I Knew All The Time That It Was
Quite Impossible For Him To Do So, As He Is One Of The Very Best
Tacticians In The Regiment - Still, It Is The Unexpected That So Often
Happens.
The band and the magnificent drum major, watching their new commander
with critical eyes, were quite enough in themselves to disconcert any
man.
I never told you what happened to that band once upon a time! It
was before we came to the regiment, and when headquarters were at Fort
Dodge, Kansas. Colonel Mills, at that time a captain, was in command.
It had been customary to send down to the river every winter a detail
of men from each company to cut ice for their use during the coming
year. Colonel Mills ordered the detail down as usual, and also ordered
the band down. It seems that Colonel Fitz-James, who had been colonel
of the regiment for some time, had babied the bandsmen, one and all,
until they had quite forgotten the fact of their being enlisted men.
So over to Colonel Mills went the first sergeant with a protest
against cutting ice, saying that they were musicians and could not be
expected to do such work, that it would chap their lips and ruin their
delicate touch on the instruments. Colonel Mills listened patiently
and then said, "But you like ice during the summer, don't you?" The
sergeant said, "Yes, sir, but they could not do such hard work as the
cutting of ice." Colonel Mills said, "You are musicians, you say?" The
unsuspicious sergeant, thinking he had gained his point, smilingly
said, "Yes, sir!" But there must have been an awful weakness in his
knees when Colonel Mills said, "Very well, since you are musicians and
cannot cut ice, you will go to the river and play for the other men
while they cut it for you!" The weather was freezing cold, and the
playing of brass instruments in the open air over two feet of solid
ice, would have been painful and difficult, so it was soon decided
that it would be better to cut ice, after all, and in a body the band
went down with the other men to the river without further complaint or
protest.
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