Read Ebook: Draw Swords! In the Horse Artillery by Fenn George Manville Groome William H C Illustrator

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Ebook has 3516 lines and 95890 words, and 71 pages

Call it vanity what you will; but it was a glorious sensation, that which came over Dick, and he would have been a strangely unnatural lad if he had not felt excited.

No wonder that he shut himself up for the first full enjoyment of the sensation alone, though perhaps there was a feeling of dread that he might be laughed at by any one who saw him for the first time, since he was painfully conscious of being very young and slight and smooth-faced, although there was a suggestion of something coming up on the narrow space just beneath his nose.

Those things did not come from the military tailor's in common brown-paper parcels, but in special japanned tin cases, with his name in white letters and "R.H.A."

But he did not turn to them first, for his natural instinct led him to open the long case containing his new sabre, which was taken out, glittering in its polish, and glorious with the golden knot so neatly arranged about the hilt.

It felt heavy--too heavy, for it was a full-grown sabre; and when he drew it glistening from its sheath, he felt that there was not muscle enough in his arm for its proper management.

"But that will come," he said to himself as he drew it slowly till the point was nearly bare, and then slowly thrust it back, when, pulling himself together, he flashed it out with a rasping sound, to hold it up to attention.

Yes, it was heavy and long, but not too long for a mounted man, and the hilt well balanced its length. Nothing could have been better, and, after restoring it to its scabbard, he attached it to the slings of the handsome belt and laid it aside upon the bed.

The cartouche-box and cross-belt followed, and were examined with the most intense interest. He had seen them before as worn by officers, but this one looked brighter, newer, and more beautiful, for it was his very own, and it went slowly and reluctantly to take its place beside the sword upon the bed. For there was the sabretache to examine and admire, with its ornate embossings and glittering embroidery.

"Pity it all costs so much," said Dick to himself as he thought of his father, the quiet doctor, at home; "but then one won't want anything of this kind new again for years to come, and aunt has paid for this."

But soon he forgot all about the cost; there was no room in his mind for such a thing, with all that military panoply before his eyes. He had to buckle on the belt, too, and walk to and fro with the sabretache flapping against his leg, while he felt strange and awkward; but that was of no consequence, for a side-peep in the looking-glass showed that it appeared magnificent.

Yes, that jacket with its gorgeous cross-braiding of gold forming quite a cuirass over the padded breast, and running in cords and lines and scrolls over the seams at the back and about the collar and cuffs. It was heavy, and was certain to be very hot to wear, especially in the tremendous heat of India and the violent effort of riding at a furious gallop. But what of that? Who would mind heat in a uniform so brilliant?

The jacket was laid down with a sigh of satisfaction, and the breeches taken up.

There is not much to be admired in a pair of breeches, be they ever so well cut; but still they were satisfactory, for, in their perfect whiteness, they threw up the beauty of the jacket and made a most effective contrast with the high, black jack-boots--the uniform of the Bengal Horse Artillery-man of those days being a compromise between that of our own corps and a Life Guardsman.

The temptation was strong to try the white garments, and then draw on the high, black boots in their pristine glossiness; but that was deferred till a more convenient season, for there was the capital of the human column to examine--that glistening, gorgeous helmet of gilded metal, with its protecting Roman pattern comb, surmounted by a plume of scarlet horsehair, to stream right back and wave and spread over the burnished metal, to cool and shade from the torrid beams of the sun, while the front bore its decoration of leopard-skin, emblematic of the fierce swiftness of the animal's attack and the dash and power of the Flying Artillery, that arm of the service which had done so much in the subjugation of the warlike potentates of India and their savage armies.

It was almost idol-worship, and Dick's cheeks wore a heightened colour as he examined his casque inside and out, gave it a wave in the air to make the plume swish, tapped it with his knuckles, and held it at arm's-length as proudly as any young knight of old donning his helmet for the first time.

At last he put it on, adjusted the scaled chin-strap, gave his head a shake to see if it fitted on tightly, and then turned to the glass and wished, "Oh, if they could only see me now!"

And the boy made all this fuss about a suit of clothes and the accoutrements just brought to his quarters from the military tailor's.

Does any lad who reads this mentally exclaim, with an accompanying look of contempt, "What a vain, weak, conceited ass Dick Darrell must have been! Why, if under such circumstances I had received the uniform I should have behaved very differently, and treated it all as a mere matter of course."

At seventeen? Hum! ha! perhaps so. It would be rude for me, the writer, to say, "I don't believe you, my lad," but one cannot help thinking something of the kind, for we all have a touch of vanity in our composition; and as for the uniform of the Bengal Horse Artillery, there was not a man who did not wear it with a feeling of pride.

Dick fell proud enough as he gazed in the glass to see a good-looking, sun-browned face surmounted by that magnificent helmet; but the lad's head was screwed on the right way, and he was not one of those who were turned out when fools were being made. For, as he gazed at himself and admired his noble helmet and plume, his proud delight was dashed with disappointment.

"I've got such a little face," he said to himself, "and it's so smooth and boyish. I seem so young and thin. I wish I hadn't tried so hard to get appointed to the horse brigade. I shall look ridiculous beside all those great, finely-built men. I wonder whether they'll laugh. Well, it's too late now. I wish I could go back home for two years to do nothing but grow."

Dick had gone through everything, even to the gloves, and was having a fight with the desire to try everything on at once, when there was a sharp rap at his door, the handle was turned, and a manly voice shouted:

"May I come in?"

Before an answer could be given the door was thrown open, and a brother-officer strode into the room in the shape of Lieutenant Wyatt, a tall, broad-chested fellow of seven or eight and twenty, a man whom nature had endowed with a tremendous moustache, all that was allowed to grow of a prolific beard.

Dick turned scarlet as he faced his visitor, who looked sharply round and burst into a hearty fit of laughter.

"Hullo, shrimp!" he cried. "What! have I caught you?"

"I don't know what you mean," said Dick sulkily.

"Of course you don't. Get out, you wicked young fibster. You have not been inspecting your new plumage--not you! Trying on, and having a good look in the glass, have you?"

"Well, if I have, what then?" said Dick fiercely.

"Cock-a-doodle-doo!" cried the visitor, after giving a very fair imitation of the challenge of a game-fowl. "Hark at him! Oh, the fierceness of the newly-fledged officer! Don't call me out, Dick, and shoot me. There, I apologise."

"I suppose it was quite natural that I should look at the things and see if everything was there."

"Quite, dear boy, quite. Well, has the snip sent in everything right?"

"I don't know. I suppose so."

"Don't be cross, Dicky. Don't sing out of tune. Well, do they fit?"

"I don't know," said the lad coldly.

"Haven't you tried them on?"

"No."

"Bless us! what self-denial! Well, I'm glad I dropped in at the nick of time. We'll have 'em all out again."

"That we won't," cried Dick shortly.

"That we will, my boy. I'm precious proud of our troop, and I'm not going to have my junior turn out a regular guy to make the men grin."

Dick ground his teeth at the very thought of it. Grinned at--for a guy!

"Our uniform takes some putting on, my lad, and we can't afford to let the ignorant sneer. We're the picked corps, and why such a shrimp as you should have been allowed to join passes my comprehension."

"Look here, Mr Wyatt, if you've come here on purpose to insult me, have the goodness to leave my room!" cried Dick fiercely, and feeling hot all over.

"Bravo! Well done, little un," cried Wyatt, patting him on the back; "I like that."

"Keep your hands off me, sir, if you please!" cried Dick furiously.

"Better still, shrimp."

"And look here," cried Dick, who was now bubbling over with anger, "if you dare to call me shrimp again I'll--I'll--Look here, sir, your conduct is most ungentlemanly, and I shall--I shall--"

"Kick me, and make me call you out; and we shall meet, exchange shots, shake hands, and be sworn friends ever after--eh, shrimp, lad? No; we'll do it without all that. Yes, precious ungentlemanly of me, and it's not nice to be laughed at and called names," said Dick's visitor. "Only my way, my lad. But I say, you know," continued the young officer, taking a chair by the back, turning it round, and then mounting it as if he already had his left foot in a stirrup, raising his right leg very high so as to clear an imaginary cantle and valise, throwing it slowly over, and then dropping down astride, "I like that, but you are little and thin, you know."

"I suppose I shall grow," retorted Dick hotly, and the words were on his lips to say, "as big and rude and ugly as you are," but he refrained.

"Grow? Like a weed, my lad. You're just the big-boned fellow for it. We'll soon make you put on muscle."

"Thank you!" cried Dick scornfully.

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