The Fortunes of Hector O'Halloran, and His Man, Mark Antony O'Toole. W. H. Maxwell

a day. Although the standard then was low, how the devil Mr. Flyn contrived to touch it, remained a mystery. Ulic was barely five feet one, his singular proportions had driven three sergeants to desperation, to “set him up” was declared to be an impossibility; he was moreover, too dirty for a pioneer, and to what military uses he might return, none could even guess.

      But it was only for a season that his candle remained under a bushel. Certes, honest Ulic, in propriâ persona, was no hero; to bloodshed generally he had an invincible antipathy; and had “the imminent deadly breach” remained unmounted until Mr. Flyn made the essay, it would have been safe for ever. To a higher order of things his talents appertained; his crimping was magnificent, and the wariest bog-trotter who ever dispensed with shoes, had reason to look sharp if he foregathered with Ulic Flyn over a noggin of whisky, and was not made “food for powder” afterwards. While the sergeant was narrating his interview with Napoleon, Ulic continued in deep conference with the most intoxicated of the countrymen, and had the unhappy bumpkin known the truth, in the course of his life he had never been in such dangerous company before. On one flank, Mr. Flyn waited an opportunity to enlist him, and on the other, Mr. Montague, of comic celebrity, was experimentalizing on his side-pocket. Both were clever in their line, but, as the result proved, of the twain the Jew was the abler artiste.

      More than one hint had been already given that the pleasantest company must part; and, as a speedy movement was at hand, Mr. Flyn redoubled his exertions to add to the defenders of the realm, and do the state some service.

      “What a life we lead!” he whispered in the countryman’s ear:

      “Nothing to do from one end of the year to the other, but eat, drink, sleep, and clean a musket!—lots of liberty!—go where you like, and—”

      “Get crammed into the black-hole on your return, and be kept at pack-drill with a log upon your leg for a fortnight,” responded the Israelite with a grin.

      Mr. Flyn directed a murderous side-look at the unbeliever, who appeared determined to render useless all his honourable efforts to uphold the glory of the land; but still the short gentleman continued to draw a pleasing and veracious picture of military life.

      “Our colonel’s such a trump—a gentleman every inch. He dances with the sergeants’ wives, calls every man by his right name—Tom, Bill, or Jerry,—and his purse is always in his fingers. ‘Ulic,’ says he to me, as I passed him in the barrack yard last Friday, ‘go, drink my health, ye divil, and if you get glorious, why tell the adjutant that I bid ye do so,’ and with that he tosses me half-a-crown.”

      “Lord! what a wopper!” ejaculated the Jew.

      “Why he’s the very terror of the regiment,—orders a man ‘a hundred’ for sneezing on parade, and flogs regularly twice a week to give the drummers exercise. Take my advice, young man; be off at once, or that’ere chap will do ye brown.” So saying, he closed his left eye, rose, and returned to the fire, under the pretence of lighting his pipe; for having succeeded in drawing out the countryman’s money-bag while he gave him good advice, the Jew was anxious to move from the immediate vicinity of the prigged pocket, before the abstraction of its contents should be discovered. The fifer immediately took the vacant seat, Mr. Flyn became more eloquent than ever, but the unbeliever had done the mischief effectually—the bird was scared; and after announcing that he was “a widow’s son,” the bumpkin stoutly declared that “he would be shot at for nobody.”

      The case seemed hopeless; but Mr. Flyn was not the person to despair. With affectionate ardour he seized the peasant’s hand, swore that from first sight he had loved him like a brother, and consequently that they must have a parting glass. He discovered, unfortunately, that he had no silver; but the sergeant had enough for all, and he would trouble him to ask him, the sergeant, for a shilling. The request was made and granted; the polite commander instantly produced the current coin, Ulic Flyn called for another pint, the fifer, underneath the table, slily attached his own cockade to the dexter side of the caubeeine of the “widow’s son,” while the lance corporal tapped him playfully on the shoulder, and hailed him for life a camarado.

      Dark suspicions flashed across the peasant’s mind. What meaned this wondrous civility? His eye caught that of the Jew—he remembered the admonition of the Israelite—and was he “done brown” already? Up he sprang, desired his companions to come away, and would have bade the company “a fair good-night,” had not a gentle detainer been laid on.

      “Sit down, my boy,” exclaimed the commander. “Drink like a soldier to-night—and in the morning ye’ll have time enough to take lave of y’er relashins.”

      “Take lave of my relashins!” returned the countryman, as he made a desperate effort to reach the door—an intention on his part which was promptly prevented; for on one side he was pinioned by the fifer, on the other collared by Mr. Flyn, while the commander talked something about the articles of war, and hinted that mutiny was punishable with death.

      Original

      The countrymen seized the intended hero by one arm, the crimps held on as doggedly by the other; and as both parties pulled stoutly, it might have been supposed that they intended to partition the victim between them. Pushes were succeeded by blows,—the mêlée became general.—Mark Antony joined the soldiers, the Jew sided with the countrymen, four or five couples were actively engaged in the centre of the floor—and divers on both sides, who, either from want of room or inclination had abstained from a personal display, carried on a sort of guerilla warfare, and, acting en tirailleur, kept up a lively discharge of turfs and pewter measures, apparently with perfect indifference as to whether the sculls their missiles might invade should prove Tyrian or Trojan. While delivering a murderous blow at his opponent, a recruit, with a sweep of his cudgel, brought down a shelf on which sundry specimens of the fine arts had been deposited; and, in the very act of deprecating hostilities, the commander received an erratic visit from a three-legged stool, which destroyed his perpendicular and sent him flying through a cupboard. The boy, small as he was, did not escape—he was driven through his own drum-head; and that stirring instrument of war was silenced most effectually.

      But battles have their limit—men cannot fight for ever,

      “The hottest steed will soonest cool;-

      The fiercest day with evening closes.”

      Irish rows end as quickly as they commence, and the rookarn’n in the Cock and Punch-bowl at last began to languish. Sundry who had already figured in the fray, now cried “hold! enough!”—and others who had saluted their mother earth still remained there recumbent, opining that under existing circumstances, this position was the safer. Two combatants however, still remained unsatisfied. They had sought each other in the conflict; and now, by a sort of general consent, the floor was abandoned by all the other belligerents, and like bulls in a china shop, the fosterer and the Israelite were left with the arena to themselves.

      Both were influenced by a deep feeling of personal hostility. The Jew hated (as Jews only know how to hate) because he had been rivalled and rejected. The fosterer, more than half in love, abhorred the Israelite for imagining aught that was injurious against the cantatrice who had elected him her knight; and further, from a pre-knowledge of Mr. Montague’s pugilistic accomplishments, Mark Antony was dying for an opportunity to ascertain whether his own talents in that line had not been rather overrated, forgetting that in his own country no man is accounted above his value—be they pugilists or prophets.

      But the men were matched unequally; and consequently the conflict was soon ended. In years the Jew was stale, and in heart a very coward—while with length and activity, the fosterer was fresh as a four-year-old and bold as a tiger. The “master of fence” proved not worth “a dish of stewed prunes”—he turned out nothing but a cur, and the desperate onslaught of the fosterer at once demolished his defensive system. The finale was sudden: in a few seconds the unbeliever lay stretched