The Birmingham age-herald., 1906-10-28


 son had got so he knew enough to bend his legs when he wanted to sit down, but he showed about as much average. every- day horse sense as a cast-lron stove lid. "Moren all that he'd made up his mind that he hadn't ought to be soldier; that lhe was too scary. l remember once we was sittin' together one evening by the fire, and there came kind of funny double barrel cry like, off In the jungle a-ways. Ktson jer<ed up like he was stung.
 "'Hear that, Jarvey?' he says. Hear that? That ain't no wild beast he says. That's one O them little devil niggers'- that's what he always called em, little devil niggers.'
 "Tm skairt of 'em, Jarvey.' he says. I low they're goin to git me one O. these days
 q didn't know as much then as I do now, and kind O laughed at him. What you goin' to do when they git you, Kit son? I says.
 "'Who. me?' he says. I reckon I'll bout lay down an die, Jarvey. But I'll run like h-l before I'll let 'em git me-
 Well, it wasn't a great while after that fore we come up with that little bunch O Pujalanes and give 'em a good hot dose O the real goods You remem- Der 1t, for that's where you got that swipe in the ribs'
 'You bet your future mother-in-law l remember it. said the corporal, "how we got 'em cooped up in that blind alley, an they come at us like wildcats, tooth an toe nail. l never let on, Jarvey but l tell you now l was as near bein skairt par alyzed that time as I've ever been. Them little scoundrels looked U me like the devils own breed"
 Well, we dished 'em up proper" went on Jarvey. There wasn't more'n a dozen of fattn sYat af ttlnAff l,uI the U. S. brand on em, one place or an- other. Chislett was crazy. though. be- cause we let any of em git through us Kitson missed that scrap. bein' off with a detachment bringin up supplies.
 "They used to detail him for that be- cause the only time he d work like horse was when it come to brngin in viotuaIs Remember how he used to eat? Never got enough. Always hungry. Ate like four men and a boy. and within an hour was cinchin' up his belt and claim in he was weak with starvation"
 "Well. Chislett was maddern a scalped 1niun to think we hadn't rounded up that whole bunch and he was only watin till the detachment joined to start off red hot after that dozen or so that sliced their way through us. It was q case O cleanin up the province if we got that outfit, and Chislett promised us all kinds O meanness if We let 'em run over us again.
 We didn't think we'd done so bad Several of the boys had got cut up and we'd finished off the bulk of the gang; but Kola, the chief, and that cut-throat dozen had give us the slip and Chisett a long way from satisfied. It was up to us. and he let us understand he'd keep on the jump over those godfor- saken hills till we got 'em.
 That was gorgeous country. certain. it was built on a perpendicular bias. You crawled on your belly up one side of the landscape and wore out the seat O your trousers slidin down the other About the time we got to the place we aimed at the guides changed their minds and we back-trac cked cuSsin', to the place We started from.
 "The guides was the worst in creation. A deaf ana dumb man with sore eyes could "a beaten 'em to a froth.
 Well 1t come along one night in the dark O the moon. Wed fell over and gone to sleep soon as we'd had our pipes, for we were about done. Didn't seem to me I'd slept a minute when a sergeant woke me up by shakin me and told me not to make any noise. We got up and grabbed our Krags in a hurry, for weren't anxious to be rushed by them Indians while we were asleep.
 ''It turned out to be nothn' but the guides again. though, and in fifteen min utes we were stringin' off up the trail sin gle file through black dark. Couldn't see the man in front of you. and we had or ders to go quiet as we could.
 .'Wen, Kitson fell in down toward the tail end of the file. l got him to tell me all about it afterward Somehow or other he didn't keep up very close to his file man, and directly he car'e to a place