My worldly effects consisted of a hat, which had once been round, but which, from my continually turning and twisting it into the shape of cocked-hats, road-hats, soldiers' caps, &c., was now any shape you wished; a little fustian jacket; waistcoat of the same material; a coarse shirt, which, from a violent shaking fit, was completely in rags; a pair of leathers, intolerably fat and greasy; ribbed worsted stockings; and a thwacking pair of high-lows, nailed from heel to toe. These, with a little stick, were my only incumbrances, save a gloomy prospect. I was bitterly hungry, and sadly tired; but on I went until we arrived within a mile of Beccles, some sixteen miles from home. Here some of the soldiers branched off to their quarters in the vicinity of the town; but I followed the greater body, as the more probable means of getting something to eat. The band now again struck up, "Over the hills, and far away." I marched at the head, but began to find that my poor craving stomach could no longer feed upon delicious melody; so I now made up my mind to accost the colonel, and ask him if he could not enlist me for a soldier. The colonel seemed a kind-hearted man; so, as modesty on my part was now quite out of the question, I bent my way to the head inn, where all the officers were assembled. I inquired for the colonel, and was at last shown into a room where he was sitting, with other officers, at breakfast. I strutted up to him with my hat in my hand, and made him a most obsequious bow, with my hand and foot at the same time. I then stood straight, as if I had swallowed a sergeant's pike; when the colonel laughingly said, "Well, my fine little rustic, what's your pleasure?" I said, making another bow, and scraping the carpet with my nailed high-lows, "Soldiering, your honour." At this, the whole of the officers burst into a roar of laughter, in which the colonel most heartily joined. I thought it was the fashion in the army, so I joined them, which only served to increase their mirth; and many of them were obliged to hold their sides from excess of laughter. I soon found that all this merriment was at my expense; at which I began to evince some slight displeasure, and was just about to express it in words, when the colonel said, in the most affectionate manner, "My dear little child, you had better return to your fond mother's lap." Here I could not help piping, and I replied, "Sir, my mother is dead." "Could I even take you," continued the colonel, "I should imagine that I was robbing some fond parent of its child; besides, we are proceeding on foreign service, against the enemy."