And if in a sunset hour on the west ridge beyond the little
town of Burlingame I had left a hopeless love behind me, I put a man's
best energy into the thing before me.
The battle-field alone is not the soldier's greatest test. I had kept
step with men who charge an enemy on an open plain or storm a high
defense in the face of sure defeat. I had been ordered with my company
to take redoubts against the flaming throats of bellowing cannon in the
life-and-death grip before Richmond. I had felt the awful thrill of
carnage as my division surged back and forth across the blood-soaked
lengths of Gettysburg, and I never once fell behind my comrades. The
battle-field breeds courage, and self-forgetfulness, and exaltation,
from the sense of duty squarely met.
There were no battle-fields in 1867, where Greek met Greek in splendid
gallantry, out on the Kansas plains. Over Fort Harker hung the pall of
death, and in the July heat the great black plague of Asiatic cholera
stalked abroad and scourged the land. Men were dying like rats, lacking
everything that helps to drive death back. The volunteer who had offered
himself to save the settlers from the scalping-knife had come here only
to look into an open grave, and then, in agony, to drop into it.
Pages:
349
350
351
352
353
354
355
356
357
358
359
360
361
362
363
364
365
366
367
368
369
370
371
372
373