f their story. They were coming now to freedom and
protection. The shadow of Old Glory would be on them in a moment; a
moment, and the life of an Indian captive would be but a horror-seared
memory.

Then it was that Custer did a graceful thing. The subjection of the
Cheyennes could have been accomplished by soldiery from Connecticut or
South Carolina, but it was for the rescue of these two, for the
protection of Kansas homes, that the Nineteenth Kansas Cavalry had
volunteered. Stepping to our commander, Colonel Moore, Custer asked that
the Kansas man should go forward to meet the captives. With a courtesy a
queen might have coveted the Colonel received them--two half-naked,
wretched, fate-buffeted women.

The officers nearest wrapped their great coats about them. Then, as the
two, escorted by Colonel Moore and his officers next of rank, moved
forward toward General Custer, who was standing apart on a little knoll
waiting to receive them, a thousand men watching breathless with
uncovered heads the while, the setting sun sent down athwart the valley
its last rich rays of glory, the motionless air was full of an
opalescent beauty; while softly, sweetly, like dream music never heard
before in that lonely land of silence, the splendid Seventh Cavalry band
was playing "Home Sweet Home."

CHAPTER XXVII

THE HERITAGE

It is morning here in Kansas, and the breakfast bell is rung!
We are not yet fairly started on the work we mean to do;
We have all the day before us, and the morning is but young,
And there's hope in every zephyr, and the skies are bright and blue.

--WALT MASON.

It was over at last, the long painful marching; the fight with the
winter's blizzard, the struggle with starvation, the sunrise and sunset
and starlight on wilderness ways--all ended after a while. Of the three
boys who had gone out from Springvale and joined in the sacrifice for
the frontier, Bud sleeps in that pleasant country at Fort Sill. The
summer breezes ripple the grasses on his grave, the sunbeams caress it
lovingly and the winter snows cover it softly over--the quiet grave he
had wished for and found all too soon. Dear Bud, "not changed, but
glorified," he holds his place in all our hearts. For O'mie, the winter
campaign was the closing act of a comic tragedy, and I can never think
sadly of the brave-hearted happy Irishman. He was too full of the sunny
joy of existence, his heart beat with too much of good-will toward