One afternoon I was loitering very dismal, and quite alone as I thought, near the foot of Dunberry Gap, when a snowball took me full on the back of the head and knocked my cap off. I was stooping to pick it up, when another came splosh in my face, blinding, and half suffocating me. I staggered to my feet, gasping, only to find myself the butt of a couple of snow forts, between whose fires I had unconsciously strayed. A row of little heads was sprung up on either side, and I was being well pounded before I could collect my wits. I must premise that at this time my empire was much fallen from its former greatness. Never having confirmed it by a second achievement, it had gradually lost the best of its credit, and, though I was still respected by the unit, there was a psychologic point in the association of units beyond which my reputation was coming to be held cheap. I was learning, in fact, the universal truth that to rest on one’s laurels is to resume them, in case of emergency, in a lamentably squashed condition. Now, with half the breath knocked out of my body and my arm protecting my face, I tried to struggle out of the line of fire, only to find the opposing forces basely combining to pelt me into helplessness. I made some show of retaliating; but what was one against twenty? In the midst, I looked up the Gap, my one way of retreat, and there, standing halfway down, watching the fray, was Harry Harrier. I was smarting all over, with rills of melted snow running down my neck, and still the bombardment took me without mercy. “Harry!” I cried. “Come and help me!” The appeal did at a stroke what months of propitiation would have missed. It put him right with himself once more. Like a young deer he came leaping down, stooping and gathering ammunition as he approached. The shower ceased on the instant; the craven enemy retreated pell-mell to its double lines of shelter. “Are you ready, sir?” said Harry, excitedly. “Git your wind and coom on. We’ll drive en out of one o’ them places, and take cover there ourselves.” He was eagerly gathering and piling the snow as he spoke. In a minute I was myself again, and burning for reprisals. Each of us well armed, we charged upon the left-hand position, which seemed the more accessible of the two, and carried it by storm against a faint show of resistance. The garrison shot out and fled, encountering a volley from the opposing force, while we peppered it in the rear. Our victory was complete. As we sank back, breathed but glowing, I looked Harry silently in the face and held out my hand for the last time. He took it in his own, hanging his silly head; but the nip he gave it felt like a winch’s. “That’s all right, then,” said I. “It’s pax between us, ain’t it, you old fool?” He nodded. A long silence fell between us, and I began to whistle. Suddenly he looked up shyly, but his eyes were quick with curiosity. “I say,” he said, “what’s a parryshoot?”