The Gentleman Cadet Part 18

"We mustn't let him be discovered," said Forester in a compa.s.sionate tone. "Let's help him out of it."

At a signal, Forester and the other cadets seized Marsden, lifted him off his legs, and carried him to the back yard--he shouting and struggling in a half-drunken way. Suddenly, however, he seemed to foresee what was in store for him, for he called out in quite a sober tone, "I'm not drunk, Forester; I was only humbugging. I'm not drunk; I'm not!"

Forester and his companions, whom I had followed, were silent, but very determined. They paid no attention to these shouts, but took off Marsden's coattee, and reduced his dress to a pair of trousers and a shirt. Three cadets then held him, whilst Forester, seizing the handle of the pump, sent a powerful stream of water over Marsden's head and down his back.

"Nothing like a cold bath to set a fellow right when he's screwed?" said Forester, as he worked vigorously at the pump-handle and deluged Marsden with a cold stream.

"I'm not drunk?" shouted Marsden. "Let me go! I'm not drunk!"

Not the slightest attention was paid to Marsden till he had been fully a minute under the pump, when he was released with the inquiry as to his feeling better and more sober.

"I'm not drunk, you confounded donkeys!" shouted Marsden again, in a great rage.

At this instant the officer on duty, having from his quarters heard the shouting, came through the division, and, seeing Marsden with his hair and clothes all wet, and hearing his shouts of "I'm not drunk?" at once said,--

"Mr Marsden, you're tipsy! You'll be in arrest, sir, till further orders?"

"I'm not drunk, sir?" said Marsden. "Go to your room, sir, in arrest!"

said the officer, as he walked off from the division.

When Forester came into his room he was in fits of laughter. "If that won't cure Marsden of shamming I don't know what will!" he said. "It serves him quite right for humbugging as he does?"

On the following morning Marsden asked Forester to give evidence as to his not being drank the night before, "for," said Marsden, "you know I wasn't."

"What?" said Forester; "when you told me you were beastly screwed on guv'nor's gooseberry--champagne, I mean? You don't mean to say you told a lie? I was bound to believe you, and did what I thought was best for you to save you from being seen in the state you were by the officer?"

"But I wasn't screwed!" said Marsden.

"Not when the officer came," replied Forester; "that's very likely. A powerful shower-bath is a wonderful soberer; and next time you come in screwed and shouting from the effects of champagne, you'll find it just as good a cure! No, I can't say you were not screwed; you looked like being so, and you said you were?"

There was an audible t.i.tter on parade that day when the officer on duty read out, among other orders by the Captain of the Cadet Company, that Mr Marsden, having been under the influence of drink when returning from leave on Sunday evening, was to be in arrest for seven days!

Forester's cure was effective. Marsden was never the worse for his governor's wine after that evening.

Note 1. "Smashed," in those days, was the familiar term for having broken one's word of honour.

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

OUTBREAK TO CHARLTON FAIR.

Towards the middle of my second half-year two very stirring events occurred at the Academy, in each of which I played a subordinate part.

The singular experiences I had in these two affairs are worthy of being recorded.

In the neighbourhood of Woolwich is a small village, called Charlton, which at that time was a thoroughly rural place. An old blacksmith's forge stood in the middle of the village, and two old-fashioned-looking inns. At the entrance of this village was a field, termed "The Fair-Field," where a large fair was annually held. This fair was termed "Horn Fair," and was one of the sights of the time.

Fairs have now degenerated, and have lost their glory; but thirty years ago Horn Fair day was a kind of Derby day, at which all the _elite_ of the neighbourhood were to be seen from about two till five on one particular day out of the three that the fair lasted.

From the entrance to the fair to the branch roads, where the cemetery is now situated, the carriages used to stand two deep during the time their occupiers strolled about the fair. Since those days, however, the railway has given such facility for the East-end of London to send down its unwashed hundreds, that first the fair was deserted by the ladies of the neighbourhood, next by the gentlemen, and finally was done away with as being detrimental to the neighbourhood.

During the three days that the fair lasted the cadet company were confined to the enclosure, and were not allowed to visit the village of Charlton. Such a restriction was ordered on account of a row which some years previously had occurred between the cadets and some of the fair people; but it was very obnoxious to the old cadets, and particularly to one who had been reduced from the rank of corporal to that of cadet.

This individual had a great deal of influence among the seniors, and on the morning of the second day of the fair he paid a visit to the majority of the rooms, in order to ventilate his ideas and organise a plan he had in his mind for the evening.

The cadet, who was named Prosser, came to our room to see Forester, and said, "Don't you think it's an awful shame to confine us to barracks like a set of schoolboys, instead of trusting us to go to the fair? I want your opinion about it, Forester."

"Well," replied Forester, "I think it's bad taste, and a mistake, for it seems to say, 'If you go to the fair you will get into a row,' but I don't see what's the use of complaining."

"I'll tell you what the use is," said Prosser. "I've got a lot of fellows who are game to fall in after tea, and go straight away to the fair--that is, if every one will go. You see, if everybody goes, they can't break a few fellows only, and they can't pitch into everybody, and I believe they will see it won't do to shut us up like sheep, but that we shall get more liberty."

"I won't join," said Forester, "if I can help it, and I think it's not the right way to go to work to remedy a grievance."

During that afternoon a paper was pa.s.sed round the Academy, saying that the whole of the first and second cla.s.s would fall in on the centre parade at half-past eight, and double off to the fair, and the third and fourth cla.s.s were to fall in at the same hour and place. This came as a kind of order from the old cadets, and we all signed our names as willing to agree to go.

Everything was kept very quiet during the afternoon, for fear the authorities might hear of the plot, and at half-past eight every cadet fell in quietly on the gra.s.s inside the Academy, and, the words of command being whispered from file to file, we broke into a double, and ran across the common towards Charlton.

There were present on that occasion every cadet except the eight corporals on duty, who thought they were bound in honour not to leave their posts. This was a sort of compromise with duty, for these eight corporals were perfectly aware that the breakout of barracks was going to be attempted, and had they done their duty they would have reported this, and put a stop at once to the affair; but the moral courage to do so was wanting. Still, none of these cadets liked to leave their posts--an indication of the right feeling that prevailed at that time in many things at the Academy, and at the same time a proof of the inconsistency in the ideas of the cadets.

Forester declined to join the "mutiny," as it might be termed, on principle, but he left Fenton and myself to do as we liked, and we both went.

The "Cadet Company," as I might term it, having got well clear of the Academy and across the common, came to a quick march, and the word was then pa.s.sed down the ranks as to our proceedings at the fair. On nearing the fair we were to form four deep and double through the fair.

We were then to enter one of the large dancing-booths, and clear it of its occupants, and finally to "pitch into" any persons who opposed us.

Under the influence of the excitement and companionship of the senior cadets, I thought the proceeding a brilliant one. The effect of charging through the fair would be grand, something like a real battle, and the people of the fair would see what a fine set of daring fellows the cadets were. With such ideas I approached the fair-field, little dreaming that three days would not elapse before I had come to the conclusion that a more foolish, stupid, and ridiculous proceeding could not have been proposed or carried out than this one, and that even the most enthusiastic of the party would admit that it was a contemptible and childish display.

Most rows or street fights, when looked upon calmly, may be cla.s.sed under the same head. They arise usually from the combat.i.tive stupidity of some individual or individuals who want excitement, or who imagine that they will exhibit their powers before an admiring audience during some fight in which they may be engaged. Two of the original promoters of the raid to the fair were the two biggest and most powerful cadets at the Academy, and were tolerably sure to hold their own in any row that might take place. For us smaller bodies the prospect was not so promising.

On nearing the entrance-gate we formed closely in fours, and at a double charged down between the booths. Men, women, and children were knocked over right and left, and sent sprawling on the ground, whilst we were saluted with stones, sticks, and other weapons seized impromptu by the indignant public.

Having made our way down the fair we entered the largest dancing-booth, which was immediately deserted by the occupants. Seizing the chairs, a few of these were smashed, and shots were then taken at the many-coloured oil-lamps, the majority of which were knocked down, but not broken. There was then a shout to extinguish all the lamps in the fair, whilst one or two of the most reckless cadets shouted, "Turn out the menagerie!"

By this time, however, there was an organised 'stance to us. The sticks used for knock-'em-downs were seized by a number of men, who commenced using these very freely, and we were soon compelled to retreat, which we did in tolerably good order; not, however, without those in rear receiving some very heavy blows.

At the Academy matters had not been idle. The cadets having left the Academy, there was a silence that, to the experienced ears of the officer on duty, at once indicated that something was up. Coming out of his quarters he found the divisions deserted, and, on entering the library, found the corporal on duty, who informed him the cadets had left the enclosure. The a.s.sembly was immediately sounded, and was obeyed only by the corporals on duty and two cadets who were ill, having just left hospital. Taking with him the corporals on duty the officer at once started for the fair, giving orders that each cadet seen was at once to be placed in arrest. Now, as a cadet was bound in honour to obey an arrest, this plan would have been effective for sending home the company. When, however, the officer was within a hundred yards of the fair-field he met the cadets returning, and at once ordered the whole of them in arrest to their rooms.

For many hundred yards from the fair we were followed by a rabble, which delighted in pelting us with various missiles and abusing us, as they now could do with impunity.

On reaching the enclosure we all went to our rooms, relating our individual experiences, escapes, and performances.

One cadet had exchanged blows with a supposed prizefighter, and had held his own; another had knocked down a burly rough who was just going to smash the head of a cadet with a life-preserver. This cadet had tripped up a Peeler who was trying to collar a cadet; that cadet had rescued a snooker who was actually in the grasp of two roughs. The feats performed were really marvellous--at least in their accounts--and for that night we were well pleased with ourselves.

Forester listened to Fenton's account of the affair, and put a few questions, and then p.r.o.nounced his verdict, that we had all made a set of fools of ourselves, and that probably the company would be decimated, every tenth cadet being discharged.

During the next two or three days there were endless speculations as to what would be the punishment given us for our conduct, and as the excitement of the affair wore off, the corporals and seniors began to get anxious for their prospects, for it was feared a severe example would be made of at least the corporals and under-officers who had gone to the fair. The whole company was confined to barracks, and could not therefore go beyond the "Ha-ha" so that groups of twenty or thirty cadets used to a.s.semble every day and walk about arm-in-arm discussing the proceedings at the fair, and the probable results.

About ten days after the breaking out the whole company was a.s.sembled on parade, and the decision of the Master-General made known. It was to the effect that every under-officer and corporal present at the fair was to be reduced to the rank of a cadet, all leave stopped till the end of the half, and the question left open whether or not the commission of these should be delayed six months. By many this punishment was considered slight, for they had expected to be rusticated, and to lose, consequently, a term; so that, as soon as the order had been read out, there was a subdued murmur of satisfaction among those who had been the ringleaders of the affair, and whose position as the seniors rendered them responsible.

This history of the life of a Woolwich cadet is intended to be a relation of the events that occurred some thirty odd years ago, and to be described as those events presented themselves to the mind of a cadet at that time. To mix up with these relations of incidents anything formal or serious would be to a certain extent out of place. This work is not intended as instructive, or as even suggestive; still, if in it some mention were not made of a most important problem connected with military educational establishments, it certainly would lack one feature, without which it would be dest.i.tute of what may be termed "backbone." The problem to which we refer is the discipline necessary in any military educational establishment.