t happened at a moment when Willett, seated at the right of "the lady
of the house," with Lilian at his dexter side, had caught the eye of
his hostess, and, after the manner of the day, had raised his brimming
sherry glass and, bowing low, was drinking to her health, a feat the
general had thrice performed already. "If I'd only known of this,
gentlemen," said their host, but a moment earlier, with resultant
access of cordiality, "and could have found a drop of Angostura about
the post, we'd have had a 'pick-me-up' before dinner, but d'you know
I--I seldom have bitters about me. I've no use for cocktails. I never
touch a drop of stingo before twelve at noon or after twelve at night.
I agree with old Bluegrass. Bluegrass was post surgeon at the Presidio
when the Second Artillery came out in '65, right on the heels of the
war, and he did his best to welcome them--especially Breck, their
adjutant, also a Kentuckian. Then he was ordered East, and he left
Breck his blessing, his liquor case, and this admonition--Breck told it
himself. 'Young man,' said he, 'I observe you drink cocktails. Now,
take my advice and don't do it. You drink the bitters and they go to
your nose and make it red. You drink the sugar and it goes to your
brain and makes it wopsy, and so--you lose all the good effects of the
whiskey'! Haw, haw, haw!" It was a story the genial old soldier much
rejoiced in, one that Stannard had bet he would tell before dinner was
half over, and it came with Doyle and the chickens. The kindly,
wrinkled, beaming face, red with the fire of Arizona's suns, redder by
contrast with the white mustache and imperial, was growing scarlet with
the flame of Bentley's cherished wine, when in sudden surprise he noted
that the junior officer present, seated alone at his right (there was
no other girl in all Camp Almy to bid to the little feast, and Mrs.
Stannard, in mourning for a brother, could not accept), had turned down
the little sherry glass. Thirty years ago such a thing was as uncommon
in the army as fifty years ago it was unheard of in civil life. For one
instant after the young officer's embarrassed answer the veteran sat
almost as though he had heard a rebuke. It was Mrs. Archer who came to
the relief of an awkward situation. "Mr. Harris believes in keeping in
training," she ventured lightly. "He could not excel in mountain
scouting without it. The general's scouting days are over and we
indulge him." Indeed, it wasn't long befo