A few of those least overcome joined the rear-guard, but the greater
number were too drunk to listen to orders, or even to the warning that the
French would be into the town as soon as the troops marched out.
CHAPTER X
CORUNNA
As the confusion in the streets increased from the pouring out from the
houses and cellars of the camp-followers--women and children, together
with men less drunk than their comrades, but still unable to walk
steadily--who filled the air with shouts and drunken execrations, Colonel
Corcoran rode along the line.
"Just look at that, boys," he said. "Isn't it better for you to be
standing here like dacent men, ready to do your duty, than to be rolling
about in a state like those drunken blackguards, for the sake of half an
hour's pleasure? Sure it is enough to make every mother's son of you swear
off liquor till ye get home again. When the French get inside the town
there is not one of the drunken bastes that won't be either killed or
marched away a thousand miles to a French prison, and all for half an
hour's drink."
The lesson was indeed a striking one, and careless as many of the men
were, it brought home to them with greater force than ever before in their
lives, not only the folly but the degradation of drunkenness. A few
minutes later, General Moore, who was riding up and down the line,
inspecting the condition of the men in each regiment, came along.
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