r
dismissed the case as one of "justifiable homicide in self-defence"; and
the hunter and I were permitted to go our way without further
interruption.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Note. Craps is a game of dice.

CHAPTER THREE.

A VOLUNTEER RENDEZVOUS.

"Now, Cap," said Lincoln, as we seated ourselves at the table of a cafe,
"I'll answer t'other question yur put last night. I wur up on the head
of Arkansaw, an' hearin' they wur raisin' volunteers down hyur, I kim
down ter jine. It ain't often I trouble the settlements; but I've a
mighty _puncheon_, as the Frenchmen says, to hev a crack at them
yeller-bellies. I hain't forgot a mean trick they sarved me two yeern
ago, up thar by Santer Fe."

"And so you have joined the volunteers?"

"That's sartin. But why ain't you a-gwine to Mexico? That 'ere's a
wonder to me, cap, why you ain't. Thur's a mighty grist o' venturin', I
heern; beats Injun fightin' all holler, an' yur jest the beaver I'd
'spect to find in that 'ar dam. Why don't you go?"

"So I purposed long since, and wrote on to Washington for a commission;
but the government seems to have forgotten me."

"Dod rot the government! git a commission for yourself."

"How?" I asked.

"Jine us, an' be illected--thet's how."

This had crossed my mind before; but, believing myself a stranger among
these volunteers, I had given up the idea. Once joined, he who failed
in being elected an officer was fated to shoulder a firelock. It was
neck or nothing then. Lincoln set things in a new light. They were
strangers to each other, he affirmed, and my chances of being elected
would therefore be as good as any man's.

"I'll tell yur what it is," said he; "yur kin turn with me ter the
rendevooz, an' see for yurself; but if ye'll only jine, an' licker
freely, I'll lay a pack o' beaver agin the skin of a mink that they'll
illect ye captain of the company."

"Even a lieutenancy," I interposed.

"Ne'er a bit of it, cap. Go the big figger. 'Tain't more nor yur
entitled to. I kin git yur a good heist among some hunters thet's thur;
but thar's a buffalo drove o' them parleyvoos, an' a feller among 'em,
one of these hyur creeholes, that's been a-showin' off and fencin' with
a pair of skewers from mornin' till night. I'd be dog-gone glad to see
the starch taken out o' that feller."

I took my resolution. In half an hour after I was standing in a large
hall or