Gleams of humour enlivened the situation.  Mrs. Gosling-Green (nee a Pounding-Pobble, Superiora Pounding-Pobble, one of the Pounding-Pobbles of Putney) was under the orders, very much under the orders, of the wife of the Sergeant-Major, and early and plainly learnt that good woman’s opinion that she was a poor, feckless body and eke a fushionless, not worth the salt of her porridge—­a lazy slut withal.

Among the “awkward squads” enrolled when rioting broke out and the corps seized the old Prison, were erstwhile grave and reverend seniors learning to “stand up like a man an’ look prahd o’ yourself” at the orders of the Sergeant-Major.  Among them were two who had been Great Men, Managers signing per and pro, Heads of Departments, almost Tin Gods, and one of them, alas, was at the mercy of a mere boy whom he had detested and frequently “squashed” in the happy days of yore.  The mere boy (a cool, humorous, and somewhat vindictive person, one of the best subalterns of the Corps and especially chosen by Colonel Ross-Ellison when re-organizing the battalion after its disbandment) was giving his close attention to the improvement of his late manager, a pompous, dull and silly bureaucrat, even as his late manager had done for him.

“Now, Private Bulliton,” he would urge, “do learn which is your right hand and which is your left.  And do stand up....  No—­don’t drop your rifle when you are told to ‘shoulder’. That’s better—­we shall make something of you yet.  Head up, man, head up!  Try and look fierce.  Look at Private Faggit—­he’ll be a Sergeant yet” ... and indeed Private Horace Faggit was looking very fierce indeed, for he desired the blood of these interfering villains who were hindering the development of the business of the fine old British firm of Messrs. Schneider, Schnitzel, Schnorrer & Schmidt and the commissions of their representative.  Also he felt that he was assisting at the making of history.  ’Orace in a bloomin’ siege—­Gorblimey!—­and he, who had never killed anything bigger than an insect in his life, lusted to know how it felt to shove your bayonet into a feller or shoot ’im dead at short rynge.  So Horace drilled with alacrity and zest, paid close attention to aiming-instruction and to such visual-training and distance-judging as his officer, Captain John Bruce, could give him, and developed a military aptitude surprising to those who had known him only as Horace Faggit, Esquire, the tried and trusted Representative of the fine old British Firm of Schneider, Schnitzel, Schnorrer & Schmidt.

To Captain Malet-Marsac, an unusually thoughtful, observant and studious soldier, it was deeply interesting to see how War affected different people how values changed, how the Great became exceeding small, and the insignificant person became important.  By the end of the first month of what was virtually the siege of the Military Prison, Horace Faggit, late office-boy, clerk, and bagman, was worth considerably more than Augustus Grobble, late Professor of Moral Philosophy; Cornelius Gosling-Green, late Publicist; Edward Jones, late (alleged) Educationist, of Duri formerly; and a late Head of a Department,—­all rolled into one—­a keen, dapper, self-reliant soldier, courageous, prompt, and very bloodthirsty.