Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1899-02-04
OF THE ARTILLERY.

ing IN Jne neaVy arLlleIy on AlCalra3
sland harbor of San Francisco, number
If years ago, was clever Englishman, sur
named St. Ronald on the muster rolls, but
known unto us of the command only as
Me Lud,'" said war department clerk
who put in a fve-year stretch in the ar
tillery branch. 1--WE didn't call him Me
Lud' because he was in anywise pompous
Or stuck up-that sort of thing doesn't 60
among the enlisted men of the American.
army-but because, although genial, amia-'
Bile, and corlling good fellow, st. Ronald
really had mighty fine manner about him,
and, when it came to pinch, he didn't
have to take any dust from any of the Off
GERS in courtliness and grace of personality.
St. Ronald was about q years old,
when he first joined the battery and he
was the very pink and picture of fine,
natural-born soldier. He had been fine
soldier before he ever broke into our outfit,
He had No. discharge, with extremely
complimentary remarks attached thereto,
from the cape mounted police of South
Africa, in which he had served three years
as sergeant, campaigning all the time.
Then he had No. l discharge from the
Canadian mounted police, in which he had
served for two years. So when he drifted
into our heavy artillery outfit he didn't
need to be told the difference between
cartridge belt and a fatigue cap. lie was
such crackaiack from the day that he got
among us that he was rated corporal and
then sergeant within three months, and
we were all glad of it, for he was way
ahead of the buck private class. | figured
St. Ronald out from the first us the bad lot
of good family, which, in fact, be was,
although he rarely spoke about his past
except to two or three of us who were very
chummy with him. He had his ups and
downs in our battery-got busted from ser.
geant to buck private, and put in 3O-day
trick in the guardhouse for trying to tear
San Francisco loose from its foundations,
then had to 60 up to his former noncom-
missioned rank again by slow stages, and in
general had the usual career OF an American
soldier who doesn't belong to the goody-
goody platoon. Whatever happened though,
Me Lud' was game for it, and he never
had kick coming and several times, when
some fellow in the battery got into gem
eral court-martial scrape, and was dishon-
orably discharged and turned adrift without
cent, with nothing but the uniforms to his
back, Me Lud' was the boy to turn in his
whole months pay to help the unfortunate
out, and to get the rest of us to do something
on the same general order.
"At another time when the old post ord
nance sergeant lost his wife and had not the
necessary funds to give the good woman the
burial to which the bereaved husband felt
she was entitled, Me Lud' goes into his
pocket for what was needed, not as loan
but as a gift, for the old sergeant was about
at the end of his days of active service, and
retired pay would never permit him to re-
| turn the amount unless at great sacrifice.
To the sergeant he said: Never mind about
giving it back, as l would have to spend it,
and spending it my way would mean being
busted" by the C. o. again, and l would
rather be discharged as a sergeant than as a
| private
"After doing his three years with the
| battery, st. Ronald took his discharge and
went over to San Francisco. He didn't tell
any of us what he was going to do, and he
only had about $25 or $50 when he was
paid off. A week after he LETT Alcqtraz a
| number of us went over to San Francisco
one night on leave. We were walking up
Kearney street, when we pushed into a
crowd surrounding d iakir. The fakir was
gotten up in stage ranchero style-velvet
| bell-bottom pants, with gold tinsel running
down the sides; velvet jacket loose, ruihed,
| spotlessly white shirt, and enormous white
| sombrero, with two or three heavy silver
cords running around it. The fakir was
| telling 'em OF some perpetuaily fragrant
| beans that he had discovered on a tour of
| South America. The beans were devised
to take the place OF sachet powders or Of
| liquid extracts, and the perfume-sGid the
fakir-never left them, lie certainly had
great spiel about those beans, and he sold
'em like hot cakes, at the rate OF so cents
for a paper bag holding about pint of
/ them. Me Lud,' the fakir, winked at us
solemnly when he saw us on the outer cir
Gle of the crowd, and we didn't have a
chance to talk with him for some time after
| ward. Then he told US that the beans he
was selling were the ordinary frijoles of
commerce, soaked over night in cheap toilet
water, and that he thought he had pretty
good thing, inasmuch as he was hauling
down profit of about $50 night.
"I didn't see any more of Me Lud' on the
coast after that. | came on to Washington
and entered the war department soon
afterward. 1 went out to the opening of the
worlds fair, and on my third tour around
the buildings / met up with Me LuG.' He
was the second man in charge of the exhibit
from Ceyon, and he looked out OF sight in
the makeup of Ceyon tea planter He was
prosperous and thoroughly in the game. lie
had quit San Francisco and gone to Ceylon
before the mast (after going broke on
'Frisco's 'Barbary coast') soon after left
the coast, and had put in the intervening
years az a timekeeper on a Cingaese teG
plantation. He was apparently pretty glad
to see me, 1 think; anyhow, know had 6
terrible headache when / woke up on the
morning after thus strangely running acros.
Me Lud' saw him number of time
] while was taking in the fair, and when
] left he told me he expected to go back Il
! Ceylon and finish the game of growing VI
with the island.
'I was leaning on the rail out at the Ben
ming race track on Thanksgiving Afternoon
, watching the horses parade on to the tract
for the Washington cup race when hearc
. voice behind me exclaim, in well-knowl
accent, I say, there, you soldier looke'
around, and there was Me Lud.' He wa
gotten up regardless, as they say, and h
was good deal the swellest looking ma
at the track. After he had collected hi
winnings on the big race, we got into hi
trnn and he droye me to n hotel that's no