"I was in love, I tell you," said the ensign, angrily. "For the _twenty-fifth_ time, eh?" "Not exactly, Monkton; but you are aware that fathers have flinty hearts, and seldom see with--with--" "With what--out with it, old fellow.", "Their charming daughters' eyes," sighed the ensign. "True, or I should have been seen to advantage long ago. But an ensign under orders for foreign service is not the most eligible of sons-in-law." "True--but in _my_ ease, at least," continued the ensign, who was quite serious, while his senior officer was purple with suppressed laughter, "in my case, as a young gentleman possessed of moderate fortune, moderate accomplishments----" "And moderate virtue--eh, Pimple?" "You are very impertinent, Monkton," remonstrated the other, upbraidingly. "But truthful, my dear boy, very truthful," said the quizzing lieutenant, for half the conversation was mere "barrack-room chaff," to use a phrase then unknown; "and if old Squaretoes----" "Who do you mean?" "Mean? why this rich old flax-spinner, the father of your fair one. If he should come down handsomely, we fellows of the 25th would consider you quite as our factor--eh, Pimple?" On hearing this number, which was so familiar to his ear, Quentin Kennedy turned to observe the speakers more particularly, when a third officer, a very handsome man, about forty years of age, with a nut-brown cheek, a rollicking blue eye, and a hearty laugh, a square, well-built form, clad in full regimentals, scarlet-faced and lapelled with green and gold to the waist, and wearing large loose epaulettes, burst into the room, noisily and without ceremony. As he did so, he threw his arms round a very pretty chambermaid, who was tripping past with something from the sideboard, and kissing the girl, who was half pleased and half scared, he shouted in a tragi-comic manner, a passage from the _Merchant's Wife_, a now forgotten play:-- "Woman thou stol'st my heart--just now thou stol'st it, A cannon-bullet might have kissed my lips And left me as much life!" "If the sour-visaged landlord catches you kissing any of his squaws"----suggested the lieutenant. "It is a custom we learned in the Dutch service," replied the new comer, laughingly. "Have you got the route for to-morrow, Warriston?" asked the lieutenant. "All right," said the other, flourishing an oblong official paper; "it was brought by an orderly dragoon--here it is. His majesty's will and pleasure, &c., to civil (query, uncivil) magistrates and others and so forth, to provide billets for the noisy, carriages for the drunken, and handcuffs for the disorderly, of three officers, three sergeants, and seventy rank and file, proceeding by Muirkirk and Kirknewton to Edinburgh--a seventy miles' march." "Ugh!" groaned the lieutenant. "So, Pimple, your love affair must be off like ourselves, by beat of drum to-morrow." The ensign heaved a kind of mock sigh, and raised his white eyebrows.