on drill before seven o'clock.

Time had been in the long-ago happy days when it was quite the thing for
Mrs. Ray, Mrs. Truscott, Margaret Dwight, and other women of the old
regiment to ride, drive, or stroll out to the ground and watch their
soldier-husbands through much of the morning's dashing drill. The effect
was good in more ways than one. It keyed up the pride of the men and
kept down the profanity of their mentors, some of whom, as was a way in
the old days of the mounted service, _would_ break out with sudden and
startling blasphemy when things went wildly amiss. It is easy on foot to
bring instant order out of apparent chaos. The stark command "Halt!"
does the business; but, given tenscore, high-strung, grain-fed, spirited
steeds, tearing at their bits and lunging full gallop in mad race for a
charge, it often happens that neither voice nor trumpet, nor tugging,
straining bridle arm can prevail, and it is then the air rings with
expletives. No one ever heard Truscott swear. He was a model of
self-control. Dwight, too, had been renowned for the success with which
he handled horses and men and maintained his personal serenity. But
Marion Ray more times than a few in the earlier days of her married life
had cause to blush for Billy, who, the idol of his men and perhaps the
most magnetic drillmaster and troop leader in the regiment, so lost
himself in the enthusiasm and dash of squadron drill at the trot or
gallop, that his Blue Grass exhortations could be heard over the thunder
of a thousand hoofs, to the entire delight of the sorrel troop, the
sympathetic joy of their rivals and the speechless dismay of the pious.

"Tut-tut-tut!" was a dear old chaplain wont to say; "is it not strange
that so good a man can use such very bad language?" Yet Captain Ray in
private life shrank from profanity as he did from punch. On mounted
drill it rippled from his lips with unconscious, unpremeditated fluency.

Just as in the old days, therefore, wives, sisters, and sweethearts of
the dashing horsemen of Minneconjou were now riding, driving, or
strolling out to the edge of the drill ground and enjoying the spirited
scene. It gave them an hour of bracing air and sparkling dew and early
sunshine and a wonderful appetite for breakfast. Mrs. Ray did not go.
Neither her husband nor her son had now any part in the panorama, and,
looking from her window she could see all she cared to see of what might
be going on--and more. The sound o