THE SOUTH COUNTRY 



described as only " slightly wounded " when he was dis- 

 charged after a " short service " of thirteen years. He 

 showed his gnarled knee to explain his crookedness. 

 Little he could tell of the battle except the sobbing of 

 the soldier next to him " a London chap from Haggers- 

 ton way. Lord ! he called for his mother and his God 

 and me to save him, and the noise he made was worse 

 than the firing and the groaning of the horses, and I was 

 just thinking how I could stop his mouth for him when a 

 bullet hits me, and down I goes like a baby." 



He had been on the road forty years. For a short time 

 after his discharge he worked on the land and lived in a 

 cottage with his wife and one child. The church bells 

 were beginning to ring, and I asked him if he was going 

 to church. At first he said nothing, but looked down at 

 his striped waistcoat and patched trousers; then, with a 

 quick violent gesture of scorn, he lifted up his head and 

 even threw it back before he spoke. " Besides," he said, 

 " I remember how it was my little girl died My 

 little girl, says I, but she would have been a big hand- 

 some woman now, forty-eight years old on the first of 

 May that is gone. She was lying in bed with a little bit 

 of a cough, and she was gone as white as a lily, and I 

 went in to her when I came home from reaping. I saw 

 she looked bad and quiet-like like a fish in a hedge and 

 something came over me, and I caught hold of both her 

 hands in both of mine and held them tight, and put my 

 head close up to hers and said, ' Now look here, Polly, 

 you've got to get well. Your mother and me can't stand 

 losing you. And you aren't meant to die; such a one 

 as you be for a lark.' And I squeezed her little hands, and 

 all my nature seemed to rise up and try to make her get 



