News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1893-09-14

Over the eastward bluffs, cold and
gray, the morning light had slowly crept
to the zenith Over the sky was spread
one limitless pail of cloud, cheerless and
repellent-a pail so dense that not one
friendly star had peeped, not one rift of
sunshine now could force its way. All
below, bleak, frowning and sullen, q
bare and blasted Landscapes; low hills
and ridges east and west, low lying shall
low and swale between, cheerless, tree
less, shrubless, not even veil of snow
to hide its nakedness, to lend one pity
ing touch to break the dull, dead monot-
ony of its wintry desolation; sweeps
and slopes rolling away unbroken to the
frowning horizon at the west, sterner,
harsher lines among the bluffs across
the tortuous stream bed, between whose
ragged banks an icy, lonely and dismal
rivulet is curdling now, spreading out
into frozen shadows at the flats, moan
ing and complaining around its warped
and sudden bends, desolate as the sur
rounding desolation, deserted as the
Dead sea, its banks repellent even to
such sharers of Dakota solitudes as the
coyote and the cottonwood, Stunned of
man or beast or tree-a stream of silence
and gloom at the dawn of this December
day, and so cherries is its every sur
rounding, so appalling the unnatural
hush, that one would never dream of
life upon it's blasted banks.
Yet, listen! Unseen, but dominant.
the sun has risen above the eastern hills,
and. as the light broadens even where it
cannot warm, there floats upon the air
from far away at the southwest, faint
and clear, cavalry trumpet call; soft
at first, then crescspdo, it ceases sud
denly in shrin |Tfote. IL thrills
through and through rare atmosphere
unruffied by the feeting wing of har-
diest bird. Like the wistful call of scat
tered quail it seems to say, Where are
your And prompt, expectant of the
coming of faithful mate, listen againi
From the dim recesses to the north,
somewhere among these bare and des-
olate slopes, the answer rises, quick,
ringing, even imperative, and the signal
reads, "'This way"
Cropping through the bitter darkness
of the December night cavalry column
has sought and, just at the opening Of
this cherries December day, has found
its mate. The comrade battalions of
the Twelfth are within hail
"ForwardI' rings the signal from the
southwest. Forward with them, then,
around that point at the low bluff to our
front, and in the ghostly, gathering
light the scene is before us, the tale is
almost told.
There, thickly dotting the prairie and
covering the low ground, it's wigwams
smoke begrimed and dingy, lies an In
dian encampment; but even in such
shelter as this the hostile horde has
Jared far better than they who through
the long, freezing night have kept watch
and ward lest again the wary chief
should slip through the meshes. 1t has
come at last. The big warriors fanat-
ical braves have made their rush, Ber
riens men the tackle. Back flew the
signal with the setting sun. Up through
the night came Farquhar with "the
guards"
Here in front the four old troops we
know so we'll have shivered for hours
dDOuI Iuo NllIdSe. 1eIe, dlCiO anu uS-
termined. Rolfe and Hazlett, Thorpe and
Gorham, have clung to front, flank and
rear, well knowing that so soon as the
colonel got the news he would not only
speed the second battalion on its way,
but, gathering any other forces he could
find, would ride the long night through.
if need were, to join his men.
Stern and silent Rolfe is standing at
the bank of the stream, wearied enough,
yet certain that there is no rest before
them. On him as senior the command
has devolved in the absence of the be-
loved major now being tenderly nursed