Men with the bark on

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PS 2695.R53M4 1900

.Men with the bark on

3 1924 022 035 111

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MEN WITH THE BARK ON

By THE SAME AUTHOR.

SUNDOWN LEFLARE. Short Stories. Illustra-
tions by the Author. Post 8vo, Cloth, Orna-
mental, $1 25.
Sundown Leflare is not idealized in Mr. Remington's

handling of him. . . . But he is a very realistic, very

human character, and one whom we would see and read

more of hereafter, — Boston Journal.

CROOKED TRAILS. Illustrated by the Author.

8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $2 00.

Mr. Remington as author and artis^ presents a perfect
combination. — Philadelphia Telegraph.

PONY TRACKS. Illustrated by the Author. 8vo,

Half Cloth, Ornamental, $1 75.
■ No better illustrated' book of frontier adventure has
been published. — Boston Journal.

NEW YORK AND LONDON:
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS.

Men with the Bark On

BY

FREDERIC REMINGTON

ILLUSTRATED BY THE AUTHOR

NEW YORK AND LONDON

HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS

igoo

6a
32B

Copyright, 1900, by Frederic Remington

All rights reserved.

"Men wit J i the bark on die like the wild
animals, unnaturally — unmourned, and even
unthought of mostly "

CONTENTS

Page

The War Dreams ... .* . .3

The Bowels of a Battle-ship .... 13

The Honor of the Troop 25

A Sketch by MacNeil . . . . 41
The Story of the Dry Leaves . .... 49
A Failure of Justice. . ... 69

Sorrows of Don Tomas Pidal, Reconcentrado 85
When a Document is Official . . 101

The White Forest . . . .121
They Bore a Hand 141

The Trouble Brothers ; Bill and the Wolf 161
With the Fifth Corps 171

ILLUSTRATIONS

CAPTAIN GRIMESS BATTERY GOING UP EL

POSO HILL Frontispiece

THE EXECUTIVE OTFICER

"THREE BANDITS WERE LED BACK INTO
THE PATH " .

"A BEAUTIFUL FIGHT ENSUED" ....

" ' THIS IS WHERE THEM INJUNS IS LIGHT-
MINDED ' "

THE PASSION OF AH-WE-AH

" THE MOOSE COULD HEAR HIM COMING FOR
AN HOUR"

" THE DRY LEAVES HAD LASTED LONGER
THAN SHE " . . . .

"THE CAPTAIN WAS A GENTLEMAN"

" ' STOP — STOP THAT, DAN !' "

"THIS WAS THE FIRST I FELT OF WAR"

"'THE MEN OF THE BATTALION FIRED
MANY SHOTS AT ME ' "

"'NO, I AM NOT LOCO'"

Fan

ng

1 8

32
36

44

54

60

62

70
73
94

96
no

ILLUSTRATIONS

"THE BUFFALO. HUNTERS KNEW BY THE

' SIGN ' ON THE TRAIL " . . . .

THE OLD YALE STROKE .
" THE SERIOUSNESS OF FOUR FEET OF

SNOW " ...

THE ESSEX TROOPER . .

THE HOT FINISH IN THE SNOW-SHOE RACE

CARIBOU TRACK . .

HAULING THE TOBOGGANS .

THE CABIN ...

ICE-FISHING . . . .

" ' DISMOUNT — GET DOWN ' " . . .
"THERE WAS NOTHING TO DO " . . .

" ' I HOPE THE COLONEL WON'T GET MAD ' "
THE DEATH OF OESTREICHER . .
"THIS IS THE WAY IT BEGAN"
" AT THE BLOODY FORD OF THE SAN JUAN "
" BEFORE THE WARNING SCREAM OF THE

SHRAPNEL " . . . .

THE TEMPORARY HOSPITAL

"THE WOUNDED, GOING TO THE REAR,

CHEERED THE AMMUNITION "...
" IN THE REAR OF THE BATTLE — WOUNDED

ON THE SAN JUAN ROAD " . . . .

Fac,

tig 116

122

124
126

128
130
I3'2

134
I36
I48
150
152
154
166
184

I9S
204
206

THE WAR DREAMS

THE WAR DREAMS

AT the place far from Washington where
l the gray, stripped war-ships swing on
the tide, and towards which the troop-trains
hurry, there is no thought of peace. The
shore is a dusty, smelly bit of sandy coral,
and the houses in this town !are built like
snare -drums; they are dismal thoroughly,
and the sun makes men sweat and wish to
God they were somewhere else.

But the men in the blue uniforms are
young, and Madame Beaulieu, who keeps
the restaurant, strives to please, so it came
to pass that I attended one of these happy-
go-lucky banquets. The others were artil-
lery officers, men from off the ships, with a
little sprinkle of cavalry and infantry just for
salt. They were brothers, and yellow-jack —
hellish heat — bullets, and the possibility of
getting mixed up in a mass of exploding
3

THE WAR DREAMS

iron had been discounted long back in their
school-boy days perhaps. Yet they are not
without sentiment, and are not even callous
to all these, as will be seen, though men are
different and do not think alike — less, even,
when they dream.

" Do you know, I had a dream last night,"
said a naval officer.

" So did I."

" So did I," was chorussed by the others.

" Well, well !" I said. " Tell your dreams.
Mr. H , begin."

" Oh, it was nothing much. I dreamed
that I was rich and old, and had a soft stom-
ach, and I very much did not want to die.
It was a curious sort of feeling, this very old
and rich business, since I am neither, nor
even now do I want to die, which part was
true in my dream.

" I thought I was standing on the bluffs
overlooking the Nile. I saw people skating,
when suddenly numbers of hippopotamuses
— great masses of them — broke up through
the ice and began swallowing the people.
This was awfully real to me. I even saw Mac
there go down one big throat as easily as a
4

THE WAR DREAMS

cocktail. Then they came at me in a solid
wall. I was crazed with fear — I fled. I
could not run; but coming suddenly on. a
pile of old railroad iron, I quickly made a
bicycle out of two car-wheels, and flew. A
young hippo more agile than the rest made
himself a bike also, and we scorched on over
the desert. My strength failed ; I despaired
and screamed — then I woke up. Begad,
this waiting and waiting in this fleet is surely
doing things to me !"

The audience laughed, guyed, and said let's
have some more dreams, and other things.
This dream followed the other things, and
he who told it was an artilleryman :

" My instincts got tangled up with one of
those Key West shrimp salads, I reckon ;
but war has ho terrors for a man who has
been through my last midnight battle. I
dreamed I was superintending two big 12-
inch guns which were firing on an enemy's
fleet. I do not know where this was. We
got out of shot, but we seemed to have
plenty of powder. The fleet kept coming
on, and I had to do something, so I put an
old superannuated sergeant in the gun. He
5

THE WAR DREAMS

pleaded, but I said he was old, the case was
urgent, it did not matter how one died for
his country, etc. — so we put the dear old
sergeant in the gun and fired him at the
fleet. Then the battle became hot. I load-
ed soldiers in the guns and fired them out to
sea until I had no more soldiers. Then I
began firing citizens. I ran out of citizens.
But there were Congressmen around some-
where there in my dreams, and though they
made speeches of protest to me under the
five-minute rule, I promptly loaded them in,
and touched them off in their turn. The
fleet was pretty hard-looking by this time,
but still in the ring. I could see the foreign
sailors picking pieces of Congressmen from
around the breech-blocks, and the officers
were brushing their clothes with their hand-
kerchiefs. I was about to give up, when I
thought of the Key West shrimp salad. One
walked conveniently up to me, and I loaded
her in. With a last convulsive yank I pulled
the lock-string, and the fleet was gone with
my dream."

" How do cavalrymen dream, Mr. B ?"

was asked of a yellow-leg.
6

THE WAR DREAMS

" Oh, our dreams are all strictly profes-
sional, too. I was out with my troop, being
drilled by a big fat officer on an enormous
horse. He was very red-faced, and crazy with
rage at us. He yelled like orte of those siren
whistles out there in the fleet.

" He said we were cowards and would not
fight. So he had a stout picket-fence made,
about six feet high, and then, forming us in
line, he said no cavalry was any good which
could be stopped by any obstacle. Mind
you, he yelled it at us like the siren. He
said the Spaniards would not pay any atten-
tion to such cowards. Then he gave the
order to charge, and we flew into the fence.
We rode at the fence pell-mell — into it
dashed our horses, while we sabred and
shouted. Behind us now came the big colo-
nel — very big he was now, and with great
red wings — saying, above all the din, ' You
shall never come back — you shall never
come back !' and I was squeezed tighter
and tighter by him up to this fence until I-
awoke; and now I have changed my cock-
tail to a plain vermouth."

When appealed to, the infantry officer
7

THE WAR DREAMS

tapped the table with his knife thoughtfully :
" My dream was not so tragic ; it was a moral
strain ; but I suffered greatly while it lasted.
Somehow I was in command of a company
of raw recruits, and was in some trenches
which we were constructing under fire. My
recruits were not like soldiers — they were not
young men. They were past middle age,
mostly fat, and many had white side whisk-
ers after the fashion of the funny papers
when they draw banker types. I had a man
shot, and the recruits all got around me;
they were pleading and crying to be allowed
to go home.

" Now I never had anything in the world
but my pay, and am pretty well satisfied as
men go in the world, but I suppose the
American does not breathe who is averse to
possessing great wealth himself ; so when one
man said he would give me $1,000,000 in gold
if I would let him go, I stopped to think."
Here is where I suffered so keenly. I wanted
the million, but I did not want to let him go.

" Then these men came up, one after the
other, and offered me varying sums of money
to be allowed to run away — and specious ar-

THE WAR DREAMS

guments in favor of the same. I was now in
agony. D — n it ! that company was worth
nearly a hundred million dollars to me if I
would let them take themselves off. I held
out, but the strain was horrible. Then they
began to offer me their daughters — they
each had photographs of the most beautiful
American girls— r dozens and dozens of Amer-
ican girls, each one of which was a ' peach.'
Say, fellows, I could stand the millions. I
never did ' gig ' on the money, but I took
the photographs, said ' Give me your girls,
and pull your freight !' and my company dis-
appeared instantly. Do you blame a man
stationed in Key West for it — do you, fel-
lows ?"

" Not by a d — d sight !" sang the com-
pany, on its feet.

" Well, you old marine, what did you
dream ?"

" My digestion is so good that my dreams
have no red fire in them. I seldom do dream ;
but last night, it seems to me, I recall having
a wee bit of a dream. I don't know that I
can describe it, but I was looking very in-
tently at a wet spot on the breast of a blue
9

THE WAR DREAMS

uniform coat. I thought they were tears —
woman's tears. I don't know whether it was
a dream or whether I really did see it."

" Oh, d — n your dreams !" said the Doctor.
" What is that bloody old Congress doing
from last reports ?"

THE BOWELS OF A
BATTLE-SHIP

THE BOWELS OF A
BATTLE-SHIP

MODERN war is supposed to be rapid,
and we Americans think " time is
money," but this war seems to be the mur-
der of time, the slow torture of opportunity.
For seven long days and nights I have
been steaming up and down on the battle-
ship Iowa, ten miles off the harbor of Ha-
vana. Nothing happened. The Mayflower
got on the land side of a British tramp and
warned her off, and a poor Spanish fishing-
schooner from Progreso, loaded with rotting
fish, was boarded by a boat's crew from us.
When the captain saw the becutlassed and
bepistolled " tars " he became badly rattled,
and told the truth about himself. A Span-
iard has to be surprised into doing this. He
had been many days out, his ice was gone,
13

BOWELS OF A BATTLE-SHIP

and his fish were " high." He wanted to
make Havana, telling the boarding- officer
that the people of Havana were very hungry.
He had been boarded five times off the coast
by our people:; so the lieutenant — who had
just gotten out of bed, by-the-way — told him
to take his cargo of odors out into the open
sea, and not to come back again.

The appalling sameness of this pacing up
and down before Havana works on the
nerves of every one, from captain to cook's
police. We are neglected ; no one comes to
see us. All the Key West trolley-boats run
to the Admiral's flag, and we know nothing
of the outside. We speculate on the Flying
Squadron, the Oregon, the army, and the
Spanish. I have an impression that I was
not caught young enough to develop a love
of the sea, which the slow passage of each
day reinforces. I have formed a hafojt of
damning the army for its procrastination,
but in my heart of hearts I yearn for it. I
want to hear a " shave-tail " bawl ; I want to
get some dust in my throat; I want to kick
the dewy grass, to see a sentry pace in the
moonlight, and to talk the language of my
14

BOWELS OF A BATTLE-SHIP

tribe. I resist it; I suppress myself; but
my homely old first love comes to haunt me,
waking and sleeping — yes, even when I look
at this mountain of war material, this epit-
ome of modern science, with its gay white
officers, who talk of London, Paris, China,
and Africa in one breath. Oh, I know I
shall fall on the neck of the first old " dough-
boy " or " yellow-leg " I see, and I don't care
if he is making bread at the time!

The Morro light has been extinguished,
but two powerful searches flash back and
forth across the sky. " Good things to sail
by," as the navigator says. "We can put
them out when the time comes." Another
purpose they serve is that " Jackie " has
something to swear at as he lies by his loaded
gun — something definite, something material,
to swear at. Also, two small gunboats de-
veloped a habit of running out of the har-
bor — not very far, and with the utmost
caution, like a boy who tantalizes a chained
bear. And at places in the town arises smoke.

" What is it ?" asks the captain of marines.

" Big tobacco-factories working over-time
for us," replies Doctor Crandell.
15

BOWELS OF A BATTLE-SHIP

I was taken down into the machinery of
the ship. I thought to find in it some hu-
man interest. Through mile after mile of
underground passages I crawled and scram-
bled and climbed amid wheels going this way
and rods plunging that, with little electric
lights to make holes in the darkness. Men
stood about in the overpowering blasts of
heat, sweating and greasy and streaked with
black — grave, serious persons of superhuman
intelligence — men who have succumbed to
modern science, which is modern life. Dai-
sies and trees and the play of sunlight mean
nothing to these — they know when all three
are useful, which is enough. They pulled
the levers, opened and shut cocks, showered
coal into the roaring white hells under the
boilers; hither and yon they wandered, be-
stowing mother-like attentions on rod and
pipe. I talked at them, but they developed
nothing except preoccupied professionalism.
I believe they fairly worship this throbbing
mass of mysterious iron ; I believe they love
this bewildering power which they control.
Its problems entrance them ; but it simply
stuns me. At last when I stood on deck I
16

BOWELS OF A BATTLE- SHIP

had no other impression but that of my own
feebleness, and, as I have said, felt rather
stunned than stimulated. Imagine a square
acre of delicate machinery plunging and
whirling and spitting, with men crawling
about in its demon folds ! It is not for me
to tell you more.

Don't waste your sympathy on these men
belowdecks — they will not thank you ; they
will not even understand you. They are
"modern" — are better off than "Jackie"
and his poor wandering soul — they love their
iron baby, so leave them alone with their joy.
Modern science does not concern itself about
death.

The Iowa will never be lost to the nation
for want of care. By night there are dozens
of trained eyes straining into the darkness,
the searches are ready to flash, and the
watch on deck lies close about its shotted
guns. Not a light shows from the loom of
the great battle -ship. Captain Evans sits
most of the time on a perch upon the bridge,
forty feet above the water-line. I have seen
him come down to his breakfast at eight
bells with his suspenders hanging down be-
b 17

BOWELS OF A BATTLE-SHIP

hind, indicating that he had been jumped
out during the night.

The executive officer, Mr. Rogers, like the
machinery down below, never sleeps. Wan-
der where I would about the ship, I could
not sit a few moments before Mr. Rogers
would flit by, rapid and ghost-like — a word
here, an order there, and eyes for everybody
and everything. Behind, in hot pursuit,
came stringing along dozens of men hunting
for Mr. Rogers ; and this never seemed to
let up — midnight and mid-day all the same.
The thought of what it must be is simply
horrible. He has my sympathy — nervous
prostration will be his reward — yet I greatly
fear the poor man is so perverted, so dehu-
manized, as positively to like his life and
work.

Naval officers are very span in their grace-
ful uniforms, so one is struck when at "quar-
ters" the officers commanding the turrets ap-
pear in their "dungaree," spotted and soiled.
The Iowa has six turrets, each in charge of
an officer responsible for its guns and hoist-
ing-gear, delicate and complicated. In each
turret is painted, in a sort of Sam Weller
18

THE EXECUTIVE OFFICE^

BOWELS OF A BATTLE-SHIP

writing, " Remember the Maine." The gun-
captains and turret-men acquire a strange in-
terest and pride in their charges, hanging,
about them constantly.

Two gun-captains in the forward turret
used to sit on the great brown barrels of the
1 2-inch rifles just outside the posts, guarding
them with jealous care ; for it is a " Jackie "
trick to look sharply after his little spot on
shipboard, and to promptly fly into any
stranger who defiles it in any way. At times
these two men popped back into their holes
like prairie-dogs. It was their hope and their
home, that dismal old box of tricks, and it
may be their grave. I was going to die with
them there, though I resolutely refused to
live with them. However, the Iowa is un-
sinkable and unlickable, and the hardware
on the forward turret is fifteen inches thick,
which is why I put my brand on it. So
good-luck to Lieutenant Van Duzer and his
merry men !

" Jackie," the prevailing thing on a man-
of-war, I fail to comprehend fully. He is a
strong-visaged, unlicked cub, who grumbles
and bawls and fights. He is simple, handy,
19

BOWELS OF A BATTLE-SHIP

humorous, and kind to strangers, as I can
testify. The nearest he ever comes to a
martial appearance is when he lines up at
quarters to answer "Here!" to his name, and
there is just where he doesn't martialize at
all. He comes barefooted, hat on fifty ways,
trousers rolled up or down, and everything
blowing wide. He scratches his head or
stands on one foot in a ragged line, which
grins at the spectators in cheerful heedless-
ness, and he looks very much gratified when
it is all over. His hope is for a bang-up sea-
fight, or two roaring days of shore liberty,
when he can "tear up the beach" with all
the force of his reckless muscularity.

The marine, or sea-soldier, has succumbed
to modern conditions, and now fights a gun
the same as a sailor-man. He manages to
retain his straight - backed discipline, but is
overworked in his twofold capacity. This
" soldier and sailor too " is a most interest-
ing man to talk to, and I wish I could tell
some of his stories. He marches into the
interior of China or Korea to pull a minister
out of the fire — thirty or forty of him against
a million savages, but he gets his man. He
20

BOWELS OF A BATTLE-SHIP

lies in a jungle hut on the Isthmus or a
" dobie " house on the West Coast while the
microbes and the " dogoes " rage.

But it's all horribly alike to me, so I man-
aged to desert. The Winslow, torpedero,
ran under our lee one fine morning, and I
sneaked on board, bound for the flag-ship —
the half-way station between us and Cayo
Hueso. We plunged and bucked about in
the roaring waves of the Gulf, and I nearly
had the breakfast shaken out of me. I as-
sure you that I was mighty glad to find tne
lee of the big cruiser New York.

On board I found that the flag-ship had
had some good sport the day previous shell-
ing some working parties in Matanzas. Mr.
Zogbaum and Richard Harding Davis had
seen it all, note-book in hand. I was stiff
with jealousy ; -but it takes more than one
fight to make a war — so here is hoping !

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

L TROOP in a volunteer regiment might
be an unadulterated fighting outfit, but
at first off, to volunteers, it would not be the
letter L which they would fight for, so much
as the mere sake of fighting, and they would
never regard the letter L as of more impor-
tance than human life. Indeed, that letter
would not signify to them any more than
the " second set of fours," or the regimental
bass drum. Later on it certainly would,
but that would take a long time. In the in-
stance of the L troop of which I speak, it
had nearly one hundred years to think about,
when any one in the troop cared to think
about the matter at all. They were honor-
able years, and some of the best men living
or dead have at one time or another followed
that guidon. It had been through the " rifle "
and "dragoon" periods of our history, and

25

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

was now part of the regular cavalry estab-
lishment, and its operations had extended
from Lake Erie to the city of Mexico.

Long lists of names were on its old rolls —
men long since dead, but men who in the
snow and on the red sands had laid down all
they had for the honor of L Troop guidon.
Soldiers — by which is meant the real long-
service military type — take the government
very much as a matter of course ; but the
number of the regiment, and particularly the
letter of their troop, are tangible, compara-
tive things with which they are living every
day. The feeling is precisely that one has
for the Alma Mater, or for the business
standing of an old commercial house.

The "old man " had been captain of L for
years and years, and for thirty years its first
sergeant had seen its rank and file fill up and
disappear. Every tenth man was a " buck "
soldier, who thought it only a personal mat-
ter if he painted a frontier town up after
pay-day, but who would follow L troop
guidon to hell, or thump any one's nose in
the garrison foolish enough to take L in vain,
and I fear they would go further than this —
26

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

yes, even further than men ought to go.
Thus the " rookies " who came under the
spell of L Troop succumbed to this venera-
tion through either conventional decorum or
the " mailed fist.".

In this instance L Troop had been thread-
ing the chaparral by night and by day on
what rations might chance, in hopes to capt-
ure for the honor of the troop sundry greas-
ers, outlawed and defiant of the fulmina-
tions of the civil order of things. Other
troops of the regiment also were desirous
of the same thing, and were threading the
desolate wastesfar op either side. Naturally
L did not want any other troop to round up
more "game" than they did, so then horses
were ridden thin, and the men's tempers were
soured by the heat, dust, poor diet, and lack
of success.

The captain was an ancient veteran, gray
and rheumatic, near his retirement, and
twenty-five years in his grade, thanks to the
silly demagogues so numerous in Congress.
He had been shot full of holes, bucketed
about on a horse, immured in mud huts,
frozen and baked and soaked until he should'
27

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

have long since had rank enough to get a
desk and a bed or retirement. Now he was
chasing human fleas through a jungle — boys'
work — and it was admitted in ranks that the
" old man " was about ready to " throw a
curb." The men liked him, even sympa-
thized with him, but there was that d G

Troop in the barrack next, and they would
give them the merry ha-ha when they re-
turned to the post if L did not do some-
thing.

And at noon — mind you, high noon — the
captain raised his right hand ; up came the
heads of the horses, and L Troop stood still
in the road. Pedro, the Mexican trailer,
pointed to the ground and said, "It's not an
hour old," meaning the trail.

" Dismount," came the sharp order.

Toppling from their horses, the men stood
about, but the individuals displayed no no-
ticeable emotion ; they did what L Troop
did. One could not imagine their thoughts
by looking at their red set faces.

They rested quietly for a time in the scant
shade of the bare tangle, and then they sat
up and listened, each man looking back up
28

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

the road. They could hear a horse com-
ing, which meant much to people such as
these.

The men "thrown to the rear" would
come first or " fire a shot," but with a slow
pattering came a cavalry courier into view
— a dusty soldier on a tired horse, which
stepped stiffly along, head down, and if it
were not for the dull kicking of the inert
man, he would have stopped anywhere. The
courier had ridden all night from the rail-
road, seventy - five miles away. He dis-
mounted and unstrapped his saddle pocket,
taking therefrom a bundle of letters and a
bottle, which he handed to the " old man "
with a salute.

The captain now had a dog-tent set up for
himself, retiring into it with his letters and
the bottle. If you had been there you
would have seen a faint ironical smile cir-
culate round the faces of L Troop.

A smart lieutenant, beautifully fashioned
for- the mounted service, and dressed in field
uniform, with its touches of the "border"
on the "regulations," stepped up' to the dog-
tent, and, stooping over, saluted, saying, " I
29

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

will run this trail for a few miles if the cap-
tain will give me a few men."

" You will run nothing. Do you not see
that I am reading my mail ? You will retire
until I direct you — "

The lieutenant straightened up with a snap
of his lithe form. His eyes twinkled mer-
rily. He was aware of the mail, he realized
the bottle, and he had not been making
strategic maps of the captain's vagaries for
four years to no purpose at all ; so he said,
"Yes, sir," as he stepped out of the fire of
future displeasure.

But he got himself straightway into the
saddle of a horse as nearly thoroughbred as
himself, and riding down the line, he 'spoke
at length with the old first sergeant. Then
he rode off into the brush. Presently six
men whose horses were " fit " followed after
him, and they all trotted along a trail whicli
bore back of the captain's tent, and shortly
they came back into the road. He had ar-
ranged so as to avoid another explosion from
the " old man."

Then Pedro Zacatin ran the trail of three
ponies — no easy matter through the maze of
3°

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

cattle-paths, with the wind blowing the dust
into the hoof-marks. He only balked at a
turn, more to see that the three did not
" split out " than at fault of his own. In an
opening he stopped, and pointing, said, in
the harsh gutturals which were partly de-
rived from an Indian mother, and partly
from excessive cigarette- smoking: "They
have stopped and made a fire. Do you see
the smoke ? You will get them now if they
do not get away."

The lieutenant softly pulled his revolver,
and raising it over his head, looked behind.
The six soldiers opened their eyes wide like
babies, and yanked out their guns. They
raised up their horses' heads, pressed in the
spurs, and as though at exercise in the rid-
ing-hall, the seven horses broke into a gallop.
Pedro stayed behind ; he had no further in-
terest in L Troop than he had already dis-
played.

With a clattering rush the little group
bore fast on the curling wreath of the camp-
fire. Three white figures dived into the lab-
yrinth of thicket, and three ponies tugged
hard at their lariats; two shots rang, one
c 31

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

from the officer's revolver, one from a cor-
poral's carbine, and a bugler- boy threw a
brass trumpet at the fleeting forms.

" Ride 'em down ! ride 'em down !" sang
out the officer, as through the swishing
brush bounded the aroused horses, while the
bullets swarmed on ahead.

It was over as I write, and in two minutes
the three bandits were led back into the
path, their dark faces blanched.

The lieutenant wiped a little stain of blood
from his face with a very dirty pocket-hand-
kerchief, a mere swish from a bush; the cor-
poral looked wofully at a shirt-sleeve torn half
off by the thorns, and the trumpeter hunted
up his instrument, while a buck soldier ob-
served, " De ' old man ' ull be hotter'n chilli
'bout dis."

The noble six looked at the ignoble three
half scornfully, half curiously, after the man-
ner of men at a raffle when they are guess-
ing the weight of the pig.

" Tie them up, corporal," said the lieuten-
ant, as he shoved fresh shells into his gun ;
" and I say, tie them to those mesquit-trees,
Apache fashion — sabe? — Apache fashion,
32

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

corporal ; and three of you men stay here
and hold 'em down." With which he rode
off, followed by his diminished escort.

The young man rode slowly, with his eyes
on the ground, while at intervals he shoved
his campaign hat to one side and rubbed his
right ear, until suddenly he pulled his hat
over his eyes, saying, " Ah, I have it." Then
he proceeded at a trot to the camp.

Here he peeped cautiously into the " old
man's " dog-tent. This he did ever so care-
fully; but the "old man" was in a sound
sleep. The lieutenant betook himself to a
bush to doze until the captain should bestir
himself. L Troop was uneasy. It sat around
in groups, but nothing happened until five
o'clock.

At this hour the " old man " came out of

his tent, saying, " I say, Mr. B' , have you

got any water in your canteen?"

"Yes, indeed, captain. Will you have a
drop?"

After he had held the canteen between

his august nose and the sky for a considerable

interval, he handed it back with a loud

" Hount !" and L Troop fell in behind him

33

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

as he rode away, leaving two men, who gath-
ered up the dog-tent and the empty bottle.

" Where is that greaser? Have

him get out here and run this trail. Here,
you tan-colored coyote, kem up !" and the
captain glared fiercely at poor Pedro, while
the lieutenant winked vigorously at that
perturbed being, and patted his lips with his
hand to enjoin silence.

So Pedro ran the trail until it was quite
dusk, being many times at fault. The lieu-
tenant would ride out to him, and together
they bent over it and talked long and ear-
nestly. L Troop sat quietly in its saddles,
grinned cheerfully, and poked each other in
the ribs.

Suddenly Pedro came back, saying to the
captain : " The men are in that bush — in
camp, I think. Will you charge, sir ?"

" How do you know that ?" was the petu-
lant query.

" Oh, I think they are there ; so does the
lieutenant. Don't you, Mr. B ?"

" Well, I have an idea we shall capture
them if we charge," nervously replied the
younger officer.

34

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

" Well — Right into line ! Revolvers !
Humph!" said the captain, and the brave old
lion ploughed his big bay at the object of
attack — it did not matter what was in front
— and L Troop followed fast. They all be-
came well tangled up in the dense chaparral,
but nothing more serious than the thorns
stayed their progress, until three shots were
fired some little way in the rear, and the lieu-
tenant's voice was heard calling, " Come
here ; we have got them."

In the growing dusk the troop gathered
around the three luckless " greasers," now
quite speechless with fright and confusion.
The captain looked his captives over softly,
saying, " Pretty work for L Troop ; sound very
well in reports. Put a guard over them, lieu-
tenant. I am going to try for a little sleep."

The reflections of L Troop were cheery as
it sat on its blankets and watched the coffee
in the tin cups boil. Our enterprising lieu-
tenant sat apart on a low bank, twirling his
thumbs and indulging in a mighty wonder if
that would be the last of it, for he knew only
too well that trifling with the " old man "
was no joke.

35

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

Presently he strolled over and called the
old first sergeant — their relations were very
close. " I think L had best not talk much
about this business. G Troop might hear
about it, and that wouldn't do L any good.
Sabe?"

" Divil the word kin a man say, sir, and
live till morning in L Troop."

Later there was a conference of the file,
and then many discussions in the ranks, with
the result that L Troop shut its mouth for-
ever.

Some months later they returned to the
post. The canteen rang with praise of the
" old man," for he was popular with the men
because he did not bother them with fussy
duties, and loud was the psean of the mighty
charge over the big insurgent camp where
the three great chiefs of the enemy were capt-
ured. Other troops might be very well, but
L was " it."

This hard rubbing of the feelings of others
had the usual irritating effect. One night
the burning torch went round and all the
troopers gathered at the canteen, where the
wag of G Troop threw the whole unvarnished
36

THE HONOR OF THE TROOP

truth in the face of L members present.
This, too, with many embellishments which
were not truthful. A beautiful fight en-
sued, and many men slept in the guard-
house.

After dark, L Troop gathered back of the
stables, and they talked fiercely at each
other ; accusations were made, and recrimi-
nation followed. Many conferences were
held in the company-room, but meanwhile G
men continued to grind it in.

Two days later the follqwing appeared in
the local newspaper :

. . . . " Pedro Zacatin, a Mexican who
served with troops in the late outbreak, was
found hanging to a tree back of the post.
There was no clew, since the rain of last night
destroyed all tracks of the perpetrators of
the deed. It may have been suicide, but it is
thought at the post that he was murdered
by sympathizers of the late revolution who
knew the part he had taken against them.
The local authorities will do well to take
measures against lawless Mexicans from
over the border who hang about this city,"
etc.

37

A SKETCH BY MacNEIL

A SKETCH BY MacNEIL

WE had to laugh. I chuckled all day, it
was all so quaint. But I don't see
how I can tell you, because you don't know
MacNeil, which is necessary.

In a labored way, MacNeil is an old fron-
tier scout with a well-frosted poll. He is
what we all call a " good fellow," with plenty
of story, laugh, and shrewd comment ; but his
sense of humor is so ridiculously healthy, so
full-bloodedly crude, that many ceremonious
minds would find themselves " off side "
when Mac turns on his sense of jollity. He
started years ago as a scout for Sheridan
down Potomac way, and since then he has
been in the Northwest doing similar duty
against Indians, so a life spent in the camps
and foot-hills has made no " scented darling "
out of old man MacNeil. He is a thousand-
times hero, but he does not in the least
4i

A SKETCH BY MacNEIL

understand this. If he could think any one
thought he was such a thing he would opine
that such a one was a fool. He has acted
all his life in great and stirring events as un-
conscious of his own force as the heat, the
wind, or the turn of tide. He is a pure old
warrior, and nothing has come down the
years to soften MacNeil. He is red-healthy
in his sixties, and has never seen anything to
make him afraid. The influence of even fear
is good on men. It makes them reflective,
and takes them out of the present. But even
this refinement never came to Mac, and he
needed it in the worst way.

So that is a bad sketch of MacNeil.

A little bunch of us sat around the hotel
one day, and we were drawing Mac's cov'ers
of knowledge concerning Indians. As the
conversation went on, Mac slapped his leg,
and laughing, said, " The most comical thing
I ever saw in my life !"

"What was that, Mac?" came a half-dozen
voices, and Mac was convulsed with merri-
ment.

" The last time the Piegans raided the
Crows I was out with the First Cavalry. We
42

A SKETCH BY MacNEIL

were camped on the Yellowstone, and had
gone to bed. I heard an Injun outside' ask-
in' about me, and pretty soon Plenty Coups
comes in, sayin' the Piegans had got away
with a good bunch of their ponies, but that
they had found the trail crossing a little way
down the river, and Big Horse and a war-
band of Crows was layin' on it, and they
wanted me to go 'long with them and help
run it. I didn't have anything but a big gov-
ernment horse, and they ain't good company
for Injun ponies when they are runnin' horse-
thieves; besides, I didn't feel called to bust
my horse helpin' Injuns out of trouble. There
had got to be lots of white folks in the coun-
try, and they wa'n't at all stuck on havin'
war-bands of Injuns pirootin' over the range.
The Injuns wanted me to protect them from
the cowboys, 'cause, you see, all Injuns look
alike to a cowboy when they are runnin' over
his cows. So Plenty Coups says he will give
a pony, and I says, ' Mr. Injun, I will go
you one.'

" I fixed up sort of warm, 'cause it was
late in the fall, and threw my saddle on the
pony, and joined the war -band. It was
d 43

A SKETCH BY MacNEIL

bright moon, and we ran the trail slowly
until morning ; and when it come day we
moved along Injun fashion, which ain't slow,
if you ask me about it. We kept a-pushin'
until late afternoon, when we saw the Pie-
gans, about seven miles ahead, just streakin'
it over the hills. My Injuns got off their
ponies, and, Injun fashion, they stripped off
every rag they had on except the G-string
and moccasins. This is where them Injuns
is light-minded, for no man has got any call
to go flirtin' with Montana weather at that
time of the year in his naked hide. Old man
Mac stands pat with a full set of jeans. And
then we got on them ponies and we ran
them Piegans as hard as we could lather ^ill
plumb dark, when we had to quit because
we couldn't see. We were in an open sage-
brush country. Well, it got darker and
darker, and then it began to rain. I sat on
my saddle and put my saddle-blanket over
my head, and I was pretty comfortable.
Then it began to rain for fair. Them Injuns
stamped and sung and near froze to death,
and I under the blanket laughing at them.
'Long bout midnight it began to snow, and
44

A SKETCH BY MacNEIL

them Injuns turned on the steam. The way
they sung and stomped round in a ring
tickled me near to death. The snow set-
tled round my blanket and kept out the
cold in great shape. I only had my nose
out, and when it began to get gray morning
I had to just yell to see them Injuns out
there in five inches of snow, without a rag on,
hoppin' for all they was worth. You talk
about shootin' up a fellow's toes to make
him dance ; it wa'n't a circumstance. Them
Injuns had to dance or ' cash in.' I have seen
plenty of Injun dances, but that dance had
a swing to it that they don't get every time.

" We got on the ponies and started back
through the falling snow, tryin' to locate
them annuity goods of theirn. 'Course we
lost the Piegans. We lost ourselves, and we
didn't find them clothes till afternoon, 'most
eighteen miles back, and then we had to dig
them up, and they was as stiff as par-fleche.
Them was a funny bunch of warriors, I tell
you.

" We found an old big-jaw * steer which

* A cattle disease.

45

A SKETCH BY MacNEIL

some punchers had killed, and them Injuns
eat that all right ; but I wasn't hungry
enough yet to eat big-jaw steer, so I pulled
along down to the railroad. I got a piece of
bread from a sheep-man, and when I got to
Gray Cliffs, on the N. P., I was 'most frozen.
My feet and knees were all swollen up.

" Whenever I gets to thinkin' 'bout them
bucks jumpin' around out there in the snow
all that night, and me a-settin' there under
the blanket, I has to laugh. She was sure a
funny old revel, boys."

And we listeners joined him, but we were
laughing at MacNeil, not with him.

THE STORY OF THE DRY
LEAVES

THE STORY OF THE DRY
LEAVES

IF one loves the earth, he finds a liveliness
in walking through the autumn woods :
the color, the crackling, and the ripeness of
the time appeal to his senses as he kicks
his way through the dry leaves with his
feet.

It is a wrong thing to dull this harmless-
ness, but still I must remind him that it was
not always so ; such leaves have been the
cause of tragedy. How could bad come of
such unoffending trifles? Listen.

Long ago a very old Indian — an Ottawa —
recalled the sad case of Ah-we-ah from the
nearly forgotten past. His case was similar
to ours, only more serious, since if we could
not approach a deer in the dry forest because
of the noise the leaves made it meant only
49

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

disappointment, but with Ah-we-ah it meant
his utter undoing.

Ah-we-ah grew up or came up as all Indian
boys do who manage to escape the deadfalls
which nature sets in such numbers and vari-
ety for them, and was at the time of the story
barely a man. His folks lived in the North-
west, in what is now known as Manitoba, and
they were of the Ojibbeway people. As was
a very common thing in those days, they were
all murdered by the Sioux; the very last kins-
man Ah-we-ah had on earth was dead when
Ah-we-ah came in one day from his hunting
and saw their bodies lying charred and wolf-
eaten about the ashes of his father's lodge.

He found himself utterly alone in the
world.

The woods Indians, who followed the
moose, the bear, and trapped the small ani-
mals for the Fur Company, did not live to-
gether in great tribal bodies, as did the buffalo
Indians, but scattered out, the better to fol-
low the silent methods of their livelihood.

Ah-we-ah was thus forced to live alone in
the forest that winter, and his little bark hut
was cold and fireless when he came in at
50

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

night, tired with the long day's hunting. This
condition continued for a time, until grief and
a feeling of loneliness determined Ah-we-ah
to start in search of a war party, that he might
accompany them against their enemies, and
have an opportunity to sacrifice honorably a
life which had become irksome to him.

Leaving his belongings on a " sunjegwun,"
or scaffold made of stout poles, he shouldered
his old trade gun, his dry meat, called his
wolf-dogs, and betook himself three days
through the forest to the small settlement
made by the hunting-camps of his tribesman,
old Bent Gun, — a settlement lying about a
series of ponds, of which no name is saved
for this story ; nor does it matter now which
particular mud-holes they were — so long ago
— out there in the trackless waste of poplar
and tamarack.

The people are long since gone ; the camps
are mould ; the very trees they lived among
are dead and down this many a year.

So the lonely hunter came to the lodge of

his friend, and sat him down on a skin, across

the fire from Bent Gun ; and as he dipped

his hollow buffalo horn into the pot he talked

5i

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

of his losses, his revenge, his war-ardor, in-
quired where he* was like to find a fellow-
feeling — yes, even pleaded with the old man
that he and his sons too might go forth to-
gether with him and slay some other simple
savage as a spiritual relief to themselves. He
chanted his war-song by the night fire in the
lodge, to the discomfort and disturbance of
old Bent Gun, who had large family interests
and was minded to stay in his hunting-
grounds, which had yielded well to his traps
and stalking ; besides which the snow was
deep, and the Sioux were far away. It was
not the proper time of the year for war.

By day Ah-we-ah hunted with old Bent
Gun, and they killed moose easily in their
yards, while the women cut them up and
drew them to the camps. Thus they were
happy in the primeval way, what with plenty
of maple-sugar, bears' grease, and the kettle
always steaming full of fresh meat.

But still by night Ah-we-ah continued to
exalt the nobleness of the wearing of the red
paint and the shrill screams of battle to his
tribesmen ; but old Bent Gun did not suc-
cumb to their spirit ; there was meat, and his
52

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

family were many. This finally was under-
stood by Ah-we-ah, who, indeed, had come to
notice the family, and one of them in particu-
lar — a young girl ; and also he was conscious
of the abundance of cheer in the teeming
lodge.

In the contemplation of life as it passed
before his eyes he found that his gaze centred
more and more on the girl. He watched her
cutting up the moose and hauling loads
through the woods with her dogs. She was
dutiful. Her smile warmed him. Her voice
came softly, and her form, as it cut against
the snow, was good to look at in the eyes of
the young Indian hunter. He knew, since
his mother and sister had gone, that no man
can live happily in a lodge without a woman.
And as the girl passed her dark eyes across
his, it left a feeling after their gaze had gone.
He was still glorious with the lust of murder,
but a new impulse had seized him — it swayed
him, and it finally overpowered him alto-
gether.

When one day he had killed a moose early
in the morning, he came back to the camp
asking the women to come out and help him
53

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

in with the meat, and Mis-kau-bun-o-kwa, or
the " Red Light of the Morning," and her
old mother accompanied him to his quarry.

As they stalked in procession through the
sunlit winter forest, the young savage gazed
with glowing eyes upon the girl ahead of him.
He was a sturdy man in whom life ran high,
and he had much character after his manner
and his kind. He forgot the scalps of his
tribal enemies ; they were crowded out by a
higher and more immediate purpose. He
wanted the girl, and he wanted her with all
the fierce resistlessness of a nature which fol-
lowed its inclinations as undisturbedly as the
wolf — which was his totem.

The little party came presently to the
dead moose, and the women, with the heavy
skinning-knives, dismembered the great ma-
hogany mass of hair, while the craunching
snow under the moccasins grew red about it.
Some little distance off stood the young
man, leaning on his gun, and with his blanket
drawn about him to his eyes. He watched
the girl while she worked, and his eyes di-
lated and opened wide under the impulse.
The blood surged and bounded through his
54

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

veins — he was hungry for her, like a famished
tiger which stalks a gazelle. They packed
their sleds and hung the remainder in the
trees to await another coming.

The old woman, having made her load,
passed backward along the trail, tugging at
her head- line and ejaculating gutturals at
her dogs. Then Ah-we-ah stepped quickly
to the girl, who was bent over her sled, and
seizing her, he threw his blanket with a deft
sweep over her head; he wrapped it around
them both, and they were alone under its
protecting folds. They spoke together until
the old woman called to them, when he re-
leased her. The girl followed on, but Ah-
we-ah stood by the blood - stained place
quietly, without moving for a long time.

That night he did not speak of war to old
Bent Gun, but he begged his daughter of
him, and the old man called the girl and set
her down beside Ah-we-ah. An old squaw
threw a blanket over them, and they were
man and wife.

In a day or two the young man had washed
the red paint from his face, and he had a
longing for his own lodge, three days away
e 5.S.

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

through the thickets. It would not be so-
lonesome now, and his fire would always be
burning;

He called his dogs, and with his wife they
all betook themselves on the tramp to his
hunting-grounds. The snow had long since
filled up the tracks Ah-we-ah had made when
he came to Bent Gun's camp.

He set up his lodge, hunted successfully,
and forgot his past as he sat by the crackle
of the fire, while the woman mended his
buckskins, dried his moccasins, and lighted
his long pipe. Many beaver-skins he had on
his " sunjegwun," and -many good buckskins
were made by his wife, and when they packed
up in the spring, the big canoe was full of
stuff which would bring powder, lead, beads,
tobacco, knives, axes, and stronding, or
squaw-cloth, at the stores of the Northwest
Company.

Ah-we-ah would have been destitute if he
had not been away when his family were
killed by the Sioux, and, as it was, he had
little beyond what any hunter has with him ;
but he had saved his traps, his canoe, and his
dogs, which in the old days were nearly every-
56

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

thing except the lordly gun and the store of
provisions which might happen.

At a camp where many of the tribe stopped
and made maple- sugar, the young pair tar-
ried and boiled sap along with the others,
until they had enough sweets for the Indian
year. And when the camp broke up they
followed on to the post of the big company,
where they traded for the year's supplies —
" double-battle Sussex powder " in corked
bottles, pig-lead, blue and red stronding, hard
biscuit, steel traps, axes, and knives. It is
not for us to know if they helped the com-
pany's dividends by the purchase of the vil-
lanous " made whiskey," as it was called in
the trade parlance, but the story relates that
his canoe was deep-laden when he started
away into the wilderness.

The canoe was old and worn out, so Ah-
we-ah purposed to make a new one. He was
young, and it is not every old man even who
can make a canoe, but since the mechanical
member of his family had his " fire put out "
by the Sioux on that memorable occasion,
it was at least necessary that he try. So he
worked at its building, and in due time
57

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

launched his bark; but it was "quick" in
the water, and one day shortly it tipped
over with him while on his journey to his
hunting-grounds. He lost all his provi-
sions, his sugar, biscuits, and many things
besides, but saved his gun. He was suffer-
ing from hunger when he again found the
company's store, but having made a good
hunt the year before, the factor made him a
meagre credit of powder, lead, and the few
necessary things. He found himself very
poor.

In due course Ah-we-ah and his family set
up their lodge. They were alone in the
country, which had been hunted poor. The
other people had gone far away to new
grounds, but the young man trusted himself
and his old locality. He was not wise like
the wolves and the old Indians, who follow
ceaselessly, knowing that to stop is to die of
hunger. He hunted faithfully, and while he
laid by no store, his kettle was kept full, and
so the summer passed.

He now directed himself more to the hunt-
ing of beaver, of which he knew of the pres-
ence of about twenty gangs within working
58

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

distance of his camp. But when he went to
break up their houses he found nearly all of
them empty. Heat last discovered that some
distemper had seized upon the beaver, and
that they had died. He recovered one which
was dying in the water, and when he cut it
up it had a bloody flux about the heart, and
he was afraid to eat it. And so it was with
others. This was a vast misfortune to the
young hunter ; but still there were the elk.
He had shot four up to this time, and there
was "sign" of moose passing about. The
leaves fell, and walking in them he made a
great noise, and was forced to run down an
elk — a thing which could be done by a
young and powerful man, but it was very
exhausting.

When an Indian hunts the elk in this
manner, after he starts the herd, he follows
at such a gait as he thinks he can maintain
for many hours. The elk, being frightened,
outstrip him at first by many miles, but the
Indian, following at a steady pace along the
trail, at length comes in sight of them ; then
they make another effort, and are no more
seen for an hour or two ; but the intervals
59

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

in which the Indian has them in sight grow
more and more frequent and longer and
longer, until he ceases to lose sight of them
at all. The elk are now so much fatigued
that they can only move at a slow trot. At
last they can but walk, by which time the
strength of the Indian is nearly exhausted ;
but he is commonly able to get near enough
to fire into the rear of the herd. This kind
of hunting is what Ah-we-ah was at last com-
pelled to do. He could no longer stalk with
success, because the season was dry and the
dead leaves rattled under his moccasins.

He found a band, and all day long the
hungry Indian strove behind the flying elk ;
but he did not come up, and night found him
weak and starved. He lay down by a little
fire, and burned tobacco to the four corners
of the world, and chanted softly his medicine-
song, and devoutly hoped that his young
wife might soon have meat. It might be
that on his return to his lodge he would hqa,r
another voice beside that familiar one.

Ah-we-ah slept until the gray came in the
east, and girding himself, he sped on through
the forest ; the sun came and found the buck-
60

"THE MOOSE COULD HEAR HIM COMING FOR AN HOUR

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

skinned figure gliding through the woods.
Through the dry light of the day he sweated,
and in the late afternoon shot a young elk.
He cut away what meat he could carry in
his weakness, ate the liver raw, and with lag-
ging steps hastened backward to his far-off
lodge.

The sun was again high before Ah-we-ah
raised the entrance-mat of his home, and it
was some moments before he could discern
in the dusk that the wife was not alone.
Hunger had done its work, and the young
mother had suffered more than women ought.

Her strength had gone.

The man made broth, and together they
rested, these two unfortunates ; but on the
following day nature again interposed the
strain of the tightened belly.

Ah-we-ah went forth through the noisy
leaves. If rain or snow would come to soften
the noise; but no; the cloudless sky over-
spread the yellow and red of the earth's car-
pet. No matter with what care the wary
moccasin was set to the ground, the sweesh-
sweesh of the movmg hunter carried terror
and warning to all animal kind. He could
61

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

not go back to the slaughtered elk ; it was
too far for that, and the wolf and wolver-
ene had been there before. Through the
long day no hairy or feathered kind passed
before his eye. At nightfall he built his fire,
and sat crooning his medicine-song until nat-
ure intervened her demands for repose.

With the early light Ah-we-ah looked on
the girl and her baby.

The baby was cold.

The dry breasts of Mis-kau-bun-o-kwa had
been of no purpose to this last comer, but
the mother resisted Ah-we-ah when he tried
to take the dead child away, and he left it.
This cut and maddened the hunter's mind,
and he cursed aloud his medicine-bag, and
flung it from him. It had not brought him
even a squirrel to stay the life of his first-
born. His famished dogs had gone away,
hunting for themselves; they would no
longer stay by the despairing master and his
dreary lodge.

Again he dragged his wretched form into

the forest, and before, the sun was an hour

high the blue smoke had ceased to curl over

the woful place, and the fainting woman lay

62

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

quite still on her robe. Through the dry-
brush and the crackling leaves ranged the
starving one, though his legs bent and his
head reeled. The moose could hear him for
an hour.

And again at evening he returned to his
bleak refuge; the hut was gray and lifeless.
He dropped into his place without making a
fire. He knew that the woman was going
from him. From the opposite side of the wig-
wam she moaned weakly — he could scarcely
hear her.

Ah-we-ah called once more upon his gods,
to the regular thump-thump of his tomtom.
It was his last effort — his last rage at fate.
If the spirits did not come now, the life
would soon go out of the abode of Ah-we-ah,
even as the fire had gone.

He beat and sang through the doleful si-
lence, and from the dark tamaracks the
wolves made answer. They too were hun-
gry-

The air, the leaves, the trees, were still ;

they listened to the low moan of the woman,

to the dull thump of the tomtom, to the

long piercing howl of the wolf, the low rising

63

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

and falling voice of the man chanting: "He-
ah neen-gui-o-ho o-ho man-i-to-we-tah-hah
gah-neen-qui-o we-i-ah-nah we-he-a."

The air grew chill and cold. Ah-we-ah
was aroused from his deep communion by-
cold spots on his face. He opened the door-
mat. He peered into the gray light of the
softly falling snow. The spirits had come to
him, he had a new energy, and seizing his
gun, the half-delirious man tottered into the
forest, saying softly to himself : " A bear — I
walk like a bear myself — myself I walk like a
bear — a beast comes calling — I am loaded — I
am ready. Oh, my spirit! Oh, my manitou!"

A black mass crossed the Indian's path —
it had not heard the moccasins in the muffle
of the snow. The old trade gun boomed
through the forest, and the manitou had sent
at last to Ah-we-ah a black bear. He tore
out his knife and cut a small load of meat
from the bear, and then he strode on his
back track as swiftly as he could in his weak-
ness. He came to the hole in the forest in
the middle of which sat the lodge, calling :
"Mis-kau-bun-o-kwa! Mis-kau-bun-o-kwa!"
but there was no answer.
64

STORY OF THE DRY LEAVES

He quickly lighted a fire — he threw meat
upon it, and bending backward from the
flame, touched her, saying, " Good bear,
Mis-kau-bun-o-kwa; I have a good bear for
the bud-ka-da-win — for the hunger"; but
Mis-kau-bun-o-kwa could not answer Ah-we-
ah. The dry leaves had lasted longer than
she.

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

CAPTAIN HALLERAN of the dra-
goons stepped off the way freight at
Alkali Flat, which sort of place has been
well described as a " roaring board and can-
vas city"; only in justice to certain ancient
adobe huts I should mention their presence.

He was on government business connect-
ed with the Indian war then raging in the
Territory, and Alkali Flat was a temporary
military depot piled high with crackers,
bacon, cartridges, and swarming with mules,
dusty men, and all the turmoil which gath-
ers about a place where Uncle Sam dispenses
dollars to his own.

The captain was a gentleman and a schol-
ar, but he didn't look the part. What sweat
and alkali dust won't do to a uniform, sleep-
ing on the ground in it for a month or two
will do, and then he was burned like a ripe
69

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

peach. This always happens to American
soldiers in wars, whatever may be the case
in Europe. The captain's instincts, how-
ever, had undergone no change whatever, and
the dust-blown plaza did not appeal to him
as he sauntered s across towards the long row
of one-storied shanties. There was a dismal
array of signs — " The Venus," " The Medi-
cine Queen," " The Beer Spring," " The Free
and Easy " — but they did not invite the cap-
tain. There were two or three outfitting
stores which relieved, the business aspect, but
the simple bed and board which the captain
wanted was not there, unless with its tin-pan
piano or gambling-chip accompaniment.

He met a man who had the local color, and
asked if there was not in the town a hotel
run somewhat more on the ancient lines.

" Sure there is, cap, right over to the
woman's," said he, pointing. " They don't
have no hell round the old woman's. That's
barred in this plaza, and she can cook jes like
mother. That's the old woman's over thar
whar yu' see the flowers in front and the two
green trees — jes nex' the Green Cloth sa-
loon."

70

"the captain was a gentleman"

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

The captain entered the place, which was
a small bar-room with a pool-table in the
centre, and back of this a dining-room.
Behind the bar stood a wholesome-looking
woman in a white calico dress, far enough
this side of middle age to make " old woman "
libellous as applied to her.

" Good -evening, madam," ventured the
captain, feeling that such a woman could
not escape matrimony at the Flat.

" Good - evening, captain. Want some
supper?"

"Yes, indeed, and I guess I will take a
drink — a cocktail, if you please," as he leaned
on the bar.

"Captain, the boys say I am a pretty bad
bartender. I'll jes give yu' the stuff, and you
can fix it up to your taste. I don't drink
this, and so I don't know what men like.
It's grub and beds I furnish mostly, but you
can't exactly run a hotel without a bar. My
customers sort of come in here and tend bar
for themselves. Have a lemon -peel, cap-
tain?"

The captain comprehended, mixed and
drank his cocktail, and was ushered into the
7i

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

dining-room. It was half full of picturesque
men in their shirt -sleeves, or in canvas and
dusty boots. They were mostly red-faced,
bearded, and spiked with deadly weapons.
They were quiet and courteous.

Over his bottle the American is garrulous,
but he handles his food with silent earnest-
ness.

Chinamen did the waiting, and there was
no noise other than the clatter of weapons,
for the three-tined fork must be regarded as
such. The captain fell to with the rest, and
found the food an improvement on field-
rations. He presently asked a neighbor
about the hostess — how she managed to
compete with the more pretentious resorts.
Was it not a hard place for a woman to do
business?

"Yes, pard, yu' might say it is rough on
some of the ladies what's sportin' in this
plaza, but the old woman never has no
trouble." And his new acquaintance leaned
over and whispered : " She's on the squar',
pard ; she's a plum' good woman, and this
plaza sort of stands for her. She's as solid
as a brick church here."
72

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

The captain's friend and he, having wres-
tled their ration, adjoined to the sidewalk,
and the friend continued : "She was wife to
an old sergeant up at the post, and he went
and died. The boys here wanted a eatin'-
joint, bein' tired of the local hash, which I

honest can tell you was most d bad ; so

they gets her down here to ride herd on
this bunch of Chinamen topside. She does
pretty well for herself — gives us good grub,
and all that — but she gets sort of stampeded
at times over the goin's on in this plaza, and
the committee has to go out and hush 'em
up. Course the boys gets tangled up with
their irons, and then they are packed in here,
and if the old woman can't nurse 'em back
to life they has to go. There is quite a little
bunch of fellers here what she has set up
with nights, and they got it put up that she

is about the best d woman on the earth.

They sort of stand together when any alco-
holic patient gets to yellin' round the old
woman's or some sportin' lady goes after the
woman's hair. About every loose feller
round yer has asked the old woman to marry
him, which is why she ain't popular with the
73

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

ladies. She plays 'em all alike and don't
seem to marry much, and this town makes a
business of seein' she always lands feet first,
so when any one gets to botherin', the com-
mittee comes round and runs him off the
range. It sure is unhealthy fer any feller to
get loaded and go jumpin' sideways round
this 'dobie. Sabe ?"

The captain did his military business at
the quartermaster's, and then repaired to the
old woman's bar-room to smoke and wait for
the down freight. She was behind the bar,
washing glasses.

A customer came in, and she turned to him.

" Brandy, did yu' say, John ?"

" Yes, madam ; that's mine."

" I don't know brandy from whiskey,
John ; yu' jes smell that bottle."

John put the bottle to his olfactories and
ejaculated, " Try again ; that ain't brandy,
fer sure."

Madam produced another bottle, which
stood the test, and the man poured his por-
tion and passed out.

Alkali Flat was full of soldiers, cow-men,
prospectors who had been chased out of the
74

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

hills by the Apaches, government freighters
who had come in for supplies, and the gam-
blers and whiskey-sellers who helped them to
sandwich a little hilarity into their business
trips.

As the evening wore on the blood of Al-
kali Flat began to circulate. Next door to
the old woman's the big saloons were in a riot.
Glasses clinked, loud-lunged laughter and de-
moniac yells mixed with the strained piano,
over which untrained fingers banged and pir-
ouetted. Dancers bounded to the snapping
fiddle tones of " Old Black Jack." The chips
on the faro-table clattered, the red-and-black
man howled, while from the streets at times
came drunken whoops mingled with the
haw-haws of mules over in the quartermas-
ter's corral.

Madam looked towards the captain, say-
ing, " Did you ever hear so much noise in
your life ?"

" Not since Gettysburg," replied the ad-
dressed. "My tastes are quiet, but I should
think Gettysburg the most enjoyable of the
two. But I suppose these people think this
is great fun."

75

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

" Yes, they live so quiet out in the hills
that they like to get into this bedlam when
they are in town. It sort of stirs them up,"
explained the hostess.

" Do they never trouble you, madam ?"

" No — except for this noise. I have had
bullets come in here, but they wasn't meant
for me. They get drunk outside and shoot
wild sometimes. I tell the boys plainly that
I don't want none of them to come in here
drunk, and I don't care to do any business
after supper. They don't come around here
after dark much. I couldn't stand it if they
did. I would have to pull up."

A drunken man staggered to the door of
the little hotel, saw the madam behind the
bar, received one look of scorn, and backed
out again with a muttered " Scuse me, lady ;
no harm done."

Presently in rolled three young men, full
of the confidence which much too much
liquor will give to men. They ordered
drinks at the bar roughly. Their Derby
hats proclaimed them Easterners — railroad
tramps or some such rubbish, thought the
captain. Their conversation had the glib
76

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

vulgarity of the big cities, with many of
their catch phrases, and they proceeded to
jolly the landlady in a most offensive way.
She tried to brave it out, until one of them
reached over the bar and chucked her under
the chin. Then she lifted her apron to her
face and began to cry.

The wise mind of the captain knew that
society at Alkali Flat worked like an naph-
tha-engine — by a series of explosions. And
he saw a fearful future for the small bar-
room.

Rising, he said, " Here, here, young men,
you had better behave yourselves, or you
will get killed."

Turning with a swagger, one of the hoboes
said, "Ah! whose '11 kill us, youse ?"

" No, he won't !" This was shouted in a
resounding way into the little room, and all
eyes turned to the spot from which the voice
came. Against the black doorway stood Dan
Dundas — the gambler who ran the faro lay-
out next door, and in his hands were two
Colts levelled at the toughs, while over them
gleamed steadily two blue eyes like planet-
ary stars against the gloom of his complex-
7?

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

ion. " No, he won't kill yu'; he don't have
to kill yu'. I will do that."

With a hysterical scream the woman flew
to her knight -errant. "Stop — stop that,
Dan! Don't you shoot — don't you shoot,
Dan! If you love me, Dan, don't, don't!"

With the quiet drawl of the Southwest the
man in command of the situation replied:
" Well, I reckon I'll sure have to, little wom-
an. Please don't put your hand on my guns.
Mabeso I won't shoot, but, Helen — but I
ought to, all right. Hadn't I, captain?"

Many heads lighted up the doorway back
of the militant Dan, but the captain blew a
whiff of smoke towards the ceiling and said
nothing.

The three young men were scared rigid.
They held their extremities as the quick sit-
uation had found them. If they had not
been scared, they would still have failed to
understand the abruptness of things; but
one found tongue to blurt:

"Don't shoot! We didn't do nothin',
mister."

Another resounding roar came from Dan,
" Shut up!" And the quiet was opaque.
78

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

" Yes," said the captain, as he leaned on
the billiard-table, " you fellows have got
through your talking. Any one can see
that ;" and he knocked the ash off his cigar.

"What did they do, Helen?" And Dan
bent his eyes on the woman for the briefest
of instants.

Up went the apron to her face, and through
it she sobbed, " They chucked me under the
chin, Dan, and — and one of them said I was
a pretty girl — and — "

" Oh, well, I ain't sayin' he's a liar, but he
'ain't got no call for to say it. I guess we
had better get the committee and lariat 'em
up to a telegraph pole — sort of put 'em on
the Western Union line — or I'll shoot 'em.
Whatever you says goes, Helen," pleaded
justice amid its perplexities.

"No, no, Dan! Tell me you won't kill
'em. I won't like you any more if you do."

" Well, I sure ought to, Helen. I can't
have these yer hoboes comin' round here in-
sultin' of my girl. Now yu' allow that's so,
don't yu'?"

" Well, don't kill 'em, Dan ; but I'd like to
tell 'em what I think of them, though."
g 79

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

" Turn her loose, Helen. If yu' feel like
talkin', just yu' talk. You're a woman, and,
it does a woman a heap of good to talk ; but
if yu' don't want to talk, I'll turn these guns
loose, or we'll call the committee without no
further remarks — jes as you like, Helen. It's
your play."

The captain felt that the three hoboes
were so taken up with Dan's guns that
Helen's eloquence would lose its force on
them. He also had a weak sympathy for
them, knowing that they had simply applied
the low street customs of an Eastern city in
a place were customs were low enough, ex-
cept in the treatment of decent women.

While Dan had command of the situation,
Helen had command of Dan, and she began
to talk. The captain could not remember
the remarks — they were long and passionate
— but as she rambled along in her denuncia-
tion, the captain, who had been laughing
quietly, and quizzically admiring the scene,
became suddenly aware that Dan was being
more highly wrought. upon than the hoboes.

He removed his cigar, and said in a low
voice, " Say, Dan, don't shoot ; it won't pay."
80

A FAILURE OP JUSTICE

"No?" asked Dan, turning his cold, wide-
open blue eyes on the captain.

" No ; I wouldn't do it if I were you ; you
are mad, and I am not, and you had better
use my judgment."

Dan looked at the hoboes, then at the
woman, who had ceased talking, saying,
"Will I shoot, Helen?"

" No, Dan," she said, simply.

" Well, then," he drawled, as he sheathed
his weapons, " I ain't goin' to trifle round yer
any more. Good -night, Helen," and he
turned out into the darkness.

" Oh, Dan !" called the woman.

" What ?"

" Promise me that no one kills these boys
when they go out of my place ; promise me,
Dan, you will see to it that no one kills them.
I don't want 'em killed. Promise me," she
pleaded out of the door.

" I'll do it, Helen. I'll kill the first man
what lays a hand on the dog-gone skunks,"
and a few seconds later the captain heard
Dan, out in the gloom, mutter, " Well, I'll be
d !"

A more subdued set of young gentlemen
81

A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

than followed Dan over to the railroad had
never graced Alkali Flat.

Dan came back to his faro game, and, sit-
ting down, shuffled the pack and meditatively
put it in the box, saying to the case-keeper,
" When a squar' woman gets in a game, I
don't advise any bets."

But Alkali Flat saw more in the episode
than the mere miscarriage of justice; the
excitement had uncovered the fact that Dan
Dundas and Helen understood each other.

SORROWS OF DON TOMAS
PIDAL, RECONCENTRADO

SORROWS OF DON TOMAS
PIDAL, RECONCENTRADO

I WAS driving lately with the great Cuban
" war special " Sylvester Scovel along a
sun-blazoned road in the Havana province,
outside of Mainion ; we were away beyond
the patrols of the Seventh Corps. The na-
tive soldiers pattered along the road on their
rat-like ponies. To them Scovel was more
than a friend : he was a friend of the great
chief Gomez, and that is more than enough
for a Cuban.

He pointed to a ditch and to a hill, saying
he had been in fights in those places — back
in Maceo's time ; hot little skirmishes, with
no chance to put your hat on your sword.
But he had always managed to get away
from the Spanish; and so had Maceo — all
but the one time.

85

SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

Beside the road there were fine old man-
sions — stuccoed brick, with open windows,
and with the roofs fallen in. The rank tropic
vegetation was fast growing up around them,
even now choking the doorways and gravel
walks. And the people who lived in them ?
God knows !

The day grew into noon. We were hun-
gry, and the ardent sun suggested stopping
at a village which we were passing through.
There was a fonda, so we got down from our
carriage, and, going in, sat down at a table in
a little side-room.

One is careful about the water in Cuba,
and by no chance can a dirty cook get his
hands on a boiled egg. We ordered coffee
and eggs. A rural Cuban fonda is very close
to the earth.

Through the open window could be seen
the life of the village — men sitting at tables
across the way, drinking, smoking, and laz-
ing about. It was Sunday. Little children
came to the window and opened their eyes
at us, and we pitied their pale anaemic faces
and little puffed bellies, for that terrible or-
der of Weyler's had been particularly hard
86

SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

on children. There were men hanging about
who looked equally hollow, but very few
women.

" Reconcentrados — poor devils," observed
my friend.

This harmless peasantry had suffered all
that people could suffer. To look at them
and to think of them was absolutely sadden-
ing. Still, the mass of suffering which they
represented also deadened one's sensibilities
somewhat, and for an ordinary man to put
out his hand in help seemed a thing of no
importance.

" I should like to know the personal ex-
periences of one individual of this fallen
people, Scovel. I can rise to one man, but
two or three hundred thousand people is too
big for me."

" All right," replied the alert " special."
"We will take that Spanish -looking man
over there by the cart. He has been starved,
and he is a good type of a Cuban peasant."
By the arts of the finished interviewer, Sco-
vel soon had the man sitting at our table,
with brandy- and -water before" him. The
man's eyes were like live coals, which is the
87

SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

most curious manifestation of starvation.
His forehead Was wrinkled, the eyebrows
drawn up in the middle. He had the green-
ish pallor which comes when the blood is
thin behind a dark, coarse skin. He did not
seem afraid of us, but behind the listlessness
of a low physical condition there was the
quick occasional movement of a wild animal.

" Reconcentrado ?"

" Si, sefior. I have suffered beyond count-
ing.

" We are Americans: we sympathize with
you ; tell us the story of all you have suf-
fered. Your name? Oh! Don Tomas Pidal,
will you talk to us?"

" It will be nearly three rains since the
King's soldiers burned the thatch over my
head and the cavalry shoved us down the
road like the beasts.

" I do not know what I shall do. I may
yet die — it is a small affair. Everything
which I had is now gone. The Americans
have come to us; but they should have come
long before. At this time we are not worth
coming to. Nothing is left but the land,
and that the Spaniards could not kill. Sefior,
88

SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

they of a surety would have burnt it, but
that is to them impossible."

"Are you not a Spaniard by birth?"
" No ; my father and mother came from
over the sea, but I was. born in sight of this
town. I have always lived here, and I have
been happy, until the war came. We did
not know what the war was like. We, used
to hear of it years ago, but it was far to the
east. The war never came to Punta Brava.
We thought it never would ; but it did
come ; and now you cannot see a thatch
house or an ox, and you have, to gaze hard
to see any people in this country about
here. That is what war does, sefior, and we
people here did not want war.

" Some of the valiant men who used to
dwell around Punta Brava took their guns
and the machete of war, and they ran away
into the manigua. They used to talk in the
fonda very loud, and they said they would
not leave a Spaniard alive on the island. Of
a truth, sefior, many of those bravos have
gone, they have taken many Spaniards with
them to death, and between them both the
people who worked in the fields died of the
89

SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

hunger. They ate the oxen, they burned
the thatch, and the fields are grown up with
bushes. There is not a dog in Punta Brava
to-day.

" When the bravos ran away, the King's
soldiers came into this land in numbers as
great as the flies. This village sheltered
many of them — many of the battalion San
Quintin — and that is why the houses are not
flat with the ground." ,

" Why did you not go out into the ma-
nigua, Don Pidal ?" was asked.

" Oh, sefiors, I am not brave. I never
talked loud in the fonda. Besides, I had a
wife and five children. I lived perfectly. I
had a good house of the palm. I had ten
cows of fine milk and two yokes of heavy
work- oxen. There were ten pigs on my
land, and two hundred chickens laid eggs
for me. By the sale of these and my fruit I
got money. When I killed a pig to sell in
Havana, it was thirty dollars. When I did
not choose to sell, we had lard in the house
for a month, and I had not to buy. Two of
my boys, of fourteen and sixteen years, aided
me in my work. We bred the beasts, planted
9°

SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

tobacco, corn, sweet-potatoes, and plantains,
and I had a field of the pineapples, besides
many strong mango -trees. Could a man
want for what I did not have? We ate twice
a day, and even three times. We could have
eaten all day if we had so desired.

"Then, sefior, the tax-gatherers never sus-
pected that I had fourteen hundred dollars
in silver buried under the floor of my house.
We could work as much as we pleased, or as
little ; but we worked, sefior — all the men
you gee sitting about Punta Brava to-day
worked before the war came ; not for wages,
but for the shame of not doing so. When
the yokes were taken from the cattle at night
and the fodder was thrown to them, we could
divert ourselves. The young men put on
their ' guayaberas,' * threw their saddles on
their ' caballitos,' f and marched to the girls,
where they danced and sang and made love.
To get married it was only for the young
man to have seventy dollars; the girl had to
have only virtue. There was also to go to
town to buy, and- then the feast-days and the

* Fine shirts. t Little horses.

91

SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

Sunday nights. There was always the work
— every day the same, except in the time of
tobacco ; then we worked into the night. In
the house the women washed, they cooked,
they looked after the pigs and the chickens,
they had the children, and in the time of the
tobacco they also went forth into the fields.
" It was easy for any man to have money, if
he did not put down much on the fighting-
cocks. The church cost much ; there was
the cura, the sacristan — many things to pay
away the money* for ; but even if the goods
from Spain did cost a great sum, because
the officers of the King made many col-
lections on them, even if the taxes on the
land and the animals were heavy, yet, sefior,
was it not better to pay all than to have the
soldiers come ? Ah me, amigo, of all things
the worst are the King's soldiers. It was
whispered that the soldiers of your people
wefe bad men. It was said that if they ever
came to Punta Brava we should all die; but
it is not so. Your soldiers do not live in
other people's houses. They are all by them-
selves in tents up the King's road, and they
leave us alone. They do nothing but bring
92

SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

us food in their big wagons. They lied about
your soldiers. It was the talk in this coun-
try, sefior, that the great people in the Free
States of the North wanted to come to us
and drive the King's soldiers out of the
country, but it was said that your people
quarrelled among themselves about coming.
The great general who lived in Havana was
said to be a friend to all of us, but he did
not have the blue soldiers then. He is down
the King's road now — I saw him the other
day — and a man cannot see over the land far
enough to come to the end of his tents.

" If they had been there one day the King's
soldiers would not have come through my
land and cut my boy to pieces in my own
field. They did that, sefior — cut him with
the machetes until he was all over red, and
they took many canastos of my fruits away.
I went to the comandante to see what should
be done, but he knew nothing about it.

" Then shortly a column of troops came
marching by my house, and the officer said
by word of mouth that we must all go to
town, so that there would be none but rebels
in the country. They burned my house and
93

SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

drove all my beasts away — all but one yoke
of oxen. I gathered up some of. my chick-
ens and what little I could find about the
place and put it on a cart, but I could not
get my money from the burning house, be-
cause they drove us away. This was the
first I felt of war.

" I thought that the King would give us
food, now that lie had taken us from our
fields, but we got nothing from the King's
officers. I could even then have lived on
the outside of the town, with my chickens
and what I could have raised, but it was only
a short time before the soldiers of the bat-
talion took even my chickens, and they made
me move inside of a wire fence which ran
from one stone fort to another.' I tried to
get a pass to go outside of the wire fence,
and for a few weeks I was used to go and
gather what potatoes I could find, but so
many men were cut to pieces by the gueril-
las as they were coming from the fields that
I no longer dared go out by day.

" We had a little thatch over our heads,
but it did not keep out the rain. We be-
came weak with the hunger. We lived in
94

SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

sorrow and with empty bellies. My two
young children soon died, and about me
many of my friends were dying like dogs.
The ox-cart came in the afternoon, and they
threw my two children into it like carrion.
In that cart, senor, were twenty-two other
dead people. It was terrible. My wife never
dried her tears after that. If I had five dol-
lars I could have gotten a box, but I did not
have it. The priest would not go for less
than double the price of the box, which is
the custom. So my two little ones went to
Guatoco on an ox- cart loaded with dead like
garbage — which the Spanish comandante
said we were.

" Now came the hard days, senor. Not
even a dog could, pick up enough in Punta
Brava to keep life in his ribs. My people
lay on the floor of our thatch hut, and they
had not the strength to warm water in the
kettle. My other child died, and again the
ox-cart came. My oldest boy said he was
going away and would not return. He got
through the wire fence in the dark of the
night, and I went with him. We got a
small bunch of bananas, and in the black
95

SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

night out there in the manigua we embraced
each other, and he went away into the coun-
try. I have not seen him since ; I no longer
look for him.

" Only the strongest could live, but I had
hopes that by going through the fence every
few nights I could keep my wife alive. This
I did many times, and came back safely ; but
I was as careful as a cat, sefior, as I crawled
through the grass, for if a soldier had shot
me, my wife would then have but to die. It
was hard work to gather the fruit and nuts
in the night, and I could not get at all times
enough. My wife grew weaker, and I began
to despair of saving her. One night I stole
some food in a soldier's kettle from near a
mess fire, and the men of the battalion fired
many shots at me, but without doing me in-
jury. Once a Spanish guerilla, whom I had
known before the war came, gave me a piece
of fresh beef, which I fed to my wife. I
thought to save her with the beef, but she
died that night in agony. There was no
flesh on her bones.

" Then I ran away through the wire fence.
I could not see my wife thrown on the dead-
96

' THE MEN OF THE BATTALION FIRED MANY SHOTS AT ME

SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

wagon, and I never came back until a few
days since. I did not care if the guerillas
found me. I made my way into Havana,
and I got bread from the doorways at times,
enough to keep me alive. There was a little
work for wages along the docks, but I was
not strong to do much. One night I looked
between iron bars at some people of your
language, sefior., They were sitting at a
table which was covered with food, and
when they saw me they gave me much
bread, thrusting it out between the bars. A
Spaniard would not do that.

" I was not born in a town, and when the
King's soldiers sailed away I came back here
to my own country. I did not like to live
in Havana.

" But now I do not care to live here. I do
not see, senor, why people who do not want
war should have it. I would have paid my
taxes. I did not care if the goods from Spain
cost much. There was to get along without
them if they were beyond price. It was said
by the soldiers that we peasants out in the
fields told the men of the manigua what the
battalion San Quintin were doing. Sefior,
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SORROWS OF DON PIDAL

the battalion San Quintin did nothing but
eat and sleep in Punta Brava. The guerillas
roamed about, but I never knew whence they
roamed.

"The men of the manigua took my pota-
toes and my plantains, but, with their guns
and machetes, could I make them not to
take them ? Was it my fault if fifty armed
men did what pleased them ?

" Senor, why did not the blue soldiers of
your language come to us before we died?"

This we were not able to answer.

WHEN A DOCUMENT IS
OFFICIAL

WHEN A DOCUMENT IS
OFFICIAL

WILLIAM or "Billy" Burling had for
these last four years worn three yel-
low stripes on his coat -sleeve with credit to
the insignia. Leading up to this distinction
were two years when he had only worn two,
and back of that were yet other annums
wlren his blue blouse had been severely
plain except for five brass buttons down
the front. This matter was of no conse-
quence in all the world to any one except
Burling, but the nine freezing, grilling, fam-
ishing years which he had so successfully
contributed to the cavalry service of the
United States were the "clean-up" of his
assets. He had gained distinction in several
pounding finishes with the Indians; he was
liked in barracks and respected on the line ;

WHEN A DOCUMENT IS OFFICIAL

and he had wrestled so sturdily with the
books that when his name came up for pro-
motion to an officer's commission he had
passed the examinations. On the very morn-
ing of which I speak, a lieutenant of his com-
pany had quietly said to him: "You need
not say anything about it, but I heard this
morning that your commission had been
signed and is now on the way from Wash-
ington. I wan.t to congratulate you."

" Thank you," replied William Burling, as
the officer passed on. The sergeant sat down
on his bunk and said, mentally, " It was a
damn long time coming."

There is nothing so strong in human nat-
ure as the observance of custom, especially
when all humanity practises it, and the best
men in America and Europe, living or dead,
have approved of this one. It has, in cases
like the sergeant's, been called " wetting a
new commission." I suppose in Moham-
medan Asia they buy a new wife. Some-
thing outrageous must be done when a mil-
itary man celebrates his "step" ; but be that
as it may, William Burling was oppressed by
a desire to blow off steam. Here is where
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the four years of the three stripes stood by
this hesitating mortal and overpowered the
exposed human nature. Discipline had near-
ly throttled custom, and before this last could
catch its breath again the orderly came in to
tell Burling that the colonel wanted him up
at headquarters.

It was early winter at Fort Adobe, and the
lonely plains were white with a new snow. It
certainly looked lonely enough out beyond
the last buildings, but in those days one
could not trust the plains to be as lonely as
they looked. Mr. Sitting-Bull or Mr. Crazy-
Horse might pop out of any coulee with a
goodly following, and then life would not be
worth living for a wayfarer. Some of these
high-flavored romanticists had but lately re-
moved the hair from sundry buffalo-hunters
in Adobe's vicinity, and troops were out in
the field trying to "kill, capture, or destroy"
them, according to the ancient and honor-
able form. All this was well known to Ser-
geant Burling when he stiffened up before
the colonel.

" Sergeant, all my scouts are out with the
commands, and I am short of officers in post.
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I have an order here for Captain Morestead,
whom I suppose to be at the juncture of Old
Woman's Fork and Lightning Creek, and I
want you to deliver it. You can easily find
their trail. The order is important, and must
go through. How many men do you want?"

Burling had not put in nine years on the
plains without knowing a scout's answer to
that question. " Colonel, I prefer to go
alone." There was yet another reason than
" he travels the fastest who travels alone" in
Burling's mind. He knew it would be a very
desirable thing if he could take that new com-
mission into the officers' mess with the pres-
tige of soldierly devotion upon it. Then, too,
nothing short of twenty-five men could hope
to stand off a band of Indians.

Burling had flipped a mental coin. It came
down heads for him, for the colonel said :
"All right, sergeant. Dress warm and travel
nights. There is a moon. Destroy that or-
der if you have bad luck. Understand?"

"Very well, sir," and he took the order
from the colonel's hand.

The old man noticed the figure of the young
cavalryman, and felt proud to command such
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a man. He knew Burling was an officer, and
he thought he knew that Burling did not
know it. He did not like to send him out
in such weather through such a country, but
needs must.

As a man Burling was at the ripe age of
thirty, which is the middle distance of use-
fulness for one who rides a government
horse. He was a light man, trim in his fig-
ure, quiet in manner, serious in mind. His
nose, eyes, and mouth denoted strong char-
acter, and also that there had been little
laughter in his life. He had a mustache,
and beyond this nothing can be said, because
cavalrymen are primitive men, weighing no
more than one hundred and sixty pounds.
The horse is responsible for this, because he
cannot carry more, and that weight even then
must be pretty much on the same ancient
lines. You never see long, short, or odd
curves on top of a cavalry horse — not with
nine years of field service

Marching down to the stables, he gave his

good bay horse quite as many oats as were

good for him. Then going to his quarters,

he dressed himself warmly in buffalo coat,

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buffalo moccasins, fur cap and gloves, and he
made one saddle-pocket bulge with coffee,
sugar, crackers, and bacon, intending to fill
the opposite side with grain for his horse.
Borrowing an extra six-shooter from Ser-
geant McAvoy, he returned to the stables
and saddled up. He felt all over his person
for a place to put the precious order, but the
regulations are dead set against pockets in
soldiers' clothes. He concluded that the
upper side of the saddle - bags, where the
extra horseshoes go, was a fit place. Strap-
ping it down, he mounted, waved his hand
at the fellow-soldiers, and trotted off up the
road.

It was getting towards evening, there was
a fine brisk air, and his horse was going
strong and free. There was no danger until
he passed the Frenchman's ranch where the
buffalo-hunters lived ; and he had timed to
leave there after dark and be well out be-
fore the moon should discover him to any
Indians who might be viewing that log
house with little schemes of murder in ex-
pectance.

He got there in the failing light, and tying
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his horse to the rail in front of the long log
house, he entered the big room where the
buffalo-hunters ate, drank, and exchanged
the results of their hard labor with each
other as the pasteboards should indicate.
There were about fifteen men in the room,
some inviting the bar, but mostly at various
tables guessing at cards. The room was hot,
full- of tobacco smoke and many democratic
smells, while the voices of the men were as
hard as the pounding of two boards together.
What they said, for the most part, can never
be put in your library, neither would it inter-
est if it was. Men with the bark on do not
say things in their lighter moods which go
for much ; but when these were behind a
sage-bush handling a Sharps, or skimming
among the tailing buffaloes on a strong pony,
what grunts were got out of them had mean-
ing!

Buffalo-hunters were men of iron endeavor
for gain. They were adventurers; they were
not nice. Three buckets of blood was four
dollars to them. They had thews, strong-
smelling bodies, and eager minds. Life was
red on the buffalo-range in its day. There
i 107

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was an intellectual life — a scientific turn —
but it related to flying lead, wolfish knowl-
edge of animals, and methods of hide-strip-
ping.

The sergeant knew many of them, and was
greeted accordingly. He was feeling well.
The new commission, the dangerous errand,
the fine air, and the ride had set his blood
bounding through a healthy frame. A young
man with an increased heart action is going
to do something besides standing on one foot
leaning against a wall : nature arranged that
long ago.

Without saying what he meant, which was
" let us wet the new commission," he sang
out : " Have a drink on the army. Kem up,
all you hide-jerkers," and they rallied around
the young soldier and " wet." He talked
with them a few minutes, and then stepped
out into the air — partly to look at his horse,
and partly to escape the encores which were
sure to follow. The horse stood quietly.
Instinctively he started to unbuckle the sad-
dle-pocket. He wanted to see how the
" official document " was riding, that being
the only thing that oppressed Burling's mind.
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But the pocket was unbuckled, and a glance
showed that the paper was gone.

His bowels were in tremolo. His heart
lost three beats ; and then, as though to ad-
just matters, it sent a gust of blood into his
head. He pawed at his saddle-bags ; he un-
buttoned his coat and searched with nervous
fingers everywhere through his clothes; and
then he stood still, looking with fixed eyes
at the nigh front foot of the cavalry horse.
He did not stand mooning long; but he
thought through those nine years, every day
of them, every minute of them ; he thought
of the disgrace both at home and in the
army ; he thought of the lost commission,
which would only go back the same route it
came. He took off his overcoat and threw it
across the saddle. He untied his horse and
threw the loose rein over a post. He tugged
at a big sheath-knife until it came from the
back side of his belt to the front side, then
he drew two big army revolvers and looked
at the cylinders — they were full of gray lead.
He cocked both, laid them across his left
arm, and stepped quickly to the door of the
Frenchman's log house. As he backed into
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the room he turned the key in the lock and
put it under his belt. Raising the revolvers
breast-high in front of him, he shouted,
" Attention !" after the loud, harsh habit of
the army. An officer might talk to a bat-
talion on parade that way.

No one had paid any attention to him
as he entered. They had not noticed him,
in the preoccupation of the room, but ev-
ery one quickly turned at the strange
word.

" Throw up your hands instantly, every
man in the room !" and with added vigor,
" Don't move!"

Slowly, in a surprised way, each man be-
gan to elevate his hands — some more slowly
than others. In settled communities this
order would make men act like a covey of
quail, but at that time at Fort Adobe the
six-shooter was understood both in theory
and in practice.

"You there, bartender, be quick! I'm
watching you." And the bartender exalted
his hands like a practised saint.

"Now, gentlemen," began the soldier,
" the first man that bats an eye or twitches
no

WHEN A DOCUMENT IS OFFICIAL

a finger or moves a boot in this room will
get shot just that second. Sabe ?"

" What's the matter, Mr. Soldier ? Be you
loco f" sang out one.

" No, I am not loco. I'll tell you why I
am not." Turning one gun slightly to the
left, he went on : " You fellow with the long
red hair over there, you sit still if you are
not hunting for what's in this gun. I rode
up to this shack, tied my horse outside the
door, came in here, and bought the drinks.
While I was in here some one stepped out
and stole a paper — official document — from
my saddle-pockets, and unless that paper is
returned to me, I am going to turn both of
these guns loose on this crowd. I know you
will kill me, but unless I get the paper I want
to be killed. So, gentlemen, you keep your
hands up. You can talk it over ; but re-
member, if that paper is not handed me in
a few minutes, T shall begin to shoot." Thus
having delivered himself, the sergeant stood
by the door with his guns levelled. A hum
of voices filled the room.

" The soldier is right," said some one.

"Don't point that gun at me; I hain't
m

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got any paper, pardner. I can't even read
paper, pard. Take it off; you might git
narvous."

" That sojer's out fer blood. Don't hold
his paper out on him."

" Yes, give him the paper," answered oth-
ers. " The man what took that paper wants
to fork it over. This soldier means business.
Be quick."

"Who's got the paper?" sang a dozen
voices. The bartender expostulated with
the determined man — argued a mistake —
but from the compressed lips of desperation
came the word " Remember !"

From a near table a big man with a gray
beard said : " Sergeant, I am going to stand
up and make a speech. Don't shoot. I am
with you." And he rose quietly, keeping
an inquisitive eye on the Burling guns, and
began :

" This soldier is going to kill a bunch of
people here ; any one can see that. That
paper ain't of no account. Whatever did
any fool want to steal it for? I have been
a soldier myself, and I know what an officer's
paper means to a despatch-bearer. Now,

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men, I say, after we get through with this
mess, what men is alive ought to take the
doggone paper-thief, stake the feller out, and
build a slow fire on him, if he can be ridden
down. If the man what took the paper will
hand it up, we all agree not to do anything
about it. Is that agreed?"

" Yes, yes, that's agreed," sang the chorus.

" Say, boss, can't I put my arms down ?"
asked a man who had become weary.

" If you do, it will be forever," came the
simple reply.

Said one man, who had assembled his
logistics : "There was some stompin' around
yar after we had that drink on the sojer.
Whoever went out that door is the feller
what got yer document ; and ef he'd a-took-
en yer horse, I wouldn't think much — I'd be
lookin' fer that play, stranger. But to go
cincha a piece of paper ! Well, I think you
must be plumb loco to shoot up a lot of men
like we be fer that yar."

" Say," remarked a natural observer- — one

of those minds which would in other places

have been a head waiter or some other highly

sensitive plant — " I reckon that Injun over

113

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thar went out of this room. I seen him go
out."

A little French half-breed on Burling's
right said, " Maybe as you keel de man what
'ave 'and you de papier — hey?"

" No, on my word I will not," was the
promise, and with that the half-breed con-
tinued : " Well, de papier ees een ma pocket.
Don't shoot."

The sergeant walked over to the abomina-
tion of a man, and putting one pistol to his
left ear, said, " Give it up to me with one fist
only — mind, now !" But the half-breed had
no need to be admonished, and he handed
the paper to Burling, who gathered it into
the grip of his pistol hand, crushing it against
the butt.

• Sidling to the door, the soldier said, " Now
I am going out, and I will shoot any one who
follows me." He returned one gun to its
holster, and while covering the crowd, fum-
bled for the key-hole, which he found. He
backed out into the night, keeping one gun
at the crack of the door until the last, when
with a quick spring he dodged to the right,
slamming the door.

114

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The room was filled with a thunderous
roar, and a dozen balls crashed through the
door.

He untied his horse, mounted quickly with
the overcoat underneath him, and galloped
away. The hoof-beats reassured the buffalo-
hunters ; they ran outside and blazed and
popped away at the fast-receding horseman,
but to no purpose. Then there was a scurry-
ing for ponies, and a pursuit was instituted,
but the grain-fed cavalry horse was soon lost
in the darkness. And this was the real end
of Sergeant William Burling.

The buffalo-hunters followed the trail next
day. All night long galloped and trotted
the trooper over the crunching snow, and
there was no sound except when the moon-
stricken wolves barked at his horse from the
gray distance.

The sergeant thought of the recent occur-
rence. The reaction weakened him. His face
flushed with disgrace; but he knew the com-
mission was safe, and did not worry about the
vengeance of the buffalo-hunters, which was
sure to come.

At daylight he rested in a thick timbered
"5

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bottom, near a cut bank, which in plains strat-
egy was a proper place to make a fight. He
fed himself and his horse, and tried to
straighten and smooth the crumpled order
on his knee, and wondered if the people at
Adobe would hear of the unfortunate occur-
rence. His mind troubled him as he sat gaz-
ing at the official envelope ; he was in a brown
study. He could not get the little sleep he
needed, even after three hours' halt. Being
thus preoccupied, he did not notice that his
picketed horse from time to time raised his
head and pricked his ears towards his back
track. But finally, with a start and a loud
snort, the horse stood eagerly watching the
bushes across the little opening through
which he had come.

Burling got on his feet, and untying his
lariat, led his horse directly under the cut
bank in some thick brush. As he was in the
act of crawling up the bank to have a look
at the flat plains beyond, a couple of rifles
cracked and a ball passed through the soldier's
hips. He dropped and rolled down the bank,
and then dragged himself into the brush.

From all sides apparently came Indians'
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"Ki-yis" and "coyote yelps." The cavalry
horse trembled and stood snorting, but did
not know which way to run. A great silence
settled over the snow, lasting for minutes.
The Sioux crawled closer, and presently saw
a bright little flare of fire from the courier's
position, and they poured in their bullets, and
again there was quiet. This the buffalo -
hunters knew later by the "sign" on the
trail. To an old hunter there is no book so
plain to read as footprints in the snow.

And long afterwards, in telling about it, an
old Indian declared to me that when they
reached the dead body they found the ashes
of some paper which the soldier had burned,
and which had revealed his positiou. " Was
it his medicine which had gone back on
him ?"

" No," I explained, " it wasn' t his medi-
cine, but the great medicine of the white man,
which bothered the soldier so."

" Hump ! The great Washington medi-
cine maybeso. It make dam fool of soldiers
lots of time I know 'bout," concluded " Bear-
in-the-Night," as he hitched up his blanket
around his waist.

117

THE WHITE FOREST

THE WHITE FOREST

FROM the mid-winter mist and mush of
New York it was a transformation to us
standing there in the smoking-room of the
Chateau Frontenac at Quebec, looking down
across the grand reaches of the St. Lawrence,
where the ice ran in crashing fields through
the streaming water of the flood-tide. It was
a cheerful view from a cheerful place, though
the frost was on the pane, and the wood-work
popped with the cold. Down in the street
the little Canadian horses, drawing their loads,
were white with rime, while their irrepressible
French drivers yelled at each other until we
could hear them through the double windows.
There is energy in this fierce Northern air.

" Why Florida in winter? Why not Que-
bec ?" said the old Yale stroke.

" Yes, why not?" reiterated the Essex
trooper.

THE WHITE FOREST

But the cosiness of the chateau did not
suggest the seriousness of our purpose. We
wanted to get out on the snow — to get in the
snow — to tempt its moods and feel its im-
pulses. We wanted to feel the nip of that
keen outside air, to challenge a contest with
our woollens, and to appropriate some of its
energy. Accordingly we consulted a wise
mind who sold snow-shoes, blankets, moc-
casins, and socks, and he did a good business.

" Shall we dress at St. Raymond or in the
chateau ?" said my companion, mindful of the
severity of convention in New York, as he
gazed on the litter of his new garments spread
out on the floor of our room.

" We will dress here, and leave so early
that Quebec will not be out of bed until we
are away ; but if Quebec were awake and on
the streets, Quebec would not turn its head
to honor our strangeness with a glance, be-
cause it would see nothing new in us;" and
dress we did. We only put on three pairs
of socks and one pair of flannel-lined moc-
casins, but we were taught later to put on
all we had. As the rich man said to the re-
porter, when trying to explain the magnitude

5V>

THE OLD YALE STROKE

THE WHITE FOREST

of his coming ball, " There will be ten thou-
sand dollars' worth of ice-cream," so I say to
you we had forty dollars' worth of yarn socks.

We had bags of blankets, hunks of fresh
beef and pork, which had to be thawed for
hours before cooking, and potatoes in a gunny
sack, which rattled like billiard-balls, so hard
were they frozen. We found great amusement
on the train by rattling the bag of potatoes,
for they were the hardest, the most dense
things known to science.

The French drivers of the burleaus who
deposited us at the train took a cheery in-
terest in our affairs ; they lashed the horses,
yelled like fiends, made the snow fly around
the corners, nearly ran down an early police-
man, and made us happy with the animation.
They are rough children, amazingly polite —
a product of paternalism — and comfortable
folks to have around, only you must be care-
ful not to let them succeed in their childish
endeavor to drive their horses over you.
Anyway, they cheered us off through the
softly falling snow of that early winter morn-
ing, and made us feel less like strangers.

At St. Raymond were the guides and little
123

THE WHITE FOREST

one-horse burleaus all ready for the trip to
the " bush," or at least for the fifteen miles,
which was as far as sleighs could go, up to old
man O'Shannahan's, which is the first camp
of the club. There were nearly four feet of
snow on the ground, so that the regular road
between the fences was drifted full, compel-
ling the habitants to mark out another way
with evergreen trees through their fields.

Far apart over the white landscape are set
the little French cottages, with their curved
roofs. They are so cosily lonely, and the
rough hills go up from the valley to further
isolate them. Coming along the road we met
the low hauling-sleds of the natives, who ran
their horses off the road into the snow half-
way up their horses' sides ; but the sledges
were flat, and floated, as it were. Picturesque
fellows, with tuques, red sashes, and fur coats,
with bronzed faces, and whiskers worn under
their chin, after the fashion of the early thir-
ties. The Quebec habitants don't bother their
heads about the new things, which is the great
reason why they are the most contented peo-
ple in America.

The faithful watch-dog barked at us from
124

"THE SERIOUSNESS OF FOUR FEET OF SNOW "

THE WHITE FOREST

every cottage, and, after the manner of all
honesf house-dogs, charged us, with skinned
lips and gleaming eye. We waited until they
came near to the low -set burleau, when we
menaced them with the whip, whereat they
sprang from the hard road into the soft snow,
going out of sight in it, where their flounder-
ing made us laugh loud and long. Dogs do
not like to be laughed at, and it is so seldom
one gets even with the way-side pup.

At O'Shannahan's we were put up in the
little club cabin and made comfortable. I
liked everything in the country except the
rough look of the hills, knowing, as I do, that
all the game in America has in these latter
days been forced into them, and realizing that
to follow it the hunter must elevate himself
over the highest tops, which process never
became mixed in my mind with the poetry
of mountain scenery.

We essayed the snow-shoes — an art neg-
lected by us three people since our boyhood
days. It is like horseback-riding — one must
be at it all the time if he is to feel comfort-
able. Snow-shoes must be understood, or
they will not get along with you.
125

THE WHITE FOREST

Bebe Larette laughingly said, " Purty soon
you mak de snow-shoe go more less lak dey
was crazee."

Having arranged to haul the supplies into
the "bush" next day, we lay down for the
night in the warm cabin, tucked in and ba-
bied by our generous French guides. The
good old Irishman, Mr. O'Shannahan, was
the last to withdraw.

" Mr. O'Shannahan, what do the French
say for 'good-night '?"

" Well, som' o' thim says ' Bung-sware,' and
som' o' thim says 'Bung way';" but none of
them, I imagine, say it just like Mr. O'Shan-
nahan.

With the daylight our hut began to abound
with the activities of the coming day. A
guide had a fire going, and Mr. O'Shannahan
stood warming himself beside it. The Essex
trooper, having reduced himself to the buff,
put on an old pair of moccasins and walked
out into the snow. The New Jersey ther-
mometer which we had brought along may
not have as yet gotten acclimated, but it
solemnly registered 5 below zero.

" Bebe, will you kindly throw a bucket of
126

THE ESSEX TROOPER

In*"/

THE WHITE FOREST

water over my back?" he asked; but Bebe
might as well have been asked to kindly shoot
the Essex trooper with a gun, or to hit him
with an axe. Bebe would have neither ice-
water, rifle, nor axe on his pious soul.

I knew the stern requirements of the morn-
ing bath, and dowsed him with the desired
water, when he capered into the cabin and
began with his crash towel to rub for the re-
action. Seeing that Mr. O'Shannahan was
perturbed, I said :

" What do you think of that act ?"

" Oi think a mon is ez will aff be the soide
av this stove as to be havin' the loikes av yez
poor ice-wather down his spoine."

Mr. O'Shannahan reflected and hunched
nearer the box-stove, saying : " It's nowgaun
a year, but oi did say a mon do mooch the
loikes av that wan day. He divisted himself
av his last stitch, an' dayliberately wint out
an' rowled himsilf in the snow. That before
brikfast,moind ye. Oi've no doobt he's long
since dead. Av the loikes av this t'ing do be
goan an, an' is rayparted down en the Parlia-
mint, they'll be havin' a law fer it — more's
the nade."

127

THE WHITE FOREST

After breakfast a hundred pounds of our
war material was loaded on each toboggan.
We girded on our snow-shoes and started
out to break trail for the sledges. I know
of no more arduous work. And while the
weather was very cold, Mr. O'Shannahan
nearly undressed us before he was satisfied
at our condition for bush-ranging. We sank
from eight to ten inches in the soft snow.
The raising of the snow- burdened racket
tells on lung and ankle and loin with killing
force. Like everything else, one might be-
come accustomed to lugging say ten pounds
extra on each set of toes, but he would have
to take more than a day at it. The perspira-
tion comes in streams, which showed the
good of O'Shannahan's judgment. Besides,
before we had gone three miles we began to
understand the mistake of not wearing our
forty dollars' worth of socks. Also we had
our moccasins on the outside, or next to the
snow - shoes. They got damp, froze into
something like sheet-iron, and had a fine ice-
glaze on their bottoms which made them
slip and slide backward and forward on the
snow-shoes.

128

s

bj4

w 1

ePSS ;

HI

jPl:'

1 3FIb

i

Jo*

THE WHITE FOREST

After three miles, Bebe readjusted and tied
my moccasins, when Oliver, the cook, who
was a very intelligent man, mopped his fore-
head with his shirt-sleeve and observed :

" Excuse me, I t'ink you bettair go back
dose cabain — you are not fix hup more
propair for dees beesness. Ma dear fren',
dose man een Quebec what sol' you dose
t'ing" — and here his quiet, patient personal-
ity was almost overcome, this human reflec-
tion of the long Northern winter could not
calm himself, so he blurted, in his peaceful
way — "dose man een Quebec dey weare
know not'ing."

We were in the light of a great truth — the
shoes would not stay on — the thongs cut our
toes — we had outlived our usefulness as trail-
breakers, and we succumbed. The back
track was one of my greatest misfortunes in
life, but it was such a measly lot of cold-fin-
ger, frozen-toe, slip-down detail that I will
forbear. My companions were equally un-
fortunate ; so when we finally fell into the
arms of Mr. O'Shannahan, he said:

" Ah, a great hardship. Oi will make that
matter plain to yez."

129

The white forest

The sledges had deposited their loads half-
way up the trail, the guides coming back for
the night.

Next morning the remainder of our stuff
was loaded, and with renewed faith we strode
forth. The snow-shoes were now all right,
and, with five pairs of socks apiece — one
outside the moccasins — the thongs could
not eat our toes. We took photographs of
our moccasins — unwholesome, swollen things
— and dedicated the plates to Mr. Kipling as
" the feet of the young men."

The country of the Little Saguenay is as
rough as any part of the Rocky Mountains.
It is the custom to dress lightly for travel-
ling, notwithstanding the 20 below zero,
and even then one perspires very freely,
making it impossible to stop long for a rest,
on account of the chill of the open pores.
Ice forms on eyebrow, hair, and mustache,
while the sweat freezes in scales on the back
of one's neck. The snow falls from the
trees on the voyager, and melting slightly
from the heat of the body, forms cakes of
ice. Shades of Nansen and all the Arctic
men ! I do not understand why they are
130

CARIBOU XRACR

THE WHITE FOREST

not- all pillars of ice, unless it be that there
are no trees to dump snow on them. The
spruce and hemlock of these parts all point
upward as straight as one could set a lance,
to resist the constant fall of snow. If one
leaned ever so little out of the perpendicu-
lar, it could not survive the tremendous
average of fifty feet of snowfall each winter.
Their branches, too, do not grow long, else
they would snap under the weight. Every
needle on the evergreens has its little bur-
den of white, and without intermission the
snow comes sifting down from the sky
through the hush of the winter. When we
stopped, and the creak of the snow-shoes
was still, we could almost hear our hearts
beat. We could certainly hear the cracking
of the tobacco burning in our pipes. It had
a soothing, an almost seductive influence,
that muffle of snow. So solemn is it, so lit-
tle you feel yourself, that it is a conscious-
ness which brings unconsciousness, and the
calm white forest is almost deadening in its
beauty. The winter forest means death.

Then came the guides dragging their to-
boggans, and we could hear them pant and
131

THE WHITE FOREST

grunt and creak and slip ; how they manage
the fearful work is quite beyond me. Used
to it, I suppose. So are pack - mules ; but
think of the generations of suffering behind
this which alone makes it possible. The
men of the pack, the paddle, snow-shoe, to-
boggan, and axe do harder, more exhausting
work than any other set of people ; they are
nearer to the primitive strain against the
world of matter than are other men — they
are the " wheelers," so to speak.

The last stage up the mountain was a
lung- burster, but finally we got to a lake,
which was our objective. It was smooth.

" Let us take off these instruments of
torture and rest our feet on the smooth
going," said we, in our innocence, and we
undid a snow-shoe each. The released foot
went into the snow up to our middles, and
into water besides. We resumed our snow-
shoe, but the wet moccasins coming in con-
tact with the chill air became as iron. Our
frozen snow-shoe thongs were wires of steel.
Our hands were cold with the work of read-
justment, our bodies chilled with the waiting.
It was a bad half-hour before the cabin was
132

THE WHITE FOREST

reached. We built a fire, but the provisions
had not come up, so we sat around and
gazed with glaring eyes at each other. The
Essex trooper and I talked of eating the old
Yale stroke, who was our companion, but we
agreed he was too tough. I was afraid for a
time that a combination might be made
against me on those lines, but luckily the
toboggans arrived.

The log cabin was seventeen feet square,
so what with the room taken by the bunks,
box-stove, our provender and dunnage, the
lobby of the house was somewhat crowded.
There were three Americans and five French-
men. The stove was of the most excitable
kind, never satisfied to do its mere duty, but
threatening a holocaust with every fresh
stick of wood. We made what we called
"atmospheric cocktails" by opening the
door and letting in one part of 30° below
zero air to two parts of 16$° above zero air,
seasoned with French bitters. It had the
usual effect of all cocktails; we should much
have preferred the " straight goods " at, say,
70°.

In the morning we began a week's work
i33

THE WHITE FOREST

at caribou-hunting. It is proper to state at
this interval that this article can have no
" third act," for success did not crown our
efforts. We scoured the woods industrious-
ly behind our India-rubber, leather-lunged
guides, with their expert snow-shoeing, and
saw many caribou ; but they saw us first, or
smelled us, or heard us, and, with the ex-
ception of two " clean misses," we had no
chance. It may be of interest to tell what
befalls those who "miss," according to the
rough law of the cabin. The returning hunt-
er .may deny it vigorously, but the grinning
of the guide is ample testimony for convic-
tion. The hunter is led to the torture tree.
All the men, cook included, pour out of the
cabin and line up. The " misser" is required
to assume a very undignified posture, when
all the men take a hack at him with a frozen
moccasin. It is rude fun, but the howls of
laughter ring through the still forest, and
even the unfortunate sportsman feels that he
has atoned for his deed.

Bebc Larette killed a young caribou, which
was brought into camp for our observation.
It was of a color different from what we had
134

THE CABIN

THE WHITE FOREST

expected, darker on the back, blacker on the
muzzle, and more the color of the tree trunks
among which it lives. Indeed, we had it
frozen and set up in the timber to be photo-
graphed and painted. Standing there, it
was almost invisible in its sameness.

Its feet were the chief interest, for we had
all seen and examined its tracks. If one
puts his hand down into the track, he will
find a hard pillar of snow which is com-
pressed by their cup-like feet ; and more
striking still is it that the caribou does not
sink in the snow as far as our big snow-shoes,
not even when it runs, which it is able to do
in four feet of snow with the speed of a red
deer on dry ground. In these parts the cari-
bou has no enemy but man : the wolf and
the panther do not live here, though the
lynx does, but I could not learn that he at-
tacks the caribou.

From Mr. Whitney's accounts, I was led to
believe the caribou was a singularly stupid
beast, which he undoubtedly is in the Barren
Grounds. For sportsmen who hunt in the fall
of the year he is not regarded as especially
difficult — he is easily shot from boats around
135

THE WHITE FOREST

ponds ; but to kill a caribou in the Lauren-
tian Mountains in midwinter is indeed a feat.
This is due to the deathly stillness of the win-
ter forest, and the snow- shoeing difficulties
which beset even the most clever sportsrnan.

This brings to my mind the observation
that snow-shoeing, as a hunter is required to
do it when on the caribou track, has the same
relationship to the "club snow-shoe run,"
so called, that "park riding" has to "punch-
ing cows." The men of the "bush" have
short and broad oval shoes, and they must
go up and down the steepest imaginable
places, and pass at good speed and perfect
silence through the most dense spruce and
tamarack thickets, for there the caribou leads.
The deep snow covers up the small evergreen
bushes, but they resist it somewhat, leaving
a soft spot, which the hunter is constantly
falling into with fatal noise. If he runs against
a tree, down comes an avalanche of snow,
which sounds like thunder in the quiet.

I was brought to a perfectly fresh -track of
three caribou by two guides, and taking the
trail, we found them not alarmed, but travel-
ling rapidly. So "hot" was the trail that I
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THE WHITE FOREST

removed the stocking from my gun -breech.
We moved on with as much speed as we
could manage in silence. The trees were
cones of snow, making the forest dense, like
soft-wood timber in summer. We were led
up hills, through dense hemlock thickets,
where the falling snow nearly clogged the
action of my rifle and filled the sights with
ice. I was forced to remove my right mit-
ten to keep them ice -clear by warming with
the bare hand. The snow-shoeing was diffi-
cult and fatiguing to the utmost, as mile after
mile we wound along after those vagrant car-
ibou. We found a small pond where they had
pawed for water, and it had not yet frozen
after their drink.

Now is the time when the hunter feels the
thrill which is the pleasure of the sport.

Down the sides of the pond led the trail,
then twisting and turning, it entered the
woods and wound up a little hill. Old man
Larette fumbled the snow with his bare hand ;
he lifted towards us some unfrozen spoor —
good, cheerful old soul, his eyes were those
of a panther. Now we set our shoes ever so
carefully, pressing them down slowly, and
i37

THE WHITE FOREST

shifting our weight cautiously lest the footing
be false. The two hunters crouched in the
snow, pointing. I cocked my rifle ; one snow-
shoe sunk slowly under me — the snow was
treacherous — and three dark objects flitted
like birds past the only opening in the forest,
seventy-five yards ahead.

" Take the gun, Con," I said, and my voice
broke on the stillness harshly: the game was
up, the disappointment keen. The reaction
of disgust was equal to the suppressed elation
of the second before. "Go to camp the near-
est way, Larette."

The country was full of caribou. They
travel constantly, not staying in one section.
New tracks came every day into our little
territory. We stalked and worked until our
patience gave out, when we again loaded our
toboggans for the back track.

At Mr. O'Shannahan's we got our burleaus,
and jingled into St. Raymond by the light of
the moon.

THEY BORE A HAND

THEY BORE A HAND

WHEN Mrs. Kessel, with the two chil-
dren, saw the troops pack up and en-
train their horses, she had plenty of things
to do for the major besides control her feel-
ings. It had happened so many times before
that it was not a particularly distinct sensa-
tion ; but the going forth of an armed man
is always thrilling — yes, even after twenty
years of it. She did not think, I imagine,
but she knew many wives of regular army
officers whom Congress had forgotten after
the dead heroes had been heralded up and
down the land and laid away. The " still,
small voice " of the army widow doesn't make
the halls of Congress yell with rage at the
stern facts. But she was accustomed, since
the year of their marriage, to the departure
of her besabred husband, and that was the
Hi

THEY BORE A HAND

"worse" for which she married him. The
eldest girl was as near twenty as I can tell
about such things. They were excited by
the fast moving of events, and the flash of
steel had benumbed their reflective quality,
but papa was a soldier, and Spain had to be
licked. Who could do it better than papa,
Oestreicher, his orderly trumpeter, and the
gallant Third, those nimble athletes who took
the three bareback horses over the hurdles
in the riding -hall? Who could withstand
the tearing charge down the parade with the
white blades flashing? Nothing but Oest-
reicher with his trumpet could stop that.

Oestreicher had told them a thousand times
that papa could lick any one under any con-
ceivable circumstances. They very well knew
that he had followed the flying Arapaho vil-
lage far into the night, until he had captured
everything ; they were familiar with the nice-
ties of the Apache round-up at San Carlos,
because Oestreicher had handed the major a
six-shooter at the particular instant, and the
terrible ten days' battle with the revengeful
Cheyennes, when the snow was up to the
horses' bellies, had been done to death by
142

THEY BORE A HAND

the orderly. Papa had been shot before, but
it hadn't killed him, and they had never heard
of "Yellow-Jack" on the high plains. Papa
did all this with Oestreicher to help him, to
be sure, for the orderly always declared him-
self a full partner in the major's doings, and
divided the glory as he thought best.

Oestreicher, orderly trumpeter, was white
and bald. He never stated any recollections
of the time before he was a soldier. He was
a typical German of the soldier class ; a fierce
red in the face, illuminated by a long, yel-
lowish-white mustache, but in body becom-
ing a trifle wobbly with age. He had been
following the guidon for thirty -seven years.
That is a long time for a man to have been
anything, especially a trooper.

Oh yes, it cannot be denied that Oest-
reicher got drunk on pay-days and state oc-
casions, but he was too old to change ; in his
day that thing was done. Also, he had love-
affairs of no very complex nature. They
were never serious enough for the girls to
hear of. Also, he had played the various
financial allurements of the adjoining town,
until his "final statement" would be the
i43

THEY BORE A HAND

month's pay then due. But this bold hu-
manity welled up in Oestreicher thoroughly
mixed with those soft virtues which made
every one come to him when he was in trou-
ble. He was a professional soldier, who knew
no life outside a Sibley or a barrack, except
the major's home, which he helped the major
to run. To the girls this had been always so.
On the drill-ground the major undoubtedly
had to be taken into account, but at the ma-
jor's quarters Oestreicher had so close an al-
liance with madam and the girls that the "old
man" made a much smaller impression. A
home always should be a pure democracy.

The Kessel outfit was like this : It was
"military satrap" from the front door out,
but inside it was " the most lovable person
commands," and Oestreicher often got this
assignment.

In the barracks Oestreicher was always
"Soda" — this was an old story, which may
have related to his hair, or his taste, or an
episode — but no man in the troop knew why.
When they joined, Oestreicher was "Soda,"
and traditions were iron in the Third.

Oestreicher and the major got along with-
144

THEY BORE A HAND

out much friction. After pay-day the major
would say all manner of harsh things about
the orderly because he was away on a drunk,
but in due time Oestreicher would turn up
smiling. Madam and the girls made his
peace, and the major subsided. He had got
mad after this manner at this man until it
was a mere habit, so the orderly trumpeter
never came up with the court- martialling he
so frequently courted, for which that worthy
was duly grateful, and readily forgave the
major his violent language.

For days Oestreicher and the women folks
had been arranging the major's field kit. The
major looked after the troops and the trump-
eter looked after the major, just as he had
for years and years before. When the train
was about to pull out, the major kissed away
his wife's tears and embraced his children,
while Oestreicher stood by the back door of
the Pullman, straight and solemn.

" Now look out for the major," solicited
the wife, while the two pretty girls pulled
the tall soldier down and printed two kisses
on his red -burnt cheeks, which he received
in a disciplined way.

i4S

X1.I1U VJCSLICi(.LlCl I1CVC1 1S.11CW LllcLL IllclUcUI]

had told the major to look out well for the
orderly, because he. was old, and might not
stand things which he had in the earlier years.
That did not matter, however, because it was
all a day's work to the toughened old soldier.
The dogs, the horses, the errands, the girls,
the major, were habits with him, and as for
the present campaign — he had been on many
before. It gave only a slight titillation.

Thus moved forth this atom of humanity
with his thousands of armed countrymen to
do what had been done before — -set the Stars
and Stripes over the frontier and hold them
there. Indians, greasers, Spaniards — it was
all the same, just so the K Troop guidon was
going that way.

The "shave-tails" could kick and cuss at
the criminal slowness of the troop train's
progress, but Oestreicher made himself com-
fortable with his pipe and newspaper, won-
dering what kind of cousins Spaniards were
146

• THEY BORE A HAND

to Mexicans, and speculating with another
old yellow-leg on the rough forage of Cuba.

So he progressed with the well-known
events to Tampa and to Daiquiri, and here
he fell over a very bad hurdle. He could
brown hardtack in artful ways, he did not
mind the mud, he could blow a trumpet to
a finish, he could ride a horse as far as the
road was cut out, but the stiffened knees of
the old cavalryman were badly sprung under
the haversack and blanket-roll afoot.

The column was well out on the road to
Siboney, when the major noted the orderly's
distress: "Oestreicher, fall out — go back to
the transport. You can't keep up. I will
give you an order," which he did.

The poor old soldier fell to the rear of the
marching men and sat down on the grass.
He was greatly depressed, both in body and
mind, but was far from giving up. As he
sat brooding, he noticed a ragged Cuban
coming down the road on a flea-bitten pony,
which was heavily loaded with the cast-off
blankets of the volunteers. A quick, lawless
thought energized the broken man, and he
shoved a shell into his Krag carbine. Rising
147

THEY BORE A HAND

slowly, he walked to meet the ragged figure.
He quickly drew a bead on the sable patriot,

saying, " Dismount — get down — you d

greaser !" ,

" No entiendo."

"Get down."

" Por Dios, hombre, que va hacer?" and at
this juncture Oestreicher poked the Cuban in
the belly with his carbine, and he slid off on
the other side.

" Now run along — vamoose — underlay —
get a gait on you," sang out the blue soldier,
while the excited Cuban backed up the road,
waving his hands and saying, "Bandolero,
ladrone, sin verguenza — porque me roba el
caballo ?"

To which Oestreicher simply said, " Oh
hell!"

Not for a second did Oestreicher know that
he was a high agent of the law. Be it known
that any man who appropriates property of
your Uncle Samuel can be brought to book.
It is hard to defend his actions, when one
considers his motive and the horse.

The final result was that Oestreicher ap-
peared behind the Third Cavalry, riding
148

" ' DISMOUNT — GET DOWN '

THEY BORE A HAND

nicely, with his blanket-roll before his sad-
dle. The troops laughed, and the major
looked behind ; but he quickly turned away,
grinning, and said to Captain Hardier :

" Look at the d old orderly ! If that

isn't a regular old-soldier trick! I'm glad he
has a mount ; you couldn't lose him."

" Yes," replied the addressed, " you can
order Oestreicher to do anything but get
away from the Third. Can't have any more
of this horse -stealing;- it's demoralizing,"
and the regiment plodded along, laughing at
old " Soda," who sheepishly brought up the
rear, wondering what justice had in store for
him.

Nothing happened, however, and present-
ly Oestreicher sought the major, who was
cursing his luck for having missed the fight
at Las Guasimas. He condoled with the
major in a tactful way he had, which busi-
ness softened things up. While the major
was watching him boil the coffee in the tin
cups over a little " Indian fire," he put the
order in the flames, and it went up in smoke.

" You old rascal !" was all the major said,
which meant that the incident was closed.
n 149

THEY BORE A HAND

Right glad was the major to have his
orderly during the next week. The years
had taught Oestreicher how to stick a dog-
tent and make a bed, and how to cook and
forage. Oestreicher's military conscience
never vibrated over misappropriated things
to eat, and Fagin could not have taught him
any new arts.

Then came the fateful morning when the
Third lay in the long grass under the hail of
Mausers and the sickening sun. " Will the
major have some water ?" said Oestreicher, as
he handed over one canteen.

" You go lie down tiiere with the men and
don't follow me around — you will get shot,"
commanded Kessel ; but when he looked
around again, there was Oestreicher stalking
behind. He could fool away no more energy
on the man.

Then came the forward movement, the
firing and the falling men, and ahead strode
the officer, waving his sword and shouting
fiercely. Behind followed the jaded old
trumpeter, making hard going of it, but de-
termined to keep up. His eye was not on
the blazing heights, but on the small of the
150

?$■

A
fp
I

THEY BORE A HAND

major's back, when the officer turned, facing
him, and he ran into his arms. Down over
his major's face came gushes of blood. He
reeled — would have fallen but for the sup-
porting arms of the soldier. The rush of
men passed them.

They lay down in the grass. The orderly
brushed the blood from the pale face, while
he cut up a " first-aid " bandage and bound
the wound. Then he gave him water ; but
the major was far gone, and the orderly
trumpeter was very miserable. Oestreicher
replaced the major's sword in its scabbard.
Men came tottering back, holding on to
their wounds.

" Say, Johnson," sung out Oestreicher to
a passing soldier, "you ain't hit bad ; gimme
a lift with the major here." The soldier
stopped, while they picked up the uncon-
scious officer and moved heavily off towards
the Red Cross flag. Suddenly they lurched
badly, and all three figures sank in the pea-
green grass. A volley had found them.
Johnson rolled slowly from side to side and
spat blood. He was dying. Oestreicher
hung on to one of his arms, and the bluish-
151

THEY BORE A HAND

mauve of the shirt - sleeve grew slowly to a
crimson lake. He sat helplessly turning his
eyes from the gasping Johnson, the pale
major, and the flaming hill -crest. He put
his hat over the major's face. He drank
from his canteen. There was nothing to do.
The tropical July sun beat on them, until
his head swam under the ordeal.

Presently a staff-officer came by on a horse.

" Say, captain," yelled the soldier, "come
here. Major Kessel is shot in the head.
Take him, won't you ?"

" Oh, is that you ?" said the one addressed
as he rode up, for he remembered Kessel's
orderly. Dismounting, the two put the limp
form on the horse. While Oestreicher led
the animal, the captain held the nearly life-
less man in the saddle, bent forward and
rolling from side to side. Thus they pro-
gressed to the blood -soaked sands beside
the river, where the surgeons were working
grimly and quickly.

It was a month before the pale old men

got off the train at Burton, one an officer

and the other a soldier, and many people

in the station had a thrill of mingled pity

152

" ' I HOPE THE COLONEL WON'T GET MAD ' "

THEY BORE A HAND

and awe as they looked at them. Two very
pretty girls kissed them both, and people
wondered the more. But the papers next
morning told something about it, and no
policeman could be induced to arrest Oest-
reicher that day when he got drunk in
Hogan's saloon, telling how he and the
major took San Juan Hill.

Time wore on — wounds healed, and the
troops came back from Montauk to the yell-
ing multitudes of Burton, the home station.
The winter chilled the fever out of their
blood. The recruits came in and were pulled
into shape, when the long-expected order for
the Philippines came, and the old scenes were
re-enacted, just as they had happened in the
Kessel household so many times before, only
with a great difference : Oestreicher was de-
tached and ordered to stay in the guard of
the post. This time the major, who was a
' colonel now, settled it so it would stay settled.
An order is the most terrible and potent thing
a soldier knows. Oestreicher shed tears, he
pleaded, he got the women to help him, but
the major stamped his foot and became ossi-
fied about the mouth.
153

THEY BORE A HAND

Clearly there was only one thing left for
Oestreicher to do in this case, and he did it
with soldierly promptness. He got drunk —
good and drunk — and the Third Cavalry was
on its way to Manila. When the transport
was well at sea from Seattle, the colonel was
reading a novel on the after-deck. A soldier
approached him, saluting, and saying, " I hope
the colonel won't get mad — "

The colonel looked up ; his eyes opened,

he said, slowly, "Well — I — will — be — d !"

and he continued to stare helplessly into the
cheerful countenance of Oestreicher, orderly
trumpeter, deserter, stowaway, soft food for
court-martials. " How did you get here, any-
way r

Then the colonel had a military fit. He
cussed Oestreicher long and loud, told him
he was a deserter, said his long-service pen-
sion was in danger ; and true it is that Oest-
reicher was long past his thirty years in the
army, and could retire at any time. But
through it all the colonel was so astonished
that he could not think — he could only rave
at the tangle of his arrangements in the old
orderly's interest.

'54

THE DEATH OF OESTREICHER

THEY BORE A HAND

" How did you get here, anyhow?"

"Came along with 'the train, sir — same
train you were on, sir," vouchsafed the vet-
eran.

" Well — well — well !" soliloquized the colo-
nel, as he sat down and took up his novel.
"Get out — I don't want to see you — go
away," and Oestreicher turned on his heel.

Other officers gathered around and laughed
at the colonel.

" What am I to do with that old man? I
can't court-martial him. He would get a mill-
ion years in Leavenworth if I did. D — —
these old soldiers, anyhow — they presume on
their service! What can I do?"

" Don't know," said the junior major ;
" reckon you'll have to stay home yourself if
you want to keep Oestreicher there."

It was plajn to be seen that public senti-
ment was with the audacious and partly hu-
morous orderly.

" Well — we — will see — we will see," testily
jerked the old' man, while the young ones
winked at each other — long broad winks,
which curled their mouths far up one side.

The colonel has been seeing ever since. I
155

THEY BORE A HAND

have only just found out what he " saw," by
a letter from an old friend of mine out in the
Philippines, which I shall quote.

"You remember Colonel Kessel's old or-
derly — Oestreicher? Was with us that time
we were shooting down in Texas. He was
ordered to stay at Jackson Barracks, but he
deserted. The men hid him under their bunks
on the railroad train, and then let him on the
transport at Seattle. Soldiers are like boys —
they will help the wicked. One day he pre-
sented himself to the old man. Oh, say — you
ought to have heard the old Nan-Tan cuss
him out — it was the effort of the ' old man's'
life ! We sat around and enjoyed it, because
Oestreicher is a habit with the colonel. We
knew he wouldn't do anything about it after
he had blown off steam.

" Well, the night after our fight at Caba-
natuan it was dark and raining. What do
you suppose I saw ? Saw the ' old man ' in a
nipa hut with a doctor, and between them
old Oestreicher, shot through the head and
dying. There was the colonel sitting around
doing what he could for his old dog-soldier.
I tell you it was a mighty touching sight.
i S 6

THEY BORE A HAND

Make a good story that — worked up with
some blue-lights and things. He sat with
him until he died. Many officers came in and
stood with their hats off, and the colonel
actually boo-hooed. As you know, boo-hoo-
ing ain't the ' old man's' long suit by a d — ■ —
sight !"

/

THE TROUBLE BROTHERS

BILL AND THE WOLF

THE TROUBLE BROTHERS

BILL AND THE WOLF

SADNESS comes when we think of how
long ago things happened. Let us not
bother ourselves about time, though we can-
not cease to remember that it took youth to
sit up all night in the club and ride all next
day, or sleep twenty-four hours on a stretch,
as the situation demanded. The scene, as I
recall it, demanded exactly that. The am-
bulances of Fort Adobe brought a party of
ranking military men, sundry persons of sub-
stance, lesser mortals of much enthusiasm,
and Colonel William Cody — the Great Un-
known — up the long thirty miles of dusty
plains from the railroad. The yellow coun-
try in the autumn is dry riding and hard
work. The officers stationed at the post
took a brotherly interest in the new-comers
161

THE TROUBLE BROTHERS

because they were also sportsmen. You
could not drive an iron wedge between the
plains type of officer and a sportsman with-
out killing both. There were dinners of cus-
tom and such a gathering at the club as was
unusual, where the hunting plans were keen-
ly discussed — so keenly, in fact, that it was
nearer morning than midnight when it was
considered desirable to go to bed.

There were dogs which the sportsmen had
brought along — fierce wolf-hounds from Rus-
sia — and Buffalo Bill had two malignant pups
in which he took a fine interest. The officers
at Adobe were possessed of a pack of rough
Scotch hounds, besides which, if every in-
dividual soldier at the post did not have his
individual doggie, I must have made a mis-
count. It was arranged that we consolidate
the collection and run a wolf on the morrow.

When sport was in prospect, reveille was
the usual hour, regardless of bedtime. Morn-
ing found us all mounted, and the throng of
horses started up the road. The dogs were
kept together ; the morning was of the gold-
en, frosty, Adobe type, and the horses could
feel the run which was coming to them.
162

THE TROUBLE BROTHERS

Everything was ready but the wolf. It was
easy to find wolves in that country, however.
We had slow dogs to trail them with. But
our wolf came to us in the way money comes
to a modern politician.

Bill, the chief of sports, as we called him,
was riding ahead, when we saw him stop a
wagon. It was driven by an old " prairie-
dog,"* and on the bed of the wagon was a
box made of poles and slats. Inside of this
was a big gray wolf, which the man had caught
in a trap without injuring it in the least. He
hoped to be able to sell it at the post, but he
realized his hope and his price right there.
"Now, boys, we'll have a wolf-hunt; but let
us go back to the post, where the ladies and
the men can see it."

We could not agree whether it was the
colonel's gallantry or his circus habits which
prompted this move, but it was the thing
which brought a blighting sorrow to Fort
Adobe. We turned back, bundling Mr. Wolf
down the road. He sat behind the slats,
gazing far away across his native hills, silent

* Nondescript man of the plains.
163

THE TROUBLE BROTHERS

and dignified as an Indian warrior in cap-
tivity.

The ladies were notified, and came out in
traps. The soldiers joined us on horseback
and on foot, some hundred of them, each
with his ^ftt fice* at his heels.

The domestic servants of the line came
down back of the stables. The sentries on
post even walked sidewise, that they might
miss no details. Adob6 was out for a race. I
had never supposed there were so many dogs
in the world. As pent-up canine animosi-
ties displayed themselves, they fell to taking
bites at each other in the dense gathering;
but their owners policed and soothed them.

Every one lined up. The dogs were ar-
ranged as best might. The wagon was driven
well out in front, and Colonel William Cody
helped the driver to turn the wolf loose, a
matter which gave no trouble at all. They
removed two slats, and if there had been a
charge of melinite behind that wolf he could
not have hit that valley any harder.

The old hounds, which had scented and

* Cur-dog.
164

THE TROUBLE BROTHERS

had seen the wolf, straightway started on his
course. With a wild yell the cavalcade sprang
forward. Many cur-dogs were ridden scream-
ing under foot. The two bronco ponies of
the man who had brought the wolf turned
before the rush and were borne along with
the charge. Everything was going smoothly.

Of the garrison curs many were left be-
hind. They knew nothing about wolves or
field-sports, but, addled by the excitement,
fell into the old garrison feuds.

At a ravine we were checked. I looked
behind, and the intervening half-mile was
dotted here and there with dog-fights of vari-
ous proportions. Some places there were
as high as ten in a bunch, and at others only
couples. The infantry soldiers came running
out to separate them, and, to my infinite sur-
prise, I saw several of the dough-boys cir-
cling each other in the well-known attitudes
of the prize-ring. Officers started back to
pull them apart. Our dogs were highly ex-
cited. Two of them flew at each other; more
sprang into the jangle. The men yelled at
them and got off their horses. One man
kicked another man's dog, whereat the ag-
165

THE TROUBLE BROTHERS

grieved party promptly swatted him on the
eye. This is the way it began. While you
read, over a hundred and fifty men were
pounding each other with virility, while
around and underfoot fought each doggie
with all possible vim. Greyhounds cut red
slices on quarter-bred bulls; fox-terriers hung
on to the hind legs of such big dogs as were
fully engaged in front. Fangs glistened ;
they yelled and bawled- and growled, while
over them struggled and tripped the men as
they swung for the knock-out blow. If a
man went down he was covered with biting
and tearing dogs. The carnage became aw-
ful — a variegated foreground was becoming
rapidly red. The officers yelled at the men,
trying to assert their authority, but no offi-
cer could yell as loud as the acre of dogs.
By this time the men were so frenzied that
they could not tell a shoulder-strap from a
bale of hay. One might as well have attempt-
ed to stop the battle of Gettysburg.

Naturally this could not last forever, and
gradually the men were torn apart and the
dogs unhooked their fangs from their adver-
saries. During the war I looked towards the
166

THE TROUBLE BROTHERS

fort, hoping for some relief, but the half-mile
was dotted here and there with individuals
thumping and pounding each other, while
their dogs fought at their heels. Where,
where had I seen this before, thought came.
Yes, yes --in Caesar's Commentaries. They
did things just this way in his time. Bare
legs and short swords only were needed here.

Things gradually quieted, and the men
started slowly back to the post nursing their
wounds. Most of the horses had run away
during the engagement. It was clear to be
seen that plaster and liniment would run short
at Adobe that day.

Colonel Cody sat on his horse, thinking of
the destruction he had wrought.

The commanding officer gathered himself
and sang out : " Say, Bill, there is your dog-
goned old wolf sitting there on the hill look-
ing at you. What do you reckon he thinks?"

" I reckon he thinks we have made trouble
enough for to-day. Next time we go hunt-
ing, colonel, I think you had better leave
your warriors at home," was Bill's last com-
ment as he turned his horse's tail towards
the wolf.

167

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

T APPROACH this subject of the Santiago
1 campaign with awe, since the ablest cor-
respondents in the country were all there,
and they wore out lead-pencils most indus-
triously. I know I cannot add to the facts,
but I remember my own emotions, which
were numerous, interesting, and, on the
whole, not pleasant. I am as yet unable to
decide whether sleeping in a mud -puddle,
the confinement of a troop -ship, or being
shot at is the worst. They are all irritating,
and when done on an empty stomach, with
the object of improving one's mind, they
are extravagantly expensive. However, they
satisfied a life of longing to see men do the
greatest thing which men are tailed on to
do.

The creation of things by men in time of
peace is of every consequence, but it does
171

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

not bring forth the tumultuous energy which
accompanies the destruction of things by men
in war. He who has not seen war only half
comprehends the possibilities of his race.
Having thought of this thing before, I got a
correspondent's pass, and ensconced myself
with General Shafter's army at Tampa.

When Hobson put the cork in Cervera's
bottle, it became necessary to send the
troops at once, and then came the first
shock of the war to me. It was in the form
of an order to dismount two squadrons of
each regiment of cavalry and send them on
foot. This misuse of cavalry was compelled
by the national necessities, for there was not
at that time sufficient volunteer infantry
equipped and in readiness for the field. It
is without doubt that our ten regiments of
cavalry are the most perfect things of all
Uncle Sam's public institutions. More good
honest work has gone into them, more en-
thusiasm, more intelligence, and they have
shown more results, not excepting the new
navy or the postal system.

The fires of hatred burned within me. I
was nearly overcome by a desire to " go off
172

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

the reservation." I wanted to damn some
official, or all officialism, or so much thereof
as might be necessary. I knew that the
cavalry officers were to a man disgusted,
and thought they had been misused and
abused. They recognized it as a blow at
their arm, a jealous, wicked, and ignorant
stab. Besides, the interest of my own art
required a cavalry charge.

General Miles appeared at Tampa about
that time, and I edged around towards him,
and threw out my " point." It is necessary
to attack General Miles with great care and
understanding, if one expects any success.
" General, I wonder who is responsible for
this order dismounting the cavalry?" I vent-
ured.

I think the " old man " could almost see
me coming, for he looked up from the read-
ing of a note, and in a quiet manner, which
is habitual with him, said, " Why, don't they
want to go?" and he had me flat on the
ground.

" Oh yes, of course ! They are crazy to
go ! They would go if they had to walk on
their hands !" I said, and departed. A soldier
p 173

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

who did not want to go to Cuba would be
like a fire which would not burn — useless
entirely. So no one got cursed for that
business ; but it is a pity that our nation
finds it necessary to send cavalry to war on
foot. It would be no worse if some day it
should conclude to mount " bluejackets" for
cavalry purposes, though doubtless the" blue-
jackets " would "sit tight." But where is the
use of specialization ? One might as well ask
the nurse-girl to curry the family horse.

So the transports gathered to Port Tam-
pa, and the troops got on board, and the
correspondents sallied down to their quar-
ters, and then came a wait. A Spanish war-
ship had loomed across the night of some
watch -on - deck down off the Cuban coast.
Telegrams flew from Washington to " stop
where you are." The mules and the corre-
spondents were unloaded, and the whole en-
terprise waited.

Here I might mention a series of events
which were amusing. The exigencies of. the
service left many young officers behind, and
these all wanted, very naturally,, to go to
Cuba and get properly shot, as all good
i74

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

soldiers should. They used their influence
with the general officers in command ; they
begged, they implored, and they explained
deviously and ingeniously why the expedi-
tion needed their particular services to insure
success. The old generals, who appreciated
the proper spirit which underlay this enthu-
siasm, smiled grimly as they turned " the
young scamps " down. I used to laugh to
myself when I overheard these interviews,
for one could think of nothing so much as
the school -boy days, when he used to beg
off going to school for all sorts of reasons
but the real one, which was a ball-game or
a little shooting-trip.

Presently the officials got the Spanish
war -ship off their nerves, and the trans-
ports sailed. Now it is so arranged in the
world that I hate a ship in a compound,
triple -expansion, forced -draught way. Bar-
ring the disgrace, give me " ten days on the
island." Do anything to me, but do not
have me entered on the list of a ship. It
does not matter if I am to be the lordly
proprietor of the finest yacht afloat, make
me a feather in a sick chicken's tail on
i7S

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

shore, and I will thank you. So it came
about that I did an unusual amount of real
suffering in consequence of living on the
Seguranqa during the long voyage to Cuba.
I used to sit out on the after-deck and won-
der why, at my time of life, I could not so
arrange my affairs that I could keep off
ships. I used to consider seriously if it
would not be a good thing to jump over-
board and let the leopard - sharks eat me,
and have done with a miserable existence
which I did not seem to be able to control.

When the first landing was made, General
Shafter kept all the correspondents and the
foreign military attaches in his closed fist,
and we all hated him mightily. We shall
probably forgive him, but it will take some
time. He did allow us to go ashore and see
the famous interview which he and Admiral
Sampson held with Garcia, and for the first
time to behold the long lines of ragged
Cuban patriots, and I was convinced that it
was no mean or common impulse which kept
up the determination of these ragged, hun-
gry souls.

Then on the morning of the landing at
176

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

Daiquiri the soldiers put on their blanket
rolls, the navy boats and launches lay by
the transports, and the light ships of Samp-
son's fleet ran slowly into the little bay and
"turned everything loose" on the quiet,
palm- thatched village. A few fires were
^burning in the town, but otherwise it was
quiet. After severely pounding the coast,
the launches towed in the long lines of
boats deep laden with soldiery, and the cor-
respondents and foreigners saw them go
into the overhanging smoke. We held our
breath. We expected a most desperate
fight for the landing. After a time the
smoke rolled away, and our people were
on the beach, and not long after some men
climbed the steep hill on which stood a
block-house, and we saw presently the Stars
and Stripes break from the flag-staff. " They
are Chinamen !" said a distinguished foreign
soldier ; and he went to the other side of
the boat, and sat heavily down to his read-
ing of our artillery drill regulations.

We watched the horses and mules being
thrown overboard, we saw the last soldiers
going ashore, and we bothered General
177

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

Shatter's aid, the gallant Miley, until he
put us all on shore in order to abate the
awful nuisance of our presence.

No one had any transportation in the
campaign, not even colonels of regiments,
except their good strong backs. It was for
every man to personally carry all his own
hotel accommodations; so we correspond-
ents laid out our possessions on the deck,
and for the third time sorted out what little
we could take. I weighed a silver pocket-
flask for some time, undecided as to the pos-
sibility of carriage. It is now in the woods
of Cuba, or in the ragged pack of some
Cuban soldier. We had finally three days
of crackers, coffee, and pork in our haver-
sacks, our canteens, rubber ponchos, cameras,
and six-shooter — or practically what a soldier
has.

I moved out with the Sixth Cavalry a mile
or so, and as it was late afternoon, we were
ordered to bivouac. I sat on a hill, and
down in the road below saw the long lines
of troops pressing up the valley towards
Siboney. When our troops got on the
sand beach, each old soldier adjusted his
178

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

roll, shouldered his rifle, and started for
Santiago, apparently by individual intuition.

The troops started, and kept marching just
as fast as they could. They ran the Span-
iards out of Siboney, and the cavalry brigade
regularly marched down their retreating col-
umns at Las Guasimas, fought them up a
defile, outflanked, and sent them flying into
Santiago. I think our army would never
have stopped until it cracked into the
doomed city in column formation, if Shaft-
er had not discovered this unlooked-for en-
terprise, and sent his personal aide on a
fast horse with positive orders to halt until
the " cracker-line " could be fixed up behind
them.

In the morning I sat on the hill, and still
along the road swung the hard-marching col-
umns. The scales dropped from my eyes. I
could feel the impulse, and still the Sixth was
held by orders. I put on my " little hotel
equipment," bade my friends good-bye, and
" hit the road." The sides of it were blue
with cast-off uniforms. Coats and overcoats
were strewn about, while the gray blankets
lay in the camps just where the soldiers had
179

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

gotten up from them after the night's rest.
This I knew would happen. Men will not
carry what they can get along without un-
less they are made to ; and it is a bad thing
to " make " American soldiers, because they
know what is good for them better than any
one who sits in a roller-chair. In the tropics
mid - day marching under heavy kits kills
more men than damp sleeping at night. I
used to think the biggest thing in Shafter's
army was my pack.

It was all so strange, this lonely tropic for-
est, and so hot. I fell in with a little bunch
of headquarters cavalry orderlies, some with
headquarters horses, and one with a mule
dragging two wheels, which I cannot call a
cart, on which General Young's stuff was
tied. We met Cubans loitering along, their
ponies loaded with abandoned soldier-clothes.
Staff- officers on horseback came back and
said that there had been a fight on beyond,
and that Colonel Wood was killed and young
Fish shot dead — that the Rough Riders were
all done to pieces. There would be more
fighting, and we pushed forward, sweating
under the stifling heat of the jungle-choked
180

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

road. We stopped and cracked cocoanuts
to drink the milk. Once, in a sort of sa-
vanna, my companions halted and threw
cartridges into their carbines. I saw two or
three Spanish soldiers on ahead in some
hills and brush. We pressed on ; but as the
Spanish soldiers did not seem to be con-
cerned as to our presence, I allowed they
were probably Cubans who had taken
clothes from dead Spanish soldiers, and
so it turned out. The Cubans seem to
know each other by scent, but it bothered
the Northern men to make a distinction
between Spanish and Cuban, even when
shown Spanish prisoners in order that they
might recognize, their enemy by sight. If
a simple Cuban who stole Spanish soldier
clothes could only know how nervous it
made the trigger fingers of our regulars, he
would have died of fright. He created the
same feeling that a bear would, and the im-
pulse to " pull up and let go " was so in-
stinctive and sudden with our men that I
marvel more mistakes were not made.

At night I lay up beside the road outside
of Siboney, and cooked my supper by a sol-

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

dier fire, and lay down under a mango-tree
on my rubber, with my haversack for a pil-
low. I could hear the shuffling of the
marching troops, and see by the light of
the fire near the road the white blanket-
rolls glint past its flame — tired, sweaty men,
mysterious and silent too but for the clank
of tin cups and the monotonous shuffle of
feet.

In the early morning the field near me
was covered with the cook-fires of infantry,
which had come in during the night. Pres-
ently a battery came dragging up, and was
greeted with wild cheers from the infantry,
who crowded up to the road. It was a great
tribute to the guns ; for here in the face of
war the various arms realized their interde-
pendence. It is a solace for cavalry to know
that there is some good steady infantry in
their rear, and it is a vast comfort for in-
fantry to feel that their front and flanks are
covered, and both of them like to have the
shrapnel travelling their way when they " go
in."

At Siboney I saw the first wounded Rough
Riders, and heard how they had behaved.
182

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

From this time people began to know who
this army doctor was, this Colonel Wood.
Soldiers and residents in the Southwest had
known him ten years back. They knew
Leonard Wood was a soldier, skin, bones,
and brain, who travelled under the disguise
of a doctor, and now they know more than
this.

Then I met a fellow -correspondent, Mr.
John Fox, and we communed deeply. We
had not seen this fight of the cavalry bri-
gade, and this was because we were not at
the front. We would not let it happen
again. We slung our packs and most in-
dustriously plodded up the Via del Rey
until we got to within hailing distance of
the picket posts, and he said : " Now, Fred-
eric, we will stay here. They will pull off
no more fights of which we are not a party
of the first part." And stay we did. If
General Lawton moved ahead, we went up
and cultivated Lawton ; but if General Chaf-
fee got ahead, we were his friends, and gath-
ered at his mess fire. To be popular with
us it was necessary for a general to have
command of the advance.
183

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

But what satisfying soldiers Lawton and
Chaffee are ! Both seasoned, professional mil-
itary types. Lawton, big and long, forceful,
and with iron determination. Chaffee, who
never dismounts but for a little sleep during
the darkest hours of the night, and whose
head might have been presented to him by
one of William's Norman barons. Such a
head ! We used to sit around and study
that head. It does not belong to the pe-
riod ; it is remote, when the race was young
and strong ; and it has " warrior " sculptured
in every line. It may seem trivial to you,
but I must have people " look their part."
That so many do not in this age is probably
because men are so complicated ; but " war
is a primitive art," and that is the one ob-
jection I had to von Moltke, with his sim-
ple, student face. He might have been any-
thing. Chaffee is a soldier.

The troops came pouring up the road,
reeking under their packs, dusty, and with
their eyes on the ground. Their faces were
deeply lined, their beards stubby, but their
minds were set on "the front " — "on Santi-
ago." There was a suggestion of remorse-
184 •

'■■%
4

m^q^m -k

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

less striving in their dogged stepping along,
and it came to me that to turn them around
would require some enterprise. I thought at
the time that the Spanish commander would
do well to assume the offensive, and march-
ing down our flank, pierce the centre of the
straggling column ; but I have since changed
my mind, because of the superior fighting
ability which our men showed. It must be
carefully remembered that, with the excep-
tion of three regiments of Shafter's army,
and even these were " picked volunteers,"
the whole command was our regular army
— trained men, physically superior to any
in the world, as any one will know who
understands the requirements of our enlist-
ment as against that of conscript troops ;
and they were expecting attack, and pray-
ing devoutly for it. Besides, at Las Guasi-
mas we got the moral on the Spanish.

Then came the " cracker problem." The
gallant Cabanais pushed his mules day and
night. I thought they would go to pieces
under the strain, and I think every " packer "
who worked on the Santiago line will never
forget it. Too much credit cannot be given
i»5 ■

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

them. The command was sent into the field
without its proper ratio of pack-mules, and I
hope the blame of that will come home to
some one some day. That was the direct
and only cause of all the privation and delay
which became so notable in Shafter's opera-
tions. I cannot imagine a man who would
recommend wagons for a tropical country
during the rainy season. Such a one should
not be censured or reprimanded ; he should
be spanked with a slipper.

So while the engineers built bridges, and
the troops made roads behind them, and
until we got "three days crackers ahead" for
the whole command, things stopped. The
men were on half -rations, were out of to-
bacco, and it rained, rained, rained. We
were very miserable.

Mr. John Fox and I had no cover to keep
the rain out, and our determination to stay
up in front hindered us from making friends
with any one who had. Even the private
soldiers had their dog- tents, but we had
nothing except our two rubber ponchos.
At evening, after we had " bummed " some
crackers and coffee from some good-natured
1 86

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

officer, we repaired to our neck of woods,
and stood gazing at our mushy beds. It
was good, soft, soggy mud, and on it, or
rather in it, we laid one poncho, and over
that we spread the other.

" Say, Frederic, that means my death ; I
am subject to malaria."

" Exactly so, John. This cold of mine
will end in congestion of the lungs, or pos-
sibly bronchial consumption. Can you sug-
gest any remedy?"

" The fare to New York," said John, as
we turned into our wallow.

At last I had the good fortune to buy a
horse from an invalided officer. It seemed
great fortune, but it had its drawback. I
was ostracized by my'fellow-correspondents.

All this time the reconnoissance of the
works of Santiago and the outlying post of
Caney was in progress. It was rumored
that the forward movement would come,
and being awakened by the bustle, I got
up in the dark, and went gliding around
until I managed to steal a good feed of
oats for my horse. This is an important
•truth as showing the demoralization of war.
Q 187

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

In the pale light I saw a staff -officer who
was going to Caney, and I followed him.
We overtook others, and finally came to a
hill overlooking the ground which had been
fought over so hard during the day. Ca-
pron's battery was laying its guns, and back
of the battery were staff -officers and corre-
spondents eagerly scanning the country with
field-glasses. In the rear of these stood the
hardy First Infantry, picturesquely eager and
dirty, while behind the hill were the battery
horses, out of harm's way.

The battery opened and knocked holes in
the stone fort, but the fire did not appear to
depress the rifle-pits. Infantry in the jungle
below us fired, and were briskly answered
from the trenches.

I had lost my canteen and wanted a drink
of water, so I slowly rode back to a creek.
I was thinking, when along came another
correspondent. We discussed things, and
thought Caney would easily fall before
Lawton's advance, but we had noticed a
big movement of our troops towards Santi-
ago, and we decided that we would return
to the main road and see which promised
1 88

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

best. Sure enough, the road was jammed
with troops, and up the hill of El Poso went
the horses of Grimes's battery under whip and
spur. Around El Poso ranch stood Cubans,
and along the road the Rough Riders —
Roosevelt's now, for Wood was a brigadier.

The battery took position, and behind it
gathered the foreigners, naval and military,
with staff - officers and correspondents. It
was a picture such as may be seen at a
manoeuvre. Grimes fired a few shells tow-
ards Santiago, and directly came a shrill
screaming shrapnel from the Spanish lines.
It burst over the Rough Riders, and the
manoeuvre picture on the hill underwent a
lively change. It was thoroughly evident
that the Spaniards had the range of every-
thing in the country. They had studied it
out. For myself, I fled, dragging my horse
up the hill, out of range of Grimes's inviting
guns. Some as gallant soldiers and some
as daring correspondents as it is my pleas-
ure to know did their legs proud there.
The tall form of a staff -major moved in
my front in jack-rabbit bounds. Prussian,
English, and Japanese, correspondents, ar-
189

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

tists, all the news, and much high - class art
and literature, were flushed, and went strad-
dling up the hill before the first barrel of
the Dons. Directly came the warning
scream of No. 2, and we dropped and
hugged the ground like star -fish. Bang!
right over us it exploded. I was dividing
a small hollow with a distinguished colonel
of the staff.

" Is this thing allowed, colonel?"

" Oh yes, indeed !" he said. " I don't
think we could stop those shrapnel."

And the next shell went into the battery,
killing and doing damage. Following shell
were going into the helpless troops down in
the road, and Grimes withdrew his battery for
this cause. He had been premature. All
this time no one's glass could locate the fire
of the Spanish guns, and we could see Ca-
pron's smoke miles away on our right. Smoky
powder belongs with arbalists and stone axes
and United States ordnance officers, which
things all belong in museums, with other
dusty rust.

Then I got far up on the hill, walking over
the prostrate bodies of my old friends the
190

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

Tenth Cavalry, who were hugging the hot
ground to get away from the hotter shrap-
nel. There I met a clubmate from New
York, and sundry good foreigners, notably
the Prussian (von Goetzen), and that lovely
" old British salt " Paget, and the Japanese
major, whose name I could never remember.
We sat there. I listened to much expert
artillery talk, though the talk was not quite
so impressive as the practice of that art.

But the heat — let no man ever attempt
that after Kipling's "and the heat would
make your blooming eyebrows crawl."

This hill was the point of vantage ; it
overlooked the flat jungle, San Juan hills,
Santiago, and Caney, the whole vast coun-
try to the mountains which walled in the
whole scene. I heard the experts talk, and
I love military science, but I slowly thought
to myself this is not my art — neither the sci-
ence of troop movement nor the whole land-
scape. My art requires me to go down in
the road where the human beings are who do
these things which science dictates, in the
landscape which to me is overshadowed by
their presence. I rode slowly, on account
191

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

of the awful sun. Troops were standing
everywhere, lying all about, moving regu-
larly up the jungle road towards Santiago,
and I wound my way along with them, say-
ing, " Gangway, please."

War is productive of so many results,
things happen so awfully fast, men do such
strange things, pictures make themselves at
every turn, the emotions are so tremendous-
ly strained, that what knowledge I had fled
away from my brain, and I was in a trance ;
and do you know, cheerful reader, I am not
going to describe a battle to you.

War, storms at sea, mountains, deserts,
pests, and public calamities leave me with-
out words. I simply said, " Gangway " as I
wormed my way up the fateful road to San-
tiago. Fellows I knew out West and up
North and down South passed their word
to me, and I felt that I was not alone. A
shrapnel came shrieking down the road,
and I got a drink of water and a cracker
from Colonel Garlington. The soldiers were
lying alongside and the staff - officers were
dismounted, also stopping quietly in the
shade of the nearest bush. The column of
192

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

troops was working its way into the battle-
line.

" I must be going," I said, and I mounted
my good old mare — the colonel's horse. It
was a tender, hand - raised trotting - horse,
which came from Colorado, and was perfect-
ly mannered. We were in love.

The long columns of men on the road
had never seen this condition before. It
was their first baby. Oh, a few of the old
soldiers had, but it was so long ago that this
must have come to them almost as a new
sensation. Battles are like other things in
nature — no two the same.

I could hear noises such as you can make
if you strike quickly with a small walking-
stick at a very few green leaves. Some of
them were very near and others more faint.
They were the Mausers, and out in front
through the jungle I could hear what sound-
ed like a Fourth of July morning, when the
boys are setting off their crackers. It struck
me as new, strange, almost uncanny, because
I wanted the roar of battle, which same I
never did find. These long-range, smoke-
less bolts are so far-reaching, and there is so
193

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

little fuss, that a soldier is for hours under
fire getting into the battle proper, and he
has time to think. That is hard when you
consider the seriousness of what he is think-
ing about. The modern soldier must have
moral quality ; the gorrilla is out of date.
This new man may go through a war, be in
a dozen battles, and survive a dozen wounds
without seeing an enemy. This would be
unusual, but easily might happen. All our
soldiers of San Juan were for the most part
of a day under fire, subject to wounds and
death, before they had even a chance to
know where the enemy was whom they
were opposing. To all appearance they
were apathetic, standing or marching through
the heat of the jungle. They flattened them-
selves before the warning scream of the shrap-
nel, but that is the proper thing to do. Some
good-natured fellow led the regimental mas-
cot, which was a fice, or a fox-terrier. Really,
the dog of war is a fox-terrier. Stanley took
one through Airica. He is in all English
regiments, and he is gradually getting into
ours. His flag is short, but it sticks up
straight on all occasions, and he is a vaga-
194

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

bond. Local ties must set lightly on sol-
diers and fox-terriers.

Then came the light as I passed out of
the jungle and forded San Juan River. The
clicking in the leaves continued, and the
fire - crackers rattled out in front. " Get
down, old man; you'll catch one!" said an
old alkali friend, and I got down, sitting
there with the officers of the cavalry bri-
gade. But promptly some surgeons came
along, saying that it was the only safe place,
and they began to dig the sand to level it.
We, in consequence, moved out into the
crackle, and I tied my horse with some
others.

" Too bad, old fellow," I thought ; " I
should have left you behind. Modem rifle
fire is rough on horses. They can't lie down.
But, you dear thing, you will have to take
your chances." And then I looked at the
preparation for the field hospital. It was
altogether too suggestive. A man came,
stooping over, with his arms drawn up, and
hands flapping downward at the wrists. That
is the way with all people when they are
shot through the body, because they want
i9S

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

to hold the torso steady, because if they
don't it hurts. Then the oncoming troops
poured through the hole in the jungle which
led to the San Juan River, which was our
line of battle, as I supposed. I knew noth-
ing of the plan of battle, and I have an odd
conceit that no one else did, but most all the
line -officers were schooled men, and they
were able to put two and two together
mighty fast, and in most instances faster
than headquarters. When educated sol-
diers are thrown into a battle without un-
derstanding, they understand themselves.

As the troops came pouring across the ford
they stooped as low as they anatomically
could, and their faces were wild with excite-
ment. The older officers stood up as straight
as if on parade. They may have done it
through pride, or they may have known that
it is better to be " drilled clean " than to have
a long, ranging wound. It was probably
both ideas which stiffened them up so.

Then came the curious old tube drawn by
a big mule, and Borrowe with his squad of
the Rough Riders. It was the dynamite-
gun. The mule was unhooked and turned
196

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

loose. The gun was trundled up the road
and laid for a shot, but the cartridge stuck,
and for a moment the cheerful grin left the
red face of Borrowe. Only for a moment;
for back he came, and he and his men
scraped and whittled away at the thing
until they got it fixed. The poor old mule
lay down with a grunt and slowly died.
The fire was now incessant. The bullets
came like the rain. The horses lay down
one after another as the Mausers found
their billets. I tried to take mine to a
place of safety, but a sharp-shooter potted
at me, and I gave it up. There was no
place of safety. For a long time our peo-
ple did not understand these sharp-shooters
in their rear, and I heard many men mur-
mur that their own comrades were shooting
from behind. It was very demoralizing to
us, and on the Spaniards' part a very des-
perate enterprise to lie deliberately back of
our line; but of course, with bullets coming
in to the front by the bucketful, no one
could stop for the few tailing shots. The
Spaniards were hidden in the mango- trees,
and had smokeless powder.
197

WITH TH,E FIFTH CORPS

Now men came walking or were carried
into the temporary hospital in a string.
One beautiful boy was brought in by two
tough, stringy, hairy old soldiers, his head
hanging down behind. His shirt was off,
and a big red spot shone brilliantly against
his marble-like skin. They laid him tender-
ly down, and the surgeon stooped over him.
His breath came in gasps. The doctor laid
his arms across his breast, and shaking his
head, turned to a man who held a wounded
foot up to him, dumbly imploring aid, as a
dog might. It made my nerves jump, look-
ing at that grewsome hospital, sand-covered,
with bleeding men, and yet it seemed to
have fascinated me; but I gathered myself
and stole away. I went down the creek,
keeping under the bank, and then out into
the "scrub," hunting for our line; but I
could not -find our line. The bullets cut
and clicked around, and a sharp - shooter
nearly did for me. The thought came to
me, what if I am hit out here in the bush
while all alone? I shall never be found. I
would go back to the road, where I should be
discovered in such case; and I ran so quick-
198

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

ly across a space that my sharp - shooting
Spanish friend did not see me. After that
I stuck to the road. As I passed along it
through an open space I saw a half-dozen
soldiers sitting under a tree. " Look out —
sharp-shooters !" they sang out. "Wheet!"
came a Mauser, and it was right next to my
ear, and two more. I dropped in the tall
guinea - grass, and crawled to the soldiers,
and they studied the mango-trees; but we
could see nothing. I think that episode cost
me my sketch-book. I believe I lost it dur-
ing the crawl, and our friend the Spaniard
shot so well I wouldn't trust him again.

From the vantage of a little bank under a
big tree I had my first glimpse of San Juan
Hill, and the bullets whistled about. One
would " tumble " on a tree or ricochet from
the earth, and then they shrieked. Our men
out in front were firing, but I could not see
them. I had no idea that our people were
to assault that hill — I thought at the time
such an attempt would be unsuccessful. I
could see with my powerful glass the white
lines of the Spanish intrenchments. I did
not understand how our men could stay out

R 199

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

there under that gruelling, and got back into
the safety of a low bank.

A soldier said, while his stricken compan-
ions were grunting around him, " Boys, I
have got to go one way or the other, pretty
damn quick." Directly I heard our line yell-
ing, and even then did not suppose it was an
assault.

Then the Mausers came in a continuous
whistle. I crawled along to a new place, and
finally got sight of the fort, and just then I
could distinguish our blue soldiers on the
hill-top, and I also noticed that the Mauser
bullets rained no more. Then I started
after. The country was alive with wounded
men — some to die in the dreary jungle, some
to get their happy-home draft, but all to be
miserable. Only a handful of men got to the
top, where they broke out a flag and cheered.
"Cheer" is the word for that sound. You
have got to hear it once where it means so
much, and ever after you will grin when
Americans make that noise.

San Juan was taken by infantry and dis-
mounted cavalry of the United States 1 regu-
lar army without the aid of artillery. It was
200

WITH THE 'FIFTH CORPS

the most glorious feat of arms I ever heard
of, considering every condition. It was done
without grub, without reserves of either am-
munition or men, under tropical conditions.
It was a storm of intrenched heights, held
by veteran troops armed with modern guns,
supported by artillery, and no other troops
on the earth would have even thought
they could take San Juan heights, let alone
doing it.

I followed on and up the hill. Our men
sat about in little bunches in the pea-green
guinea-grass, exhausted. A young officer of
the Twenty-fourth, who was very much ex-
cited, threw his arms about me, and pointing
to twenty-five big negro infantrymen sitting
near, said, "That's all — that is all that is left
of the Twenty - fourth Infantry," and the
tears ran off his mustache.

Farther on another officer sat with his
arms around his knees. I knew him for one
of these analytical chaps — a bit of a philoso-
pher — too highly organized — so as to be mo-
rose. " I don't know whether I am brave or

not. Now there is S ; he don't mind

this sort of thing. I think — "
20 1

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

"Oh, blow your philosophy!" I interrupt-
ed. " If you were not brave, you would not
be here."

The Spanish trenches were full of dead
men in the most curious attitudes, while
about on the ground, lay others, mostly on
their backs, and nearly all shot in the head.
Their set teeth shone through their parted
lips, and they were horrible. The life never
runs so high in a man as it does when he is
charging on the field of battle; death never
seems so still and positive.

Troops were moving over to the right,
where there was firing. A battery came up
and went into position, but was driven back
by rifle fire. Our batteries with their smoky
powder could not keep guns manned in the
face of the Mausers. Then, with gestures
much the same as a woman makes when she
is herding chickens, the officers pushed the
men over the hill. They went crawling.
The Spanish were trying to retake the hill.
We were short of ammunition. I threw off
my hat and crawled forward to have a look
through my glass at the beyond. I could
hardly see our troops crouching in the grass

202

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

beside me, though many officers stood up.
The air was absolutely crowded with Span-
ish bullets. There was a continuous whistle.
The shrapnel came screaming over. A ball
struck in front of me, and filled my hair and
face with sand, some of which I did not get
out for days. It jolted my glass and my
nerves, and I beat a masterly retreat, crawl-
ing rapidly backwards, for a reason which I
will let you guess. The small-arms rattled;
now and then a wounded man came back
and started for the rear, some of them shot
in the face, bleeding hideously.

" How goes it?" I asked one.

"Ammunition! ammunition!"said the man,
forgetful of his wound.

I helped a man to the field hospital; and
got my horse. The lucky mare was un-
touched. She was one of three animals not
hit out of a dozen tied or left at the hospital.
One of these was an enormous mule, loaded
down with what was probably officers' blan-
ket rolls, which stood sidewise quietly as
only a mule can all day, and the last I saw
of him he was alive. Two fine officers'
chargers lay at his feet, one dead and the
203

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

other unable to rise, and suffering pathet-
ically. The mule was in such an exposed
position that I did not care to unpack him,
and Captain Miley would not let any one
shoot a horse, for fear of the demoralizing
effect of fire in the rear.

A trumpeter brought in a fine officer's
horse, which staggered around in a circle.
I saw an English sabre on the saddle, and
recognized it as Lieutenant Short's, and in-
deed I knew the horse too. He was the fine
thoroughbred which that officer rode in Madi-
son Square military tournament last winter,
when drilling the Sixth Cavalry. The trum-
peter got the saddle off, and the poor brute
staggered around with a bewildered look in
his eager eyes, shot in the stifle- joint, I
thought; and then he sat down in the creek
as a dog would on a hot day. The suffering
of animals on a battle-field is most impres-
sive to one who cares for them.

I again started out to the hill, along with
a pack - train loaded with ammunition. A
mule went down, and bullets and shell were
coming over the hill aplenty. The wounded
going to the rear cheered the ammunition,
204

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

and when it was unpacked at the front, the
soldiers seized it like gold. They lifted a
box in the air and dropped it on one cor-
ner, which smashed it open.

"Now we can hold San Juan Hill against
them garlics — hey, son!" yelled a happy
cavalryman to a doughboy.

"You bet — until we starve to death."

"Starve nothin' — we'll eat them gun-
teams."

Well, well, I said, I have no receipt for
licking the kind of troops these boys repre-
sent. And yet some of the generals wanted
to retreat.

Having had nothing to eat this day, I
thought to go back to headquarters camp
and rustle something. Besides, I was sick.
But beyond the hill, down the road, it was
very dangerous, while on the hill we were
safe. "Wait for a lull; one will come
soon," advised an old soldier. It is a curi-
ous thing that battle firing comes like a big
wind, and has its lulls. Now it was getting
dark, and during a lull I went back. I gave
a wounded man a ride to the field hospital,
but I found I was too weak myself to walk
205

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

far. I had been ill during the whole cam-
paign, and latterly had fever, which, taken
together with the heat, sleeping in the mud,
marching, and insufficient food, had done
for me.

The sight of that road as I wound my
way down it was something I cannot de-
scribe. The rear of a battle. All the broken
spirits, bloody bodies, hopeless, helpless suf-
fering which drags its weary length to the
rear, are so much more appalling than any-
thing else in the world that words won't
mean anything to one who has not seen it.
Men half naked, men sitting down on the
road - side utterly spent, men hopping on
one foot with a rifle for a crutch, men out
of their minds from sunstroke, men dead,
and men dying. Officers came by white as
this paper, carried on rude litters made by
their devoted soldiers, or borne on their
backs. I got some food about ten o'clock
and lay down. I was in the rear at head-
quarters, and there were no bullets and
shells cracking about my ears, but I found
my nerves very unsettled. During the day
J had discovered no particular nervousness
/ 206

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

in myself, quite contrary to my expecta-
tions, since I am a nervous man, but there
in the comparative quiet of the woods the
reaction came. Other fellows felt the same,
and we compared notes. Art and literature
under Mauser fire is a jerky business ; it
cannot be properly systematized. I declared
that I would in the future paint." set pieces
for dining-rooms." Dining-rooms are so much
more amusing than camps. The novelist al-
lowed that he would be forced to go home
and complete " The Romance of a Quart
Bottle." The explorer declared that his
treatise on the "Flora of Bar Harbor" was
promised to his publishers.

Soldiers always joke after a battle. They
have to loosen the strings, or they will snap.
There was a dropping fire in the front, and
we understood our fellows were intrenching.
Though I had gotten up that morning at
half past three, it was nearly that time again
before I went to sleep. The fever and the
strong soldier - coffee banished sleep ; then,
again, I could not get the white bodies
which lay in the moonlight, with the dark
spots on them, out of my mind. Most of
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WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

the dead on modern battle-fields are half
naked, because of the "first-aid bandage."
They take their shirts off, or their panta-
loons, put on the dressing, and 'die that way.

It is well to bear in mind, the difference
in the point of view of an artist or a corre-
spondent, and a soldier. One has his duties,
his responsibilities, or his gun, and he is on
the firing-line under great excitement, with
his reputation at stake. The other stalks
through the middle distance, seeing the
fight and its immediate results, the wound-
ed; lying down by a dead body, mayhap,
when the bullets come quickly; he will
share no glory; he has only the responsi-
bility of seeing clearly what he must tell ;
and he must keep his nerve. I think the
soldier sleeps better nights.

The next day I started again for the front,
dismounted, but I only got to El Poso Hill.
I lay down under a bank by the creek. I
had the fever. I only got up to drink deep-
ly of the dirty water. The heat was intense.
The re-enforcing troops marched slowly up
the road. The shells came railroading down
through the jungle, but these troops went
208

WITH THE FIFTH CORPS

on, calm, steady, like true Americans. I
made my way back to our camp, and lay
there until nightfall, making up my mind
and unmaking it as to my physical con-
dition, until I concluded that I had "fin-
- ished."

THE END