I walked gently forward and peeped in, and certainly anything more in contrast with my late revery need not be conceived.

There sat the skipper, a bluff, round-faced, jolly-looking little tar, mixing a bowl of punch at a table, at which sat my friend Power, the adjutant, and a tall, meagre-looking Scotchman, whom I once met in Cork, and heard that he was the doctor of some infantry regiment.

Two or three black bottles, a paper of cigars, and a tallow candle were all the table equipage; but certainly the party seemed not to want for spirits and fun, to judge from the hearty bursts of laughing that every moment pealed forth, and shook the little building that held them.
Power, as usual with him, seemed to be taking the lead, and was evidently amusing himself with the peculiarities of his companions.
"Come, Adjutant, fill up; here's to the campaign before us.

We, at least, have nothing but pleasure in the anticipation; no lovely wife behind; no charming babes to fret and be fretted for, eh ?" "Vara true," said the doctor, who was mated with a _tartar_, "ye maun have less regrets at leaving hame; but a married man is no' entirely denied his ain consolations." "Good sense in that," said the skipper; "a wide berth and plenty of sea room are not bad things now and then." "Is that your experience also ?" said Power, with a knowing look.

"Come, come, Adjutant, we're not so ill off, you see; but, by Jove, I can't imagine how it is a man ever comes to thirty without having at least one wife,--without counting his colonial possessions of course." "Yes," said the adjutant, with a sigh, as he drained his glass to the bottom.