The young soldiers got so tired that toward the end they relapsed into silence of their own accord. Nobody said anything more, except the learned Parson and the lively Dewey, both of whom saw an excellent opportunity to talk all they wanted to without interruption. When Dewey once got started at his jokes a whole express train full of air brakes couldn’t have stopped him. He explained the matter to his meek and long-suffering companions by singing the verse from “Alice in Wonderland:”
“‘In my youth,’ said his father, ‘I took to the law,
And argued each case with my wife.
And the muscular strength which it gave to my jaw,
Has lasted the rest of my life.’”
In Dewey’s case, at any rate, it lasted until the welcome order was given:
“Company, halt!”
Which meant that the battalion was at last upon the scene of their home for the next ten days, “Camp Lookout,” twelve miles back in the mountains from West Point.
Poor Indian, who was exhausted and breathless by this time, expected that he would get a chance to sit down and rest. But Indian was destined to learn that that is not the army way of doing business; he was obliged to content himself with a few longing glances at the inviting scene about him. Then he got to work.
The first order was to stack arms; the second to unsling knapsacks and deposit them near the guns. After that the corps pitched in to unload the mule wagon.