the gentleman-ranker
sighed in his sleep. Ortheris took Mulvaney's tendered pouch, and we
three smoked gravely for a space while the dust-devils danced on the
glacis and scoured the red-hot plain.

'Pop?' said Ortheris, wiping his forehead.

'Don't tantalise wid talkin' av dhrink, or I'll shtuff you into your
own breech-block an'--fire you off!' grunted Mulvaney.

Ortheris chuckled, and from a niche in the veranda produced six
bottles of gingerade.

'Where did ye get ut, ye Machiavel?' said Mulvaney. ''Tis no bazar
pop.'

''Ow do _Hi_ know wot the Orf'cers drink?' answered Ortheris. 'Arst
the mess-man.'

'Ye'll have a Disthrict Coort-Martial settin' on ye yet, me son,' said
Mulvaney, 'but'--he opened a bottle--'I will not report ye this time.
Fwhat's in the mess-kid is mint for the belly, as they say, 'specially
whin that mate is dhrink. Here's luck! A bloody war or a--no, we've
got the sickly season. War, thin!'--he waved the innocent 'pop' to the
four quarters of heaven. 'Bloody war! North, East, South, an' West!
Jock, ye quackin' hayrick, come an' dhrink.'

But Learoyd, half mad with the fear of death presaged in the swelling
veins of his neck, was begging his Maker to strike him dead, and
fighting for more air between his prayers. A second time Ortheris
drenched the quivering body with water, and the giant revived.

'An' Ah divn't see thot a mon is i' fettle for gooin' on to live; an'
Ah divn't see thot there is owt for t' livin' for. Hear now, lads!
Ah'm tired--tired. There's nobbut watter i' ma bones. Let me die!'

The hollow of the arch gave back Learoyd's broken whisper in a bass
boom. Mulvaney looked at me hopelessly, but I remembered how the
madness of despair had once fallen upon Ortheris, that weary, weary
afternoon in the banks of the Khemi River, and how it had been
exorcised by the skilful magician Mulvaney.

'Talk, Terence!' I said, 'or we shall have Learoyd slinging loose, and
he'll be worse than Ortheris was. Talk! He'll answer to your voice.'

Almost before Ortheris had deftly thrown all the rifles of the guard
on Mulvaney's bedstead, the Irishman's voice was uplifted as that of
one in the middle of a story, and, turning to me, he said:--

'In barricks or out of it, as _you_ say, Sorr, an Oirish rig'mint is
the divil an' more. 'Tis only fit for a young man wid eddicated
fisteses. Oh the crame av disruption is an Oirish rig'mint, an'
rippin', tearin', ragin' scattherers in the field av