thenceforward, I left him watching the river with renewed vigilance, and
awaiting the next merman who should report himself.

Finding my way to the building, I hunted up a sergeant and a blanket,
got a fire kindled in the dismantled chimney, and sat before it in my
single garment, like a moist, but undismayed Choctaw, until my horse and
clothing could be brought round from the Causeway. It seemed strange
that the morning had not yet dawned, after the uncounted periods that
must have elapsed; but when my wardrobe arrived, I looked at my watch
and found that my night in the water had lasted precisely one hour.

Galloping home, I turned in with alacrity, and without a drop of
whiskey, and waked a few hours after in excellent condition. The rapid
changes of which that Department has seen so many--and, perhaps, to so
little purpose--soon transferred us to a different scene. I have been on
other scouts since then, and by various processes, but never with a zest
so novel as was afforded by that night's experience. The thing soon got
wind in the regiment, and led to only one ill consequence, so far as I
know. It rather suppressed a way I had of lecturing the officers on the
importance of reducing their personal baggage to a minimum. They got a
trick of congratulating me, very respectfully, on the thoroughness with
which I had once conformed my practice to my precepts.

* * * * *

ON A LATE VENDUE.


The red flag--not the red flag of the loathed and deadly pestilence that
has destroyed so many lives and disfigured so many fair and so many