On this morning we six were to have a breakfast such as rarely fell to our lot in the Crimea; for Evans, my Welsh factotum and _fidus Achates_, was a clever fellow, and speedily had prepared for us, at a fire improvised under the shelter of a rock, a large kettle of steaming coffee, which, sans milk, we drank from tin canteens, tumblers, or anything suitable, and Gwynne's loaf was shared fraternally among us, together with a brace of fowls found by him in a Tartar cottage. "Lineal descendants of the cock that crew to Mahomet, no doubt," said he; "and now, thanks to Evans, there they are, brown, savoury, appetising, gizzard under one wing, liver under the other--done to a turn, and on an old ramrod." And while discussing them, the events of the siege were also discussed, as coolly as we were wont to do the most ordinary field man[oe]uvres at home. "The deuce!" said I, "how the breeze comes under the wall of this wretched tent!" "Don't abuse the tent, Harry," said Caradoc; "I am thankful to find myself in one, after being on board the Hydaspes. It must be a veritable luxury to be able to sleep, even on a camp-bed and alone, after being in a hospital, with one sufferer on your right, another on your left, dead or dying, groaning and in agony. May God kindly keep us all from the 'bloody hospital of Scutari,' after all I have heard of it!" "You were with us last night in the trenches, Mostyn?" said I. "Yes, putting Gwynne's Hythe theories into practice from a rifle pit. I am certain that I potted at least three of the Ruskies as coolly as ever I did grouse in Scotland. All squeamishness has left me now, though I could not help shuddering when first I saw a man's heels in the air, after firing at him. You will never guess what happened on our left. A stout vivandière of the 3rd Zouaves, while in the act of giving me a _petit verre_ from her little keg, was taken--" "By the enemy?" exclaimed Price. "Not at all--with the pains of maternity; and actually while the shot and shell were flying over our heads." "And what were the trench casualties?" asked Gwynne. "About a hundred and twenty of all ranks, killed, wounded, and missing. A piece more of the fowl--thanks." "A guardsman was killed last night, I have heard," said Hugh Price. "Yes; poor Evelyn of the Coldstreams; he was first blinded by dust and earth blown into his eyes by the ricochetting of a 36-pound shot, and as he was groping about in an exposed place between the gabions, he fell close by me." "Wounded?" "Mortally--hit in the head; he' was just able to whisper some woman's name, and then expired. He purchased all his steps up to the majority, so there's a pot of money gone. I think I could enjoy a quiet weed now; but, Clavell, there was surely an awful shindy in your quarter last night?" "Yes," replied Tom, who, since he had been under fire, seemed to have grown an inch taller; "a sortie." "A sortie?" said two or three, laughing.