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Found in the Philippines The Story of a Woman's Letters By: Charles King (1844-1933) |
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The Story of a Woman's Letters BY
CAPTAIN CHARLES KING GROSSET & DUNLAP PUBLISHERS
Eleven East Sixteenth Street New York Copyrighted 1899, by F. Tennyson Neely. Copyrighted 1901, by The Hobart Company.
FOUND IN THE PHILIPPINES. CHAPTER I.
Something unusual was going on at division headquarters. The men in the
nearest regimental camps, regular and volunteer, were "lined up" along
the sentry posts and silently, eagerly watching and waiting. For a week
rumor had been rife that orders for a move were coming and the brigades
hailed it with delight. For a month, shivering at night in the dripping,
drenching fogs drifting in from the Pacific, or drilling for hours each
day on the bleak slopes of the Presidio Heights, they had been praying
for something to break the monotony of the routine. They were envious of
the comrades who had been shipped to Manila, emulous of those who had
stormed Santiago, and would have welcomed with unreasoning enthusiasm any
mandate that bore promise of change of scene or duty. The afternoon was
raw and chilly; the wet wind blew salt and strong from the westward sea,
and the mist rolled in, thick and fleecy, hiding from view the familiar
landmarks of the neighborhood and forcing a display of lamplights in the
row of gaudy saloons across the street that bounded the camp ground
toward the setting sun, though that invisible luminary was still an hour
high and afternoon drill only just over. Company after company in their campaign hats and flannel shirts, in worn
blue trousers and brown canvas leggings, the men had come swinging in
from the broad driveways of the beautiful park to the south and, as they
passed the tents of the commanding general, even though they kept their
heads erect and noses to the front, their wary eyes glanced quickly at
the unusual array of saddled horses, of carriages and Concord wagons
halted along the curbstone, and noted the number of officers grouped
about the gate. Ponchos and overcoat capes were much in evidence on every
side as the men broke ranks, scattered to their tents to stow away their
dripping arms and belts, and then came streaming out to stare, unrebuked,
at headquarters. It was still early in the war days, and, among the
volunteers and, indeed, among regiments of the regulars whose ranks were
sprinkled with college men who had rubbed shoulders but a few months
earlier with certain subalterns, the military line of demarcation was a
dead letter when "the boys" were out of sight and hearing of their
seniors, and so it happened that when a young officer came hurrying down
the pathway that led from the tents of the general to those of the field
officers of the Tenth California, he was hailed by more than one group of
regulars along whose lines he passed, and, as a rule, the query took the
terse, soldierly form of "What's up, Billy?" The lieutenant nodded affably to several of his fellows of the football
field, but his hand crept out from underneath the shrouding cape, palm
down, signalling caution. "Orders some kind," he answered in tones just
loud enough to be heard by those nearest him. "Seen the old man anywhere?
The general wants him," and, never halting for reply the youngster
hurried on. He was a bright, cheery, brave eyed lad of twenty who six months earlier
was stumbling through the sciences at the great university on the heights
beyond the glorious bay, never dreaming of deadlier battle than that in
which his pet eleven grappled with the striped team of a rival college.
All on a sudden, to the amaze of the elders of the great republic, the
tenets and traditions of the past were thrown to the winds and the "Hermit
Nation" leaped the seas and flew at the strongholds of the Spanish
colonies. Volunteers sprang up by the hundred thousand and a reluctant
Congress accorded a meagre addition to the regular army... Continue reading book >>
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