Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle - Sir Arthur Canon Doyle

Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle - Sir Arthur Canon Doyle

In four novels and fifty-six short stories Sir Arthur Canon Doyle developed the characters Mr. Sherlock Holmes and his trusted friend Dr. John Watson. The creation of brilliant sleuth and his partner, who, although not possessing genius, stimulated it in his friend, was a masterstroke. The adventures, memories, return, last bow, and case book of Sherlock Holmes, as well as the four famous novels, are stories of sheer delight. Readers of English literature may not have everlasting charm of Holmesian characters and adventures, or even a famous resident of Baker Street, but there is much in his methodological approach to the solving of criminal cases that is of relevance to applied econometric modeling. Holmesian detection may be interpreted as accommodating the relationship of theories, specification and re-specification of theories, re-evaluation and reformulation of theories, and finally reaching a solution to the problems at hand. With this mind, one can apply reason to learn from the master of detection. This provides an outline of Holmesian deduction through the various stages of deduction through the various stages of accommodation, namely problem solving, theorizing before data, examining the quality of data, the meaning of truth, reconciliation with data, and testing of theories, Testing procedures, especially the use of diagnostic, are the most common in research method used in common in research method used in examining a number of specifications within a modeling cycle of specification, estimation and evaluation. A diagnostic approach to the evaluation or empirical approach models is outlined through testing the key assumption, which defines the parameter space for purposes of inference.

Summery:

At about 4 o’clock on Christmas morning a row broke out between the stranger, who was carrying a white goose slung over his shoulder and a little knot of roughs. The stranger raised his stick to defend himself and smashed the shop window behind him. On hearing the broken sound Mr. Peterson, the honest police officer rushed to spot in order to save the stranger from his assailants, but seeing an official-looking person in uniform, dropped and white goose and his felt hat the stranger and his assailants vanished amid the labyrinth of small streets of the town.

Mr. Peterson collected both goose and the felt-hat on the spot and handed them to Mr. Sherlock Holmes and asked him to find out any clue about the owner of the lost property to restore. The old and patched hat did not produce any clue except the letters H.B. indicates Henry Baker. But it is very difficult to establish the real owner of the hat and the goose among several Henry Bakers of the town. Finally Holmes decided to give an advertisement in the local newspapers about the lost property thinking that if anybody may come to contact him and claim the property.

On 26^th morning Mr. Peterson came to Mr. Sherlock Holmes and showed him a small scintillating blue diamond with the size of a small bean that was found in the crop of the goose. Immediately, Sherlock Holmes recollected about the news published on 22^nd of December telling about the theft that had taken place in Hotel Cosmopolitan and John Horner, the plumber, was accused in that connection.  Further the news says that the blue carbuncle belonged to the Countess of Morcar.

The next day when Dr. Watson approached to Sherlock Holmes flat a person was waiting to meet Mr. Holmes in order to recover his lost property, the goose and the hat advertised in the newspapers. He did not show any particular interest in goose though he was told that the goose was fried for the supper. Even he did not give any importance to the leftovers of the goose like crop, feathers and legs etc. Holmes came to a decision that the person who came to him in the name of Henry Baker is proved his innocence in smuggling of the diamond.  Later, the stranger told that he had bought the goose in Alpha goose club.   

Sherlock Holmes learnt that Alpha goose Club was supplied the same geese by Mr. Breckinridge. When he went to Breckinridge, Holmes came to know the geese actually supplied by Mrs.Oakshott, 117 Brixton Road.  As he is approaching Mrs.Oakshott  to find out  the secret how the blue stone had come into the crop of a goose James Ryder met Holmes on the way and asked about the white goose advertised in the news paper. He told every thing about the blue gem how it was stolen by Catherine Cusack, the maid servant to the Countess Morcar, and handed over him to convert it into money. He went to his sister’s farm and put the stone into the gullet of the white goose with cross-barred tail. He requested his sister, Maggie to sell one fat goose for the Christmas but he had chosen another bird with same plumage. After knowing that he had chosen a wrong bird he ran to his sister’s farm and learnt that all the geese have been sold to Mrs. Oakshott. As he ran to Oakshott she sold them Breckinridge and Breckinridge to Alpha Club. From Alpha Club, Henry Baker had bought the goose with out knowledge of the gem within its crop.  Finally Holmes decided that John Horner, the plumber, is innocent in this connection of the theft that had occurred in the Hotel Cosmopolitan. Plainly James Ryder was asked to get out of the Holmes’ place because it was the season of excuse.  

*****

MENDING WALL - Robert Frost

 MENDING WALL - Robert Frost

Mending wall, is one of the most widely quoted poems of Robert frost, published in 1914. It is a lyric in the form of dramatic monologue. The speaker in the poem is a young man, presumably the poet himself. The lyric is an expression of his views and attitudes. The other character in the poem is the poet's neighbour, an old farmer. He does not speak even a single word, but we know of his views and attitudes, of his conservation and orthodoxy, from what speaker says about him.

The poet and his neighbour get together every spring to repair the stone wall between their respective properties. The neighbour, an old New England farmer, seems to have a deep-seated faith in the value of walls and fences. He declines to explain his belief and only reiterates his father's saying "Good fences make good neighbours". But the speaker is of the opposite opinion. As he points out:

                                There where it is we do not need the wall;

                                He is all pine and I am apple orchard.

To him the neighbour's adherence to his father's saying suggests the narrowness and ignorance of the primitive:

                                He moves in darkness as it seems to me,

                                Not of woods only and shade of trees.

Yet the speaker's own attitude is also enigmatic and in some respects primitive. He seems to be in sympathy with some elemental spirit in nature, which denies all boundaries. It is suggested that there is some supernatural power at work in Nature that is always against all fences and walls,

                                Something three is that doesn't love the wall,

                                That sends the frozen ground swell under it,

                                And spills the upper boulders in the sun;

                                And makes gaps even two can pass abreast….

                                It might be some mysterious fairy:

                                Something there is that doesn't love a wall

        That wants it down. I could say Elves to him,

        But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather

        He said it for himself.

The poem portrays a clash between these two points of view, and it may, therefore, seem that its meaning Is the solution. Frost offers to the conflict. The poem leads one to ask, which of the two is right. The speaker or his Yankee neighbour? Should man tear down the barriers which isolate individuals from one another., or should he recognise the distinction and limits are necessary for human life? "Frost does not provide an answer, and the attempt to wrest one from his casual details and enigmatic comments would falsify us a lesson in human relations." Though the poem presents the speaker's attitude more sympathetically than the neighbour's, it does not offer this as the total meaning. Frost's intention is to portray a problem and explore the many different and paradoxical issues it involves. He pictures it within an incident from rural life, and in order to reveal its complex nature he develops it thorough the conflict of two opposed points of view.

*****

Hard Times - Charles Dickens

Hard Times - Charles Dickens 

Examine Hard Times as a social novel. / Discuss Dickens as social reformer with special reference to Hard Times.

J.W. Beach points out, Dickens's Hard Times, attacks the very basic assumptions and the characteristic ideology of industrial England. This novel, says Beach, is a dramatization of what Carlyle took to be the meaning of utilitarianism and of the orthodox liberal system of Laissez-faire. This novel clearly shows the role of Dickens as a critic of social structures and as a social reformer.

“Utilitarianism” owes its full theoretical development to Jeremy Bentham, who said that society should aim at the greatest happiness of the greatest number. Bentham held that the aim of life was happiness; and this happiness-philosophy made an immediate appeal to the superficial kind of thinking which is known as “utilitarianism” because this philosophy emphasized the importance of material goods and seemed to ignore completely the moral and spiritual needs of human beings. According to this philosophy, if the amount of happiness secured was equal, then gambling was as good as poetry. It also meant that the happiness of thoroughly selfish life was equal to or even grater than the happiness of greatest number, Bentham added a second principle namely that every man was the best judge of his own interests. This second principle led to the formulation of a policy that came to be called Laissez-faire, meaning that ‘people should be left free to act for themselves’.

The theory of utilitarianism was severely criticized by philosophers like Carlyle who were believers in the moral and spiritual values of life. The principle of Laissez-faire became in course of time during the Victorian Age, a term of abuse in the vocabulary of socialism because it stood for governmental refusal to intervene in the cause of social justice, to protect the weak against the strong, and to allow individuals to pursue their own selfish interests. Hard Times shows Dickens’s antagonism to both utilitarianism and laissez-faire. Dickens attacks the Victorian Society which has characteristic of the greed for money that he regarded as the root of all evils.

The utilitarian principle finds its exponents and champions in the two leading characters of Hard Times, Thomas Gradgrind and Josiah Bounderby. Grandgrind’s theory of education is evidently an offshoot of his utilitarian attitude to life. This man emphasizes the importance of facts, and fails to attach any importance of feelings and emotions. He wants to develop the reasoning faculty of the pupils in his school and, to that end; he exhorts the new schoolmaster to teach the boys and the girls in his model school facts, and facts alone, and to root out everything else. Gradgrind is man of realities, man of facts and calculations. He always proceeds upon the principle that two and two are four and nothing more. This “eminently practical man” goes about with rule, a pair of scales and the multiplication table always in his pocket, because life and human beings are matters of facts and figures for him.   

Bounderby, banker and industrialist, is another embodiment of the utilitarian principle; he illustrates the principle of Laissez-faire. Bounderby is described as a “man perfectly devoid of sentiment”: while Gradgrind does show signs of human feeling by taking the abandoned sissy under his protection and he certainly changes his outlook upon life by the time the story ends, Bounderby shows no signs of any human feeling and remains till the end what he is at the beginning. Bounderby is a man “made out of a coarse material”. He constantly boasts of his being a self-made man; he looks upon his workmen as tools by using which in the proper manner he can enrich himself. He is frankly contemptuous of the needs, requirements, and demands of his workmen; because he thinks that these people would not be satisfied with anything less than turtle soup and venison, with gold spoon. He shamelessly regards industrial smoke as “meat and drink” for the workers and for the factory-owners; this smoke is in his opinion the healthiest thing in the world in all respects, and particularly for the lungs. Dickens’s portrayal of Bounderby is as severe a condemnation of utilitarianism as could be imagined from the pen of a great satirist.

Thus Hard Times is considered a social novel or of Dickens as a social reformer in this novel. Dickens’s criticism of the hypocrisy and false pride of the upper classes as represented in the portrayal of Mrs. Sparsit, Slackbridge, and Harthouse and his unemotional pursuit of Louisa.   

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Active voice and Passive voice

Tense	Active voice (verb)	Passive voice (verb)
Simple present	write/ writes (any transitive verb)	is/are written
Present continuous	am/is/are writing	is/ are being written
Present prefect	has/have written	has/have been written
Present perfect continuous	has/have been writing	No passive voice
Simple past	wrote	was/ were written
Past continuous	was/ were writing	was/ were being written
Past perfect	had written	had been written
Past perfect continuous	had been writing	No passive voice
Simple future	will/shall/may/can/ought/would/should / could/might write	will/shall/may/can/ought/would/should / could/might be written
Future continuous	will/shall/may/can/ought/would/should / could/might be writing	No passive voice
Future perfect	will/shall/may/can/ought/would/should / could/ might have written	will/shall/may/can/would/should/could /might have been written
Future perfect continuous	will/shall/may/can/ought/would/should / could/ might have been writing	No passive voice
Model sentences Rama kills Ravana                             Ravana is killed by Rama I wrote a letter.                                     A letter was written be me He is drawing a picture                       A picture is being drawn by her Do it yourself I have written a letter. I can do it. She hunts a deer. He drove a car. She has read a novel. I bought this book. We have done this job. -----

Springtime - O Henry

Springtime - O Henry

A famous American short story writer William Sydney Porter is known to the literary world as O. Henry. When he was 22, he moved to New York and published over three hundred short stories under the pen name of O. Henry. His short stories are marked with realistic details culminated with effective surprising endings.

“Springtime” is a beautiful romantic love story between Sarah, a typist at a restaurant in New York and Walter Franklin, a farmer in the country. Sarah, a beautiful young lady with fine figure working as a typist in Schulenberg Home Restaurant. It was just next door to the red-brick building where she had a living room. Sarah has to type menu cards and bills of fare every day for 21 tables of Schulenberg Home Restaurant.  

Sarah, an intelligent young lady, chose to work on a typewriter. Though she did not type very quickly yet she did her work skillfully and pleasantly. Mr. Schulenberg was delighted at her work and willingly agreed to send her room three meals a day. Sarah had to prepare menu cards for 21 tables of the restaurant every day.  She listed the dishes so temptingly in each of the menu to catch the eye of the costumer. However, she did not feel quite happy despite her comfortable life.

In the summer of the last year, Sarah had gone into the country and had fallen in love with a young farmer, Walter Franklin. Together they sat and wove a crown of dandelions to her nut brown hair. He praised the effect of those yellow flowers against to her nut brown hair. They decided to marry at the very signs of the next spring.

Sarah returned to New York to hit the typewriter. One afternoon she was shaking with cold in her room. A waiter came to her and handed the list of the menu written in unreadable hand writing. There were many changes in the menu than usual. She classified all dishes properly. When she was typing the list of fruits she reminded the arrival of the spring. Tears welled up in her eyes by remembering her lover, Walter. She had not received any letter from him for more than two weeks. The lonely time proves to be depressing for Sarah. The memories of Walter tormenting her ceaselessly.

One-day, as Sarah began her typing work for the day, one item among the list of menu that read Dandelions with Eggs.  This upset her as she remembered Walter’s offer of the crown made of dandelions. Immediately tears welled up in her eyes by the memory of dandelions. Sarah tried to force back her tears to type the menu cards.

At six O’clock the waiter brought her dinner and carried away the typewritten menu. She ate her food sadly and after a while she sat for reading. As settled down for reading the front-door bell rang. The landlady answered it. Sarah left her book and listened. The farmer Walter Franklin had come there in search of Sarah.  Listening to this Sarah rushed to meet him and cried “Why haven’t you written?”

Franklin had come to New York a week ago and went to her old address. But she had left that house. He searched for her. She told him that she had written to him but that had not reached him. In the course of his search for her he had somehow come to the restaurant that evening. When he saw the typewritten menu-card, he observed certain clues in it and instantly he shouted for the owner and got her address.

The capital letter ‘W’ in the menu card was above the line. In the upper right-hand corner a tear had fallen between two titles of dishes on the list was description: ‘Dearest Walter, with hard-boiled Egg’. It was the surest sign that the lovelorn Sarah had typed it. Through the owner’s help, he lands in Sarah’s room. For Sarah and Walter, it is a God-sent gift.

****

If You Are True To Your Gift – Irakli Abashidaze

If You Are True to Your Gift - Irakli Abashidaze

Irakli Abashidaze was a Georgian poet, a literary scholar and a politician born in 1909. Most of his poems were patriotic but normally loyal to Soviet Union. In this poem ‘If Your Are True To Your Gift’, the poet expresses his true feelings about life and its importance. The poet says that if a person is true to the gift i.e. ‘life’ given to us by the God and if that gift is true, then such a gift opens the radiant and dazzling gates of the dawn. If a person is true to his life and has some moral values in his life, nothing can harm his life (gift). The three beasts or the three plagues i.e. neither ‘Old Age’, nor ‘Time’ nor ‘Space’ can do anything to the gift of life.

The Poet says that the bells will toll and the old age which is like a bandit (thief) would come creeping. Man will not be known that his worn out face in his own old age when it comes to him.  As time passes old age comes to a person, his knees are bent and crippled but his daily life goes on through ages till the end of his life.

Man has to face the physical changes that are brought about the Time but his ethical (moral) values should be retained as it is till the end. His screen (vision) grows dimmer and greyer. The charm of a person will be faded away by the Time day by day. Man is not the same next day even though he is clad in precious stone from ‘Eklari’; he is unaware of the sudden movement of the swift wings of the bats.

The bells will toll as long as man lives then he says a few sundry words and leads his life after sometime he makes room for the new generation. He is uprooted from this Earth just leaving his outline in this world. Some other person will soon fill his place. They say that the voice of a person leaves a visible phrase of him. Hence the poet says that if we are true to our lives and led a worthy life properly and morally that itself is a gift to us. Each and every person should know – what you are? What is the purpose of life? And use this gift of life in a most perfect way as it is required. Then they wouldn’t have any fear for man about his life because the Time, Old Age and Space will spare him and do not harm.

****

WINDHOVER--To Christ our Lord

WINDHOVER--To Christ our Lord

Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844 - 1889)

I caught this morning morning's minion, Kingdom

Of daylight's dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding

Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding:

High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing

In his ecstasy! Then off forth on swing,

As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding

Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding

Stirred for a bird,--- the achieve of, the mastery of the thing

Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here

Buckle! And the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion

Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

No wonder of it: sheer plod makes plough down sillion

Shine, and blue --bleak embers, ah my dear,

Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermilion.

Glossary:

The windhover: a kestrel, a small hawk that hovers in the wind

minion : wings of a pet bird

dauphin: heir (figuratively)

rolling level underneath him steady air : this refers to the buoyancy of the air to lift up the bird while flying.

how he rung :  the line brings out the poet's joy and surprise

'rung upon the rein' : checked at the rein's end i.e., the speed of flying.

Buckle: to fasten

chevalier: a knight of the medieval times

sillion: furrow made by ploughing

ah, my dear: refers to Jesus Christ as the subtitle of the poem indicates.

fall …. Vermilion: this is a reference to Christ's bleeding on the crucifix.

Summary:

                           

Gerard Manley Hopkins was the pioneer of the Modern English verse. Like many other poets he too was highly experimental in writing the modern verse. As a poet, he has the originality of thought and style. His poems are capturing at the beauty and splendour of the Nature, which he saw as a manifestation of God's glory. His concepts of inscape, instress and sprung rhythm gave rise to new aesthetic theory and today he is seen as the first of the moderns. But his critics often commented that his poetry was imperfect in many ways.

As a parson G. M. Hopkins glorifies the sacrifice of Jesus Christ in the poem The Windhover. The windhover, the falcon, symbolises the spiritual majesty and the glory of Jesus Christ.

One day, early in the morning Hopkins saw a falcon flying. It seemed the steady air held him up in his flight. The flight of the bird and gliding with its stretched wings was so majestic. He sails smoothly and glided over. It is just a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend.  The majesty of the brute beauty and valorous act appease our eyes and gladden our hearts. The chivalrous heroic deeds are lovely though it sounds dangerous. The furrows made by plough while ploughing reminds us the past activities of Jesus Christ and suffering himself on the Cross.

Jesus Christ suffered the inexplicable pain inflicted on him at the time of crucification was a supreme sacrifice. This indicates the glory and spiritual height he attained. Thus G. M. Hopkins poems are full of religious with pure spiritual experience.

****

Channel Firing – Thomas Hardy

Channel Firing – Thomas Hardy

“Channel Firing”; The poem is an illustrative of Thomas Hardy’s view that the pain-inducing flaws in the nature of things are ever present and eternal. This of course is not Hardy’s only view on the war subject. Inconsistently, in some poems, he implies a view that history had degenerated to a condition of endurable suffering and disillusionment, and that time should stop before things get worse.

‘Channel Firing’ is Thomas Hardy’s way of saying that war is pointless. They’ve been around forever, but what was truly been accomplished by it?

The narrator is a dead person awoke from its eternal sleep in its grave by cannons going off out at sea to practise firing just before World War I. At first the narrator believes, it is ‘God’s Judgement Day’. Then Hardy states that the mouse and the worms got scared by the roaring sound of the guns, but the glebe cow, or cow at a church used for keeping the grass short, just drools as if understands too well what is going on thus the guns going off is expected.

Then God tells the narrator that it is not Judgement Day, and that the noises are from gunnery practice at sea. He says the world is just like it used to be. God also tells the dead that those involved in the war do not do anything more than the dead people in their graves as far as forwarding his purposes. He says that most of the living are lucky. It isn’t Judgement Day because they could all being sweeping the floors of Hell for their threats of war. Then one of the dead asks themselves if the world will ever understand what it’s meant for, or if it will always be as confusing as when that dead person was alive. Another one of the dead persons is a preacher who says he wished he would have just smoked and drank instead of preaching. The final stanza mentions avenging, or getting revenge for, at three places Stourton Tower, Camelot and Stonehenge.

The essence of the poem is a criticism of war and of the endless human desire to have war and violence. Hardy points out that though it occurs time and time again, and though it is incredible devastation, people are too crazy to stop, and would always continue to make red war more redder though it displeases and doesn’t honour God(s).

(or)

Channel Firing – Thomas Hardy

Channel Firing, one of the few war poems in the selection, is by far the most savagely critical in its scornful condemnation of man's irredeemable desire for conflict.

The poem is spoken in the first person by one of the dead buried in a church the windows of which have been shattered by the report of guns being fired for "practice" in the English Channel.  So great is the disturbance that the skeletons believe Judgement Day (the resurrection of the dead) has and make all suddenly sitting up in readiness for the great day. Then the poem takes an irreverent turn as Hardy introduces God to the proceedings, reassuring the corpses that it is not time for the Judgement Day but merely "gunnery practice", adding that the world is as it was when the dead men "went below" to their graves.  That is to say, every country is trying to make its methods of destruction more efficient, and shed more blood, making "red war yet redder".  The living are seen as being insane and no more ready to exercise Christian love than are the dead, who are perforce "helpless in such matters".  In other words, they do nothing "for Christ’s sake". 

God continues, observing that those responsible for the "gunnery practice" are fortunate that it is not the day of judgement,  as, if it were, their bellicose threats would be punished by their having to scour the floor of Hell. Hell seems to be the appropriate place for the war-makers.  With a hint of malice God suggests that He will ensure that His judgement day is far hotter, though He concedes that He may not bother as eternal rest seems more suited to the human condition.  The blowing of trumpet signals the end of the world.

God's remarks being at an end, the skeletons voice their own opinions of the gunnery practice, wondering if sanity will ever be achieved by man.  Significantly, while many of the skeletons nod as if to suggest that man will never learn, the parson regrets having spent his life giving sermons which have had no effect on his congregation: "preaching forty year" has made no difference to his hearers.

In the final stanza of the poem Hardy writes of how the threatening sound of the guns, ready "to avenge” resounds far inland, as far as the places he names.  The landmarks to which Hardy refers are not chosen merely to provide authentic local detail. By invoking the dead civilizations of the past, Hardy sets the poem in a far more expansive historical time-scale.  Perhaps he further suggests that civilizations (including his own?) are doomed because man's nature never makes any moral advance.

12 Manners to get respect from others

12 Manners to get respect from others

The Golden word is “Mannerism make a man, good manners make a good man.”

Sometimes, even educated people behave unnatural way even in trifle matters and become cheap in the eyes of others. So to avoid such embarrassing situations, it is well and good to observe the following 12 points and be dignified.

1. Never read the letters of even your closest relatives, friends, and family members like brothers / sisters. If you read their letters, they will treat you a person without manners.

2. Never show interest in others personal matters and do not read their personal diaries.

3. Never see their SMSs in their cell phones and also their money purses.

4. Don’t see their albums, unless they request you to see them and also not pass your comments about the album’s nature and external appearance.

5. Switch off the cell phones or keep them in silent mode, when you are attending the official meetings, cultural programmes and also during dinner times in the presence of guests.

6. Whenever guest visit your home, open the door and invite them politely and walk behind them (not in front of them) and make them be seated comfortably either in the chairs or in a sofa.

7. Whenever you go to your friend’s house, take with you, sweets and fruits and for the children biscuits and chocolates etc.

8. Whenever anyone visits your home, usually they bring something for you and to your children also and you also reciprocate them in the same manner.

9. Whenever you have taken help from others, express your gratitude by saying words like, ‘thanks or please…’, etc. you will get good impression in their opinion about you. Give tips to waiters in hotels or restaurants.

10. During parties or in functions take the food items along with the guests (not alone) and also it is good to serve each other and drink together. It is a good social behaviour.

11. While taking coffee, tea or cool drink in the office, always keep the office files on your left side (not on a right side).

12. A simple smile on your face brings laurels and creates good impression on you in other’s minds; moreover it costs nothing but fetches everything.

‘Give respect and take respect’ is a good slogan and keep it in your mind, wherever you go and whatever your profession and position may be.

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Waterloo - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Waterloo - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: Summary 

There are four characters in this play. Corporal Brewster aged ninety-six, Norah Brewster, his grandniece, Sergeant McDonald and Colonel Midwinter. In a front room in a small country house there is a roughly made painting of Corporal Brewster in a red coat with a bearskin. On one side of the portrait, there is a cutting from a newspaper framed, and on the other, there is a medal also within a frame. 

Norah Brewster comes in with a bundle of her luggage. She finds nobody at home. She is impressed with her grand-uncle's portrait and medal. Her granduncle seems to have been neglected, so she has come to look after him. The housekeeper seems to have gone after lighting the fire. Norah waxes to prepare food for her granduncle. She thinks only a brave man dared to fight against him. 

Just then Sergeant McDonald has come to see Corporal Gregory Brewster, who was in the Scots Guards and who fought in the battle of Waterloo. Then the Sergeant goes out wishing to come again in an hour or two when he comes back from the butts. Then Norah asks who she will say came for him. He returns and says that he is Sergeant McDonald of Artillery. He has heard that the old gentleman was not properly looked after. Norah says that that is why her father sent her to do what she could. She is preparing tea for the old man. McDonald says that there is not many living now who can say that they fought against Napoleon Bonaparte. He reads the slip of paper beside the medal. There is the date, August 1815: He also reads the cutting of the newspaper. There's the heading "Heroic Deed" and the following report: "On Tuesday an interesting ceremony was performed at the barracks of the third regiment of the Guards and a special meal was presented to Corporal Gregory Brewster in recognition of his bravery in the recent great battle. On the 18th of June four companies of the Third Guards held the important farmhouse of Hougoumont. At a critical period of the action the troops found themselves short of powder, and Corporal Brewster was sent to bring the reserve ammunition. The Corporal returned with two carts, but he found that in his absence the French had ignited the hedge around the farm and the passage of the carts had become almost impossibility. The first cart exploded, killing the driver and his comrade turned his horses, but Corporal Brewster jumped into his seat, threw the driver down and drove the cart through the flames and rejoined his comrades and the battle was bravely won." He hands back the frame and Norah says that they are all proud of her uncle. 

Taking his carbine, the Sergeant goes and Norah thinks that he kindly reads to her all about her uncle. Her uncle calls Mary, the housekeeper, to give him his food. Corporal Brewster enters. He is walking unsteadily. He's very thin, bent and his hair is white and his face is wrinkled. When he walks across the room, Norah looks at the man first and then at his picture on the wall. The old man is dissatisfied and asks for food because the cold has injured him without food. He wants to have tea. Then Norah introduces her as his brother, George's granddaughter and he is surprised at his little George having a girl. He remembers that he gave a pup to his brother and asks her if he did not give it to her to bring. And Norah replies that her grandfather died twenty years before. He drinks tea with loud supping. She gives him butter and egg and he eats voraciously. He asks her if she came by coach yesterday. Then she replies that she came by the morning train. But the old man is afraid of the new things. He wonders how she travelled more than twenty miles in the morning. He is surprised at the rapid progress in the world. He says that he gets energy from food. Life does not seem very long to him. He is over ninety, but he thinks that he got his bounty only yesterday and he still feels the smell of the burned powder on his nose. He is proud of the day when he was given the medal. He coughs and drinks medicine out of the bottle. 

A regiment of soldiers is coming down the street. Norah is quite excited. The old man wants his glasses and complains that bands don't seem to play as loud nowadays as they used to. He wants to know their number, but Norah says they have no numbers, but names. He is not very happy with this change. He enjoys watching them march and swing. He feels pain in his chest and his skin also causes him pain. 

The Sergeant appears again in the room. He wants to see the old man. He says that he is proud and glad to see the old man. He salutes him. Norah is half frightened and half attracted to see the young man. The old man asks him to sit down. When he sees the three stripes, he says that it is three times easier to these days. The Sergeant introduces himself and says that all his mates are proud to have the old man in the town. He also invites the old man to the non-commissioned mess to have a pipe and a glass of rum. The Corporal says that he will go there in fine weather. He is happy to hear about the non-commissioned mess. When the Sergeant asks him if he was in the Guards, he replies that he was in the Scots Guards. He adds that all the Guardsmen from the Colonel Byng to the drummer boys have marched away and that he is still here as a loafer. He thinks that it is not his fault because he can't leave his post without being called. The Sergeant gives him a pouch of tobacco. He tries to fill his clay pipe, but drops it. It breaks and he begins to sob like a child. The Sergeant soothes him by giving him his wooden pipe and he smiles instantly bursting through his tears. He says that it's a fine pipe, and that his brother, George, never had pipes like this. He also wants to have the feel of the carbine and is surprised at it. Then the Sergeant goes out. Norah thinks that he will be like her granduncle in sixty years and that her granduncle was once like him. The old man asks her to move his chair to the door. It will be warm there and the flies won't disturb him. 

The old man then asks Norah to read to him from the Bible. He wants her to read about the wars and soldiers. When Norah says that it's all peace in the next world, he replies that there will be the final battle of Armageddon. He wants to go back to the corner. When he is rising, Colonel Midwinter comes in civilian costume. He has come to see the Corporal (the old man). When he introduces himself as the Colonel of the Scots Guards, the Corporal jumps to his feet and salutes Then he staggers and is about to fall. The Colonel and Norah support him. He feels very happy that the colonel has come to visit him. The Colonel also says that they are proud of the Corporal in London. He tells the Colonel about his health. But his memory is excellent. He remembers the names of every person in the company and every detail of the battle. The most impressive thing of his life was that he lost three half-crowns that he lent to Jabes Smith at Brussels. The Colonel says that the officers of the Guards want him to buy him some little present which may add to his comfort. Then the Corporal requests the Colonel to do him a favor He wishes to have a flag and a firing party when he dies because he is not a civilian and he also wants two lines of the bearskins after his coffin The Colonel says that he will see to it but hopes that they may have nothing but good news from him. And he goes out. 

Norah supposes that the old man is asleep. But he is so grey and thin that he frightens her. She wishes she had someone to advise her when he is ill and when he is not. Suddenly the Sergeant enters and asks how he is. But she feels quite frightened about him. He hopes that the sleep will bring strength to him. He has collected a pound of fine tobacco for the old man. He asks her if she has been to the barrack and requests her to come with her granduncle. The old man, in a loud voice says that the Guards need powder and struggles to rise. Norah is frightened. He again says that the Guards need powder and falls back into the chair. Norah and the Sergeant rush to him. Norah starts to sob and asks what he thinks of the old man. The Sergeant seriously replies that the corporal is dead and with his old companions. 

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