regimental surgeon was summoned in alarm, it was instantly believed in
the regiment that "Old Sauerkraut" was stricken with cholera. He at
first suffered hideous pains in the stomachic regions. This was followed
by a raging thirst, and, unknown to the physician, the three bottles of
schnapps were quite emptied. On the fourth day the poor man, very
woe-begone, but now suffering no pain, was carried to the hospital, and
the next day, as the campaign was about to begin, he was sent North, to
leave room near the field for those who should be wounded in the coming
engagement.

Company K was drilling on the wide plateau between the camp and the
highway when the ambulance bearing the afflicted officer came slowly
over the road worn through the greensward. Hussey sat solemnly on the
seat with the driver, and as the vehicle reached the company, standing
at rest, Barney Moore in the rear rank spoke up:

"Tim, is the poor colonel no better?"

"Divil a betther; it's worse he's intirely. God be good till 'im!"

Neither Jack nor Nick Marsh dared trust himself to meet the other's eyes
as the helpless chief disappeared down the hillside, while Barney
entered into an exhaustive treatise on the symptoms of cholera and the
liability of the most robust to meet sudden disaster in this malarious
upland, circumvailated by ages of decaying matter in the damp swamps on
every hand. But when, an hour later, Company K's whole street was
aroused by peal on peal of Abderian laughter, Jack and Nick were found
helpless in their bunks, and Barney was engaged in presenting a potion
to settle their collapsed nerves!

"Well, haven't I won the guinea, now? It cost me just twice that. If
ye's have a spark of honor ye'll pay your just dues, so ye will," Barney
said, in the evening, returning from parade, where Lieutenant-Colonel
Grandison officiated as commander, to the unconcealed delight of all but
the Oswald parasites among the officers.

"Don't say a word, Barney--to whom the medicos of mythology and all the
wizards of antique story are clowns and mountebanks--you shall have the
guinea or its equivalent."

"Twenty-one shillings gold, bear in mind. Yer father's a banker, ye
ought to know that!"

"I do. You shall have the twenty-one shillings in the shinplasters of
the republic."

The colonel had been routed none too soon. The very next morning, when
the Caribees "fell in" for roll-call, the orderly received a paper from
the commander's orderly