Under Two Flags

his exploit, was having a dressing down after a gentle exercise. "You've pulled it off, haven't you? You've cut the work out for 'em! You've shown 'em what a luster is! Strike me a loser, but

radicted by all the evidences of the flat and furrow, while Forest King drank a dozen go-downs of water, and was rewarded for the patience with which he had subdued his inclin

orse with a sort of passion since his victory over the Shires. "Yo

anted no gold powder, the clearest, sauciest eyes, and the handsomest mouth in the world; but of grammar she had not a notion, of her aspirates she had never a recollection, of conversation she had not an idea; of slang she had, to be sure, a repertoire, but to this was her command of language limited. She dressed perfectly, but she was a vulgar little soul; drank everything, from Bass' ale to rum-punch, and from cherry-brandy to absinthe; thought it the height of wit to stifle you with cayenne slid into your vanilla ice, and the climax of repartee to cram your hat full of peach

g on the purple cushions of a barouche for the time of straw pallets and untroubled sleep, why-the Zu-Zu would have vaulted herself on the box-seat of a drag, and told you "to stow all that trash"; her childish recollections were of a stifling lean-to with the odor of

ere more suitable in artistic and intellectual similarity, and that, when the Zu-Zu and her sisterhood plunge their white arms elbow-deep into so many fortunes, and rule the world right and left as they do, they could also sound their H's properly, and knew a little orthography, if they could not be changed into such queens of grace, of intellect, of sovereign mind and splendid wit as were their prototypes when she whose name they debase h

e, bearing no very good will to her; for Rake had very strong prejudices, and none stronger than against these fair pillagers who went about seeking whom they

les! Why, she ain't worth sixpence thrown away on her, unless it's worth while to hear how hard she can swear at you!" averred Rake, in his eloquence; and he was undoubtedly right for that matter; but then-the

him vivacious and peppery; Mr. Rake polished his wits quite as much as he polished the tops, and considered himself a philosopher. Of whose son he was he had not the remotest idea; his earliest recollections were of the tender mercies of the workhouse; but even that chill foster-

what he fought for), a boatman on the bay of Mapiri, a blacksmith in Santarem, a trapper in the Wilderness, and finally, working his passage home again, took the Queen's shilling in Dublin, and was drafted into a light-cavalry regiment. With the -th he served half a dozen years in India; a rough-rider, a splendid fellow in a charge or a pur

On active service Rake was, by instinct, too good a soldier not to manage to keep the curb on himself tolerably well though he was always regarded in his troop rather as a hound that will "riot" is regarded in the pack; but when the -th came back to Brighton and to barracks,

lic having left him with strongly aristocratic prejudices; "but when it comes to a duffer like that, that knows no better than me, what ain't a bit better than me, and what is as clumsy a duffer about a horse's plate

e. Rake had a Scotch hound that was the pride of his life; his beer-money often going instead to buy dainties for the dog, who became one of the channels through which Warne could annoy and thwart him. The dog did no harm, being a fine, well-bred deerhound; but it pleased the Corporal to consider that it did, si

hand; infuriated by the pain, the dog flew at him, tearing his overalls with a fierce crunch of his teeth. "Take the brute off, and string him up with a halter; I've put up with him too long!" cried Warne to a couple of privat

uch a hair of him, I'll double-tho

word, had he not been made a prison

e field, patient, pulseless, and enduring of every provocation, cruelty, and insolence in the camp and barrack, as though they were statues of

for years; and, in consideration of the provocation received, the prisoner, who was much liked by the officers, was condemned to six months' imprisonment for his insubordination and blow to his superior officer, without being tied up to the triangles. At the court-m

ntle, wayward, and spoilt by his own world, he was still never so selfish and philosophic as he pretended but wh

I could have got up the pace for so much exertion," murmured Cecil to his cheroot, careless of the demoralizing tendency of his rema

fine a fellow from the risks of his turbulent passion and from the stern fetters of a trying discipline; hence, when Rake found himself condemned to his cell, he had a message sent him by Bertie's groom that, when h

at message reached him, a vivid sense that he was a condemned and disgraced man suddenly flooded in on him; a passionate gratitude seized him to the young aristocrat who had thought of him in his destitution and condemnation, who had even thou

uct in the Light Cavalry; but Cecil never troubled his head about what people said; and so invaluable did Rake sp

ry rifle and boots; slaved for him cheerfully, and was as proud of the deer he stalked, of the brace he bagged, of his winnings when

st of the cardinal what-d'ye-call-'ems-sins, ain't it?-go to a noble-hearted Scamp; he'll stick to you till he kills himsel

ld have escaped any save one who had been practiced as a trapper in the red Canadian woods; namely, the head of a man, almost hidden among the heavy, though leafless, brushwood and the yellow gorse of a spinney which lay on his left in Royallieu Park. Rake's eyes were telescopic and microscopic; moreover,

und in. "If he ain't a rascal, I never seen one; it's my belief he cheats the stable thick and thin, and gets on Mr. Cecil's mounts to a goo

. Instantaneous thoughts darted through his mind of tethering his horse, and making a reconnaissance, safely and unseen, with the science of stalking brute or man that he had learned of his friends the Sioux.

overlook his foe's movements; and with a gallop that was muffled on the heathered turf he dashed straight at the covert, unperceived till he was within ten paces. Wi

d laughed nervously as Ra

care you don't get bucked out o' sa

retorted Rake scornfully; boldness was not his e

r. Willon, looking anything but easy, while the co

g there; his spirits don't seem much in sorts now," continued the ruthless inquisitor, with a glance at the "keeper's tree" by which they stood, in the middle of dank undergrowth, whose branches were adorned with dead cats, curs, owls, kestrels, stoats,

somewhere; where the deuce was it? Cousin; yes, cousins in Queer Street, I dare say! Why should he go and meet his 'cousin' out in the fog

would have been more so had he guessed that Ben Davis' red beard and demure attire, with other as efficient disguises, had prevented even his o