Read "V. C" by David Christie Murray online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
It was the First of May, and that same good three-master, the _Caesar_, which had carried Major de Blacquaire and Sergeant Jervase from the Crimea to Scutari, was bowling merrily along south of Naples, where Vesuvius had his smoking cap on. There were many invalided men on board, and amongst them three with whom this story has a particular concern.
'You are right, Captain Tompson, it is abominably unlucky; I had reckoned on seeing the finish of the campaign, and it's hard to find oneself bowled over now, and sent home again like a useless old bale of damaged goods.'