jor, but
the Interior Department had moved some thousands of the lately hostile
Indians down close to the line of the railway, where they could be more
readily fed and cared for. Great thereat was the alarm of the settlers,
and great the protest of the cattlemen, whose steers now roamed all over
the prairies within tempting distance of the restless young braves
across the reservation line. Scott was not a cavalry post at all. It had
no suitable stables, and only infantry ordinarily had been stationed
there since the completion of the railway, and thither Devers had been
sent when the final dissolution of the field column took place, and no
one of the field officers wanted him in his command, and he preferred to
be as usual,--alone. But then came the move of the Indians and the cry
of inadequate protection. Tintop had to part with two of his pet
companies--Cranston's and Hay's--at the reluctant orders from department
head-quarters. Still a fourth had to be sent, and Truman was taken from
the lieutenant-colonel and Major Warren despatched from head-quarters to
Scott as commander of this cavalry battalion or squadron at the very
moment when he was clinching his arrangements for long leave of absence.
He went, commanded a month, but persisted in his application. Long years
of service entitled him to the indulgence and it was granted, but
neither the lieutenant-colonel nor senior major would consent to give up
the command of a post to go to Scott as a subordinate to old Colonel
Peleg Stone, an infantry veteran of many a war, both in garrison and in
the field. A shout of merriment was heard in the camp of the cavalry
when the original orders were read distributing the troops to stations.
"Old Pegleg's got his match at last," was the comment of the knowing
ones. "He can't worry Devers half as much as Devers will worry him."
Scott was the innermost and easternmost of all the stations to which the
three regiments of cavalry were distributed. The big, bustling, growing
cattle town of Braska lay but a few miles away. Thriving and populous
ranches surrounded the post on every side, replacing the buffalo,
antelope, and deer of the decade gone by with countless herds of horned
cattle. Braska sported a theatre, an assembly-room, restaurants,
concert-halls and banks--of all kinds. It had the unhallowed features of
the average frontier metropolis and some of the more agreeable traits of
an Eastern city. It contained a very large number of