“In the American army.”
“Yes, siree, and in the First Division, too. This is Brigadier-General William J. Worth’s division of Regulars: Fourth Infantry, Fifth Infantry, Sixth Infantry, Eighth Infantry, Second and Third Artillery. The Eighth Infantry—that’s my regiment—is in the Second Brigade. Colonel Clarke’s our commander. Garland’s commander of the First Brigade. They’re both good men—and so’s General Worth. My eye! Isn’t he, though! You’re lucky to have struck the Regulars. If you’d stayed with the Mohawks—my eye!”
“Who are they, Hannibal?”
“The Volunteers. We call ’em ‘Mohawks’ because they’re so wild. They’re General Patterson’s division, the Third: the Palmettos—those are the South Carolinans; the First and Second Tennessee Mountaineers; the First and Second Pennsylvania Keystoners; the Second New Yorkers; the Third and Fourth Illinois Suckers; the Georgia Crackers, and the Alabamans. Guess they can fight, but they’re awful on discipline. Won’t even salute their officers. Expect you passed through them on your way from the naval battery.”
The sun had risen, flooding all the chaparral and glinting on the gulf surges beyond the fringing beach. The uproar of the cannon in castle and city had welled to a deep, angry chorus; the American guns were answering; the morning air quivered to the quick explosions; and over city and strip of plain a cloud of black smoke floated higher and higher, veiling the sun itself. Now and then a piece of shell droned in, skimming the sand hills and kicking up puffs of dust. A round-shot of solid iron actually came rolling down a slope and landed at their very feet. Jerry stooped to feel of it. Ouch! It was still hot.
“Shucks!” Hannibal laughed. “Put it in your pocket.” He cocked his cap defiantly. “It’s a dead one. When you’re in your first battle you think every gun is aimed at you; and after that you don’t care.”
“You’ve been in other battles, Hannibal?”
“I should rather say! We’re all veterans, in this division. We were with Old Zach—he’s General Zachary Taylor—when he licked the dons at Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma in Texas last May, and we helped take Monterey in September. We’d have been licking ’em again if we hadn’t been sent here with Old Fuss and Feathers.”
“But General Taylor’s been licked since, hasn’t he? At Buena Vista?”
“He? Old Zach? Do you believe that story? It’s just a Mexican lie. I wasn’t there, but the New Orleans papers say he wasn’t licked at all. There can’t anybody lick Old Zach. He just wears his old clothes and sits his horse sideways, and tells the men: ‘The bayonet, my hardy cocks!’ When we joined Old Fuss and Feathers we knew he was all right, too, but we expected to have to dress up and shave. I tell you, there was hustling. Regulations say that officers’ and men’s hair has got to be cropped—cut short, you know; whiskers can’t grow lower than the ears and nobody except the cavalry can wear moustaches. Old Davy—that’s General David Twiggs of the Second Division of Regulars—he had a white beard reaching nearly to his waist, and he shaved it all off and cut his hair. Looked funny, too. But the regulations aren’t being enforced, after all. We’re in Mexico to fight. Wait till you see General Worth’s side-whiskers. But let’s climb a hill, farther front, and lie down, and I’ll show you things. No! Wait a minute. Listen to that cheering. I guess there’s news. Come on.”