"DEAR TOM,--I hear that what you in England call a mail is to
leave camp this evening; so, that you may have no excuse for not
writing to me constantly, I am sitting down to spin you such a
yarn as I can under the disadvantages circumstances in which this
will leave me.

"This time last year, or somewhere thereabouts, I was enjoying
academic life with you at Oxford; and now here I am, encamped at
some unpronounceable place beyond Umbala. You won't be much the
wiser for that. What do you know about Umbala? I didn't myself
know that there was such a place till a month ago, when we were
ordered to march up here. But one lives and learns. Marching over
India has its disagreeables, of which dysentery and dust are
about the worst. A lot of our fellows are down with the former;
amongst others my captain; so I am in command of the company. If
it were not for the glorious privilege of grumbling, I think that
we should all own that we liked the life. Moving about, though
one does get frozen and broiled regularly once in twenty-four
hours, suits me; besides, they talk of matters coming to a
crisis, and no end of fighting to be done directly. You'll know
more about what's going on from the papers than we do, but here
they say the ball may begin any day; so we are making forced
marches to be up in time. I wonder how I shall like it. Perhaps,
in my next, I may tell you how a bullet sounds when it comes at
you. If there is any fighting, I expect our regiment will make
their mark. We are in tip-top order; the colonel is a grand
fellow, and the regiment feels his hand down to the youngest
drummer boy. What a deal of good I will do when I'm a colonel!

"I duly delivered the enclosure in your last to your convict, who
is rapidly ascending the ladder of promotion. I am disgusted at
this myself, for I have had to give him up, and there never was
such a jewel of a servant; but, of course, it's a great thing for
him. He is covering sergeant of my company, and the smartest
coverer we have, too. I have got a regular broth of a boy, an
Irishman, in his place, who leads me a dog of a life. I took him
chiefly because he very nearly beat me in a foot-race. Our senior
major is a Pat himself, and, it seems, knew something of Larry's
powers. So, one day at mess, he offered to back him against
anyone in the regiment for 200 yards. My captain took him up and
named me, and the race came off next day; and a precious narrow
thing it was, but I manag