course, but our own fellows,--the young Oxford and Cambridge
'saps,'--the green ones waiting for their gazette in the Guards! Where
are you bound for?--what are you doing?" asked he, as if a sudden
thought had crossed his mind.

"I am endeavoring to get back to the Crimea," said Conway, smiling at
the prospect which the other had with such frankness opened to him.

"The Crimea!" exclaimed Beecher, "why, that is downright madness; they
're fighting away there just as fresh as ever. The very last paper I saw
is filled with an account of a Russian sortie against our lines, and a
lot of our fellows killed and wounded."

"Of course there are hard knocks--"

"It's all very well to talk of it that way, but I think you might have
been satisfied with what you saw, I 'd just as soon take a cab down to
Guy's, or the Middlesex Hospital, and ask one of the house-surgeons to
cut me up at his own discretion, as go amongst those Russian savages. I
tell you it don't pay,--not a bit of it!"

"I suppose, as to the paying part, you 're quite right; but, remember,
there are different modes of estimating the same thing. Now, I like
soldiering--"

"No accounting for tastes," broke in Beecher. "I knew a fellow who was
so fond of the Queen's Bench Prison he would n't let his friends clear
him out; but, seriously speaking, the Crimea 's a bad book."

"I should be a very happy fellow to-night if I knew how I could get back
there. I 've been trying in various ways for employment in any branch
of the service. I 'd rather be a driver in the Wagon Train than whip the
neatest four-in-hand over Epsom Downs."

"There 's only one name for that," said Beecher; "at least, out of
Hanwell."

"I 'd be content to be thought mad on such terms," said Conway,
good-humoredly, "and not even quarrel with those who said so!"

"I 've got a better scheme than the Crimea in my head," said Beecher, in
a low, cautious voice, like one afraid of being overheard. "I've half
a mind to tell you, though there 's one on board here would come down
pretty heavily on me for peaching."

"Don't draw any indignation on yourself on _my_ account," said Conway,
smiling. "I'm quite unworthy of the confidence, and utterly unable to
profit by it."

"I 'm not so sure of that," responded Beecher. "A fellow who has got it
so hot as you have, has always his eyes open ever after. Come a little
to this side," whispered he, cautiously. "Did you remark my going
forward two or three