The speech of every man jack of them was like the exhalation of a cesspool, and the newest of Her Majesty’s hired servants sat in a grim wrath and loathing, seeing that he had chosen these for his life companions. The meal was plentiful, and not bad of its kind, but it was dirtily served, and asked for long custom or an appetite of more than average keenness. Our recruit had neither the one nor the other, but he remembered his promise to Irene. He had undertaken to meet his fate cheerfully, and the fare was part of his fate. He would have no re-pinings. The food was honest and wholesome, and he would probably learn to be eager for worse before the war was over. So he, as it were, squared his shoulders at his trencher, and was just ready to fall to, when one of the plough-tail gentry sitting just opposite let fall a speech which would have turned the stomach of a decent hog, if he had happened to understand it. Polson’s heart maddened within him, and he smote his fist upon the unclothed table so that the plates of chipped enamel iron danced from end to end on it. ‘You filthy clodpole!’ he said, rising from his place and thrusting a prognathous jaw and blazing eyes half-way across the table. ‘Speak like that again in my hearing, and I’ll give you such a hiding as you never had since you were born.’ ‘And sarve him right, begorra,’ said the man at the head of the table. ‘It’s sick I am of all the dirty stuff I’ve to listen to--An’ dese boys is ‘listed for de war, and dere’s not wan of ‘em knows he mayn’t be stiff on de field in tree or four monts’ time. An’ be way of makin’ ready for a soldier’s end an’ a sudden meetin’ wid his God, dey’re chewin’ blasphaymious conversation from _reveille_ to lights out, so dey are.’ ‘Thank you,’ said Polson, and so sat down and tried to go on with his dinner. The meal was finished in silence. The scene had its effect, and it had all the more surely for two or three things which happened later on. Example. The whole rough squad was turned into the riding school that afternoon dressed as they might happen to be. The accustomed old drill-horses, saddled and bridled, were ranged on the tan at the wall, with stirrups crossed over the shoulders, and when the word ‘Mount’ was given, Polson was the only one of the newly recruited crowd who did not make a painful climb in trying to obey the order. He was in the saddle in a flash, and sat there like a centaur. ‘We’ve got one man amongst us, seemin’ly,’ said the old rough-riding Sergeant. ‘You’ve seen a horse before to-day, my lad.’ ‘One or two,’ said Polson. ‘Come out,’ said the red-nosed drill. ‘Let’s see what you’re good for. Put her at that.’ ‘That’ was a furze-covered revolving pole mounted on swivelled trestles, and about three feet high. It was a leap for a child, and Polson went over it, turned and came nimbly back again. The instructor approached him and took him by the foot and ankle.