new footbridge erected by Skidmore), to
spend their leisure hours and scanty cash over the reeking counters of
the saloon, deeming themselves robbed of a right accorded every other
wageworker throughout Christendom, and saying things of their Congress
it wasn't safe for their officers even to think. They did not so much
blame the women who had started the movement that spoiled their soldier
homelife--how could women of the Fold be expected to know anything about
the conditions on the frontier?--but, said our sergeants and corporals
and sturdy men-at-arms, the soldier had a right to expect that Congress
would look before it voted. Possibly had the soldiers, too, been voters
their side of the case might have met some consideration; but, being
politically on the same plane with "Indians not taxed," it was safe, at
least, to similarly fix their social status and restrictions. Forbidden
by the people he was sworn to serve, to take his temperate drink at
home, but permitted by the same people to drink his fill of fiery stuff
abroad, abroad the thirsty soldier went, and with him went many a man
who had been content with mighty little, but resented it that he should
be discriminated against, denied the right of the humblest citizen, and
declared the only white man in America fit only to be ruled as is the
red.

The morning list of prisoners at Minneconjou was something over which
Stone was nearly breaking his heart. Every night now, in numbers, the
men were sneaking off across the stream, lured by the dance music, the
sound of clinking glass and soldier chorus and siren laughter. However
well the colonel might know his own profession, he was powerless under
the law to deal with this question. Here "Skid" had him and the garrison
by the throat. With the knowledge that his men were drinking, dicing,
and going generally to the devil within those ramshackle walls across
the stream, he could neither remove the victims nor dislodge their
tempters. Patrols he could send to search the roads, the open prairie,
the river bottom, but Skidmore had declared that no armed party could
legally cross his threshold, and the courts had backed him. Soldiers
roistering in the roadway in front of the dive would dart within doors
at sight of the patrol, and the officer, sergeant, or private that
entered there left hope behind of fair treatment in the civil courts.
Stone tried sending a big sergeant and six stalwart men unarmed, and
they came back eve