News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1902-06-04

of that six Hundred whom ! have
| personally met, yet | haven't been a
great traveller"
Perhaps" said |, Lord Cardigan
| didn't carefully count his men before
riding at the Russian guns, or perhaps
Tennyson took poetic license as TO
| number"
| Cloyne laughed as he tried pun.
Somebody somewhere has ventured
more lie than sense on the subject"
| / thought this was very cynical Of
Cloyne. OF course there are impostors
everywhere, but splendid, straight
manly looking fellows like our own
regiments share of the six Hundred
could not be suspected of anything I'M
fair or pretentious. They were superb
| ly cool and composed, as great soldiers
always are, and neither of them seem
ed to take ordinary interest in any
one around him until l CHANGED 70
mention one of them to the other. re
my great surprise, they were not even
acquaintances. This fact or some
other seemed to surprise the one
| spoke to, and when l brought them to-
| gether and introduced them they did
not look and act at all as | imagined
old comrades in a historic battle would.
Thinking perhaps they preferred to re-
view old associations in private, | left
them, after which they began to chat
! quite freely, and when next | met one
of them he told me they had identified
each other at last, and glad they were
to find they were old friends. 1t was
| a long time before | could get Cloyne
to take the slightest interest in them,
| but he finally eyed them, first careless
| ly, then curiously. Later | saw him
| in earnest conversation with one of
| them, and when | joked with him
| about it he put on a queer smile and
patted ne on the shoulder in patron
| izing manner that eXasperated me.
Our reception at the camp of the
| Thirty-eighth was not what | had eX-
| pected. The veterans of the regiment
| did not turn out to cheer the brave
| youths who had come to help them
| put down the rebellion. They did not
even offer us something to eat, al
though it was long after breakfast
! time and our haversacks had been
empty since the night before. A few
sauntered over to the adjutant's tent,
to which we had been marched, and
| looked at us as if in search of familiar
| faces, but no one took special interest
in us except the orderly sergeants of
| the various companies, whom the adj
| jutant'had the sergeant major summon
by bugle call. The company in which
we had enlisted had not yet been
organized, so we were allotted TEN.
| porarily among the older companies,
| and the orderly sergeants swore fright
| fully, as they marched us off, at the
trouble they would have to squeeze an
| extra man or two into every tent of a
| lot already we'll filled. The men in the
| tents did not do much to make US feel
| at home, although one or two put on
some appearance of friendliness as
they asked US if we had brought down
anything in pocket TASKS.
We SWnmerton boys were not made
any more comfortable by being sep
| arated, as we CHANGED to be. No three
of us were assigned to the same COM
pany, much less to the same tent.
There seemed nothing for us to do or
see either, for no drill was ordered
during the morning. Before dinner
| cali was sounded | had lost ali inter-
est In the service and the war. | could
think of nothing but our farm at Sum-
merton and the people who occupied
it. My father had promised to visit
me in camp before winter if the au-
thorities would permit How l hoped
he would not do it! should have been
glad to have him see the camp of the
Ninety ninth, but the cavalry camp
was very different. There seemed no
end of detached tents and huts, with
no particular purpose that | could dis
cover. Nothing was as had expected.
After dinner we boys had an oppor-
tunity to see each other again. We
enjoyed the meeting, but not its pur-
pose, for each new recruit was given a
shovel and set to digging post holes
and bitches for some new stables that
were to be built. could have had
plenty Of digging without coming sew
eral hundred miles from home, for my
father had long intended to set a new
fence. An eXcItable young French
man among the recruits seemed some
what Of my way of thinking, for he
suddenly'dropped his shovel and shout
ed; ~ss.s7~,.. -...-.,rt
q viii not dig re hole! 1 enlist for
la gloire, not for dirty worls like zis"
"Ah, you wants glory, eh?" said the
German Sergeant who seemed engineer
III Chief, Den better it is you go back
to your own country, we're dey amt
g6t no sense" ,~.s,. --s7,--7---if7F
The Frenchman said something be-
tween his teeth and thrust out his fist.
The sergeant collared tie Frenchman
and kicked him all the way to the
guardhousc. There were no protests
after that. Post holes and bitches in
creased rapidly, and l was somewhat
astonished to discover that the short
ditch dug by Phil Hamilton was the
most shapely of the lot
We Racruits. got some comfort after