CHAPTER I.
PRISSY, HUGH JOHN, AND SIR TOADY LION.
It is always difficult to be great, but it is specially difficult whengreatness is thrust upon one, as it were, along with the additionalburden of a distinguished historical name. This was the case withGeneral Napoleon Smith. Yet when this story opens he was not ageneral. That came later, along with the cares of empire and themanagement of great campaigns.
But already in secret he was Napoleon Smith, though his nursesometimes still referred to him as Johnnie, and his father--but stay.I will reveal to you the secret of our soldier's life right at thestart. Though a Napoleon, our hero was no Buonaparte. No, his name wasSmith--plain Smith; his father was the owner of four large farms and agood many smaller ones, near that celebrated Border which separatesthe two hostile countries of England and Scotland. Neighbours referredto the General's father easily as "Picton Smith of Windy Standard,"from the soughing, mist-nursing mountain of heather and fir-treeswhich gave its name to the estate, and to the large farm he hadcultivated himself ever since the death of his wife, chiefly as ameans of distracting his mind, and keeping at a distance lonelinessand sad thoughts.
Hugh John Smith had never mentioned the fact of his Imperial descentto his father, but in a moment of confidence he had told his oldnurse, who smiled with a world-weary wisdom, which betrayed herknowledge of the secrets of courts--and said that doubtless it was so.He had also a brother and sister, but they were not, at that time, ofthe race of the Corporal of Ajaccio. On the contrary, Arthur George,the younger, aged five, was an engine-driver. There was yet anotherwho rode in a mail-cart, and puckered up his face upon beingaddressed in a strange foreign language, as "Was-it-then? Adarling--goo-goo--then it was!" This creature, however, was not ownedas a brother by Hugh John and Arthur George, and indeed may at thispoint be dismissed from the story. The former went so far as stoutlyto deny his brother's sex, in the face of such proofs as were dailyafforded by Baby's tendency to slap his sister's face wherever theymet, and also to seize things and throw them on the floor for thepleasure of seeing them break. Arthur George, however, had secrethopes that Baby would even yet turn out a satisfactory boy whenever hesaw him killing flies on the window, and on these occasions houndedhim on to yet deadlier exertions. But he dared not mention hisanticipations to his soldier brother, that haughty scion of anImperial race. For reasons afterwards to be given, Arthur George wasusually known as Toady Lion.
Then Hugh John had a sister. Her name was Priscilla. Priscilla wasdistinguished also, though not in a military sense. She was literary,and wrote books "on the sly," as Hugh John said. He considered thissecrecy the only respectable part of a very shady business. Speciallyhe objected to being made to serve as the hero of Priscilla's tales,and went so far as to promise to "thump" his sister if he caught herintroducing him as of any military rank under that of either generalor colour-sergeant.
"Look here, Pris," he said on one occasion, "if you put me into yourbeastly girl books all about dolls and love and trumpery, I'll bat youover the head with a wicket!"
"Hum--I dare say, if you could catch me," said Priscilla, with hernose very much in the air.
"Catch you! I'll catch and bat you now if you say much."
"Much, much! Can't, can't! There! 'Fraid cat! Um-m-um!"
"By Jove, then, I just will!"
It is sad to be obliged to state here, in the very beginning of theseveracious chronicles, that at this time Prissy and Napoleon Smith wereby no means model children, though Prissy afterwards marvellouslyimproved. Even their best friends admitted as much, and as for theirenemies--well, their old gardener's remarks when they chased eachother over his newly planted beds would be out of place even in amilitary periodical, and might be the means of preventing a book withMr. Gordon Browne's nice pictures from being included in somewell-conducted Sunday-school libraries.
General Napoleon Smith could not catch Priscilla (as, indeed, he wellknew before he started), especially when she picked up her skirts andwent right at hedges and ditches like a young colt. Napoleon lookedupon this trait in Prissy's character as degrading and unsportsmanlikein the extreme. He regarded long skirts, streaming hair, and flapping,aggravating pinafores as the natural handicap of girls in the race oflife, and as particularly useful when they "cheeked" their brothers.It was therefore wicked to neutralise these equalising disadvantagesby strings tied round above the knees, or by the still more scientificdevice of a sash suspended from the belt before, passed betweenPrissy's legs, and attached to the belt behind.
But, then, as Napoleon admitted even at ten years of age, girls arecapable of anything; and to his dying day he has never had any reasonto change his opinion--at least, so far as he has yet got.
* * * * *
"All right, then, I will listen to your old stuff if you will say youare sorry, and promise to be my horse, and let me lick you for an hourafterwards--besides giving me a penny."
It was thus that Priscilla, to whom in after times great lights ofcriticism listened with approval, was compelled to stoop to artificeand bribery in order to secure and hold her first audience. Whereuponthe authoress took paper from her pocket, and as she did so, held themanuscript with its back to Napoleon Smith, in order to conceal thesuspicious shortness of the lines. But that great soldier instantlydetected the subterfuge.
"It's a penny more for listening to poetry!" he said, with suddenalacrity.
"I know it is," replied Prissy sadly, "but you might be nice about itjust this once. I'm dreadfully, dreadfully poor this week, Hugh John!"
"So am I," retorted Napoleon Smith sternly; "if I wasn't, do you thinkI would listen at all to your beastly old poetry? Drive on!"
Thus encouraged, Priscilla meekly began--
"_My love he is a soldier bold, And my love is a knight; He girds him in a coat of mail, When he goes forth to fight._"
"That's not quite so bad as usual," said Napoleon condescendingly,toying meanwhile with the lash of an old dog-whip he had just "boned"out of the harness-room. Priscilla beamed gratefully upon her critic,and proceeded--
"_He rides him forth across the sand_----"
"Who rides whom?" cried Napoleon. "Didn't the fool ride a horse?"
"It means himself," said Priscilla meekly.
"Then why doesn't _it_ say so?" cried the critic triumphantly, tappinghis boot with the "boned" dog-whip just like any ordinary lord ofcreation in presence of his inferiors.
"It's poetry," explained Priscilla timidly.
"It's silly!" retorted Napoleon, judicially and finally.
Priscilla resumed her reading in a lower and more hurried tone. Sheknew that she was skating over thin ice.
"_He rides him forth across the sand, Upon a stealthy steed._"
"You mean 'stately,' you know," interrupted Napoleon--somewhat rudely,Priscilla thought. Yet he was quite within his rights, for Priscillahad not yet learned that a critic always knows what you mean to saymuch better than you do yourself.
"No, I don't mean 'stately,'" said Priscilla, "I mean 'stealthy,' theway a horse goes on sand. You go and gallop on the sea-shore andyou'll find out."
"I shan't. I haven't got any sea-shore," said Napoleon. "But do hurry.I've listened quite a pennyworth now."
"_He rides him forth across the sand, Upon a stealthy steed, And when he sails upon the sea, He plays upon a reed!_"
"Great soft _he_ was," cried Napoleon Smith; "and if ever I hear yousay that I did such a thing----"
Priscilla hurried on more quickly than ever.
"_In all the world there's none can do The deeds that he hath done: When he hath slain his enemies, Then he comes back alone._"
"That's better!" said Napoleon, nodding encouragement. "At any rate itisn't long. Now, give me my penny."
"Shan't," said Priscilla, the pride of successful achievement swellingin her breast; "besides, it isn't Saturday yet, and you've onlylistened to three verses anyway
. You will have to listen to ever somuch more than that before you get a penny."
"Hugh John! Priscilla!" came a voice from a distance.
The great soldier Napoleon Smith instantly effected a retreat inmasterly fashion behind a gooseberry bush.
"There's Jane calling us," said Priscilla; "she wants us to go in andbe washed for dinner."
"Course she does," sneered Napoleon; "think she's out screeching likethat for fun? Well, let her. I am not going in to be towelled till I'mall over red and scurfy, and get no end of soap in my eyes."
"But Jane wants you; she'll be _so_ cross if you don't come."
"_I_ don't care for Jane," said Napoleon Smith with dignity, but allthe same making himself as small as possible behind his gooseberrybush.
"But if you don't come in, Jane will tell father----"
"_I_ don't care for father--" the prone but gallant General wasproceeding to declare in the face of Priscilla's horrifiedprotestations that he mustn't speak so, when a slow heavy step washeard on the other side of the hedge, and a deep voice uttered thesingle syllable, "_John!_"
"Yes, father," a meek young man standing up behind the gooseberry bushinstantly replied: he was trying to brush himself as clean ascircumstances would permit. "Yes, father; were you calling me,father?"
Incredible as it seems, the meek and apologetic words were those ofthat bold enemy of tyrants, General Napoleon Smith.
Priscilla smiled at the General as he emerged from the hands of Jane,"red and scurfy," just as he had said. She smiled meaningly andaggravatingly, so that Napoleon was reduced to shaking his clenchedfist covertly at her.
"Wait till I get you out," he said, using the phrase time-honoured bysuch occasions.
Priscilla Smith only smiled more meaningly still. "First catch yourhare!" she said under her breath.
Napoleon Smith stalked in to lunch, the children's dinner at the houseof Windy Standard, with an expression of fixed and Byronic gloom onhis face, which was only lightened by the sight of his favouritepigeon-pie (with a lovely crust) standing on the side-board.
"Say grace, Hugh John," commanded his father.
And General Napoleon Smith said grace with all the sweet innocence ofa budding angel singing in the cherub choir, aiming at the same time akick at his sister underneath the table, which overturned a footstooland damaged the leg of a chair.