The roll of the drum

Front matter

THE ROLL

BY R.MOUNTENEY-JEPHSON

Routledge's Railway Library Advertiser.

Preface

These stories are essentially military. Nearly all the characters " follow the drum," and the scenes are invariably laid within sound of the drum-roll. Under the appropriate and significant title, therefore, of " The Roll OF the Drum," they appear in a collected form. As little Charlie Dare, in the first story, heard the roll of the drum in the shell, so probably will the imaginative reader hear it in nearly every page of the book. I hope that the continued roll will not become monotonous to him; that, on the contrary, he will find it, in the words of Othello, " spirit stirring."

R. MOUNTENEY JEPHSON.

London, 1879.

Contents

PAGB

THE ROLL OF THE DRUM ... . . . i

• •

THE

ROLL OF THE DRUM

Chapter I

It is many years since Sir George Dare, a Peninsular and Waterloo veteran, retired from the service. It nearly broke his heart to sever all ties with the profession which had been his glory from boyhood. There was no actual reason for his retirement except the dictates of one of the most sensitively honourable minds ever possessed by man. A true and noble patriotism guided him to take a step which was one of the most trying in his life. "The old ones should not block up the channels of promotion," he had said; " let us make way for the younger men to come on." So Sir George Dare, with an aching heart, " sent in his papers," and though still a soldier in spirit, ceased to be one in the flesh.

Making the sacrifice doubly hard to bear, he lost soon after leaving the service the wife who had been his loving, trusted, and trusting companion from early manhood — for Sir George had married young. His only son, a youngster of about twenty, and of course a soldier (the Dares were a race of soldiers), was away in India with his regiment, and the old soldier, lonely and sick at heart, lived in club chambers in London. He had inherited an old baronetcy from his father many years before, and with the title had succeeded to a substantial fortune. The two advantages

2 The Roll of the Drtcm.

of wealth and position, combined with a simple and trusting nature, speedily made him a mark for unprincipled speculation.

In law there is a maxim that every man is innocent until he i r proved guilty. In speculation the converse that every man is dishonest until you have proved him the reverse, seems to be the safer if less exalted principle to go upon. This it was not in Sir George's nature to do. He thought every man, until he had found him out to be a rogue, as guileless as himself. The result is easily foreseen. He was duped. He became a director of a bogus company — that is, a company existing on a false foundation, and before long Sir George Dare, the very soul of honour, the knight, sans pair et sans reproche, the gallant guileless old soldier, stood in the dock, together with the other directors, on a charge of fraud. He was acquitted of all guilt by the jury, who, not content with their bare verdict, handed into the court a written paper, signed by all of them, testifying to their sense of Sir George's untarnished honour, and the presiding judge in passing sentence on the other directors, took the opportunity of rendering, amidst applause which on this occasion was not suppressed, the highest tribute to Sir George's worth.

" Sir George Dare," said his Lordship, in loud and impressive tones, "you leave this court without the slightest stain on your character, which, whether on the glorious battle-field or in the quieter scenes of peaceful life has ever been a model on which I would to God the characters of all men were moulded. Were all men as you are, Sir George Dare, my occupation, like Othello's, would be gone."

The conclusion of this speech was drowned in a roar of applause, which that dingy stifling court had never heard before. The old service-worn warrior caught in the meshes of villany like u lion in the toils, had enlisted the sympathies of all from the very commencement of the proceedings. Even the old usher, who tvas the very pink of propriety, and had hitherto looked upon a cheer in court as an enormity of the deepest dye, now found himself shouting out at the top of his voice, " Hear, hear ! brayvo ! " at the same time emphasizing his remarks with a roll of parchment on the bald head of a gentleman who was utterly unconscious of the breach of etiquette, being too absorbed at the moment in applauding with the ferrule of his umbrella on the corns of an adjacent old gentlemen, who of all in that crowded court was perhaps the only one who failed to detect the beauty and force of the learned judge's remarks.

But judge and jury and public applause could not in Sir George Dare's own estimation entirely wipe away the stains. His reputation he considered no longer spotless. It had been dragged through the mire, and there is an old saying as true as it is homely, that you cannot touch dirt and not be defiled. The iron entered deep into the soul. As Shakespeare says —

" The purest treasure mortal times afford, Is spotless reputation ; that away Men are but gilded loam or painted clay."

Sir George felt as if he had lost this " purest treasure." Many a time in the Peninsula, at Waterloo, and in India, had he bled for his country, but no wound ever smarted like this one. It was " past all surgery," as Cassio, when he lost his reputation, said to that villain Iago. Like that same young soldier Cassio, our old soldier cried out in the bitterness of a wounded spirit — -

" Reputation, reputation, reputation. Oh, I have lost my reputation ! I have lost the immortal part of myself."

Sir George Dare, however, was hard upon himself — the only living creature on this earth he could have been hard upon. No one could say a word against him. He made the noblest reparation for what on his own part had merely been a too-trusting confidence in his fellow-creatures. He devoted nearly the whole of his fortune to repaying those who had lost money in the miserable swindle to which he in his guileless innocence had lent his good name. Before he had washed his hands of the

b 2 pollution, his fortune had dwindled down into dimensions very minute compared with its former bulk.

At the very first approach of the trouble Sir George Dare had sent for his son to come to him.

" My boy, I have robbed you of your inheritance. Your old father stands before you a culprit," were almost the first words Sir George spoke to his son when they met.

Englishmen, even the most closely related to each other, are not much given to embracing, and no better specimen of a young Englishman could be found than young George Dare. Nevertheless he threw his arms round his white-headed care-worn old father's neck, and in a voice choked with emotion, said : —

" Father, dear old father, you have handed down your sword to me, and if I inherit enough of your brave spirit to wield it as gallantly as you have done, that will be enough inheritance for me."

Chapter II

Younc. Dare soon returned to rejoin his regiment in India, accompanied by a young bride, and Sir George was left in solitude. The old soldier leading a bachelor life in London chambers, felt rather like a fish out of water, which, to say the least of it, is a very unpleasant condition of existence. One day, as he was standing in the street, watching with glistening eyes a battalion o ( the Guards marching past — his heart always yearned to the red coats — he felt a hearty slap on the shoulder, a roar in his ears anr then a jolly rubicund old face confronted his astonished one.

" What, George Dare ! " roared the voice.

" What, Jack Paynter ! old Jack Paynter ! " ejaculated Sir George, in delighted tones.

The two friends had not met for years, and they wrung each other's hands until the passers-by stared. Jack Paynter was a retired post-captain of the Royal Navy, and his intimacy with nis military friend had commenced in the first Burmese war, in which a naval force co-operated with the troops in that deadly and savage campaign. At that time Sir George was a senior captain of one of the regiments constituting the land force, and Jack Paynter was first lieutenant of a frigate. No two men could have been more unlike than George Dare and Jack Paynter. The one was courteous and gentle to an extreme ; the other blunt and rough to a fault. George Dare, however, soon recognized that under that rough and unpolished exterior were many qualities of sterling gold; and Jack Paynter had many opportunities of observing that, with all his gentleness and courteous demeanour, George Dare possessed a lion's heart. They took to each other, and their acquaintance ripened into deep friendship. The two were striking illustrations of how extremes meet. As they now stood face to face on the London pavement, which, by the way, was not exactly Jack Paynter's native heath, the two hearts warmed to each other.

" Come down with me, George, to Devonshire, and share a little crib I have there, perched upon a hill on the north-west coast," said Captain Paynter, after a few notes of each other's doings had been rapidly compared. " Come, George, and drive a little of the London tog and villany out of your system with a few fresh breezes from over the sea, the sea, the open sea."

" How long before you return, Jack ? "

" Let's see," said the old sailor, as he hauled at a cable-like chain until an enormous chronometer burst into sight with quite a pop. " It would bother the London pickpockets to take that prize," he chuckled. " Now let's see ; it's just three o'clock ; I leave London in a hour and a half. I only arrived in the middle of the day, but I couldn't sleep a night here. I should be suffocated."

" An hour and a half, eh ? Well, I'll accompany you, Jack.

Come with me to my rooms, and I'll just get a few traps together, and then I shall be at your service. Alan wants but little here below, and light marching order is my normal condition."

" Bravo, George ! Bravo ! " roared Jack Paynter, with a hearty bellow, that brought a policeman running round the corner under the impression that some one had been assaulted, and was crying out for assistance. " Well done ! that's worthy of a sailor. I couldn't have believed that an old button and pipeclay fellow could have slipped his cable and got under way like that."

Sir George Dare was as good as his word ! Within twelve hours he was under the hospitable roof of Jack Paynter's snug little cottage, and so much did he like the primitive peaceful spot, and the companionship of his old friend, that what was to have been merely a visit ended in a permanent residence.

Peacefully the years sped over the two old veteran heads. The greatest, and, with one or two exceptions, the pleasantest events in Sir George's life, were the arrivals of the Indian mail. Each one brought a letter from his son in India. One contained the joyful announcement that a little grandson was born to Sir George ; and after a few years another letter, couched in heartrending terms, told him that his son was a widower. The regiment was on the point of proceeding to the Punjaub on active service, and the motherless little boy was sent home to his grandfather.

Of course little Charlie (that was the boy's name) became the old man's darling, and in Jack Paynter's large heart there also sprang up a deep affection for the child.

" He must be a sailor," said old Jack Paynter, when Charlie was little more than a baby. " He's cut out for it. He's too good for anything else. I already detect many sterling seamanlike qualities in him. He shall be a sailor."

With this object in view the old salt used to spin the child long yarns about the wonders of the sea.

One evening just after the candles had been lit in the snug little apartment the two old men were sitting close to the fire, with

The Roll of the Drum. y

little Charlie, aged six, between them on a small chair which they had made for him with their own hands.

" Well, Charlie, what do you see in the fire, my boy ? " asked old Jack Paynter, as he noticed the child's gaze steadily fixed on the glowing coals.

"I see little soldiers running about, Uncle Jack," replied the child, who had been taught to call his old friend " Uncle." " There, there's a piece of coal just like a soldier."

" Pooh, not a bit like a soldier," said old Jack Paynter, while Sir George sat watching the two with a quiet smile on his face. " It's exactly like a ship, a ship in full sail."

" No, it's not a bit like a ship," said the child stoutly. " It's just like Oh, there, its gone and tumbled in two."

" Well, and what's it like now, Charlie ? "

" It's — it's like two soldiers now."

Old Jack Paynter tried another tack. From the mantel-piece he took down a large shell which he had picked up on the Coromandel coast.

" There, Charlie, my boy, hold that up to your ear, and you'll hear some pretty music."

The child did as he was bid, and there was a dead silence while the two old men sat intently watching him squatted on his little chair with the shell up to his ear.

"Well, Charlie," said Jack Paynter, whose impatient nature could brook no further delay. " don't you hear the sea whispering to you ? "

" No," replied the child dreamily, and still holding the shell to his ear.

" Don't you hear the murmur of the sea, my boy ? " said the old sailor.

" No, I don't hear that, Uncle Jack."

" Well, what do you hear, Charlie ? " asked Sir George, for it was plain the little listener heard something.

" I hear, grandfather," said the child still listening, and with

8 7 he Roll of the Drum.

the blood mantling his cheeks as he spoke, " I hear the -oiling of drums. Yes, it's so pretty. I hear the roll of the drum."

Sir George snatched the child off his little perch and hugged him, while old Jack Paynter seized the poker and made a furious onslaught on the fire, as being the primary cause of the mischief.

As years went on the two old men vied with each other in bringing up Charlie in the way each thought he should go. Sir George Dare's first consideration was, of course, the spiritual welfare of his charge. One example is worth a thousand sermons, it is said, and Sir George Dare's gentle life was an example constantly before the boy. He spared the rod, bul he did not spoil the child ; he never raised a hand to Charlie, but kept him with a gentle and loving influence in the right path. Sir George was no gloomy ascetic in religious matters, and, while he paid every attention to the after life, he also took especial care to bring the boy up to be an English gentleman. As Charlie Dare grew up, he became a proficient in every manly sport. His grandfather taught him to ride and shoot, while old Jack Paynter was his tutor in swimming and fishing. It would have been a treat to anyone with a spark of manliness in him to see the old soldier showing the lad how to take his fences on horseback. When Charlie was about fourteen, Sir George Dare was sixty-five years of age, but he sat as erect in his saddle as a smart young dragoon fresh from the riding school, and over his fences he looked part and parcel of the horse he bestrode. He had not lost that firm but easy seat which, when he was little more than a mere child, in the Peninsula, had elicited the admiration of the Duke of Wellington, himself a perfect horseman, and so great an advocate for hunting in the British army that during the Peninsular War he kept a pack of foxhounds at his own expense.

" Who's that youngster ? " asked the Iron Duke one day, when out with his own pack, as he pointed to George Dare, mounted

The Roll of the Drum. g

on an Andalusian horse, and sailing away over a stiff country in true Leicestershire style.

"Young Dare, of the 95th Rifles, my lord."

" Let him be attached to my staff," was the mandate.

Young Dare was not the first instance of an officer getting on the Duke's staff by sheer hard riding.

Jack Paynter rather looked down upon the art of riding as being an accomplishment peculiarly within the province of land-lubbers ; but to admit, for one moment, that any one of this large and degraded class of beings could do what he could not was not to be thought of.

" Now, Charlie, my boy, I'll show you," said Jack Paynter on£ day, as his old friend took his horse over a flight of hurdles for his pupil's especial behoof. " Come down, George, and let me go aloft."

" No, no, Jack," said Sir George, with a quiet smile ; " you had better not."

" Better not ! what do you mean ? " said Jack Paynter, warmly. "Do you think, George, that I can't do what nearly every English gentleman who stays at home at ease can do ? By the living jingo, I thought you knew Jack Paynter better than that."

George Dare knew enough of his old friend to know that the best way of convincing him was to let him run his own course and convince himself.

In a few moments the wilful old sailor had clambered into the saddle and seized the reins as if they had been tiller ropes, while Charlie Dare stood by with a merry smile.

" What fun ! " said Charlie, gleefully rubbing his hands.

" Steady, Jack, steady ! Woa, mare, woa ! " said Sir George, as a difference of opinion between horse and rider threatened dissolution of partnership at every moment. The more Captain Paynter hauled at the mare's mouth and rolled about in the saddle, the more she testified her disapproval by twisting and jumping about. At last, as if remarking to herself, " Oh, you know, horseflesh and blood can stand this no longer," she gave io The Roll of the Drum.

a buck which transferred Captain Paynter's plump body from her back to her head.

" Steady, Jack, don't tumble overboard," said Sir George, rushing to the assistance of his friend in difficulties.

" Sheer off, George," gasped out Captain Jack Paynter, purple in the face with the exertion of hanging on. " How do you know I'm not doing this on purpose ? "

Now sitting on a horse's head is a capital thing when he is down, and struggling to free himself from a weight of harness, but to do so when he is on his legs is, to say the least of it, premature. The mare herself evidently thought that the improper proceeding had better be nipped in the bud at once. Eighteen stone on her back was bad enough, but eighteen stone on her head was simply unbearable, and so, quietly dropping her neck, she deposited Captain Paynter on Mother Earth. He was not in the least hurt, and Sir George and Charlie, feeble with suppressed laughter, assisted the fallen hero to rise.

" Pshaw ! " spluttered Captain Jack Paynter, " I never did think much of riding. It's only fit for a land-lubber, after all."

All Captain Paynter's efforts at improving Charlie were not such failures as this had been. Besides swimming and fishing, as already mentioned, he taught the boy to box the compass, to " shoot the sun," that is to take an observation correctly, how to splice and tie knots of every description, how to row, and how to handle a sailing-boat, and when Charlie showed what an apt scholar he was in all these matters, the old sailor would remark with a groan to his friend,

" You surely don't mean to say, George, that you're going to make a soldier of that boy ? "

" Yes, I am, Jack ; or rather his father is. It's his wish. The Dares have all been soldiers from father to son."

" Pshaw ! you're throwing him away — throwing him away, I tell you," Captain Paynter would roar out in high dudgeon.

As his admiration of Charlie's nautical talents increased, the efforts of the old sailor to turn the professional line of the Dares from a military into a naval direction were often repeated ; but when Charlie became too old for a naval cadetship, and the golden opportunity was gone for ever, he grew more resigned, though he would often sigh over the loss of a second Nelson which the country had sustained.

Chapter III

One of the greatest amusements of Charlie Dare's boyhood was a flagstaff of which Captain Jack Paynter was proprietor. In connection with this wonderful flagstaff Charlie was, much to his delight, constituted a sort of signal midshipman and signalman combined. It was hardly less a delight to Captain Paynter himself. It was the toy of his old age. He would have been much insulted at its being called a toy ; and to do it justice, it was not altogether without some use. Captain Jack Paynter was always sweeping the horizon with a telescope, and tapping barometers, and generally keeping his weather eye as wide open as if he were commanding a brig in the hurricane latitudes. Consequently, he was more weatherwise than anyone in Clumberstone, and he made a beneficial use of his knowledge. He drew up a code of storm signals which he distributed amongst the fishermen, and any atmospheric commotion was predicted from the flagstaff long before the less gifted mortals in the village had detected any signs of the same. The most opinionated old fisherman in Clumberstone was not above casting his eye up at " Old Bloomin' PolitefulV flagstaff, and taking its warnings. "Old Bloomin' Politeful" was a nickname which the sailors who sailed under him had conferred upon Captain Paynter many years before, on the lucus a non lucendo principle, and it had stuck to him evei since. Nearly everyone who sailed the seas in the British navy thirty or forty years ago knew who " Old Bloomin' Politeful " was ; and when Captain Paynter settled down in the quiet little village on the Devonshire coast, the name somehow followed him there. It must be explained that this pet sobriquet was only used behind Captain Paynter's back. To his face, he was treated as a sort of Great Mogul.

The little village of Clumberstone looked up to Captain Paynter's flagstaff in every sense of the phrase. It was quite an institution in Clumberstone. In addition to the practical purposes it served, as above explained, it kept alive in the untutored minds of the village folk the memory of many a glorious deed of England's sons. When the morning sun would shine on the flagstaff gay with bunting, some fisherman would remark, " Halloo ! Old Bloomin' Politeful's at it again. Now what battle is this here day the hanniversary of, I wonder ? " Then would follow a long discussion, and conjecture would be rife in the village, until the knotty point was settled, whether the subject of commemoration was the Battle of the Nile, or Trafalgar, or Waterloo, or Salamanca, or the storming of Seringapatam.

Captain Jack Paynter did not think much of fights on land compared with those which had taken place on the sea. I am not sure whether he did not look upon Waterloo as rather a minor affair when compared with some cutting-out expedition, with a couple of pinnaces and a launch, under a lieutenant. Out of compliment, however, to his old friend and crony, all the actions in which Sir George Dare had taken part received as much honour and glory in the way of flags as Trafalgar itself, which, in Captain Paynter's opinion, was, of course, the greatest earthly event that had ever happened.

At a very early age Sir George Dare commenced Charlie's military education, and by the time the boy was twelve years of age he knew all about Vauban's " First System of Fortification," and could go through the Manual and Platoon and the Bayonet

Exercise with all the dexterity and precision of an old soldier. He also learned to play on a bugle all the different military calls. This was an accomplishment in which he took especial delight and the hills about Clumberstone often resounded to the blast of the "Assemble" or the "Retire," or some other call.

Of course, many a yarn, naval and military, did Charlie listen to with open eyes and ears.

" Of most disastrous chances, Of moving accidents by flood and field, Of hair-breadth 'scapes i' the imminent deadly breach,"

the two old men gave him his fill. He was never tired of hearing from his grandfather's lips the story of that protracted and gallant struggle in the Peninsula, and the colour would mount into his cheeks and his eyes would flash as he listened to the recital of some deed of daring, and he would long for the time to come when he too should be able to seek the bubble reputation at the cannon's mouth.

"No, no, Charlie," the old man would say, as he noted the boy's look, " don't long for war, my dear boy. When it comes, do your duty, and always bear in mind that ' the paths of glory lead but to the grave.' "

Sometimes Sir George's stories would be laid in more peaceful scenes, and he would talk of the time when the joint armies occupied France, and our soldiers lived peaceably and happily for more than two years in the cottages of the French peasantry. Then the scene would change again to India, to the storming of fortified pagodas and Burmese stockades; to Afghan and the Cabul pass, to tiger- shooting and pig-sticking. No wonder Charlie Dare was a soldier at heart while he was yet a child, and thus did his longing for a soldier's life grow with his growth and increase with his strength.

14 The Roll of the Dncm.

Chapter IV

" Run 'em up, my boy, run 'em up ! That's it. Now let 'em float out to the breeze. Now belay ! That's it. Now then, take your time from me. Hip, hip, hip, hooray ! One more, Hooray ! Though they were lobsters, by the living jingo, they did their work well ! Hang it, if they had been bluejackets they couldn't have done better. Give 'em another. Now then, my lads, we'll serve out grog all round and drink to their jolly good healths."

The speaker was Captain Paynter, or, rather I should say, the roarer, for the above was roared out at the top of his voice, " Old Bloomin' Politeful" was at it again with his flagstaff. Around him on this occasion were Sir George Dare, Charlie — now a handsome manly-looking boy between fifteen and sixteen years of age — and a group of fishermen.

" What was the name of the river again, George ? " asked old Jack Paynter as he mopped up the perspiration engendered by excitement and five minutes' frantic cheering.

"The Alma, Jack, the Alma," replied Sir George, with a strange mixture of enthusiasm and sadness on his furrowed face:

" Ay, the Alma. And they crossed the river, eh, under a galling fire did you say, George?"

" Yes, Jack, thank God they fought nobly for old England." " And they stormed the heights above and thrashed the Russians, eh ? Do you hear that, my lads ? " said Captain Jack Paynter, turning to the group of fishermen who having cheered themselves hoarse were anxiously awaiting the next act in the performance, that of drinking their gallant countrymen's healths.

Jack Paynter did not keep them long in suspense. Rum-and-water was served out all round to them, and then after a hurried and subdued consultation amongst themselves, one of their number, who evidently was very averse to having the greatness thrust upon him, was shoved to the front.

"Cap'en Paynter, sir, and Sir George," said the rough old fisherman. " I ain't got the gift o' the gab pertickerlerly strong. When the gab was bein' served out, I suppose the lawyers and the parsons was in front, and got a double allowance, and the fishermen and sailors, and such like was a long way behind and com'd badly off. But what me and my mates was sayin' amongst ourselves is this here. We thought that while we was drinkin' the health of them brave chaps as didn't mind goin' through danger and death for the old country, we should drink the health too of Major George Dare, your son, Sir George, what's been in the thick of it, and behaved hisself, I'll be bound, as a son of his father, and as the father of young Master Charlie there would behave hisself. I ain't quite got the name of the place where all this fightin's been goin' on "