Tenting on the Plains Part 16

While the officers and men with us were working with all their might to save lives and property, the little post was beleaguered. The flood came so unexpectedly that the first known of it was the breaking in of the doors of the quarters. The poorly built, leaky, insecure adobe houses had been heretofore a protection, but the freshet filled them almost instantly with water. The quarters of the laundresses were especially endangered, being on even lower ground than the officers' houses. The women were hurried out in their night-dresses, clasping their crying children, while they ran to places pointed out by the officers, to await orders. Even then, one of our Seventh Cavalry officers, who happened to be temporarily at the garrison, clambered up to the roof of an adobe house to discover whether the women of his regiment were in peril. The same plan for rescue was adopted at the post that had been partly successful above. A ferry was improvised out of a wagon-bed, and into this were collected the women and children. The post was thus emptied in time to prevent loss of life. First the women, then the sick from the hospital, and finally the drunken men; for the hospital liquor was broken into, and it takes but a short time to make a soldier helplessly drunk. The Government property had to be temporarily abandoned, and a great deal was destroyed or swept away by the water. It was well that the camp women were inured to hardship, for the condition in which the cold, wet, frightened creatures landed, without any protection from the storm, on the opposite bank, was pitiful. One laundress had no screams of terror or groans of suffering over physical fright; her wails were loud and continuous because her savings had been left in the quarters, and facing death in that frail box, as she was pulled through the turbid flood, was nothing to the pecuniary loss. It was all the men could do to keep her from springing into the wagon-bed to return and search for her money.

On still another branch of Big Creek there was another body of men wrestling with wind and wave. Several companies, marching to New Mexico, had encamped for the night, and the freshet came as suddenly upon them as upon all of us. The colonel in command had to seize his wife, and wade up to his arms in carrying her to a safe place. Even then, they were warned that the safety was but temporary. The ambulance was harnessed up, and they drove through water that almost swept them away, before they reached higher ground. There was a strange coincidence about the death, eventually, of this officer's wife. A year afterward they were encamped on a Texas stream, with similar high banks, betokening freshets, and the waters rose suddenly, compelling them to take flight in the ambulance again; but this time the wagon was overturned by the current, and the poor woman was drowned.

When the day dawned, we were surrounded by water, and the havoc about us was dreadful. But what a relief it was to have the rain cease, and feel the comfort of daylight! Eliza broke up her bunk to make a fire, and we had breakfast for everybody, owing to her self-sacrifice! The water began to subside, and the place looked like a vast laundry. All the camp was flying with blankets, bedding and clothes. We were drenched, of course, having no dry shoes even, to replace those in which we had raced about in the mud during the night. But these were small inconveniences, compared with the agony of terror that the night had brought. As the morning advanced, and the stream fell constantly, we were horrified by the sight of a soldier, swollen beyond all recognition, whose drowned body was imbedded in the side of the bank, where no one could reach it, and where we could not escape the sight of it. He was one who had implored us to save him, and our failure to do so seemed even more terrible than the night before, as we could not keep our fascinated gaze from the stiffened arm that seemed to have been stretched out entreatingly.

Though we were thankful for our deliverance, the day was a depressing one, for the horror of the drowning men near us could not be put out of our minds. As night came on again, the clouds began to look ominous; it was murky, and it rained a little.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A BUFFALO UNDECIDED AS TO AN ATTACK ON GENERAL CUSTER.]

At dark word came from the fort, to which some of the officers had returned, that we must attempt to get to the high ground, as the main stream, Big Creek, was again rising. All the officers were alarmed. They kept measuring the advance of the stream themselves, and guards were stationed at intervals, to note the rise of the water and report its progress. The torch-lights they held were like tiny fire-flies, so dark was the night. An ambulance was driven to our tent to make the attempt to cross the water, which had abated there slightly, and, if possible, to reach the divide beyond. One of the officers went in advance, on horseback, to try the depth of the water. It was a failure, and the others forbade our going, thinking it would be suicidal. While they were arguing, Diana and I were wrapping ourselves in what outside garments we had in the tent. She had been plucky through the terrible night, writing next morning to the General that she never wished herself for one moment at home, and that even with such a fright she could never repay us for bringing her out to a life she liked so much. Yet as we tremblingly put on our outside things, she began to be agitated over a subject so ridiculous in such a solemn and dangerous hour, that I could not keep my face from what might have been a smile under less serious circ.u.mstances.

Her trepidation was about her clothes. She asked me anxiously what she should do for dresses next day, and insisted that she must take her small trunk. In vain I argued that we had nowhere to go. We could but sit in the ambulance till dawn, even if we were fortunate enough to escape to the bluff. She still persisted, saying, "What if we should reach a fort, and I was obliged to appear in the gown I now wear?" I asked her to remember that the next fort was eighty miles distant, with enough water between it and us to float a ship, not to mention roving bands of Indians lying in wait; but this by no means quieted her solicitude about her appearance. At last I suggested her putting on three dresses, one over the other, and then taking, in the little trunk from which she could not part, the most necessary garments and gowns.

When I went out to get into the wagon, after the other officers had left, and found our one escort determined still to venture, I was obliged to explain that Diana could not make up her mind to part with her trunk. He was astounded that at such an hour, in such a dangerous situation, clothes should ever enter anyone's head. But the trunk appeared at the entrance of the tent, to verify my words. He argued that with a wagon loaded with several people, it would be perilous to add unnecessary weight in driving through such ground. Then, with all his chivalry, working night and day to help us, there came an instant when he could no longer do justice to the occasion in our presence; so he stalked off to one side, and what he said to himself was lost in the growl of the thunder.

The trunk was secured in the ambulance, and Diana, Eliza and I followed.

There we sat, getting wetter, more frightened and less plucky as the time rolled on. Again were we forbidden to attempt this mode of escape, and condemned to return to the tent, which was vibrating in the wind and menacing a downfall. No woman ever wished more ardently for a brown-stone front than I longed for a dug-out. Any hole in the side of a bank would have been a palace to me, living as I did in momentary expectation of no covering at all. The rarest, most valuable of homes meant to me something that could not blow away. Those women who take refuge in these days in their cyclone cellar--now the popular architecture of the West--will know well how comforting it is to possess something that cannot be readily lifted up and deposited in a neighboring county.

With the approach of midnight, there was again an abatement in the rain, and the water of the stream ceased to creep toward us; so the officers, gaining some confidence in its final subsidence, again left us to go to their tents. For three days the clouds and thunder threatened, but at last the sun appeared. In a letter to my husband, dated June 9, 1867, I wrote: "When the sun came out yesterday, we could almost have worshipped it, like the heathen. We have had some dreadful days, and had not all the officers been so kind to us, I do not know how we could have endured what we have. Even some whom we do not know have shown the greatest solicitude in our behalf. We are drenching wet still, and everything we have is soggy with moisture. Last evening, after two sleepless nights, Mrs. Gibbs and her two boys, Alphie and Blair, Diana and I, were driven across the plain, from which the water is fast disappearing, to the coveted divide beyond. It is not much higher, as you know, than the spot where our tents are; but it looked like a mountain, as we watched it, while the water rose all around us. Some of the officers had tents pitched there, and we women were given the Sibley tent with the floor, that sheltered me in the other storm. We dropped down in heaps, we were so exhausted for want of sleep, and it was such a relief to know that at last the water could not reach us." The letter (continued from day to day, as no scouts were sent out) described the moving of the camp to more secure ground. It was incessant motion, for no place was wholly satisfactory to the officers. I confessed that I was a good deal unnerved by the frights, that every sound startled me, and a shout from a soldier stopped my breathing almost, so afraid was I that it was the alarm of another freshet--while the clouds were never more closely watched than at that time.

A fresh trouble awaited me, for General Hanc.o.c.k came to camp from Harker, and brought bad news. The letter continues: "The dangers and terrors of the last few days are nothing, compared with the information that General Hanc.o.c.k brings. It came near being the last proverbial 'straw.' I was heart-sick, indeed, when I found that our schemes for being together soon were so ruthlessly crushed. General Hanc.o.c.k says that it looks as if you would be in the Department of the Platte for several months--at which he is justly indignant--but he is promised your return before the summer is ended. He thinks, that if I want to go so badly, I may manage to make you a flying visit up there; and this is all that keeps me up. The summer here, so far separated from you, seems to stretch out like an arid desert. If there were the faintest shadow of a chance that I would see you here again, I would not go, as we are ordered to. I will come back here again if I think there is the faintest prospect of seeing you. If you say so, I will go to Fort McPherson on the cars, if I get the ghost of an opportunity."

Eliza, in ending her recollections of the flood at Fort Hays, says, "Well, Miss Libbie, when the water rose so, and the men was a-drownin', I said to myself in the night, if G.o.d spared me, that would be the last of war for me; but when the waters went down and the sun came out, then we began to cheer each other up, and were willing to go right on from there, if we could, for we wanted to see the Ginnel so bad. But who would have thought that the stream would have risen around the little knoll as it did? The Ginnel thought he had fixed us so nice, and he had, Miss Libbie, for it was the knoll that saved us. The day the regiment left for Fort McPherson the Ginnel staid behind till dark, gettin'

everythin' in order to make you comfortable, and he left at 12 o'clock at night, with his escort, to join the troops. He'd rather ride ride all night than miss that much of his visit with you. Before he went, he came to my tent to say good-by. I stuck my hand out, and said, 'Ginnel, I don't like to see you goin' off in this wild country, at this hour of the night.' ... 'I have to go,' he says, 'wherever I'm called. Take care of Libbie, Eliza,' and puttin' spurs to his horse, off he rode.

Then I thought they'd certainly get him, ridin' right into the mouth of 'em. You know how plain the sound comes over the prairie, with nothin', no trees or anythin', to interfere. Well, in the night I was hearin'

_quare_ sounds. Some might have said they was buffalo, but on thy went, lumpety lump, lumpety lump, and they was Indians! Miss Libbie, sure as you're born, they was Indians gettin' out of the way, and, oh! I was so scart for the Ginnel."

CHAPTER XVIII.

ORDERED BACK TO FORT HARKER.

AFTER the high-water experience, our things were scarcely dry before I found, for the second time, what it was to be under the complete subjection of military rule. The fiat was issued that we women must depart from camp and return to garrison, as it was considered unsafe for us to remain. It was an intense disappointment; for though Fort Hays and our camp were more than dreary after the ravages of the storm, to leave there meant cutting myself off from any other chance that might come in my way of joining my husband, or of seeing him at our camp. Two of the officers and an escort of ten mounted men, going to Fort Harker on duty, accompanied our little cortege of departing women. At the first stage-station the soldiers all dismounted as we halted, and managed by some pretext to get into the dug-out and buy whiskey. Not long after we were again _en route_ I saw one of the men reel on his saddle, and he was lifted into the wagon that carried forage for the mules and horses.

One by one, all were finally dumped into the wagons by the teamsters, who fortunately were sober, and the troopers' horses were tied behind the vehicles, and we found ourselves without an escort. Plains whiskey is usually very rapid in its effect, but the stage-station liquor was concocted from drugs that had power to lay out even a hard-drinking old cavalryman like a dead person in what seemed no time at all. Eliza said "they only needed to smell it, 'twas so deadly poison." A barrel of tolerably good whiskey sent from the States was, by the addition of drugs, made into several barrels after it reached the Plains.

The hours of that march seemed endless. We were helpless, and knew that we were going over ground that was hotly contested by the red man. We rose gradually to the summit of each divide, and looked with anxious eyes into every depression; but we were no sooner relieved to find it safe, than my terrors began as to what the next might reveal. When we came upon an occasional ravine, it represented to my frightened soul any number of Indians in ambush.

In that country the air is so clear that every object on the brow of a small ascent of ground is silhouetted against the deep blue of the sky.

The Indians place little heaps of stones on these slight eminences, and lurk behind them to watch the approach of troops. Every little pile of rocks seemed, to my strained eyes, to hide the head of a savage. They even appeared to move, and this effect was heightened by the waves of heat that hover over the surface of the earth under that blazing sun. I was thoroughly frightened, doubtless made much more so because I had nothing else to think of, as the end of the journey would not mean for me what the termination of ever so dangerous a march would have been in the other direction. Had I been going over such country to join my husband, the prospect would have put temporary courage into every nerve.

During the hours of daylight the vigilance of the officers was unceasing. They knew that one of the most hazardous days of their lives was upon them. They felt intensely the responsibility of the care of us; and I do not doubt, gallant as they were, that they mentally p.r.o.nounced anathemas upon officers who had wanted to see their wives so badly that they had let them come into such a country. When we had first gone over the route, however, its danger was not a circ.u.mstance to this time. Our eyes rarely left the horizon; they were strained to discern signs that had come to be familiar, even by our hearing them discussed so constantly; and we, still novices in the experience of that strange country, had seen for ourselves enough to prove that no vigilance was too great. If on the monotonous landscape a whirl of dust arose, instantly it was a matter of doubt whether it meant our foe or one of the strange eccentricities of that part of the world. The most peculiar communions are those that the clouds seem to have with the earth, which result in a cone of dust whirlpooling itself straight in the air, while the rest of the earth is apparently without commotion, bearing no relation to the funnel that seems to struggle upward and be dissolved into the pa.s.sing wind. With what intense concentration we watched to see it so disappear! If the puff of dust continued to spread, the light touching it into a deeper yellow, and finally revealing some darker shades, and at last shaping itself into dusky forms, we were in agony of suspense until the field-gla.s.ses proved that it was a herd of antelopes fleeing from our approach. There literally seemed to be not one inch of the way that the watchful eyes of the officers, the drivers, or we women were not strained to discover every object that specked the horizon or rose on the trail in front of us.

With all the terror and suspense of those dragging miles, I could not be insensible to the superb and riotous colors of the wild flowers that carpeted our way. It was the first time that I had ever been where the men could not be asked, and were not willing, to halt or let me stop and gather one of every kind. The gorgeousness of the reds and orange of those prairie blossoms was a surprise to me. I had not dreamed that the earth could so glow with rich tints. The spring rains had soaked the ground long enough to start into life the wonderful dyes that for a brief time emblazon the barren wilderness. The royal livery floats but a short period over their temporary domain, for the entire cessation of even the night dews, and the intensity of the scorching sun, shrivels the vivid, flaunting, feathery petals, and burns the venturesome roots down into the earth. What presuming things, to toss their pennants over so inhospitable a land! But what a boon to travelers like ourselves to see, for even the brief season, some tint besides the burnt umber and yellow ochre of those plains! All the short existence of these flowers is condensed into the color, tropical in richness; not one faint waft of perfume floated on the air about us. But it was all we ought to have asked, that their brilliant heads appear out of such soil. This has served to make me very appreciative of the rich exhalation of the Eastern gardens. I do not dare say what the first perfume of the honeysuckle is to me, each year now; nor would I infringe upon the few adjectives vouchsafed the use of a conventional Eastern woman when, as it happened this year, the orange blossoms, white jessamine and woodbine wafted their sweet breaths in my face as a welcome from one garden to which good fortune led me. I remember the starvation days of that odorless life, when, seeing rare colors, we instantly expected rich odors, but found them not, and I try to adapt myself to the customs of the country, and not rave, but, like the children, keep up a mighty thinking.

Buffalo, antelope, blacktail deer, coyote, jack-rabbits, scurried out of our way on that march, and we could not stop to follow. I was looking always for some new sight, and, after the relief that I felt when each object as we neared it turned out to be harmless, was anxious to see a drove of wild horses. There were still herds to be found between the Cimmaron and the Arkansas rivers. The General told me of seeing one of the herds on a march, spoke with great admiration and enthusiasm of the leader, and described him as splendid in carriage, and bearing his head in the proudest, loftiest manner as he led his followers. They were not large; they must have been the Spanish pony of Cortez' time, as we know that the horse is not indigenous to America. The flowing mane and tail, the splendid arch of the neck, and the proud head carried so loftily, give the wild horses a larger, taller appearance than is in reality theirs. Few ever saw the droves of wild horses more than momentarily.

They run like the wind.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A BUFFALO AT BAY. (FROM A PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN ON THE SPOT.)]

After the introduction of the dromedary into Texas, many years since, for transportation of supplies over that vast territory, one was brought up to Colorado. Because of the immense runs it could make without water, it was taken into the region frequented by the wild horses, and when they were sighted, the dromedary was started in pursuit. Two were run down, and found to be nearly dead when overtaken. But the poor dromedary suffered so from the p.r.i.c.kly-pear filling the soft ball of its feet, that no farther pursuit could ever be undertaken.

I had to be content with the General's description, for no wild horses came in our way. But there was enough to satisfy any one in the way of game. The railroad had not then driven to the right and left the inhabitants of that vast prairie. Our country will never again see the Plains dotted with game of all sorts. The railroad stretches its iron bands over these desert wastes, and scarcely a skulking coyote, hugging the ground and stealing into gulches, can be discovered during a whole day's journey.

As the long afternoon was waning, we were allowed to get out and rest a little while, for we had reached what was called the "Home Station," so called because at this place there was a woman, then the only one along the entire route. I looked with more admiration than I could express on this fearless creature, long past the venturesome time of early youth, when some dare much for excitement. She was as calm and collected as her husband, whom she valued enough to endure with him this terrible existence. How good the things tasted that she cooked, and how different the dooryard looked from those of the other stations! Then she had a baby antelope, and the apertures that served as windows had bits of white curtains, and, altogether, I did not wonder that over the hundreds of miles of stage-route the Home Station was a place the men looked forward to as the only reminder of the civilization that a good woman establishes about her. There was an awful sight, though, that riveted my eyes as we prepared to go on our journey, and the officers could not, by any subterfuge, save us from seeing it. It was a disabled stage-coach, literally riddled with bullets, its leather hanging in shreds, and the woodwork cut into splinters. When there was no further use of trying to conceal it from us, we were told that this stage had come into the station in that condition the day before, and the fight that the driver and mail-carrier had been through was desperate. There was no getting the sight of that vehicle out of my mind during the rest of the journey.

What a friend the darkness seemed, as it wrapped its protecting mantle about us, after the long twilight ended! yet it was almost impossible to sleep, though we knew we were comparatively safe till dawn. At daybreak the officers asked us to get out, while the mules were watered and fed, and rest ourselves, and though I had been so long riding in a cramped position, I would gladly have declined. Cleanliness is next to G.o.dliness, and, one of our friends said, "With a woman, it is before G.o.dliness," yet that was an occasion when I would infinitely have preferred to be numbered with the great unwashed. However, a place in the little stream at the foot of the gully was pointed out, and we took our tin basin and towel and freshened ourselves by this early toilet; but there was no lingering to prink, even on the part of the pretty Diana. Our eyes were staring on all sides, with a dread impossible to quell, and back into the ambulance we climbed, not breathing a long, free breath until the last of those terrible eighty miles were pa.s.sed, and we beheld with untold grat.i.tude the roofs of the quarters at Fort Harker.

I felt that we had trespa.s.sed as much as we ought upon the hospitality of the commanding officer of the post, and begged to be allowed to sleep in our ambulance while we remained in the garrison. He consented, under protest, and our wagon and that of Mrs. Gibbs were placed in the s.p.a.ce between two Government storehouses, and a tarpaulin was stretched over the two. Eliza prepared our simple food over a little camp-fire. While the weather remained good, this was a very comfortable camp for us--but when, in Kansas, do the elements continue quiet for twenty-four hours?

In the darkest hour of the blackest kind of night the wind rose into a tempest, rushing around the corners of the buildings, hunting out with pertinacity, from front and rear, our poor little temporary home. The tarpaulin was lifted on high, and with ropes and picket-pins thrashing on the canvas it finally broke its last moorings and soared off into s.p.a.ce. The rain beat in the curtains of the ambulance and soaked our blankets. Still, we crept together on the farther side of our narrow bed and, rolled up in our shawls, tried to hide our eyes from the lightning, and our ears from the roar of the storm as it swept between the sheltering buildings and made us feel as if we were camping in a tunnel.

Our neighbor's dog joined his voice with the sobs and groans of the wind, while in the short intervals of quiet we called out, trying to get momentary courage from speech with each other. The curtain at the end of the ambulance jerked itself free, and in came a deluge of rain from a new direction. Pins, strings and four weak hands holding their best, did no earthly good, and I longed to break all military rule and scream to the sentinel. Not to speak to a guard on post is one of the early lessons instilled into every one in military life. It required such terror of the storm and just such a drenching as we were getting, even to harbor a thought of this direct disobedience of orders. Clutching the wagon-curtains and watching the soldier, who was revealed by the frequent flashes of lightning as he tramped his solitary way, might have gone on for some time without the necessary courage coming to call him, but a new departure of the wind suddenly set us in motion, and I found that we were spinning down the little declivity back of us, with no knowledge of when or where we would stop. Then I did scream, and the peculiar shrillness of a terrified woman's voice reached the sentinel.

Blessed breaker of his country's laws! He answered to a higher one, which forbids him to neglect a woman in danger, and left his beat to run to our succor.

Our wagon was dragged back by some of the soldiers on night duty at the guard-house, and was newly pinioned to the earth with stronger picket-pins and ropes, but sleep was murdered for that night. Of course the guard reported to the commanding officer, as is their rule, and soon a lantern or two came zigzagging over the parade-ground in our direction, and the officers called to know if they could speak with us.

There was no use in arguing. Mrs. Gibbs and her boys, Diana drenched and limp as to clothes, and I decidedly moist, were fished out of our watery camp-beds, and with our arms full of apparel and satchels, we followed the officers in the dark to the dry quarters, that we had tried our best to decline rather than make trouble.

It was decided that we must proceed to Fort Riley, as there were no quarters to offer us; and tent-life, as I have tried to describe it, had its drawbacks in the rainy season. Had it not meant for me ninety miles farther separation from my husband, seemingly cut off from all chance of joining him again, I would have welcomed the plan of going back, as Fort Harker was at this time the most absolutely dismal and melancholy spot I remember ever to have seen. A terrible and unprecedented calamity had fallen upon the usually healthful place, for cholera had broken out, and the soldiers were dying by platoons. I had been accustomed to think, in all the vicissitudes that had crowded themselves into these few months, whatever else we were deprived of, we at least had a climate unsurpa.s.sed for salubrity, and I still think so. For some strange reason, right out in the midst of that wide, open plain, with no stagnant water, no imperfect drainage, no earthly reason, it seemed to us, this epidemic had suddenly appeared, and in a form so violent that a few hours of suffering ended fatally. n.o.body took dying into consideration out there in those days; all were well and able-bodied, and almost everyone was young who ventured into that new country, so no lumber had been provided to make coffins. For a time the rudest receptacles were hammered together, made out of the hardtack boxes. Almost immediate burial took place, as there was no ice, nor even a safe place to keep the bodies of the unfortunate victims. It was absolutely necessary, but an awful thought nevertheless, this scurrying under the ground of the lately dead, perhaps only wrapped in a coa.r.s.e gray army blanket, and with the burial service hurriedly read, for all were needed as nurses, and time was too precious to say even the last words, except in haste. The officers and their families did not escape, and sorrow fell upon every one when an attractive young woman who had dared everything in the way of hardships to follow her husband, was marked by that terrible finger which bade her go alone into the valley of death. In the midst of this scourge, the Sisters of Charity came. Two of them died, and afterward a priest, but they were replaced by others, who remained until the pestilence had wrought its worst; then they gathered the orphaned children of the soldiers together, and returned with them to the parent house of their Order in Leavenworth.

I would gladly have these memories fade out of my life, for the scenes at that post have no ray of light except the heroic conduct of the men and women who stood their ground through the danger. I cannot pa.s.s by those memorable days in the early history of Kansas without my tribute to the brave officers and men who went through so much to open the way for settlers. I lately rode through the State, which seemed when I first saw it a hopeless, barren waste, and found the land under fine cultivation, the houses, barns and fences excellently built, cattle in the meadows, and, sometimes, several teams ploughing in one field. I could not help wondering what the rich owners of these estates would say, if I should step down from the car and give them a little picture of Kansas, with the hot, blistered earth, dry beds of streams, and soil apparently so barren that not even the wild-flowers would bloom, save for a brief period after the spring rains. Then add pestilence, Indians, and an undisciplined, mutinous soldiery who composed our first recruits, and it seems strange that our officers persevered at all. I hope the prosperous ranchman will give them one word of thanks as he advances to greater wealth, since but for our brave fellows the Kansas Pacific Railroad could not have been built; nor could the early settlers, daring as they were, have sowed the seed that now yields them such rich harvests.

We had no choice about leaving Fort Harker. There was no accommodation for us--indeed we would have hampered the already overworked officers and men; so we took our departure for Fort Riley. There we found perfect quiet; the negro troops were reduced to discipline, and everything went on as if there were no such thing as the dead and the dying that we had left a few hours before. There was but a small garrison, and we easily found empty quarters, that were lent to us by the commanding officer.

Then the life of watching and waiting, and trying to possess my soul in patience, began again, and my whole day resolved itself into a mental protest against the slowness of the hours before the morning mail could be received. It was a doleful time for us; but I remember no uttered complaints as such, for we silently agreed they would weaken our courage. If tears were shed, they fell on the pillow, where the blessed darkness came to absolve us from the rigid watchfulness that we tried to keep over our feelings. My husband gladdened many a dark day by the cheeriest letters. How he ever managed to write so buoyantly was a mystery when I found afterward what he was enduring. I rarely had a letter with even so much as a vein of discontent, during all our separations. At that time came two that were strangely in contrast to all the brave, encouraging missives that had cheered my day. The accounts of cholera met our regiment on their march into the Department of the Platte; and the General, in the midst of intense anxiety, with no prospect of direct communication, a.s.sailed by false reports of my illness, at last showed a side of his character that was seldom visible.

His suspense regarding my exposure to pestilence, and his distress over the fright and danger I had endured at the time of the flood at Fort Hays, made his brave spirit quail, and there were desperate words written, which, had he not been relieved by news of my safety, would have ended in his taking steps to resign. Even he, whom I scarcely ever knew to yield to discouraging circ.u.mstances, wrote that he could not and would not endure such a life.

Our days at Fort Riley had absolutely nothing to vary them after mail time. I sat on the gallery long before the time of distribution, pretending to sew or read, but watching constantly for the door of the office to yield up next to the most important man in the wide world to me. The soldier whose duty it was to bring the mail became so inflated by the eagerness with which his steps were watched, that it came near being the death of him when he joined his company in the autumn, and was lost in its monotonous ranks. He was a ponderous, lumbering fellow in body and mind, who had been left behind by his captain, ostensibly to take care of the company property, but I soon found there was another reason, as his wits had for some time been unsettled, that is--giving him the benefit of a doubt--if he ever had any. Addled as his brain might be, the remnant of intelligence was ample in my eyes if it enabled him to make his way to our door. As he belonged to the Seventh Cavalry, he considered that everything at the post must be subservient to my wish, when in reality I was dependent for a temporary roof on the courtesy of the infantry officer in command. If I even met him in our walks, he seemed to swell to twice his size, and to feel that some of the odor of sanct.i.ty hung around him, whether he bore messages from the absent or not.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE ADDLED LETTER-CARRIER.]

The contents of the mail-bag being divided, over six feet of anatomical and military perfection came stalking through the parade-ground. He would not demean himself to hasten, and his measured steps were in accordance with the gait prescribed in the past by his sergeant on drill. He appeared to throw his head back more loftily as he perceived that my eyes followed his creeping steps. He seemed to be reasoning. Did Napoleon ever run, the Duke of Wellington ever hasten, or General Scott quicken his gait or impair his breathing by undue activity, simply because an unreasoning, impatient woman was waiting somewhere for them to appear? It was not at all in accordance with his ideas of martial character to exhibit indecorous speed. The great and responsible office of conveying the letters from the officer to the quarters had been a.s.signed to him, and nothing, he determined, should interfere with its being filled with dignity. His country looked to him as its savior. Only a casual and condescending thought was given to his comrades, who perhaps at that time were receiving in their bodies the arrows of Indian warriors. No matter how eagerly I eyed the great official envelope in his hand, which I knew well was mine, he persisted in observing all the form and ceremony that he had decided was suitable for its presentation.

He was especially particular to a.s.sume the "first position of a soldier," as he drew up in front of me. The tone with which he addressed me was deliberate and grandiloquent. The only variation in his regulation manners was that he allowed himself to speak before he was spoken to. With the flourish of his colossal arm, in a salute that took in a wide semicircle of Kansas air, he said, "Good morning, Mrs.

Major-General George Armstrong Custer." He was the only gleam of fun we had in those dismal days. He was a marked contrast to the disciplined enlisted man, who never speaks unless first addressed by his superiors, and who is modesty itself in demeanor and language in the presence of the officers' wives. The farewell salute of our mail-carrier was funnier than his approach. He wheeled on his military heel, and swung wide his flourishing arm, but the "right about face" I generally lost, for, after s.n.a.t.c.hing my envelope from him, unawed by his formality, I fled into the house to hide, while I laughed and cried over the contents.

CHAPTER XIX.

THE FIRST FIGHT OF THE SEVENTH CAVALRY.

THE first fight of the Seventh Cavalry was at Fort Wallace. In June, 1867, a band of three hundred Cheyennes, under Roman Nose, attacked the stage-station near that fort, and ran off the stock. Elated with this success, they proceeded to Fort Wallace, that poor little group of log huts and mud cabins having apparently no power of resistance. Only the simplest devices could be resorted to for defense. The commissary stores and ammunition were partly protected by a low wall of gunny-sacks filled with sand. There were no logs near enough, and no time if there had been, to build a stockade. But our splendid cavalry charged out as boldly as if they were leaving behind them reserve troops and a battery of artillery. They were met by a counter-charge, the Indians, with lances poised and arrows on the string, coming on swiftly in overwhelming numbers. It was a hand-to-hand fight. Roman Nose was about to throw his javelin at one of our men, when the cavalryman, with his left hand, gave a sabre-thrust equal to the best that many good fencers can execute with their sword-arm. With his Spencer rifle he wounded the chief, and saw him fall forward on his horse.

The post had been so short of men that a dozen negro soldiers, who had come with their wagon from an outpost for supplies, were placed near the garrison on picket duty. While the fight was going on, the two officers in command found themselves near each other on the skirmish-line, and observed a wagon with four mules tearing out to the line of battle. It was filled with negroes, standing up, all firing in the direction of the Indians. The driver lashed the mules with his black-snake, and roared at them as they ran. When the skirmish-line was reached the colored men leaped out and began firing again. No one had ordered them to leave their picket-station, but they were determined that no soldiering should be carried on in which their valor was not proved. The officers saw with surprise that one of the number ran off by himself into the most dangerous place, and one of them remarked, "There's a gone n.i.g.g.e.r, for a certainty!" They saw him fall, throw up his hands, kick his feet in the air, and then collapse--dead to all appearances. After the fight was over, and the Indians had withdrawn to the bluffs, the soldiers were called together and ordered back to the post. At that moment a negro, gun in hand, walked up from where the one supposed to be slain had last been seen. It was the dead restored to life. When asked by the officer, "What in thunder do you mean, running off at such a distance into the face of danger, and throwing up your feet and hands as if shot?" he replied, "Oh, Lord, Ma.s.sa, I just did dat to fool 'em. I fot deyed try to get my scalp, thinkin' I war dead, and den I'd jest get one of 'em."

The following official report, sent in from some colored men stationed at Wilson's Creek, who were attacked, and successfully drove off the Indians, will give further proof of their good service, while at the same time it reveals a little of other sides of the negro, when he first began to serve Uncle Sam:

"All the boys done bully, but Corporal Johnson--he flinked. The way he flinked was, to wait till the boys had drove the Injuns two miles, and then he hollered, 'Gin it to 'em!' and the boys don't think that a man that would flink that way ought to have corporal's straps."

In order to give this effort at military composition its full effect, it would be necessary to add the official report of a cut-and-dried soldier. No matter how trifling the duty, the stilted language, bristling with technical pomposity, in which every military move is reported, makes me, a non-combatant, question if the white man is not about as absurd in his way as the darkey was in his.