e town by the light
of torches. There were many aching heads in the two Looes next
morning; but nobody died: and from that night Captain Pond's Company
wore the name of "The Die-hards."

All went well at first; for the autumn closed mildly. But with
November came a spell of north-easterly gales, breeding bronchial
discomfort among the aged; and Black Care began to dog the Commander.
He caught himself regretting the admission of so many gunners of
riper years, although the majority of these had served in His
Majesty's Navy, and were by consequence the best marksmen.
They weathered the winter, however; and a slight epidemic of
whooping-cough, which broke out in the early spring, affected none of
the Die-hards except the small bugler, and he took it in the mildest
form. The men, following the Doctor's lead, began to talk more
boastfully than ever. Only the Captain shook his head, and his eyes
wore a wistful look, as though he listened continually for the
footsteps of Nemesis--as, indeed, he did. The strain was breaking
him. And in August, when word came from headquarters that, all
danger of invasion being now at an end, the Looe Volunteer Artillery
would be disbanded at the close of the year, he tried in vain to
grieve. A year ago he would have wept in secret over the news.
Now he went about with a solemn face and a bounding heart. A few
months more and then--

And then, almost within sight of goal, Sergeant Fugler had broken
down. Everyone knew that Fugler drank prodigiously; but so had his
father and grandfather, and each of them had reached eighty.
The fellow had always carried his liquor well enough, too.
Captain Pond looked upon it almost as a betrayal.

"I don't know what folks' constitutions are coming to in these days,"
he kept muttering, on this morning of November the 3rd, as he sat on
the muzzle of Thundering Meg and dangled his legs.

And then, glancing up, he saw the Doctor coming from the town along
the shore-wall, and read evil news at once. For many of the
Die-hards stopped the Doctor to question him, and stood gloomy as he
passed on. It was popularly said in the two Looes, that "if the
Doctor gave a man up, that man might as well curl up his toes then
and there."

Catching sight of his Captain on the platform, the Doctor bent his
steps thither, and they were slow and inelastic.

"Tell me the worst," said Captain Pond.

"The worst is that he's no better; no, the worst of all is that he