iQO 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, 

 youVe 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 



