THE CUSS WORD THAT SAVED A MUTINY.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 59, 3 April 1909, Page 4

THE CUSS WORD THAT SAVED A MUTINY.

, "The scene was Rorke's Drift, on 23rd January, IH7O. We "had retreated from lsaudlwaua that morning, and hail reached the store camp. Everyone was down on his luck, and everything looked very gloomy. For all we knew, the Zulus were already i» Natal.

At thc time 1 commanded ithe Third Natal Native Contingent, and for the last three days we had been overworked, underfed, and had had no bleep or vest at all. The officers were therefore slack and despondent, and the non-coms, hungry, -savage, and inclined to be mutinous. It therefore behoved me .to buck Iheln up. They were, on the whole, a wild, lawless crowd; very many of them the driftweed of the seven seas. However, 1 knew them and they knew me, and L wanted to keep them for future .service, ah I was sure that, tough as they were, it would be -hard to collect a more reckless or pluckier lot. 1 ypeaed fire on them with: "Now, then, my lads, how many of you are lit fur duty? 1. waut y-ou to quiet those howling nigger*. Those of you who are lit, fall in."

.Mv servant Quia ami all the old soldiers at mu-e I'ell iu, but the others stood muttering aud grumbling in their throats.

Then I let them have it JiOt and strong. I pointed out to tlieni the fact that the Twenty-fourth aud the guns were alongside, a'ud it wanted very little of that sort of talk ami behaviour to make me go to Colonel (llyn and get him to turn them on to such a set of mutinous scoundrels, and after 1 had called them by the names they most understood, 1 turned to tile leader of | the sea pirates and .singled him out. This mail .lack Williams was the name he had joined under-was an old shell-back, of the -stamp that is now as ' rare as the dodo. A man of past middle life, grey and grilled, about sft Oin ill height, "but of enormous width and strength. lie had lieen to sea nearly all his life, and for years in the South Seas or trading ou the Pacific .Slope. i assured the men there was plenty of gootl lighting in front of us, and that 'none of them need repine because we had got one licking, and wound up by telling them that their mixed conduct made me look ou them as a lot of bally conundrums, "and, as for you, Jack Williams, turning sharply to the old buccaneer, "vou are nothing more or less than an a'rliodaetyle ungulate mammal!" (Tins is simply'the zoological name for a pig.) The old sea-dog broke out into a broad grin; never before in all his wicked life had he been called by such a name. He had served under many a Yankee skipper and many a blue-nose mate, but none of them had ever coined such ft cuss word as that. It was medicine to him. . Stepping out from among the men, lie made me hi.s very best sea bow, and then, turning to tlieni, and slapping one huge list into the palm of the other huge hand, lie harangued tlieni. Quoth he: "See 'ore, mates, when a hoilicer, as we know to be. a liolliccr, and a hedecatcd gcnelmaii to boot, speaks yO.u fair like, as man to man, and goes so far as, to call you uns a lot of blankety-blank coinumdrums, and me, Jack Williams, a lilooinin' arkidaktulungrimaniinal, I sav as how that's the hoilicer I stands by aud sticks to. Ain't I right, Bill!' This to his chum. "In course ye it re, Jack," came back the ready answer. • ''Then fall in astern of the commandant. you ballv coiuuindniins!'' And the whole of ;lhe pirates fell in, ready for anvthing. it is written somewhere that n sott word lurneth away wrath. In this case a hard word stopped trouble.—By Col. Hamilton Browne (generally known as | "Maori" Browne), in Pearson's Weekly.