The times., 1898-06-04
OUR BOYS AT THE FRONT.
The District Guards Getting "a Taste
of Mnr.

of war
A call to war awakens and startIes the
country. The old militant spirit sung of
by the poets and historians Of the past
is found neither dead nor degenerate.
but TO exist in its full primal force, and
men and boys spring up by the thousand
anxious 10 try and to be tried
The sense of danger and adventure,
sharp and keenly fascinating as 1t is,
appeals to the most prosaic. The pros
pect of thirst, starvation and ceaseless
personal discomfort is not overlooked,
and when encountered is ready TO be
sauarely faced. Experience through war
seldom fails to work for good, 10 develop
men. The fact that sallow, pampered
puppets of the New York fashionables
have come 10 stand man to man with
cowboys, and are meeting things stall
wartIy. will result IN great and whole
some change for many of them.
There were certain officers in the Dis
trict National Guards who, when the flag
was presented 10 their regiment the last
day at Camp Alger, were moved more
genvinely. more profoundly than they had
ever beeu in their lives. There were boys
in Washington who could not rest, nor
eat nor sleep, until they enlisted as SOL
diers.
The examining surgeon said 10 one of
them. a slight, sick-looking fellow: Look
here. boy. you can't stand this-you IL dle
If you go inr'
Il will die if I stay out the boy re-
sponded simply and quietly
The surgeon looked at him. Il believe
Won will" he said slowly, and passed
him in ,
BILE Youngsters who ''ioined 20 have jolly
vacation and now they are having IL,
writes a disguised boy at Tampa, hard
tack fat pork and ALL" There were 9TH
ers who thought it would kill time, and
some with no motives at all, untroubled
by a spark of patriotism, who simply
followed the crowd" but the majority
of our District boys realized. na to It's
full extent perhaps, the Importance ana
significance of their step and got quite
worked up over the tune of Victory or
Death" The trouble was that movement
did not come quick enough for them, and
fire and glory went out of the atmosphere
with the blazing sun, the dirt, and the
| drill. drill, drill every other hour in the
| day. and the mess which killed Company
DIS fine pig. So for a space patriotism
dwindled and the boys sang at night, I'VE
| had a good home and we left it; what
made us such - big fools?'' And this
| pleased their mothers at home, and the
| fathers wrote to the boys, Il told you
| So
| Then, too, the tasks of war were far
| removed from the sublime. Six of Com
| pany HIS boys will not forget the igno-
minious watch they kept the last night
| In Camp Alger when they mounted guard
over the canteen till daybreak and paced
round and round the beer to keep the
| PENNSYLVANIA troopers away.
Down in Chickamauga, however, things
were a trifle more warlike. The rumor
| spread around that the place was ''jes
! chuck full of Spanish spies. that several
had been caught trying TO poison the
| little water there was and had been shot
| in consequence. The boys who mounted
| guard were urged to keep a special look
out for them In the day time this was
| easy enough to do, but when night came
| on and the ramparts left over from the
| civil war. shadowed with gigantic old can
non. Ioomed up black against the ghost
| like tents, and the rocks and cactii in the
District camp took on strange shapes and
stretched out prickly arms, and th'