Evening star., 1916-07-22
THE SURVEYOR.

| matter to the camps today for the men
! and promised to have another lot ready
for distribution in few days. He has
| had considerable experience as Y. M
| c. A. worker among soldiers. Recently
| he went from the international border
south as far as the head of Gen. Per
shings column He rode in an army
| motor truck and carried about two tons
| of reading matter along with him Tor the
soldiers. On the truck with him were Two
drivers and another soldier. Every one
in the party was armed. full army equip
ment having been issued to MI carter
before he started into Mexico. His trip
to Gen Pershing's advance column and
return amounted to about 900 miles
Percy, the pet prairie boomer OF
erous a supply of lizards brought about
his end A pet rabbit belonging to the
company also has passed to the great
beyond. but this does not mean that
the command is without mascot, for
its airedale is still on the job, and the
company recently has come into the
possession of twenty-one horned toads.
The manner in which the latter were
acquired follows:
Private Frank J. Kotrba of the field
hospital unit prior to being ordered
into service was employed in the de-
partments of anthropology and zoology
of the National Museum in Washington.
He is well versed in zoology and
knows all kinds of crawling things by
their first names.
Carries Toads to Camps.
Kotrba set about to get horned
toad as a mascot for his. company,
and after a few hours search the other
day he was rewarded for his effort by
running across three of them He
picked them up in a fearless manner
and brought them back to camp.
box with top of fly screen was pro-
vided for them and then came the mat
ter of selecting names, for camp mas
Dick and Harry seemed to be the
three most popular names. and with
due ceremony the toads were named
accordingly.
Sunday morning when kotrba went
to the cage to give his pets their daily
supply of flies he was astonished to
find eighteen little horned toads rum
ming about. They were about the size
of a dime and about four times as
thick. All three of the adult toads
appeared to take a motherly interest
in the new arrivals.
Kotrba has been forced to find new
names for his pets. Tom. Dick and
Harry are totally inadequate. Mary.
Jane and Alice have been selected in
their stead.
Gets Men Out of Tents.
Top Sergt. Johnson of the Signal
Corps has struck upon fine scheme for
getting the men out of their tents in
the morning when assembly is sounded.
He has made a rule that the section
which is last in forming will receive an
extra trick of duty to perform as pun
ishment for it's tardiness.
AS the result of this rule Sergt. John
son is getting his sections in line these
mornings in readiness for setting-up
exercises in record-breaking time. The
first morning it was put into effect the
men came out of their tents as if shot
from a cannon. So eager were the oc-
cupants of one tent to get into line that
two of their number collided at the en-
trance and went sprawling into the
company street.
The fourth section was the first
group of men to feel the effect of this
rule. One of their number was slow in
dressing and the whole section had to
suffer as the result. The extra work
consisted in digging a deep trench in
which to build an incinerator for burn
ing garbage. The tardy member Of
section four was a very unpopular COM
rade the remainder of the day.
Wood Supply a Problem.
Cutting two logs of hard oak wood
into stove length is the task assigned to
each member of the kitchen detail
every day. Obtaining supply of fire
wood is one of the problems here at the
camp. There is no wood of burning
size for many miles around, and all the
wood that is used in this section has to
be hauled a great distance by train 1t
sells for SIS to $50 cord.
Members of the Signal Corps are put
ting the grand stand and bleachers in
the Warren base bali park to a new
use, while one militiaman takes his
position in the pitchers box and sends
wig-wag and semaphore messages to
his comrades, who take seats in the
stands.
PRINCE FELIX FOR SHORT.