THE LITTLE BROWN BOY.

Otago Witness, Issue 2892, 11 August 1909, Page 90

THE LITTLE BROWN BOY.

By L. G. Mobeely. ,

He sat in the front row. It was th© j first time that he had ever been to a military tournament, and he thought it was the most wonderful sight he had ever seen in all his nine years of life. He scarcely took his eyes off the soldiers and horses, and each manoeuvre in turn he watched with absorbed in- ' terest. His mother spent most of her time in watching him. For the little brown boy was the centre and joy of I her whole life. You see, hie father had gone away into the silent land when his small son had been a laughing, brown- ; eyed baby, and now the little brown boy I was, as his mother said, "everything in ! the world" to her. "My goodness !" he exclaimed breathlessly, as the men and horses went through each wonderful perforfan-ce, "I'll have to be a soldieT, mother. I couldn't be anything else, could I?" "No, sonny," she answered softly ; and ■ if she sighed, well, nobody noticed it ; I and if her eyes grew dim with tears, no , one saw them, because they were fixed j on the little brown boy, and his were ! glued to the arena. She knew he would, as he expressed it, "have to be a sol- j ■ dier." He came of a soldier race, and | he would, of course, follow in his father's j and grandfather's footsteps. It happened that on the day when the j mother and he were at the military I tournament a very gireat and distin- ■ guished commander was also there. He was so great a man that when the audi- • ence "ealised his presence they rose to j i their feet as one man, and cheered him | until the place rang with the sound again i j and again. The little blown boy cTamI bered' upon his chair to get a good view ! of the hero, and the eyes of the small, j eager-faced' boy and the stalwart, keenfaced .man met. The little boy was waving his cap in his small brown hands, and a smile rippled over the great soldier's face and a light sprang into his blue eyes as he met those adoring brown ones. A flush of joy swept over the little • brown boy's' cheeks. He whispered to his mother in awestruck tones : "He smiled at me,, mother. I say, wasn't I a luckj chap ? My goodness ! I'd Tike to shake hands with him. ; only, of course, he wouldn't shake hands with a little chap like me." Wait a bit, little brown boy, the time may come ! It was later on in the same afternoon that something happened which gave a clue to what stuff the little brown boy was made of. Just when the performance "was art. its height, and the great hall' packed from end to end, a sudden cry went up close to one of the entrances : "Fire l Fire!" j In the flash of a second a wave of panic spread' through the audience, and there began one of those ghastly rushes which, once seen, can never be forgot- ! ten. I The little brown boy glanced at his , mother. His face was white, but his eyes shone. He slipped a hand into hei-6. "We'd better stop here, dear," he said. "We'd never get through the crowd. I'll take care of you, mummy." And his mother, looking down at him, realised all at once some strange force of character in her little .*on. The panic was over in a ley, minutes ; | the alarm proved to huve been a faJse I one ; but if his mother had been proud of him before, she wa6 prouder than ever now of her little brown boy. It was his mother why had first given him that title — because of the clear brown of his face and the deep, soft brown of his eyes and hair. She had a fancy, too, for dressing him in brown clothes, so that the name by no means suited him badly. He was her one and oaly joy — I have said that, have 1 not? And, dear chivalrous little soul, he did his level best to take care of her as if he had been a •• man. He could dimly remember — very, very dimly — being lifted upon his father's bed, j long ago, and heai ing hie father say very faintly, in a weak, tiled voice : "God bless you, my son ! Be a braA - e, good man. Take care of mother — some , day." And though he had been .^o small I when the words were spoken, they had somehow become rooted in his mind. The two ambitions of hia life weie: to take | care of mother and to be a good soldier like father. i "Nobody knows what he is to me," his irother ufed to say ; "he Ls so thoughtful ) and tender for such a little boy. *He is always thinking how he can make me i happy." • ' Not that he vrae not a thorough boy- ! like boy. on the other hand, vi spite of i, liih okl-fashioned wave. He was always [ ' to the fore in every manly game at the . school to which he went every day, and i I am afraid that his mother was | more proud of him than otherwise when i ; l:e returned from his first fight, proud . and triumphant. He had knocked down j his adversary at every round although I the adversa/ry had the advantage of him • in age and* size. , And after the military tournament, no - one guessed what agonies his mother en- [ dured when the little brown boy spent » all his leisure time in trying to perform : all the acrobatic feats he had witnessed, >■ and in endeavouring to induce the pony : to perform in the paddock that adjoined I ' the house all ihe marvellous evolutions he - ! had admired as carried out by the hor>€s : of the Dragoons ! i "You see, mother," he said gravely,

"if I'm to be a sol* 1 '■ v I' 1 b^tt^r fp "-'i all thtsc th.ii g5g 5 as * - - -\i-i 1 <.c<k. •>c a? lil be a belt *o!uui viicn th" time ciiruo It -•' on ,'t do t nr a -i. 1 ! to be an. id or nc f jdo tiling-, wcul'l it, moth-ev ' Ai J ilr> Lc'dc-ll smiled and agreed, and boie tl c, .' as well as she could, fee'ii g rr.^ia. d t fat -Denis would end his heroic n. manure- in some disastrous fa-Li* N Bui h<? mana <~ to survive, iu\truicles~. A Iny, like a cat, has nine • li\e:>. I t aiiey. anJ this boy, in spite of : a variety of accidents sufficiently alarming to tm n grey tJie hair of the most hardened mother, did escape with life and limb, and grew from a little brown boy into a big one. " : But though he altered in size he remained the same in nature — loving, tender- ; hearted, straight, and strong— a boy to make his mother's heart swell with pride very often. i His care for his ''little mother." as he called her, wnen he shot up to be a head and shoulders taJler than she was, was as .' chivalrous and thoughtful as ever, and I ' think that if she had expressed the least -\ shadow of dislike to bis entering the army i he would have given up what was the J ambition and dream of his life — to be a great soldier. But Mrs Lkldell had not been a. soldier's daughter and a soldier's wife for nothing. If he talked of the days when lie would wear the Queen's uniform, and perhaps even fight for England, she smiled and entered into all his liopes; she i never let him know how it made her heart > ache to think of the time that was com- j ing when her boy would have to go out, ) like the other sons of the Empire, to : guard the Empire's outposts. j Tliat is the way with mothers. Theirs is the pain and the watching and waiting , at horn?, whilst 'the Empire claims their j darlings for its own ! This mother was like all the rest. j She almost counted the days whilst he : was still at Sandhurst ; she quite counted the hours when the order went forth that j Denis Liddell was to join his regiment in ' Egypt ; and she went with him to South- I ampton with a smiling face and a break- : ing heart. Her little brown boy was all j the world to her, and he was going away, perhaps forever ! A wide stretch of desert sand. Away in the west the sun, a blood red ball, was sinking to rest in a clear, brilliant sky, throwing long, level rays across - the battlefield. The famous charge was over. The battle had raged fiercely. On ; every hand lay the dead and the dying, : but the fight above their heads did not ! ©ease. In the midst of the fiercest fighting ! Tose a brown-faced boy, his eyes shining", ' his lips "set hard, his face grim with the stern elation and excitement of this his fret taste of war; and when the great charge was over has features relaxed a little, but his eyes shone still. j Suddenly a voice beside him exclaimed, "Good heavens! Where is Renton? He was hit — just now— back there — amongst those' fiends. . . Good heavens!" , Without a word or syllable the brownfaced boy turned his horse. He looked . at the man, whose words had been spoken gaspingly, breathlessly, because' of a wound received in that great onslaught. He Jeant a little from the saddle, and , touched the other man's hand, his eyes fixed on the wlrate face, where pain was already carving deep lines. i '"Im going back for Renton," he said quietly. , "Great heavens, man! you can't. It's ' a sheer impossibility. Why — Liddell, it's riding back — into— -hell." "Then into hell I must ride," the boy ' answered shortly. " ! "God bless you !" the elder man's weak voice whispered : and the boy rode back into the wild hideous battle behind them. ' His lips wexxs more tightly set than i ever, but his brown eyes still shone, ' thoujh verily it seemed as though he had ridden into hell itself. Evil-faced dervishes closed around him. the groans of the dying, the cries of the wounded mnigled in his ears with the fierce ' shouts of the foe. A gash across the j cheek r*nt the blood raining down his face, blinding him for a moment. . . . He literally hewed his way onwards, one thought only surging through his brain — Renton must be found and rescued. To find ham at all in the fearful melee seemed at fiist a sheer impossibility ; but at last at la.«t he uttered a little exclamation of thankfulness, for there, lying at his feet, was the man he sought. ". . . How he did it he could never teU, but he flung himself from his horee and lifted the wounded man upon it. "Better leave me," Renton whispered feebly : "we shall never both get through. Splendid of — you to — come." "Oh, 'Vs all right," the boy answered as h« swung himself into the saddle behind his comrade and held the almost | unconscious form close to him. The j deadly moments that followed brought I grey hairs upon Denis Liddell's head. I Whilst his left hand gripped tiie j woundted man firmly, he warded 'off with j ln> right hand, as well as he could, the blow* that fell upon him from all sides. ' ... A scalp wound made him dizzy and s-ick ; a spear thrust in his leg sent a tin ill of agony through him; but he never loosed his hold of the man lie | held, and his faithful horse went fori ward with no more guidance than his | own wis-dom and steadfastness, which be reemed to share with his young master. | The dizziness and sickness were fast getting the better of the little brown boy, the fiendish faces round him ran i together into one hideous nrigihtmare, j the ground seemed to rock and wave like the sea. the sky be-ctan to stoop to meet it. There was a surging in his ears like a rushing of water.*, and all at once he thought he saw his mother's face ; and then — above and beyond — i a ringing cheer pierced his fast-dulling senses. He tried to null himself to- i gether to discover what it meant, when . suddenly his horse .-=tood ttill. •

The world still rocked and waved round him, but the dark fiends were gone, ai:d ;n; n their ste;:d English faces looked into ul>-. eager hands took his unconscious* bidden from his arm, and other eager liquids lilted him from the saddle. There was a hum of voices round him, and cheer after cheer rang out again and again from the crowd of soldiers clustering round. He reeled, and put his hand to his head. . ".What is it?" lie said faintly. "Why. are .they cheering ? Who is it for ?" "Why, for you, old chap •" someone answered chokingly. "They're cheering then Denis Liddell tottered and would have fallen but for the kindly arms that bore him into safe quarters. When he was next conscious ot any external "matter Denis found Himself in bed, and. as he expressed it, bke a mummy for bandages." He was very stiff and sore, intensely hot, and his head ached maddeningly. But the woild no longer rocked up and down and ne could think for two seconds consecutive, v, which was w>re than he had been ab.e to do for a long time. Two seconds was quite long enough for thought ; at the end of that tfme.be was glad to he down and watch idly a long streak of sunlight that lay across his bed. As he watched, the sfereaks widened, because someone parted the door of the tent and let m a. broad pathway of blazing white sunbeams from outside. . Denis heard a clear, decided voice say softly : " One moment. Dale ; I want to see how the boy is,," and then a shadow fell across the strip of sunlight on the bed and a tall man stood beside it. A strange, bewildered recollection came back to Denis' of a certain military tournament, years ago, and of a great commander for whose sake the audience had risen to its- feet and cheered, and ot a little brown-faced boy who had said eagerly : "My goodness! I'd like to shake hands with him; only, of course, he wouldn't shake hands with a little chap like me." , . His two seconds of consecutive thought had lengthened themselves into something; like a- minute; his mind has passed into blankness again, when again it was roused. \ strong hand gripped his, his eyes met the glance of a pair of piercing blue ones, full to the brim of a strange tenderness. "Getting on. my boy?" a clear-decided voice said, still in that curiously softened tone. "This is the first time you have known me." „■,.,_ v , The -strong hand' still held the boy s closely. Denis looked at it almost curiously; a queer little smile broke over his white- face. " I knew you— long ago — sir, he whispered. "When I was— a little chap— l wanted to shake hands— with you— l never thought . . should." His eyes closed. The great ganeral looked at him closely. He fancied the boy \v«s wandering, and beckoned to the doctor, who had entered the teat quietly. "How is he?" the general asktd. 'I thought at first He was batter, but he seems to be wandering. We can't afford to lose him." " I hope we sha'n't do that, sir, the doctor said cheerily. " He's had a hard fight, and so have we, for bis life ;^ but be and we have won. He'll do now." 1 And the next morning, when the general again entered the tent, Denis's brown eyes 'met his in full recognition, and a flush crept over the boy's face as again the strong man's hand grasped his. ! "Ah! you really know me this tune, my boy," the. great man said gently. I Denis smiled, . I "I knew you yesterday, sir; he said, i "only I got a bit mixed, remembering a ' day yearns ago when I had seen you before. I never thought then that you would take such a lot of trouble over me now." , | "Trouble?" The great soldier's strong point was not speech, bat the grip of his hand spoke volumes. " You've got to get well quickly now. We want men like Iyou." "We want men. like you." The , words brought a flush to Denis's face once I more, rang in his ears ' day and night afterwards, echoed and re-echoed in his brain when, a few weeks later, he was invalided home to recruit his strength. " He seemed to mean it, too, mother,' he said simply. " Not that I did anything, you know; but he was jolly good to me,, and I tell you, I never was so surprised at anything in my life as I was when I looked up and saw him by ray bed. Shaking hands with me, too, as if I had done something ! He was jolly good to take any notice of a youngster like me. If I had really done anything I could understand it; but, of course, I did nothing except get a lot of wounds and give a lot of bother!" Perhaps his mother viewed the matter differently. Mothers do sometimes! Perhaps her pride in him was justified — for there came a day when he laid in her lap the small bronze cross which her Majesty gave to her soldiers " for valour " — a day when his mother knew that others besides herself recognised as a hero her "little brown boy." — Ontario Free Press. The collection of animals at the Wellington Zoo now comprises about 300 specimens, representing 100 species. After the disgraceful scene at Melbourne subsequent to a football match between.' South Melbourne and Fitzroy, the captain lof the latter was interviewed, and expressed the opinion that the management of every ground should construct a sub* way leading from the playing gTound to the dressing rooms, or build a high fence to form an avenue along which th© players coiUd pass in safety. There is such a subway at the Collingwood Ground. "Speak to me only with thine eyes,'* But let those eyes be clear; A cold soon makes them otherwise—-. ! Dim, swollen, red, and blear. But still, if beauty would allure When colds have made her plain, Woods' Peppermint Cure will soon «ecu»» I Her speaking eyes again.