The Patriarch's nephew, very white and very fierce to hear himself
addressed in terms which - out of respect for his august and powerful
uncle - had never been used to him before, demanded instant
satisfaction. He got it next morning in the shape of half-an-ounce
of lead through his foolish brain, and a terrible uproar ensued. To
appease it a scapegoat was necessary. As Samoval so truly said, the
mob is a ferocious god to whom sacrifices must be made. In this
instance the sacrifice, of course, was Major Berkeley. He was broken
and sent home to cut his pigtail (the adornment still clung to by the
29th) and retire into private life, whereby the British army was
deprived of an officer of singularly brilliant promise. Thus, you
see, the score against poor Richard Butler - that foolish victim of
wine and circumstance - went on increasing.
But in my haste to usher Major Berkeley out of a narrative which he
touches merely at a tangent, I am guilty of violating the
chronological order of the events. The ship in which Major Berkeley
went home to England and the rural life was the frigate Telemachus,
and the Telemachus had but dropped anchor in the Tagus at the date
with which I am immediately concerned.
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