CHAPTER TWENTY SIX.
HOW I WAS UNEXPECTEDLY ENLISTED IN A NEW SERVICE, IN COMPANY WITH AN IRISHMAN.
The first thing I was conscious of, after partially recovering from the agony, mental and bodily, of my late accident, was a sharp tugging at my handle.
"Watch! I say, watch!" I heard a voice whisper, "what's to be done ?" It was the watered ribbon.
"How should I know ?" I growled; "if you had done your duty we should never have been here!" One is always ready to blame somebody for everything that happens amiss.
"Oh, yes, I dare say," it replied; "if you hadn't poked your nose into that hole we should never have been here." I did not like being thus talked to by a disreputable piece of watered ribbon, and so kept a dignified silence.
"What's to be done ?" presently repeated my companion, giving me another rude tug at the collar.
"Hold your tongues, if we've nothing to say," was my curt reply.
"Oh, but I've a lot to say," went on this irrepressible chatterbox; "in the first place--" "_Will_ you be silent ?" said I, angrily; "isn't it bad enough to be down here, all through your carelessness ?" "But it's not through my carelessness; it was through the hole in the pocket you got down here." "If you had half the sense of a--" "Of a nickel watch, let us say," said the watered ribbon, losing his temper; "and that would be precious little.

Well ?" "If you had half the sense of a blade of grass, you would have been able to prevent it." "But you see I hadn't half the sense of a blade of grass, or a quarter, or an eighth, or a sixteenth.

If I had I should have known better than to lend my moral support to a good-for-nothing, tarnished, ill- regulated, mendacious piece of Britannia metal, that chooses to call itself a silver watch.

Ha, ha! what do you think of that ?" What I thought of that this impudent ribbon was not destined then to hear; for there came at that moment a sound of approaching footsteps across the field, which made us both hold our breaths.

Unless the comer, whoever he was, could get sight of us, he was sure to tread right on the top of us! Luckily the moon was out, and with her aid I made myself as bright as possible.