Plain though it was, being destitute of lace or epaulettes, poor Quentin was very proud of his volunteer uniform, and being eminently a handsome young man, he looked very well in it. The coarse buff crossbelts, the pouch, and bayonet, and, more especially, the Brown Bess he had to carry, did not suit his taste quite so well. He had imagined that he would have to shoulder a kind of Joe Manton, or something like a smart Enfield rifle of the present day, with a "draw" of ten pounds or less on the trigger, instead of a long blunderbuss like the regulation musket of those days, weighing fourteen pounds, with its enormous butt-plate of brass and so forth. Thanks to the teaching of the old quartermaster, he proved himself so apt a pupil under the sergeant-major and old Norman Calder, that within a week he was reported as "fit for duty," as Monkton said, "doing as much credit to his preceptors as to the cabbage-stalk," for so he designated the army tailor. But we are anticipating. His first parade was an inauspicious one, in so far as it was for punishment. A sergeant of the regiment had been recently tried by a regimental court-martial for permitting spirits to be brought by a woman to the main guard-house at night, while he was in command, and by these means certain prisoners became intoxicated and riotous. He alleged that he was asleep on that luxurious couch, the guard bed, after posting his sentinels, and that the fault lay with his corporal and others; but the plea was urged in vain--the corps was under orders for foreign service--an example was necessary; so he was now to receive the award of his dereliction of duty, and as the drum-major had received some special instructions over night, all knew that it involved the application of the now (happily) almost obsolete instrument--the cat! The degradation of a non-commissioned officer is always a painful duty; but when flogging is added thereto, it is doubly painful to the witnesses, and maddening to the culprit. "I told you old Middleton was a Tartar," said Monkton, as he and Quentin hurried downstairs from their quarters; "he'd certainly flog ensigns if he could; and the _Gazette_ of last night won't have improved his variable temper. But here he comes, mounted, with holsters and blue saddle-cloth, but looking for all the world like an old woman trotting to market with her butter and eggs. Such a seat--such a queer length, or rather want of length, in the stirrup-leathers! Good morning, Buckle--so we are to have a flogging--ugh? that isn't lively."