He was a tall and stout-made personage, apparently of middle age, with sandy hair and whiskers, partially intersprinkled with grey. His countenance was particularly good-humoured--and in his light blue eyes there was an expression of drollery and acuteness. He wore a hare-skin cap, a dark-coloured shooting-jacket, short tights, and leather gaiters. He was provided with a goat-skin knapsack--two wiry terriors followed closely at his heels, and a _dhudeene_ and oak-stick completed his appointments. The style also by which his comrades addressed him added to the mystery of his profession: the soldier addressing him as “_ta Copteeine_,” * and the student merely calling him _Shemus Rhua_. ** * The Captain. ** Red James. If in the captain’s _sobriquets_ and outer man there was anything embarrassing, there was nothing about the soldier-like concealment. The chevrons on his arm told his rank, and the pack upon his shoulder his regiment. After announcing that he was on the route to embark with a draught of volunteers for the Peninsula, he thus noticed his companions. “This,” he said, pointing to the student, “is the making of a priest; but if I can persuade him, he’ll not give them any trouble in Maynooth. What a sin it would be to spoil a fellow cut out for a flanker; and on a shoulder intended to carry a grenade, to hang a surplice. Leave your breviary to your old uncle, and take _brown bess_ in place of it. Spain’s the place, Tom. Egad, how the old priest will stare when he finds out that I have whisked away his nephew.” “Faith,” replied the student, “the only wonder is you did not whisk away his niece.” “No, no--Ellen and I must leave matters as they are until we return. Then, I’ll marry your pretty cousin, Tom, and we’ll share Father Dominick’s purse honestly between us. What say ye, captain?” “Why that you must put the old man under the turf first. He would not part with a dollar to make a colonel of ye.” “Well, priests cannot live for ever. But whither are you bound, honest Shemus? Are you on a medical excursion at present?” “Is this gentleman a doctor?” inquired Mark Antony. “He’s a man of many trades,” returned the sergeant, with a laugh. “With Humbert he was a captain; a doctor afterwards; poaches a little now and then; bleeds old women; ties flies; breaks dogs; cures children; kills rats; and, in a word, is generally accomplished. His titles are numerous as his tastes; and he still holds the same rank he had when he was out with the French in ninety-eight.” The captain smiled at the sergeant’s description; and the travellers jested, laughed, and sang until they reached the public-house, where they were to separate from the fosterer and his companion. While the soldier, the student, and the rat-catcher settled themselves in the kitchen, Mark Antony and the wandering girl retired to a private room. Both were heavily cast down, for in a brief space they were to part, and probably for ever.