come to me in his harness more than once for my sword; but like a good fellow, you always sent it back again," said Monkton, laughing.
"Two remarks of the great General Monk should always be borne in mind by those who enter the service," said the major, who seemed a well-read and intelligent officer; "and in youth I learned them by rote, and so have never forgotten them since. 'War, the profession of a soldier, is that of all others which, as it conferreth most honour upon a man who therein acquitteth himself well, so it draweth the greatest infamy upon one who demeaneth himself ill; for one fault committed can never be repaired, and one hour causeth the loss of that reputation which hath been thirty years acquiring!' Elsewhere he says, 'A soldier must be always ready to confront extremity of danger by extremity of valour, and overtop fury with a higher resolution. A soldier ought to fear nothing but God and Dishonour, and the officer who commands should feel for him as a parent does for his child!' And now, to become more matter of fact, Monkton will tell you, Mr. Kennedy, all about a volunteer's outfit; the plainer, and the less there is of it, the better."
"Thanks, sir; you are most thoughtful."
"You shall have to carry the arms and accoutrements of a private, and a knapsack too, perhaps, under some circumstances, till luck turns up a commission for you. In all respects you will be treated as a gentleman; but doing the duty and yielding the implicit obedience of a private soldier. Do you understand me?"
"Perfectly, sir," replied Quentin, cheerfully.
"As for the knapsack," said Monkton, "its weight matters little if your heart be light, my friend."
Quentin smiled, as if he meant to confront fortune boldly, and the future too.
"We are now under orders to hold ourselves in readiness for foreign service, and a fortnight at farthest will see the regiment on board ship."
"For where?" asked Monkton.
"The continent of Europe."
Quentin was glad to hear this, as he knew that his funds would not last him long in Colchester, and if reduced to his volunteer pay of one shilling per diem, current coin of this realm, what would become of him then?
"You shall dine with me at the mess to-day as my guest, Mr. Kennedy," said the major, "and I shall have the pleasure of introducing you to the corps."
"And as my guest to-morrow, Quentin," said Monkton; "it is the last time we shall have our legs under its blessed mahogany, as it is to be broken up."
"What—the table?"
"No, the mess. Adieu till the drum beats, major."
With Monkton, Quentin quitted Middleton's quarters, extremely well-pleased with his interview, convinced that the lieutenant must have quizzed him about the major's alleged severity, and now with satisfaction feeling himself in some manner a member of the corps and of the service, a part or portion of the 25th Foot.
His uniform, a plain scarlet coatee, faced, lapelled and buttoned like that of an officer, with two little swallow-tails nine inches long (then the regulation), though destitute of lace or epaulettes, with his other requisites, made a sad hole in his little exchequer; and, as he sat in his room that night, and counted over the fifteen that remained of the good quartermaster's guineas, he felt something like a miser, and trembled for the future.
However, fifteen guineas were more than a subaltern's pay for a month; he was only to be two weeks in barracks, and when once in camp, a small sum with rations would go a long way. He had a subaltern's quarters assigned him, with an officer's allowance of coal, candle, and barrack furniture—to wit: one hard wood table; two ditto chairs, of the Windsor pattern; an elegant coal-box, like a black iron trough, bearing the royal arms, and the huge enigmatical letters B.O., of which he could make nothing; a pair of bellows, fire-irons, fender, and an iron candlestick, unique in form and colour.
These, with a pallet, formed his principal household gear, and for two at least of the remaining fourteen days, he would have the luxury of the festive mess, the perfection of a dinner table; and thereafter, as he had been told, it would be broken up, its rich old plate and appurtenances consigned to iron-bound chests, and left behind in the barrack stores, and many who dined therewith might never meet around that jolly table more, for war and peril were before them, and the dust would be gathering on the forgotten mess chests, as the grass would be sprouting on the graves of the slain.
But little thought "The Borderers" of that—for the soldier, luckily for himself, is seldom of a very reflective turn—when the orderly drum and fife struck up "The Roast Beef" in front of the mess-house to announce that dinner was being served; and there Quentin hurried, in company with the major and Monkton.