e Inkerman pet," and then there was a stamping of feet,
and a little laughter, and cheering in various parts of the room, but
the new comer made one bow and walked on.

"Pray, sir," said I, bending over to one of those who had spoken
before, "who is that gentleman?"

He had no need to tell me. The man we spoke of reached the orchestra
and turned round. It was Jim Brentwood!

There was a great white seam down his face, and he wore a pair of light
curling moustachios, but I knew him in a moment; and, when he faced
round to the company, I noticed that his person seemed known to the
public, for there was not a little applause with the bottoms of
tumblers, not unlike what one remembers at certain banquets I have been
at, with certain brethren, Sons of Apollo.

In one moment we were standing face to face, shaking one another by
both hands; in another, we were arm in arm, walking through the quiet
streets towards Jim's lodgings. He had been in Ireland with his
regiment, as I knew, which accounted for my not having seen him. And
that night, Major Brentwood recounted to me all his part in the last
great campaign, from the first fierce rush up the hill at the Alma,
down to the time when our Lady pinned a certain bit of gun metal on to
his coat in St. James's Park.

A few days after this, Jim and I were standing together on the platform
of the Wildmoor station, on the South-Western Railway, and a couple of
porters were carrying our portmanteaus towards a pair-horse phaeton, in
which stood Sam Buckley, shouting to us to come on, for the horses
wouldn't stand. So, in a moment, I was alongside of Sam in the front
seat, with Jim standing up behind, between the grooms, and leaning over
between us, to see after Sam's driving; and away we went along a
splendid road, across a heath, at what seemed to me a rather dangerous
pace.

"Let them go, my child," said Jim to Sam, "you've got a fair mile
before. You sit at your work in capital style. Give me time and I'll
teach you to drive, Sam. How do you like this, Uncle Jeff?"

I said, "That's more than I can tell you, Master Jim. I know so little
of your wheeled vehicles that I am rather alarmed."

"Ah!" said Jim, "you should have been in Calcutta when the O'Rourke and
little Charley Badminton tried to drive a pair of fresh imported
Australians tandem through the town. Red Maclean and I looked out of
the billiard-room, and we saw the two horses go by with a bit of a
shaft banging abou