't do. I'd--I'd
study the art of war: I know there are books about it. I'd get out
to the East, away from this depot work; and if there is no fighting
there, as every one says there will not be, I'd go into a marching
regiment, and see service. I'd,--hang it, if they'd have me,--I'd even
go to the senior department at Sandhurst, and read mathematics!"

Sabina kept her countenance (though with difficulty) at this
magnificent bathos; for she saw that the little man was really in
earnest; and that the looks and words of the strange actress had
awakened in him something far deeper and nobler than the mere sensual
passion of a boy.

"Ah, if I had but gone out to Varna with the rest! I thought myself a
lucky fellow to be left here."

"Do you know that it is getting very late?"

So Frederick Lord Scoutbush went home to his rooms: and there sat
for three hours and more with his feet on the fender, rejecting the
entreaties of Mr. Bowie, his servant, either to have something, or to
go to bed; yea, he forgot even to smoke, by which Mr. Bowie "jaloused"
that he was hit very hard indeed: but made no remark, being a
Scotchman, and of a cautious temperament.

However, from that night Scoutbush was a changed man, and tried to be
so. He read of nothing but sieges and stockades, brigade evolutions,
and conical bullets; he drilled his men till he was an abomination in
their eyes, and a weariness to their flesh; only every evening he went
to the theatre, watched La Cordifiamma with a heavy heart, and then
went home to bed; for the little man had good sense enough to ask
Sabina for no more interviews with her. So in all things he acquitted
himself as a model officer, and excited the admiration and respect of
Serjeant Major MacArthur, who began fishing at Bowie to discover the
cause of this strange metamorphosis in the rackety little Irishman.

"Your master seems to be qualifying himself for the adjutant's post,
Mr. Bowie. I'm jalousing he's fired with martial ardour since the war
broke out."

To which Bowie, being a brother Scot, answered Scottice, by a crafty
paralogism.

"I've always held it as my opeeeenion, that his lordship is a youth of
very good parts, if he was only compelled to employ them."

CHAPTER VIII.

TAKING ROOT.

Whosoever enjoys the sight of an honest man doing his work well,
would have enjoyed the sight of Tom Thurnall for the next two months.
In-doors all the morning, and out of doors all the after