pioneer sergeant had his crosses finished.

"Well," he said, as he set the crosses against the wall, "there's three
of the finest officers we ever had in this battalion. You take 'em up
to-night when you go, sergeant."

"We're not going up to-night. The boys are coming out this evening,"
replied Sergeant Mackay.

"No? Is that so? I never heard that. Guess I'll have to go up with
some other outfit. Comin' out this evening? Well, it's time they were.
They've had one hell all the time, I hear, this tour."

"Yes," continued Sergeant Mackay, "and the highlanders are sending up
their band to meet them and play them out. I call that a mighty fine
thing to do. You know our own band had to go up with water and rations
last night, and they can't get out until to-night. So the Highlanders'
band--"

"Pretty good band, too, isn't it?"

"Best pipe band in the army," said Sergeant Mackay with enthusiasm.

"Oh, a pipe band!" exclaimed the pioneer sergeant in a disappointed
tone.

"Yes, a pipe band, what else?" enquired Sergeant Mackay truculently.

"Why don't they send up their real band, when they're doin' it, anyway?"

"What!" shouted Sergeant Mackay. "I'll tell you. For the same reason
that they don't make you O. C. in this battalion, you damned fat
lobster! There now, you've started me swearin' again, and I was quittin'
it."

Sergeant Mackay's wrath at the slur cast upon the pipe band, the
only band, in his opinion, worthy of any real man's attention, was
intensified by his lapse into his habit of profanity, which, out of
deference to the Pilot, he for some weeks had been earnestly striving to
hold in check.

"Oh well, Scotty, don't spoil your record for me. I guess a pipe band is
all right for them that likes that kind of music. For me, I can't ever
tell when they quit tunin' up and begin to play."

Sergeant Mackay looked at him with darkening face, evidently uncertain
as to what course he should adopt--whether to "turn himself loose" upon
this benighted Englishman or to abandon him to his deserved condition
of fatuous ignorance. He decided upon the latter course. In portentous
silence he turned his back upon Fatty Matthews and walked the whole
length of the line to get a mule back over the rope. It took him some
little time for the mule had his own mind about the manoeuvre and
the sergeant was unwontedly deliberate and gentle with him. Then, the
manoeuver executed, he walked slowly back to the pioneer sergeant and