noon
I pressed her hand to my lips , gave one long , last look , turned my horse rapidly away , and ere a minute was far out of sight of where I had left her . Power was detained in town by some orders from the adjutant-general , so that I started for Cork the next morning with no other companion than my servant Mike . For the first few stages upon the road , my own thoughts sufficiently occupied me to render me insensible or indifferent to all else . My opening career , the prospects my new life as a soldier held out , my hopes of distinction , my love of Lucy with all its train of doubts and fears , passed in review before me , and I took no note of time till far past noon . I now looked to the back part of the coach , where Mike 's voice had been , as usual , in the ascendant for some time , and perceived that he was surrounded by an eager auditory of four raw recruits , who , under the care of a sergeant , were proceeding to Cork to be enrolled in their regiment . The sergeant , whose minutes of wakefulness were only those when the coach stopped to change horses , and when he got down to mix a `` summat hot , '' paid little attention to his followers , leaving them perfectly free in all their movements , to listen to Mike 's eloquence and profit by his suggestions , should they deem fit . Master Michael 's services to his new acquaintances , I began to perceive , were not exactly of the same nature as Dibdin is reported to have rendered to our navy in the late war .