If I could, I would make such havoc among the shams of Palestine that I would leave little there for men to feast their eyes and feed their fancies upon save the Hill of Calvary, and the lesson it carries to the most careless heart that pulses in its presence. I would leave it to tell of Him who suffered there, and to suggest the picture of the Crucifixion more vividly than the multitude of its surroundings, which are at best of questionable holiness, can ever do. All things must pass away but that one Figure, and when they do, the world will be none the loser for it.
The day shall come when the families of Shechem, whose genealogical trees were hoary with age when Christ talked with their ancestor at the well of Samaria, shall have passed from earth and been forgotten; when the Oaks of Mamre shall mark no more the grave of Jacob, and the tomb of his Rebekah shall arrest no curious wayfarer from Bethlehem to the City of David; when the awful march of Joshua from the Waters of Merom to Baal-Gad shall be a vague tradition, and the shepherds of Anti-Lebanon no longer see his shadowy armies sweep by in the mists of the night; when Jerusalem shall have crumbled to dust and the place of the Manger passed from the knowledge of men; when the history of all Israel shall be as the secret sepulchre the Mountains of Moab hide in their solitudes—yet still, serenely above the waste and ruin of the ages, the Teacher of Nazareth, standing upon the height of Calvary—sacred because the theatre of the noblest self-sacrifice man has yet conceived—shall say to them that mourn this desolation, “Peace! I am the Resurrection and the Life!”
In that day, reverence will be offered where it of right belongs.
But excuse me. I have wandered a little from my subject. It is sound parliamentary human nature, though. There was never a legislator yet who could rise to a question of privilege and stick to the matter of it.
MARK TWAIN
It was in the time of the Indian war, a quarter of a century ago. Company C, 7th Cavalry, 45 strong, had been headed off by a body of well armed Indians numbering 600 seasoned warriors, and had taken sanctuary in a small island in the South Platte a hundred miles from the nearest army post. Their situation was critical, and from day to day it grew worse; for their supply of provisions was slender, and a couple of attempts to get word to the fort had failed. This during the first twelve days. The Indians appeared in force every morning at a judicious distance beyond the river in the plain, and for hours kept up a long-range rifle practice upon the camp. The sharp-shooters of Company C wasted no ammunition—it was too scarce and too precious for that; they only fired when they were nearly sure of their man; the intervals between their shots were wide, but the shots were deadly. In the course of a day’s work they bagged many Indians, while the reckless storm of Indian bullets harvested but a small crop of casualties by comparison. Yet the general result was against the soldiers, for to them the loss of a man was a serious matter, whereas to the enemy the loss of a dozen was of no considerable consequence.
Sometimes the Indians, driven to fury by the stubborn resistance of the handful of whites cast their native caution aside for a moment and dashed through the shallow stream and tried to storm the camp—but in broad day always; so the whites were ready for them, and flung them back defeated, each time.
At the end of three weeks the soldiers were in sorry case. Their commander was lying in the protection of a pit hollowed in the sand, helpless, with both legs broken by balls; eight of his men were dead, twelve were wounded, five of them to disablement; of the twenty-nine still ranking as effectives one was departing under cover of the night to try and carry word to the fort, and the rest were weak from insufficient nourishment and from want of due rest and sleep; the horses were all dead and were serving as breast works and food.
Now came a lull. The plains were silent, the enemy had vanished. This continued all day. In some breasts it raised a hope—perhaps the Indians had seen smoke-signals warning them of the approach of white reinforcements and had given up and taken themselves off. It was a fair surmise, but some of the old hands said it could mean something of a different sort. Jack Burdick said—
“They can be hatching something outside of their own usages. There’s a couple of white renegades with them.”
The remark made an impression. “It’s so,” said several: “we can’t prophesy what Indians will do when they’ve that kind of cattle on hand to help invent projects.”
There was silence for a while and much reflection. Then Phil Cassidy began—
“If Captain Johnson would let one of us slip over there to-night and—”
“Well, he won’t,” said Jack Burdick with decision, “so you can drop that notion.”
It was dropped, and there was another silence. A hundred yards away, down among a growth of young cottonwoods the barking of a dog broke out of the stillness, in a series of strange, sharp, broken notes.
“At it again,” said Tom Hackett.
“Yes,” said another; “time-keeper of the camp; when he begins, you know it’s sundown.”
“Practicing his voice—been an opera dog, Sandy says; expects to get an engagement again when the war’s over.”
“Not in the way of singing, I reckon,” said Hackett; “it’s too jerky and broken-up; the most undoglike racket I’ve ever heard out of a dog’s mouth.”
“Sandy calls it staccato—says that’s its scientific name.”
“It’s a bright little chap, anyway; Sandy talks to him the same as if he was a human.”
“Yes, and what’s more, he understands—understands every word. He can say to him, ‘Now Billy, you go and snoop around in the bushes at the head of the island, and if you don’t smell Injuns over on the shore, speak up and say so;’ and the dog will trot right off, and by and by you’ll hear him bark, sure enough, showing that he got the whole idea and is furnishing the facts.”
A doubter laughed, and said—“You idiot, that don’t prove anything. How’d you know whether he was telling the truth or not.”
The rest laughed, and the witness “schwieg,” as the Germans say, and seemed sorry he had said anything.
“Say—the sun’s down and he’s at it yet……There, he’s stopped, but it’s too late. Poor little doggy. It’s an awful pity.”
“By George, it just is! Why, hang it, we can’t get along without the little cuss—he’s just a dear, and the friendliest little thing—”
“Just the life of the camp. Right you are, Jack Burdick. Blamed if I couldn’t ’most cry.”
“What in the nation has possessed Sandy, to let the poor little fellow break the orders?”
“Oh, you can bet on it he ain’t with him, or he wouldn’t.”
“Well, maybe the captain—just this once—”
“No—you needn’t imagine it,” said Jack Burdick sorrowfully, “he loves the little dog, and it’ll hurt him in his heart, but that don’t matter; duty is duty, discipline is discipline, and if his own brother broke an order he’d have to take the proceeds.”
The men sighed, and said—“It’s so. Poor little chap! He was so friendly and sociable.”
“And is so brave, too.
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