"
"It will do him good," Captain Doolan said disdainfully. "I have
no patience with a man who is forever working himself to death,
riding about the country as if Old Nick were behind him, and never
giving himself a minute for diversion of any kind. Faith, I would
rather throw myself down a well and have done with it, than work
ten times as hard as a black nigger."
"Well, I don't think, Doolan," the Doctor said dryly, "you are ever
likely to be driven to suicide by any such cause."
"You are right there, Doctor," the other said contentedly. "No man
can throw it in my teeth that I ever worked when I had no occasion
to work. If there were a campaign, I expect I could do my share
with the best of them, but in quiet times I just do what I have to
do, and if anyone has an anxiety to take my place in the rota for
duty, he is as welcome to it as the flowers of May. I had my share
of it when I was a subaltern; there is no better fellow living than
the Major, but when he was Captain of my company he used to keep
me on the run by the hour together, till I wished myself back
in Connaught, and anyone who liked it might have had the whole of
India for anything I cared; he was one of the most uneasy creatures
I ever came across."
"The Major is a good officer, Doolan, and you were as lazy a youngster,
and as hard a bargain, as the Company ever got. You ought to thank
your stars that you had the good luck in having a Captain who knew
his business, and made you learn yours.
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