was brought face to face with a far different
proposition. The renegades of northern Arizona in the earliest of the
seventies were mainly Tontos, but many a young brave of the Apache
Mohave tribe had cast his lot with them. Many had taken their women and
children, and 'Tonio would be hunting, possibly, his own flesh and
blood. The junior general had ventured to remonstrate by letter, even
when issuing the order indicated, but the senior stood to his
prerogative with a tenacity that set the junior's teeth on edge, and
started territorial and unbecoming comparisons between the division
commander's firmness on the fighting line a decade earlier, and far
behind it now. San Francisco was perhaps five hundred miles from the
scene of hostilities, and those farthest away seldom fail to see
clearer than those on the spot, and to think they know better, so
Harris and his dusky henchman came up to Almy with little by way of
welcome, and back from their first scout with nothing by way of result.
Therefore, the sextette of officers that had been but lukewarm at the
start became lavish in cordiality at the close. The failure of Harris,
the favorite of the chieftain of the big Division, meant that no
further criticism could attach to them. If Harris could accomplish
nothing worth mention, what could be expected of others?

Therefore, while awaiting the return of the courier sent up to
Prescott, with report of what Harris had not accomplished, and asking
instructions as to what the gentleman would have next, the commanding
officer of the old post, built by California volunteers during the
Civil War and garrisoned later by reluctant regulars, set a good
example to his subordinates by doing his best to console the "casuals,"
as visitors were officially rated, and his subordinates loyally
followed suit.

But Harris seemed unresponsive. Harris seemed almost sulky. Harris had
added silence to dignity, and spent long hours of a sunny day sprawled
in a hammock, smoking his pipe and studying 'Tonio, who squatted in the
shade at the end of the narrow porch of the old officers' mess
building, still more silent and absorbed than his young commander.

And this was the condition of things when the Latest Arrival appeared
on the scene, fresh from head-quarters, some ninety miles northwest and
two thousand feet higher. He had come late the previous afternoon. He
had skated down the flinty scarp of Misery Hill, with the wheels of his
buckboard loc