ntal commanders were practically deprived
of their commands; their regiments were broken up into pygmy detachments
and scattered hither and thither by companies and squads, covering
sometimes a tract of suburbs fifteen miles long and half as wide, while
the entire force was placed under the orders of a city official
notoriously in sympathy with the initial strike and seeking the
suffrages of the very class from which the mobs were drawn. The
extraordinary spectacle was seen of a veteran colonel with only half a
company to guard the head-quarters of the regiment in a remote and
dangerous spot, and absolutely forbidden to summon any of his own
regiment to his defence in case of emergency, except upon the advice and
consent of some official of the city police. Well was it for Chicago and
the nation that the President of the United States stood as unmoved by
the puerile protests of the demagogue in office as were his loyal
soldiery by the fury of insult, abuse, and violence heaped upon them by
that mob of demagogue-supporters.

"By heaven," said the editor of a great daily to old Kenyon at the close
of the week, "I never dreamed of such superb discipline, and under such
foul insult. I swear I don't see how you fellows could stand it."

"Oh," said Kenyon, grimly, "it wasn't half as hard to bear as what your
columns have been saying about us any time these last five years."

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XV.

When the President of the United States declined to withdraw the
regulars from Chicago as urged by the governor of Illinois, Mr.
Elmendorf decided that it was because he had not been heard from on the
subject, and so started for Washington. This was how it happened that he
abandoned his project of leading his friends and fellow-citizens in
their determined assault upon the serried ranks of capital, backed
though they were by "the bristling bayonets of a usurper." For several
days his deluded disciples looked for him in vain. The telegraphic
despatches of the Associated Press told briefly of another crank
demanding audience at the White House, claiming to represent the people
of Chicago and persisting in his demand until, "yielding to force," he
was finally ejected. But Elmendorf was silent upon this episode when he
returned, so the story could hardly have referred to him. Calling at
Allison's to attend to the long-deferred duty of packing his trunk, he
was informed by the butler that that labor h