ry.

"Don't talk nonsense!" exclaimed Sam. "Only Castalian fiends would try
to destroy law and order and upset the peaceable course of society in
such a way. Do you suppose that any of our people at home would do such
a thing?"

"None, outside of the artillery," answered Cleary. "Well, at any rate,
our blowing up of the convent didn't do much good. There was some talk
of putting poison in the river to dispose of them, but of course we
couldn't do that."

"Of course not," said Sam. "That would be barbarous and against all
military precedents. The rules of war don't allow it."

"They're rather queer, those rules," answered his friend. "I should
like my enemies to take notice that I prefer being poisoned to being
blown up with bombshells. In some respects they don't pay much
attention to the rules, either. They don't take prisoners much
nowadays. Most of my despatches now read, 'fifty natives killed,' but
they say nothing of wounded or prisoners."

"We're fighting savages, we must remember that," said Sam.

"Then we've got a way of trying our pistols and rifles on natives
working in the fields; it's rather novel, to say the least. I saw one
man in the 73d try his new revolver on a native rowing a boat on the
river, and over the fellow toppled and the boat drifted down-stream.
The men all applauded, and even the officers laughed."

"Boys will be boys," said Sam, smiling. "They're good shots, at
any rate."

"They are that. There were some darkies plowing up there just this
side of San Diego, and some of our fellows picked them off as neatly
as you please. It must have been eight hundred yards if it was a foot.
But somehow I don't quite like it."

"War is war," said Sam, using a phrase which presumably has a rational
meaning, as it is so often employed by reasonable people. "It doesn't
pay to be squeamish. The squeamish men don't make good soldiers. I've
seen enough to learn that. They hesitate to obey orders, if they don't
like them."

As he said this they passed a small crowd of boys in the street. They
were trying to make two dogs fight, but the dogs refused to do so, and
the boys were beating them and urging them on.

"What stupid brutes they are," said Sam. "They're badly trained."

"They haven't had a military education," responded Cleary. "But I
almost forgot to ask you, have you seen the papers from home this
morning? They're all full of you and your greatness. He