trestles - eighty men, flushed with mutiny, stripped to their
shirt sleeves, their knapsacks half-packed for the march to the
sea, made the two-inch boards thunder again as they chanted, to a
tune that Mulcahy knew well, the Sacred War Song of the Mavericks-

Listen in the north, my boys, there's trouble on the wind;
Tramp o' Cossack hooves in front, gray great-coats behind,
Trouble on the Frontier of a most amazin' kind,
Trouble on the waters o' the Oxus!

Then, as the table broke under the furious accompaniment -
Hurrah! hurrah! it's north by west we go;
Hurrah! hurrah! the chance we wanted so;
Let 'em hear the chorus from Umballa to Moscow,
As we go marchin' to the Kremling.

"Mother of all the saints in bliss and all the devils in cinders,
where's my fine new sock widout the heel?" howled Horse Egan,
ransacking everybody's valise but his own. He was engaged in
making up deficiencies of kit preparatory to a campaign, and in
that work he steals best who steals last. "Ah, Mulcahy, you're in
good time," he shouted, "We've got the route, and we're off on
Thursday for a pic-nic wid the Lancers next door."

An ambulance orderly appeared with a huge basket full of lint
rolls, provided by the forethought of the Queen for such as might
need them later on. Horse Egan unrolled his bandage, and flicked
it under Mulcahy's nose, chanting -

"Sheepskin an' bees' wax, thunder, pitch, and plaster,