"At sunset we laid him to rest, with full military honours. The salute was fired; then, with tears coursing down his bronzed cheek, the bugler stepped to the head of that lowly grave and sounded taps—the soldier's 'good-night.' Sweetly and sadly those mournful cadences floated out over the desert, Troop C's farewell to little Sammy.
"Two days later a message came from Department Headquarters inquiring if one Izo Yamato, a Japanese, was at Huachuca, and if so to extend to him every courtesy, etc., etc., by order of the War Department. I replied, briefly detailing the history of his death. I also wrote the Japanese consul at San Francisco, telling him all.
"A month slipped by, when an ambulance and escort arrived from Benson. Sammy's father, Count Yamato, a distinguished man of middle age, had come to take the body home. Through an interpreter and Reynolds he heard the story of Sammy's gallant fight and death. He was much moved and, though his eyes were dim with unshed tears, he gravely saluted the Colonel and myself, and declared himself content, since his son had died as befitted a Samurai of his rank.
"Through the interpreter, we told him of the great friendship between his son and Reynolds. It was after a long talk with the Count next day that Reynolds sought the Colonel with a strange request. He explained that, as his three years of service would expire within a month, he desired the Colonel's influence with the Department in securing his immediate discharge. The Count had offered formally to adopt him as his son and, having no ties which bound him to his native land, the Sergeant had accepted. Count Yamato seconded the petition, stating that having lost his only son, his heart had gone out to the gallant young American whom he now desired to make his heir. It was easily arranged, and two days later they started west with Sammy's remains.
"Within a week or two after I, too, was in San Francisco, ordered to duty at the Presidio. As I crossed the ferry from Oakland, we ran close under the stern of a great Pacific liner bound for the Orient. On the after-deck stood a tall figure, and Sergeant Reynolds' voice came to me across the waters, 'Good-bye and God bless you, Captain.' The Count stood beside him, and I knew that below decks little Sammy's body was going home to sleep beside his fathers. Into the splendour of the sunset which lay beyond the Golden Gate, to the far-off land of flowers, sailed the mighty ship bearing my two Samurai, the living and the dead."
The Colonel paused in his story, and taking from his pocket a letter postmarked Tokio, Japan, May 1, 1904, he read the following extract:
"'As a military man you are, of course, interested in the war. Here in Japan we hear little of events at the front save the official dispatches, with which you are already familiar. Yesterday, however, I witnessed an event of more than passing interest. During the recent desperate fighting between the Japanese torpedo flotilla and the Russian battleships about Port Arthur, a lieutenant-commander of the Japanese navy, in command of a destroyer, made a daring and successful attack upon one of the enemy's vessels. He was killed in the action, and his body brought home for interment. Never have I seen so splendid a spectacle nor so impressive a service. In attendance were the Emperor and the entire Imperial Court, as well as the highest officers of the Army and Navy, all ablaze with gold lace and jewelled decorations. The body rested upon a magnificent catafalque of purple velvet, bearing the national arms and draped with the battle-flags of his ship. It seems that the officer had been a Samurai, a member of some noble family, and, in recognition of his gallantry in action, a part of the ceremony was the conferring by the Emperor on the dead man of the Order of the Golden Kite, thus marking him as one of Japan's national heroes. After this ceremony was ended, an old, white-haired noble, said to be the dead man's father, took from an attendant a package, which proved to be a silken American flag, with which he reverently covered the casket. Then the crowd slowly filed out, leaving the dead hero alone under the folds of Old Glory. It is said to have been an event unprecedented in the history of Japan, but I could learn little concerning it. Those I asked either didn't know, or wouldn't tell. Strange people, these Japanese.'"
The Colonel folded up the letter and replaced it in his pocket. As he rose to bid us good-night, he said:
"I have since learned that the daring commander who gave his life to Japan, and whose body lay in the old temple, shrouded in the American colours, was Sergeant Reynolds of old Troop C, one of my Two Samurai."
END