k with a grim air
of iron severity, as if resolved to preserve his own "discipline" if
he could not control that of any one else. I doubt very much whether
her Majesty has in her service a more dutiful loyalist than Corporal
Blunt, if that excellent functionary has not succumbed to African
malaria.

I hoped that something would occur to melt the corporal's heart during
the evening, and had prepared a little vial in my pocket, which, at
least, would have given him a stirless nap of twenty-four hours. But
nothing broke the charm of his spell-bound sobriety. There he marched,
to and fro, regular as a drum tap, hour after hour, stiff and
inexorable as a ramrod!

But who, after the fall of Corporal Blunt, shall declare that there is
a living man free from the lures of betrayal? And yet, he only
surrendered to an enemy in disguise!

"God bless me, corporal," said our prize lieutenant, "in the name of
all that's damnable, why don't you let out a reef or two from those
solemn cheeks of yours, and drink a bumper to Captain Gaspard and Don
Teodor? You ain't afraid of _cider_, are you?"

"_Cider_, captain?" said the corporal, advancing to the front and
throwing up his hand with a military salute.

"Cider and be d----d to you!" returned the lieutenant. "Cider--of
course, corporal; what other sort of pop can starving wretches like us
drink in Sary-loney?"

"Well, lieutenant," said the corporal, "if so be as how them fizzing
bottles which yonder Spanish gentleman is a-pourin' down is _only
cider_; and if cider ain't agin rules after 'eight bells;' and if you,
lieutenant, orders me to handle my glass,--I don't see what right I
have to disobey the orders of my superior!"

"Oh! blast your sermon and provisos," interjected the lieutenant,
filling a tumbler and handing it to the corporal, who drained it at a
draught. In a moment the empty glass was returned to the lieutenant,
who, instead of receiving it from the subaltern, refilled the tumbler.

"Oh, I'm sure I'm a thousand times obliged, lieutenant," said Blunt,
with his left hand to his cap, "a thousand, thousand times,
lieutenant,--but I'd rather take no more, if it's all the same to your
honor."

"But it ain't, Blunt, by any means; the rule is universal among
gentlemen on ship and ashore, that whenever a fellow's glass is
filled, he must drink it to the dregs, though he may leave a drop in
the bottom to pour out on the table in honor of his sweetheart;--so,
down with the