“Help yourself,” said Jim, as he reached over his greasy old pocketbook to me. “Take all you want, now that you have come to your senses. But you must admit that what I said about your being a fool, was true.”
“Yes, and an idiot, and an ass,” I said, as I handed back Jim's money. “But that settles it. I will never gamble another cent's worth as long as I live, and if I see a friend of mine gambling, I will try and break him of the habit. There is nothing in it, and I went to sleep, and didn't dream any more about winning all the money in camp.”
Two days before Christmas our cavalry, consisting of a full brigade, started on a raid, or a march through the enemy's country, and as I could not act as an officer very well, before my commission arrived, and as the colonel seemed to hate to see me in the ranks when I was looked upon as an officer, he sent me to brigade headquarters on a detail to carry the brigade colors. The brigade colors consisted of a blue guidon, on a pole. The butt end of the pole, or staff, was inserted in a socket of leather fastened to my stirrup, and I held on to the staff with my right hand when on the march, guiding my horse with my left hand, When the command halted the colors were planted in the ground in front of the place which the brigade commander had selected. On the march I rode right behind the brigade commander and his staff, with the body guard to protect the precious colors. I was glad of this position, because it took me among high officials, and if there was anything I doted, on it was high officers. The colonel had told me that I must be on my good behavior, and salute the officers of the staff, whenever they came near me. He said the brigade commander was a strict disciplinarian, and wouldn't put up with any monkey business. The first hour of my service as color bearer came near breaking up the brigade. I was perhaps forty feet behind the brigade commander and his staff, riding as stiff as though I was a part of the horse, and feeling as proud as though I owned the army. Suddenly the colonel and staff turned out of the road, and faced to the rear, and started to ride back to one of the regiments in the rear. I saw them coming, and felt that I must salute them. How to do it was a puzzle to me. If I saluted with my left hand, it would be wrong, besides I would have to drop the reins, and my horse might start to run, as he was prancing and putting on as much style as I was. If I saluted with my right hand, I should have to let go the flag staff. The salute must be sudden, so I could grasp the staff very quick, before it toppled over. It took a great head to decide what to do, and I had to decide quick. Just as the brigade commander got opposite me I let go the flag stair, brought my right hand quickly to the right eye, as nice a salute as a man ever saw, and returned it to grab the flag stall. But it was too late. As soon as my right hand let go of the staff, it fell over and the gilt dart on the end of the staff struck the general's horse in the flank, he jumped sideways against the adjutant-general's horse, and his horse fell over the brigade surgeon's horse, the general's horse run under a tree, and brushed the general off, and the whole staff was wild trying to hold their horses, and jumping to catch the general's horse, and pick the general off the ground. In the meantime my horse had got frightened at the staff and flag that was dragging on the ground, with one end in the socket in the stirrup, the pole tickling him in the ribs, and he began to dance around, and whirl, and knock members of the color-guard off their horses, and they stampeded to the woods leaving me in the road, on a frightened horse, whirliing around, unmanageable, the start striking trees and horses, until the staff was broken.
The regiment in the rear of us saw the commotion, saw the general dismounted, and the colors on the ground, and a general stampede in front, and, thinking the general and staff had been ambushed by the rebels, and many killed, the colonel ordered his men forward on a charge, and, in less time than it takes to write it, the woods were full of charging soldiers, looking for an imaginary enemy, a surgeon had opened up a lot of remedies, and all was confusion, and I was the innocent cause of it all. I had seen my mistake as soon as the flag staff knocked the general off his horse, and when I dismounted and picked up the flag, and the pieces of the staff, and found myself surrounded by excited troops, I wondered if the general would pull his revolver and shoot me himself, or order some of the soldiers to kill me. For choice I had rather have been killed by a volley from a platoon of soldiers, but I recognized the fact that the general had a perfect right to kill me. In fact I wanted him to shoot me. I was trimming the limbs off a sapling for a makeshift flag staff, when I saw the crowd open, and the general walked towards me. His face was a trifle pale, except where the red clay from the road covered it, and I felt that the next moment or two would decide in what manner I was to meet my doom. I remembered what the colonel had told me, about the general being a strict disciplinarian, and wondered if it wouldn't help matters if I should fall on my knees and say a little prayer, or ask him to spare my life. I wondered if I would be justified in drawing my revolver and trying to get the drop on the general. But I had no time to think it over, for he come right up to me, and said:
“I beg your pardon, my young friend, for the trouble and annoyance I have caused you. I should have known better than to ride so near you, and frighten your horse, when you had only one hand to guide the animal. Are you hurt? No; well, I am very glad. Ah, the flag staff is broken! Let me help you tack the flag on the sapling. Orderly, bring me some nails. Let me whittle the bark off the sapling, so it will not hurt your hands. When we get into camp tonight, and the wagons come up, I will see that you have another staff. There, don't feel bad about it. There is no damage.”
Bless his soul! I could, have hugged him for his kindness. When he came towards me, I was mad and desperate, and when he spoke kind words to me, my chin trembled, and I felt like a baby. He stopped the brigade for half an hour, to help fix up my flag, and all the time talked so kindly to me, that when the thing was fixed, I felt remorse of conscience, and said: “General, I am entirely to blame myself. I tried to perform the impossible feat of saluting you and holding the colors at the same time, which I am satisfied now cannot be done successfully. Lay it all to me.”
“I knew it,” said the good old general, “and I was going to tell you that you are not expected to salute anybody when you have the colors. You are a part of the flag, then. You will learn it all by and by,” and he mounted his horse and rode away about his business, as cool as though nothing had happened, and left me feeling that he was the best man on earth. Further acquaintance with the old man taught me that he was one of nature's noblemen. He was an Illinois farmer, who had enlisted as a private, and had in time become colonel of his regiment, and had been placed in command of this brigade. Every evening he would take an axe and cut up fire-wood enough for headquarters, and he was not above cleaning off his horse if his servant was sick, or did not do it to suit, and frequently I have seen him greasing his own boots.
Two days out, and we were in the pine woods of Alabama, with no habitation within ten miles. After a day's march we went into camp in the woods, and it was the afternoon before Christmas. The young pines, growing among the larger ones, were just such little trees as were used at home for Christmas trees, and within an hour after getting the camp made, every man thought of Christmas at home. The boys went off into the woods and got holly, and mistletoe, and every pup tent of the whole brigade was decorated, and they hung nose bags, grain sacks, army socks and pants on the trees. Around the fires stakes had been driven to hang clothes on to dry, and as night came and the pitch pine fires blazed up to the tops of the great pines, it actually looked like Christmas, though there was not a Christmas present anywhere. After supper the brigade band began to play patriotic airs, with occasionally an old fashioned tune, like “Old Hundred,” the woods rung with music from the boys who could sing, and everybody was as happy as I ever saw a crowd of people, and when it came time to retire the band played “Home, Sweet Home,” and three thousand rough soldiers went to bed with tears in their eyes, and every man dreamed of the dear ones at home, and many prayed that the home ones might be happy, and in the morning they all got up, stripped the empty Christmas stockings off the evergreen trees, put them on, and went on down the red road, and at noon the army entered Montgomery, Alabama, the first capital of the confederate states, took possession of the capital building in which were millions of dollars of confederate money and bonds. Every soldier filled his pockets and saddle bags with bonds and bills of large denominations. It was a poor soldier that could not count up his half a million dollars, but with all the money no man could buy a Christmas dinner. A dollar in greenbacks would buy more than all of the wagon loads of confederate currency captured that day. And yet the people of Montgomery looked upon the arrival of the Yankees much as they would the arrival of a pestilence. However, it was not many days before a better understanding was arrived at, and Yankee blue and Confederate gray got mixed up, and acquaintances were made that ripened into mutual respect and in some cases love.