Someone has blundered: an echo of the first verse of Tennyson’s “The Charge of the Light Brigade.” They were greatly feared by the poor and old. Workhouse: The Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 provided that no able-bodied person could get poor relief unless they went to live in special workhouses, where they had to work, often in very harsh conditions, for their food and accommodation. The mouth of hell: an echo of Verse 4 of Tennyson’s “The Charge of the Light Brigade.” Stand to attention: Stand upright, with the head up, the back straight, the chin in, and the hands down by the sides. Here it is a reference to Altred, Lord Tennyson, who was Poet Laureate from 1850 until his death in 1892, and wrote “The Charge of the Light Brigade.” Master-singer: a highly-accomplished singer an echo of “The Mastertersingers of Nuremberg” by the German opera composer Richard Wagner (1813-1883). (See ‘Danny Deever’, The Military Setting) Each pair formed a ‘file’ and the strength of a unit was measured in the number of files on parade. Ten-file strong: Twenty men in two ranks, one behind the other as in a battalion on parade. See “The Mutiny of the Mavericks” in Life’s Handicap, page 223, line 19. The man who writes: Lord Tennyson – see aboveĬolours: the Regimental Colours – the regimental flags which used to be carried into battle. To keep the wolf from the door: to ward off starvation. They lived in deathless song: the Charge of the Light Brigade was celebrated in prose and verse, most memorably in Tennyson’s poem It should be noted that ars does not signify fine art but the art of some skilled activity – in this context, the art of medicine art was long: an echo of the Latin translation of an aphorism by the ancient Greek physician Hippocrates: Ars longa, vita brevis, usually translated in English as ‘art is long, life is short’. Troopers: in this context, cavalrymen under the rank of non-commissioned officer, the equivalent of private soldiers in the infantry. Thirty million: the population of England was some 27 million in 1891, and – with Scotland and Wales – some 33 million.
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