e yard
from head to croup," said the drill book of the day, and, but for that,
the riders might have dropped their reins upon the pommel as practically
unnecessary. But, for the first hour or so, at least, the tendency
toward the rear of column was ever to crowd upon the file leaders, a
proceeding resented, not infrequently, in less disciplined commands than
Ray's, by well-delivered kicks, or at least such signs of equine
disapprobation as switching tail or set-back ears. But Ray's troop
horses moved like so many machines, so constant and systematic had been
their drill; and Ray's men rode in the perfection of uniform, so far as
armament and equipment were concerned. Each greatcoat, precisely rolled,
was strapped with its encircling poncho at the pommel. Each blanket, as
snugly packed, with the sidelines festooned upon the top, was strapped
at the cantle. Lariat and picket pin, coiled and secured, hung from the
near side of the pommel. The canteen, suspended from its snap hook, hung
at the off side. Saddle-bags, with extra horse shoes, nails, socks,
underwear, brushes and comb, extra packages of carbine and revolver
cartridges and minor impedimenta, equally distributed as to weight,
swung from the cantle and underneath the blanket roll. From the broad,
black leather carbine sling, over each trooper's left shoulder, the
hard-shooting brown barrelled little Springfield hung suspended, its
muzzle thrust, as was the fashion of the day, into the crude socket
imposed so long upon our frontier fighters by officials who had never
seen the West, save, as did a certain writer of renown, from a car
window, thereby limiting their horizon. Ray despised that socket as he
did the Shoemaker bit, but believed, with President Grant, that the best
means to end obnoxious laws was their rigorous enforcement. Each man's
revolver, a trusty brown Colt, hung in its holster at the right hip.
Each man was girt with ammunition belt of webbing, the device of an
old-time Yankee cavalryman that has been copied round the world, the
dull-hued copper cartridges bristling from every loop. Each man wore, as
was prescribed, the heavy, cumbrous cavalry boot of the day and
generation, but had stowed in his saddle-bags light moccasins and
leggings with which to replace them when, farther afield, their
clear-headed commander should give the word. Each man, too, wore the
gauntlets of Indian-tanned buckskin, a special pattern that Ray had been
permitted to use ex