n't you let me hear you call Sergeant Ripsy Tipsy again. One of
these days, mark my words, he will find out that you have nicknamed him
with a _T_ instead of an _R_, and he will never forgive you."

"Tckkk!"

"What are you laughing at, sir?"

"Oh, don't say sir, Mr Archie! There's no one near. Of course I don't
mind when anybody's by, but I couldn't help laughing. Old Patient Job
found it out long ago."

"He did?"

"Yes, sir."

"And yet you wonder that he has got what you call his knife into you!"

"Oh, I don't think that's why, sir."

"Well, I do."

"No, sir; it's his aggravating way of wanting to see a company of human
men going across the parade like a great big caterpillar or a big bit of
a machine raking up the sand."

"Never mind. Old Ripsy is a fine soldier, and I advise you not to let
him hear you."

"Pst!"

"What is it?"

"Mr Maine, sir," whispered the lad; and the subaltern's heels dropped
at once from the table upon which they had been resting, for plainly
heard through the window, in a loud, forced cough, full of importance,
came the utterance, "Errrrum! Errum!" and Private Peter Pegg's lower
jaw dropped, and his eyes, as he fixed them upon the subaltern's face,
opened in so ghastly a stare of dread that, in spite of his annoyance,
Ensign Maine's hands were clapped to his mouth to check a guffaw. But
as the regular stamp more than stride of a heavy man reached his ears,
the young officer's countenance assumed a look of annoyance, and he
whispered in a boyish, nervous way:

"Slip off, Pete; and don't let him see you leaving my room."

"I can't, sir," whispered the lad, with a look full of agony.

"What!"

"He telled me if ever he catched me loafing about your quarters he'd--"

"Don't talk. Cut!"

"I can't, sir."

"You can."

"But--"

"Don't talk. Off at once."

"But I tell you, sir--"

"I don't want to be told. He mustn't see you going away from here."

"But he's stopped, sir. Can't you hear?"

"No--yes. Why has he stopped?"

"Because he can see my two blessed buckets standing there."

"Oh, Peter Pegg! Tut, tut, tut, tut, tut!" And as the young subaltern
gave utterance to these homely sounds, he was recalling certain
sarcastic remarks of the stern master of drill respecting officers and
gentlemen demeaning themselves by associating with the men.

CHAPTER TWO.

A ROWING.

"A Guilty conscience needs no accuser," said Archie Maine to himself.
"There'