button
with fire from throat to belt.

So her lancer rode away into the unknown; and she sat on the edge
of her bed, crying, until it was time to go on duty and sit beside
the dying in the sick wards.

They brought her his last letter that evening.

"You wicked little thing," it ran, "if you hadn't taught me
self-respect I'd have tried to run the guard to-night, and would
probably have been caught and drummed out or shot. We're in a
bustle; orders, totally unexpected, attach us to Porter's Corps,
Sykes's division of regulars. Warren's brigade, which includes, I
believe, the 5th Zouaves, the 10th Zouaves, 6th Pennsylvania
Lancers, and 1st Connecticut Heavy Artillery.

"We've scarcely time to get off; our baggage will never be ready,
and how we're going to get to Alexandria and aboard ship is more
than I know.

"And I'm simply furious; I'd counted on a dramatic situation,
Ailsa--the soldiers farewell, loud sobs, sweetheart faints, lancer
dashes away unmanly tears--'Be strong, be br-r-rave, dah-ling!
Hevving watches over your Alonzo!'

"Not so. A big brawny brute in spurs comes in the dark to stir us
with the toe of his boot. 'Silence,' he hisses, 'if you can't hear
that damn reveille, I'll punch you in the snoot, an' then mebbe
you'll spread them lop-ears o' yourn!'

"Heaven! Your Alonzo is derided by a hireling!

"'Pack up, you swallow-tailed, leather-seated, pig-prodding sons of
galoots!' Thus, our first sergeant, recently of the regulars,
roll-call having ended.

"Coffeeless, soupless, tackless, we leer furtively at the two days'
rations in our haversacks which we dare not sample; lick our chops
reflectively, are cruelly chidden by underlings in uniform, further
insulted by other underlings, are stepped on, crowded, bitten, and
kicked at by our faithful Arab steeds, are coarsely huddled into
line, where officers come to gloat over us and think out further
ingenious indignities to heap upon us while we stand to horse. And
we stand there two hours!

"I can't keep up this artificial flow of low comedy. The plain
fact of the situation is that we're being hustled toward an
amphibious thing with paddle-wheels named _The Skylark_, and I
haven't said good-bye to you.

"Ailsa, it isn't likely that anything is going to knock my head off
or puncture vital sections of me. But in case the ludicrous should
happen, I want you to know that a cleaner man goes before the last
Court Marshal than would have st