thing for you that there was about
four thousand of us regulars just as crazy as him, or you'd never seen
the top of the hill."

One morning there was a great commotion on deck, and all the
convalescents balanced themselves on the rail, shivering in their
pajamas, and pointed one way. The transport was moving swiftly and
smoothly through water as flat as a lake, and making a great noise with
her steam-whistle. The noise was echoed by many more steam-whistles; and
the ghosts of out-bound ships and tugs and excursion steamers ran past
her out of the mist and disappeared, saluting joyously. All of the
excursion steamers had a heavy list to the side nearest the transport,
and the ghosts on them crowded to that rail and waved handkerchiefs
and cheered. The fog lifted suddenly, and between the iron rails the
Lieutenant saw high green hills on either side of a great harbor.

Houses and trees and thousands of masts swept past like a panorama;
and beyond was a mirage of three cities, with curling smoke-wreaths and
sky-reaching buildings, and a great swinging bridge, and a giant statue
of a woman waving a welcome home.

The Lieutenant surveyed the spectacle with cynical disbelief. He was
far too wise and far too cunning to be bewitched by it. In his heart he
pitied the men about him, who laughed wildly, and shouted, and climbed
recklessly to the rails and ratlines. He had been deceived too often not
to know that it was not real. He knew from cruel experience that in
a few moments the tall buildings would crumble away, the thousands of
columns of white smoke that flashed like snow in the sun, the busy,
shrieking tug-boats, and the great statue would vanish into the sea,
leaving it gray and bare. He closed his eyes and shut the vision out. It
was so beautiful that it tempted him; but he would not be mocked, and he
buried his face in his hands. They were carrying the farce too far, he
thought. It was really too absurd; for now they were at a wharf which
was so real that, had he not known by previous suffering, he would have
been utterly deceived by it. And there were great crowds of smiling,
cheering people, and a waiting guard of honor in fresh uniforms, and
rows of police pushing the people this way and that; and these men about
him were taking it all quite seriously, and making ready to disembark,
carrying their blanket-rolls and rifles with them.

A band was playing joyously, and the man in the next cot, who was being
lifte