able
distance; and the future beckons to us with both hands to step down
at last into the arena, and try our fortune amid the uncertain but
illimitable chances of the greatest game in the World.

To all of us, that is, save one.

The road running up the hill from the little mortuary is lined on
either side by members of our company, specklessly turned out and
standing to attention. At the foot of the slope a gun-carriage is
waiting, drawn by two great dray horses and controlled by a private of
the Royal Artillery, who looks incongruously perky and cockney amid
that silent, kilted assemblage. The firing party form a short lane
from the gun-carriage to the door of the mortuary. In response to the
sergeant's command, each man turns over his rifle, and setting the
muzzle carefully upon his right boot--after all, it argues no extra
respect to the dead to get your barrel filled with mud--rests his
hands upon the butt-plate and bows his head, as laid down in the
King's Regulations.

The bearers move slowly down the path from the mortuary, and place the
coffin upon the gun-carriage. Upon the lid lie a very dingy glengarry,
a stained leather belt, and a bayonet. They are humble trophies, but
we pay them as much reverence as we would to the _baton_ and cocked
hat of a field-marshal, for they are the insignia of a man who has
given his life for his country.

On the hill-top above us, where the great military hospital rears its
clock-tower foursquare to the sky, a line of convalescents, in natty
blue uniforms with white facings and red ties, lean over the railings
deeply interested. Some of them are bandaged, others are in slings,
and all are more or less maimed. They follow the obsequies below
with critical approval. They have been present at enough hurried and
promiscuous interments of late--more than one of them has only just
escaped being the central figure at one of these functions--that they
are capable of appreciating a properly conducted funeral at its true
value.

"They're putting away a bloomin' Jock," remarks a gentleman with an
empty sleeve.

"And very nice, too!" responds another on crutches, as the firing
party present arms with creditable precision. "Not 'arf a bad bit of
eye-wash at all for a bandy-legged lot of coal-shovellers."

"That lot's out of K(1)," explains a well-informed invalid with his
head in bandages. "Pretty 'ot stuff they're gettin'. _Tres moutarde!_
Now we're off."

The signal is passed