"It is an old regimental story," said the major, laughing, as he filled his horn with wine from the gushing borrachio; "it happened when we were in garrison at Fort St. John on the Richelieu River (a place I have often told you about); provisions were scarce, for the Yankees had intercepted all our supplies, so that at times we were literally starving, while to conciliate the colonists, strict orders were issued against plundering. It was as much as your life was worth if the provost marshal caught you stealing anything, even a kiss from a girl in Vermont or New York, so such a thing as levanting with a sucking-pig or a turkey-poult, was not to be thought of even in our wildest dreams: moreover they would not have _sold_ a chicken for thrice its weight in gold, to a red-coat! "Some weeks passed over thus; we were getting very lanky and lean, and though our lovely countenances were ruddied by the American frost, we were always hungry, always thirsty, and longed in our day-dreams for a cooper of the old mess port, or a devilled drumstick; but these were only to be had at the head-quarters of the Borderers and Cameronians, then far away in the Jerseys, in pursuit of the rebels, under Lord Stirling; and we often shivered with hunger as well as with cold under the ice-covered roofs of our wooden barracks at night. "Lord Rohallion of ours, had a servant named Jack Andrews, a knowing old file, from his own place in Carrick, who contrived to make off with a sheep. How or where Jack did it, the Lord only knows, and we never enquired; but the owner, a Pennsylvanian quaker, made an outcry about it, and the Provost's guard were speedily on poor Jack's track with the gallows rope. A stab with a bayonet in the throat soon silenced the sheep, and Jack brought it under his greatcoat to our quarters, and while the provost, with Simon Pure, was overhauling the soldiers' barrack, we tucked up the spoil in a cradle, with a blanket over it and a muslin cap round its head. We set a piper's wife to rock it, while Jack pretended to make caudle at the fire, and in this occupation they were found, when the provost came in, intent on death, and Broadbrim on retribution. "Hush-a-by, baby, on the tree-top, When the wind blows the cradle will rock," sung the piper's wife, patting the sheep tenderly. "'Hush,' said Jack to the intruders; 'don't stir for the life that is in you!' "'Why--what is the matter with the baby?' "'It's either measles or small-pox; we don't know which,' said Jack. "'Yea verily--aye--ho, hum,' snivelled the Quaker.