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Cavalry Life, or Sketches and Stories in Barracks and Out
Cavalry Life or Sketches and Stories in Barracks and Out Author:John Strange Winter General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1884 Original Publisher: Chatto and Windus Subjects: Fiction / Classics History / General History / Europe / Great Britain History / Military / General Literary Collections / General Literary Criticism / General Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the ... more »original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: THE OKDEAL BY PAINT; OR, IIY FIRST DAY IN THE REGIMENT. " Here he comes !" " By gad, so he does ! Hurrah ! Some sport to-night." " Looks rather pale, doesn't he?" " Yes, and will want a good deal of setting up, too." " Poor devil! I pity him." As I was not at all afflicted -- in that instance I might have said blessed -- with deafness, these were a few of the remarks I could not help hearing, as I drove up to the officers' mess of the cavalry barracks at Colchester, where I had come to join the regiment, to which I had been gazetted a couple of months before. Quite unwittingly, I had chosen a very poor time for presenting myself. " Mid-day stables " were just over, and almost all the officers of the regiment were waiting about the verandah till luncheon should be ready. They were none of them in very amiable tempers; for they had just heard in the office that a letter had come down for them to hold themselves in readiness to march to the autumn manoeuvres at Aldershot, and Aldershot is, as most people know, a spot no cavalry officer rejoices to find himself near, even when there are no mano3uvres going on. Anything more uncomfortable than were my feelings that morning could not be easily imagined. I had never met my regiment before. I knew none of the men, and I was quite at a loss to know to whom I must address myself. However, I was compelled to act; and stumbling out of the cab, wit...« less