breakfasts—for I had been round some twenty
barrack-rooms, and it was now nearly half-past
eight, the breakfasts being served at eight
precisely—they were cleaning their belts, or
reading, or putting their various belongings in order.
I asked for the corporals of the room, but one
was absent on guard, and the other, a married
man, lived in the married men's quarters. The
orderly sergeant of the company had entered
when I did, but had turned to go out with me,
and had not seen who threw the bread. The
regimental orderly sergeant—who always
accompanies the orderly officer in his rounds—
had also turned to leave the room when I was
thus insulted. I asked again who had done the
deed, determined in my own mind to treat it as
if it had been a case of sky-larking, and to
pretend that I believed the loaf had struck me by
accident. Still no reply. I asked who was the
oldest soldier in the room, and a man I knew
very well came forward. "Grady," said I,
"will you protect the coward who did this?
Answer me. Who threw that loaf?" Grady
coloured up, and said, "I would tell yer
honer in a minit, but I did not see it; I was
busy reading this paper." And, in fact, I
remembered very well noticing when I entered
the room that the man was sitting holding a
large newspaper before him, and, although he
had sprung up to "Attention!" when I entered,
it was probable enough that on my turning to
leave he had become absorbed in the contents
of the print he held in his hand. Besides, he
bore so good a character, and had been so long
in the regiment, that it was more than likely he
would have told me if he could. I questioned,
one by one, every man in the room, but not a man
would say a word, and so the only course left me
was to take down all their names, and report
the circumstance through the adjutant to the
colonel. I did so, and was ordered to attend
next morning at the orderly-room—the daily
petty sessions of the commanding officer.

At afternoon roll-call, the orderly sergeant
of the company in whose barrack-room the
loaf had been thrown at me, came up just as
the captain of the day was dismissing the
parade, and told me that he thought he had
found out who it was that had thrown the
loaf of bread. He said that a man of the
company had confessed to him that he had seen
a comrade named O'Brien pick up a ration
loaf as I turned to leave the room, take deliberate
aim at me, and fling the missile with all his
power. I was glad to learn that, at any rate,
one of those who knew who the culprit was
had come forward to denounce him, as it showed
there was some determination among them to
stand by their officer; but I was very sorry to
hear that O'Brien was the man. I had known
the lad very well at Chatham, where our depôt
was, and had come out on board the same ship
with him, via the Cape. When I say I had
known him, I mean known him as well as
in the English army—where there is an
impassable gulf between the commissioned officers
and the rank and file—it is possible for an
officer to know a soldier. He was a youth of
some education, and, although he spoke with
a very strong brogue, his manners were good,
and his appearance stamped him as being above
the ordinary class of recruits. When ordered
to the guard-room as a prisoner, and afterwards
when brought before the commanding officer,
O'Brien stoutly denied that he was the man.
Still his accuser persisted in his story, and
declared that O'Brien, and no other, was the
guilty person. When O'Brien was asked at the
orderly-room whether—supposing him not to be
the culprit—he knew who had been guilty of
this grave offence, he did not answer a word.
The colonel then said that if he (O'Brien) were
not the offender, he knew perfectly well who
was. Still he said nothing. He brought
forward three men of the room, all of whom
solemnly declared that O'Brien was not the
man. Of these, two, when asked whether they
knew who was the man, held their tongues, and
would make no reply: just as O'Brien had done.
The third soldier declared that he had not seen,
and therefore could not say, who had thus
misbehaved himself. After a very long and utterly
fruitless attempt to get at the truth—O'Brien's
accuser remaining firm to his previous story—
the colonel determined to refer the matter to
the general commanding the division; by him
it was sent on to head-quarters at Simla;
and in about three weeks there came from
the commander-in-chief in India an order to
try O'Brien by general court-martial. In
another week the court, consisting of three
field-officers, four captains, and six subalterns,
assembled at our mess-room. I was called upon
to give my evidence, which I did. The soldier
who accused O'Brien was the most important
witness, and by this time, although all real
interest in the question had subsided, and the
time to make an example of the mutineer, even
if we had got hold of the right man, was long
gone by, people had begun to accept as a matter
of fact that O'Brien was the guilty man. The
proceedings of the court only lasted three
or four hours; the finding and sentence were
not promulgated until they were sent back
from head-quarters. It would seem that the
verdict of the court was neither approved nor
confirmed, for the court had to meet again, and
so another delay of about ten or twelve days
occurred. At last, the whole garrison was
ordered to assemble on our parade-ground, and,
seeing the triangles to which soldiers are bound
when flogged carried to the ground by the
drummers, we all knew but too well what was
coming.

Squads were inspected, then formed into
companies, the battalion mustered together,
the other European corps arrived from
their own parade-ground, and the square,
numbering some two thousand four hundred
men of all arms, was formed. In the middle
were the triangles. The brigade-major and the
brigadier commanding, were present. The former
read the proceedings of the court, with the
finding "Guilty," and the sentence that "the