Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: September 29, 2025
The man could not explain how, like a homing pigeon, he had found his way to his own old mess again. Of what he had suffered or seen he knew nothing. He cringed before Dirkovitch as instinctively as he had pressed the spring of the candlestick, sought the picture of the drum-horse, and answered to the Queen's toast. The rest was a blank that the dreaded Russian tongue could only in part remove.
The next day was a Thursday, and the men, hearing that Yale was going to shoot the Drum-Horse in the evening, determined to give the beast a regular regimental funeral a finer one than they would have given the Colonel had he died just then.
This appeared to soothe the Colonel, for he wanted the Drum-Horse disposed of. He felt that he had made a mistake, and could not of course acknowledge it. Meantime, the presence of the Drum-Horse was an annoyance to him. Yale took to himself a glass of the old brandy, three cheroots, and his friend, Martyn; and they all left the Mess together.
When the corpse was dumped into the grave and the men began throwing down armfuls of roses to cover it, the Farrier-Sergeant ripped out an oath and said aloud, "Why, it ain't the Drum-Horse any more than it's me!" The Troop Sergeant-Majors asked him whether he had left his head in the Canteen.
The horses that had barely put their muzzles into the trough's reared and capered; but, as soon as the Band broke, which it did when the ghost of the Drum-Horse was about a furlong distant, all hooves followed suit, and the clatter of the stampede quite different from the orderly throb and roar of a movement on parade, or the rough horse-play of watering in camp made them only more terrified.
But one of the Subalterns Hogan-Yale, an Irishman bought the Drum-Horse for Rs. 160 at the sale; and the Colonel was wroth. Yale professed repentance he was unnaturally submissive and said that, as he had only made the purchase to save the horse from possible ill-treatment and starvation, he would now shoot him and end the business.
It was worse than exposing the inner life of the Regiment to the whole world, or selling the Mess Plate to a Jew a black Jew. The Colonel was a mean man and a bully. He knew what the Regiment thought about his action; and, when the troopers offered to buy the Drum-Horse, he said that their offer was mutinous and forbidden by the Regulations.
This appeared to soothe the Colonel, for he wanted the Drum-Horse disposed of. He felt that he had made a mistake, and could not of course acknowledge it. Meantime, the presence of the Drum-Horse was an annoyance to him. Yale took to himself a glass of the old brandy, three cheroots, and his friend Martyn; and they all left the Mess together.
The Band, a disorganized mob, tore past, and at its heels labored the Drum-Horse the dead and buried Drum-Horse with the jolting, clattering skeleton, Hogan-Yale whispered softly to Martyn "No wire will stand that treatment," and the Band, which had doubled like a hare, came back again.
When the corpse was dumped into the grave and the men began throwing down armfuls of roses to cover it, the Farrier-Sergeant ripped out an oath and said aloud: "Why, it ain't the Drum-Horse any more than it's me!" The Troop-Sergeant-Majors asked him whether he had left his head in the Canteen.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking