Middy and Ensign | Page 6

have often wished that my company was composed of Adam Grays."
"Adam, eh? To be sure; I remember the fellow now. Well, he's a poor descendant of the first Adam, for if that fellow is not an arrant coward my name isn't Bolter."
"Really, doctor, I think you do the man an injustice. He is a very superior, well educated fellow; and it has often puzzled me how he became a private soldier."
"Scamp!" said the doctor, shortly. "Some runaway or another. The ranks of the army are made a receptacle for blackguards!"
"Hang it, doctor!" cried the young captain, warmly, "I cannot sit here and listen to such heresy. I confess that we do get some scoundrels into the army; but as a rule our privates are a thoroughly trustworthy set of fellows, ready to go through fire and water for their officers; and I only wish the country would make better provision for them when their best days are past."
"Ah, that's right enough," said the doctor; "they are all what you say, and they do deserve better treatment of their country. I mean, ha, ha, ha! to make teetotallers of them this trip. I'm not going to have the men poisoned with that red hot country arrack, I can tell them."
"It is terrible stuff, I believe."
"Terrible? It's liquid poison, sir! and I don't know that I sha'n't try and set up a private brewery of my own, so as to supply the poor fellows with a decent glass of beer."
"Poor fellows! eh, doctor? Why, you said just now they were a set of scoundrels."
"Well, well, well; I didn't mean all. But look at that fellow Sim-- there's a pretty rascal for you! He's always on the sick-list, and it's nearly always sham."
"I'm afraid he is a bit of a black sheep," said Captain Smithers.
"Inky black, Smithers, inky black. I shall poison that fellow some day. But I say, my dear boy, the brewery."
"What about it?"
"What about it? Why, it would be splendid. I mean to say it is a grand idea. I'll get the major to let me do it."
"My dear doctor," said Captain Smithers, laughing, "I'm afraid if you did brew some beer, and supply it to the men, fancy would go such a long way that they would find medicinal qualities in it, and refuse to drink a drop."
"Then they would be a set of confoundedly ungrateful scoundrels," said the doctor, angrily, "for I should only use malt and hops."
"And never serve it as you did the coffee that day, doctor?"
"Well, well, I suppose I must take the credit of that. I did doctor it a little; but it was only with an astringent corrective, to keep the poor boys from suffering from too much fruit."
"Poor boys! eh, doctor? Come, come, you don't think my brave lads are a set of scoundrels then?"
"I said before, not all--not all," replied the doctor.
"Ah, doctor," said Captain Smithers, "like a good many more of us, you say more than you mean sometimes, and I know you have the welfare of the men at heart."
"Not I, my lad, not I. It's all pure selfishness; I don't care a pin about the rascals. All I want is to keep them quite well, so that they may not have to come bothering me, when I want my time to go botanising; that's all."
"And so we have fewer men on the sick-list than any regiment out here?"
"Tut! tut! Nonsense!"
Just then the ladies came up from the principal cabin, and began to walk slowly up and down the quarter-deck, evidently enjoying the delicious coolness of the night air, and the beauty of the sea and sky.
Captain Smithers sat watching them intently for a time, and then, as he happened to turn his head, he caught sight of the sentry, Adam Gray, and it struck him that he, too, was attentively watching the group of ladies. So convinced did the young officer become of this, that he could not refrain from watching him.
Once or twice he thought it was only fancy, but at last he felt sure; and a strange angry sensation sprang up in his breast as he saw the sentry's countenance change when the ladies passed him.
"An insolent scoundrel!" he muttered. "How dare he?"
Then, as the ladies took their seats at some distance, he began thinking over what the doctor had said, and wondering whether this man, in whom he had heretofore taken a great deal of interest, was such a coward; and in spite of his angry feelings, he could only come to the conclusion that the doctor was wrong.
But at the same time what he had heard and seen that evening had not been without its effect, and he found himself irritable and vexed against this man, while his previous good feelings seemed to be