there's hundreds of men as brave
as me that never had the luck to get anything for their bravery but a
curse from the sergeant, and the blame for the faults of them that ought
to have been their betters? I've learnt more than you'd think, sir;
for how would a gentleman like you know what a poor ignorant conceited
creature I was when I went from here into the wide world as a soldier?
What use is all the lying, and pretending, and humbugging, and letting
on, when the day comes to you that your comrade is killed in the trench
beside you, and you don't as much as look round at him until you trip
over his poor body, and then all you say is to ask why the hell the
stretcher-bearers don't take it out of the way. Why should I read the
papers to be humbugged and lied to by them that had the cunning to
stay at home and send me to fight for them? Don't talk to me or to any
soldier of the war being right. No war is right; and all the holy water
that Father Quinlan ever blessed couldn't make one right. There, sir!
Now you know what O'Flaherty V.C. thinks; and you're wiser so than the
others that only knows what he done.

SIR PEARCE [making the best of it, and turning goodhumoredly to him
again]. Well, what you did was brave and manly, anyhow.

O'FLAHERTY. God knows whether it was or not, better than you nor me,
General. I hope He won't be too hard on me for it, anyhow.

SIR PEARCE [sympathetically]. Oh yes: we all have to think seriously
sometimes, especially when we're a little run down. I'm afraid we've
been overworking you a bit over these recruiting meetings. However, we
can knock off for the rest of the day; and tomorrow's Sunday. I've
had about as much as I can stand myself. [He looks at his watch.] It's
teatime. I wonder what's keeping your mother.

O'FLAHERTY. It's nicely cocked up the old woman will be having tea at
the same table as you, sir, instead of in the kitchen. She'll be after
dressing in the heighth of grandeur; and stop she will at every house
on the way to show herself off and tell them where she's going, and fill
the whole parish with spite and envy. But sure, she shouldn't keep you
waiting, sir.

SIR PEARCE. Oh, that's all right: she must be indulged on an occasion
like this. I'm sorry my wife is in London: she'd have been glad to
welcome your mother.

O'FLAHERTY. Sure, I know she would, sir. She was always a kind friend to
the poor. Little her ladyship knew, God help her, the depth of divilment
that w