The Cardinal's Wargame Reveries

The Wagram project ,French Artillery part 1

2012-01-22T12:37:00.000+11:00

All AB 12 & 8lbers

Pike

2012-01-03T16:02:00.002+11:00

Kriegsmarine and RN, in a small scale..

2012-01-03T15:20:00.003+11:00

Scharnhorst and Gneiseneau

Bismarck and Tirpitz

The Kriegdmarine capital ships

Pocket Battleships

Nelson and Rodney

The Mighty Hood

a 10c coin for scale

The Wagram project ,French chassuers a cheval and Saxon hussars

2011-11-16T15:01:00.001+11:00

All AB 18mm

The Duke of Brunswick June 1815

2011-11-14T23:27:00.001+11:00

Perry

Napoleonic Staff painted for the Goulburn Congress

2011-11-14T23:24:00.001+11:00

a variety of 28mm

The Emperor..and others..

2011-11-14T23:09:00.000+11:00

Foundry Imperial Tableau

Russian Civil War ,Red Army MMGs

2011-11-14T22:59:00.000+11:00

bought at MOAB bring and buy and then reworked.Copplestone 20mm

The Wagram project ,The last German infantry completed

2011-11-14T22:49:00.001+11:00

These had gone missing in the front room.. preparing for the carboot sale turned them up..

avatar

2011-11-13T01:03:00.004+11:00

Normans, for Impetus

2011-11-08T14:49:00.000+11:00

Riders , a mix of Crusader metals and Conquest plastics, all horse Conquest plastics

The Red Phalanx in 28mm

2011-11-06T14:01:00.001+11:00

Seleucids for AP..shields white and glossy so he can put on his own LBM shield patterns

1st Corp Successor Pikes..

2011-10-28T14:09:00.001+11:00

shields white as my mate AP will , thankfully, put on his own LBM shields patters, good on him I say...

Saga Revisited

2011-10-25T13:05:00.001+11:00

Reorganised these, with a few extra to broaden it all out ..so
1.Hearth guard and leader and beserks, 17 figures

Huscarles,or hearthguard..and the leader..

Two units of Warriors ,24 miniatures
2. The first unit of 12.

3.the second unit of 12.

and finally 12 levy bow

Saga Vikings ,28mm plastic

2011-10-22T01:08:00.002+11:00

did these, made from both Gripping Beast and Wargames Factory, completed , in the painting sense in a 24 hour period..37 fine fellows
a leader, 12 heavy infantry, 4 berserks, 4 bowmen and 16 medium infantry

The Chieftain and his hearth fellows

Bows

The folk of lesser quality

The four beserker

The mollwitz project

2011-09-29T21:53:00.000+10:00

Condotta Captain

2011-09-25T17:58:00.002+10:00

Foundry

Normans , 28mm , for Impetus

2011-09-13T14:25:00.000+10:00

My first , and only unit so far ..all Conquest plastic horses, mix of Conquest and Crusader plastic and metal humans

The painting zone

2011-08-29T16:56:00.000+10:00

disassembled, cleaned, dusted , vacummed, reassembled in about half the area,, what a day. I do have a bit of paint

Wagram Project Massed French

2011-08-28T19:00:00.000+10:00

All AB 15s

The Melancholy Hussar of the German Legion

2011-08-23T16:58:00.000+10:00

The Melancholy Hussar of the German Legion

by Thomas Hardy

Chapter I

Here stretch the downs, high and breezy and green, absolutely unchanged since those eventful days. A plough has never disturbed the turf, and the sod that was uppermost then is uppermost now. Here stood the camp; here are distinct traces of the banks thrown up for the horses of the cavalry, and spots where the midden-heaps lay are still to be observed. At night, when I walk across the lonely place, it is impossible to avoid hearing, amid the scourings of the wind over the grass-bents and thistles, the old trumpet and bugle calls, the rattle of the halters; to help seeing rows of spectral tents and the impedimenta of the soldiery. From within the canvases come guttural syllables of foreign tongues, and broken songs of the fatherland; for they were mainly regiments of the King’s German Legion that slept round the tent-poles hereabout at that time.

It was nearly ninety years ago. The British uniform of the period, with its immense epaulettes, queer cocked-hat, breeches, gaiters, ponderous cartridge-box, buckledshoes, and what not, would look strange and barbarous now. Ideas have changed; invention has followed invention. Soldiers were monumental objects then. A divinity still hedged kings here and there; and war was considered a glorious thing.

Secluded old manor-houses and hamlets lie in the ravines and hollows among these hills, where a stranger had hardly ever been seen till the King chose to take the baths yearly at the sea-side watering-place a few miles to the south; as a consequence of which battalions descended in a cloud upon the open country around. Is it necessary to add that the echoes of many characteristic tales, dating from that picturesque time, still linger about here in more or less fragmentary form, to be caught by the attentive ear? Some of them I have repeated; most of them I have forgotten; one I have never repeated, and assuredly can never forget.

Phyllis told me the story with her own lips. She was then an old lady of seventy-five, and her auditor a lad of fifteen. She enjoined silence as to her share in the incident, till she should be ‘dead, buried, and forgotten.’ Her life was prolonged twelve years after the day of her narration, and she has now been dead nearly twenty. The oblivion which in her modesty and humility she courted for herself has only partially fallen on her, with the unfortunate result of inflicting an injustice upon her memory; since such fragments of her story as got abroad at the time, and have been kept alive ever since, are precisely those which are most unfavourable to her character.

It all began with the arrival of the York Hussars, one of the foreign regiments above alluded to. Before that day scarcely a soul had been seen near her father’s house for weeks. When a noise like the brushing skirt of a visitor was heard on the doorstep, it proved to be a scudding leaf; when a carriage seemed to be nearing the door, it was her father grinding his sickle on the stone in the garden for his favourite relaxation of trimming the box-tree borders to the plots. A sound like luggage thrown down from the coach was a gun far away at sea; and what looked like a tall man by the gate at dusk was a yew bush cut into a quaint and attenuated shape. There is no such solitude in country places now as there was in those old days.

Yet all the while King George and his court were at his favourite sea-side resort, not more than five miles off.

The daughter’s seclusion was great, but beyond the seclusion of the girl lay the seclusion of the father. If her social condition was twilight, his was darkness. Yet he enjoyed his darkness, while her twilight oppressed her. Dr. Grove had been a professional man whose taste for lonely meditation over metaphysical questions had diminished his practice till it no longer paid him to keep it going; after which he had relinquished it and hired at a nominal rent the small, dilapidated, half farm half manor-house of this obscure inland nook, to make a sufficiency of an income which in a town would have been inadequate for their maintenance. He stayed in his garden the greater part of the day, growing more and more irritable with the lapse of time, and the increasing perception that he had wasted his life in the pursuit of illusions. He saw his friends less and less frequently. Phyllis became so shy that if she met a stranger anywhere in her short rambles she felt ashamed at his gaze, walked awkwardly, and blushed to her shoulders.

Yet Phyllis was discovered even here by an admirer, and her hand most unexpectedly asked in marriage.

The King, as aforesaid, was at the neighbouring town, where he had taken up his abode at Gloucester Lodge and his presence in the town naturally brought many county people thither. Among these idlers— many of whom professed to have connections and interests with the Court—was one Humphrey Gould, a bachelor; a personage neither young nor old; neither good-looking nor positively plain. Too steady-going to be ‘a buck’ (as fast and unmarried men were then called), he was an approximately fashionable man of a mild type. This bachelor of thirty found his way to the village on the down: beheld Phyllis; made her father’s acquaintance in order to make hers; and by some means or other she sufficiently inflamed his heart to lead him in that direction almost daily; till he became engaged to marry her.

As he was of an old local family, some of whose members were held in respect in the county, Phyllis, in bringing him to her feet, had accomplished what was considered a brilliant move for one in her constrained position. How she had done it was not quite known to Phyllis herself. In those days unequal marriages were regarded rather as a violation of the laws of nature than as a mere infringement of convention, the more modern view, and hence when Phyllis, of the watering-place bourgeoisie, was chosen by such a gentlemanly fellow, it was as if she were going to be taken to heaven, though perhaps the uninformed would have seen no great difference in the respective positions of the pair, the said Gould being as poor as a crow.

This pecuniary condition was his excuse—probably a true one—for postponing their union, and as the winter drew nearer, and the King departed for the season, Mr. Humphrey Gould set out for Bath, promising to return to Phyllis in a few weeks. The winter arrived, the date of his promise passed, yet Gould postponed his coming, on the ground that he could not very easily leave his father in the city of their sojourn, the elder having no other relative near him. Phyllis, though lonely in the extreme, was content. The man who had asked her in marriage was a desirable husband for her in many ways; her father highly approved of his suit; but this neglect of her was awkward, if not painful, for Phyllis. Love him in the true sense of the word she assured me she never did, but she had a genuine regard for him; admired a certain methodical and dogged way in which he sometimes took his pleasure; valued his knowledge of what the Court was doing, had done, or was about to do; and she was not without a feeling of pride that he had chosen her when he might have exercised a more ambitious choice.

But he did not come; and the spring developed. His letters were regular though formal; and it is not to be wondered that the uncertainty of her position, linked with the fact that there was not much passion in her thoughts of Humphrey, bred an indescribable dreariness in the heart of Phyllis Grove. The spring was soon summer, and the summer brought the King; but still no Humphrey Gould. All this while the engagement by letter was maintained intact.

At this point of time a golden radiance flashed in upon the lives of people here, and charged all youthful thought with emotional interest. This radiance was the aforesaid York Hussars.

Chapter II

The present generation has probably but a very dim notion of the celebrated York Hussars of ninety years ago. They were one of the regiments of the King’s German Legion, and (though they somewhat degenerated later on) their brilliant uniform, their splendid horses, and above all, their foreign air and mustachios (rare appendages then), drew crowds of admirers of both sexes wherever they went. These with other regiments had come to encamp on the downs and pastures, because of the presence of the King in the neighbouring town.

The spot was high and airy, and the view extensive, commanding the Isle of Portland in front, and reaching to St. Aldhelm’s Head eastward, and almost to the Start on the west.

Phyllis, though not precisely a girl of the village, was as interested as any of them in this military investment. Her father’s home stood somewhat apart, and on the highest point of ground to which the lane ascended, so that it was almost level with the top of the church tower in the lower part of the parish. Immediately from the outside of the garden-wall the grass spread away to a great distance, and it was crossed by a path which came close to the wall. Ever since her childhood it had been Phyllis’s pleasure to clamber up this fence and sit on the top—a feat not so difficult as it may seem, the walls in this district being built of rubble, without mortar, so that there were plenty of crevices for small toes.

She was sitting up here one day, listlessly surveying the pasture without, when her attention was arrested by a solitary figure walking along the path. It was one of the renowned German Hussars, and he moved onward with his eyes on the ground, and with the manner of one who wished to escape company. His head would probably have been bent like his eyes but for his stiff neck-gear. On nearer view she perceived that his face was marked with deep sadness. Without observing her, he advanced by the footpath till it brought him almost immediately under the wall.

Phyllis was much surprised to see a fine, tall soldier in such a mood as this. Her theory of the military, and of the York Hussars in particular (derived entirely from hearsay, for she had never talked to a soldier in her life), was that their hearts were as gay as their accoutrements.

At this moment the Hussar lifted his eyes and noticed her on her perch, the white muslin neckerchief which covered her shoulders and neck where left bare by her low gown, and her white raiment in general, showing conspicuously in the bright sunlight of this summer day. He blushed a little at the suddenness of the encounter, and without halting a moment from his pace passed on.

All that day the foreigner’s face haunted Phyllis; its aspect was so striking, so handsome, and his eyes were so blue, and sad, and abstracted. It was perhaps only natural that on some following day at the same hour she should look over that wall again, and wait till he had passed a second time. On this occasion he was reading a letter, and at the sight of her his manner was that of one who had half expected or hoped to discover her. He almost stopped, smiled, and made a courteous salute. The end of the meeting was that they exchanged a few words. She asked him what he was reading, and he readily informed her that he was re-perusing letters from his mother in Germany; he did not get them often, he said, and was forced to read the old ones a great many times. This was all that passed at the present interview, but others of the same kind followed.

Phyllis used to say that his English, though not good, was quite intelligible to her, so that their acquaintance was never hindered by difficulties of speech. Whenever the subject became too delicate, subtle, or tender, for such words of English as were at his command, the eyes no doubt helped out the tongue, and—though this was later on—the lips helped out the eyes. In short this acquaintance, unguardedly made, and rash enough on her part, developed and ripened. Like Desdemona, she pitied him, and learnt his history.

His name was Matthaus Tina, and Saarbruck his native town, where his mother was still living. His age was twenty-two, and he had already risen to the grade of corporal, though he had not long been in the army. Phyllis used to assert that no such refined or well-educated young man could have been found in the ranks of the purely English regiments, some of these foreign soldiers having rather the graceful manner and presence of our native officers than of our rank and file.

She by degrees learnt from her foreign friend a circumstance about himself and his comrades which Phyllis would least have expected of the York Hussars. So far from being as gay as its uniform, the regiment was pervaded by a dreadful melancholy, a chronic home-sickness, which depressed many of the men to such an extent that they could hardly attend to their drill. The worst sufferers were the younger soldiers who had not been over here long. They hated England and English life; they took no interest whatever in King George and his island kingdom, and they only wished to be out of it and never to see it any more. Their bodies were here, but their hearts and minds were always far away in their dear fatherland, of which—brave men and stoical as they were in many ways—they would speak with tears in their eyes. One of the worst of the sufferers from this home-woe, as he called it in his own tongue, was Matthaus Tina, whose dreamy musing nature felt the gloom of exile still more intensely from the fact that he had left a lonely mother at home with nobody to cheer her.

Though Phyllis, touched by all this, and interested in his history, did not disdain her soldier’s acquaintance, she declined (according to her own account, at least) to permit the young man to overstep the line of mere friendship for a long while—as long, indeed, as she considered herself likely to become the possession of another; though it is probable that she had lost her heart to Matthaus before she was herself aware. The stone wall of necessity made anything like intimacy difficult; and he had never ventured to come, or to ask to come, inside the garden, so that all their conversation had been overtly conducted across this boundary.

Chapter III

But news reached the village from a friend of Phyllis’s father concerning Mr. Humphrey Gould, her remarkably cool and patient betrothed. This gentleman had been heard to say in Bath that he considered his overtures to Miss Phyllis Grove to have reached only the stage of a half-understanding; and in view of his enforced absence on his father’s account, who was too great an invalid now to attend to his affairs, he thought it best that there should be no definite promise as yet on either side. He was not sure, indeed, that he might not cast his eyes elsewhere.

This account—though only a piece of hearsay, and as such entitled to no absolute credit—tallied so well with the infrequency of his letters and their lack of warmth, that Phyllis did not doubt its truth for one moment; and from that hour she felt herself free to bestow her heart as she should choose. Not so her father; he declared the whole story to be a fabrication. He had known Mr. Gould’s family from his boyhood; and if there was one proverb which expressed the matrimonial aspect of that family well, it was ‘Love me little, love me long.’ Humphrey was an honourable man, who would not think of treating his engagement so lightly. ‘Do you wait in patience,’ he said; ‘all will be right enough in time.’

From these words Phyllis at first imagined that her father was in correspondence with Mr. Gould; and her heart sank within her; for in spite of her original intentions she had been relieved to hear that her engagement had come to nothing. But she presently learnt that her father had heard no more of Humphrey Gould than she herself had done; while he would not write and address her affianced directly on the subject, lest it should be deemed an imputation on that bachelor’s honour.

‘You want an excuse for encouraging one or other of those foreign fellows to flatter you with his unmeaning attentions,’ her father exclaimed, his mood having of late been a very unkind one towards her. ‘I see more than I say. Don’t you ever set foot outside that garden-fence without my permission. If you want to see the camp I’ll take you myself some Sunday afternoon.’

Phyllis had not the smallest intention of disobeying him in her actions, but she assumed herself to be independent with respect to her feelings. She no longer checked her fancy for the Hussar, though she was far from regarding him as her lover in the serious sense in which an Englishman might have been regarded as such. The young foreign soldier was almost an ideal being to her, with none of the appurtenances of an ordinary house-dweller; one who had descended she knew not whence, and would disappear she knew not whither; the subject of a fascinating dream—no more.

They met continually now—mostly at dusk—during the brief interval between the going down of the sun and the minute at which the last trumpet-call summoned him to his tent. Perhaps her manner had become less restrained latterly; at any rate that of the Hussar was so; he had grown more tender every day, and at parting after these hurried interviews she reached down her hand from the top of the wall that he might press it. One evening he held it so long that she exclaimed, ‘The wall is white, and somebody in the field may see your shape against it!’

He lingered so long that night that it was with the greatest difficulty that he could run across the intervening stretch of ground and enter the camp in time. On the next occasion of his awaiting her she did not appear in her usual place at the usual hour. His disappointment was unspeakably keen; he remained staring blankly at the spot, like a man in a trance. The trumpets and tattoo sounded, and still he did not go.

She had been delayed purely by an accident. When she arrived she was anxious because of the lateness of the hour, having heard as well as he the sounds denoting the closing of the camp. She implored him to leave immediately.

‘No,’ he said gloomily. ‘I shall not go in yet—the moment you come—I have thought of your coming all day.’

‘But you may be disgraced at being after time?’

‘I don’t mind that. I should have disappeared from the world some time ago if it had not been for two persons—my beloved, here, and my mother in Saarbruck. I hate the army. I care more for a minute of your company than for all the promotion in the world.’

Thus he stayed and talked to her, and told her interesting details of his native place, and incidents of his childhood, till she was in a simmer of distress at his recklessness in remaining. It was only because she insisted on bidding him good-night and leaving the wall that he returned to his quarters.

The next time that she saw him he was without the stripes that had adorned his sleeve. He had been broken to the level of private for his lateness that night; and as Phyllis considered herself to be the cause of his disgrace her sorrow was great. But the position was now reversed; it was his turn to cheer her.

‘Don’t grieve, meine Liebliche!’ he said. ‘I have got a remedy for whatever comes. First, even supposing I regain my stripes, would your father allow you to marry a non-commissioned officer in the York Hussars?’

She flushed. This practical step had not been in her mind in relation to such an unrealistic person as he was; and a moment’s reflection was enough for it. ‘My father would not—certainly would not,’ she answered unflinchingly. ‘It cannot be thought of! My dear friend, please do forget me: I fear I am ruining you and your prospects!’

‘Not at all!’ said he. ‘You are giving this country of yours just sufficient interest to me to make me care to keep alive in it. If my dear land were here also, and my old parent, with you, I could be happy as I am, and would do my best as a soldier. But it is not so. And now listen. This is my plan. That you go with me to my own country, and be my wife there, and live there with my mother and me. I am not a Hanoverian, as you know, though I entered the army as such; my country is by the Saar, and is at peace with France, and if I were once in it I should be free.’

‘But how get there?’ she asked. Phyllis had been rather amazed than shocked at his proposition. Her position in her father’s house was growing irksome and painful in the extreme; his parental affection seemed to be quite dried up. She was not a native of the village, like all the joyous girls around her; and in some way Matthaus Tina had infected her with his own passionate longing for his country, and mother, and home.

‘But how?’ she repeated, finding that he did not answer. ‘Will you buy your discharge?’

‘Ah, no,’ he said. ‘That’s impossible in these times. No; I came here against my will; why should I not escape? Now is the time, as we shall soon be striking camp, and I might see you no more. This is my scheme. I will ask you to meet me on the highway two miles off; on some calm night next week that may be appointed. There will be nothing unbecoming in it, or to cause you shame; you will not fly alone with me, for I will bring with me my devoted young friend Christoph, an Alsatian, who has lately joined the regiment, and who has agreed to assist in this enterprise. We shall have come from yonder harbour, where we shall have examined the boats, and found one suited to our purpose. Christoph has already a chart of the Channel, and we will then go to the harbour, and at midnight cut the boat from her moorings, and row away round the point out of sight; and by the next morning we are on the coast of France, near Cherbourg. The rest is easy, for I have saved money for the land journey, and can get a change of clothes. I will write to my mother, who will meet us on the way.’

He added details in reply to her inquiries, which left no doubt in Phyllis’s mind of the feasibility of the undertaking. But its magnitude almost appalled her; and it is questionable if she would ever have gone further in the wild adventure if, on entering the house that night, her father had not accosted her in the most significant terms.

‘How about the York Hussars?’ he said.

‘They are still at the camp; but they are soon going away, I believe.’

‘It is useless for you to attempt to cloak your actions in that way. You have been meeting one of those fellows; you have been seen walking with him—foreign barbarians, not much better than the French themselves! I have made up my mind—don’t speak a word till I have done, please!—I have made up my mind that you shall stay here no longer while they are on the spot. You shall go to your aunt’s.’

It was useless for her to protest that she had never taken a walk with any soldier or man under the sun except himself. Her protestations were feeble, too, for though he was not literally correct in his assertion, he was virtually only half in error.

The house of her father’s sister was a prison to Phyllis. She had quite recently undergone experience of its gloom; and when her father went on to direct her to pack what would be necessary for her to take, her heart died within her. In after years she never attempted to excuse her conduct during this week of agitation; but the result of her self-communing was that she decided to join in the scheme of her lover and his friend, and fly to the country which he had coloured with such lovely hues in her imagination. She always said that the one feature in his proposal which overcame her hesitation was the obvious purity and straightforwardness of his intentions. He showed himself to be so virtuous and kind; he treated her with a respect to which she had never before been accustomed; and she was braced to the obvious risks of the voyage by her confidence in him.

Chapter IV

It was on a soft, dark evening of the following week that they engaged in the adventure. Tina was to meet her at a point in the highway at which the lane to the village branched off. Christoph was to go ahead of them to the harbour where the boat lay, row it round the Nothe—or Look-out as it was called in those days—and pick them up on the other side of the promontory, which they were to reach by crossing the harbour-bridge on foot, and climbing over the Look-out hill.

As soon as her father had ascended to his room she left the house, and, bundle in hand, proceeded at a trot along the lane. At such an hour not a soul was afoot anywhere in the village, and she reached the junction of the lane with the highway unobserved. Here she took up her position in the obscurity formed by the angle of a fence, whence she could discern every one who approached along the turnpike-road, without being herself seen.

She had not remained thus waiting for her lover longer than a minute—though from the tension of her nerves the lapse of even that short time was trying—when, instead of the expected footsteps, the stage-coach could be heard descending the hill. She knew that Tina would not show himself till the road was clear, and waited impatiently for the coach to pass. Nearing the corner where she was it slackened speed, and, instead of going by as usual, drew up within a few yards of her. A passenger alighted, and she heard his voice. It was Humphrey Gould’s.

He had brought a friend with him, and luggage. The luggage was deposited on the grass, and the coach went on its route to the royal watering-place.

‘I wonder where that young man is with the horse and trap?’ said her former admirer to his companion. ‘I hope we shan’t have to wait here long. I told him half-past nine o’clock precisely.’

‘Have you got her present safe?’

‘Phyllis’s? O, yes. It is in this trunk. I hope it will please her.’

‘Of course it will. What woman would not be pleased with such a handsome peace-offering?’

‘Well—she deserves it. I’ve treated her rather badly. But she has been in my mind these last two days much more than I should care to confess to everybody. Ah, well; I’ll say no more about that. It cannot be that she is so bad as they make out. I am quite sure that a girl of her good wit would know better than to get entangled with any of those Hanoverian soldiers. I won’t believe it of her, and there’s an end on’t.’

More words in the same strain were casually dropped as the two men waited; words which revealed to her, as by a sudden illumination, the enormity of her conduct. The conversation was at length cut off by the arrival of the man with the vehicle. The luggage was placed in it, and they mounted, and were driven on in the direction from which she had just come.

Phyllis was so conscience-stricken that she was at first inclined to follow them; but a moment’s reflection led her to feel that it would only be bare justice to Matthaus to wait till he arrived, and explain candidly that she had changed her mind—difficult as the struggle would be when she stood face to face with him. She bitterly reproached herself for having believed reports which represented Humphrey Gould as false to his engagement, when, from what she now heard from his own lips, she gathered that he had been living full of trust in her. But she knew well enough who had won her love. Without him her life seemed a dreary prospect, yet the more she looked at his proposal the more she feared to accept it—so wild as it was, so vague, so venturesome. She had promised Humphrey Gould, and it was only his assumed faithlessness which had led her to treat that promise as nought. His solicitude in bringing her these gifts touched her; her promise must be kept, and esteem must take the place of love. She would preserve her self-respect. She would stay at home, and marry him, and suffer.

Phyllis had thus braced herself to an exceptional fortitude when, a few minutes later, the outline of Matthaus Tina appeared behind a field-gate, over which he lightly leapt as she stepped forward. There was no evading it, he pressed her to his breast.

‘It is the first and last time!’ she wildly thought as she stood encircled by his arms.

How Phyllis got through the terrible ordeal of that night she could never clearly recollect. She always attributed her success in carrying out her resolve to her lover’s honour, for as soon as she declared to him in feeble words that she had changed her mind, and felt that she could not, dared not, fly with him, he forbore to urge her, grieved as he was at her decision. Unscrupulous pressure on his part, seeing how romantically she had become attached to him, would no doubt have turned the balance in his favour. But he did nothing to tempt her unduly or unfairly.

On her side, fearing for his safety, she begged him to remain. This, he declared, could not be. ‘I cannot break faith with my friend,’ said he. Had he stood alone he would have abandoned his plan. But Christoph, with the boat and compass and chart, was waiting on the shore; the tide would soon turn; his mother had been warned of his coming; go he must.

Many precious minutes were lost while he tarried, unable to tear himself away. Phyllis held to her resolve, though it cost her many a bitter pang. At last they parted, and he went down the hill. Before his footsteps had quite died away she felt a desire to behold at least his outline once more, and running noiselessly after him regained view of his diminishing figure. For one moment she was sufficiently excited to be on the point of rushing forward and linking her fate with his. But she could not. The courage which at the critical instant failed Cleopatra of Egypt could scarcely be expected of Phyllis Grove.

A dark shape, similar to his own, joined him in the highway. It was Christoph, his friend. She could see no more; they had hastened on in the direction of the town and harbour, four miles ahead. With a feeling akin to despair she turned and slowly pursued her way homeward.

Tattoo sounded in the camp; but there was no camp for her now. It was as dead as the camp of the Assyrians after the passage of the Destroying Angel.

She noiselessly entered the house, seeing nobody, and went to bed. Grief, which kept her awake at first, ultimately wrapped her in a heavy sleep. The next morning her father met her at the foot of the stairs.

‘Mr. Gould is come!’ he said triumphantly.

Humphrey was staying at the inn, and had already called to inquire for her. He had brought her a present of a very handsome looking-glass in a frame of repousse silverwork, which her father held in his hand. He had promised to call again in the course of an hour, to ask Phyllis to walk with him.

Pretty mirrors were rarer in country-houses at that day than they are now, and the one before her won Phyllis’s admiration. She looked into it, saw how heavy her eyes were, and endeavoured to brighten them. She was in that wretched state of mind which leads a woman to move mechanically onward in what she conceives to be her allotted path. Mr. Humphrey had, in his undemonstrative way, been adhering all along to the old understanding; it was for her to do the same, and to say not a word of her own lapse. She put on her bonnet and tippet, and when he arrived at the hour named she was at the door awaiting him.

Chapter V

Phyllis thanked him for his beautiful gift; but the talking was soon entirely on Humphrey’s side as they walked along. He told her of the latest movements of the world of fashion—a subject which she willingly discussed to the exclusion of anything more personal—and his measured language helped to still her disquieted heart and brain. Had not her own sadness been what it was she must have observed his embarrassment. At last he abruptly changed the subject.

‘I am glad you are pleased with my little present,’ he said. ‘The truth is that I brought it to propitiate ’ee, and to get you to help me out of a mighty difficulty.’

It was inconceivable to Phyllis that this independent bachelor—whom she admired in some respects—could have a difficulty.

‘Phyllis—I’ll tell you my secret at once; for I have a monstrous secret to confide before I can ask your counsel. The case is, then, that I am married: yes, I have privately married a dear young belle; and if you knew her, and I hope you will, you would say everything in her praise. But she is not quite the one that my father would have chose for me—you know the paternal idea as well as I—and I have kept it secret. There will be a terrible noise, no doubt; but I think that with your help I may get over it. If you would only do me this good turn—when I have told my father, I mean—say that you never could have married me, you know, or something of that sort— ‘pon my life it will help to smooth the way vastly. I am so anxious to win him round to my point of view, and not to cause any estrangement.’

What Phyllis replied she scarcely knew, or how she counselled him as to his unexpected situation. Yet the relief that his announcement brought her was perceptible. To have confided her trouble in return was what her aching heart longed to do; and had Humphrey been a woman she would instantly have poured out her tale. But to him she feared to confess; and there was a real reason for silence, till a sufficient time had elapsed to allow her lover and his comrade to get out of harm’s way.

As soon as she reached home again she sought a solitary place, and spent the time in half regretting that she had not gone away, and in dreaming over the meetings with Matthaus Tina from their beginning to their end. In his own country, amongst his own countrywomen, he would possibly soon forget her, even to her very name.

Her listlessness was such that she did not go out of the house for several days. There came a morning which broke in fog and mist, behind which the dawn could be discerned in greenish grey; and the outlines of the tents, and the rows of horses at the ropes. The smoke from the canteen fires drooped heavily.

The spot at the bottom of the garden where she had been accustomed to climb the wall to meet Matthaus, was the only inch of English ground in which she took any interest; and in spite of the disagreeable haze prevailing she walked out there till she reached the well-known corner. Every blade of grass was weighted with little liquid globes, and slugs and snails had crept out upon the plots. She could hear the usual faint noises from the camp, and in the other direction the trot of farmers on the road to the town, for it was market-day. She observed that her frequent visits to this corner had quite trodden down the grass in the angle of the wall, and left marks of garden soil on the stepping-stones by which she had mounted to look over the top. Seldom having gone there till dusk, she had not considered that her traces might be visible by day. Perhaps it was these which had revealed her trysts to her father.

While she paused in melancholy regard, she fancied that the customary sounds from the tents were changing their character. Indifferent as Phyllis was to camp doings now, she mounted by the steps to the old place. What she beheld at first awed and perplexed her; then she stood rigid, her fingers hooked to the wall, her eyes staring out of her head, and her face as if hardened to stone.

On the open green stretching before her all the regiments in the camp were drawn up in line, in the mid-front of which two empty coffins lay on the ground. The unwonted sounds which she had noticed came from an advancing procession. It consisted of the band of the York Hussars playing a dead march; next two soldiers of that regiment in a mourning coach, guarded on each side, and accompanied by two priests. Behind came a crowd of rustics who had been attracted by the event. The melancholy procession marched along the front of the line, returned to the centre, and halted beside the coffins, where the two condemned men were blindfolded, and each placed kneeling on his coffin; a few minutes pause was now given, while they prayed.

A firing-party of twenty-four men stood ready with levelled carbines. The commanding officer, who had his sword drawn, waved it through some cuts of the sword-exercise till he reached the downward stroke, whereat the firing-party discharged their volley. The two victims fell, one upon his face across his coffin, the other backwards.

As the volley resounded there arose a shriek from the wall of Dr. Grove’s garden, and some one fell down inside; but nobody among the spectators without noticed it at the time. The two executed Hussars were Matthaus Tina and his friend Christoph. The soldiers on guard placed the bodies in the coffins almost instantly; but the colonel of the regiment, an Englishman, rode up and exclaimed in a stern voice: ‘Turn them out—as an example to the men!’

The coffins were lifted endwise, and the dead Germans flung out upon their faces on the grass. Then all the regiments wheeled in sections, and marched past the spot in slow time. When the survey was over the corpses were again coffined, and borne away.

Meanwhile Dr. Grove, attracted by the noise of the volley, had rushed out into his garden, where he saw his wretched daughter lying motionless against the wall. She was taken indoors, but it was long before she recovered consciousness; and for weeks they despaired of her reason.

It transpired that the luckless deserters from the York Hussars had cut the boat from her moorings in the adjacent harbour, according to their plan, and, with two other comrades who were smarting under ill-treatment from their colonel, had sailed in safety across the Channel. But mistaking their bearings they steered into Jersey, thinking that island the French coast. Here they were perceived to be deserters, and delivered up to the authorities. Matthaus and Christoph interceded for the other two at the court-martial, saying that it was entirely by the former’s representations that these were induced to go. Their sentence was accordingly commuted to flogging, the death punishment being reserved for their leaders.

The visitor to the well-known old Georgian watering-place, who may care to ramble to the neighbouring village under the hills, and examine the register of burials, will there find two entries in these words:—

‘Matth:— Tina (Corpl.) in His Majesty’s Regmt. of York Hussars, and Shot for Desertion, was Buried June 30th, 1801, aged 22 years. Born in the town of Sarrbruk, Germany.

‘Christoph Bless, belonging to His Majesty’s Regmt. of York Hussars, who was Shot for Desertion, was Buried June 30th, 1801, aged 22 years. Born at Lothaargen, Alsatia.’

Their graves were dug at the back of the little church, near the wall. There is no memorial to mark the spot, but Phyllis pointed it out to me. While she lived she used to keep their mounds neat; but now they are overgrown with nettles, and sunk nearly flat. The older villagers, however, who know of the episode from their parents, still recollect the place where the soldiers lie. Phyllis lies near.

October 1889.

From Wessex Tales, by Thomas Hardy, Wordsworth Classics, £1.99

Today's meeting in Goulburn

2011-08-21T22:05:00.007+10:00

3 games ..8 players and a number of visitors a fine day out, We had Hail Caesar; Gauls and Romans, Might &Reason The Battle of Mollwitz 1741 using my imaginations troops, and Rapid-Fire 2 20mm
US vs Germans 1944..Mortain. My friend Tiger Zouave, of the blog Land of the Lead , took these fine shots

And the Cardinal says..play the game, paint the unit , get the t shirt!!!

A moody photoshopped version by TZ

The Neapolitan Troops In Spain 1808-1813

2011-08-05T14:06:00.000+10:00

from Tradition Number Fifty-Five

The Brunswick Corps At Waterloo, From Tradition Number Sixty

2011-08-05T13:44:00.000+10:00

Camel Artillery of the Persian Army 1853

2011-08-04T10:14:00.001+10:00

from Tradition Number Thirty-Seven, around 1968

The Liberation Army of the Andes

2011-08-03T18:14:00.000+10:00

From Tradition Number 60

Tradition Number 60: French 16th Light Infantry 1812

2011-08-03T18:03:00.000+10:00

Airfix Magazine August 1977 Neapolitan Cavalry 1808-13

2011-08-03T17:31:00.001+10:00

Tradition number Forty Four

2011-07-31T22:05:00.003+10:00

Many years ago, 31 to be precise..I attended a Wargames Convention in Adelaide..put on by Mal Wright and his chums..and there, for something of a song I bought a stack of second hand Tradition magazines..being young and silly I pulled out many of the colour centre pages, thus ruining the magazine's intrinsic value..however they are fascinating and as they are slowly reappearing I am enjoying the experience. Here are some scans form one that I found today .
firstly A nice look at Prussian hussars of the WAS.

And a fine colour print of the Madras Horse Artillery 1845

And finally some details of Austro-Hungarian Infantry 1809

French 3rd Hussars 1798 Perry 28mm

2011-07-15T12:17:00.001+10:00

Having finally finished these, them being a sort of side job while other things were going on..I am quite pleased with them though I think I may offer them for sale at some near future date.All on 50 x 50mm x 3mm bases

Bavarian commanders

2011-07-08T20:14:00.001+10:00

All front Rank 28mm

Bavarian 28mm Napoleonic WiP

2011-06-19T18:39:00.003+10:00

Front Rank Bavarian Napoleonic 28mm..a little harsh under a single globe on the kitchen table but...
Click on image for a larger pic..

completed..

Field Marshal's mounted hand gunners

2011-05-28T15:00:00.002+10:00

for my chum the illustrious Field Marshal, erky perky Old Glory..

More Wagram Project French

2011-05-15T18:05:00.000+10:00

Some thoughts on the Duke of Cumberland

2011-05-11T11:09:00.005+10:00

The Fat Duke in his Hanoverian guise, painted by me..

Warlord games as done by me

Later Achaemenid Persians

2011-05-03T10:57:00.001+10:00

Xystron a bit of work ..but nice.. mocked up on the base as they will be travelling to Canada, annoyingly one Babylonian seems missing, complex search under way..

The Wagram Project: French heavy cavalry

2011-05-03T10:53:00.000+10:00

All AB 15s The later carabinier uniform is currently a stand in..but nice all the same..This lot represents the 12 cuirassier regiments in 1809.

More Tank WiP

2011-04-28T11:09:00.001+10:00

part II

The dried tea leaf reserve..

The process..

second round of beefing up the foliage

sealing the subject

A bit of a tank WiP..20mm

2011-04-14T23:25:00.002+10:00

needing a break from 5 weeks of a veritable horde of fiddly 28mm SYW, and some rather more refreshing 15mm Persians, the Cardinal needs a break..What better than some WWII armour?
I fished out some Raventhorpe shermans and found a Britannia US sandbagged sherman in there as well.Yoo hoo...

The firefly and a 75m gun tank.
These Raventhorpes are a bit odd.. loader's hatches and things like that ..I don't know if it is meant to be a Sherman V bit it doesn't exactly look like one. There are any number of shermans around in the 1.72 scale but none make a half accurate V..so ..

ah..the gauze,its purpose will be revealed later ..

and here one of the things that really really really really really annoys me..really really really..the fact you have to go off and find somebody nice, in this case Sean of S&S, to provide turret bins..I mean what sort of fecken' idjit markets an allegedly British sherman without supplying turret bins..Most actually . Some bunch of clowns??? Obviously

and now back to being a bit more pleasant..a 105mm support tank..As the Brits had only a few of these(if any) it will go the American tank battalion, a bit nicer than the Britannia version.

The nice Brittania 75mm gun tank with the sandbags..I know the sandbags were sprayed olive in the maintainace work shop or olive/black but they do look sexier painted in sandbag colour..can I live with myself over this?

The pine vise..or whatever , its staring bit coming up..

The washing up utensil, this one is doomed never to reach the sink..

and..when pin vise meets washing up utensil's bristles

part 1 is over

Plastic Perry Burgundians

2011-03-30T11:41:00.002+11:00

or something like that .
These are for my chum Fieldmarshall

An example of my 10 buck paint job , the new camera on an AV setting , the newer smaller, light tent and the excellent freeware graphic program that David , of NBA , put me onto ..all coming together .so far

A question of French cuirassier trumpeters

2011-03-28T15:13:00.003+11:00

Inspired by Mick the Painters picsMick the Painter's first post I have looked into the cuirassier trumpeter's coat situation. i initially was intrigued by the blue coat.. searching aroundI did indeed a first cuirassier shown in a sky blue coat. I think this is an example the parade dress as it matches the coat of a non combatant member of the regimental band..so All ok though it wouildn't have been my first choice of uniform ..here is the fruit of a mornings research..anything to avaoid the Persian 15s.\

What else can Conquest plastics be used for? ( a WiP)

2011-03-28T11:37:00.001+11:00

..you know, the sort of question that

always

turns up on TMP..like..derh.!!!!!.One thing they can't be used for, thankfully, is Carlists..but..
well I tinkered a bit..Wargames Factory torso on Conquest unarmoured rider's legs and horse,Wargames Factory shield and weapons.. some green stuff work to go on the horse archer, hair ,plume , guard on the left arm ,sword baldric, maybe a blanket roll......I imagine it as a Rohan horse archer..
The Norman..well a Cconquest torso from the above conversion with the Wargames Factory legs leftover from the above conversion , with conquest shield and axe and hand from Gripping Beast plastic Vikings ..clever or what???

The Wagram Project: The first of the French

2011-03-28T11:18:00.002+11:00

Guard Cavalry

Old Guard

Middle Guard

15mm AB

ECW/TYW command

2011-03-22T13:46:00.004+11:00

Mostly Warlords metal and plastic with at least one Foundry mounted..These are currently for sale see.. http://thecybercarbootsale.blogspot.com/

Napoleonic staff WiP

2011-03-22T13:25:00.000+11:00

for the Field Marshal

ADC

Guard chasseur officer

Cuirassier brigadier

Italian general

French brigadier

999-1101 AD Project WiP part 2

2011-03-22T13:08:00.003+11:00

28mm Conquest horses , Crusader and Conquest riders , Crusader shields

999-1101 AD Project WiP part 1

2011-03-15T13:04:00.006+11:00

Some shots of an Impetus unit in creation ..a mix of Crusader Normans and Conquest Normans all mounted on (superior)Conquest horses, all with (superior)Crusader shields.

Left Crusader rider on conquest horse ,right Conquest

Centre ; Crusader rider..North Star spear,Conquest horse. Right; Conquest rider and horse, Crusader shield

a few snapshots of the painting desks 10/03/2011

2011-03-10T11:13:00.002+11:00

Inspired by Peter Callan's amusing narratives recently I decided upon chronicling a moment in time ...a bit of a snapshot of the painting desk..I don't intend to engage the reader in a very witty narrative but rather choose to just let the pictures tell the story ..I would have had more completed but the Big Willow dropped by yesterday and we whiled away some time with coffee and chat..

should we not paint this and keep it for a master figure, it is a one only of..

just for fun

Snipers, Vostroyan ..of Major Kubrik's company

2011-02-27T15:37:00.002+11:00

Part of my foray into 40k, which was an expensive digression and ultimately a great waste of time..not real wargaming in any sense that I could comprehend..

more Mutineer Miniatures Indian Mutiny highlanders

2011-02-24T01:31:00.001+11:00

Pictures were taken when they were finished and awaiting packing up to be sent off.This is my "cheap" style, a sort of tartan equivalent to the $10 figure, though tartan and diced stockings are a deal breaker at that price.

18th Century WiP

2011-02-24T01:18:00.001+11:00

Kr.Rgt 2, morale/casualty marker

Prussian casualty marker

Hessian commader

Prussian Garde du Corp

Fred 1

Fred 2

Witzbolders

Foundry and Front Rank ..what I have done this week , so far..all close to being finished , a flat varnish and the finishing of the bases .

Mutineer Miniatures Indian Mutiny WiP..Highlanders

2011-01-27T18:21:00.001+11:00

some work started on Tuesday

Wagram Project Germans

2011-01-26T12:21:00.001+11:00

All AB

Mutineer Miniatures Indian Mutiny WiP..

2011-01-16T22:45:00.003+11:00

big bunch of pics..started 100 of them on Thursday 60 done now Sunday last 40 finished tomorrow..yada yada yada.. big buggers..

What does '11 hold for you and the hobby?

2011-01-11T10:01:00.000+11:00

a pinched concept .. all the best one are .. I have the Prussian SYW project 28mm , the 900-1101AD project 28mm awaiting 3 boxes of Normans as I type, anybody after 33 Gripping beast Normans unpainted? ($90), The now grandly titled "The Pike and Shotte" project, 28mm figs and a good fast play rules, The Sylvanan Incident (18th C pulp adventure based on Peckinpah's Major Dundee), revitalise Wings of War..a mini campaign? Complete the Armies of Gluckheinm ,Dachsdortf and Bieberhof.., finish my railwya bridge and get in more WWII games..paint some nice fantasy ..sort out the Dreadnought thing..contemplate where I am going with Naspoleonics..yjink about the Decline of the West Project...look at my Hoplite collection and...and more TANKS...many more TANKS and ..
http://passageoflines.50.forumer.com/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=1788

Foundry Landsknechts

2011-01-06T12:46:00.002+11:00

for FM, a WiP as they are unbased and in the main, weaponless..all painted in a 24 hour period..

The Cardinal's Secrets to priming and varnishing.

2010-12-19T10:57:00.008+11:00

People are always asking on forums about undercoating and varnishing and I always mention my preferences, now I will have a spot I can link to..huzzah!!!

For priming, and in the case of my cheaper paint jobs undercoating I use these sprays, .I purchase them from Bunnings or Magnet Mart or anywhere I come across them. They are around $11AUD each. .These are superior to other purely hobby branded spray cans , being much more robust in their finish and only half the price. The Primer ,I have been told is an acrylic lacquer, and dries quite hard, goes on easily and covers well. From that point I either spray them with the Matte black or undercoat in Tamiya flat brown through the airbrush.Always allow 24 hours for the Primer to dry. It dries dead flat..if you have shaken it up well. The black, on the other hand being only Matte has an annoying sheen.

When the miniature is finish I then coat it with the above, with a thick big brush..and allow to dry. If you are going to use Testors dullcote then I find this to be a crucial process.this being a Matte, not a flat, dries with a bit of an annoying sheen..but..

then comes the final varnishing ..I am just beginning to use Dullcote again..I used it all the time when I painted in oils and enamels.. but I found Acrylics a bit delicate . It is usually safe if you have sealed your mini with the Jo Sonja's Matte..if not it can eat you acrylics right off to the metal.
But my favourite is seen in the last picture .Gunze H20 flat clear..if you have let the Matte varnish dry completely, and conditions are perfect, or near perfect, then I run it through the airbrush, mixed well in my paint shaker for about 2 minutes, with about 1:5 ratio of Windex window cleaner/Varnish and spray away .

People don't take seriously the paint shaker..bad luck for them I say. An absolute must in my opinion. especially using tear dropper acrylics. I routinely shake all my new dropper bottles before first use., and it is a boon in "recovering" paint that has dehydrated to some extent..a small amount of Window cleaner and a five minute shake and you can usually bring dieing GW paint back to complete a useful life.
http://www.hobbylinc.com/htm/rob/rob411.htm
http://www.robart.com/store/hobby-tools/paint-shakers

General Stahl, the Undefeated ... a WIP part 3

2010-12-10T18:53:00.001+11:00

Wagram Project.. some more German infantry

2010-12-10T18:51:00.000+11:00

Ir 11,35,36 & 47

General Stahl, the Undefeated ... a WIP part 2

2010-12-04T13:29:00.005+11:00

amazing what a spray and a pic can do..found all the little annoying webs and wisps etc not obvious to the naked eye..
when finished he will be Friedrich Phillip-Emmanuel Kristian von GansPflücken, Baron Stahl, Count of Sontar , Proprietor of Ir10., von Sontar, of the Pangaean Reichs Armee Stahldof Kreis ,Member of the Order of St Daffyd, (The Order of the Black Duck), in the fetching General's version of the uniform of his Regiment " The Ducal Sontarans"

General Stahl, the Undefeated ... a WIP part 1

2010-12-04T12:26:00.003+11:00

A WIP; green stuff , a bit of fuse wire and a small piece of plastic-card modification of a Foundry civilian.Work on the original..he had been started but I am very very annoyed with the lack of hats on figures outdoors..NOTE Manufacturers I am ANNOYED

Wagram Project..more German infantry

2010-11-22T13:58:00.000+11:00

5 more regiments of German fusliers..first in column

then in line

Italian Wars

2010-11-05T16:18:00.000+11:00

Foundry..dogs not sure ..
French commander

Papal commander

Painting Service Details

2010-11-03T12:01:00.017+11:00

The Prices quoted below are effective from November 1, 2011

Need your armies painted quickly ? Finished to a more than an acceptable standard? Then the Cardinal's Painting Service is for you!

Need more convincing? Then look through the postings of this blog and see the many of His Eminence's works hung there by his loyal minion, Conrad Hawkwood, in an indication of the calibre of the Cardinal's work.

All commissioned work is completed using acrylic paints. All miniatures are primed, base coated and varnished upon completion.
Things such as Basing, and attaching Flags , is also undertaken upon request and its costing is separate from the cost of the painted figure .As a rules of thumb 15% of the painted price..

All periods and all scales are happily attempted...

The following prices are as follows and are for unbased miniatures..

10mm: infantry $3.40, cavalry $5.30

15mm: infantry $6.00

Cavalry, $11.50.

20mm: infantry $7.00,cavalry $13.00.

25/28mm: infantry: $10.50

25/28mmCavalry $16.50.

I am withdrawing the more expensive 25/28 painting level . It will be available only upon request and the price will be dependent upon difficulty . I can paint two or more $10.50 paint jobs in the time it takes to paint one of the more expensive version. It is no longer viable to paint these more complicated types.

I guarantee accuracy and precision.. if you have any doubts and can show me to be at fault I will happily repaint the miscreant at my own expense

Shielded types 10% extra , no two horses of a lighter colour in any 12 figure unit are the same..Dark units it is difficult to tell, though feel free to look.

25/28 mm Pulp , Fantasy and Sci-Fi individual highlander in kilt and stockings and camouflaged WWII types figures start at $15.00.

Buildings , bunkers , larger figures and monsters and terrain prices are subject to negotiation.

Vehicles .
These are the starting prices for the painting thereof.
15mm $27.00ea
20mm $38.50 ea
28mm $49.00 ea
assembling , crewing , stowing, basing ,decals and foliage extra according to complexity

Artillery
15mm $12.50
28mm $25.00

The 28mm $10.50 paint job explained ..
though guns are always a pain and are $26
to get the cheaper price please read details below ,If things stray outside the outlines then price becomes negotiable ..Kilts for example ..
1. Lots must be mostly uniform in style and pose and colour scheme and at least 18 figures strong .. or a gun and 3 crew.
Basing is an extra series of processes and negotiable upon request
2.As painting is a series of processes so as to make this viable some things are cut back, no eyes for one thing, Essentially it is a blocked in process ,then a wash , then reset/highlight technique. There is only one varnishing, in flat acrylic. I can paint at least 24 figures to this standard in one day .

an example is seen above .This example has the 50c a figure flocking and the cost of the ply base ,which came to an extra $10 to the total for all 3 bases..
Shields are something of a question here, as everywhere ,like bases subject to negotiation painful bloody things that they are,,

Basing , as seen on most pictures in this gallery is approximately 12.5% extra..the actual base often costs extra
more complex by negotiation.

The Cardinal would like to make it known that he isn't much of a modeller and isn't all that good at assembling mildly complicated kits.. and suggest that you assemble and clean things up before you give them to him as he doesn't like doing it and doesn't charge for it and if you don't care he doesn't either..
Plastics..well assembling them is a tedious chore and His Eminence will assemble them for you and charge you $35 an hour for doing it..It is no fun , tedious and complicated..

Shields
The Cardinal does not involve himself with LBM shield decals. He is happy to attempt any and all waterslide decals but the LBM are deal breakers..he is happy to prepare shields so as some other poor sap can have the pleasure of working with them.

The Cardinal understands, from experience , that only so much can be achieved in a particular time , and is looking for a number of regular and trusted patrons. As of now in time his order book has open a number of windows..he does so like to mix his metaphors.

The Ugly Matter of payment..

If the Cardinal knows you, and more importantly , trusts you, then he informs you via email of his commencing your work, thus giving you the chance to quickly reply 'NO" if that is your wish..This warning gives you a number of days in which to prepare for payment. Once started most job are completed withing 2-3 days.You are then are expected to pay very very promptly or you lose the Cardinal's trust, which , of course ,is not advisable..as you don't get any more soldiers painted for you and your name is blackened around the community
If the Cardinal doesn't know you, or worse doesn't trust you ,then its dosh up front chum.
You can pay by cheque, Money Order, direct deposit or pay pal, though the latter attracts a 4% additional cost

Feel free to post a comment or enquiry here for more details or email him at
minden1759@hotmail.com

The Cardinal has been painting miniatures since he was a boy which is some long time ago now .. and more importantly immersing himself in a truly encyclopedic study of uniforms and other military matters to the point that people have been known to leave the room upon hearing news of his impending approach..
he is also a bit of an arrogant bastard..but essentially fair..

Napoleonic Staff, Front Rank and Foundry

2010-10-25T15:45:00.009+11:00

I have had these around for a while , all are up for sale if people are interested..please feel free to inquire. Paypal 2% if in Oz, 4% other wise buy 3 or mor and you may habe a 10% discount!!!!

1.Front Rank Napoleon $30

2.Front Rank Napoleomn and Casualty $30AUD

3. Wellington ,Front Rank $30

4.Another Wellington $30

5. British cavalry General Front Rank SOLD

6. Foundry General of Brigade SOLD

7. SOLD

8. Foundry General of Brigade SOLD

9. Foundry General of division and Aide(on a Front Rank Horse) SOLD

10. sold

Foundry Emperor and Chasseur Sold

11.Front Rank Brirish offcer SOLD
Feel Free to contact me..

The Wagram Project: Artillery Park

2010-10-21T12:29:00.000+11:00

33 bases of 6lbers!!!!

Kriegsmarine....

2010-10-20T12:08:00.003+11:00

Nav War ships click on image for the big picture

Wagram Project-The Dragoons

2010-09-26T17:57:00.002+10:00

Dragoon regiments 1-6 click for monster pics

Some more Wip for the Persian Project

2010-09-23T00:48:00.000+10:00

Wagran Project-Chevauleger

2010-09-23T00:33:00.004+10:00

The Chevauxlegers..Regiments 1-6 .from the left..doublle click for big pix..

The Persian Project part 2

2010-09-19T00:05:00.001+10:00

Several virtually completed , the vast bulk blocked in and washed , and some in their base coat of Tamiya flat brown

The Persian Project

2010-09-15T13:52:00.000+10:00

a project ,in 15mm, using Xystron miniatures, nice little fellows except for all that drilling out of hands..no no Mr Xystron, NOT NICE!!! Took most of Ben Hur to do get these sixty miniaturs read. Here they are in their grey primer

Hinterland miniatures more Princess Viktoria-Luise and chums

2010-09-09T18:34:00.000+10:00

The Jagdpanther WIP

2010-08-24T23:10:00.004+10:00

I had bought a Britannia Jagdpanther at the car boot sale for 10 bucks.. it was a sort of mildly mottled shade of some sort of sand, that was about it.I had given it a thin wash and then I applied a few more thin washes of Vallejo sepia wash and began to do something with it..I came and went and its progress was incidental to other more major projects I was doing..

Ok, put on a bit of gauze so as to crerate the cammo net effect

Then applied some PVA in patches and submerged it in the dried tea leaf box..

sealed the tea leaf stuff with a coat of PVA

my strategic reserves of dried tea leaves

a second layer of foliage

final seal of the foliage


a bit green cammo pattern , paint the foliage and weather and dust

somewhere along the line I had painted the running gear Tamiya flat brown and given it a heavy sepia wash and then a light black wash..
scrubbed up well..I should have bought all the Britannia tank stuff Mick Steggles was selling .................................................doh!

Wagram Project..more Germans

2010-08-23T07:46:00.000+10:00

five more units join Arch Duke Charle's Army .All AB

Some Hungarians

2010-08-19T12:57:00.000+10:00

The last of the Hungarian Infantry

Back to the painting table , part 3

2010-08-10T10:44:00.000+10:00

well the Soviets.. first pic up ..colours blocked in , tunics flesh helmets and tracks then two thin sprays of Vallejo sepia tone.., one of my versions of the "Wash" method..

Then the reset , , a black wash over the running gear, a bit of black wash to outline grilles and hatches periscopes and whatever needs a bit of definition a spay of the lower areas with Tamiya earth then a light dusting of the upper areas with the same..then a highlight with Tamiya buff of the running gear and lower areas to show the dried mud/dust . and a light dusting again of the upper areas ..then a coat of Matte varnish by hand and a final spray of Gunze Flat clear to "pull it all together". The varnishing both protects the model and evens out the weathering, which, without varnishing , can be a bit stark and ugly.. and then the nice bases..

Back to the painting table , part 2.

2010-08-09T09:40:00.000+10:00

deciding to continue with this now WIP on soviet armour several more steps are shown below. First is the base coat of Tamiya dark Brown.

Even with careful airbrushing little bits get missed , no problem..

Then next an airbrushing with Gunze Olive Green..I leave the running gear out of this process.

Then the blocking in of incidentel detail..the tracks done in n GW Dark flesh and..

Back to the painting table!!!

2010-08-07T12:01:00.003+10:00

My serious case of cellulitis has turned into a serious ulcerous leg infection but it all seems to be clearing up, slowly, but the pain has abated to a great degree so I am back to painting, after more than two weeks away..as a sort of WIP here are some Soviets I am doing. well just started..Hat T-34 85s, a T34-76 command tank and and a Frontlin BA 64 . all crew Britannia. The retooled T34-85 is excellent for the job...

They have been primed with my favourite spray primer; plasti-kote Projekt Paint PRIMER SUPER, from Bunnings

The painting space

2010-07-02T16:34:00.001+10:00

Vostroyan Sniper

2010-06-28T14:31:00.003+10:00

Wagram Project...the Germans

2010-06-21T21:44:00.000+10:00

AB 15mm Rgts 4,14,,44,46,58,59

and the massed might of the 3lber batteries

Austrian 12lbers

2010-06-09T11:41:00.001+10:00

All AB 15mm
All up 10 elements
click on the shot for a nice big version

Some shots from the recent Gobi desert expedition

2010-06-05T20:47:00.001+10:00

Hermionee and Prudence Starkaddeer, Amateur Archaeologiststs of Note , and their escort of Gordon Highlanders.

Montana Jack Starkadder and his constant companion Elena Filitova, in the forground, with Professor Buggarov's group from the University of Glasgow's Department of Antiquities

So I watched Waterloo this afternoon ..

2010-06-05T20:41:00.002+10:00

and took this pic..he does bear a striking resemblence to Rod Steiger

1/56th , or 28mm, Front Rank Miniature

Colonels Reggie and Cedric Marple , Retired

2010-05-15T12:46:00.004+10:00

The Marple Twins..Reggie , late Lt Colonel of 2nd Chudleighs and Cedric , late Lt Colonel of the 9th Gordons

Hinterland miniatures Princess Viktoria-Luise and chums

2010-05-15T12:31:00.004+10:00

Hinterland Louisas

http://hinterlandminiatures.weebly.com/

Some Hungarians

2010-04-21T19:15:00.000+10:00

All AB 15mm
The balance of the Hungarian grenadiers and a regiment of fusliers.

More German Grenadiers

2010-04-15T12:55:00.000+10:00

The balance of the German Grenadier force

German Grenadiers part 1

2010-04-04T10:33:00.003+10:00

All AB 15mm,click on image for larger picture..abndI made the terrain as well

further to the washing imbroglio..

2010-04-03T13:22:00.001+11:00

bits still in the WIP stage which have featured in this exercise..

The Washing debate part 2

2010-03-31T12:06:00.005+11:00

I have begun to reset and block in colours that don't like a brown wash ..all taken in a rather harsh desk top light and not completed as such but posted here for continuity of discussion..those popping in for the first time follow by clicking on the label washing ..clicking on the pictures will bring thing s up..

well this is how they look

A Valiant German popped in, getting him sone for the goulburn big game , I sort of did it on the side to prcatice washing WWII, the uniform here was washed in black and reset..I could of washed in both black and sepia and if a 28mm I probably would do this ..
the 15mm austrians can be seen, now complete here
http://thecardinalspaintingblog.blogspot.com/2010/04/german-grenadiers-part-1.html

Well over on the Rum Corp Tavern.....(The Washing Part 1)

2010-03-31T10:53:00.008+11:00

...there is a bit of talk about washes and the like and I frankly and wholeheartedly think that the current craze for washing is an example of a process being substituted for ability..and I also feel that many of the "final" product look murky and muddy and rather crap.Here is the link
http://ozwargaming.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=3837
In the RCT debate, if it can be thought of as such ,it seems that some have understood me to be anti wash..well I am anti murk and and anti poor standards. I love wash ..I use it all the time but I never ever mistake it for being a substitute for care and patience so here I begin a bit of "a Reply " to those on the RCT who don't seem to "get " what I am saying.

I will post here the first of number of pictures that will , hopefully, elucidate my methods, and perhaps help others to climb from the mud....Below the stuff blocked in with colours that are only to be washed in brown .

and now the washing , with Vallejo sepia tone , begins...

more to come as the re-setting begins..

Minifigs near complete

2010-03-25T00:17:00.004+11:00

While technically a WIP, as they are theoretically unbased I will allow these to pass my otherwise pedantic and stringent views on this matter..Figures are 1974 era sculptures .. owned by larkers ,as mostly supplied by evzone .all painted by the Cardinal.Cork bases by Larkers Click on the pics for nice big versions.

http://passageoflines.50.forumer.com/viewforum.php?f=85

Minfigs Resurrection part 5

2010-03-17T14:10:00.002+11:00

well the washing with black and then sepia Vallejo wash and the begining of the painting ..

Minifigs resurrection part 4

2010-03-14T01:00:00.005+11:00

Having received some more very averagely done Minifigs and charged with organising them into an organic brigade for Lasalle who was toI say no. The plan is to use the existing paint jobs as a basis for the repaint to cut down time taken and cost for the owner..well that's the plan , I am not sure that there will be that much of a saving .. a number have to be done from scratch and there are any number of horrible mistakess to repair..but ever onwards.

Wagram Project

2010-03-08T16:48:00.000+11:00

more of the Wagram Project 6 bases of cuirassier and the final 6 bases of Landwehr..