RECOLLECTIONS OF THE WALCHEREN EXPEDITION 182 JOURNAL OF A CAMPAIGN AT THE HORSE-GUARDS 231 MESS-TABLE CHAT, NO. II. 235 GERAGHTY'S KICK 257 DUELLING IN THE SERVICE 266 NIGHTS IN THE GUARD-HOUSE, NO. III. 284 THE BISCUIT 300 THE BATTLE OF THE GRINDERS 309 A ROUGH PASSAGE TO PORTUGAL 319 THE MILITARY SKETCH-BOOK. FIRST WEEK IN THE SERVICE. “For now sits expectation in the air, And _shews_ a sword from hilt unto the point.” HENRY V. Never shall I forget the delightful sensations my mind experienced on reading, in the long-expected _Gazette_, the announcement of my first military appointment. I was in London at the time, and had been residing three weeks at _Old Slaughter's_ Coffee House, in St. Martin's Lane, deferring from Tuesday 'till Saturday, and from Saturday 'till Tuesday, the fulfilment of my mother's strict injunctions “_to take lodgings and live economically_,” when one evening the waiter handed to me, damp from the press, the official sheet which was to terminate all my anxiety. There I was in print,—in _absolute print_; and that, too, in the GAZETTE—by the King's Royal Authority! There are many youths, who, in such a situation, would, from the ecstatic impulse of their feelings, have upset the table; or have flung the decanter at the waiter's head; or, perhaps, have snatched the wig off the head of any respectable gentleman who might have happened to be sitting within reach; but I acted differently. Had it been an ordinary impulse of gladness, I should, no doubt, have poured forth my ebullition of pleasant feeling upon tables, decanters, waiters, and wigs of elderly gentlemen; but this was no everyday sensation,—no flash in the pan: it was a splendid coruscation, the intensity of which dazzled all my senses, and marvellously heightened my ideas of self-importance. The auditory organs of the Waterloo hero thrilled not more at the first announcement of his Grace's Dukedom, than mine, as my lips pronounced the consummation of my almost wearied hopes—an Ensigncy. I was more than a Duke, more than a King, more than an Emperor: I was a SUBALTERN. In idea, I was already a Captain, a Colonel, a General! I gave the reins to my enthusiastic imagination, and would not, I believe, have exchanged my commission for a coronet.