ssly, "and you are sure to find him
amongst them."

CHAPTER LVI. THE HOSPITAL AT CAVA

Had Skeff been in any mood for mirth, he might have enjoyed as rich
drollery the almost inconceivable impertinence of his companion, who
scrutinized everything, and freely distributed his comments around him,
totally regardless that he stood in the camp of the enemy, and actually
surrounded by men whose extreme obedience to discipline could scarcely
be relied on.

"Uniformity is certainly not studied here," cried M'Cas-key, as he
stared at a guard about to be detached on some duty; "three fellows have
gray trousers; two, blue, one a sort of canvas petticoat; and I see only
one real coat in the party."

A little further on he saw a group of about a dozen lying on the grass
smoking, with their arms in disorderly fashion about, and he exclaimed,
"How I 'd like to surprise those rascals, and make a swoop down here
with two or three companies of Cacciatori! Look at their muskets; there
has n't been one of them cleaned for a month.

"Here they are at a meal of some sort. Well, men won't fight on beans
and olive oil. My Irish fellows are the only devils can stand up on
roots."

These comments were all delivered in Italian, and listened to with a
sort of bewildered astonishment, as though the man who spoke them must
possess some especial and peculiar privilege to enable him to indulge so
much candor.

"That's not a knapsack," said he, kicking a soldier's pack that he saw
on the grass; "that's more like a travelling tinker's bundle. Open it,
and let's see the inside!" cried he to the owner, who, awed by the tone
of command, immediately obeyed; and M'Caskey ridiculed the shreds and
patches of raiment, the tattered fragments of worn apparel, in which
fragments of cheese and parcels of tobacco were rolled up. "Why, the
fellows have not even risen to the dignity of pillage," said he. "I
was sure we should have found some saintly ornament or a piece of the
Virgin's petticoat among their wares."

With all this freedom, carried to the extreme of impertinence, none
molested, none ever questioned them; and as the guide had accidentally
chanced upon some old friends by the way, he told M'Caskey that they had
no further need of him; that the road lay straight before them, and that
they would reach Cava in less than an hour.

At Cava they found the same indifference. They learned that Garibaldi
had not come up, though some said he had pass