Si Klegg
Chapter 26 : Si Klegg.by John McElroy.Book Two PREFACE "Si Klegg, of the 200th Ind., and Shorty

Si Klegg.

by John McElroy.

Book Two

PREFACE

"Si Klegg, of the 200th Ind., and Shorty, his Partner," were born years ago in the brain of John McElroy, Editor of THE NATIONAL TRIBUNE.

These sketches are the original ones published in THE NATIONAL TRIBUNE, revised and enlarged some what by the author. How true they are to nature every veteran can abundantly testify from his own service.

Really, only the name of the regiment was invented. There is no doubt that there were several men of the name of Josiah Klegg in the Union Army, and who did valiant service for the Government. They had experiences akin to, if not identical with, those narrated here, and substantially every man who faithfully and bravely carried a musket in defense of the best Government on earth had some times, if not often, experiences of which those of Si Klegg are a strong reminder.

THE PUBLISHERS.

THIS BOOK IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED

TO THE RANK AND FILE

OF THE GRANDEST ARMY EVER MUSTERED FOR WAR.

SI KLEOG

CHAPTER I. THROUGH MUD AND MIRE

DUTY'S PATH LEADS THE 200TH IND. SOUTHWARD FROM NASHVILLE.

"SHORTY" said Si Klegg, the morning after Christmas, 1862, as the 200th Ind. sullenly plunged along through the mud and rain, over the roads leading southward from Nashville, "they say that this is to be a sure-enough battle and end the war."

"Your granny's night-cap they do," answered Shorty crossly, as he turned his cap around back ward to stop the icy current from chasing down his backbone. "How many thousand times 's that bin stuffed into your ears?

This is the forty-thousandth mile we've marched to find that battle that was goin' to end the war. And I'll bet we'll march 40,000 more. This war ain't goin' to end till we've scuffed the top off all the roads in Kentucky and Tennessee, and wore out G.o.d's patience and all the sole-leather in the North. I believe it's the shoe-makers that's runnin'

this war in the interest o' their business."

The cold, soaking rain had reduced the most of the 200th Ind. to a mood when they would have {16}disputed the Ten Commandments and quarreled with their mothers.

"There's no use bein' crosser'n a saw-buck, if you are wet, Shorty,"

said Si, walking to the side of the road and sc.r.a.ping off his generous-sized brogans several pounds of stiff, red mud. "They say this new General with a Dutch name is a fighter from Wayback, an' he always licks the rebels right out of their boots. I'm sure, I hope it's so. I like huntin' ez well ez anybody, an' I'll walk ez fur ez the next man to find something to shoot. But I think walkin' over two States, backward and forward, is altogether too much huntin' for so little shootin'.

Don't you?"

"Don't worry," snapped Shorty. "You'll git all the shootin' you want before your three years are up. It'll keep."

"But why keep it so long?" persisted Si. "If it can be done up in three months, an' we kin git back home, why dribble it out over three years?

That ain't the way we do work back home on the Wabash."

"Confound back home on the Wabash," roared Shorty. "I don't hear nothin'

else, day and night, but 'back home on the Wabash.' I've bin on the Wabash, an' I don't want to never see the measly, muddy, agery ditch agin'. Why, they have the ager so bad out there that it shakes the b.u.t.tons off a man's clothes, the teeth out of his head, the horns off the cows. An' as for milk-sickness."

"Shorty!" thundered Si, "stop right there. If you wasn't my pardner I'd fight you this minute. I kin join in jawin' about the officers an' the {17}Government. A great deal of your slack that I can't agree with I kin put up with, but you mustn't say nothin' against my home in the Wabash Valley. That I won't stand from no man. For fear that I may lose my temper I'm goin' away from you till you're in better humor."

With that Si strode on ahead, feeling as cross and uncomfortable internally as he was ill-at-ease externally. He hated above all things to quarrel with Shorty, but the Wabash Valley, that gardenspot of earth, that place where lived his parents, and sister, and Annabel but the subject was too sore to think about.

Presently an Aid came galloping along the middle of the road, calling upon the men to make way for him. His horse's hoofs threw the mud in every direction, and Si caught a heavy spatter directly in his face.

"Confound them snips of Aids," said he angrily, as he wiped the mud off. "Put on more airs than if they was old Gen. Scott himself. Always pretend to be in such a powerful hurry. Everybody must hustle out of their way. I think that fool jest did that on purpose."

The rain kept pouring down with tormenting persistence. Wherever Si looked were drenched, de pressed-looking men; melancholy, steaming horses; sodden, gloomy fields; yellow, rus.h.i.+ng streams, and boundless mud that thousands of pa.s.sing feet were churning into the consistency of building-mortar.

Si had seen many rainy days since he had been in the army, but this was the first real Winter rain {18}he had been out in.

Jabe Belcher, the most disagreeable man in Co. Q, was just ahead of him.

He stepped into a mudpuddle, slipped, threw the mud and water over Si, and his gun, which he flung in the effort to save himself, struck Si on the shoulder.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE AID SPATTERS MUD ON SI 18]

"Clumsy lunkhead!" roared Si, as ill-tempered now as anybody. "Couldn't you see that puddle and keep out of it? You'd walk right into the c.u.mberland River if it was in front of you. Never saw such a bat-eyed looney in my life."

"If the Captain wasn't lookin'," retorted Belcher, "I'd shut up both of them dead-mackerel eyes o' your'n, you backwoods yearlin'. I'll settle with you after we git into camp. Your stripes won't save you."

"Never mind about my stripes, old Stringhalt. I kin take them off long enough to wallop you."

Si was in such a frame of mind that his usual open-eyedness was gone.

The company was wading across a creek, and Si plunged in without a thought. He stepped on a smooth stone, his feet went from under him and he sat 'down hard and waist-deep in much the coldest water that he ever remembered.

"O, Greenland's icy mountains," was all that he could think to say.

The other boys yelled:

"Come on to camp, Si. That's no place to sit down."

"Feet hurt, Si, and goin' to rest a little?"

"This your day for taking a bath, Si?"

"Thinks this is a political meetin', and he's to take the chair."

"Place Rest!"

"When I sit down, I prefer a log or a rail; but some men's different."