mane that?” sez ould Mother Shadd, lookin’ at me side-ways like a hen looks at a hawk whin the chickens are runnin’ free.  “Try me, an’ tell,” sez I. Wid that I pulled on my gloves, dhrank off the tay, an’ went out av the house as stiff as at gin’ral p’rade, for well I knew that Dinah Shadd’s eyes were in the small av my back out av the scullery window.  Faith! that was the only time I mourned I was not a cav’lry-man for the pride av the spurs to jingle.

‘I wint out to think, an’ I did a powerful lot av thinkin’, but ut all came round to that shlip av a girl in the dotted blue dhress, wid the blue eyes an’ the sparkil in them.  Thin I kept off canteen, an’ I kept to the married quarthers, or near by, on the chanst av meetin’ Dinah.  Did I meet her?  Oh, my time past, did I not; wid a lump in my throat as big as my valise an’ my heart goin’ like a farrier’s forge on a Saturday morning?  ‘Twas “Good day to ye, Miss Dinah,” an’ “Good day t’you, corp’ril,” for a week or two, and divil a bit further could I get bekaze av the respect I had to that girl that I cud ha’ broken betune finger an’ thumb.’

Here I giggled as I recalled the gigantic figure of Dinah Shadd when she handed me my shirt.

‘Ye may laugh,’ grunted Mulvaney.  ‘But I’m speakin’ the trut’, an ’tis you that are in fault.  Dinah was a girl that wud ha’ taken the imperiousness out av the Duchess av Clonmel in those days.  Flower hand, foot av shod air, an’ the eyes av the livin’ mornin’ she had that is my wife to-day—­ould Dinah, and niver aught else than Dinah Shadd to me.

‘’Twas after three weeks standin’ off an’ on, an’ niver makin’ headway excipt through the eyes, that a little drummer-boy grinned in me face whin I had admonished him wid the buckle av my belt for riotin’ all over the place.  “An’ I’m not the only wan that doesn’t kape to barricks,” sez he.  I tuk him by the scruff av his neck,—­my heart was hung on a hair-thrigger those days, you will onderstand—­an’ “Out wid ut,” sez I, “or I’ll lave no bone av you unbreakable.”—­“Speak to Dempsey,” sez he howlin’.  “Dempsey which?” sez I, “ye unwashed limb av Satan.”—­“Av the Bob-tailed Dhragoons,” sez he.  “He’s seen her home from her aunt’s house in the civil lines four times this fortnight.”—­“Child!” sez I, dhroppin’ him, “your tongue’s stronger than your body.  Go to your quarters.  I’m sorry I dhressed you down.”

‘At that I went four ways to wanst huntin’ Dempsey.  I was mad to think that wid all my airs among women I shud ha’ been chated by a basin-faced fool av a cav’lry-man not fit to trust on a trunk.  Presintly I found him in our lines—­the Bobtails was quartered next us—­an’ a tallowy, topheavy son av a she-mule he was wid his big brass spurs an’ his plastrons on his epigastrons an’ all.  But he niver flinched a hair.

’"A word wid you, Dempsey,” sez I.  “You’ve walked wid Dinah Shadd four times this fortnight gone.”

‘"What’s that to you?” sez he.  “I’ll walk forty times more, an’ forty on top av that, ye shovel-futted clod-breakin’ infantry lance-corp’ril.”