Kincaid's Battery
Page 23
XXIII
"SOLDIERS!"
With what innocent openness did we do everything in '61! "Children andfools" could not tell the truth any faster or farther than did ournewspapers--_Picayune, Delta, True Delta, Crescent, L'Abeille, andL'Estafette du Sud._ After every military review the exact number inline and the name of every command and commander were hurried intoprint. When at last we began to cast siege guns, the very first one wasdefiantly proclaimed to all the Confederacy's enemies: an eight-inchDahlgren, we would have them to know. Kincaid and his foundry weregiven full credit, and the defence named where the "iron monster" was togo, if not the very embrasure designated into which you must fire todismount it.
The ladies, God bless them, were always free to pass the guard on thecity side of that small camp and earthwork, where with the ladies' guns"the ladies' man" had worn the grass off all the plain and the zest ofnovelty out of all his nicknamers, daily hammering--he and his only lessmerciful lieutenants--at their everlasting drill.
Such ladies! Why shouldn't they pass? Was it not safe for the cause andjust as safe for them? Was not every maid and matron of them in the"Ladies' Society of the Confederate Army"--whereof Miss Callender was asecretary and Miss Valcour one of the treasurers? And had not thefellows there, owing to an influence or two in the camp itself andanother or two just outside it, all become, in a strong, fine sense andhigh degree, ladies' men? It was good for them spiritually, and good fortheir field artillery evolutions, to be watched by maidenly and matronlyeyes. Quite as good was it, too, for their occasional heavy-gun practicewith two or three huge, new-cast, big-breeched "hell-hounds," as Charlieand others called them, whose tapering black snouts lay out on theparapet's superior slope, fondled by the soft Gulf winds that came upthe river, and snuffing them for the taint of the enemy.
One afternoon when field-gun manoeuvres were at a close, Kincaid spokefrom the saddle. Facing him stood his entire command, "in order in theline," their six shining pieces and dark caissons and their twice sixsix-horse teams stretching back in six statuesque rows; each of thethree lieutenants--Bartleson, Villeneuve, Tracy--in the front line,midway between his two guns, the artificers just six yards out on theleft, and guidon and buglers just six on the right. At the commander'sback was the levee. Only now it had been empty of spectators, and he wasseizing this advantage.
"Soldiers!" It was his first attempt since the flag presentation, and itlooked as though he would falter, but he hardened his brow: "Some daysago you were told not to expect marching orders for a week. Well theweek's up and we're told to wait another. Now that makes me every bit asmad as it makes you! I feel as restless as any man in this battery, andI told the commanding general to-day that you're the worst discontentedlot I've yet seen, and that I was proud of you for it. That's all I saidto him. But! if there's a man here who doesn't yet know the differencebetween a soldierly discontent and unsoldierly _grumbling_ I want him toGO! Kincaid's Battery is not for him. Let him transfer to infantry orcavalry. Oh, I know it's only that you want to be in the very firstfight, and that's all right! But what we can't get we don't _grumblefor_ in Kincaid's Battery!"
He paused. With his inspired eyes on the splendid array, visions of itsawful destiny only exalted him. Yet signs which he dared not heed lesthe be confounded told him that every eye so fixed on his was aware ofsome droll distraction. He must speak on.
"My boys! as sure as this war begins it's going to last. There'll belots of killing and dying, and I warn you now, your share'll be a doubleone. So, then, no indecent haste. Artillery can't fight every day.Cavalry can--in its small way, but you may have to wait months andmonths to get into a regular hell on earth. All the same you'll getthere!--soon enough--times enough. Don't you know why, when we have tobe recruited--to fill up the shot holes--they'll go by the cavalry tothe infantry, and pick the best men there, and _promote_ them to yourranks? It's because of how you've got to fight when your turn comes;like devils, to hold up, for all you may know, the butt end of the wholeday's bloody business. That's why--and because of how you may have towait, _un-com-plain-ing_, in rotting idleness for the next tea party."
Again he ceased. What _was_ the matter? There sat his matchless hundred,still and straight as stone Egyptians, welcoming his every word; yetsome influence not his was having effect and, strangest of all, wasenhancing his.
"One more word," he said. "You're sick of the drill-ground. Well, theman that's spoiling for a fight and yet has no belly for drill--he--oh,he belongs to the cavalry by birth! We _love_ these guns. We're mightydogg--we're extremely proud of them. Through thick and thin, throughfire and carnage and agony, remembering where we got them, we propose to_keep_ them; and some proud day, when the trouble's all over, say twoyears hence, and those of us who are spared come home, we propose tocome with these same guns unstained by the touch of a foe's hand, avirgin battery still. Well, only two things can win that: infernalfighting and perpetual toil. So, as you love honor and your country'scause, wait. Wait in self-respectful patience. Wait and work, and youshall be at the front--the foremost front!--the very first day and hourmy best licks can get you there. That's all."
Bartleson advanced from the line: "By section!" he called, "rightwheel--"
"Section," repeated each chief of section, "right wheel--"
"March!" commanded Bartleson.
"March," echoed the chiefs, and the battery broke into column. "Forward!Guide right!" chanted Bartleson, and all moved off save Kincaid.
He turned his horse, and lo! on the grassy crest of the earthwork,pictured out against the eastern pink and blue, their summer gauzesfilled with the light of the declining sun, were half a dozen smilingladies attended by two or three officers of cavalry, and among themFlora, Constance, and Miranda.
Anna? Only when he had dismounted did his eager eye find her, where shehad climbed and seated herself on a siege gun and was letting a cavaliershow her how hard it would be for a hostile ship, even a swift steamer,to pass, up-stream, this crater of destruction, and _ergo_ howimpossible for a fleet--every ship a terror to its fellows the moment itwas hurt--to run the gauntlet of Forts Jackson and St. Philip on a farworse stretch of raging current some eighty miles farther down theriver.
Not for disbelief of the demonstration, but because of a general laugharound a tilt of words between Kincaid and the cavalry fellows, Annalighted down and faced about, to find him, for the third time in fivedays, at close range. With much form he drew nearer, a bright assurancein his eyes, a sort of boyish yes, for a moment, but the next momentgone as it met in hers a womanly no.
"You little artist," thought Flora.