Tom all good humour and high spirits--making the best of every thing--never non-plussed--never taken aback--perfectly at home, whether flirting with a Lady Charlotte in her drawing-room, or crossing a grouse mountain in the highlands--sufficiently well read to talk on any ordinary topic--and always ready-witted enough to seem more so.

A thorough sportsman, whether showing forth in the "park" at Melton, whipping a trout-stream in Wales, or filling a country-house with black cock and moor-fowl; an unexceptionable judge of all the good things in life, from a pretty ancle to a well hung tilbury--from the odds at hazard to the "Comet vintage." Such, in brief, was Tom.

Now his confrere was none of these; he had been drafted from the Galway militia to the line, for some election services rendered by his family to the government candidate; was of a saturnine and discontented habit; always miserable about some trifle or other, and never at rest till he had drowned his sorrows in Jamaica rum--which, since the regiment was abroad, he had copiously used as a substitute for whiskey.

To such an extent had this passion gained upon him, that a corporal's guard was always in attendance whenever he dined out, to convey him home to the barracks.
The wearisome monotony of a close garrison, with so ungenial a companion, would have damped any man's spirits but O'Flaherty's.

He, however, upon this, as other occasions in life, rallied himself to make the best of it; and by short excursions within certain prescribed limits along the river side, contrived to shoot and fish enough to get through the day, and improve the meagre fare of his mess-table.