m, Wood instructing
me exactly how to proceed so as to avoid confusion. Being a veteran
campaigner, he had all along insisted that for such work as we had
before us we must travel with the minimum possible luggage. The men
had merely what they could carry on their own backs, and the officers
very little more. My own roll of clothes and bedding could be put on
my spare horse. The mule-train was to be used simply for food, forage,
and spare ammunition. As it turned out, we were not allowed to take
either it or the horses.

It was dusk when I marched my long files of dusty troopers into the
station-yard. I then made all dismount, excepting the troop which I
first intended to load. This was brought up to the first freight-car.
Here every man unsaddled, and left his saddle, bridle, and all that he
did not himself need in the car, each individual's property being
corded together. A guard was left in the car, and the rest of the men
took the naked horses into the pens to be fed and watered. The other
troops were loaded in the same way in succession. With each section
there were thus a couple of baggage-cars in which the horse-gear, the
superfluous baggage, and the travel rations were carried; and I also
put aboard, not only at starting, but at every other opportunity, what
oats and hay I could get, so as to provide against accidents for the
horses. By the time the baggage-cars were loaded the horses of the
first section had eaten and drunk their fill, and we loaded them on
cattle-cars. The officers of each troop saw to the loading, taking a
dozen picked men to help them; for some of the wild creatures, half
broken and fresh from the ranges, were with difficulty driven up the
chutes. Meanwhile I superintended not merely my own men, but the
railroad men; and when the delays of the latter, and their inability
to understand what was necessary, grew past bearing, I took charge of
the trains myself, so as to insure the horse-cars of each section
being coupled with the baggage-cars of that section.

We worked until long past midnight before we got the horses and
baggage aboard, and then found that for some reason the passenger-cars
were delayed and would not be out for some hours. In the confusion and
darkness men of the different troops had become scattered, and some
had drifted off to the vile drinking-booths around the stock-yards; so
I sent details to search the latter, while the trumpeters blew the
assembly until the First Ser