The sun shines bright on my Old Kintucky Home;
'Tis Summer, the darkies are gay,
The corn tops are ripe and the medders are in bloom,
And the birds make music all the day.'
“In another minute everybody else was singin', too—singin' and gallopin'. Son, you never in your whole life seen so many hairy, ragged, rusty fellers on hoss-back a-tear in' along through the dust of a strange land, actin' like they were all in a powerful hurry to git somewheres and skeered the gates would be shut before they arrived. Boy, listen: the homesickness jest popped out through my pores like perspiration.
“It taken us all of seven days to git frum the border acros't that long stretch of waste to within a day's ride of the city of Monterey. It only taken us four and a half to git back ag'in to the border, the natives standin' by to watch us as we tore on past 'em. The sun was still several hours high on the evenin' of the fifth day when we come in sight of the Rio Grande River; and I don't ever seem to recall a stretch of muddy yaller water that looked so grateful to my eyes ez that one looked.
“We come canterin' down to the water's edge, all of us bein' plum' jaded and mighty travel-worn. And there, right over yond' on the fur bank we could see the peaky tops of some army tents standin' in rows and we heared the notes of a bugle, soundin' mighty sweet and clear in that still air. And it dawned on us that by a strange coincidence whut wouldn't be liable to happen once't in a dozen years had happened in our purticular case—that the United States Government, ez represented by a detachment of its military forces, had moved down to the line at a point almost opposite to the place where we aimed to cross back over.
“I ain't sure yit whut it was—it mout a-been the first sight of the foeman he'd fit ag'inst so long that riled him or it mout a-been merely a sort of sneakin' desire to make out like he purposed to hold off to the very last and then be won over by sweet blandishments—but jest ez we reached the river, a big feller hailin' frum down in Bland County rid up in front of Billy Priest and he says he wants to ast him a question.
“'Fire away,' says Billy.
“'Bill Priest,' says the Bland County feller, 'I take it to be your intention to go back into the once't free but now conquered state of Texas?'
“'Well, pardner,' says Billy in that whiny way of his'n, 'you certainly are a slow one when it comes to pickin' up current gossip ez it flits to and fro about the neighbourhood. Why do you s'pose we've all been ridin' hell-fur-leather in this direction endurin' of the past few days onlessen it was with that identical notion in mind?'
“'Never mind that now,' says the other feller. 'Circumstances alter cases. Don't you see that there camp over yonder is a camp of Yankee soldiers?'
“'Ef my suspicions are correct that's jest whut it is,' says Billy very politely. 'Whut of it?'