The latter operation was often
delayed by the necessity of fetching wood from a distance, the wood in the
immediate neighbourhood having been cut down and burned either by the
French on their advance, or by the British regiments ahead.
He then went to his quarters, where he received the reports of the
medical, commissariat, and transport officers, wrote a report of the state
of the road and the obstacles that he had encountered, and sent it back by
an orderly to the officer commanding the six guns which were following a
day's march behind him. These had been brought along with great labour, it
being often necessary to take them off their carriages and carry them up
or down difficult places, while the men were frequently compelled to
harness themselves to ropes and aid the horses to drag the guns and
waggons through the deep mud. Between the arrival of the troops and dinner
Terence had his time to himself, and generally spent it with his regiment.
"Never did I see such a country, Terence," O'Grady complained to him one
day. "Go where you will in ould Oirland, you can always get a jugful of
poteen, a potful of 'taties, and a rasher of bacon; and if it is a
village, a fowl and eggs. Here there are not even spirits or wine; as for
a chicken, I have not seen the feather of one since we started, and I
don't believe the peasants would know an egg if they saw it.
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