TOLD AFTER MESS 



" You want to hear the story, eh ? " 



Loud chorus of subalterns : " No ! " 



" All right, then, that settles your fate, and you 

 shall ! " and I lit a cigar preliminary to starting the 

 yarn. 



" Well do I remember the episode. It was a 

 cut-throat country that we had to ride over. Many 

 of my soldier comrades, brave and true, fell that 

 day thickly around me — but as they all got up 

 again, it did not really so much matter." 



Having deftly dodged a sofa-cushion shied at my 

 head by way of a gentle hint to " get forrard," I 

 dropped from airy heights to the sober realms of 

 fact, and proceeded to tell my plain unvarnished 

 tale. 



" After hunting for ten years with a pack be- 

 longing to a Cavalry regiment — let us call it 

 the ' Heavyshot Drag ' — the Fates (and Taylor & 

 Co.) removed me into a far country, and but 

 for the kindness of some members of the hunt, 

 who often asked me up and gave me a mount, I 

 should have known the Heavyshot no more, as it 

 336 



