Pen's
heart leaped at this: he had been to hear the band at St. James's play on
a Sunday, when he went out to his uncle. He had seen Tom Ricketts, of the
fourth form, who used to wear a jacket and trousers so ludicrously tight
that the elder boys could not forbear using him in the quality of a butt
or "cockshy"--he had seen this very Ricketts arrayed in crimson and gold,
with an immense bearskin cap on his head, staggering under the colours of
the regiment. Tom had recognised him and gave him a patronising nod--Tom,
a little wretch whom he had cut over the back with a hockey-stick last
quarter, and there he was in the centre of the square, rallying round the
flag of his county, surrounded by bayonets, cross-belts, and scarlet, the
band blowing trumpets and banging cymbals--talking familiarly to immense
warriors with tufts to their chins and Waterloo medals. What would not
Pen have given to enter such a service?
But Helen Pendennis, when this point was proposed to her by her son, put
on a face full of terror and alarm, and confessed that she should be very
unhappy if he thought of entering the army. Now Pen would as soon have
cut off his nose and ears as deliberately and of malice aforethought have
made his mother unhappy; and as he was of such a generous disposition
that he would give away anything to any one, he instantly made a present
of his visionary red coat and epaulettes to his mother.
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