The Amateur Army

Thus spoke the bright-eyed Cockney at the table next me, gazing regretfully at his empty coffee-cup and cutting away a fringe of rag-nails from his finger with a clasp-knife. The time was eight o'clock of the evening, and the youth was recounting an adventure which he had had in the morning when throwing mud at sparrows on the parade ground. A lump of clay had struck a red-haired non-commissioned officer on the j