Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1891-03-14

the pdTtor door.
There were sore hearts at RYAN in the
week that followed As had long been
anticipated, orders came for the sum-
mer practice march to the Indian terri
tory, and the Eleventh-band and all
had logged away, leaving Maj. Kenyon
to command the post, with his little bat
talon of infantry to guard it. The
orders were received two days after
Welsh's enlivening tour Of guard
duty. The command was to march
in forty-eight hours. equipped for
field service. and Lieut. Hearn. with
the other troop commanders, was
occupied every instant in getting
his horses and men in thorough
shape. Kenyon and Lane, after consulta-
ton among some of his friends, had in
duced the young fellow to promise not
to open ono of the marked copies of the
newspapers which now began to crowd
in with every mail, but to leave them
all to be considered by the little council
of three, IN whose hands he had been
persuaded to rest his case.
He had written q full denial of The
Palladium scanlalous statements with
regard to his financial cntanglenents,
and q full description, as has already
been told, OF the original trouble at the
traders store with Private Welsh.
These had both been handed to Col
Morris in his Office. 10 one had heard
from Lawler. No one knew Just exactly
what disposition the colonel had made
of these papers. Mr.. Abrams, too, had
disappeared the day after Welshs tour
of guard duty; but The whole garrison
now was flooded with newspapers by the
hundred. 1t would seem as if the guild
of the western press had resolved ON a
sudden and simultaneous assault on the
army in general, and as if Fort Ryan was
the vortex Of the storm. Sensational
dispatches We're published from various
quarters. Other journals, envious of
The Palladiun's exploit, unearthed other
victims, long since out of the army for
general worthlessness, and with flaming
head lines displayed to sympathizing
public the tale of official abuse and
tyranny which had compelled these sew
eral gallant and patriotic sons of Amer
lea to quit the service they were so well
fitted to adorn.
Dozens of tramps and tatterdenaions
reaped sudden and unexpected harvest
of eleemosynary quarters and lunches
from gaping audiences in the beer sa-
looms by detailing individual experiences
of their own when serving Under Lieut..
This or That in the Eleventh horse or
the Thirty-third foot. Dozens of Nun
chausens Wore the reporters pencils
down to the wood with details of their
narrowing sufferings. Then the edito-
rails began, and gravely lectured the
people on the wrongs OF the whole, sys-
tern-the unrepublican character of an
army anyhow, the repugnance in the
American mind to all idea of discipline.
Meantime Of course The Palladium was
firing hot shot by the ton, and new SO
called scandals at Eyan, fresh outrages
on the helpless and downtrodden SOL
diery We're the subjects of Mr.. Abrams
iurid delineations, until it was to be
wondered at that in their wrath the of
Tended public did not wipe the foul blot
ON their civilization from the face of the
earth.
1t was on Friday evening that in an
swer to certain dispatches he had been
firing 1T department headquarters, Col.
Morris received 4 message that at least
put him out of uncertainty. That day
The Palladium had outdone itself, and
no one not conversant with the illimit-
able faculties of the paid correspondent
can begin to imagine the heroic size at
tanned in its columns by the incident
briefly sketched in the last chapter:
Continued Persecution of Trooper
Welsh! Heaped Up Humiliations ON
His Head! Forced to Show Slavish
Homage to His Insulter! Helpless
Wrath of Comrades!" etc. The details
Of the incident, as told by the special
correspondent, lost nothing of sensation
ahsm, and Lieut.. Lewis came in now for
his share of obloquy. Poor Welsh was
represented as having been marched out,
and with brutal curses compelled to
salute Lieut.. Hearn, despite the fact
that he, as member of the guard, was by
law and regulations exempted from the
requirement. In vain did the young
| soldier plead that paragraph 301 of the
regulations fully excused him. His re-
lentless prosecutors de6ea the laws Of
congress, and compelled him TO stand
and deliver for the purpose of adding to
the indignities already heaped upon him.
Could the readers of The Palladium have
heard the low, deep mutterings of tho
men in the garrison this night no mu-
Tiny on their part need have surprised
| them"
The editor, too, backed up his CORE
spondent in three-quarter column as
sault on the ridiculous etiquette of the