ch to running an engine. The first three years
succeeding his graduation had been those of enervating peace; all of
which palled on the soul of Lieutenant Jack to a large degree. The
martial spirit beat high within his breast, and he wanted a scrap--he
wanted one badly.

The preliminary mutterings of this great strike had been heard for days,
but no one dreamed that anarchy was about to break loose with the
strength of all the fires of hell; and yet such was the case. On the
evening of July 4th, a message came to the commanding officer at Fort
Blank, to send his command of six companies of infantry to C---- at once
to assist in quelling the riots. The chance for a scrap so longed for by
Lieutenant Brainerd was coming swift and sure. The next morning the
command pulled out. The trip was uneventful during the day, but at night
a warning was received by Major Sharp, the grizzled battalion commander,
who had fought everything from manly, brave confederates to skulking
Indians, to watch out for trouble as he approached the storm centre.
There were rumors of dynamited bridges, broken rails, etc. The major
didn't believe much in these yarns, but--"_Verbum Sap_."--and the
precautions were taken. The next morning at five the train pulled into
Hartshorne, eleven miles out from C----. This was the beginning of the
great railroad yards and evidences of the presence of the enemy were
becoming very apparent. A large crowd had gathered to watch the
bluecoats and it was plain to be seen that they were in full sympathy
with the strikers. "Scab" and a few other choice epithets were hurled at
the train crew, and when they were ready to pull out the train didn't
go. The conductor went forward and found that the engineer had refused
to handle his engine because Hartshorne was his home and the crowd had
threatened to kill him if he hauled that load of "slaves of Pullman" any
further. When Major Sharp heard of it his little grey eyes snapped and
he growled out:--

"Won't pull this train, eh! Well, damn him, we'll make him pull it.
Here, Mr. Brainerd, you take some men and go forward and make that
engineer take us through these yards. If he refuses you know what to do
with him."

Do? Well, I reckon Jack knew what to do all right enough. He took
Sergeant Fealy, a veteran, and three men and went forward. The engineer,
a little snub-nosed Irishman, was at his post with his fireman, a good
head of steam was on, but nary an inch did that train b