The Army Mule.That republics are ungrateful,Is adage old as sin;That only he who has a pullCan rake the chestnuts in;And he, the faithful, honest heart,Who meekly bears his humble part,Is often dubbed a fool.Oh, Dewey gets a mighty praise,And everywhere they shoutAnd yell for Schley until they raiseTheir very livers out;Of rank and file much praise is heard,But then you never hear a wordAbout the Army Mule.He calmly bears his heavy pack,And twists his tail in glee;And chews at night a “gunny” sack,When corn has “gang a-glee”;But for his patient, loving waysNo annals speak a word of praiseOf that poor Army Mule.He nobly marched where bullets fell,With calm and even tread;And when he heard the bursting shell,He only shook his head;And at his post he nobly stoodTo help the boys what e’er he could,That faithful Army Mule.’Neath burning sun of Cuba’s isle,He brought the train along,To furnish Shatter’s men the whileThey sang the “rifle song”;And but for him supplies were vain;They must be brought through sun and rain,By that same Army Mule,In Luzon where the Army moves,The festive Mule is nigh;Too slow the pokey carabao proves,For Yankee soldiers fly;In heat or cold, in wet or dry,In mud or dust, they can relyOn the true Army Mule.He brings relief to sick and well,When other sources fail;His worth the soldier cannot tell,His glory shall not pale;And here a monument we raise,A tribute to the worthy praiseOf the American Mule.But first and foremost of them all,In duty or in danger;With biggest ears and loudest call,And to fatigue a stranger;The first on Santiago’s brow,And in Luzon the friskiest now:Oh, that’s the Missouri Mule.—W. S. Platt.Comedy and Carnage.The “Sky Pilot” and the “Dutch” Corporal.—The Mule that Sounded the Charge.—“Bull’s-Eye” Kelley and the Fire-Bug.War, with all its horrors, laconically described by General Sherman as hell, is not without its comedy. The marching through rain and mud; camping in marshes; digging in trenches, using the bayonet for a pick and the meat-ration can for a shovel; wading rivers by day and sleeping exposed to the elements by night, are all sandwiched with numerous mirthful incidents. Soldiers, above all people, have an eye for the ridiculous, and are ever ready to make merry and laugh over the most trivial matter. Even the horrors of battle are unable to quench the spark of gaiety ever present in the make-up of a “Yankee Doodle” soldier.There are even times when comrades are lying about dead and dying, and the missives of death yet speeding by, searching for new victims, or to penetrate the quivering form of the already wounded, that something occurs to bring forth peals of laughter.The “Sky Pilot” and the “Dutch” Corporal.During the mobilization of the Army at Tampa, Fla., at the outbreak of the Spanish-American War, an orthodox minister enlisted as a private in one of the infantry regiments. On the 6th of June came orders to break camp and prepare to go aboard transports for the invasion of Cuba.The railroad facilities from Tampa to Port Tampa, where the transports were waiting, were not equal to the emergency. Traffic became more or less clogged, and it was early the next morning when the regiment to which the preacher belonged was entrained. During the early part of the night the men were gathered in groups, some playing “shuffle the brogan,” others busy at “nosey poker,” while the greater part of them were smoking their pipes and telling yarns, or stretching their weary limbs onrolls of canvas, or on the bare ground asleep.The orthodox minister appeared worried. He was walking to and fro in an aimless manner like a headless chicken. After having paced backward and forward past a pile of mess-chests several times, each time sizing it up, he suddenly began to mount it, planted himself on the very pinnacle, and with a fog-horn voice began a patriotic harangue.Long, hair-raising, and Spanish-scalping sentences rolled from his lips like crude petroleum from a five-inch pipe. Each inflammatory oratorical flight was dramatically climaxed with the words, “For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”“For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”“For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”The sleeping ones restlessly turned over, rubbed their eyes, and opened their ears to this wonderful address. The entire regiment, officers included, soon became his audience, and all were inspired with the oft-repeatedwords, “For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”This regiment was one of the first to land in Cuba, and took a prominent part in the attack on El Caney. Its position during this fight, for many hours, was within a few hundred paces of the famous “stone block-house,” in a sunken road, and was suffering heavily.Along about two o’clock in the afternoon matters began to look blue—even a general officer who had fought in many hard battles of the Civil War, and spent the best years of his life combating the Indians on the frontier, was overheard to mutter to his adjutant that he was “afraid we’ve bitten off more’n we can chew.”There was not a cheerful face to be seen. Men with grinding teeth were soberly looking Death in the face. Sir Orthodox was burrowing his face into Mother Earth in a wild effort to shield himself from Mauserbullets. A German corporal was doing the same thing about fifty feet further down the road.As the corporal, better known as “Dutch,” was burrowing his face in the mud, an idea struck him, and, like all Teutons, he must make it known. He raised his head and looked up and down the line of prostrate soldiers till his eye fell on the flattened figure of the minister. In a voice that could be heard the full length of the regiment, he bleated out: “Say, dere, Sky Pilots, id aind so schveet to died for vonce countries, aind id?”The effect was magical. Amid this scene of carnage and death a wild yell of merriment went up that brought courage to many weakening hearts, and Caney had fallen before the men had ceased to laugh at the joke on the preacher.The Mule that Sounded the Charge.He was a Colonel with enough dignity to rule the universe, but he knew no more about music than a pig does of navigation. With his regiment he was slipping up on a Filipino town at night. It was purely a clandestine movement—orders were given in whispered tones by tiptoeing orderlies. The men were holding their bayonet scabbards against their legs to obviate screeching and rattling, and every effort was made to minimize the sounds of a marching body of men.The Colonel with the battalion on the right had arrived within charging distance of the insurgent trenches. It was the pre-arranged plan for all the companies to arrive on this line before the general advance would be made. When all were ready, the charge would be sounded by the Colonel’s bugler.The battalion with the Colonel was all ready for the bloody charge. Not knowing if the companies of the other battalions had arrived, the impatient commander sent his adjutant, mounted on a native charger, and his bugler, mounted on a Missouri mule, down the line to investigate.When all was in readiness, the adjutant was to have the bugler sound the charge, when the whole khaki-clad line, like a thousand demons, would set up that awful, “gu gu” terrorizing “Yankee yell,” and wade into the unwary Tagalos with cold steel.The adjutant and his bugler found that the companies on the left were yet some distance to the rear. The former, while waiting for the companies to come up, dismounted to tighten his saddle-girth, while the latter busied himself looking for some signs of life in the enemy’s trenches not two hundred yards ahead. His mule dropped his head in a dozing attitude. He suddenly appeared inspired,raised his head high in the air, looking toward the insurgent lines. Then, with a grunt, as if of satisfaction, elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn “A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye! a-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!” in threatening tones, which sounded through the midnight air for miles around.“He elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn ‘A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!’ in threatening tones.”“He elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn ‘A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!’ in threatening tones.”The faithful animal had not finished his challenge when the deep voice of the Colonel rang out completely drowning it, giving commands for the charge. He flashed his saber, and gallantly led the only battalion on the line into the midst of thousands of dusky soldiers—he had heard the mule sound the charge.It was a brilliant victory. The town fell with but a single American casualty—that casualty left the bugler without a mount.“Bull’s-Eye” Kelley and the Fire-Bug.Where is there a soldier whose name is dry on the muster-rolls who has not heard of “Bull’s-Eye” Kelley? Kelley gained his enviable name of “Bull’s-Eye” by having spent twenty-two successive seasons on the target-range without ever making a“bull’s-eye.” As a reward for long and honest service—not for marksmanship—he was warranted a sergeant, and went with his regiment to the Philippines.While the regiment was doing garrison duty at one of the interior towns in Luzon, it was constantly harassed by the little rebels. One dark night in June they made a determined effort to drive the Americans out. The regiment had run short of officers, so this night Kelley was in command of his company. He was a strict disciplinarian—so much so that when out of his hearing theprivates referred to him as the “Duke of Ireland.”The night of this attack his orders were to keep his men lying flat on the ground and perfectly quiet. There was to be no talking, whispering, coughing, or smoking; or, as Kelley himself expressed it, “no nothin’” would be allowed.All sorts of insects, including lightning-bugs as big as incandescent lights, were singing and flying about, causing the men to put their hands and faces through a most unique series of gymnastics.The rebel fire was becoming alarmingly effective. Although they knew nothing of the location of Kelley’s company, yet stray bullets coming that way had already hit two of his men, instantly killing one of them. He suspected that something was betraying his position. Looking down the line, he was horrified to discover what was unmistakably a man smoking. Flushed with anger, heshouted louder than his instructions would have permitted, “Hie there, me man! put thet cigaroot out,” but the light remained undisturbed. “I say there, ye insultin’ divil of a rekroot, put out thet cigaroot,” stormed the enraged Kelley.In reply came the low, mourner’s-bench, meek voice of a South Carolina recruit: “It hain’t a cigaroot, Sergeant; it’s a lightnin’-bug as big as a search-light on ’Pin-Head’ Hebb’s mustache.”The undaunted Kelley was not to be beaten thus, but sternly commanded: “I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”“I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”“I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”How I Saw Aguinaldo.An Army Officer’s Curious Experience in Luzon.—A Tight Place and a Close Call.It was during the early part of the month of June that my company was doing outpost duty on the north line at San Fernando, one of the largest inland towns on the Island of Luzon. We had been on the south line, but on the morning on which this incident took place, were directed to relieve a company of another battalion of the same regiment on the north line.Our arrival at the outpost was very early in the morning; so early that it was impossible to distinguish a man from a high stump at a distance of 100 feet. The lay of the land was new to me; I hadn’t the slightest idea of the contour of a foot of the ground to be covered by my company. After getting mymen properly stationed along the line, guarding a front of about 1700 or 1800 yards, I took an old, reliable sergeant with me and proceeded to reconnoiter the territory to my front, and to make a rough sketch map, showing on it what I could of the Filipino trenches and their outposts.We started just as the sky began to turn a deep red in the east, and the “chuck me” chameleon, the harbinger of the early dawn, began his morning challenge. Our progress was very cautiously made through the cane-fields, banana groves, and bamboo jungles, halting and investigating the slightest noise, the rustling of a leaf or the breaking of a twig not escaping our attention. First, I would take the advance and then the Sergeant. When we passed through cane-fields we found the plowed grounds but little less than marshes, for the rainy season had just begun with torrential showers. Our bodies were soon soaked to the skin, for the leavesof the cane and banana stalks were burdened with water. The cane was a trifle higher than our heads, and the wide-spreading leaves of the banana hid the sky from view.After wading and splashing along toward the Filipino lines for about 1400 yards, we suddenly and very unexpectedly came upon a well-traveled road, fringed with bamboo on either side, with quite a stretch of open ground beyond, in which was lying at the farther edge, the trenches of our enemies, which seemed to be at the time swarming with dusky soldiers preparing their morning meal.Believing ourselves not have been observed, we withdraw a short distance from the bamboo fringe into a banana grove, a position that afforded us concealment as well as an opportunity to make observations of the position of the trenches and location of the outposts of the rebels.I was busy making copious notes and my maps, while the Sergeant, with my field-glasses, was making most wonderful discoveries of masked batteries and gas-pipe cannon, when, all of a sudden, a cavalcade of insurgent officers, followed closely by a large body of foot soldiers, appeared down the road to our left, where there was a slight curve, not more than 200 yards away.What were we to do? At that short distance from our open-eared and alert rebellious fellow-citizens, we could not beat a precipitate retreat, or an orderly one, without disclosing our presence; and that fact once known to this body of armed men meant almost certain death, or worse, to be taken prisoners by this half-savage band. We held a hasty council of war in whispered tones, and decided to hold our ground till the danger passed.It was but a moment till the little steeds and their haughty riders were directly infront of us, not fifty paces away, and, to our intense surprise and discomfort, halted. There they stood, with the first ray of the rising sun resting full upon them, seventeen horsemen, officers, and just back of them about 5,000 infantrymen, all within a stone’s throw of us. What made our position all the more precarious, the infantry was standing at a “rest,” and were, as all soldiers do when first halted, looking in every direction in search of something—an enemy, fruit, a stray porker or a fowl. Our chances of being discovered were becoming momentarily greater. We could plainly see them, so naturally, if they would but look in the right direction, they could see us. What may not five hundred busy eyes discover?The danger of the mounted men seeing us was not so great, for they had discovered something interesting in our lines and were active with their glasses looking over our heads.Sixteen of these officers were dressed in light blue uniforms of some thin cloth, wide-brimmed sombreros, russet leather leggings, and clanking sabers dangling by their left sides, almost trailing the ground, while the trappings of their horses were enough to make the eyes of a militia major snap with envy. The other officer, who rode at the head, and the recipient of the most obsequious attentions, a man about middle age, with close-cropped hair, small restless eyes, and somewhat lighter complexioned than the average inhabitant of those far-away tropical islands, wore a neat-fitting uniform of khaki cloth over his diminutive body, and a helmet of the same color upon his well-shaped head. His mount was a beautiful dapple gray Filipino stallion, some larger than the average-sized native animal, and much more gorgeously caparisoned than the charges of the other officers. This pompously equipped commander wore at his leftside a most handsome saber, and on his right he carried a revolver and field-glass case.The foot soldiers were of the famous Corps d’Elite, Aguinaldo’s body-guard. We knew them by their bright red uniforms. Where Aguinaldo goes, there they go also. They are his constant attendants. They were, of course, all armed with Mauser rifles and laden with ammunition.We were so interested at the sight of this picked regiment of Tagalos, of which we had heard so much, that we almost forgot our danger, and actually raised our heads higher in order that we might have a better view of them. Just as we were craning our necks and straining our eyes to their utmost capacity, we were suddenly brought to a realization of our terrible danger by the officer in khaki dismounting, throwing the reins to an orderly, and advancing to the edge of the bamboo just in front of us. Like a flash the others followed him, and stood atattention just in his rear, gawking and peering in our direction. This was a trying moment for us. There stood the flower of the Filipino Army, facing two almost helpless servants of Uncle Sam, and, for all we knew, were deciding our fate, for they were discussing some important subject in the Tagalog tongue, all of which was Sanscrit to us. Our hearts were in our throats and kept up an increased throbbing in their new positions. Had we been discovered? Were those snapping, half-savage eyes now resting on us, and was the mode of our death being discussed? We knew not. Our faces were being pushed in the mud till our ears were begrimed in our mad efforts to conceal ourselves. We felt it would be but a matter of seconds till our hides would be perforated with Mauser bullets, or we would be bound, hand and foot, prisoners of a revengeful enemy.“We almost forgot our danger, and actually raised our heads.”“We almost forgot our danger, and actually raised our heads.”Their talk became excited. Something was being discussed with great interest andmoment. The suspense was awful. Minutes passed as hours. Our skins would cringe when the thought of a volley liable to be fired into our bodies at any moment occurred to us.Would they never leave? Their conversation warmed. The khaki-clad officer said a word, and then they faced about, reëntered the road, and passed down it out of sight, one officer alone remaining with the foot soldiers, who gave some directions to the orderlies, and the horses were led across the road and hitched. We slowly raised our mud-besmeared faces. The infantry, still looking and chattering in the twangy language of their tribe, were holding their ground. We heard the officer in command say something about “aqua” in Spanish, then a few words of command followed. They instantly came to the “attention,” moved forward till the center of the column was opposite us, wheeled to the right by fours,and stacked their arms. “Aqua”; that meant water. We knew they would soon break ranks and go some place, we knew not where, to replenish their water-bottles. So far, then, we had been unobserved. But we remembered that just a few yards to the rear of us, and in a direct line from our enemies, was a rippling stream of crystal water. We exchanged looks. Oh, what looks! The Sergeant’s expression was awful, and I knew mine to be none better. Here they came; 500 of them were moving toward us. Was it too late to run? No. I whispered, “Come on.” We were about to rise and make a wild dash for life, when a sharp blast of a trumpet was sounded to our front. All stopped in their tracks. Another trumpet-call—a rush to arms. The officers came tearing back and remounted.We waited for the volley that was to send our souls into eternity. That we had been discovered we were sure.Boom! A loud report from our rear. It was unmistakably a cannon shot. An instant later a shrieking shell passed over our heads and tore its way through a stone sugar storehouse, 100 yards ahead, rending demolition everywhere in that vicinity.The officers madly spurred their diminutive mounts in a wild effort to secure speed. Off they rode at break-neck rate over rice-paddies and small ditches in the direction of the bamboo thickets beyond the open.But the infantrymen remained steadfast! They kept their close formation, facing us. I ventured to raise my head a trifle higher when I noticed the Sergeant putting his face through a series of grimaces that would tend to make it as muscular as his brawny arms. His struggle was in vain; he could not help it—he sneezed, not once, but twice, and once again.Five hundred ears pricked up, and as many pairs of eyes were thrown upon us.It was but a second till a dozen rifles were raised to as many shoulders, the muzzles all pointing in our direction.As a last effort to save our lives, I yelled to the Sergeant to follow, and started a disorderly retreat toward our lines.Boom! Was it a volley? No, another shot from the cannon. The shell struck between our enemies and ourselves and exploded. The sky was filled with everything. We looked back over our shoulders, but could not see the red uniforms for flyingdébris.An instant later we heared a crying, screaming, terror-stricken mass of humanity breaking through the bamboo on the farther side of the road. We halted. There they went, over dykes and ditches. All organization had fled with the winds in their wild efforts to escape the next shot from our artillery.Now we were safe, and sauntered lazily back to the company, giving our hearts anopportunity to resume a normal state of affairs.When we reached our lines we found that a recruit battery of light artillery had come out from the city that morning for target-practice. An experienced non-commissioned officer fired the first shot, which hit the sugar warehouse, the target. A recruit gunner fired the second, which, falling short, saved our lives. They knew nothing of the presence of the Filipinos or of my little reconnoitering party.The next day our native spies reported that Aguinaldo and his body-guard had come down from Angeles early the morning before, but had immediately returned.I laughed when I heard this report, for I knew the circumstances.The dapper little officer in khaki was Aguinaldo, and this is the story of how I saw him.—Sunday Globe-Democrat.What the Wounded Say and Do.An American Officer’s True Stories of our Latest War.—Brave Men who Meet Death as Heroes Should.No two men behave alike when hit in battle. There is just as much difference in their actions as there is in the behavior of the members of a volunteer fire brigade at a country-town conflagration. The look of the mortally wounded is nearly always the same. There is always that deathly pallor that creeps over the face, and that fixed stare—horrible look of resignation—that tells so plainly that all is over with the unfortunate soldier. A few instances will serve to give a general idea of how the victims of the messengers of death receive them.On the 1st of July, a company of regular infantry, in reserve, was lying flat on theirstomachs in a sunken road, a few hundred yards from the stone block-house of El Caney, Cuba. The men were under a terrific fire, but were not allowed to reply to it, for ammunition was growing scarce. For hours they remained in this position. They began to get restless and to shift about. As long as they kept low, there was no danger from Spanish fire, for the bank of the road was sufficiently high to afford security. Curiosity occasionally got the better of a man, and he would poke his head above the embankment and peer in the direction from which the bullets were coming. In the company was a large, muscular German, who had early become restless and curious to see what was transpiring. He would occasionally break out and swear because he was not given a chance to fire at the hated Dons. Of a sudden he ripped out a choice lot of the best in his vocabulary, raised his head above the bank, and shook his huge fist at the lineof sombreros to be seen just above the Spanish trenches to the right of the block-house. Ping! ping! thud! “Wasn’t that an awful sound?” a dozen soldiers chimed. There is no other sound produced that can be compared with it. It stands alone for all that is sickening and horrible. All knew that some one had been hit. A moment was passed in suspense. The German whispered, in the tones of death, to his comrade at his side: “Wipe the blood off of my face!” It was his last words. He drew his knees to his chin in the agonies of death, turned over on one side, burrowing his face in the mud, and died without a groan. A Mauser had hit him squarely between the eyes.A short time later a sergeant of one of the companies of the same regiment moved a few yards forward, trying to get a pot-shot at some Spanish sharpshooters who were snugly perched in the spreading tops of some royal palm trees, and were hitting some of ourmen. He sighted one and had his rifle to his shoulder, taking a fine bead, when all at once the rifle fell to the ground and his hands dropped helplessly by his side. He coolly faced about and walked toward the rear, his arms dangling like pendulums, not even so much as muttering a word. One of his company officers asked him what was the matter, to which he laconically replied, “Hit,” and continued on his way to the dressing-station in the rear. He was shot through both shoulders—a serious wound, but he recovered.About an hour after the German was killed the same company was ordered to take a position farther to the right. They walked along, goose-fashion, single file, moving by the right flank toward their new position. Next to the last man in the rear was a corporal, a new man, just a few months in the service. Biff! ping! bang! went the deadly missiles. One struck a man’s rifle-barrel,cutting it almost in two. Another split the stock of a gun in a man’s hand. Then one struck the recruit corporal’s left arm, passing through the biceps. With an expression of great surprise he for a moment stood still, saying nothing. His eyes began to dilate, and then of a sudden he threw his fowling-piece high in the air, grasped his left arm with his right hand, and started for the rear at a disgraceful gait, yelling so as to be heard above the din of battle: “I’ve got it! I’ve got it! I’ve got it!” The last that was seen of him that day he had “it,” and was taking “it” to the rear with him.On San Juan Ridge, July 2d, just as Chaffee’s brigade had reached the crest, they were ordered to lie down and intrench, using the bayonet as a pick and the hands for shovels. A dashing young fellow of one of the companies on the right of the line was some distance in advance of his fellows when the halt was made. Instead of falling back onthe line with the other men, he stopped where he was. One of the officers shouted at him several times to fall back, as he was in danger of his own men shooting him, but he did not hear. The officer then walked down to where he was, grabbed him by a leg, and started to drag him back to the line. He had but started when he felt the man’s whole body quiver, and he flopped himself over on his back, saying as he did so, “I’m done for.” Some of the men came to the soldier and assisted the officer to carry him to a place of security. With a bayonet one of the men cut off his clothing, when a Mauser hole was seen just above the heart, where the bullet entered, passing through his body and coming out between the shoulders, near the spine. The man said no more at the time. His wounds were bound by sympathetic hands. All except the wounded man returned to the firing-line. The Spanish fire was heavy, and kept up for fourhours, occasionally a soldier dropping out, wounded or killed. When all was quiet, the officer and one of his soldiers returned to see if the young man were yet alive. They found him sitting against a small tree. His first words were: “Bill, give me a cigarette.” The man is living to-day.Just about the time this man was wounded a man in the next company on the right suddenly threw down his bayonet, jumped to his feet, paused for a second or two, looking in the direction of the Spanish trenches, then threw both hands to his breast, saying, “I’m hit.” He turned about and walked into the dense thickets of cactus and Spanish bayonet, and was never seen nor heard of again. He undoubtedly crawled far back into the heavy tropical growth and died, where the vultures claimed him.One of the coolest men who ever received a wound was an infantryman at San Fernando, in the Island of Luzon, on the 16th ofJune. The insurgents made a determined effort to retake the town early on the morning of that day. They opened up simultaneously from every quarter, and the kind and variety of missiles used would be beyond the wildest expectations of that sweet-throated midnight serenader, the Thomas-cat. Out of an old smooth-bore cannon they threw railroad spikes, horseshoes, old clocks, lemon-squeezers, and cobble-stones. From their Remingtons they shot large cubical and irregular-shaped lead slugs. One of these struck this cool man high in the right groin, deeply imbedding itself. The pain must have been excruciating, for the man was terribly lacerated. He hobbled to his company commander, saluted, and asked permission to fall out and lie down, as he had been hit. He was lying near a road where his comrades passed to and fro during the entire fight, but no one heard a word or a groan out of him unless he was spoken to.During the same fight, in another company of the same regiment, a battalion sergeant-major was ordered to take two squads and proceed to a point about 400 yards down the Angeles Road, where there was a small trench, and defend it. When about half-way down, one of his men, a green “rookie,” received a severe wound in the leg. The Sergeant endeavored to start him to the rear, with a man to assist him along, but he protested. Nothing but to continue to the front with his squad would do. He loaded and fired with the other men till the fight was over. This man was recommended for a medal of honor by his captain.—From Leslie’s Weekly, of December 9, 1899.What the Wounded Say and Do.What the Wounded Say and Do.The Flight of “Father Time.”A Case of Mistaken Identity.Captain C. was what soldiers call a “fussy” officer. He was constantly prying into matters that concerned him but little, and wasted his energies in performing duties usually within the province of a corporal. In fact, he would march a “set of fours” to dinner. In a fight, however, his soul enlarged, and he was ever to be found at the front directing his men, and doing much to atone for sins committed during less exciting moments. Always in the van, his long, gray whiskers gently flowing in the breezes, his sword drawn and pointing toward the enemy, suggested to the men the pictures they had seen in almanacs of “Father Time”; and when speaking of him among themselves, he had no other name.In August, 1899, his company was at Angeles, in Luzon, and was entrenching on the outskirts, for the pesky little “niggers” were constantly threatening and frequently attacking the place.The Quartermaster Department hired a lot of Macebebes, who had offered their services, to do the harder part of the work of trench-digging, for the men were exhausted by an arduous and exacting campaign.One bright morning about two hundred of these laborers were put to work a short distance to the front of the trenches under construction, to cut away a dense growth of cane, and open up a field of fire toward the enemy. The faithful fellows jumped into the work with a vim seldom seen in that country, slashing to the right and left with bolos, machetes, knives, hoes, scythes, and a variety of other edged implements, felling the large cane stalks with great rapidity.“Father Time’s” company was just inrear of them, with rifle and belt, ready to protect them from the insurgents, who hated a Macebebe even worse than a despised Americano.The usual activity in the cane-field was soon discovered by the festive little rebels, who promptly proceeded to pour volleys into the place where the cane was so mysteriously disappearing. The unarmed Macebebes stood their ground for a moment, but when the Mauser bullets came whistling uncomfortably close, and one of them had been slightly hit, they could stand it no longer, but, with an unearthly yell of fright, they broke for the rear like a herd of stampeded cattle. A regular race of mad men.When the firing began, the soldiers threw themselves upon the ground as flat as pancakes. The Captain was busy writing in a nipa palm hut a few hundred yards in rear. He rapidly buckled on his equipment and “took up the double time” to join his men.As he neared the trenches he raised his head to look for his company. Not a soldier was in sight. As he stood in wonderment it seemed that the gates of the infernal regions were standing ajar and the inmates escaping toward him. Two hundred black devils, every imp of them screaming and yelling at each leap forward, were coming for him, armed with bolos and other death-dealing weapons, to mince him in a thousand pieces. He knew his men had been massacred to a man. He alone remained to face this mass of uncivilized warriors eager for every drop of his blood.“Two hundred black devils were coming for him, armed with bolos and other death-dealing weapons.”“Two hundred black devils were coming for him, armed with bolos and other death-dealing weapons.”No general ever more quickly decided upon a definite maneuver, or put one into execution with a more fixed determination than this veteran officer, hero of three wars, decided to decrease the distance between himself and the main body of his regiment in town. Two miles over muddy roads and rice “paddies” is not an easy march for ayoung man, but when a valiant gentleman of sixty summers covers the distance at a forced-march gait, without a halt, a record has been broken.When “Father Time” learned that not a man of his company had been hurt, he was pleased; but the news that he had mistaken a lot of Macebebes, hopelessly stampeded, for a blood-thirsty enemy, had to be broken to him gently by the Colonel.Camp Alarms—False But Startling.The Red-Headed Recruit and the Cuban Dog.—The Charge of the Hospital Corps.—Private Timmons and the Carabao.In the face of his reputation for undaunted courage and dashing deeds of valor, the American soldier has at times allowed himself to become frightfully alarmed and on the eve of being panic-stricken, when taken unawares. He soon collects himself, however, and is ready to meet all emergencies, let them come from whatever source they will. Even the old “vet” may lose his head for a moment or two, and find some difficulty in establishing his equilibrium. The Yankee soldier is ever ready to obey his officer, and if the latter will but keep his wits, order may be restored out of hopeless demoralization.The Civil War was replete with camp alarms, some of them of the most ridiculous type; and our war with Spain and the Filipinos has added greatly to the stock. The tropical countries, with their dense growths of vegetation, myriads of crawling creatures, and hair-raising sounds, form a replete field for alarms, which are usually started by frightened sentries on lonely outposts.The Red-Headed Recruit and the Cuban Dog.One of the most notable alarms that occurred during the campaign about Santiago was within two miles of the “Stone Block-House,” at El Caney, on the night before the attack on that place. The brigade that did the hardest fighting there, and that had been in advance the greater part of the time from the landing at Baiquiri, received orders late in the afternoon of June 30th to move forward and take a position within easy striking distance of El Caney, and to there rest on arms for the night. The march began at dusk, and, by a long, circuitous route, ended at 12 o’clock midnight at an open field, which the guides said was within two miles of the nearest Spanish position in the town. The march, in single file, up and down hills, over slippery ground, by men as silent as mice, was a tiresome one. Allwere glad to hear the word passed along in low whispers to quietly lie down, retaining arms and equipment, and bivouac for the night. The silence of death prevailed. The long line of dark figures on the open field, silhouetted against the star-lit sky, and the stillness that reigned, reminded one more of stereopticon views thrown upon canvas, than of the presence of eighteen hundred fighting men, stealing upon their prey.It was not a minute after the whispered command to lie down was given till all except a few selected for duty on outposts had stretched their weary limbs on the dewy grass.The outposts were placed around the main body, some few hundred yards distant, most of them in the direction of the Spanish lines. The command was soon asleep. There was the usual number of disturbed dreamers, and occasionally the snorer would burst out in loud and long-drawn tones, onlyto be promptly kicked in the ribs by his light-sleeping comrade. The nocturnal cigarette-smoker was prohibited from indulging in his nightly practice, and soon there was a long mass of sleeping humanity, not a sign of wakeful eyes to be seen.As sudden as the flash of lightning the woods in the direction of the Spanish lines was filled with yells, screams, and the heavy falling of feet in rapid retreat.The brigade sprang to its feet as if each man had been lying on a stiff spring and the whole touched off simultaneously by the pressing of a button—every man with loaded and cocked rifle in hand. Then began the low, mumbling sound of a suddenly aroused camp. The efforts of the officers who had kept their heads to keep it down were fruitless. It was a long line of buzzing sounds like the swarming of bees. But the screaming and yelling continued and grew nearer.Shouting at the top of his voice at everyjump, “They’re coming! they’re coming!” tall, lean, red-headed, and hatless, the recruit sentry came by leaps and strides, and close at his heels a half-starved Cuban dog, playfully pursuing him, soliciting some of the hardtack in the recruit’s haversack.It was near dawn before complete order was restored. Many eyes were opened by that alarm raised by the panic-stricken recruit that never again closed till closed in death.The Charge of the Hospital Corps.The campaign in the Philippines against the wily Tagalo has been replete with false alarms, owing to the prowling and sneaking nature of the enemy, and the unearthly noises made by the animals of that sun-scorched and water-splashed country.There is a line of trenches and block-houses around the city of Manila, the average distance being about two miles out from the suburbs. This was called the “firing-line.” On first arriving from the United States, regiments were sent out to occupy a part of this position, to recuperate from the long sea voyage aboard crowded transports, and at the same time help maintain the line of defense around the city. Most of the newly arrived regiments were filled up with recruits with but a few months’ service; so this position afforded the opportunity to get these men in shape for field-service.This line of defense was the theater in which was acted the comedy of the war. Here is where occurred the most foolish alarms and at the same time some serious ones.There is one famous charge (?) that occurred in a newly arrived regiment, which was spending its first night on the Island of Luzon in these trenches. It is known as the “Charge of the Hospital Corps,” and promises to be handed down in army tradition. The gallant leader of this daring advance was a young surgeon, recently appointed to the regular establishment as a battalion pill-dispenser. His command consisted of three privates and an acting steward of the Hospital Corps.Arguing that he was fighting a savage enemy, not a party to the Geneva Convention, and consequently would not recognize as non-combatants the wearers of the red cross, he succeeded in having a requisitionhonored by the ordnance officer for five big forty-five caliber “six-shooters,” with which he armed himself and command.This embryo warrior and his gallant following were tickled with their toys, and flourished them most dangerously during the day, vowing death and destruction to any thousand Filipinos who would dare to face them and their death-dealing weapons.The doctor, or “Pills,” as the men called him, established his battalion hospital in a ravine in a break in the trenches. It was a lonesome place. Night came on, and the corps men retired to sleep their first night on Luzon’s soil; but their sleep was not easy. Visions of gore and midnight slaughter passed in review before their drowsy eyes; and just as a black-faced little rebel had them by the throat and was plunging a great long knife into their vitals, they would awaken with a start, feel under their heads for their fire-arms, to reassure themselves, patthe trusty weapon a time or two, call it “good old Bets,” and again doze off to sleep, only to repeat the performance.One hungry, gaunt-looking fellow, who his comrades said had a head that would fit in a regulation full-dress helmet, could stand the nervous strain no longer. The noises that came from the little thickets of bamboo and cogonales into his little “tepee” were more than he could stand. He had listened to them in his mind, enlarged, multiplied, and magnified them in his own imagination, till he was sure the whole insurrectionist army was quietly, inch by inch and foot by foot, slipping down upon him. Up he jumped, revolver in hand, gripping the handle and gritting his teeth, and proceeded to investigate the sounds. Approaching within a few yards of a thick bunch of trees not far in front of the hospital tent, he halted to listen. Yes, they were there beyond all doubt. He could almost see them crawling toward him; ahundred dusky demons upon all fours, with long, glistening, razor-edged knives held between their shining teeth. They must be stopped. With a loud voice, trembling with fear, he challenged: “If you’re an American, for God’s sake say so, or I’ll shoot.” The noise made no reply, and the shooting began promptly as promised.The valiant “Pills” landed on his feet in the middle of his tent, rallying his men, and was soon leading them to the attack. Bang! bang! biff! bang! rang out the loud-mouthed Colt’s revolvers. A moment later the Krags began to pop to the right and left, the alarm traveling up and down the line with lightning-like rapidity. Soon six miles of grim-looking rifle muzzles were pointing toward the innocent nothing to the front, a volley occasionally resounding through the midnight air at an imaginary enemy.Dawn found “Pills” searching the field of battle for dead and wounded. He discoverednumerous bullet-holes in his tent and medicine chests, made by 45-caliber balls; and, lying near the place where the gaunt, hungry-looking corps man first fired upon the enemy, he found poor “Paterno,” Company E’s monkey mascot, with a short and bloody tail, that member having been lost in the battle—a penalty for his nocturnal perambulations.Private Timmons and the Carabao.Timmons was a recruit private in an infantry regiment, and, when stationed in a temperance community, was a mighty good soldier. True to his steel, he met death in the general advance from San Fernando, in August, 1899. He was one of those jolly, good natured fellows who can sit in the mud and crack jokes, and sing standing in water to his arm-pits. And what is better, he possessed the happy faculty of imparting his exuberance to his long-faced, homesick, and downcast fellow-privates. His temper was as smooth as a becalmed sea, and seldom was it that a ripple passed over the smooth surface. There was just one word in the soldier’s vocabulary that would disturb him, but this word never failed to bring on a typhoon. This innocent yet magic word was “carabao,” the name of the water buffalo, thebeast of burden that formed the American “cracker line” in the Philippines before the introduction of the ever-faithful mule. This is how it came to have such a terror for poor Timmons:His regiment was undergoing its training on the “firing-line,” and his company furnished twelve men daily for the “lunette,” a kind of detached bastion about 800 yards in front of the line in the direction of the enemy. This was a lonesome detail. Just twelve men to man an isolated little fort, the enemy known to be in great numbers not more than four or five miles away. It came Timmons’ turn to go on this duty for, the first time. The detail, in command of a sergeant, marched out at sundown and relieved the men who had been on the previous twenty-four hours. The old guard turned over its orders and at the same time reported having seen some armed “gugus” in the direction of the Mariquina River, whichran in front of the “lunette” about a thousand yards away, the intervening space being an open rice-field.The old guard marched off and the new one on, throwing off their blanket-rolls and making themselves as comfortable for the night as possible. But two men at a time were required to remain awake and vigilant.Night came on as black as the enemy they were fighting, and with it all the breath-stopping and hair-raising noises that the myriads of flying and crawling animals of that war-ridden country produces. There was the “vantriloquest” bird, gifted with a voice that is the essence of all that is frightful and hideous in sounds—forty demons running amuck and coming your direction.In painful harmony was the low, deep tones the “chuck me,” whose vocal cords are tuned after the left end of the key-board of the pipe organ. Then there were slimy lizards, chameleons, tree-frogs, scorpions,and wonderful bugs, all with voices peculiar to their families. There were lightning-bugs as big as jack-o’-lanterns, and tarantulas with round and velvety bodies, and a spread of legs that would cover a frying-pan. All this and the known presence of a sneaking enemy was enough to test the nerves of veterans, so its effect on recruits can easily be imagined.Timmons’ time to remain awake and go on post duty arrived. Jones, who called himself an old “vet,” because he had served in Cuba, went on with “Tim,” as his comrades called him. Their turn began at midnight. The Sergeant, who had posted them, was soon lying down taking a non-commissioned officer’s sleep—one eye closed, the other on thequi vive. Both sentries were on the alert. Many suspicious noises came to their ears, and imaginary murderous-looking “niggers” were seen lurking in the grass, behind rice-dykes, and lying crouching on theground. If “Tim” discovered something that he was certain was a death-dealing boloman, he would tiptoe over to Jones and hold a council of war. That worthy—the old “vet”—would dispense nerve-soothing whispers in his ears, and he would return to his post a less nervous “rookey.”The time dragged wearily on, and finally arrived when they were about to be relieved. The blackest of the night was on. Jones left his post to arouse the Sergeant and acquaint that official with the hour. “Tim” was now alone. A slowly moving figure loomed up before him not fifty yards away. Then came the sounds of heavy tramping feet. The sounds were rapidly drawing nearer. There, before his dilated eyes, dimly outlined, and within pistol-shot, was the enemy in great numbers, who would soon close around the little garrison and murder them to a man. What should he do? His orders were strict about giving undue alarms, butif he wasted a moment longer, there would be no time for defense. If he left his post to arouse his comrades, the enemy would rush upon them. No. He would give the alarm by firing and one dead Filipino would be the result of it. He nervously raised his rifle, took deliberate aim at the advancing figures, and fired. There was a sickening thud, a heavy fall, and low, deep moans. The men were aroused and manned the fort. The Sergeant ordered a general fusillade. The regiment was in the trenches in a moment and remained there till dawn.The first light of day revealed, lying in a great pool of his own blood, “Big Bill,” the bull buffalo that drew the headquarters water-cart, who had been out grazing that night.
The Army Mule.That republics are ungrateful,Is adage old as sin;That only he who has a pullCan rake the chestnuts in;And he, the faithful, honest heart,Who meekly bears his humble part,Is often dubbed a fool.Oh, Dewey gets a mighty praise,And everywhere they shoutAnd yell for Schley until they raiseTheir very livers out;Of rank and file much praise is heard,But then you never hear a wordAbout the Army Mule.He calmly bears his heavy pack,And twists his tail in glee;And chews at night a “gunny” sack,When corn has “gang a-glee”;But for his patient, loving waysNo annals speak a word of praiseOf that poor Army Mule.He nobly marched where bullets fell,With calm and even tread;And when he heard the bursting shell,He only shook his head;And at his post he nobly stoodTo help the boys what e’er he could,That faithful Army Mule.’Neath burning sun of Cuba’s isle,He brought the train along,To furnish Shatter’s men the whileThey sang the “rifle song”;And but for him supplies were vain;They must be brought through sun and rain,By that same Army Mule,In Luzon where the Army moves,The festive Mule is nigh;Too slow the pokey carabao proves,For Yankee soldiers fly;In heat or cold, in wet or dry,In mud or dust, they can relyOn the true Army Mule.He brings relief to sick and well,When other sources fail;His worth the soldier cannot tell,His glory shall not pale;And here a monument we raise,A tribute to the worthy praiseOf the American Mule.But first and foremost of them all,In duty or in danger;With biggest ears and loudest call,And to fatigue a stranger;The first on Santiago’s brow,And in Luzon the friskiest now:Oh, that’s the Missouri Mule.—W. S. Platt.
That republics are ungrateful,Is adage old as sin;That only he who has a pullCan rake the chestnuts in;And he, the faithful, honest heart,Who meekly bears his humble part,Is often dubbed a fool.
That republics are ungrateful,
Is adage old as sin;
That only he who has a pull
Can rake the chestnuts in;
And he, the faithful, honest heart,
Who meekly bears his humble part,
Is often dubbed a fool.
Oh, Dewey gets a mighty praise,And everywhere they shoutAnd yell for Schley until they raiseTheir very livers out;Of rank and file much praise is heard,But then you never hear a wordAbout the Army Mule.
Oh, Dewey gets a mighty praise,
And everywhere they shout
And yell for Schley until they raise
Their very livers out;
Of rank and file much praise is heard,
But then you never hear a word
About the Army Mule.
He calmly bears his heavy pack,And twists his tail in glee;And chews at night a “gunny” sack,When corn has “gang a-glee”;But for his patient, loving waysNo annals speak a word of praiseOf that poor Army Mule.
He calmly bears his heavy pack,
And twists his tail in glee;
And chews at night a “gunny” sack,
When corn has “gang a-glee”;
But for his patient, loving ways
No annals speak a word of praise
Of that poor Army Mule.
He nobly marched where bullets fell,With calm and even tread;And when he heard the bursting shell,He only shook his head;And at his post he nobly stoodTo help the boys what e’er he could,That faithful Army Mule.
He nobly marched where bullets fell,
With calm and even tread;
And when he heard the bursting shell,
He only shook his head;
And at his post he nobly stood
To help the boys what e’er he could,
That faithful Army Mule.
’Neath burning sun of Cuba’s isle,He brought the train along,To furnish Shatter’s men the whileThey sang the “rifle song”;And but for him supplies were vain;They must be brought through sun and rain,By that same Army Mule,
’Neath burning sun of Cuba’s isle,
He brought the train along,
To furnish Shatter’s men the while
They sang the “rifle song”;
And but for him supplies were vain;
They must be brought through sun and rain,
By that same Army Mule,
In Luzon where the Army moves,The festive Mule is nigh;Too slow the pokey carabao proves,For Yankee soldiers fly;In heat or cold, in wet or dry,In mud or dust, they can relyOn the true Army Mule.
In Luzon where the Army moves,
The festive Mule is nigh;
Too slow the pokey carabao proves,
For Yankee soldiers fly;
In heat or cold, in wet or dry,
In mud or dust, they can rely
On the true Army Mule.
He brings relief to sick and well,When other sources fail;His worth the soldier cannot tell,His glory shall not pale;And here a monument we raise,A tribute to the worthy praiseOf the American Mule.
He brings relief to sick and well,
When other sources fail;
His worth the soldier cannot tell,
His glory shall not pale;
And here a monument we raise,
A tribute to the worthy praise
Of the American Mule.
But first and foremost of them all,In duty or in danger;With biggest ears and loudest call,And to fatigue a stranger;The first on Santiago’s brow,And in Luzon the friskiest now:Oh, that’s the Missouri Mule.
But first and foremost of them all,
In duty or in danger;
With biggest ears and loudest call,
And to fatigue a stranger;
The first on Santiago’s brow,
And in Luzon the friskiest now:
Oh, that’s the Missouri Mule.
—W. S. Platt.
Comedy and Carnage.The “Sky Pilot” and the “Dutch” Corporal.—The Mule that Sounded the Charge.—“Bull’s-Eye” Kelley and the Fire-Bug.War, with all its horrors, laconically described by General Sherman as hell, is not without its comedy. The marching through rain and mud; camping in marshes; digging in trenches, using the bayonet for a pick and the meat-ration can for a shovel; wading rivers by day and sleeping exposed to the elements by night, are all sandwiched with numerous mirthful incidents. Soldiers, above all people, have an eye for the ridiculous, and are ever ready to make merry and laugh over the most trivial matter. Even the horrors of battle are unable to quench the spark of gaiety ever present in the make-up of a “Yankee Doodle” soldier.There are even times when comrades are lying about dead and dying, and the missives of death yet speeding by, searching for new victims, or to penetrate the quivering form of the already wounded, that something occurs to bring forth peals of laughter.The “Sky Pilot” and the “Dutch” Corporal.During the mobilization of the Army at Tampa, Fla., at the outbreak of the Spanish-American War, an orthodox minister enlisted as a private in one of the infantry regiments. On the 6th of June came orders to break camp and prepare to go aboard transports for the invasion of Cuba.The railroad facilities from Tampa to Port Tampa, where the transports were waiting, were not equal to the emergency. Traffic became more or less clogged, and it was early the next morning when the regiment to which the preacher belonged was entrained. During the early part of the night the men were gathered in groups, some playing “shuffle the brogan,” others busy at “nosey poker,” while the greater part of them were smoking their pipes and telling yarns, or stretching their weary limbs onrolls of canvas, or on the bare ground asleep.The orthodox minister appeared worried. He was walking to and fro in an aimless manner like a headless chicken. After having paced backward and forward past a pile of mess-chests several times, each time sizing it up, he suddenly began to mount it, planted himself on the very pinnacle, and with a fog-horn voice began a patriotic harangue.Long, hair-raising, and Spanish-scalping sentences rolled from his lips like crude petroleum from a five-inch pipe. Each inflammatory oratorical flight was dramatically climaxed with the words, “For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”“For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”“For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”The sleeping ones restlessly turned over, rubbed their eyes, and opened their ears to this wonderful address. The entire regiment, officers included, soon became his audience, and all were inspired with the oft-repeatedwords, “For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”This regiment was one of the first to land in Cuba, and took a prominent part in the attack on El Caney. Its position during this fight, for many hours, was within a few hundred paces of the famous “stone block-house,” in a sunken road, and was suffering heavily.Along about two o’clock in the afternoon matters began to look blue—even a general officer who had fought in many hard battles of the Civil War, and spent the best years of his life combating the Indians on the frontier, was overheard to mutter to his adjutant that he was “afraid we’ve bitten off more’n we can chew.”There was not a cheerful face to be seen. Men with grinding teeth were soberly looking Death in the face. Sir Orthodox was burrowing his face into Mother Earth in a wild effort to shield himself from Mauserbullets. A German corporal was doing the same thing about fifty feet further down the road.As the corporal, better known as “Dutch,” was burrowing his face in the mud, an idea struck him, and, like all Teutons, he must make it known. He raised his head and looked up and down the line of prostrate soldiers till his eye fell on the flattened figure of the minister. In a voice that could be heard the full length of the regiment, he bleated out: “Say, dere, Sky Pilots, id aind so schveet to died for vonce countries, aind id?”The effect was magical. Amid this scene of carnage and death a wild yell of merriment went up that brought courage to many weakening hearts, and Caney had fallen before the men had ceased to laugh at the joke on the preacher.The Mule that Sounded the Charge.He was a Colonel with enough dignity to rule the universe, but he knew no more about music than a pig does of navigation. With his regiment he was slipping up on a Filipino town at night. It was purely a clandestine movement—orders were given in whispered tones by tiptoeing orderlies. The men were holding their bayonet scabbards against their legs to obviate screeching and rattling, and every effort was made to minimize the sounds of a marching body of men.The Colonel with the battalion on the right had arrived within charging distance of the insurgent trenches. It was the pre-arranged plan for all the companies to arrive on this line before the general advance would be made. When all were ready, the charge would be sounded by the Colonel’s bugler.The battalion with the Colonel was all ready for the bloody charge. Not knowing if the companies of the other battalions had arrived, the impatient commander sent his adjutant, mounted on a native charger, and his bugler, mounted on a Missouri mule, down the line to investigate.When all was in readiness, the adjutant was to have the bugler sound the charge, when the whole khaki-clad line, like a thousand demons, would set up that awful, “gu gu” terrorizing “Yankee yell,” and wade into the unwary Tagalos with cold steel.The adjutant and his bugler found that the companies on the left were yet some distance to the rear. The former, while waiting for the companies to come up, dismounted to tighten his saddle-girth, while the latter busied himself looking for some signs of life in the enemy’s trenches not two hundred yards ahead. His mule dropped his head in a dozing attitude. He suddenly appeared inspired,raised his head high in the air, looking toward the insurgent lines. Then, with a grunt, as if of satisfaction, elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn “A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye! a-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!” in threatening tones, which sounded through the midnight air for miles around.“He elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn ‘A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!’ in threatening tones.”“He elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn ‘A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!’ in threatening tones.”The faithful animal had not finished his challenge when the deep voice of the Colonel rang out completely drowning it, giving commands for the charge. He flashed his saber, and gallantly led the only battalion on the line into the midst of thousands of dusky soldiers—he had heard the mule sound the charge.It was a brilliant victory. The town fell with but a single American casualty—that casualty left the bugler without a mount.“Bull’s-Eye” Kelley and the Fire-Bug.Where is there a soldier whose name is dry on the muster-rolls who has not heard of “Bull’s-Eye” Kelley? Kelley gained his enviable name of “Bull’s-Eye” by having spent twenty-two successive seasons on the target-range without ever making a“bull’s-eye.” As a reward for long and honest service—not for marksmanship—he was warranted a sergeant, and went with his regiment to the Philippines.While the regiment was doing garrison duty at one of the interior towns in Luzon, it was constantly harassed by the little rebels. One dark night in June they made a determined effort to drive the Americans out. The regiment had run short of officers, so this night Kelley was in command of his company. He was a strict disciplinarian—so much so that when out of his hearing theprivates referred to him as the “Duke of Ireland.”The night of this attack his orders were to keep his men lying flat on the ground and perfectly quiet. There was to be no talking, whispering, coughing, or smoking; or, as Kelley himself expressed it, “no nothin’” would be allowed.All sorts of insects, including lightning-bugs as big as incandescent lights, were singing and flying about, causing the men to put their hands and faces through a most unique series of gymnastics.The rebel fire was becoming alarmingly effective. Although they knew nothing of the location of Kelley’s company, yet stray bullets coming that way had already hit two of his men, instantly killing one of them. He suspected that something was betraying his position. Looking down the line, he was horrified to discover what was unmistakably a man smoking. Flushed with anger, heshouted louder than his instructions would have permitted, “Hie there, me man! put thet cigaroot out,” but the light remained undisturbed. “I say there, ye insultin’ divil of a rekroot, put out thet cigaroot,” stormed the enraged Kelley.In reply came the low, mourner’s-bench, meek voice of a South Carolina recruit: “It hain’t a cigaroot, Sergeant; it’s a lightnin’-bug as big as a search-light on ’Pin-Head’ Hebb’s mustache.”The undaunted Kelley was not to be beaten thus, but sternly commanded: “I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”“I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”“I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”
The “Sky Pilot” and the “Dutch” Corporal.—The Mule that Sounded the Charge.—“Bull’s-Eye” Kelley and the Fire-Bug.
The “Sky Pilot” and the “Dutch” Corporal.—The Mule that Sounded the Charge.—“Bull’s-Eye” Kelley and the Fire-Bug.
War, with all its horrors, laconically described by General Sherman as hell, is not without its comedy. The marching through rain and mud; camping in marshes; digging in trenches, using the bayonet for a pick and the meat-ration can for a shovel; wading rivers by day and sleeping exposed to the elements by night, are all sandwiched with numerous mirthful incidents. Soldiers, above all people, have an eye for the ridiculous, and are ever ready to make merry and laugh over the most trivial matter. Even the horrors of battle are unable to quench the spark of gaiety ever present in the make-up of a “Yankee Doodle” soldier.
There are even times when comrades are lying about dead and dying, and the missives of death yet speeding by, searching for new victims, or to penetrate the quivering form of the already wounded, that something occurs to bring forth peals of laughter.
The “Sky Pilot” and the “Dutch” Corporal.During the mobilization of the Army at Tampa, Fla., at the outbreak of the Spanish-American War, an orthodox minister enlisted as a private in one of the infantry regiments. On the 6th of June came orders to break camp and prepare to go aboard transports for the invasion of Cuba.The railroad facilities from Tampa to Port Tampa, where the transports were waiting, were not equal to the emergency. Traffic became more or less clogged, and it was early the next morning when the regiment to which the preacher belonged was entrained. During the early part of the night the men were gathered in groups, some playing “shuffle the brogan,” others busy at “nosey poker,” while the greater part of them were smoking their pipes and telling yarns, or stretching their weary limbs onrolls of canvas, or on the bare ground asleep.The orthodox minister appeared worried. He was walking to and fro in an aimless manner like a headless chicken. After having paced backward and forward past a pile of mess-chests several times, each time sizing it up, he suddenly began to mount it, planted himself on the very pinnacle, and with a fog-horn voice began a patriotic harangue.Long, hair-raising, and Spanish-scalping sentences rolled from his lips like crude petroleum from a five-inch pipe. Each inflammatory oratorical flight was dramatically climaxed with the words, “For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”“For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”“For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”The sleeping ones restlessly turned over, rubbed their eyes, and opened their ears to this wonderful address. The entire regiment, officers included, soon became his audience, and all were inspired with the oft-repeatedwords, “For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”This regiment was one of the first to land in Cuba, and took a prominent part in the attack on El Caney. Its position during this fight, for many hours, was within a few hundred paces of the famous “stone block-house,” in a sunken road, and was suffering heavily.Along about two o’clock in the afternoon matters began to look blue—even a general officer who had fought in many hard battles of the Civil War, and spent the best years of his life combating the Indians on the frontier, was overheard to mutter to his adjutant that he was “afraid we’ve bitten off more’n we can chew.”There was not a cheerful face to be seen. Men with grinding teeth were soberly looking Death in the face. Sir Orthodox was burrowing his face into Mother Earth in a wild effort to shield himself from Mauserbullets. A German corporal was doing the same thing about fifty feet further down the road.As the corporal, better known as “Dutch,” was burrowing his face in the mud, an idea struck him, and, like all Teutons, he must make it known. He raised his head and looked up and down the line of prostrate soldiers till his eye fell on the flattened figure of the minister. In a voice that could be heard the full length of the regiment, he bleated out: “Say, dere, Sky Pilots, id aind so schveet to died for vonce countries, aind id?”The effect was magical. Amid this scene of carnage and death a wild yell of merriment went up that brought courage to many weakening hearts, and Caney had fallen before the men had ceased to laugh at the joke on the preacher.
During the mobilization of the Army at Tampa, Fla., at the outbreak of the Spanish-American War, an orthodox minister enlisted as a private in one of the infantry regiments. On the 6th of June came orders to break camp and prepare to go aboard transports for the invasion of Cuba.
The railroad facilities from Tampa to Port Tampa, where the transports were waiting, were not equal to the emergency. Traffic became more or less clogged, and it was early the next morning when the regiment to which the preacher belonged was entrained. During the early part of the night the men were gathered in groups, some playing “shuffle the brogan,” others busy at “nosey poker,” while the greater part of them were smoking their pipes and telling yarns, or stretching their weary limbs onrolls of canvas, or on the bare ground asleep.
The orthodox minister appeared worried. He was walking to and fro in an aimless manner like a headless chicken. After having paced backward and forward past a pile of mess-chests several times, each time sizing it up, he suddenly began to mount it, planted himself on the very pinnacle, and with a fog-horn voice began a patriotic harangue.
Long, hair-raising, and Spanish-scalping sentences rolled from his lips like crude petroleum from a five-inch pipe. Each inflammatory oratorical flight was dramatically climaxed with the words, “For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”
“For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”“For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”
“For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”
The sleeping ones restlessly turned over, rubbed their eyes, and opened their ears to this wonderful address. The entire regiment, officers included, soon became his audience, and all were inspired with the oft-repeatedwords, “For it is sweet to die for one’s country.”
This regiment was one of the first to land in Cuba, and took a prominent part in the attack on El Caney. Its position during this fight, for many hours, was within a few hundred paces of the famous “stone block-house,” in a sunken road, and was suffering heavily.
Along about two o’clock in the afternoon matters began to look blue—even a general officer who had fought in many hard battles of the Civil War, and spent the best years of his life combating the Indians on the frontier, was overheard to mutter to his adjutant that he was “afraid we’ve bitten off more’n we can chew.”
There was not a cheerful face to be seen. Men with grinding teeth were soberly looking Death in the face. Sir Orthodox was burrowing his face into Mother Earth in a wild effort to shield himself from Mauserbullets. A German corporal was doing the same thing about fifty feet further down the road.
As the corporal, better known as “Dutch,” was burrowing his face in the mud, an idea struck him, and, like all Teutons, he must make it known. He raised his head and looked up and down the line of prostrate soldiers till his eye fell on the flattened figure of the minister. In a voice that could be heard the full length of the regiment, he bleated out: “Say, dere, Sky Pilots, id aind so schveet to died for vonce countries, aind id?”
The effect was magical. Amid this scene of carnage and death a wild yell of merriment went up that brought courage to many weakening hearts, and Caney had fallen before the men had ceased to laugh at the joke on the preacher.
The Mule that Sounded the Charge.He was a Colonel with enough dignity to rule the universe, but he knew no more about music than a pig does of navigation. With his regiment he was slipping up on a Filipino town at night. It was purely a clandestine movement—orders were given in whispered tones by tiptoeing orderlies. The men were holding their bayonet scabbards against their legs to obviate screeching and rattling, and every effort was made to minimize the sounds of a marching body of men.The Colonel with the battalion on the right had arrived within charging distance of the insurgent trenches. It was the pre-arranged plan for all the companies to arrive on this line before the general advance would be made. When all were ready, the charge would be sounded by the Colonel’s bugler.The battalion with the Colonel was all ready for the bloody charge. Not knowing if the companies of the other battalions had arrived, the impatient commander sent his adjutant, mounted on a native charger, and his bugler, mounted on a Missouri mule, down the line to investigate.When all was in readiness, the adjutant was to have the bugler sound the charge, when the whole khaki-clad line, like a thousand demons, would set up that awful, “gu gu” terrorizing “Yankee yell,” and wade into the unwary Tagalos with cold steel.The adjutant and his bugler found that the companies on the left were yet some distance to the rear. The former, while waiting for the companies to come up, dismounted to tighten his saddle-girth, while the latter busied himself looking for some signs of life in the enemy’s trenches not two hundred yards ahead. His mule dropped his head in a dozing attitude. He suddenly appeared inspired,raised his head high in the air, looking toward the insurgent lines. Then, with a grunt, as if of satisfaction, elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn “A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye! a-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!” in threatening tones, which sounded through the midnight air for miles around.“He elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn ‘A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!’ in threatening tones.”“He elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn ‘A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!’ in threatening tones.”The faithful animal had not finished his challenge when the deep voice of the Colonel rang out completely drowning it, giving commands for the charge. He flashed his saber, and gallantly led the only battalion on the line into the midst of thousands of dusky soldiers—he had heard the mule sound the charge.It was a brilliant victory. The town fell with but a single American casualty—that casualty left the bugler without a mount.
He was a Colonel with enough dignity to rule the universe, but he knew no more about music than a pig does of navigation. With his regiment he was slipping up on a Filipino town at night. It was purely a clandestine movement—orders were given in whispered tones by tiptoeing orderlies. The men were holding their bayonet scabbards against their legs to obviate screeching and rattling, and every effort was made to minimize the sounds of a marching body of men.
The Colonel with the battalion on the right had arrived within charging distance of the insurgent trenches. It was the pre-arranged plan for all the companies to arrive on this line before the general advance would be made. When all were ready, the charge would be sounded by the Colonel’s bugler.
The battalion with the Colonel was all ready for the bloody charge. Not knowing if the companies of the other battalions had arrived, the impatient commander sent his adjutant, mounted on a native charger, and his bugler, mounted on a Missouri mule, down the line to investigate.
When all was in readiness, the adjutant was to have the bugler sound the charge, when the whole khaki-clad line, like a thousand demons, would set up that awful, “gu gu” terrorizing “Yankee yell,” and wade into the unwary Tagalos with cold steel.
The adjutant and his bugler found that the companies on the left were yet some distance to the rear. The former, while waiting for the companies to come up, dismounted to tighten his saddle-girth, while the latter busied himself looking for some signs of life in the enemy’s trenches not two hundred yards ahead. His mule dropped his head in a dozing attitude. He suddenly appeared inspired,raised his head high in the air, looking toward the insurgent lines. Then, with a grunt, as if of satisfaction, elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn “A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye! a-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!” in threatening tones, which sounded through the midnight air for miles around.
“He elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn ‘A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!’ in threatening tones.”“He elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn ‘A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!’ in threatening tones.”
“He elevated his chin, began working his huge ears backward and forward in a pumping motion, and set up a long-drawn ‘A-w-e ye! a-w-e ye!’ in threatening tones.”
The faithful animal had not finished his challenge when the deep voice of the Colonel rang out completely drowning it, giving commands for the charge. He flashed his saber, and gallantly led the only battalion on the line into the midst of thousands of dusky soldiers—he had heard the mule sound the charge.
It was a brilliant victory. The town fell with but a single American casualty—that casualty left the bugler without a mount.
“Bull’s-Eye” Kelley and the Fire-Bug.Where is there a soldier whose name is dry on the muster-rolls who has not heard of “Bull’s-Eye” Kelley? Kelley gained his enviable name of “Bull’s-Eye” by having spent twenty-two successive seasons on the target-range without ever making a“bull’s-eye.” As a reward for long and honest service—not for marksmanship—he was warranted a sergeant, and went with his regiment to the Philippines.While the regiment was doing garrison duty at one of the interior towns in Luzon, it was constantly harassed by the little rebels. One dark night in June they made a determined effort to drive the Americans out. The regiment had run short of officers, so this night Kelley was in command of his company. He was a strict disciplinarian—so much so that when out of his hearing theprivates referred to him as the “Duke of Ireland.”The night of this attack his orders were to keep his men lying flat on the ground and perfectly quiet. There was to be no talking, whispering, coughing, or smoking; or, as Kelley himself expressed it, “no nothin’” would be allowed.All sorts of insects, including lightning-bugs as big as incandescent lights, were singing and flying about, causing the men to put their hands and faces through a most unique series of gymnastics.The rebel fire was becoming alarmingly effective. Although they knew nothing of the location of Kelley’s company, yet stray bullets coming that way had already hit two of his men, instantly killing one of them. He suspected that something was betraying his position. Looking down the line, he was horrified to discover what was unmistakably a man smoking. Flushed with anger, heshouted louder than his instructions would have permitted, “Hie there, me man! put thet cigaroot out,” but the light remained undisturbed. “I say there, ye insultin’ divil of a rekroot, put out thet cigaroot,” stormed the enraged Kelley.In reply came the low, mourner’s-bench, meek voice of a South Carolina recruit: “It hain’t a cigaroot, Sergeant; it’s a lightnin’-bug as big as a search-light on ’Pin-Head’ Hebb’s mustache.”The undaunted Kelley was not to be beaten thus, but sternly commanded: “I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”“I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”“I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”
Where is there a soldier whose name is dry on the muster-rolls who has not heard of “Bull’s-Eye” Kelley? Kelley gained his enviable name of “Bull’s-Eye” by having spent twenty-two successive seasons on the target-range without ever making a“bull’s-eye.” As a reward for long and honest service—not for marksmanship—he was warranted a sergeant, and went with his regiment to the Philippines.
While the regiment was doing garrison duty at one of the interior towns in Luzon, it was constantly harassed by the little rebels. One dark night in June they made a determined effort to drive the Americans out. The regiment had run short of officers, so this night Kelley was in command of his company. He was a strict disciplinarian—so much so that when out of his hearing theprivates referred to him as the “Duke of Ireland.”
The night of this attack his orders were to keep his men lying flat on the ground and perfectly quiet. There was to be no talking, whispering, coughing, or smoking; or, as Kelley himself expressed it, “no nothin’” would be allowed.
All sorts of insects, including lightning-bugs as big as incandescent lights, were singing and flying about, causing the men to put their hands and faces through a most unique series of gymnastics.
The rebel fire was becoming alarmingly effective. Although they knew nothing of the location of Kelley’s company, yet stray bullets coming that way had already hit two of his men, instantly killing one of them. He suspected that something was betraying his position. Looking down the line, he was horrified to discover what was unmistakably a man smoking. Flushed with anger, heshouted louder than his instructions would have permitted, “Hie there, me man! put thet cigaroot out,” but the light remained undisturbed. “I say there, ye insultin’ divil of a rekroot, put out thet cigaroot,” stormed the enraged Kelley.
In reply came the low, mourner’s-bench, meek voice of a South Carolina recruit: “It hain’t a cigaroot, Sergeant; it’s a lightnin’-bug as big as a search-light on ’Pin-Head’ Hebb’s mustache.”
The undaunted Kelley was not to be beaten thus, but sternly commanded: “I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”
“I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”“I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”
“I don’t give a dom what ’tis, put it out.”
How I Saw Aguinaldo.An Army Officer’s Curious Experience in Luzon.—A Tight Place and a Close Call.It was during the early part of the month of June that my company was doing outpost duty on the north line at San Fernando, one of the largest inland towns on the Island of Luzon. We had been on the south line, but on the morning on which this incident took place, were directed to relieve a company of another battalion of the same regiment on the north line.Our arrival at the outpost was very early in the morning; so early that it was impossible to distinguish a man from a high stump at a distance of 100 feet. The lay of the land was new to me; I hadn’t the slightest idea of the contour of a foot of the ground to be covered by my company. After getting mymen properly stationed along the line, guarding a front of about 1700 or 1800 yards, I took an old, reliable sergeant with me and proceeded to reconnoiter the territory to my front, and to make a rough sketch map, showing on it what I could of the Filipino trenches and their outposts.We started just as the sky began to turn a deep red in the east, and the “chuck me” chameleon, the harbinger of the early dawn, began his morning challenge. Our progress was very cautiously made through the cane-fields, banana groves, and bamboo jungles, halting and investigating the slightest noise, the rustling of a leaf or the breaking of a twig not escaping our attention. First, I would take the advance and then the Sergeant. When we passed through cane-fields we found the plowed grounds but little less than marshes, for the rainy season had just begun with torrential showers. Our bodies were soon soaked to the skin, for the leavesof the cane and banana stalks were burdened with water. The cane was a trifle higher than our heads, and the wide-spreading leaves of the banana hid the sky from view.After wading and splashing along toward the Filipino lines for about 1400 yards, we suddenly and very unexpectedly came upon a well-traveled road, fringed with bamboo on either side, with quite a stretch of open ground beyond, in which was lying at the farther edge, the trenches of our enemies, which seemed to be at the time swarming with dusky soldiers preparing their morning meal.Believing ourselves not have been observed, we withdraw a short distance from the bamboo fringe into a banana grove, a position that afforded us concealment as well as an opportunity to make observations of the position of the trenches and location of the outposts of the rebels.I was busy making copious notes and my maps, while the Sergeant, with my field-glasses, was making most wonderful discoveries of masked batteries and gas-pipe cannon, when, all of a sudden, a cavalcade of insurgent officers, followed closely by a large body of foot soldiers, appeared down the road to our left, where there was a slight curve, not more than 200 yards away.What were we to do? At that short distance from our open-eared and alert rebellious fellow-citizens, we could not beat a precipitate retreat, or an orderly one, without disclosing our presence; and that fact once known to this body of armed men meant almost certain death, or worse, to be taken prisoners by this half-savage band. We held a hasty council of war in whispered tones, and decided to hold our ground till the danger passed.It was but a moment till the little steeds and their haughty riders were directly infront of us, not fifty paces away, and, to our intense surprise and discomfort, halted. There they stood, with the first ray of the rising sun resting full upon them, seventeen horsemen, officers, and just back of them about 5,000 infantrymen, all within a stone’s throw of us. What made our position all the more precarious, the infantry was standing at a “rest,” and were, as all soldiers do when first halted, looking in every direction in search of something—an enemy, fruit, a stray porker or a fowl. Our chances of being discovered were becoming momentarily greater. We could plainly see them, so naturally, if they would but look in the right direction, they could see us. What may not five hundred busy eyes discover?The danger of the mounted men seeing us was not so great, for they had discovered something interesting in our lines and were active with their glasses looking over our heads.Sixteen of these officers were dressed in light blue uniforms of some thin cloth, wide-brimmed sombreros, russet leather leggings, and clanking sabers dangling by their left sides, almost trailing the ground, while the trappings of their horses were enough to make the eyes of a militia major snap with envy. The other officer, who rode at the head, and the recipient of the most obsequious attentions, a man about middle age, with close-cropped hair, small restless eyes, and somewhat lighter complexioned than the average inhabitant of those far-away tropical islands, wore a neat-fitting uniform of khaki cloth over his diminutive body, and a helmet of the same color upon his well-shaped head. His mount was a beautiful dapple gray Filipino stallion, some larger than the average-sized native animal, and much more gorgeously caparisoned than the charges of the other officers. This pompously equipped commander wore at his leftside a most handsome saber, and on his right he carried a revolver and field-glass case.The foot soldiers were of the famous Corps d’Elite, Aguinaldo’s body-guard. We knew them by their bright red uniforms. Where Aguinaldo goes, there they go also. They are his constant attendants. They were, of course, all armed with Mauser rifles and laden with ammunition.We were so interested at the sight of this picked regiment of Tagalos, of which we had heard so much, that we almost forgot our danger, and actually raised our heads higher in order that we might have a better view of them. Just as we were craning our necks and straining our eyes to their utmost capacity, we were suddenly brought to a realization of our terrible danger by the officer in khaki dismounting, throwing the reins to an orderly, and advancing to the edge of the bamboo just in front of us. Like a flash the others followed him, and stood atattention just in his rear, gawking and peering in our direction. This was a trying moment for us. There stood the flower of the Filipino Army, facing two almost helpless servants of Uncle Sam, and, for all we knew, were deciding our fate, for they were discussing some important subject in the Tagalog tongue, all of which was Sanscrit to us. Our hearts were in our throats and kept up an increased throbbing in their new positions. Had we been discovered? Were those snapping, half-savage eyes now resting on us, and was the mode of our death being discussed? We knew not. Our faces were being pushed in the mud till our ears were begrimed in our mad efforts to conceal ourselves. We felt it would be but a matter of seconds till our hides would be perforated with Mauser bullets, or we would be bound, hand and foot, prisoners of a revengeful enemy.“We almost forgot our danger, and actually raised our heads.”“We almost forgot our danger, and actually raised our heads.”Their talk became excited. Something was being discussed with great interest andmoment. The suspense was awful. Minutes passed as hours. Our skins would cringe when the thought of a volley liable to be fired into our bodies at any moment occurred to us.Would they never leave? Their conversation warmed. The khaki-clad officer said a word, and then they faced about, reëntered the road, and passed down it out of sight, one officer alone remaining with the foot soldiers, who gave some directions to the orderlies, and the horses were led across the road and hitched. We slowly raised our mud-besmeared faces. The infantry, still looking and chattering in the twangy language of their tribe, were holding their ground. We heard the officer in command say something about “aqua” in Spanish, then a few words of command followed. They instantly came to the “attention,” moved forward till the center of the column was opposite us, wheeled to the right by fours,and stacked their arms. “Aqua”; that meant water. We knew they would soon break ranks and go some place, we knew not where, to replenish their water-bottles. So far, then, we had been unobserved. But we remembered that just a few yards to the rear of us, and in a direct line from our enemies, was a rippling stream of crystal water. We exchanged looks. Oh, what looks! The Sergeant’s expression was awful, and I knew mine to be none better. Here they came; 500 of them were moving toward us. Was it too late to run? No. I whispered, “Come on.” We were about to rise and make a wild dash for life, when a sharp blast of a trumpet was sounded to our front. All stopped in their tracks. Another trumpet-call—a rush to arms. The officers came tearing back and remounted.We waited for the volley that was to send our souls into eternity. That we had been discovered we were sure.Boom! A loud report from our rear. It was unmistakably a cannon shot. An instant later a shrieking shell passed over our heads and tore its way through a stone sugar storehouse, 100 yards ahead, rending demolition everywhere in that vicinity.The officers madly spurred their diminutive mounts in a wild effort to secure speed. Off they rode at break-neck rate over rice-paddies and small ditches in the direction of the bamboo thickets beyond the open.But the infantrymen remained steadfast! They kept their close formation, facing us. I ventured to raise my head a trifle higher when I noticed the Sergeant putting his face through a series of grimaces that would tend to make it as muscular as his brawny arms. His struggle was in vain; he could not help it—he sneezed, not once, but twice, and once again.Five hundred ears pricked up, and as many pairs of eyes were thrown upon us.It was but a second till a dozen rifles were raised to as many shoulders, the muzzles all pointing in our direction.As a last effort to save our lives, I yelled to the Sergeant to follow, and started a disorderly retreat toward our lines.Boom! Was it a volley? No, another shot from the cannon. The shell struck between our enemies and ourselves and exploded. The sky was filled with everything. We looked back over our shoulders, but could not see the red uniforms for flyingdébris.An instant later we heared a crying, screaming, terror-stricken mass of humanity breaking through the bamboo on the farther side of the road. We halted. There they went, over dykes and ditches. All organization had fled with the winds in their wild efforts to escape the next shot from our artillery.Now we were safe, and sauntered lazily back to the company, giving our hearts anopportunity to resume a normal state of affairs.When we reached our lines we found that a recruit battery of light artillery had come out from the city that morning for target-practice. An experienced non-commissioned officer fired the first shot, which hit the sugar warehouse, the target. A recruit gunner fired the second, which, falling short, saved our lives. They knew nothing of the presence of the Filipinos or of my little reconnoitering party.The next day our native spies reported that Aguinaldo and his body-guard had come down from Angeles early the morning before, but had immediately returned.I laughed when I heard this report, for I knew the circumstances.The dapper little officer in khaki was Aguinaldo, and this is the story of how I saw him.—Sunday Globe-Democrat.
It was during the early part of the month of June that my company was doing outpost duty on the north line at San Fernando, one of the largest inland towns on the Island of Luzon. We had been on the south line, but on the morning on which this incident took place, were directed to relieve a company of another battalion of the same regiment on the north line.
Our arrival at the outpost was very early in the morning; so early that it was impossible to distinguish a man from a high stump at a distance of 100 feet. The lay of the land was new to me; I hadn’t the slightest idea of the contour of a foot of the ground to be covered by my company. After getting mymen properly stationed along the line, guarding a front of about 1700 or 1800 yards, I took an old, reliable sergeant with me and proceeded to reconnoiter the territory to my front, and to make a rough sketch map, showing on it what I could of the Filipino trenches and their outposts.
We started just as the sky began to turn a deep red in the east, and the “chuck me” chameleon, the harbinger of the early dawn, began his morning challenge. Our progress was very cautiously made through the cane-fields, banana groves, and bamboo jungles, halting and investigating the slightest noise, the rustling of a leaf or the breaking of a twig not escaping our attention. First, I would take the advance and then the Sergeant. When we passed through cane-fields we found the plowed grounds but little less than marshes, for the rainy season had just begun with torrential showers. Our bodies were soon soaked to the skin, for the leavesof the cane and banana stalks were burdened with water. The cane was a trifle higher than our heads, and the wide-spreading leaves of the banana hid the sky from view.
After wading and splashing along toward the Filipino lines for about 1400 yards, we suddenly and very unexpectedly came upon a well-traveled road, fringed with bamboo on either side, with quite a stretch of open ground beyond, in which was lying at the farther edge, the trenches of our enemies, which seemed to be at the time swarming with dusky soldiers preparing their morning meal.
Believing ourselves not have been observed, we withdraw a short distance from the bamboo fringe into a banana grove, a position that afforded us concealment as well as an opportunity to make observations of the position of the trenches and location of the outposts of the rebels.
I was busy making copious notes and my maps, while the Sergeant, with my field-glasses, was making most wonderful discoveries of masked batteries and gas-pipe cannon, when, all of a sudden, a cavalcade of insurgent officers, followed closely by a large body of foot soldiers, appeared down the road to our left, where there was a slight curve, not more than 200 yards away.
What were we to do? At that short distance from our open-eared and alert rebellious fellow-citizens, we could not beat a precipitate retreat, or an orderly one, without disclosing our presence; and that fact once known to this body of armed men meant almost certain death, or worse, to be taken prisoners by this half-savage band. We held a hasty council of war in whispered tones, and decided to hold our ground till the danger passed.
It was but a moment till the little steeds and their haughty riders were directly infront of us, not fifty paces away, and, to our intense surprise and discomfort, halted. There they stood, with the first ray of the rising sun resting full upon them, seventeen horsemen, officers, and just back of them about 5,000 infantrymen, all within a stone’s throw of us. What made our position all the more precarious, the infantry was standing at a “rest,” and were, as all soldiers do when first halted, looking in every direction in search of something—an enemy, fruit, a stray porker or a fowl. Our chances of being discovered were becoming momentarily greater. We could plainly see them, so naturally, if they would but look in the right direction, they could see us. What may not five hundred busy eyes discover?
The danger of the mounted men seeing us was not so great, for they had discovered something interesting in our lines and were active with their glasses looking over our heads.
Sixteen of these officers were dressed in light blue uniforms of some thin cloth, wide-brimmed sombreros, russet leather leggings, and clanking sabers dangling by their left sides, almost trailing the ground, while the trappings of their horses were enough to make the eyes of a militia major snap with envy. The other officer, who rode at the head, and the recipient of the most obsequious attentions, a man about middle age, with close-cropped hair, small restless eyes, and somewhat lighter complexioned than the average inhabitant of those far-away tropical islands, wore a neat-fitting uniform of khaki cloth over his diminutive body, and a helmet of the same color upon his well-shaped head. His mount was a beautiful dapple gray Filipino stallion, some larger than the average-sized native animal, and much more gorgeously caparisoned than the charges of the other officers. This pompously equipped commander wore at his leftside a most handsome saber, and on his right he carried a revolver and field-glass case.
The foot soldiers were of the famous Corps d’Elite, Aguinaldo’s body-guard. We knew them by their bright red uniforms. Where Aguinaldo goes, there they go also. They are his constant attendants. They were, of course, all armed with Mauser rifles and laden with ammunition.
We were so interested at the sight of this picked regiment of Tagalos, of which we had heard so much, that we almost forgot our danger, and actually raised our heads higher in order that we might have a better view of them. Just as we were craning our necks and straining our eyes to their utmost capacity, we were suddenly brought to a realization of our terrible danger by the officer in khaki dismounting, throwing the reins to an orderly, and advancing to the edge of the bamboo just in front of us. Like a flash the others followed him, and stood atattention just in his rear, gawking and peering in our direction. This was a trying moment for us. There stood the flower of the Filipino Army, facing two almost helpless servants of Uncle Sam, and, for all we knew, were deciding our fate, for they were discussing some important subject in the Tagalog tongue, all of which was Sanscrit to us. Our hearts were in our throats and kept up an increased throbbing in their new positions. Had we been discovered? Were those snapping, half-savage eyes now resting on us, and was the mode of our death being discussed? We knew not. Our faces were being pushed in the mud till our ears were begrimed in our mad efforts to conceal ourselves. We felt it would be but a matter of seconds till our hides would be perforated with Mauser bullets, or we would be bound, hand and foot, prisoners of a revengeful enemy.
“We almost forgot our danger, and actually raised our heads.”“We almost forgot our danger, and actually raised our heads.”
“We almost forgot our danger, and actually raised our heads.”
Their talk became excited. Something was being discussed with great interest andmoment. The suspense was awful. Minutes passed as hours. Our skins would cringe when the thought of a volley liable to be fired into our bodies at any moment occurred to us.
Would they never leave? Their conversation warmed. The khaki-clad officer said a word, and then they faced about, reëntered the road, and passed down it out of sight, one officer alone remaining with the foot soldiers, who gave some directions to the orderlies, and the horses were led across the road and hitched. We slowly raised our mud-besmeared faces. The infantry, still looking and chattering in the twangy language of their tribe, were holding their ground. We heard the officer in command say something about “aqua” in Spanish, then a few words of command followed. They instantly came to the “attention,” moved forward till the center of the column was opposite us, wheeled to the right by fours,and stacked their arms. “Aqua”; that meant water. We knew they would soon break ranks and go some place, we knew not where, to replenish their water-bottles. So far, then, we had been unobserved. But we remembered that just a few yards to the rear of us, and in a direct line from our enemies, was a rippling stream of crystal water. We exchanged looks. Oh, what looks! The Sergeant’s expression was awful, and I knew mine to be none better. Here they came; 500 of them were moving toward us. Was it too late to run? No. I whispered, “Come on.” We were about to rise and make a wild dash for life, when a sharp blast of a trumpet was sounded to our front. All stopped in their tracks. Another trumpet-call—a rush to arms. The officers came tearing back and remounted.
We waited for the volley that was to send our souls into eternity. That we had been discovered we were sure.
Boom! A loud report from our rear. It was unmistakably a cannon shot. An instant later a shrieking shell passed over our heads and tore its way through a stone sugar storehouse, 100 yards ahead, rending demolition everywhere in that vicinity.
The officers madly spurred their diminutive mounts in a wild effort to secure speed. Off they rode at break-neck rate over rice-paddies and small ditches in the direction of the bamboo thickets beyond the open.
But the infantrymen remained steadfast! They kept their close formation, facing us. I ventured to raise my head a trifle higher when I noticed the Sergeant putting his face through a series of grimaces that would tend to make it as muscular as his brawny arms. His struggle was in vain; he could not help it—he sneezed, not once, but twice, and once again.
Five hundred ears pricked up, and as many pairs of eyes were thrown upon us.It was but a second till a dozen rifles were raised to as many shoulders, the muzzles all pointing in our direction.
As a last effort to save our lives, I yelled to the Sergeant to follow, and started a disorderly retreat toward our lines.
Boom! Was it a volley? No, another shot from the cannon. The shell struck between our enemies and ourselves and exploded. The sky was filled with everything. We looked back over our shoulders, but could not see the red uniforms for flyingdébris.
An instant later we heared a crying, screaming, terror-stricken mass of humanity breaking through the bamboo on the farther side of the road. We halted. There they went, over dykes and ditches. All organization had fled with the winds in their wild efforts to escape the next shot from our artillery.
Now we were safe, and sauntered lazily back to the company, giving our hearts anopportunity to resume a normal state of affairs.
When we reached our lines we found that a recruit battery of light artillery had come out from the city that morning for target-practice. An experienced non-commissioned officer fired the first shot, which hit the sugar warehouse, the target. A recruit gunner fired the second, which, falling short, saved our lives. They knew nothing of the presence of the Filipinos or of my little reconnoitering party.
The next day our native spies reported that Aguinaldo and his body-guard had come down from Angeles early the morning before, but had immediately returned.
I laughed when I heard this report, for I knew the circumstances.
The dapper little officer in khaki was Aguinaldo, and this is the story of how I saw him.—Sunday Globe-Democrat.
What the Wounded Say and Do.An American Officer’s True Stories of our Latest War.—Brave Men who Meet Death as Heroes Should.No two men behave alike when hit in battle. There is just as much difference in their actions as there is in the behavior of the members of a volunteer fire brigade at a country-town conflagration. The look of the mortally wounded is nearly always the same. There is always that deathly pallor that creeps over the face, and that fixed stare—horrible look of resignation—that tells so plainly that all is over with the unfortunate soldier. A few instances will serve to give a general idea of how the victims of the messengers of death receive them.On the 1st of July, a company of regular infantry, in reserve, was lying flat on theirstomachs in a sunken road, a few hundred yards from the stone block-house of El Caney, Cuba. The men were under a terrific fire, but were not allowed to reply to it, for ammunition was growing scarce. For hours they remained in this position. They began to get restless and to shift about. As long as they kept low, there was no danger from Spanish fire, for the bank of the road was sufficiently high to afford security. Curiosity occasionally got the better of a man, and he would poke his head above the embankment and peer in the direction from which the bullets were coming. In the company was a large, muscular German, who had early become restless and curious to see what was transpiring. He would occasionally break out and swear because he was not given a chance to fire at the hated Dons. Of a sudden he ripped out a choice lot of the best in his vocabulary, raised his head above the bank, and shook his huge fist at the lineof sombreros to be seen just above the Spanish trenches to the right of the block-house. Ping! ping! thud! “Wasn’t that an awful sound?” a dozen soldiers chimed. There is no other sound produced that can be compared with it. It stands alone for all that is sickening and horrible. All knew that some one had been hit. A moment was passed in suspense. The German whispered, in the tones of death, to his comrade at his side: “Wipe the blood off of my face!” It was his last words. He drew his knees to his chin in the agonies of death, turned over on one side, burrowing his face in the mud, and died without a groan. A Mauser had hit him squarely between the eyes.A short time later a sergeant of one of the companies of the same regiment moved a few yards forward, trying to get a pot-shot at some Spanish sharpshooters who were snugly perched in the spreading tops of some royal palm trees, and were hitting some of ourmen. He sighted one and had his rifle to his shoulder, taking a fine bead, when all at once the rifle fell to the ground and his hands dropped helplessly by his side. He coolly faced about and walked toward the rear, his arms dangling like pendulums, not even so much as muttering a word. One of his company officers asked him what was the matter, to which he laconically replied, “Hit,” and continued on his way to the dressing-station in the rear. He was shot through both shoulders—a serious wound, but he recovered.About an hour after the German was killed the same company was ordered to take a position farther to the right. They walked along, goose-fashion, single file, moving by the right flank toward their new position. Next to the last man in the rear was a corporal, a new man, just a few months in the service. Biff! ping! bang! went the deadly missiles. One struck a man’s rifle-barrel,cutting it almost in two. Another split the stock of a gun in a man’s hand. Then one struck the recruit corporal’s left arm, passing through the biceps. With an expression of great surprise he for a moment stood still, saying nothing. His eyes began to dilate, and then of a sudden he threw his fowling-piece high in the air, grasped his left arm with his right hand, and started for the rear at a disgraceful gait, yelling so as to be heard above the din of battle: “I’ve got it! I’ve got it! I’ve got it!” The last that was seen of him that day he had “it,” and was taking “it” to the rear with him.On San Juan Ridge, July 2d, just as Chaffee’s brigade had reached the crest, they were ordered to lie down and intrench, using the bayonet as a pick and the hands for shovels. A dashing young fellow of one of the companies on the right of the line was some distance in advance of his fellows when the halt was made. Instead of falling back onthe line with the other men, he stopped where he was. One of the officers shouted at him several times to fall back, as he was in danger of his own men shooting him, but he did not hear. The officer then walked down to where he was, grabbed him by a leg, and started to drag him back to the line. He had but started when he felt the man’s whole body quiver, and he flopped himself over on his back, saying as he did so, “I’m done for.” Some of the men came to the soldier and assisted the officer to carry him to a place of security. With a bayonet one of the men cut off his clothing, when a Mauser hole was seen just above the heart, where the bullet entered, passing through his body and coming out between the shoulders, near the spine. The man said no more at the time. His wounds were bound by sympathetic hands. All except the wounded man returned to the firing-line. The Spanish fire was heavy, and kept up for fourhours, occasionally a soldier dropping out, wounded or killed. When all was quiet, the officer and one of his soldiers returned to see if the young man were yet alive. They found him sitting against a small tree. His first words were: “Bill, give me a cigarette.” The man is living to-day.Just about the time this man was wounded a man in the next company on the right suddenly threw down his bayonet, jumped to his feet, paused for a second or two, looking in the direction of the Spanish trenches, then threw both hands to his breast, saying, “I’m hit.” He turned about and walked into the dense thickets of cactus and Spanish bayonet, and was never seen nor heard of again. He undoubtedly crawled far back into the heavy tropical growth and died, where the vultures claimed him.One of the coolest men who ever received a wound was an infantryman at San Fernando, in the Island of Luzon, on the 16th ofJune. The insurgents made a determined effort to retake the town early on the morning of that day. They opened up simultaneously from every quarter, and the kind and variety of missiles used would be beyond the wildest expectations of that sweet-throated midnight serenader, the Thomas-cat. Out of an old smooth-bore cannon they threw railroad spikes, horseshoes, old clocks, lemon-squeezers, and cobble-stones. From their Remingtons they shot large cubical and irregular-shaped lead slugs. One of these struck this cool man high in the right groin, deeply imbedding itself. The pain must have been excruciating, for the man was terribly lacerated. He hobbled to his company commander, saluted, and asked permission to fall out and lie down, as he had been hit. He was lying near a road where his comrades passed to and fro during the entire fight, but no one heard a word or a groan out of him unless he was spoken to.During the same fight, in another company of the same regiment, a battalion sergeant-major was ordered to take two squads and proceed to a point about 400 yards down the Angeles Road, where there was a small trench, and defend it. When about half-way down, one of his men, a green “rookie,” received a severe wound in the leg. The Sergeant endeavored to start him to the rear, with a man to assist him along, but he protested. Nothing but to continue to the front with his squad would do. He loaded and fired with the other men till the fight was over. This man was recommended for a medal of honor by his captain.—From Leslie’s Weekly, of December 9, 1899.What the Wounded Say and Do.What the Wounded Say and Do.
An American Officer’s True Stories of our Latest War.—Brave Men who Meet Death as Heroes Should.
An American Officer’s True Stories of our Latest War.—Brave Men who Meet Death as Heroes Should.
No two men behave alike when hit in battle. There is just as much difference in their actions as there is in the behavior of the members of a volunteer fire brigade at a country-town conflagration. The look of the mortally wounded is nearly always the same. There is always that deathly pallor that creeps over the face, and that fixed stare—horrible look of resignation—that tells so plainly that all is over with the unfortunate soldier. A few instances will serve to give a general idea of how the victims of the messengers of death receive them.
On the 1st of July, a company of regular infantry, in reserve, was lying flat on theirstomachs in a sunken road, a few hundred yards from the stone block-house of El Caney, Cuba. The men were under a terrific fire, but were not allowed to reply to it, for ammunition was growing scarce. For hours they remained in this position. They began to get restless and to shift about. As long as they kept low, there was no danger from Spanish fire, for the bank of the road was sufficiently high to afford security. Curiosity occasionally got the better of a man, and he would poke his head above the embankment and peer in the direction from which the bullets were coming. In the company was a large, muscular German, who had early become restless and curious to see what was transpiring. He would occasionally break out and swear because he was not given a chance to fire at the hated Dons. Of a sudden he ripped out a choice lot of the best in his vocabulary, raised his head above the bank, and shook his huge fist at the lineof sombreros to be seen just above the Spanish trenches to the right of the block-house. Ping! ping! thud! “Wasn’t that an awful sound?” a dozen soldiers chimed. There is no other sound produced that can be compared with it. It stands alone for all that is sickening and horrible. All knew that some one had been hit. A moment was passed in suspense. The German whispered, in the tones of death, to his comrade at his side: “Wipe the blood off of my face!” It was his last words. He drew his knees to his chin in the agonies of death, turned over on one side, burrowing his face in the mud, and died without a groan. A Mauser had hit him squarely between the eyes.
A short time later a sergeant of one of the companies of the same regiment moved a few yards forward, trying to get a pot-shot at some Spanish sharpshooters who were snugly perched in the spreading tops of some royal palm trees, and were hitting some of ourmen. He sighted one and had his rifle to his shoulder, taking a fine bead, when all at once the rifle fell to the ground and his hands dropped helplessly by his side. He coolly faced about and walked toward the rear, his arms dangling like pendulums, not even so much as muttering a word. One of his company officers asked him what was the matter, to which he laconically replied, “Hit,” and continued on his way to the dressing-station in the rear. He was shot through both shoulders—a serious wound, but he recovered.
About an hour after the German was killed the same company was ordered to take a position farther to the right. They walked along, goose-fashion, single file, moving by the right flank toward their new position. Next to the last man in the rear was a corporal, a new man, just a few months in the service. Biff! ping! bang! went the deadly missiles. One struck a man’s rifle-barrel,cutting it almost in two. Another split the stock of a gun in a man’s hand. Then one struck the recruit corporal’s left arm, passing through the biceps. With an expression of great surprise he for a moment stood still, saying nothing. His eyes began to dilate, and then of a sudden he threw his fowling-piece high in the air, grasped his left arm with his right hand, and started for the rear at a disgraceful gait, yelling so as to be heard above the din of battle: “I’ve got it! I’ve got it! I’ve got it!” The last that was seen of him that day he had “it,” and was taking “it” to the rear with him.
On San Juan Ridge, July 2d, just as Chaffee’s brigade had reached the crest, they were ordered to lie down and intrench, using the bayonet as a pick and the hands for shovels. A dashing young fellow of one of the companies on the right of the line was some distance in advance of his fellows when the halt was made. Instead of falling back onthe line with the other men, he stopped where he was. One of the officers shouted at him several times to fall back, as he was in danger of his own men shooting him, but he did not hear. The officer then walked down to where he was, grabbed him by a leg, and started to drag him back to the line. He had but started when he felt the man’s whole body quiver, and he flopped himself over on his back, saying as he did so, “I’m done for.” Some of the men came to the soldier and assisted the officer to carry him to a place of security. With a bayonet one of the men cut off his clothing, when a Mauser hole was seen just above the heart, where the bullet entered, passing through his body and coming out between the shoulders, near the spine. The man said no more at the time. His wounds were bound by sympathetic hands. All except the wounded man returned to the firing-line. The Spanish fire was heavy, and kept up for fourhours, occasionally a soldier dropping out, wounded or killed. When all was quiet, the officer and one of his soldiers returned to see if the young man were yet alive. They found him sitting against a small tree. His first words were: “Bill, give me a cigarette.” The man is living to-day.
Just about the time this man was wounded a man in the next company on the right suddenly threw down his bayonet, jumped to his feet, paused for a second or two, looking in the direction of the Spanish trenches, then threw both hands to his breast, saying, “I’m hit.” He turned about and walked into the dense thickets of cactus and Spanish bayonet, and was never seen nor heard of again. He undoubtedly crawled far back into the heavy tropical growth and died, where the vultures claimed him.
One of the coolest men who ever received a wound was an infantryman at San Fernando, in the Island of Luzon, on the 16th ofJune. The insurgents made a determined effort to retake the town early on the morning of that day. They opened up simultaneously from every quarter, and the kind and variety of missiles used would be beyond the wildest expectations of that sweet-throated midnight serenader, the Thomas-cat. Out of an old smooth-bore cannon they threw railroad spikes, horseshoes, old clocks, lemon-squeezers, and cobble-stones. From their Remingtons they shot large cubical and irregular-shaped lead slugs. One of these struck this cool man high in the right groin, deeply imbedding itself. The pain must have been excruciating, for the man was terribly lacerated. He hobbled to his company commander, saluted, and asked permission to fall out and lie down, as he had been hit. He was lying near a road where his comrades passed to and fro during the entire fight, but no one heard a word or a groan out of him unless he was spoken to.
During the same fight, in another company of the same regiment, a battalion sergeant-major was ordered to take two squads and proceed to a point about 400 yards down the Angeles Road, where there was a small trench, and defend it. When about half-way down, one of his men, a green “rookie,” received a severe wound in the leg. The Sergeant endeavored to start him to the rear, with a man to assist him along, but he protested. Nothing but to continue to the front with his squad would do. He loaded and fired with the other men till the fight was over. This man was recommended for a medal of honor by his captain.—From Leslie’s Weekly, of December 9, 1899.
What the Wounded Say and Do.What the Wounded Say and Do.
What the Wounded Say and Do.
The Flight of “Father Time.”A Case of Mistaken Identity.Captain C. was what soldiers call a “fussy” officer. He was constantly prying into matters that concerned him but little, and wasted his energies in performing duties usually within the province of a corporal. In fact, he would march a “set of fours” to dinner. In a fight, however, his soul enlarged, and he was ever to be found at the front directing his men, and doing much to atone for sins committed during less exciting moments. Always in the van, his long, gray whiskers gently flowing in the breezes, his sword drawn and pointing toward the enemy, suggested to the men the pictures they had seen in almanacs of “Father Time”; and when speaking of him among themselves, he had no other name.In August, 1899, his company was at Angeles, in Luzon, and was entrenching on the outskirts, for the pesky little “niggers” were constantly threatening and frequently attacking the place.The Quartermaster Department hired a lot of Macebebes, who had offered their services, to do the harder part of the work of trench-digging, for the men were exhausted by an arduous and exacting campaign.One bright morning about two hundred of these laborers were put to work a short distance to the front of the trenches under construction, to cut away a dense growth of cane, and open up a field of fire toward the enemy. The faithful fellows jumped into the work with a vim seldom seen in that country, slashing to the right and left with bolos, machetes, knives, hoes, scythes, and a variety of other edged implements, felling the large cane stalks with great rapidity.“Father Time’s” company was just inrear of them, with rifle and belt, ready to protect them from the insurgents, who hated a Macebebe even worse than a despised Americano.The usual activity in the cane-field was soon discovered by the festive little rebels, who promptly proceeded to pour volleys into the place where the cane was so mysteriously disappearing. The unarmed Macebebes stood their ground for a moment, but when the Mauser bullets came whistling uncomfortably close, and one of them had been slightly hit, they could stand it no longer, but, with an unearthly yell of fright, they broke for the rear like a herd of stampeded cattle. A regular race of mad men.When the firing began, the soldiers threw themselves upon the ground as flat as pancakes. The Captain was busy writing in a nipa palm hut a few hundred yards in rear. He rapidly buckled on his equipment and “took up the double time” to join his men.As he neared the trenches he raised his head to look for his company. Not a soldier was in sight. As he stood in wonderment it seemed that the gates of the infernal regions were standing ajar and the inmates escaping toward him. Two hundred black devils, every imp of them screaming and yelling at each leap forward, were coming for him, armed with bolos and other death-dealing weapons, to mince him in a thousand pieces. He knew his men had been massacred to a man. He alone remained to face this mass of uncivilized warriors eager for every drop of his blood.“Two hundred black devils were coming for him, armed with bolos and other death-dealing weapons.”“Two hundred black devils were coming for him, armed with bolos and other death-dealing weapons.”No general ever more quickly decided upon a definite maneuver, or put one into execution with a more fixed determination than this veteran officer, hero of three wars, decided to decrease the distance between himself and the main body of his regiment in town. Two miles over muddy roads and rice “paddies” is not an easy march for ayoung man, but when a valiant gentleman of sixty summers covers the distance at a forced-march gait, without a halt, a record has been broken.When “Father Time” learned that not a man of his company had been hurt, he was pleased; but the news that he had mistaken a lot of Macebebes, hopelessly stampeded, for a blood-thirsty enemy, had to be broken to him gently by the Colonel.
Captain C. was what soldiers call a “fussy” officer. He was constantly prying into matters that concerned him but little, and wasted his energies in performing duties usually within the province of a corporal. In fact, he would march a “set of fours” to dinner. In a fight, however, his soul enlarged, and he was ever to be found at the front directing his men, and doing much to atone for sins committed during less exciting moments. Always in the van, his long, gray whiskers gently flowing in the breezes, his sword drawn and pointing toward the enemy, suggested to the men the pictures they had seen in almanacs of “Father Time”; and when speaking of him among themselves, he had no other name.
In August, 1899, his company was at Angeles, in Luzon, and was entrenching on the outskirts, for the pesky little “niggers” were constantly threatening and frequently attacking the place.
The Quartermaster Department hired a lot of Macebebes, who had offered their services, to do the harder part of the work of trench-digging, for the men were exhausted by an arduous and exacting campaign.
One bright morning about two hundred of these laborers were put to work a short distance to the front of the trenches under construction, to cut away a dense growth of cane, and open up a field of fire toward the enemy. The faithful fellows jumped into the work with a vim seldom seen in that country, slashing to the right and left with bolos, machetes, knives, hoes, scythes, and a variety of other edged implements, felling the large cane stalks with great rapidity.
“Father Time’s” company was just inrear of them, with rifle and belt, ready to protect them from the insurgents, who hated a Macebebe even worse than a despised Americano.
The usual activity in the cane-field was soon discovered by the festive little rebels, who promptly proceeded to pour volleys into the place where the cane was so mysteriously disappearing. The unarmed Macebebes stood their ground for a moment, but when the Mauser bullets came whistling uncomfortably close, and one of them had been slightly hit, they could stand it no longer, but, with an unearthly yell of fright, they broke for the rear like a herd of stampeded cattle. A regular race of mad men.
When the firing began, the soldiers threw themselves upon the ground as flat as pancakes. The Captain was busy writing in a nipa palm hut a few hundred yards in rear. He rapidly buckled on his equipment and “took up the double time” to join his men.As he neared the trenches he raised his head to look for his company. Not a soldier was in sight. As he stood in wonderment it seemed that the gates of the infernal regions were standing ajar and the inmates escaping toward him. Two hundred black devils, every imp of them screaming and yelling at each leap forward, were coming for him, armed with bolos and other death-dealing weapons, to mince him in a thousand pieces. He knew his men had been massacred to a man. He alone remained to face this mass of uncivilized warriors eager for every drop of his blood.
“Two hundred black devils were coming for him, armed with bolos and other death-dealing weapons.”“Two hundred black devils were coming for him, armed with bolos and other death-dealing weapons.”
“Two hundred black devils were coming for him, armed with bolos and other death-dealing weapons.”
No general ever more quickly decided upon a definite maneuver, or put one into execution with a more fixed determination than this veteran officer, hero of three wars, decided to decrease the distance between himself and the main body of his regiment in town. Two miles over muddy roads and rice “paddies” is not an easy march for ayoung man, but when a valiant gentleman of sixty summers covers the distance at a forced-march gait, without a halt, a record has been broken.
When “Father Time” learned that not a man of his company had been hurt, he was pleased; but the news that he had mistaken a lot of Macebebes, hopelessly stampeded, for a blood-thirsty enemy, had to be broken to him gently by the Colonel.
Camp Alarms—False But Startling.The Red-Headed Recruit and the Cuban Dog.—The Charge of the Hospital Corps.—Private Timmons and the Carabao.In the face of his reputation for undaunted courage and dashing deeds of valor, the American soldier has at times allowed himself to become frightfully alarmed and on the eve of being panic-stricken, when taken unawares. He soon collects himself, however, and is ready to meet all emergencies, let them come from whatever source they will. Even the old “vet” may lose his head for a moment or two, and find some difficulty in establishing his equilibrium. The Yankee soldier is ever ready to obey his officer, and if the latter will but keep his wits, order may be restored out of hopeless demoralization.The Civil War was replete with camp alarms, some of them of the most ridiculous type; and our war with Spain and the Filipinos has added greatly to the stock. The tropical countries, with their dense growths of vegetation, myriads of crawling creatures, and hair-raising sounds, form a replete field for alarms, which are usually started by frightened sentries on lonely outposts.The Red-Headed Recruit and the Cuban Dog.One of the most notable alarms that occurred during the campaign about Santiago was within two miles of the “Stone Block-House,” at El Caney, on the night before the attack on that place. The brigade that did the hardest fighting there, and that had been in advance the greater part of the time from the landing at Baiquiri, received orders late in the afternoon of June 30th to move forward and take a position within easy striking distance of El Caney, and to there rest on arms for the night. The march began at dusk, and, by a long, circuitous route, ended at 12 o’clock midnight at an open field, which the guides said was within two miles of the nearest Spanish position in the town. The march, in single file, up and down hills, over slippery ground, by men as silent as mice, was a tiresome one. Allwere glad to hear the word passed along in low whispers to quietly lie down, retaining arms and equipment, and bivouac for the night. The silence of death prevailed. The long line of dark figures on the open field, silhouetted against the star-lit sky, and the stillness that reigned, reminded one more of stereopticon views thrown upon canvas, than of the presence of eighteen hundred fighting men, stealing upon their prey.It was not a minute after the whispered command to lie down was given till all except a few selected for duty on outposts had stretched their weary limbs on the dewy grass.The outposts were placed around the main body, some few hundred yards distant, most of them in the direction of the Spanish lines. The command was soon asleep. There was the usual number of disturbed dreamers, and occasionally the snorer would burst out in loud and long-drawn tones, onlyto be promptly kicked in the ribs by his light-sleeping comrade. The nocturnal cigarette-smoker was prohibited from indulging in his nightly practice, and soon there was a long mass of sleeping humanity, not a sign of wakeful eyes to be seen.As sudden as the flash of lightning the woods in the direction of the Spanish lines was filled with yells, screams, and the heavy falling of feet in rapid retreat.The brigade sprang to its feet as if each man had been lying on a stiff spring and the whole touched off simultaneously by the pressing of a button—every man with loaded and cocked rifle in hand. Then began the low, mumbling sound of a suddenly aroused camp. The efforts of the officers who had kept their heads to keep it down were fruitless. It was a long line of buzzing sounds like the swarming of bees. But the screaming and yelling continued and grew nearer.Shouting at the top of his voice at everyjump, “They’re coming! they’re coming!” tall, lean, red-headed, and hatless, the recruit sentry came by leaps and strides, and close at his heels a half-starved Cuban dog, playfully pursuing him, soliciting some of the hardtack in the recruit’s haversack.It was near dawn before complete order was restored. Many eyes were opened by that alarm raised by the panic-stricken recruit that never again closed till closed in death.The Charge of the Hospital Corps.The campaign in the Philippines against the wily Tagalo has been replete with false alarms, owing to the prowling and sneaking nature of the enemy, and the unearthly noises made by the animals of that sun-scorched and water-splashed country.There is a line of trenches and block-houses around the city of Manila, the average distance being about two miles out from the suburbs. This was called the “firing-line.” On first arriving from the United States, regiments were sent out to occupy a part of this position, to recuperate from the long sea voyage aboard crowded transports, and at the same time help maintain the line of defense around the city. Most of the newly arrived regiments were filled up with recruits with but a few months’ service; so this position afforded the opportunity to get these men in shape for field-service.This line of defense was the theater in which was acted the comedy of the war. Here is where occurred the most foolish alarms and at the same time some serious ones.There is one famous charge (?) that occurred in a newly arrived regiment, which was spending its first night on the Island of Luzon in these trenches. It is known as the “Charge of the Hospital Corps,” and promises to be handed down in army tradition. The gallant leader of this daring advance was a young surgeon, recently appointed to the regular establishment as a battalion pill-dispenser. His command consisted of three privates and an acting steward of the Hospital Corps.Arguing that he was fighting a savage enemy, not a party to the Geneva Convention, and consequently would not recognize as non-combatants the wearers of the red cross, he succeeded in having a requisitionhonored by the ordnance officer for five big forty-five caliber “six-shooters,” with which he armed himself and command.This embryo warrior and his gallant following were tickled with their toys, and flourished them most dangerously during the day, vowing death and destruction to any thousand Filipinos who would dare to face them and their death-dealing weapons.The doctor, or “Pills,” as the men called him, established his battalion hospital in a ravine in a break in the trenches. It was a lonesome place. Night came on, and the corps men retired to sleep their first night on Luzon’s soil; but their sleep was not easy. Visions of gore and midnight slaughter passed in review before their drowsy eyes; and just as a black-faced little rebel had them by the throat and was plunging a great long knife into their vitals, they would awaken with a start, feel under their heads for their fire-arms, to reassure themselves, patthe trusty weapon a time or two, call it “good old Bets,” and again doze off to sleep, only to repeat the performance.One hungry, gaunt-looking fellow, who his comrades said had a head that would fit in a regulation full-dress helmet, could stand the nervous strain no longer. The noises that came from the little thickets of bamboo and cogonales into his little “tepee” were more than he could stand. He had listened to them in his mind, enlarged, multiplied, and magnified them in his own imagination, till he was sure the whole insurrectionist army was quietly, inch by inch and foot by foot, slipping down upon him. Up he jumped, revolver in hand, gripping the handle and gritting his teeth, and proceeded to investigate the sounds. Approaching within a few yards of a thick bunch of trees not far in front of the hospital tent, he halted to listen. Yes, they were there beyond all doubt. He could almost see them crawling toward him; ahundred dusky demons upon all fours, with long, glistening, razor-edged knives held between their shining teeth. They must be stopped. With a loud voice, trembling with fear, he challenged: “If you’re an American, for God’s sake say so, or I’ll shoot.” The noise made no reply, and the shooting began promptly as promised.The valiant “Pills” landed on his feet in the middle of his tent, rallying his men, and was soon leading them to the attack. Bang! bang! biff! bang! rang out the loud-mouthed Colt’s revolvers. A moment later the Krags began to pop to the right and left, the alarm traveling up and down the line with lightning-like rapidity. Soon six miles of grim-looking rifle muzzles were pointing toward the innocent nothing to the front, a volley occasionally resounding through the midnight air at an imaginary enemy.Dawn found “Pills” searching the field of battle for dead and wounded. He discoverednumerous bullet-holes in his tent and medicine chests, made by 45-caliber balls; and, lying near the place where the gaunt, hungry-looking corps man first fired upon the enemy, he found poor “Paterno,” Company E’s monkey mascot, with a short and bloody tail, that member having been lost in the battle—a penalty for his nocturnal perambulations.Private Timmons and the Carabao.Timmons was a recruit private in an infantry regiment, and, when stationed in a temperance community, was a mighty good soldier. True to his steel, he met death in the general advance from San Fernando, in August, 1899. He was one of those jolly, good natured fellows who can sit in the mud and crack jokes, and sing standing in water to his arm-pits. And what is better, he possessed the happy faculty of imparting his exuberance to his long-faced, homesick, and downcast fellow-privates. His temper was as smooth as a becalmed sea, and seldom was it that a ripple passed over the smooth surface. There was just one word in the soldier’s vocabulary that would disturb him, but this word never failed to bring on a typhoon. This innocent yet magic word was “carabao,” the name of the water buffalo, thebeast of burden that formed the American “cracker line” in the Philippines before the introduction of the ever-faithful mule. This is how it came to have such a terror for poor Timmons:His regiment was undergoing its training on the “firing-line,” and his company furnished twelve men daily for the “lunette,” a kind of detached bastion about 800 yards in front of the line in the direction of the enemy. This was a lonesome detail. Just twelve men to man an isolated little fort, the enemy known to be in great numbers not more than four or five miles away. It came Timmons’ turn to go on this duty for, the first time. The detail, in command of a sergeant, marched out at sundown and relieved the men who had been on the previous twenty-four hours. The old guard turned over its orders and at the same time reported having seen some armed “gugus” in the direction of the Mariquina River, whichran in front of the “lunette” about a thousand yards away, the intervening space being an open rice-field.The old guard marched off and the new one on, throwing off their blanket-rolls and making themselves as comfortable for the night as possible. But two men at a time were required to remain awake and vigilant.Night came on as black as the enemy they were fighting, and with it all the breath-stopping and hair-raising noises that the myriads of flying and crawling animals of that war-ridden country produces. There was the “vantriloquest” bird, gifted with a voice that is the essence of all that is frightful and hideous in sounds—forty demons running amuck and coming your direction.In painful harmony was the low, deep tones the “chuck me,” whose vocal cords are tuned after the left end of the key-board of the pipe organ. Then there were slimy lizards, chameleons, tree-frogs, scorpions,and wonderful bugs, all with voices peculiar to their families. There were lightning-bugs as big as jack-o’-lanterns, and tarantulas with round and velvety bodies, and a spread of legs that would cover a frying-pan. All this and the known presence of a sneaking enemy was enough to test the nerves of veterans, so its effect on recruits can easily be imagined.Timmons’ time to remain awake and go on post duty arrived. Jones, who called himself an old “vet,” because he had served in Cuba, went on with “Tim,” as his comrades called him. Their turn began at midnight. The Sergeant, who had posted them, was soon lying down taking a non-commissioned officer’s sleep—one eye closed, the other on thequi vive. Both sentries were on the alert. Many suspicious noises came to their ears, and imaginary murderous-looking “niggers” were seen lurking in the grass, behind rice-dykes, and lying crouching on theground. If “Tim” discovered something that he was certain was a death-dealing boloman, he would tiptoe over to Jones and hold a council of war. That worthy—the old “vet”—would dispense nerve-soothing whispers in his ears, and he would return to his post a less nervous “rookey.”The time dragged wearily on, and finally arrived when they were about to be relieved. The blackest of the night was on. Jones left his post to arouse the Sergeant and acquaint that official with the hour. “Tim” was now alone. A slowly moving figure loomed up before him not fifty yards away. Then came the sounds of heavy tramping feet. The sounds were rapidly drawing nearer. There, before his dilated eyes, dimly outlined, and within pistol-shot, was the enemy in great numbers, who would soon close around the little garrison and murder them to a man. What should he do? His orders were strict about giving undue alarms, butif he wasted a moment longer, there would be no time for defense. If he left his post to arouse his comrades, the enemy would rush upon them. No. He would give the alarm by firing and one dead Filipino would be the result of it. He nervously raised his rifle, took deliberate aim at the advancing figures, and fired. There was a sickening thud, a heavy fall, and low, deep moans. The men were aroused and manned the fort. The Sergeant ordered a general fusillade. The regiment was in the trenches in a moment and remained there till dawn.The first light of day revealed, lying in a great pool of his own blood, “Big Bill,” the bull buffalo that drew the headquarters water-cart, who had been out grazing that night.
The Red-Headed Recruit and the Cuban Dog.—The Charge of the Hospital Corps.—Private Timmons and the Carabao.
The Red-Headed Recruit and the Cuban Dog.—The Charge of the Hospital Corps.—Private Timmons and the Carabao.
In the face of his reputation for undaunted courage and dashing deeds of valor, the American soldier has at times allowed himself to become frightfully alarmed and on the eve of being panic-stricken, when taken unawares. He soon collects himself, however, and is ready to meet all emergencies, let them come from whatever source they will. Even the old “vet” may lose his head for a moment or two, and find some difficulty in establishing his equilibrium. The Yankee soldier is ever ready to obey his officer, and if the latter will but keep his wits, order may be restored out of hopeless demoralization.
The Civil War was replete with camp alarms, some of them of the most ridiculous type; and our war with Spain and the Filipinos has added greatly to the stock. The tropical countries, with their dense growths of vegetation, myriads of crawling creatures, and hair-raising sounds, form a replete field for alarms, which are usually started by frightened sentries on lonely outposts.
The Red-Headed Recruit and the Cuban Dog.One of the most notable alarms that occurred during the campaign about Santiago was within two miles of the “Stone Block-House,” at El Caney, on the night before the attack on that place. The brigade that did the hardest fighting there, and that had been in advance the greater part of the time from the landing at Baiquiri, received orders late in the afternoon of June 30th to move forward and take a position within easy striking distance of El Caney, and to there rest on arms for the night. The march began at dusk, and, by a long, circuitous route, ended at 12 o’clock midnight at an open field, which the guides said was within two miles of the nearest Spanish position in the town. The march, in single file, up and down hills, over slippery ground, by men as silent as mice, was a tiresome one. Allwere glad to hear the word passed along in low whispers to quietly lie down, retaining arms and equipment, and bivouac for the night. The silence of death prevailed. The long line of dark figures on the open field, silhouetted against the star-lit sky, and the stillness that reigned, reminded one more of stereopticon views thrown upon canvas, than of the presence of eighteen hundred fighting men, stealing upon their prey.It was not a minute after the whispered command to lie down was given till all except a few selected for duty on outposts had stretched their weary limbs on the dewy grass.The outposts were placed around the main body, some few hundred yards distant, most of them in the direction of the Spanish lines. The command was soon asleep. There was the usual number of disturbed dreamers, and occasionally the snorer would burst out in loud and long-drawn tones, onlyto be promptly kicked in the ribs by his light-sleeping comrade. The nocturnal cigarette-smoker was prohibited from indulging in his nightly practice, and soon there was a long mass of sleeping humanity, not a sign of wakeful eyes to be seen.As sudden as the flash of lightning the woods in the direction of the Spanish lines was filled with yells, screams, and the heavy falling of feet in rapid retreat.The brigade sprang to its feet as if each man had been lying on a stiff spring and the whole touched off simultaneously by the pressing of a button—every man with loaded and cocked rifle in hand. Then began the low, mumbling sound of a suddenly aroused camp. The efforts of the officers who had kept their heads to keep it down were fruitless. It was a long line of buzzing sounds like the swarming of bees. But the screaming and yelling continued and grew nearer.Shouting at the top of his voice at everyjump, “They’re coming! they’re coming!” tall, lean, red-headed, and hatless, the recruit sentry came by leaps and strides, and close at his heels a half-starved Cuban dog, playfully pursuing him, soliciting some of the hardtack in the recruit’s haversack.It was near dawn before complete order was restored. Many eyes were opened by that alarm raised by the panic-stricken recruit that never again closed till closed in death.
One of the most notable alarms that occurred during the campaign about Santiago was within two miles of the “Stone Block-House,” at El Caney, on the night before the attack on that place. The brigade that did the hardest fighting there, and that had been in advance the greater part of the time from the landing at Baiquiri, received orders late in the afternoon of June 30th to move forward and take a position within easy striking distance of El Caney, and to there rest on arms for the night. The march began at dusk, and, by a long, circuitous route, ended at 12 o’clock midnight at an open field, which the guides said was within two miles of the nearest Spanish position in the town. The march, in single file, up and down hills, over slippery ground, by men as silent as mice, was a tiresome one. Allwere glad to hear the word passed along in low whispers to quietly lie down, retaining arms and equipment, and bivouac for the night. The silence of death prevailed. The long line of dark figures on the open field, silhouetted against the star-lit sky, and the stillness that reigned, reminded one more of stereopticon views thrown upon canvas, than of the presence of eighteen hundred fighting men, stealing upon their prey.
It was not a minute after the whispered command to lie down was given till all except a few selected for duty on outposts had stretched their weary limbs on the dewy grass.
The outposts were placed around the main body, some few hundred yards distant, most of them in the direction of the Spanish lines. The command was soon asleep. There was the usual number of disturbed dreamers, and occasionally the snorer would burst out in loud and long-drawn tones, onlyto be promptly kicked in the ribs by his light-sleeping comrade. The nocturnal cigarette-smoker was prohibited from indulging in his nightly practice, and soon there was a long mass of sleeping humanity, not a sign of wakeful eyes to be seen.
As sudden as the flash of lightning the woods in the direction of the Spanish lines was filled with yells, screams, and the heavy falling of feet in rapid retreat.
The brigade sprang to its feet as if each man had been lying on a stiff spring and the whole touched off simultaneously by the pressing of a button—every man with loaded and cocked rifle in hand. Then began the low, mumbling sound of a suddenly aroused camp. The efforts of the officers who had kept their heads to keep it down were fruitless. It was a long line of buzzing sounds like the swarming of bees. But the screaming and yelling continued and grew nearer.
Shouting at the top of his voice at everyjump, “They’re coming! they’re coming!” tall, lean, red-headed, and hatless, the recruit sentry came by leaps and strides, and close at his heels a half-starved Cuban dog, playfully pursuing him, soliciting some of the hardtack in the recruit’s haversack.
It was near dawn before complete order was restored. Many eyes were opened by that alarm raised by the panic-stricken recruit that never again closed till closed in death.
The Charge of the Hospital Corps.The campaign in the Philippines against the wily Tagalo has been replete with false alarms, owing to the prowling and sneaking nature of the enemy, and the unearthly noises made by the animals of that sun-scorched and water-splashed country.There is a line of trenches and block-houses around the city of Manila, the average distance being about two miles out from the suburbs. This was called the “firing-line.” On first arriving from the United States, regiments were sent out to occupy a part of this position, to recuperate from the long sea voyage aboard crowded transports, and at the same time help maintain the line of defense around the city. Most of the newly arrived regiments were filled up with recruits with but a few months’ service; so this position afforded the opportunity to get these men in shape for field-service.This line of defense was the theater in which was acted the comedy of the war. Here is where occurred the most foolish alarms and at the same time some serious ones.There is one famous charge (?) that occurred in a newly arrived regiment, which was spending its first night on the Island of Luzon in these trenches. It is known as the “Charge of the Hospital Corps,” and promises to be handed down in army tradition. The gallant leader of this daring advance was a young surgeon, recently appointed to the regular establishment as a battalion pill-dispenser. His command consisted of three privates and an acting steward of the Hospital Corps.Arguing that he was fighting a savage enemy, not a party to the Geneva Convention, and consequently would not recognize as non-combatants the wearers of the red cross, he succeeded in having a requisitionhonored by the ordnance officer for five big forty-five caliber “six-shooters,” with which he armed himself and command.This embryo warrior and his gallant following were tickled with their toys, and flourished them most dangerously during the day, vowing death and destruction to any thousand Filipinos who would dare to face them and their death-dealing weapons.The doctor, or “Pills,” as the men called him, established his battalion hospital in a ravine in a break in the trenches. It was a lonesome place. Night came on, and the corps men retired to sleep their first night on Luzon’s soil; but their sleep was not easy. Visions of gore and midnight slaughter passed in review before their drowsy eyes; and just as a black-faced little rebel had them by the throat and was plunging a great long knife into their vitals, they would awaken with a start, feel under their heads for their fire-arms, to reassure themselves, patthe trusty weapon a time or two, call it “good old Bets,” and again doze off to sleep, only to repeat the performance.One hungry, gaunt-looking fellow, who his comrades said had a head that would fit in a regulation full-dress helmet, could stand the nervous strain no longer. The noises that came from the little thickets of bamboo and cogonales into his little “tepee” were more than he could stand. He had listened to them in his mind, enlarged, multiplied, and magnified them in his own imagination, till he was sure the whole insurrectionist army was quietly, inch by inch and foot by foot, slipping down upon him. Up he jumped, revolver in hand, gripping the handle and gritting his teeth, and proceeded to investigate the sounds. Approaching within a few yards of a thick bunch of trees not far in front of the hospital tent, he halted to listen. Yes, they were there beyond all doubt. He could almost see them crawling toward him; ahundred dusky demons upon all fours, with long, glistening, razor-edged knives held between their shining teeth. They must be stopped. With a loud voice, trembling with fear, he challenged: “If you’re an American, for God’s sake say so, or I’ll shoot.” The noise made no reply, and the shooting began promptly as promised.The valiant “Pills” landed on his feet in the middle of his tent, rallying his men, and was soon leading them to the attack. Bang! bang! biff! bang! rang out the loud-mouthed Colt’s revolvers. A moment later the Krags began to pop to the right and left, the alarm traveling up and down the line with lightning-like rapidity. Soon six miles of grim-looking rifle muzzles were pointing toward the innocent nothing to the front, a volley occasionally resounding through the midnight air at an imaginary enemy.Dawn found “Pills” searching the field of battle for dead and wounded. He discoverednumerous bullet-holes in his tent and medicine chests, made by 45-caliber balls; and, lying near the place where the gaunt, hungry-looking corps man first fired upon the enemy, he found poor “Paterno,” Company E’s monkey mascot, with a short and bloody tail, that member having been lost in the battle—a penalty for his nocturnal perambulations.
The campaign in the Philippines against the wily Tagalo has been replete with false alarms, owing to the prowling and sneaking nature of the enemy, and the unearthly noises made by the animals of that sun-scorched and water-splashed country.
There is a line of trenches and block-houses around the city of Manila, the average distance being about two miles out from the suburbs. This was called the “firing-line.” On first arriving from the United States, regiments were sent out to occupy a part of this position, to recuperate from the long sea voyage aboard crowded transports, and at the same time help maintain the line of defense around the city. Most of the newly arrived regiments were filled up with recruits with but a few months’ service; so this position afforded the opportunity to get these men in shape for field-service.
This line of defense was the theater in which was acted the comedy of the war. Here is where occurred the most foolish alarms and at the same time some serious ones.
There is one famous charge (?) that occurred in a newly arrived regiment, which was spending its first night on the Island of Luzon in these trenches. It is known as the “Charge of the Hospital Corps,” and promises to be handed down in army tradition. The gallant leader of this daring advance was a young surgeon, recently appointed to the regular establishment as a battalion pill-dispenser. His command consisted of three privates and an acting steward of the Hospital Corps.
Arguing that he was fighting a savage enemy, not a party to the Geneva Convention, and consequently would not recognize as non-combatants the wearers of the red cross, he succeeded in having a requisitionhonored by the ordnance officer for five big forty-five caliber “six-shooters,” with which he armed himself and command.
This embryo warrior and his gallant following were tickled with their toys, and flourished them most dangerously during the day, vowing death and destruction to any thousand Filipinos who would dare to face them and their death-dealing weapons.
The doctor, or “Pills,” as the men called him, established his battalion hospital in a ravine in a break in the trenches. It was a lonesome place. Night came on, and the corps men retired to sleep their first night on Luzon’s soil; but their sleep was not easy. Visions of gore and midnight slaughter passed in review before their drowsy eyes; and just as a black-faced little rebel had them by the throat and was plunging a great long knife into their vitals, they would awaken with a start, feel under their heads for their fire-arms, to reassure themselves, patthe trusty weapon a time or two, call it “good old Bets,” and again doze off to sleep, only to repeat the performance.
One hungry, gaunt-looking fellow, who his comrades said had a head that would fit in a regulation full-dress helmet, could stand the nervous strain no longer. The noises that came from the little thickets of bamboo and cogonales into his little “tepee” were more than he could stand. He had listened to them in his mind, enlarged, multiplied, and magnified them in his own imagination, till he was sure the whole insurrectionist army was quietly, inch by inch and foot by foot, slipping down upon him. Up he jumped, revolver in hand, gripping the handle and gritting his teeth, and proceeded to investigate the sounds. Approaching within a few yards of a thick bunch of trees not far in front of the hospital tent, he halted to listen. Yes, they were there beyond all doubt. He could almost see them crawling toward him; ahundred dusky demons upon all fours, with long, glistening, razor-edged knives held between their shining teeth. They must be stopped. With a loud voice, trembling with fear, he challenged: “If you’re an American, for God’s sake say so, or I’ll shoot.” The noise made no reply, and the shooting began promptly as promised.
The valiant “Pills” landed on his feet in the middle of his tent, rallying his men, and was soon leading them to the attack. Bang! bang! biff! bang! rang out the loud-mouthed Colt’s revolvers. A moment later the Krags began to pop to the right and left, the alarm traveling up and down the line with lightning-like rapidity. Soon six miles of grim-looking rifle muzzles were pointing toward the innocent nothing to the front, a volley occasionally resounding through the midnight air at an imaginary enemy.
Dawn found “Pills” searching the field of battle for dead and wounded. He discoverednumerous bullet-holes in his tent and medicine chests, made by 45-caliber balls; and, lying near the place where the gaunt, hungry-looking corps man first fired upon the enemy, he found poor “Paterno,” Company E’s monkey mascot, with a short and bloody tail, that member having been lost in the battle—a penalty for his nocturnal perambulations.
Private Timmons and the Carabao.Timmons was a recruit private in an infantry regiment, and, when stationed in a temperance community, was a mighty good soldier. True to his steel, he met death in the general advance from San Fernando, in August, 1899. He was one of those jolly, good natured fellows who can sit in the mud and crack jokes, and sing standing in water to his arm-pits. And what is better, he possessed the happy faculty of imparting his exuberance to his long-faced, homesick, and downcast fellow-privates. His temper was as smooth as a becalmed sea, and seldom was it that a ripple passed over the smooth surface. There was just one word in the soldier’s vocabulary that would disturb him, but this word never failed to bring on a typhoon. This innocent yet magic word was “carabao,” the name of the water buffalo, thebeast of burden that formed the American “cracker line” in the Philippines before the introduction of the ever-faithful mule. This is how it came to have such a terror for poor Timmons:His regiment was undergoing its training on the “firing-line,” and his company furnished twelve men daily for the “lunette,” a kind of detached bastion about 800 yards in front of the line in the direction of the enemy. This was a lonesome detail. Just twelve men to man an isolated little fort, the enemy known to be in great numbers not more than four or five miles away. It came Timmons’ turn to go on this duty for, the first time. The detail, in command of a sergeant, marched out at sundown and relieved the men who had been on the previous twenty-four hours. The old guard turned over its orders and at the same time reported having seen some armed “gugus” in the direction of the Mariquina River, whichran in front of the “lunette” about a thousand yards away, the intervening space being an open rice-field.The old guard marched off and the new one on, throwing off their blanket-rolls and making themselves as comfortable for the night as possible. But two men at a time were required to remain awake and vigilant.Night came on as black as the enemy they were fighting, and with it all the breath-stopping and hair-raising noises that the myriads of flying and crawling animals of that war-ridden country produces. There was the “vantriloquest” bird, gifted with a voice that is the essence of all that is frightful and hideous in sounds—forty demons running amuck and coming your direction.In painful harmony was the low, deep tones the “chuck me,” whose vocal cords are tuned after the left end of the key-board of the pipe organ. Then there were slimy lizards, chameleons, tree-frogs, scorpions,and wonderful bugs, all with voices peculiar to their families. There were lightning-bugs as big as jack-o’-lanterns, and tarantulas with round and velvety bodies, and a spread of legs that would cover a frying-pan. All this and the known presence of a sneaking enemy was enough to test the nerves of veterans, so its effect on recruits can easily be imagined.Timmons’ time to remain awake and go on post duty arrived. Jones, who called himself an old “vet,” because he had served in Cuba, went on with “Tim,” as his comrades called him. Their turn began at midnight. The Sergeant, who had posted them, was soon lying down taking a non-commissioned officer’s sleep—one eye closed, the other on thequi vive. Both sentries were on the alert. Many suspicious noises came to their ears, and imaginary murderous-looking “niggers” were seen lurking in the grass, behind rice-dykes, and lying crouching on theground. If “Tim” discovered something that he was certain was a death-dealing boloman, he would tiptoe over to Jones and hold a council of war. That worthy—the old “vet”—would dispense nerve-soothing whispers in his ears, and he would return to his post a less nervous “rookey.”The time dragged wearily on, and finally arrived when they were about to be relieved. The blackest of the night was on. Jones left his post to arouse the Sergeant and acquaint that official with the hour. “Tim” was now alone. A slowly moving figure loomed up before him not fifty yards away. Then came the sounds of heavy tramping feet. The sounds were rapidly drawing nearer. There, before his dilated eyes, dimly outlined, and within pistol-shot, was the enemy in great numbers, who would soon close around the little garrison and murder them to a man. What should he do? His orders were strict about giving undue alarms, butif he wasted a moment longer, there would be no time for defense. If he left his post to arouse his comrades, the enemy would rush upon them. No. He would give the alarm by firing and one dead Filipino would be the result of it. He nervously raised his rifle, took deliberate aim at the advancing figures, and fired. There was a sickening thud, a heavy fall, and low, deep moans. The men were aroused and manned the fort. The Sergeant ordered a general fusillade. The regiment was in the trenches in a moment and remained there till dawn.The first light of day revealed, lying in a great pool of his own blood, “Big Bill,” the bull buffalo that drew the headquarters water-cart, who had been out grazing that night.
Timmons was a recruit private in an infantry regiment, and, when stationed in a temperance community, was a mighty good soldier. True to his steel, he met death in the general advance from San Fernando, in August, 1899. He was one of those jolly, good natured fellows who can sit in the mud and crack jokes, and sing standing in water to his arm-pits. And what is better, he possessed the happy faculty of imparting his exuberance to his long-faced, homesick, and downcast fellow-privates. His temper was as smooth as a becalmed sea, and seldom was it that a ripple passed over the smooth surface. There was just one word in the soldier’s vocabulary that would disturb him, but this word never failed to bring on a typhoon. This innocent yet magic word was “carabao,” the name of the water buffalo, thebeast of burden that formed the American “cracker line” in the Philippines before the introduction of the ever-faithful mule. This is how it came to have such a terror for poor Timmons:
His regiment was undergoing its training on the “firing-line,” and his company furnished twelve men daily for the “lunette,” a kind of detached bastion about 800 yards in front of the line in the direction of the enemy. This was a lonesome detail. Just twelve men to man an isolated little fort, the enemy known to be in great numbers not more than four or five miles away. It came Timmons’ turn to go on this duty for, the first time. The detail, in command of a sergeant, marched out at sundown and relieved the men who had been on the previous twenty-four hours. The old guard turned over its orders and at the same time reported having seen some armed “gugus” in the direction of the Mariquina River, whichran in front of the “lunette” about a thousand yards away, the intervening space being an open rice-field.
The old guard marched off and the new one on, throwing off their blanket-rolls and making themselves as comfortable for the night as possible. But two men at a time were required to remain awake and vigilant.
Night came on as black as the enemy they were fighting, and with it all the breath-stopping and hair-raising noises that the myriads of flying and crawling animals of that war-ridden country produces. There was the “vantriloquest” bird, gifted with a voice that is the essence of all that is frightful and hideous in sounds—forty demons running amuck and coming your direction.
In painful harmony was the low, deep tones the “chuck me,” whose vocal cords are tuned after the left end of the key-board of the pipe organ. Then there were slimy lizards, chameleons, tree-frogs, scorpions,and wonderful bugs, all with voices peculiar to their families. There were lightning-bugs as big as jack-o’-lanterns, and tarantulas with round and velvety bodies, and a spread of legs that would cover a frying-pan. All this and the known presence of a sneaking enemy was enough to test the nerves of veterans, so its effect on recruits can easily be imagined.
Timmons’ time to remain awake and go on post duty arrived. Jones, who called himself an old “vet,” because he had served in Cuba, went on with “Tim,” as his comrades called him. Their turn began at midnight. The Sergeant, who had posted them, was soon lying down taking a non-commissioned officer’s sleep—one eye closed, the other on thequi vive. Both sentries were on the alert. Many suspicious noises came to their ears, and imaginary murderous-looking “niggers” were seen lurking in the grass, behind rice-dykes, and lying crouching on theground. If “Tim” discovered something that he was certain was a death-dealing boloman, he would tiptoe over to Jones and hold a council of war. That worthy—the old “vet”—would dispense nerve-soothing whispers in his ears, and he would return to his post a less nervous “rookey.”
The time dragged wearily on, and finally arrived when they were about to be relieved. The blackest of the night was on. Jones left his post to arouse the Sergeant and acquaint that official with the hour. “Tim” was now alone. A slowly moving figure loomed up before him not fifty yards away. Then came the sounds of heavy tramping feet. The sounds were rapidly drawing nearer. There, before his dilated eyes, dimly outlined, and within pistol-shot, was the enemy in great numbers, who would soon close around the little garrison and murder them to a man. What should he do? His orders were strict about giving undue alarms, butif he wasted a moment longer, there would be no time for defense. If he left his post to arouse his comrades, the enemy would rush upon them. No. He would give the alarm by firing and one dead Filipino would be the result of it. He nervously raised his rifle, took deliberate aim at the advancing figures, and fired. There was a sickening thud, a heavy fall, and low, deep moans. The men were aroused and manned the fort. The Sergeant ordered a general fusillade. The regiment was in the trenches in a moment and remained there till dawn.
The first light of day revealed, lying in a great pool of his own blood, “Big Bill,” the bull buffalo that drew the headquarters water-cart, who had been out grazing that night.