What innocence! Or shall I say, what ignorance?
"The authorities of West Point have entered an interdict against the cadets loaning their sashes and other military adornments to young ladies, and great is the force of feminine indignation." Summer of 1873.
COME KISS ME, LOVE.
A young lieutenant at the Academy and his fiancée were seen by an old maid at the hotel to kiss each other. At the first opportunity she reproved the fair damsel for, to her, such unmaidenly conduct. With righteous indignation she repelled the reproof as follows:
"Not let S—kiss me! Why, I should die!" Then lovingly,
"Come kiss me, love, list not what they say,
Their passions are cold, wasted away.
They know not how two hearts like ours are
Long to mingle i' the sweetness o' the kiss,
That like the soft light of a heavenly star,
As it wanders from its world to this,
Diffuses itself through ev'ry vein
And meets on the lips to melt again."
CHAPTER XV.
GRADUATION—IN THE ARMY.
"Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet."
MY four years were drawing to a close. They had been years of patient endurance and hard and persistent work, interspersed with bright oases of happiness and gladness and joy, as well as weary barren wastes of loneliness, isolation, unhappiness, and melancholy. I believe I have discharged—I know I have tried to do so—every duty faithfully and conscientiously. It had been a sort of bittersweet experience, this experimental life of mine at West Point. It was almost over, and whatever of pure sweetness, whatever of happiness, or whatever reward fortune had in store for me, was soon to become known.