The San Francisco call., 1899-08-27

! that preceded them received all kinds
of welcomes, the real cheers were kept
for those who were to come. They
were long in coming, for far up the
street the crowds began to close in, and
the progress they made was slow and
| uncertain.
| The enthusiasm started over the
veterans of the Spanish war, the vete-
rams who were not attached to any par
ticular command and those who went
out from the State naval militia to
serve in the navy The veterans were
| headed by Charles Dutreaux, a naval
militiaman, who left the State organiz-
ation to become seaman on the Olym-
| pia. He was with her during the bat
| tie of Manila. Just behind marched
some of the men who were in the tug
! fleet here, and then came the veteran
soldiers. 1t did not take the crowd long
to find out who was passing, and the
people gave cheers enough to wake
themselves up and make ready for
what was coming.
| What was coming were mostly police
waving whips, aids with bedraggled
sashes and hoarse voices, patrol wag
onS with bells changing and cavalrymen
and Signal Corps men beating back the
advancing crowds with the fiat of their
| sabers What the crowd didn't know
about the parade would fill a respect
able column, but they did know that
! last of all would come the California
men, and that just before would come
the other veterans. AS a consequence,
when it neared the end, there was no
controlling the people. They rushed
out from the sidewalk and the column
dwindled from company front to col
umn of fours and then to column of
twos and even to single file. 1t was be-
cause of no desire on the part of the
people to break up the parade. They
didn't want any one else to get in ahead
of them, so every one rushed for a posi-
ton in front and there was no room
left for the troops.
Along Van Ness avenue 1t was hard
marching, but when the column of vol
unteers neared Market street it was "a
days work to go block. When half
past 10 arrived, when the boys were ex-
pected to have passed down to the
ferry back again and over Montgom-
cry and Kearny streets, and then on
out Market again, to be reviewed at
City Hall avenue, it was still trying,
with the aid of half the police force, to
make headway down the first block on
Market street.
And even the upper end of Market
street was not SO bad as down below
Eighth, where the strings of lamps end
ed. Below that it was every man for
himself and dodge the flying clubs if
he happened to be out of uniform. 1t
was a bowling, struggling, sweltering
mass of humanity, packed closely as
hay in bale and with the best of
good nature, trying to jockey each
other out of places on the curb or next
the tight-stretched ropes. The air was
full of cheers, and exploding powder,
and rockets and red fire, with it's ac-
companying sulphurous smoke. Roman
candles were let off into the crowd,
with not murmur from those who
caught the sparks; rockets showered
ribbons of fire in among the people, and
heads ducked now and then to dodge
bomb wavering in it's flight. But no
one cared and no one complained; they
only crushed closer, guyed the police
man nearest and waited for chance
to make another inch toward where the
men were passing.
! The California men marched as best
they could, but there was that about
their line which perhaps escaped the
ones who yelled the loudest or howled
the longest. To many the struggling
| line of old men who marched by the
side of the boys We're enthusiasts who
had dropped into the column to follow
along, but to those who knew it was
one Of the prettiest elements of the pa
rade. They were the veterans of the
Civil War-the members of the local
posts of the Grand Army, and it was
their line that was thrown around the
new veterans, coming home with new
stories, new glory, new honors. The
| grizzled old men could hardly stand
the strain of the hurried march. the
marrying of the crowd, the smoke, the
noise, the excitement, but they strug-
gled on until first one and then another
of the boys would give them a hand.
| in, ha ~