CHAPTER PAGE
[I.]The Interruption[1]
[II.]Disgrace[11]
[III.]Outcast[19]
[IV.]Fourteen Years Later[30]
[V.]Past-Worthy[40]
[VI.]The Chums[48]
[VII.]Left Behind[55]
[VIII.]Council of War[63]
[IX.]A Lesson in Manners[75]
[X.]Sergeant Dadd[84]
[XI.]Devil and Deep Sea[97]
[XII.]The Little Lady[103]
[XIII.]The Alarm[112]
[XIV.]Dad the Paladin[124]
[XV.]Fighting Joe[132]
[XVI.]The Chickahominy[139]
[XVII.]“Battle Jimmie”[148]
[XVIII.]“General” Dadd[155]
[XIX.]The Clash[165]
[XX.]The Prodigal Father[174]
[XXI.]The Little Lady Again[181]
[XXII.]The Afterglow[189]
[XXIII.]The Attack[200]
[XXIV.]A Lost Burden[209]
[XXV.]The Three Comrades[218]
[XXVI.]The Iron Chess-Game[226]
[XXVII.]A Stern Chase[237]
[XXVIII.]Check and Countercheck[248]
[XXIX.]The End of the Fight[260]
[XXX.]Battle Jimmie, Courier[266]
[XXXI.]Jimmie and the Generals[273]
[XXXII.]Love[283]
[XXXIII.]War![290]
[XXXIV.]The Man at Washington[297]

“DAD”

CHAPTER I
THE INTERRUPTION

ACROSS the plaza, under the white sun-glare, marched and countermarched the crack regiment’s bronzed men in their heavy high caps and the rest of the odd regimentals of the late Forties.

From walls and roofs hung a myriad of more or less soiled American flags. On the plaza band stand a group of Mexican musicians were wrestling with “Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean.”

This last feature of the celebration was a bit of tragic irony attributed to no less a humorist than the arch-victor, the hero of the day—Major-General Winfield Scott. The native musicians were in no wise loath, on patriotic grounds, to play “Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean.”