, mixed up the meal in a very small
bowl. It became a dense dough-like mass; and on emptying it into the
pot, instead of incorporating with the boiling water, it sank in a solid
cake to the bottom. In vain I stirred, and manipulated, and kept up the
fire. The stubborn mass refused to separate or dilute, and at length
burnt brown against the bottom of the pot--a hue which the gruel-like
fluid which floated over also assumed; and at length, in utter despair
of securing aught approaching to an average consistency for the whole,
and hearing my master's foot at the door, I took the pot from off the
fire, and dished up for supper a portion of the thinner mixture which it
contained, and which, in at least colour and consistency, not a little
resembled chocolate. The poor man ladled the stuff in utter dismay. "Od,
laddie," he said, "what ca' ye this? Ca' ye this _brochan_?" "Onything
ye like, master," I replied; "but there are two kinds in the pot, and it
will go hard if none of them please you." I then dished him a piece of
the cake, somewhat resembling in size and consistency a small brown
dumpling, which he of course found wholly inedible, and became angry.
But this bad earth of ours "is filled," according to Cowper, "with wrong
and outrage;" and the barrack laughed and took part with the defaulter.
Experience, however, that does so much for all, did a little for me. I
at length became a tolerably fair plain cook, and not a very bad baker;
and now, when the exigencies required that I should take my full share
in the duties of the barrack, I was found adequate to their proper
fulfilment. I made cakes and porridge of fully the average excellence;
and my brose and _brochan_ enjoyed at least the negative happiness of
escaping animadversion and comment.

Some of the inmates, however, who were exceedingly nice in their eating,
were great connoisseurs in porridge; and it was no easy matter to please
them. There existed unsettled differences--the results of a diversity of
tastes--regarding the time that should be given to the boiling of the
mess, respecting the proportion of salt that should be allotted to each
individual, and as to whether the process of "mealing," as it was
termed, should be a slow or a hasty one, and, of course, as in all
controversies of all kinds, the more the matters in dispute were
discussed, the more did they grow in importance. Occasionally the
disputants had their porridge made at the same time in the same