Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1916-08-27
OFFICERS WANT
QUARTERS FOR
THEIR WIVES
North Dakota Guardsmen Pre-
pairing for Long Service on
Border. .. .
OUR BOYS PREPARE
FOR PATROL DUTY
Large Quantities of Ammunition
Has Been Issued to First
Regiment.
By EWING LEWIS.

Mercedes, Texas, Aug. 26.-bls-
marck soldiers were carrying big
chests of ammunition down the sun
baked company street today. Ammu-
milton has been issued to all the COM
panies of the regiment. With the
movement of regulars and Texas
guards, relieved from patrol work at
many points along the Rio Grande,
and of Nebraska and Indiana guards
who will take their places, the be-
lief that real work awaits them has
filled the hearts of the North Dakot-
ans, and they are cheerful regi'
ment.
Long Stay.
They are also becoming convinced
that they are not on the border for
a month or two of training, but for
a long stay. A number of officers
make arrangements for their families
to join them in Mercedes, to spend
the winter here if the regiment is
stationed in Mercedes that long.
Houses are hard to get With 1900
soldiers at Llano Grande, three miles
away, and no habitations there but
tents, shelter in Mercedes is at a.
premium. A Western Union operator.
sent here from Dallas, yesterday paid
$25 for a single room for himself and
his wife. for q month. He had rented
his Dallas bungalow, furnished, for
here. Officers are paying similar
rents for rooms. In number of
cases three or four officers have pool
cd their money, rented a furnished
house, and sent for their families.
There is not a vacant house, in re-
pair, to be had in Mercedes.
~, -. Making Money.
Nearly everybody in Mercedes, in
cluding the women and children, is
busy making money, and no doubt the
fever will claim a number of North
Dakota families when they arrive. OF
course the Mercedes folk won't let
them in on the ground floor. They
consider the troops from the north
are Providence's gift to them, and
they get up early to fight for their
share of the mama. But there are
money-making opportunities for stran-
gers too. Skillful seamstresses are
in demand. All the big camps have
sweet teeth that are never satisfied.
know Mercedes woman who each
Saturday bakes an oven full of white
icing cakes, each subscribed for by
a hungry officer. If she should ever
fail to do her Saturday baking, I be-
lieve they would haul her before a
court martial.
"kids Busy Too.
It's question whether the Merce-
des children can be persuaded to go
to school when classes are opened
next month. Almost every youngster
over four years of age is making
money. There are drivers of ''two-
bitneys" not twelve years old. Boys
tend soda fountains, sell candy, pa
pers, magazines and Mexican souve-
Mrs. They collect laundry and dis
tribute it. l think they would guide
you into Mexico and introduce you
to Villa if you offered them money
to do it. Some of the little bootblacks
are making $3.50 a day. Augustine
a ten-year-old Mexican, tells me he
has saved $40 since the soldiers came.
He makes enough in three days to
pay the rent Of the family home for
a month.
The Golden Egg.
With the high school being used as
the North Dakota field hospital, it's
question whether pupils or patients
Probably the school trustees think
they should get their bite of the gold
en- egg which the American eagle laid
in the lower valley of the Rio Grande.
With a climate like this, I should
think an outdoors school would be
pleasant enough. Latin and history
could be studied under the palms and
the algebra boards planted in the
grass. But, at present, the young
sters of Mercedes never think of
classes. They are too busy accumu.
lating dimes.
Soldiers throng the little Catholic
church in Mercedes each Sunday
morning. Father Henri Janvier, the
little priest of the mission, radiates
the sunniest good will, the mellowest
happiness. Most of the North Da-
kotans who visited his little church
the first Sunday after their arrival
on the border mistook Father Janvier's
dark skin and his accent for Spanish.
He is French, and his kin are fighting
across the Atlantic. His sister-in-