Melbourne House Part 20

"Is that all, Captain Drummond?"

"Not quite all."

"What else?"

"Well, Daisy, a soldier, even under a good General, is often ordered to do hard things."

"What sort of things?"

"What do you think," said the Captain, lolling comfortably on the green bank, "of camping out under the rain-clouds ? with no bed but stones or puddles of mud and wet leaves ? and rain pouring down all night, and hard work all day; and no better accommodations for week in and week out?"

"But Captain Drummond!" said Daisy, horrified, "I thought soldiers had tents?"

"So they do ? in fine weather ?" said the Captain. "But just where the hardest work is to do, is where they can't carry their tents."

"Couldn't that be prevented?"

"I'm afraid not."

"I should think they'd get sick?"

"_Think_ they would! Why, they do, Daisy, by hundreds and hundreds. What then? A soldier's life isn't his own; and if he has to give it up in a hospital instead of on the field, why it's good for some other fellow."

So this it was, not to belong to oneself! Daisy looked on the soldier before her who had run, or would run, such risks, very tenderly; but nevertheless the child was thinking her own thoughts all the while. The Captain saw both things.

"What is the 'hard work' they have to do?" she asked, presently.

"Daisy, you wouldn't like to see it."

"Why, sir?"

"Poor fellows digging and making walls of sand or sods to shelter them from fire ? when every now and then comes a shot from the enemy's batteries, ploughs up their work, and knocks over some poor rascal who never gets up again. That's one kind of hard work."

Daisy's face was intent in its interest; but she only said, "Please go on."

"Do you like to hear it?"

"Yes, I like to know about it."

"I wonder what Mrs. Randolph would say to me?"

"Please go on, Captain Drummond!"

"I don't know about that. However, Daisy, work in the trenches is not the hardest thing ? nor living wet through or frozen half through ? nor going half fed ? about the hardest thing I know, is in a hurried retreat to be obliged to leave sick and wounded friends and poor fellows to fall into the hands of the enemy. That's hard."

"Isn't it hard to fight a battle?"

"You would not like to march up to the fire of the enemy's guns, and see your friends falling right and left of you ?

struck down?"

"Would you?" said Daisy.

"Would I what?"

"Don't _you_ think it is hard, to do that?"

"Not just at the time, Daisy. It is a little tough afterwards, when one comes to think about it. It is hard to see fellows suffer too, that one cannot help."

Daisy hardly knew what to think of Captain Drummond. His handsome pleasant face looked not less gentle than usual, and _did_ look somewhat more sober. Daisy concluded it must be something about a soldier's life that she could not understand, all this coolness with which he spoke of dreadful things. A deep sigh was the testimony of the different feelings of her little breast. Captain Drummond looked up at her.

"Daisy, women are not called to be soldiers."

Daisy pa.s.sed that.

"Have you told me all you can tell me, Captain Drummond?"

"I should not like to tell you all I could tell you."

"Why? Please do! I want to know all about soldiers."

He looked curiously at her. "After all," he said, "it is not so bad as you think, Daisy. A good soldier does not find it hard to obey orders."

"What sorts of orders does he have to obey?"

"All sorts."

"But suppose they were wrong orders?"

"Makes no difference."

"_Wrong_ orders?"

"Yes," said Captain Drummond, laughing. "If it is something he can do, he does it; if it is something he can't do, he loses his head trying."

"Loses his head, sir?"

"Yes ? by a cannon ball; or his heart, by a musket ball; or maybe he gets off with losing a hand or a leg; just as it happens. That makes no difference, either." He watched Daisy as he spoke, seeing a slight colour rise in her cheeks, and wondering what made the child's quiet grey eyes look at him so thoughtfully.

"Captain Drummond, is he ever told to do anything he _can't_ do?"

"A few years ago, Daisy, the English and the French were fighting the Russians in the Crimea. I happened to be there on business, and I saw some things. An order was brought one day to an officer commanding a body of cavalry ? you know what cavalry is?"

"Yes, I know."

"The order was brought in ? Hallo! what's that?" For a voice was heard shouting at a little distance, "Drummond! Ho, Drummond! Where are you?"

"It's Mr. McFarlane!" said Daisy. "He'll come here. I'm very sorry."