The National tribune., 1899-06-29

drafted little rats were all over camp last
night, and into more kinds of devilment
about nothing else this morning"
why" said 81, y supposed that they
was too tired to do anything but lay down
and go to sleep, What'd they do?"
Better @s ask what gy they didn't do" replied
a passeI o. impish school boys could think
of, and what they couldn't think of them
smart Alecks down in the company put 'em
up to. I'm going to put some O them
smarties through course O. sprouts. l
enjoy joke with the next man, but there g
such a thing as being too funny. / think
few hours o extry fatigue duty will re-
duce their fever for fun"
why, what'd they do?" repeated ST.
"Well, in the first place, they got that
10 on their tents, and then put the same,
with their names, on d Sheet of paper, and
take it up to the Captains tent.
"The Captain was having a life-and-
death rasSle with Cap Summerville over
their eternal chess, when he's crosser'n two
you interrupt him. Hello, what do you
want? What's this?' says he, taking the
paper
says the brats, cool as cucumbers.
| Thought we ought to give 'em to you, so 8
y
wanted us in a hurry, say, at night
| 1.-The blaZeS it is says Cap, and Cap
Summerville roared. You get back to
your quarters quick as you can run. Don't
worry about my not finding you when
want you. It's my business to find you,
and I've got men to help me do it. I'll find
you sometimes in way that'll make your
hair stand up. Get out, now, and never
come around my tent with any such blamed
nonsense as that
of the break to snap up Caps queen, which
made him hotter'n ever.
when the boys got back they, found
them smart Alecks, Bob Walsh and Andy
Sweeney, waiting for 'em, and they con
so!ed 'em, saying, That's just the way
good advice from nobody about runnin' the
company. Thinks he knows it all. You
see how he runs the company. He haint
got the addresses O. half his men this
minnit, and don't know where they are
That's the reason so many O. our letters
from home, and the good things they send
us, never reach us. He ought to keep q
regler directory, same as in the other com
panies."
Then some o them smarties found out
that Scruggs was stuck on his spouting.
Seems that he was the star declaimer in his
school. They laid it in to him that was
soft on hearing poetry spouted, especially
after night, when the moon was up, and
everything quiet III camp, and that l was
particularly tender on 'Bingen on the
Rhine You know that if there is any
thing I'm dead sore on it's that sniveling
rot. There used to be pasty-faced boy in
school that'd wall that out, and set all the
girls to bawling. Then they gave us an
entertainment just before we left, and all
the girls Were there, and Pasty-Face he
out his condemned old There-w -was-a-sol-
dier-of-the ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Algiers,
and all the girls looked at us as if we were
already dead, and they'd better look out
for new beaux. My own particular geran-
ium did not lose any time, but married
another feler before we got to Stone River.
That made me hate the blasted caterwaul
worse'n ever. Then that white-eyed, moon
struck Alfonso used to be yowling it at
every chance, until he went to the hospital,
and he got all the rest SO that they were
ISputtering rags and tags Of it. But I've
been sorer than a bile on the condemned sick
calfishness ever since l brung my chum
jim Bridgewater Off the field at Chicka-
mauga, and watched him die rs the moon
rose, back there at Mcfarland Gap. Well,
|Scruggs with the idea that the best way to
make himself forever solid with me was
to stroll down close to my tent and casually
let off 'Bingen on the Rhine in his best
lstyle. I'd just got down to work on them
pesky pay.rolls, having, kept Monaghan
sure that he'd be sober enough to help me-
and you know Monaghan's lightning with
the pen when he's sober-when that pos
sessed sap-sucker Scruggs began blating
out 'Bingen on the Rhine till you could
hear him down to the Colonel's quarters.
It made me so mad that knocked over the
ink as | jumped up. and spoiled the tripli-
cate rolls that we'd got about half made
out. l snatched up club to simply mash
the bawling brat, but they got him away
before l could reach 'em. They explained
to Scruggs afterward that was subject to
ter, and they'd forgotten to look at the al