6 NOTIONS ABOUT WAR. 



This poor woman's work was weeding 

 in the garden and shrubbery walks, or 

 sometimes round the plantation hedges ; 

 and what with sun and wind and old age, 

 she was like a shrivelled apple, with a little 

 red colour left in its cheeks. The only place 

 she could go to for dinner was the shed 

 where I slept; and there, over the stoke- 

 hole, we used to sit and eat together ; and 

 many's the tale of trouble that poor crea- 

 ture's told me, especially in winter, when 

 we were both of us the worst off. If it 

 hadn't been for her I'm sure I should have 

 gone off to sea, or for a drummer-boy, spite 

 of the horrid tales I'd heard my father's old 

 comrades tell about the wars, when they 

 used to be drinking together after they'd 

 drawn their pension-money. And talking 

 of that, I've never read of any bloody mur- 

 ders to match things I've heard some of 'em 

 boast of doing, and glory in, too. Not my 

 father, he was the wrong sort of man ; and 

 often, after I'd been listening, he would say, 

 " Bad work, boy, bad work ; and who's to 

 account for it by and by I don't know ; but 

 I hope not me, though I've had so much to 

 do with it." 



