There was a score of recruiting parties in the town beating up for men to join our gallant armies in America and Germany.
Roderick approaches a Captain and a Sergeant, who quickly make him welcome.
RODERICK
I will tell you frankly, sir. I am a young gentleman in difficulties; I have killed an officer in a duel, and I am anxious to get out of the country.
RODERICK (V.O.)
But I needn't have troubled myself with any explanations; King George was in too much want of men to heed from whence they came -- and a fellow of my inches was always welcome. Indeed, I could not have chosen my time better. A transport was lying at Dunleary, waiting for a wind.
RODERICK (V.O.)
I never had a taste for any thing but genteel company, and hate all descriptions of low life. Hence my account of the society in which I at present found myself must of necessity be short. The reminiscences of the horrid black-hole of a place in which we soldiers were confined, of the wretched creatures with whom I was now forced to keep company, of the plowmen, poachers, pickpockets, who had taken refuge from poverty, or the law, as, in truth, I had done myself, is enough to make me ashamed even now.
Roderick sits very disconsolately over a platter of rancid bacon and moldy biscuit, which is served to him at mess. When it comes to his turn to be helped to drink, he is served, like the rest, with dirty tin noggin, containing somewhat more than half a pint of rum and water. The beaker is so greasy and filthy that he cannot help turning round to the messman and saying:
RODERICK
Fellow, get me a glass!
At which, all the wretches round him burst into a roar of laughter, the very loudest among them being Mr. Toole, a red-haired monster of a man.
MR. TOOLE
Get the gentleman a towel for his hands, and serve him a basin of turtle-soup.
Roars the monster, who is sitting, or rather squatting, on the deck opposite him, and as he speaks, he suddenly seizes Roderick's beaker of grog and empties it in midst of another burst of applause.
LINK-BOY
(whispers)
If you want to vex him, ask him about his wife, the washerwoman, who bates him.
RODERICK
Is it a towel of your wife's washing, Mr. Toole? I'm told she wiped your face often with one.
LINK-BOY
(whispers)
Ask him why he wouldn't see her yesterday, when she came to the ship.
RODERICK (V.O.)
And so I put to him some other foolish jokes about soapsuds, hen-pecking, and flat-irons, which set the man into a fury, and succeeded in raising a quarrel between us.
Roderick and Toole fight with cudgels. Roderick gives him a thump across his head which lays him lifeless on the floor.
RODERICK (V.O.)
This victory over the cock of the vile dunghill obtained me respect among the wretches among whom I formed part.
RODERICK (V.O.)
Our passage was very favorable, and in two days we landed at Cuxhaven, and before I had been a month in the Electorate, I was transported into a tall and proper young soldier, and, having a natural aptitude for military exercise, was soon as accomplished at the drill as the oldest sergeant in the regiment.
Various cuts.
Roderick learning the soldierly arts, musket drill, manual of arms, bayonet, marching.
The Cuxhaven troops are drawn up to receive a new regiment, arrived from England.
Roderick sees, marching at the head of his company, his old friend, Captain Grogan, who gives him a wink.
RODERICK (V.O.)
Six weeks after we arrived in Cuxhaven, we were reinforced by Gales regiment of foot from England, and I promise you the sight of Grogan's face was most welcome to me, for it assured me that a friend was near me.
Roderick and Grogan.
RODERICK (V.O.)
Grogan gave me a wink of recognition, but offered no public token of acquaintance and it was not until two days afterwards that he called me into his quarters, and then, shaking hands with me cordially, gave me news which I wanted, of my family.
CAPTAIN GROGAN
I had news of you in Dublin. Faith, you've begun early, like your father's son, but I think you could not do better than as you have done. But why did you not write home to your poor mother? She has sent half-a-dozen letters to you in Dublin.
RODERICK
I suppose she addressed them to me in my real name, by which I never thought to ask for them at the post office.
CAPTAIN GROGAN
We must write to her today, and you can tell her that you are safe and married to "Brown Bess."
Roderick sighs when Grogan says the word "married," on which Grogan says with a laugh:
CAPTAIN GROGAN
I see you are thinking of a certain young lady at Duganstown.
RODERICK
Is Miss Dugan well?
CAPTAIN GROGAN
There's only six Miss Dugans now... poor Dorothy.
RODERICK
Good heavens! Whatever? Has she died of grief?
CAPTAIN GROGAN
She took on so at your going away that she was obliged to console herself with a husband. She is now Mrs. John Best.
RODERICK
Mrs. John Best! Was there another Mr. John Best?!
CAPTAIN GROGAN
No, the very same one, my boy. He recovered from his wound. The ball you hit him with was not likely to hurt him. It was only made of tow. Do you think the Dugans would let you kill fifteen hundred a-year out of the family? The plan of the duel was all arranged in order to get you out of the way, for the cowardly Englishman could never be brought to marry from fear of you. But hit him you certainly did, Roderick, and with a fine thick plugget of tow, and the fellow was so frightened that he was an hour in coming to. We told your mother the story afterwards, and a pretty scene she made.
RODERICK
The coward!
CAPTAIN GROGAN
He has paid off your uncle's mortgage. He gave Dorothy a coach-and-six. That coward of a fellow has been making of your uncle's family. Faith, the business was well done. Your cousins, Michael and Harry, never let him out of their sight, though he was for deserting to England, until the marriage was completed, and the happy couple off on their road to Dublin. Are you in want of cash, my boy? You may draw upon me, for I got a couple of hundred out of Master Best for my share and, while they last, you shall never want.
Roderick on the march.
RODERICK (V.O.)
Our regiment, which was quartered about Stade and Luneberg, speedily had got orders to march southwards towards the Rhine, where we would fight the famous battle of Minden. It would require a greater philosopher and historian than I am to explain the causes of the famous Seven Years' War in which Europe was engaged, and, indeed, its origin has always appeared to me to be so complicated, and the books written about it so amazingly hard to understand, that I have seldom been much wiser at the end of a chapter than at the beginning, and so shall not trouble you with any personal disquisitions concerning the matter.
Various cuts featuring Roderick; marching, cooking at open fires, gambling, resting in a farm yard, officers riding by; shivering in his blanket.