Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol 7.djvu/254

210 THE WINTER TROUBLES. CHAP, which might be made to him by officers of their IX ' own free will ; and it is evident that, to draw full advantage from occasions found in that way, the enquirer, instead of ' enquiring,' must be a man so socially gifted that by his own powers of conversation he can evoke the conversation of others. Eussell was all that and more ; for he was a great humourist, and more, again, he was an Irish humourist, whose very tones fetched a laugh. If only he shouted ' Virgilio ! ' — Virgilio was one of his servants — the sound when heard through the canvas used often to send divine mirth into more than one neighbouring tent; and whenever in solemn accents he owned the dread uniform he wore to be that of the late ' disembodied militia,' one used to think nothing more comic could ever be found in creation than his ' rendering ' of a ' live Irish ghost.' In those days when the army was moving after having disembarked at Old Fort, he had not found means to reorganise the needed campaigning arrangements which liis voyage from Bulgaria had disturbed, and any small tribulation he suffered in consequence used always to form tbe subject of his humourously plaintive laments. He always found, sooner or later, some blank leaves torn out of a pocket-book, and besides, some stump of a pencil with which to write his letters — letters destined in the sheets of the ' Times ' to move the hearts and souls of our people at liome, and inake them hang on his words ; but, until he could lay his hand on some such writing materials, there was ineffable