"Likely not," replied James; "John sees a deal more than those who hear; he is obliged to amuse himself with something; and, as he cannot hear, he sees."
The sergeant-major paused, and his companions with him; he became abstracted—the leaves dropped from his fingers—and, at last, turning abruptly away, he retraced his steps homewards.
Old John touched his brow with his forefinger significantly, and James muttered to himself—"The wound in his head may have damaged the sergeant-major, to be sure,—but, it is his daughter, poor thing, for all the roses on her cheek, and her sweet voice!" John did not hear a word his comrade spoke, but his thoughts were in the same channel. "He loves to see us all the same," he said, "as when he was with the old 'half-hundred,' and takes a march through the college every morning, keeping wonderful count of our victories; and then mounts guard over his daughter, as regularly as beat of drum;—he's constant with her; if the sun's too hot, under the shade of the avenue trees; or, if it is too cold, in the warmth of Cheyne-walk, 
or with old Mr. Anderson in the botanic garden, gathering the virtues of the herbs, and telling each other tales of the cedars and plane trees of foreign parts; may be, looking through the old water gate, or at the statue of Sir Hans Sloane.[1] I hear tell that Miss Lucy has great knowledge of such things; but she'll not live—not she—no more than her mother; I'm sure of that."
- ↑ This was the third botanic garden, established about the year 1673, in England. In a very old manuscript the spot is thus quaintly described:—"Chelsea physic garden has great variety of plants, both in and out of green-houses; their perennial green hedges, and rows of different coloured herbs, are very pretty, and so are the banks set with shades of herbs in the Irish style." The drawing Mr. Fairholt was so good as to make for this little book, gives a faithful representation of the statue of Sir Hans Sloane, by Rysbach, the two famous cedars, and the water-gate; and as this time-honoured garden is about to be converted into "a square of houses," I am glad of the opportunity to preserve a memorial of it. It in not only sacred to
