rolled on. But with Abe Bolton drinking
tended to develop moroseness into savagery.

"Ah, comfort me with apple-jack, and stay me with flagons of it," said
Kent Edwards, setting down the jug with the circumspection of a man not
yet too drunk to suspect that he is losing exact control of his legs
and arms. "That gets better the deeper down you go. First it was like
swallowing a chestnut burr; now, old hand-made Bourbon couldn't be
smoother."

"A man can get used to a'most anything," said Bolton.

"I get gladder every day, Abe, that I came into the army. I wouldn't
have missed all this experience for the finest farm in the Miami Valley.

"Twere worth ten years of peaceful life,
To soldier have a day,"

Sir Walter Scott says--as I improve him."

"'Specially one of them soaking days when we were marching through
the mud to Wildcat."

"O, those were just thrown in to make us appreciate good weather when we
have it. Otherwise we wouldn't. You know what the song says:

'For Spring would be but gloomy weather,
If we had nothing else but Spring.'"

"Well, for my part, one o' them days was enough to p'ison six months
o' sunshine. I declare, I believe I'll feel mildewed for the rest of my
life. I know if I pulled off my clothes you could scrape the green mold
off my back."

"And I'm sure that if we'd had the whole army to pick from, we
couldn't've got in with a better lot of boys and officers. Every one of
them's true blue, and a MAN all the way through. It's the best regiment
in the army, and our company's the best company in the regiment, and I
flatter myself the company hasn't got two other as good men as we are."

"Your modesty'll ruin you yet, Kent," said Abe, sardonically. "It's very
painful to see a man going 'round unerrating himself as you do. If
I could only get you to have a proper opinion of yourself--that is,
believe that you are a bigger man than General Scott or George B.
McClellan, I'd have some hopes of you."

"We'll have one grand, big battle with the Secessionists now, pretty
soon--everything's getting ripe for it--and we'll whip them like
Wellington whipped Napoleon at Waterloo. Our regiment will cover itself
with glory, in which you and I will have a big share. Then we'll march
back to Sardis with flags flying and drums beating, everybody turning
out, and the bands playing 'See, the Conquering Hero Comes,' when you
and I come down the street, and we'll be heroes