No More Learning

G. Don't be too hard on a man. You know that a lot of us only take
up the thing for a few years and then go back to Town and catch on with
the rest.

Capt. M. Not lots, and they aren't some of Us.

Capt. G. And then there are one's affairs at Home to be considered--my
place and the rents, and all that. I don't suppose my father can last
much longer, and that means the title, and so on.

Capt. M. 'Fraid you won't be entered in the Stud Book correctly unless
you go Home? Take six months, then, and come out in October. If I could
slay off a brother or two, I s'pose I should be a Marquis of sorts.
Any fool can be that; but it needs men, Gaddy--men like you--to lead
flanking squadrons properly. Don't you delude yourself into the belief
that you're going Home to take your place and prance about among
pink-nosed Kabuli dowagers. You aren't built that way. I know better.

Capt. G. A man has a right to live his life as happily as he can. You
aren't married.

Capt. M. No--praise be to Providence and the one or two women who have
had the good sense to jawab me.

Capt. G. Then you don't know what it is to go into your own room and see
your wife's head on the pillow, and when everything else is safe and the
house shut up for the night, to wonder whether the roof-beams won't give
and kill her.

Capt. M.