n.
The colonel then told me to watch my chance and make off to you in the
Jarseys, as fast as I could. He told me, besides, that I was to stay
with you, because you was likely to have business for me to do."

"That's true, good sergeant."

"There came on a darkish, drizzly evening; and a little before roll
call, at sun set, I borrowed an old forage cloak from Corporal
Green--you mought have remembered him--and out I went towards the lines,
and sauntered along the edge of the town, till I came to one of your
pipe-smoking, gin-drinking Hessians, keeping sentry near the road that
leads out towards Ashley ferry:--a fellow that had no more watch in
him--bless your soul!--as these Dutchmen hav'n't--than a duck on a rainy
day. So, said I, coming up boldly to him, 'Hans, wie gehet es'--'Geh zum
Teufel,' says he, laughing--for he knowed me. That was all the Dutch I
could speak, except I was able to say it was going to rain, so I told
him--'Es will regnen'--which he knowed as well as I did, for it was
raining all the time. I had a little more palaver with Hans, and, at
last, he got up on his feet and set to walking up and down. By this time
the drums beat for evening quarters, and I bid Hans good night; but,
instead of going away, I squatted behind the Dutchman's sentry
box;--and, presently, the rain came down by the bucket full; it got very
dark and Hans was snug under cover. The grand rounds was coming; I could
hear the tramp of feet, and as no time was to be lost, I made a long
step and a short story of it, by just slipping over the lines and
setting out to seek my fortune."

"Well done, sergeant! You were ever good at these pranks."

"But that wasn't all," continued Robinson. "As the prime file leader of
mischief would have it, outside of the lines I meets a cart with a man
to drive it, and two soldiers on foot, by way of guard.

"The first I was aware of it, was a hallo, and then a bagnet to my
breast. I didn't ask for countersigns, for I didn't mean to trade in
words that night; but, just seizing hold of the muzzle of the piece, I
twisted it out of the fellow's hand, and made him a present of the
butt-end across his pate. I didn't want to hurt him, you see, for it
wa'n't his fault that he stopped me. A back-hander brought down the
other, and the third man drove off his cart, as if he had some suspicion
that his comrades were on their backs in the mud. I didn't mean to
trouble a peaceable man with my compliments, but on