reproached him on account of his unsoldierly condition.

"Arrah now," wailed Mick piteously, "sure, an' if it wor yersilf lavin' the darlint av a young wife behind ye, glad an' fain ye would be to take a dhrap to deaden yer sorrow. Whin I sed good-bye to the Crayture this mornin', I thought she'd have died outright wid the sobs from the heart av her. Och, chum, the purty, beautiful crayture that I love so, an' that loves me, an' me lavin' her to the hard wurrld! gorra, an' there she stands!"

Be

Sure enough, standing there in the crowd, weeping as if she would break her heart, was Mick's poor little wife.

"Hould me carabine, chum, just for a moment, till I be givin' her just wan last kiss!" pleaded the poor fellow, and with a sudden spring he was out of the ranks unobserved, and hidden in the crowd that opened to receive him. His chum tramped on, but he reached the main-deck of the troopship still carrying two carbines, for as yet Mick had not reappeared.

The comrade's anxious eyes searched the crowded jetty in vain. But they scanned a scene of singular pathos. The grizzled old quarter-master was wiping his shaggy eyelashes furtively as he turned away from the children he was leaving behind. There were poor

wretches of wives who had been married without leave, as "the Crayture" had been-some with babes in their arms, weeping hopelessly as they thought of

the thousands of miles that were to part them from the men of their hearts. And there were weeping women there also who had not even the sorrowful consolation of being entitled to call themselves wives; and boys were cheering, and the band was playing "The Girl I left behind me," and non-commissioned officers were swearing, and some halfdrunk recruit-soldiers were singing a dirty ditty, and heart-strings were being torn, and the work of embarkation was steadily and relentlessly progressing.

The embarkation completed, the shore-goers having been cleared out of the ship and the gangway drawn, there was a muster on deck, and the roll of each troop was called. In G troop one man was missing, and that man was Mick Sullivan. The muster had barely broken off, when a wild shout from the jetty was heard. There stood Mick very limp and staggery, "the Crayture" clinging convulsively round his neck, and he hailing the ship over her shoulder. Behind the forlorn couple was a sympathising crowd of females sobbing in unmelodious concert, with here and there a wilder screech of woe from the throat of some tenderhearted country - woman of Mr. Sullivan. some delay, Mick was brought on to the upper deck of the trooper, where he stood before the lieutenant of his troop in an attitude meant to represent the rigidity of military attention, contrasting vividly with his tear-stained face, his inability to refrain from a frequent hiccough, and an obvious difficulty in over

After

coming the propensity of his knee-joints to serve their owner treacherously.

“Well, Sullivan," said the young officer, with an affectation of sternness which under the circumstances was most praiseworthy, "what do you mean by this conduct ?"

Plase, sor, an' beg yer parrdon, sor, but I didn't mane only to fall out just for wan last worrd.

It

wasn't the dhrink at all, at all, sor; it's the grief that kilt me intirely. Ah, sure, sor," added Mick insinuatingly, "it's yersilf, yer honour, that is lavin', maybe, a purty crayture wapin' for yer handsome face!"

The touch of nature made the officer kind. "Get out of sight at once, you rascal," said he, turning away to hide rather a sad smile, "and take care the colonel don't set eyes on you, else you'll find yourself in irons in double-quick time.”

"Thank ye, sor; it's a good heart ye have," said Mick over his shoulder, as his chum hustled him toward the hatchway. "The Crayture" was on the pier-head waving her poor little dud of a white handkerchief, as the troopship, gathering way, steamed down Southampton Water, and the strains of “The Girl I left behind me" came back fainter and more faint on the light wind.

Bangalore, up country in the Madras Presidency, was the allotted station of the 30th Light. The regiment had barely settled down in the upland cantonment, when tidings came south of the mutiny of Bengal native troops on the parade-ground of

Berhampore.

Every mail brought news from the north more and more disquieting, and in the third week of May the devilry of Meerut was recounted in the gasping terseness of a telegram. The regiment hoped in vain for a summons to Bengal, but there was no other cavalry corps in all the Madras Presidency, and the authorities could not know but that the Madras native army might at any moment flame out into mutiny. In the early days of June a sergeant's party of the 30th Light was sent down. from Bangalore to Madras to perform some exceptional orderly duty, and to this party belonged Mick Sullivan and his chum. A week later Sir Patrick Grant, the Madras Commander-in-Chief, was summoned by telegraph to Calcutta, to assume the direction of military operations in Bengal, consequent on poor General Anson's sudden death. The Fire Queen anchored in the roads with Havelock aboard, fresh from his successes in Persia, and it was arranged that the two old soldiers should hurry up to Calcutta without an hour's delay. Grant wanted a soldierclerk to write for him on the voyage, and a soldierservant warranted proof against sea-sickness to look after his chargers aboard ship. There was no time for ceremony, and Mick's chum, who was a welleducated man, was laid hold of as the amanuensis, while Mick himself was shipped as the general's temporary groom. The services of the pair ceased when Calcutta was reached, and they were attached to the Fort William garrison, pending the opportunity

to ship them back to Madras. But the two men, burning for active service, determined to make a bold effort to escape relegation to the dull inactivity of Bangalore. Watching their chance, they addressed their petition to Sir Patrick, as he sat in the verandah of his quarters in the fort. "Quite irregular,” exclaimed the veteran Highlander, "but I like your spirit, men! Let me see; I'll arrange matters with your regiment. You want to be in the thick of it at once, eh? Well, you must turn infantrymen; the Ross-shire Buffs are out at Chinsurah, and will have the route to-morrow. You can reach them in a few hours, and I'll give you a chit to Colonel Hamilton which will make it all right for you. One of you is

a Highlander born, and as for you, Sullivan, if you talk Erse to the fellows of the 78th, they won't know it from Argyllshire Gaelic."

Three hours later the comrades had ceased for the time to be Light Dragoons, and were acting members of the Grenadier Company of the Rossshire Buffs. Hart, the regimental sergeant-major, had presented them to Colonel Hamilton, who duly honoured Sir Patrick's chit, and had sent them over to the orderly-room tent, where they found the adjutant, that gallant soldier now alas! dead, whom later his country knew as Sir Herbert Macpherson, V.C.

"What is your name, my man?" asked Macpherson of Sullivan.

"Michael Donald Mactavish Sullivan, sor," re

C