Page:The Wouldbegoods.djvu/67

 So did we.

Then he said:

"You seem to be a military lot."

We said we wished we were.

"And patriotic," said he.

Alice said she should jolly well think so.

Then he said he had noticed us there for several days, and he had halted the battery because he thought we might like to look at the guns.

Alas! there are but too few grown-up people so far-seeing and thoughtful as this brave and distinguished officer.

We said, "Oh yes," and then we got off the wall, and that good and noble man showed us the string that moves the detonator, and the breech-block (when you take it out and carry it away, the gun is in vain to the enemy, even if he takes it); and he let us look down the gun to see the rifling, all clean and shiny; and he showed us the ammunition boxes, but there was nothing in them. He also told us how the gun was unlimbered (this means separating the gun from the ammunition carriage), and how quick it could be done—but he did not make the men do this then, because they were resting. There were six guns. Each had painted on the carriage, in white letters, 15 Pr., which the captain told us meant fifteen-pounder.

"I should have thought the gun weighed more than fifteen pounds," Dora said. "It would if it was beef, but I suppose wood and gun are lighter."

And the officer explained to her very kindly