FullReads

It seemed an age, ere the Colonel joined me. He had been to the jobbing-tailor’s to be sewn up in several places, and attributed our defeat to the refusal of the detested Drowvey to fall. Finding her so obstinate he had said to her in a loud voice, “Die, recreant!” but had found her no more open to reason on that point than the other.

My blooming Bride appeared, accompanied by the Colonel’s Bride, at the Dancing-School next day. What? Was her face averted from me? Hah! Even so. With a look of scorn she put into my hand a bit of paper, and took another partner. On the paper was pencilled, “Heavens! Can I write the word! Is my husband a Cow?”

In the first bewilderment of my heated brain I tried to think what slanderer could have traced my family to the ignoble animal mentioned above. Vain were my endeavours. At the end of that dance I whispered the Colonel to come into the cloak-room, and I showed him the note.

“There is a syllable wanting,” said he, with a gloomy brow.

“Hah! What syllable?” was my inquiry.

“She asks, Can she write the word? And no; you see she couldn’t,” said the Colonel, pointing out the passage.

“And the word was?” said I.

“Cow–cow–coward,” hissed the Pirate-Colonel in my ear, and gave me back the note.

Feeling that I must for ever tread the earth a branded boy–person I mean–or that I must clear up my honour, I demanded to be tried by a Court-Martial. The Colonel admitted my right to be tried. Some difficulty was found in composing the court, on account of the Emperor of France’s aunt refusing to let him come out. He was to be the President. ‘Ere yet we had appointed a substitute, he made his escape over the back wall, and stood among us, a free monarch.

The court was held on the grass by the pond. I recognised in a certain Admiral among my judges my deadliest foe. A cocoa-nut had given rise to language that I could not brook. But confiding in my innocence, and also in the knowledge that the President of the United States (who sat next him) owed me a knife, I braced myself for the ordeal.

It was a solemn spectacle, that court. Two executioners with pinafores reversed, led me in. Under the shade of an umbrella, I perceived my Bride, supported by the Bride of the Pirate-Colonel. The President (having reproved a little female ensign for tittering, on a matter of Life or Death) called upon me to plead, “Coward or no Coward, Guilty or not Guilty?” I pleaded in a firm tone, “No Coward and Not Guilty.” (The little female ensign being again reproved by the President for misconduct, mutinied, left the court, and threw stones.)

My implacable enemy, the Admiral, conducted the case against me. The Colonel’s Bride was called to prove that I had remained behind the corner-lamp-post during the engagement. I might have been spared the anguish of my own Bride’s being also made a witness to the same point, but the Admiral knew where to wound me. Be still my soul, no matter. The Colonel was then brought forward with his evidence.

It was for this point that I had saved myself up, as the turning-point of my case. Shaking myself free of my guards–who had no business to hold me, the stupids! unless I was found guilty–I asked the Colonel what he considered the first duty of a soldier? ‘Ere he could reply, the President of the United States rose and informed the court that my foe the Admiral had suggested “Bravery,” and that prompting a witness wasn’t fair. The President of the Court immediately ordered the Admiral’s mouth to be filled with leaves, and tied up with string. I had the satisfaction of seeing the sentence carried into effect, before the proceedings went further.

I then took a paper from my trousers-pocket, and asked: “What do you consider, Colonel Redforth, the first duty of a soldier? Is it obedience?”