ppy, the bright, the unforgotten. I was myself nearly two-and-twenty
years of age at that period, and felt as old as, ay, older than the
Colonel.

Whilst he was singing his ballad, there had walked, or rather reeled,
into the room, a gentleman in a military frock-coat and duck trousers of
dubious hue, with whose name and person some of my readers are perhaps
already acquainted. In fact it was my friend Captain Costigan, in his
usual condition at this hour of the night.

Holding on by various tables, the Captain had sidled up, without
accident to himself or any of the jugs and glasses round about him, to
the table where we sat, and had taken his place near the writer, his
old acquaintance. He warbled the refrain of the Colonel's song, not
inharmoniously; and saluted its pathetic conclusion with a subdued
hiccup and a plentiful effusion of tears. "Bedad, it is a beautiful
song," says he, "and many a time I heard poor Harry Incledon sing it."

"He's a great character," whispered that unlucky King of Corpus to
his neighbour the Colonel; "was a Captain in the army. We call him the
General. Captain Costigan, will you take something to drink?"

"Bedad, I will," says the Captain, "and I'll sing ye a song tu."

And, having procured a glass of whisky-and-water from the passing
waiter, the poor old man, settling his face into a horrid grin, and
leering, as he was wont when he gave what he called one of his prime
songs, began his music.

The unlucky wretch, who scarcely knew what he was doing or saying,
selected one of the most outrageous performances of his repertoire,
fired off a tipsy howl by way of overture, and away he went. At the end
of the second verse the Colonel started up, clapping on his hat, seizing
his stick, and looking as ferocious as though he had been going to do
battle with a Pindaree.

"Silence!" he roared out.

"Hear, hear!" cried certain wags at a farther table. "Go on, Costigan!"
said others.

"Go on!" cries the Colonel, in his high voice trembling with anger.
"Does any gentleman say 'Go On?' Does any man who has a wife and
sisters, or children at home, say 'Go on' to such disgusting ribaldry
as this? Do you dare, sir, to call yourself a gentleman, and to say that
you hold the King's commission, and to sit down amongst Christians
and men of honour, and defile the ears of young boys with this wicked
balderdash?"

"Why do you bring young boys here, old boy?" cries a voice of the
malcontents.

"Wh