Captain Macklin: His Memoirs

by Richard Harding Davis

“I beg your pardon, sir,” I gasped, “but what did you call me then—just now?”

“Call you,” he said. “Oh, I called you ‘captain.’ You are a captain. I will assign you your troop to-morrow.”

He turned and buried his face in his arm, and unable to thank him I stepped outside of the tent and stood looking up at the stars, with my grandfather’s sword clasped close in my hands. And I was so proud and happy that I believe I almost prayed that he could look down and see me.

That was how I received my first commission—in a swamp in Honduras, from General Laguerre, of the Foreign Legion, as he lay half-asleep upon his cot. It may be, if I continue as I have begun, I shall receive higher titles, from ministers of war, from queens, presidents, and sultans. I shall have a trunk filled, like that of General Laguerre’s, with commissions, brevets, and patents of nobility, picked up in many queer courts, in many queer corners of the globe. But to myself I shall always be Captain Macklin, and no other rank nor title will ever count with me as did that first one, which came without my earning it, which fell from the lips of an old man without authority to give it, but which seemed to touch me like a benediction.

. . . . . . . . . .

The officer from whom I took over my troop was a German, Baron Herbert von Ritter. He had served as an aide-de-camp to the King of Bavaria, and his face was a patchwork of sword-cuts which he had received in the students’ duels. No one knew why he had left the German army. He had been in command of the troop with the rank of captain, but when the next morning Laguerre called him up and told him that I was now his captain he seemed rather relieved than otherwise.

“They’re a hard lot,” he said to me, as we left the General. “I’m glad to get rid of them.”

The Legion was divided into four troops of about fifty men each. Only half of the men were mounted, but the difficulties of the trail were so great that the men on foot were able to move quite as rapidly as those on mule-back. Under Laguerre there were Major Webster, an old man, who as a boy had invaded Central America with William Walker’s expedition, and who ever since had lived in Honduras; Major Reeder and five captains, Miller, who was in charge of a dozen native Indians and who acted as a scout; Captain Heinze, two Americans named Porter and Russell, and about a dozen lieutenants of every nationality. Heinze had been adjutant of the force, but the morning after my arrival the General appointed me to that position, and at roll-call announced the change to the battalion.

“We have been waiting here for two weeks for a shipment of machine guns,” he said to them. “They have not arrived and I cannot wait for them any longer. The battalion will start at once for Santa Barbara, where I expect to get you by to-morrow night. There we will join General Garcia, and continue with him until we enter the capital.”

The men, who were properly weary of lying idle in the swamp, interrupted him with an enthusiastic cheer and continued shouting until he lifted his hand.