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Bobby received his orders on returning from a dance at Viceregal
Lodge where he had-but only
the Haverley girl knows what Bobby had said or how many waltzes
he had claimed for the next
ball. Six in the morning saw Bobby at the Tonga Office in the
drenchmg rain, the whirl of the
last waltz still in his ears, and an intoxication due neither to wine
nor waltzing in his brain.

"Good man!" shouted Deighton of the Horse Battery, through the
mists. "Whar you raise dat
tonga? I'm coming with you. Ow! But I've had a head and a half.
I didn't sit out all night. They
say the Battery's awful bad," and he hummed dolorously-

ONLY A SUBALTERN
23~

'~eave the what at the what's-its-name, Leave the flock without
shelter, Leave the corpse
uninterred, Leave the bride at the altar!


"My faith! It'll be more bally corpse than bride, though, this
journey. Jump in, Bobby. Get on,
Coachwanl"

On the Umballa platform waited a detachment of officers
discussing the latest news from the
stricken cantonment, and it was here that Bobby learned the real
condition of the Tail 'œwisters.

"They went into camp," said an elderly Major recalled from the
whist-tables at Mussoorie to a
sickly Native Regiment, "they went into camp with two hundred
and ten sick in carts. Two
hundred and ten fever cases only, and the balance looking like so
many ghosts with sore eyes. A
Madras Regiment could have walked through 'em."

"But they were as fit as he-damned when I left them!" said Bobby.

"Then you'd better make them as fit as be-damned when you
rejoin," said the Major, brutally.

Bobby pressed his forehead against the rain-splashed windowpane
as the train lumbered across
the sodden Doab, and prayed for the health of the Tyneside Tail
Twisters. Naini Tal had sent
down her contingent with all speed; the lathering ponies of the
Dalhousie Road staggered into
Pathankot, taxed to the full stretch of their strength; while from
cloudy Darjiling the Calcutta
Mail whirled up the last straggler of the little army that was to
fight a fight, ip which was neither
medal nor honor for the winning, against an enemy none other
than "the sickness that destroyeth
in the noonday."

And as each man reported himself, he said: "This is a bad
business," and went about his own
forthwith, for every Regiment and Battery in the cantonment was
under canvas, the sickness
bearing them company.

Bobby fought his way through the rain to the Tail Twisters'
temporary mess, and Revere could
have fallen on the boy's neck for the joy of seeing that ugly,
wholesome phix once more.

"Keep 'em amused and interested," said Revere. "They went on the
drink, poor fools, after the
first two cases, and there was no improvement. Oh, it's good to
have you back, Bobby! Porkiss
is a-never mind."

Deighton came over from the Artillery camp to attend a dreary
mess dinner, and contributed to
the general gloom by nearly weeping over the condition of his
beloved Battery. Porkiss so far
forgot h!mself as to insinuate that the presence of the officers
could do no earthly good, and that
the best thing would be to send the entire Regiment into hospital
and "let the doctors look after
them." Porkiss was demoralized with fear, nor was his peace of
mind restored when Revere said
coldly:
"Oh! The sooner you go out the better, if that's your way of
thinking. Any public school could
send us fifty good men in your place, but it takes time, time,
Porkiss, and money, and a certain
amount of trouble, to make a Regiment. 'S'pose you're the person
we go into camp for, eh?"

Whereupon Porkiss was overtaken with a great and chilly fear
which a drenching in the rain did
not allay, and, two days later, quitted this world for another where,
men do fondly hope,

238
WORKS OF RUDYARD KIPLING

allowances are made for the weaknesses of the flesh. The
Regimental Sergeant-Major looked
wearily across the Sergeants' Mess tent when the news was
announced.

"There goes the worst of them," he said. "It'll take the best, and
then, please God, it'll stop." The
Sergeants were silent till one said: "It couldn't be him!" and all
knew of whom Travis was
thinking.

Bobby Wick stormed through the tents of his Company, rallying,
rebuking. mildly, as is
consistent with the Regulations, chaffing the faint-hearted:
haling the sound into the watery sunlight when there was a break
in the weather, and bidding
them be of good cheer for their trouble was nearly at an end;
scuttling on his dun pony round the
outskirts of the camp and heading back men who, with the innate
perversity of British soldier's,
were always wandering into infected villages, or drinking deeply
from rain-flooded marshes;
comforting the panic-stricken with rude speech, and more than
once tending the dying who had
no friends-the men without "townies"; organizing, with banjos and
burned cork, Sing-songs
which should allow the talent of the Regiment full play; and
generally, as he explained, "~aying
the giddy garden-goat all round."

"You're worth half a dozen of us, Bobby," said Revere in a moment
of enthusiasm. "How the
devil do you keep it up?"

Bobby made no answer, but had Revere looked into the
breast-pocket of
~s coat he might have seen there a sheaf of badly-written letters
which perhaps accounted for
the power that p05-
sessed the boy. A letter came to Bobb~ every other day. The
spelling was not above reproach,
but the sentiments must have been most satisfactory, for on receipt
Bobby's eyes softened
marvelously, and he was wont to fall into a tender abstraction for a
while ere, shaking his
cropped head, he charged into his work.

By what power he drew after him the hearts of the roughest, and
the Tail Twisters counted in
their ranks some rough diamonds indeed, was a mystery to both
skipper and C. 0., who learned
from the regimental chaplain that Bobby was considerably more in
request in the hospital tents
than the Reverend John Emery.

"The men seem fond of you. Are you in the hospitals much?" said
the Colonel, who did his dail}
round and ordered the men to get well with a hardness that did not
cover his bitter grief.

"A little, sir," said Bobby.

"Shouldn't go there too often if I were you. They say it's not
contagious, but there's no use in
running unnecessary risks. We can't afford to have you down,
y'know."

Six days later, it was with the utmost difficulty that the post-runner
plashed his way out to the
camp with mailbags, for the rain was falling in torrents. Bobby
received a letter, bore it off to
his tent, and, the programme for the next week's Sing-song being
satisfactorily disposed of, sat
down to answer it. For an hour the unhandy pen toiled over the
paper, and where sentiment rose
to more than normal tide-level Bobby Wick stuck out his tongue
and breathed heavily. He was
not used to letter-writing.

ONLY A SUBALThRN
230


"Beg y'pardon, sir," said a voice at the tent door; "but Dormer's
'orrid bad, sir, an' they've taken
him orf, sir.

"Damn Private Dormer and you too!" said Bobby Wick running the
blotter over the half-finished
letter. "Tell him I'll come in the morning."

'E's awful bad, sir," said the voice, hesitatingly. There was an
undecided squelching of heavy
boots.

"Well?" said Bobby, impatiently.

"Excusin' 'imself before an' for takin' the liberty, 'e says it would be
a comfort for to assist 'im,
sir, if"-"Tattoo lao! Get my pony! Here, come in out of the rain till
I'm ready. 'Vhat blasted
nuisances you are! That's brandy. Drink some; you want it. Hang
on to my stirrup and tell me if I
go mo fast."

Strengthened by a four-finger "nip" which he swallowed without a
wink, the Hospital Orderly
kept up with the slipping, mud-stained, and very disgusted pony as
it shambled to the hospital
tent.

Private Dormer was certainly " 'orrid bad." He had all but reached
the stage of collapse and was
not pleasant to look upon.

"What's this, Dormer?" said Bobby, bending over the man. "You're
not going out this time.
You've got to come fishin~ with me once or twice more yet."

The blue lips parted and in the ghost of a whisper said,-"Beg
y'pardon, sir, disturbin' of you now,
but would you mm' 'oldin' my 'and, sir?"

Bobby sat on the side of the bed, and the icy cold hand closed on
his own like a vice, forcing a
lady's ring which was on the little finger de~p into the
flesh. Bobby Set his lips and waited, the water dripping from the
hem of his trousers. An hour
passed and the grasp of the hand did not relax, nor did the
expression on the drawn face change.
Bobby with infinite craft lit himself a cheroot with the left hand,
his right arm was numbed to
the elbow, and resigned himself to a night of pain.

Dawn showed a very white-faced Sub altern sitting on the side of a
sick man's cot, and a Doctor
in the doorway using language unfit for publication.

"Have you been here all night, you young ass?" said the Doctor.

"There or thereabouts," said Bobby, ruefully. "He's frozen on to
me."

Dormer's mouth shut with a click. He turned his head and sighed.
The clinging band opened,
and Bobby's arm fell useless at his side.

"He'll do," said the Doctor, quietly. "It must have been a to~s-up
all througb the night. 'Think
you're to be congratulated on this case."

"Oh, bosh!" said Bobby. "I thought the man had gone out long
ag~only
only I didn't care to take my hand away. Rub my arm down, there's
a good chap. What a grip the
brute has! I'm chilled to the marrow!" He passed out of the tent
shivering.

Private Dormer was allowed to celebrate his repulse of Death by
strong waters. Four days later,
he sat on the side of his cot and said to the patients mildly: "I'd 'a'
liken to 'a' spoken to 'im-so I
should."

But at that time Bobby was reading yet another letter-he had the
most persistent correspondent
of any man in camp~and was even then about to write that the
sickness had abated. and in

240
WORKS OF RUDYARD KIPLING

another week at the outside would be gone. He did not intend to
say that the chill of a sick man's
hand seemed to nave struck into the heart whose capacities for
affection he dwelt on at such
length. He did intend to enclose the illustrated programme of the
forthcoming Sing-song
whereof he was not a little proud. He also intended to write on
many other matters which do not
concern us, and doubtless would have done so but for the slight
feverish headache which made
him dull and unresponsive at mess.

"You are overdoing it, Bobby," said his skipper. "'Might give the
rest of us credit of doing a
little work. You go on as if you were the whole Mess rolled into
one. Take it easy."

"I will," said Bobby. "I'm feeling done up, somehow." Revere
looked at him anxiously and said
nothing.

There was a flickering of lanterns ab3ut the camp that night, and a
rumor that brought men out
of their cots to the tent doors, a paddling of the naked feet of
doolie-bearers and the rush of a
galloping horse.

"Wot's up?" asked twenty tents; and through twenty tents ran the
answer-"Wick, 'e's down."

They brought the news to Revere and he groaned. "Any one but
Bobby and I shouldn't have
cared! The Sergeant-Major was right."

"Not going out this journey," gasped Bobby, as he was lifted from
the doolie. "Not going out this
journey." Then with an air of supreme conviction-"I can't, you
see."

"Not if I can do anything!" said the Surgeon-Major, who had
hastened over
from the mess where he had been dining.

He and the Regimental Surgeon fought together with Death for
the life of Bobby Wick. Their
work was interrupted by a hairy apparition in a blue-grey
dressing-gown who stared in horror at
the bed and cried-"Oh, my Gawd. It can't be 'im!" until an
indignant Hospital Orderly whisked
him away.

If care of man and desire to live could have done aught, Bobby
would have been saved. As it
was, he made a fight of three days, and the Surgeon-Major's brow
uncreased. "We'll save him
yet," he said; and the Surgeon, who, though he ranked with the
Captain, had a very youthful
heart, went out upon the word and pranced joyously in the mud.

"Not going out this journey," whispered Bobby Wick, gallantly, at
the end of the third day.

"Bravo!" said the Surgeon-Major. "That's the way to look at it,
Bobby."

As evening fell a grey shade gathered round Bobby's mouth, and he
turned his face to the tent
wall wearily. The Surgeon-Major frowned.

"I'm awfully tired," said Bobby, very faintly. "What's the use of
bothering me with medicine?
I~on't-want-it. Let me alone."

The desire for life had departed, and Bobby was content to drift
away on the easy tide of Death.

"It's no good," said the SurgeonMajor. "He doesn't want to live.
He's meeting it, poor child." And
he blew his nose.

Half a mile away, the regimental band was playing the overture to
the Sing.

IN THE MATTER OF A PRIVATE
241

song, for the men had been told that Bobby was out of danger.
The clash of the brass and the
wail of the horns reached Bobby's ears.


Is there a single joy or pain,

That I should never kno~ow?

You do not ~ove me, 'tis in vain,

Bid me good-bye and go!


An expression of hopeless irritation crossed the boy's face, and he
tried to shake his head.

The Surgeon-Major bent down-"What is it? Bobby?"-"Not that
waltz," muttered Bobby.
"That's our own-our very ownest own.
Mummy dear."

With this he sank into the stupor that gave place to death early
next morning.

Revere, his eyes red at the rims and his nose very white, went into
Bobby's tent to write a letter
to Papa Wick which should bow the white head of the
ex-Commissioner of Chota-Buldana in the
keenest sorrow of his life. Bobby's little store of papers lay in
confusion on the table, and among
them a half-finished letter. The last sentence ran:
"So you see, darling, there is really no fear, because as long as I
know you care for me and I care
for you, nothing can touch me."

Revere stayed in the tent for an hour. When he came out, his eyes
were redder than ever.

*
*
*
*
*
*


Private Conklin sat on a turned-down bucket, and listened to a not
unfamiliar tune. Private
Conklin was a convalescent and should have been tenderly treated.

"Ho!" said Private Conklin. "There's another bloomin' orf'cer
da~d."

The bucket shot from under him, and his eyes filled with a
smithyful of sparks. A tall man in a
blue-grey bedgown was regarding him with deep disfavor.

"You ought to take shame for yourself, Conky! Orf'cer?-bloomin'
orf'cer? I'll learn you to
misname the likes of 'im. Hangel! Bloomin' Hangel! That's wot 'e
is!"

And the Hospital Orderly was so satisfied with the justice of the
punishment that he did not even
order Private Dormer back to his cot.



In the Matter of a Private
Hurrah! hurrah! a soldier's life for me! Shout, boys, shout! for it
makes you

jolly and free.

-The Ramrod Corps.


PEOPLE who have seen, say that one of the quaintest spectacles of
human frailty is an outbreak
of hysterics in a girls' school. It starts without warning, generally
on a hot afternoon among the
elder pupils. A girl giggles till the giggle gets beyond control.
Then she throws up her head, and
cries, "Honk, honk, honk," like a wild goose, and tears mix with
the laughter. If the n,istres. be
wise she will rap out sometl~ng severc at this point 0 check
matters. If she be tender-hearted,
and send for a drink of water, the chances are largely in

i42
WORKS OF RUDYARD KIPLING

favor of another girl laughing at the afflicted one and herself
collapsing. Thus Lhe trouble
spreads, and may end in half of what answers to the Lower Sixth
of a boys' school rocking and
whooping together. Given a week of warm weather, two stately
promenades per diem, a heavy
mutton and rice meal in the middle of the day, a certain amount of
nagging from the teachers,
and a few other things, some amazing effects develop. At least
this is what folk say who have
had experience.

Now, the Mother Superior of a Convent and the Colonel of a
British Infantry Regiment would be
justly shocked at any comparison being made between their
respective charges. But it is a fact
that, under certain circumstances, Thomas in bulk can be worked
up into ditthering, rippling
hysteria. He does not weep, but he shows his trouble
unmistakably, and the consequences get
into the newspapers, and all the good people who hardly know a
Martini from ~ Snider say:
"Take away the brute's ammunition!"

Thomas isn't a brute, and his business, which is to look after the
virtuous people, nemands that
he shall have his am-munition to his hand. He doesn't wear silk
stockings, and he really ought to
he supplied with a new Adjective to help him to express his
opinions; but, for all that, he is a
great man. If you call him "the heroic defender of the national
honor" one day, and "a brutal and
licentious soldiery" the next, you naturally bewilder him, and he
looks upon you with suspicion.
There is nobody to speak for Thomas except people who have
theories to work off on him; and
nobody understands Thomas except
Thomas, and he does not always kno~ what is the matter with
himself.

That is the prologue. This is the story:

Corporal Slane was engaged to be married to Miss Jhansi
M'Kenna, whose history is well known
in the regiment and elsewhere. He had his Colonel's permission,
and, being popular with the
men, every arrangement had been made to give the wedding what
Private Ortheris called
"eeklar." It fell in the heart of the hot weather, and, after the
wedding, Slane was going up to the
Hills with the Bride. None the less, Slane's grievance was that the
affair would he only a
hired-carriage wedding, and he felt that the "eeklar" of that was
meagre. Miss M'Kenna did not
care so much. The Sergeant's wife was helping her to make her
wedding-dress, and she was very
busy. Slane was, just then, the only moderately contented man in
barracks. All the rest were
more or less miserable.

And they had so much to make them happy, too. All their work
was over at eight in the morning,
and for the rest of the day they could lie on their backs and smoke
Canteen-plug and swear at the
punkab-coolies. They enjoyed a fine, full flesh meal in the middle
of the day, and then threw
themselves down on their cot~ and sweated and slept till it was
cool enough to go out with their
"towny," whose vocabulary contained less than six hundred words,
and the Adjective, and whose
views on every conceivable question they had heard many times
before.

There was the Canteen, of course, and there was the Temperance
Room with the second-hand
papers in it; but

IN ThE MATTER OF A PRIVATE
243

a man of any profession cannot read for eight hours a day in a
temperature of 960 or 980 in the
shade, running up sometimes to 1030 at midnight. Very few men,
even though they get a
pannikin of flat, stale, muddy beer and hide it under their cots, can
continue drinkmg for six
hours a day. One man tried, but he died, and nearly the whole
regiment went to his funeral
because it gave them something to do. It was too early for the
excitement of fever or cholera.
The men could only wait and wait and wait, and watch the shadow
of the barrack creeping
across the blinding white dust. That was a gay life.

They lounged about cantonments-it was too hot for any sort of
game, and almost too hot for
vice-and fuddled themselves in the evening, and filled themselves
to distension with the healthy
nitrogenous food provided for them, and the more they stoked the
less exercise they took and
more explosive they grew. Then tempers began to wear away, and
men fell a-brooding over
insults real or imaginary, for they had nothing else to think of. The
tone of the repartees
changed, and instead of saying light-heartedly: "I'll knock your
silly face in," men grew
laboriously p0lite and hinted that the cantonments were not big
enough for themselves and their
enemy, and that there would he more space for one of the two in
another place.

It may have been the Devil who arranged the thing, but the fact of
+,he case is that Losson had
for a long time been worrying Simmons in an aimless way. It gave
him occupation. The two had
their cots side by side, and would
sometimes spend a long afternoon swearing at each other; but
Simmons was afraid of Losson
and dared not challenge him to a fight. He thought over the words
in the hot still nights, and half
the hate he felt toward Losson be vented on the wretched
punkahcoolie.

Losson bought a parrot in the bazar, and put it into a little cage,
and lowered the cage into the
cool darkness of a well, and sat on the well-curb, shouting bad
language down to the parrot. He
taught it to say: "Simmons, ye so-oor," which means swine, and
several other things entirely
unfit for publication. He was a big gross man, and he shook like a
jelly when the parrot had the
sentence correctly. Simmons, however, shook with rage, for all
the room were laughing at
him-the parrot was such a disreputable puff of green feathers and it
looked so human when it
chattered. Losson used to sit, swinging his fat legs, on the side of
the cot, and ask the parrot what
it thought of Simmons. The parrot would answer:
"Simmons, ye so-oor." "Good boy," Losson used to say, scratching
the parrot's head; "ye 'ear
that, Sim?" And Simmons used to turn over on his stomach and
make answer: "I 'ear. Take 'eed
you don't 'ear something one of these days."

In the restless nights, after he had been asleep all day, fits of blind
rage came upon Simmonr and
held him till he trembled all over, while he thought in how many
different ways he would slay
Losson. Sometimes he would picture himself trampling the life
out of the man, with heavy
ammunition-boots, and at others smashing in his face with

244
WORKS OF RUDYARD KiPLING

the butt, and at oth~r~ jumping on his shoulders and dragging the
head back till the necKbone
cracked. Then his mouth would feel hot and fevered, and he
would reach out for another sup of
the beer in tue pannikin.

But the fancy that came to him most frequently and stayed with
him longest was one connected
with the great roll of fat under Losson's right ear. He noticed it
first on a moonlight night, and
thereafter it was always before his eyes. It was a fascinating roll of
fat. A man could get his hand
upon it and tear away one side of the neck; or he could place the
muzzle of a rifle on it and blow
away all the head in a flash. Losson had no right to be sleek and
contented and well-to-do, when
he, Simmons, was the butt of the room, Some day, perhaps, he
would show those who laughed at
the "Simmons, ye so-oor" joke, that he was as good as the rest, and
held a man's life in the crook
of his forefinger. When Losson snored, Simmons hated him more
bitterly than ever. Why
should Losson be able to sleep when Simmons had to stay awake
hour after hour, tossing and
turning on the tapes, with the dull liver pain gnawing into his right
side and his head throbbing
and aching after Canteen? He thought over this for many nights,
and the world became
unprofitable to him. He even blunted his naturally fine appetite
with beer and tobacco; and all
the while the parrot talked at and made a mock of him.

The heat continued and the tempers wore away more quickly than
before. A Sergeant's wife died
of heat-apoplexy in the night, and the rumor ran abroad
that it was cholera. Men rejoiced openly, hoping that it would
spread and send them into camp.
But that was a false alarm.

It was late on a Tuesday evening, and the men were waiting in the
deep double verandas for
"Last Posts," when Simmons went to the box at the foot of his bed,
took aut his pipe, and
slammed the lid down with a bang that echoed through the
deserted barrack like the crack of a
rifle. Ordinarily speaking, the men would have taken no notice;
but their nerves were fretted to
fiddle-strings. They jumped up, and three or four clattered into the
barrack-room only to find
Simmons kneeling by his box.

"Owl It's you, is it?" they said and laughed foolishly. "We t h 0 u
g h t 'twas"-Simmons rose
slowly. If th~ accident had so shaken his fellows, what would not
the reality do?

"You thought it was-did you? And what makes you think?" he said,
iashmg himself into madness
as he went on; "to Hell with your thinking, ye dirty spies."

"Simmons, ye so-oor," chuckled the parrot in the veranda, sleepily,
recognizing a well-known
voice. Now that was absolutely all.

The tension snapped. Simmons fell back on the arm-rack
deliberately,-the men were at the far
end of the room,-and took out his rifle and packet of ammunition.
"Don't go ~laying the goat,
Sim!" said Losson. "Put it down," but there was a quaver in his
voice. Another man stooped,
slipped his boot and hurled it at Simmon's head. The prompt
answer was a shot

IN ThE MATTER OF A PRIVATE
243

a man of any profession cannot read for eight hours a day in a
temperature of 960 or 980 in the
shade, running up sometimes to 1030 at midnight. Very few men,
even though they get a
pannikin of fiat, stale, muddy beer and hide it under their cots, can
continue drinkmg for six
hours a day. One man tried, but he died, and nearly the whole
regiment went to his funeral
because it gave them something to do. It was too early for the
excitement of fever or cholera.
The men could only wait and wait and wait, and watch the shadow
of the barrack creeping
across the blinding white dust. That was a gay life.

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