The Opelousas courier., 1898-10-08
THE VETERANS STORY.
Tie Absolutely True Tale of How the Ser
qeaut Sent the News to the General.

Tie Absolutely True Tale of How the Ser
geant Sent the News to the General.
! The veteran, in the dingy uniform
hat might have been gray or blue,
VS. perhaps a shade indefinite rs to
wht}e he had experienced the stories
he Vn.s telling, but he was an inter-
esting Rld fellow, and hiaslisteneIs had
been relying .tt!6' ma mar war tales sent
by speciur' 0atsSeGGers to newspapers
to worry about tie details SO long as
the results were good. SO they filled
up the narratcr's beer mug and set
him going again.
'One of the oldest things" he said,
with the calm confidence of truth,
that l can remember happened to my
brother and nc, both Of us being MEM
bCrs of a battery. On Il occasion
we had been watching the enemy for
ing a river until our reinforcemcnts
had got up, but the rains had set in
and the men couldn't move, and we
were pretty sure that the enemy was
up to some dodge Or other that was
going to wipe us off the face of the
earth, for he had ten times as many
men and guns as we had to meet him
with. OF course, that made the COM
handing officers dead blue, and they
offered all sorts of Inducements for
some Of our fellows to so over and
find out what was UP. l suppose a
dozen or more went, to ten times that
many who volunteered to go, but none
came back, and we wasn't any better
off than We We're before.
Zone morning l told the General that
my brother and me had a scheme to
get the Information he wanted, and il
he would agree to promote Us both if
got it, we'd try for it. He mighty
near agreed to make Brigadiers Of us.
but we compromised on sergcaEtS, and
my brother left for the other side, af-
ter telling me goodbye. For two days
we did not hear from him, and on the
third the enemy got q 12-pound gun
into a position the battery l was with
had been fighting him away from for
IL "tCN, iuu 1 SCI u luS I4oII liiC
Major, but l never said q word. Nei-
did the General; and my poor
brother-nobody knew where he was.
"Strange to say, our battery didn't
open up on the enemy, either, in his
position. and the officers began
to look worried, waiting to hear from
the General in command. About 10
in the morning the encmy's
gun let loose with a roar that tore the
ground up, and Il shell that looked to
as big as a barrel come flying
across the river and hit in a sand pile
IN the rear of our battery. In a min
ute l had broke for that sand pile and
was scratching like a dog at a rabbit
hole, and pretty soon I come out with
The shell in MY arms and was cutting
across lots fer the Generals tent.
Il never stopped to ask any ques-
ions of the folks at our battery, but
to the General as soon as l could,
md rushing right into his tent, /
dropped that hot shell into a bucket
If water and out again, and let into
he vent of it with a Ratchet. Well,
% make a long story short, on the in
side Of the shell where the blow-uD
stuff usually it was a communication
rom my brother signed Sergeant John
Smith, giving the General the very
Kind of information he was crazy to
lit hold of, and it fixed him so that he
Knocked the enemy galley west in no
line. My brother had got onto it easy
for it wasn't such a great
'ecret over there what they was going
do. They only trouble was we
hadn't been able to git back with it
When our men went over after it. My
got onto Il plan, though, by
it into the shell and firing it
rom the gun in the position he had
,ot for it, when the enemy couldn't
ave done it in 4 month. That was
he scheme we worked, and my broth
r, being a fine gunner, had no trouble
in with the artillery company,
specially when he went to the officers
With a story about how he could get
he gun in the position that they had
cen trying so long to get and couldn't,
wing to our battery on the other bank
f the river. He was a great strate-
list, was my brother.
NO" sighed the veteran, she never
ot his promotion, though l did mine,
$ the General said l should. NV
rother was killed at the battery he
red the shell from, and by the guns
f his own friends. Just as like as not
done it myself, but that is war;
The Origin of X-Ray.
Professor Rontgen came upon hIs