“Well, since ye ask me, sir, in my opinion they might do worse; annyhow, I’ll have a good try.  I might get a sort of doctor’s certificate—­mental you know.  I’m a first-class shot, though naturally a bit out of practice; and very hefty with the bayonet.  I’d like well to stir them Germans up, ever since one great ugly brute went out of his way to give me a kick.  I was black and blue for weeks.  Did you hear them the day before they were took off—­just screeching mad, shoutin’ and drinkin’, as if the world was their own.  Well, annyhow, I can enlist as full private; I’m sound in wind and limb and, I tell ye, we want all the men we can get, for I heard them Germans talkin’ very big in Rangoon, saying they’d eat us all up within the next three months—­body, sleeves and trimmings!”

“Easier said than done,” rejoined Shafto; “although they have a splendid army—­and thousands of big guns.”

“I’d like well to have a hand in real fighting—­none of your autumn manoeuvres, but the proper thing; and after I put the war over, I’ll go and see Ireland.  It’s strange, although I’m Irish, I’ve never put a toe in the country, and never been nearer it than a black native.  My father’s people were reared in the Galtees; it’s my Irish blood that’s uppermost now and driving me home.  I’ve often heard the boys talkin’ of the grand purple mountains, the wonderful greenery everywhere, and the lovely soft, moist air.”

“Well, Michael, I hope you may see it all some day.  What put it into your head to throw off the yellow robe and take this sudden start?”

“It was the barrack talk, sir; I heard them chaps cursin’ and groanin’ that they were stuck fast in Rangoon and had no chance of gettin’ a look in, and says I to myself, what’s to hinder you from goin’?”

“But how about the passage money?” inquired Shafto.  “I thought you were vowed to poverty and had nothing in your wooden bowl?”

“I had the ruby that you gave back to me.  I believe it was a rare fine stone.  I had it in me mind to offer it to the Pagoda; it was well I waited, as things turned out; a friend sold it for me in the bazaar—­he got four hundred pounds of English money.  He says it was worth some thousands; it was bought for a Pagoda, annyhow, and I have a nice big sum lodged in a London bank, and when the war is over, please God, it will help to settle me in a small place in Ireland.  I took me passage and bought some kit, and I have a few pounds in hand—­so that I won’t be stranded.  At first I felt the clothes terrible awkward, especially the trousers, after living in a petticoat so long; and I did not know what to be doin’ with a knife and fork—­and leadin’ such a quiet, cramped sort of life I lost the use of meself; but I tramped up and down the decks for a couple of hours of a morning, and a nice young fellow in the pantry has lent me a pair of dumb-bells.  By the time I get to England I’ll be well set up with a black moustache—­and mabbe, ye’ll hardly know me!”