Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon Volume I Part 45

"Come down, Mr. O'Malley," cried the skipper's well-known voice,--"come down below and join us in a parting gla.s.s; that's the Lisbon light to leeward, and before two hours we drop our anchor in the Tagus."

CHAPTER x.x.xV.

MAJOR MONSOON.

Of my travelling companions I have already told my readers something. Power is now an old acquaintance; to Sparks I have already presented them; of the adjutant they are not entirely ignorant; and it therefore only remains for me to introduce to their notice Major Monsoon. I should have some scruple for the digression which this occasions in my narrative, were it not that with the worthy major I was destined to meet subsequently; and indeed served under his orders for some months in the Peninsula. When Major Monsoon had entered the army or in what precise capacity, I never yet met the man who could tell. There were traditionary accounts of his having served in the East Indies and in Canada in times long past. His own peculiar reminiscences extended to nearly every regiment in the service, "horse, foot, and dragoons." There was not a clime he had not basked in; not an engagement he had not witnessed. His memory, or, if you will, his invention, was never at fault; and from the siege of Seringapatam to the battle of Corunna he was perfect. Besides this, he possessed a mind retentive of even the most trifling details of his profession,--from the formation of a regiment to the introduction of a new b.u.t.ton, from the laying down of a parallel to the price of a camp-kettle, he knew it all. To be sure, he had served in the commissary-general's department for a number of years, and nothing instils such habits as this.

"The commissaries are to the army what the special pleaders are to the bar," observed my friend Power,--"dry dogs, not over creditable on the whole, but devilish useful."

The major had begun life a two-bottle man; but by a studious cultivation of his natural gifts, and a steady determination to succeed, he had, at the time I knew him, attained to his fifth. It need not be wondered at, then, that his countenance bore some traces of his habits. It was of a deep sunset-purple, which, becoming tropical, at the tip of the nose verged almost upon a plum-color; his mouth was large, thick-lipped, and good-humored; his voice rich, mellow, and racy, and contributed, with the aid of a certain dry, chuckling laugh, greatly to increase the effect of the stories which he was ever ready to recount; and as they most frequently bore in some degree against some of what he called his little failings, they were ever well received, no man being so popular with the world as he who flatters its vanity at his own expense. To do this the major was ever ready, but at no time more so than when the evening wore late, and the last bottle of his series seemed to imply that any caution regarding the nature of his communication was perfectly unnecessary. Indeed, from the commencement of his evening to the close, he seemed to pa.s.s through a number of mental changes, all in a manner preparing him for this final consummation, when he confessed anything and everything; and so well regulated had those stages become, that a friend dropping in upon him suddenly could at once p.r.o.nounce from the tone of his conversation on what precise bottle the major was then engaged.

Thus, in the outset he was gastronomic,--discussed the dinner from the soup to the Stilton; criticised the cutlets; p.r.o.nounced upon the merits of the mutton; and threw out certain vague hints that he would one day astonish the world by a little volume upon cookery.

With bottle No. 2 he took leave of the _cuisine_, and opened his battery upon the wine. Bordeaux, Burgundy, hock, and hermitage, all pa.s.sed in review before him,--their flavor discussed, their treatment descanted upon, their virtues extolled; from humble port to imperial tokay, he was thoroughly conversant with all, and not a vintage escaped as to when the sun had suffered eclipse, or when a comet had wagged his tail over it.

With No. 3 he became pipeclay,--talked army list and eighteen manoeuvres, lamented the various changes in equipments which modern innovation had introduced, and feared the loss of pigtails might sap the military spirit of the nation.

With No. 4 his anecdotic powers came into play,--he recounted various incidents of the war with his own individual adventures and experience, told with an honest _navete_, that proved personal vanity; indeed, self-respect never marred the interest of the narrative, besides, as he had ever regarded a campaign something in the light of a foray, and esteemed war as little else than a pillage excursion, his sentiments were singularly amusing.

With his last bottle, those feelings that seemed inevitably connected with whatever is last appeared to steal over him,--a tinge of sadness for pleasures fast pa.s.sing and nearly pa.s.sed, a kind of retrospective glance at the fallacy of all our earthly enjoyments, insensibly suggesting moral and edifying reflections, led him by degrees to confess that he was not quite satisfied with himself, though "not very bad for a commissary;" and finally, as the decanter waxed low, he would interlard his meditations by pa.s.sages of Scripture, singularly perverted by his misconception from their true meaning, and alternately throwing out prospects of censure or approval. Such was Major Monsoon; and to conclude in his own words this brief sketch, he "would have been an excellent officer if Providence had not made him such a confounded, drunken, old scoundrel."

"Now, then, for the King of Spain's story. Out with it, old boy; we are all good men and true here," cried Power, as we slowly came along upon the tide up the Tagus, "so you've nothing to fear."

"Upon my life," replied the major, "I don't half like the tone of our conversation. There is a certain freedom young men affect now a-days regarding morals that is not at all to my taste. When I was five or six and twenty--"

"You were the greatest scamp in the service," cried Power.

"Fie, fie, Fred. If I was a little wild or so,"--here the major's eyes twinkled maliciously,--"it was the ladies that spoiled me; I was always something of a favorite, just like our friend Sparks there. Not that we fared very much alike in our little adventures; for somehow, I believe I was generally in fault in most of mine, as many a good man and many an excellent man has been before." Here his voice dropped into a moralizing key, as he added, "David, you know, didn't behave well to old Uriah. Upon my life he did not, and he was a very respectable man."

"The King of Spain's sherry! the sherry!" cried I, fearing that the major's digression might lose us a good story.

"You shall not have a drop of it," replied the major.

"But the story, Major, the story!"

"Nor the story, either."

"What," said Power, "will you break faith with us?"

"There's none to be kept with reprobates like you. Fill my gla.s.s."

"Hold there! stop!" cried Power. "Not a spoonful till he redeems his pledge."

"Well, then, if you must have a story,--for most a.s.suredly I must drink,--I have no objection to give you a leaf from my early reminiscences; and in compliment to Sparks there, my tale shall be of love."

"I dinna like to lose the king's story. I hae my thoughts it was na a bad ane."

"Nor I neither, Doctor; but--"

"Come, come, you shall have that too, the first night we meet in a bivouac, and as I fear the time may not be very far distant, don't be impatient; besides a love-story--"

"Quite true," said Power, "a love-story claims precedence; _place aux dames_. There's a b.u.mper for you, old wickedness; so go along."

The major cleared off his gla.s.s, refilled it, sipped twice, and ogled it as though he would have no peculiar objection to sip once more, took a long pinch of snuff from a box nearly as long as, and something the shape of a child's coffin, looked around to see that we were all attention, and thus began:--

"When I have been in a moralizing mood, as I very frequently am about this hour in the morning, I have often felt surprised by what little, trivial, and insignificant circ.u.mstances our lot in life seems to be cast; I mean especially as regards the fair s.e.x. You are prospering, as it were, to-day; to-morrow a new cut of your whiskers, a novel tie of your cravat, mars your destiny and spoils your future, _varium et mutabile_, as Horace has it.

On the other hand, some equally slight circ.u.mstance will do what all your ingenuity may have failed to effect. I knew a fellow who married the greatest fortune in Bath, from the mere habit he had of squeezing one's hand. The lady in question thought it particular, looked conscious, and all that; he followed up the blow; and, in a word, they were married in a week.

So a friend of mine, who could not help winking his left eye, once opened a flirtation with a lively widow which cost him a special license and a settlement. In fact you are never safe. They are like the guerillas, and they pick you off when you least expect it, and when you think there is nothing to fear. Therefore, as young fellows beginning life, I would caution you. On this head you can never be too circ.u.mspect. Do you know, I was once nearly caught by so slight a habit as sitting thus, with my legs across."

Here the major rested his right foot on his left knee, in ill.u.s.tration, and continued:--

"We were quartered in Jamaica. I had not long joined, and was about as raw a young gentleman as you could see; the only very clear ideas in my head being that we were monstrous fine fellows in the 50th, and that the planters' daughters were deplorably in love with us. Not that I was much wrong on either side. For brandy-and-water, sangaree, Manilla cigars, and the ladies of color, I'd have backed the corps against the service.

Proof was, of eighteen only two ever left the island; for what with the seductions of the coffee plantations, the sugar canes, the new rum, the brown skins, the rainy season, and the yellow fever, most of us settled there."

"It's very hard to leave the West Indies if once you've been quartered there."

"So I have heard," said Power.

"In time, if you don't knock under to the climate, you become soon totally unfit for living anywhere else. Preserved ginger, yams, flannel jackets, and grog won't bear exportation; and the free-and-easy chuck under the chin, cheris.h.i.+ng, waist-pressing kind of way we get with the ladies would be quite misunderstood in less favored regions, and lead to very unpleasant consequences."

"It is a curious fact how much climate has to do with love-making. In our cold country the progress is lamentably slow. Fogs, east winds, sleet, storms, and cutting March weather nip many a budding flirtation; whereas warm, sunny days and bright moonlight nights, with genial air and balmy zephyrs, open the heart like the cup of a camelia, and let us drink in the soft dew of--"

"Devilish poetical, that," said Power, evolving a long blue line of smoke from the corner of his mouth.

"Isn't it, though?" said the major, smiling graciously. "'Pon my life, I thought so myself. Where was I?"

"Out of my lat.i.tude altogether," said the poor skipper, who often found it hard to follow the thread of a story.

"Yes, I remember. I was remarking that sangaree and calipash, mangoes and guava jelly, dispose the heart to love, and so they do. I was not more than six weeks in Jamaica when I felt it myself. Now, it was a very dangerous symptom, if you had it strong in you, for this reason. Our colonel, the most cross-grained old crabstick that ever breathed, happened himself to be taken in when young, and resolving, like the fox who lost his tail and said it was not the fas.h.i.+on to wear one, to pretend he did the thing for fun, determined to make every fellow marry upon the slightest provocation.

Begad, you might as well enter a powder magazine with a branch of candles in your hand, as go into society in the island with a leaning towards the fair s.e.x. Very hard this was for me particularly; for like poor Sparks there, my weakness was ever for the petticoats. I had, besides, no petty, contemptible prejudices as to nation, habits, language, color, or complexion; black, brown, or fair, from the Muscovite to the Malabar, from the voluptuous _embonpoint_ of the adjutant's widow,--don't be angry old boy,--to the fairy form of Isabella herself, I loved them all round. But were I to give a preference anywhere I should certainly do so to the West Indians, if it were only for the sake of the planters' daughters. I say it fearlessly, these colonies are the brightest jewels in the crown. Let's drink their health, for I'm as husky as a lime-kiln."

This ceremony being performed with suitable enthusiasm, the major cried out, "Another cheer for Polly Hackett, the sweetest girl in Jamaica. By Jove, Power, if you only saw her as I did five and forty years ago, with eyes black as jet, twinkling, ogling, leering, teasing, and imploring, all at once, do you mind, and a mouthful of downright pearls pouting and smiling at you, why, man, you'd have proposed for her in the first half-hour, and shot yourself the next, when she refused you. She was, indeed, a perfect little beauty, _rayther_ dark, to be sure,--a little upon the rosewood tinge, but beautifully polished, and a very nice piece of furniture for a cottage _orne_, as the French call it. Alas, alas, how these vanities do catch hold of us! My recollections have made me quite feverish and thirsty. Is there any cold punch in the bowl? Thank you, O'Malley, that will do,--merely to touch my lips. Well, well, it's all past and gone now; but I was very fond of Tolly Hackett, and she was of me.

We used to take our little evening walks together through the coffee plantation: very romantic little strolls they were, she in white muslin with a blue sash and blue shoes; I in a flannel jacket and trousers, straw hat and cravat, a Virginia cigar as long as a walking-stick in my mouth, puffing and courting between times; then we'd take a turn to the refining-house, look in at the big boilers, quiz the n.i.g.g.e.rs, and come back to Tw.a.n.gberry Moss to supper, where old Hackett, the father, sported a glorious table at eleven o'clock. Great feeding it was; you were always sure of a preserved monkey, a baked land-crab, or some such delicacy. And such Madeira; it makes me dry to think of it.

"Talk of West India slavery, indeed. It's the only land of liberty.

There is nothing to compare with the perfect free-and-easy, devil-may-care-kind-of-a-take-yourself way that every one has there. If it would be any peculiar comfort for you to sit in the saddle of mutton, and put your legs in a soup tureen at dinner, there would be found very few to object to it. There is no nonsense of any kind about etiquette. You eat, drink, and are merry, or, if you prefer, are sad; just as you please. You may wear uniform, or you may not, it's your own affair; and consequently, it may be imagined how insensibly such privileges gain upon one, and how very reluctant we become ever to resign or abandon them.

"I was the man to appreciate it all. The whole course of proceeding seemed to have been invented for my peculiar convenience, and not a man in the island enjoyed a more luxurious existence than myself, not knowing all the while how dearly I was destined to pay for my little comforts. Among my plenary after-dinner indulgences I had contracted an inveterate habit of sitting cross-legged, as I showed you. Now, this was become a perfect necessity of existence to me. I could have dispensed with cheese, with my gla.s.s of port, my pickled mango, my olive, my anchovy toast, my nutsh.e.l.l of curacoa, but not my favorite lounge. You may smile; but I've read of a man who could never dance except in a room with an old hair-brush. Now, I'm certain my stomach would not digest if my legs were perpendicular. I don't mean to defend the thing. The att.i.tude was not graceful, it was not imposing; but it suited me somehow, and I liked it.

"From what I have already mentioned, you may suppose that West India habits exercised but little control over my favorite practice, which I indulged in every evening of my life. Well, one day old Hackett gave us a great blow-out,--a dinner of two-and-twenty souls; six days' notice; turtle from St. Lucie, guinea-fowl, claret of the year forty, Madeira _a discretion_, and all that. Very well done the whole thing; nothing wrong, nothing wanting. As for me, I was in great feather. I took Polly in to dinner, greatly to the discomfiture of old Belson, our major, who was making up in that quarter; for you must know, she was an only daughter, and had a very nice thing of it in mola.s.ses and n.i.g.g.e.rs. The papa preferred the major, but Polly looked sweetly upon me. Well, down we went, and really a most excellent feed we had. Now, I must mention here that Polly had a favorite Blenheim spaniel the old fellow detested; it was always tripping him up and snarling at him,--for it was, except to herself, a beast of rather vicious inclinations. With a true Jamaica taste, it was her pleasure to bring the animal always into the dinner-room, where, if papa discovered him, there was sure to be a row. Servants sent in one direction to hunt him out, others endeavoring to hide him, and so on; in fact, a tremendous hubbub always followed his introduction and accompanied his exit, upon which occasions I invariably exercised my gallantry by protecting the beast, although I hated him like the devil all the time.

"To return to our dinner. After two mortal hours of hard eating, the pace began to slacken, and as evening closed in, a sense of peaceful repose seemed to descend upon our labors. Pastels shed an aromatic vapor through the room. The well-iced decanters went with measured pace along; conversation, subdued to the meridian of after-dinner comfort, just murmured; the open _jalousies_ displayed upon the broad veranda the orange-tree in full blossom, slightly stirring with the cool sea-breeze."

"And the piece of white muslin beside you, what of her?"