By mid-afternoon the whole valley was in view. There were numerous towns; several large lakes; the City of Mexico was disclosed as a patch of sparkling towers and turrets, thirty miles distant. And after a time the ranks began to pick out the camps of the Second and Fourth Divisions, blue with soldiers and slightly marked by the few tents of officers.
“That first is Twiggs.”
“No, it’s Quitman. I can see the Mohawks ’atin’!”
“B’gorry, ’tis Twiggs; for there’s Ould Fuss an’ Feathers, big as anny thray men!”
“Column, close up—march!”
The ranks closed, the men fell into the cadenced step. Drum Major Brown ordered “Coming Through the Rye”; and with the fifes and drums of the Fourth Regiment playing “If a body meet a body,” and the other music and the bands playing what they chose, they all marched past the first camp (that of the Quitman Volunteers and Marines); before reaching the camp of the Second they turned into a road branching off to the southwest, as if for a round shining lake; and at sunset, while the clouds promised rain, they made camp at a village named Chalco, near the eastern border of the lake.
The evening was rainy. Under orders from the officers the company sergeants soon billeted the men in the village houses and shacks. Jerry’s mess—First Sergeant Mulligan, Corporal Finerty, Fifer O’Toole, Privates “Scotty” MacPheel, John Doane (who had served in the British army) and Henry Brewer from New Jersey—got quarters equal to the best: the same being a room with stout clay walls and mud roof, and a fireplace, and sheep pelts on the dirt floor for softness. To be sure, the pelts smelled rather strong when warmed up, but what difference?
Sergeant Mulligan sent out Scotty and Henry to forage, with Jerry as interpreter. They three came back bringing a shoulder of mutton, two chickens and an armful of corn. Under orders from the sergeant, in a gruff voice, but delivered by Jerry, the Mexican who owned the hut supplied firewood. Speedily the mess was cooking and eating.
“The only thing that bothers me now is, jest how are we goin’ to call on Santy Annie?” said Fifer O’Toole, munching; “for, as I understand, all the roads leadin’ in to him are dikes, like, through the bogs, wid wather on both hands an’ cannon overhead.”
“Why can’t you l’ave that to Gin’ral Scott?” Corporal Finerty reproved. “Faith, he’ll find the way in an’ we’ll take it. Meself, I ain’t paid to do a gin’ral’s work; I’ve my own business, an’ that’s fightin’ whin the officers give the word. They’re the lads who know.”