ttle silence that follows on the ceremony there entered
the native officer who had played for the Lushkar team. He could not
of course eat with the alien, but he came in at dessert, all six feet
of him, with the blue-and-silver turban atop, and the big black
top-boots below. The mess rose joyously as he thrust forward the hilt
of his saber, in token of fealty, for the colonel of the White Hussars
to touch, and dropped into a vacant chair amid shouts of "_Rung ho_!
Hira Singh!" (which being translated means "Go in and win!"). "Did I
whack you over the knee, old man?" "Ressaidar Sahib, what the devil
made you play that kicking pig of a pony in the last ten minutes?"
"Shabash, Ressaidar Sahib!" Then the voice of the colonel, "The health
of Ressaidar Hira Singh!"

After the shouting had died away, Hira Singh rose to reply, for he was
the cadet of a royal house, the son of a king's son, and knew what was
due on these occasions. Thus he spoke in the vernacular:--

"Colonel Sahib and officers of this regiment, much honor have you done
me. This will I remember. We came down from afar to play you; but we
were beaten." ("No fault of yours, Ressaidar Sahib. Played on our own
ground, y' know. Your ponies were cramped from the railway. Don't
apologize.") "Therefore perhaps we will come again if it be so
ordained." ("Hear! Hear, hear, indeed! Bravo! Hsh!") "Then we will
play you afresh" ("Happy to meet you"), "till there are left no feet
upon our ponies. Thus far for sport." He dropped one hand on his sword
hilt and his eye wandered to Dirkovitch lolling back in his chair.
"But if by the will of God there arises any other game which is not
the polo game, then be assured, Colonel Sahib and officers, that we
shall play it out side by side, though _they_"--again his eye sought
Dirkovitch--"though _they_, I say, have fifty ponies to our one
horse." And with a deep-mouthed _Rung ho_! that rang like a musket
butt on flagstones, he sat down amid shoutings.

Dirkovitch, who had devoted himself steadily to the brandy--the
terrible brandy aforementioned--did not understand, nor did the
expurgated[14] translations offered to him at all convey the point.
Decidedly the native officer's was the speech of the evening, and the
clamor might have continued to the dawn had it not been broken by the
noise of a shot without that sent every man feeling at his defenseless
left side. It is notable that Dirkovitch "reached back," after the
American fashio