ldier, then?"

"I will do anything rather than go there."

He was directed to go about his business and, soon thereafter, I
inquired about the case. Dr. Spaulding said: "I discovered there was
nothing the matter with the man, only that he was playing off, and when
he described his alleged symptoms, I began a course of heroic treatment.
He was purged, cupped, blistered, given emetics, until life really
became a burden and he ran away from the 'treatment.'"

This man never went to the regimental hospital again, but he made no end
of trouble. He was a chronic shirk. He would not work, and there were
not men enough in the regiment to get him into a fight. Soon after the
campaign of 1863 opened in Virginia he was missing, and the next thing
heard from him was that he had been discharged from some hospital for
disability. He never smelt powder, and years after the war, he was to
all appearance an able-bodied man. I believe the Sixth was the third
regiment which he had gone into in the same way. When he enlisted, the
surgeon who examined him pronounced him a sound man, and it was a
mystery how he could be physically sound or physically unsound, at will,
and so as to deceive the medical examiners in either event. He died long
ago and his widow drew a pension after his death as he did before it,
but he never did a day's honest military duty in his life. Peace to his
ashes! He may be playing some useful part in the other world, for all
that I know. At all events, I am glad that his widow gets a pension,
though as a soldier he was never deserving of anything but contempt,
for he would desert his comrades when they needed aid and never exposed
his precious carcass to danger for his country or for a friend.

That is not an attractive picture which I have drawn. I will paint
another, the more pleasing by reason of the contrast which the two
present.

One day a party of sixteen men came into camp and applied for
enlistment. A condition of the contract under which they were secured
for my troop was that one of their number be appointed sergeant. They
were to name the man and the choice, made by ballot, fell upon Marvin E.
Avery. At first blush, he was not a promising candidate for a
non-commissioned office. Somewhat ungainly in figure, awkward in
manners, and immature in mind and body, he appeared to be; while he
seemed neither ambitious to excel nor quick to learn. He certainly did
not evince a craving for preferment. In the end