This was certainly information enough to furnish me with food for reflection for the remainder of the night, and, as if to enhance its _agreeable_ nature, the sergeant-major paid me a visit at daylight in the morning, and informed me that such things did sometimes happen;--he enumerated several cases of the kind in different regiments, and left me with the consolatory piece of information that the officer of the guard had on each occasion been _allowed_ to retire without a court-martial!!! My readers, I am sure, will rejoice with me that in this, as in other cases, there is no rule without an exception, for otherwise they would never have had the pleasure of reading a book of mine. How I had the good fortune to be excepted on that occasion I never found out; probably, in the hurry and bustle of preparation it was overlooked,--or, probably, because they hoped better things of me thereafter,--but my commanding officer never noticed it, and his kindness in so doing put me more on the alert for the future than if he had written a volume of censure. Among the other novelties of the aforesaid guard-house on that memorable night, I got acquainted with a very worthy goose, whose services in the Rifle Brigade well merit a chapter in its history. If any one imagines that a goose is a goose he is very much mistaken: and I am happy in having the power of undeceiving him, for I am about to show that my (or rather our regimental) goose was shrewd, active, and intelligent, it was a faithful public servant, a social companion, and an attached friend, (I wish that every biped could say but half so much). Its death, or its manner of departure from this world, is still clouded in mystery; but while my book lives, the goose's memory shall not die. It had attached itself to the guard-house several years prior to my appearance there, and all its doings had been as steady as a sentry-box: its post was with the sentry over the guard; in fine weather it accompanied him in his walk, and in bad, it stood alongside of him in his box. It marched with the officer of the guard in all his visiting rounds, and it was the first on all occasions to give notice of the approach of any one in authority, keeping a particularly sharp look-out for the captain and field-officer of the day, whether by day or night. The guard might sleep, the sentry might sleep, but the goose was ever wide awake. It never considered itself relieved from duty, except during the breakfast and dinner-hours, when it invariably stepped into the guard-house, and partook of the soldiers' cheer, for they were so devotedly attached to it that it was at all times bountifully supplied, and it was not a little amusing, on those occasions, to see how the fellow cackled whenever the soldiers laughed, as if it understood and enjoyed the joke as much as they did.