sang another group. And――
Upon the hill he turned,
To take a last fond look
Of the valley and the village church,
And the cottage by the brook.
He listened to the sounds,
So familiar to his ear,
And the soldier leant upon his sword
And wiped away a tear.
A tall bearded Tennesseean was singing that, while his companions
listened soberly.
But a chorus welled and spread until all the groups were joining in.
Green grow the rushes, O!
Green grow the rushes, O!
The sweetest hours that e’er I spend
Are spent among the lasses, O!
“They sang that stuff all through Texas and North Mexico,” said
Hannibal. “It’s the Mohawk war cry. And the Mexicans think it’s a
sort of national song, like some of theirs. You ought to hear ’em try
to sing it themselves. ‘Gringo, gringo,’ they say, instead of ‘Green
grow,’ and they call the Americans ‘gringos’!”
“That’s right; they do,” Jerry agreed, remembering the two Manuels and
other Vera Cruzans. “They called me a ‘gringo’ whenever they were mean,
but it wasn’t Spanish and they didn’t seem to know where it came from.
‘Gringo!’ Huh!”
Now he understood at last.
“Well, I’ve got to go back for that blamed ‘retreat,’” Hannibal
grumbled. “Thunder! I never did see the use in all this parading every
day.” Which was an odd remark for a Regular and a veteran.
They were just leaving the mess fires of the Mohawks, when there
was a great shout of laughter, and out of the brush here came a big
Illinoisan, a dead turkey in one hand and his long musket in the other,
driving before him two ragged Mexicans.
“What you got there, Bill?”
“Part the Mexican army, boys. ’Peared like they were going to ambush
me and take this turkey; but I said ‘Nary, Mary Ann,’ and fetched ’em
along with help of old Sal.” And he flourished his gun.
[Illustration: “’PEARED LIKE THEY WERE GOING TO AMBUSH ME AND TAKE THIS
TURKEY”]
“We meant no harm, good Americanos,” the Mexicans whined. “We are only
poor countrymen.”
“Pass your turkey over to us,” the soldiers cried, to Bill. “Tell your
_paisanos_ to git and come back with the rest of their army.”
“I know them!” Jerry exclaimed. “They aren’t in the army. They’re brush
cutters.” He ran aside. “Hello, Manuel.”
The two Manuels had been cringing and smiling and repeating: “Good
Americanos! Valiant soldiers! Do not harm us, and God will reward you.”
They saw Jerry, and recognized him. “Gringo puppy,” they hissed. “Where
have you been?”
“Yes, I’m a gringo,” Jerry answered. “And I’m in the army of the
Americans. You said they couldn’t take Vera Cruz. What do you say now?”
“They took Vera Cruz by standing off and killing all the people,” old
Manuel snarled, in Spanish. “But wait, till they try to march on. Our
Santa Anna and fifty thousand brave men are coming to meet them. Hear
that, gringito? You’ll wish you’d stayed in the brush with old Manuel.”
Jerry laughed. He told Hannibal what had been said, and Hannibal
laughed. As they went on they looked back. The two Manuels were
scuttling out of the camp, unharmed, for the soldiers were more
interested in the turkey.
Teams and cavalry mounts, and wagons and supplies were very slow in
arriving, so that the army stayed in camp at Vera Cruz for over a week
without a move. The yellow fever increased――only the fresh lively air
blown in by the northers had held it down; and as soon as the northers
ceased then the vomito would rage as usual. A large number of the men,
especially the Volunteers, were ill with disease caused by drinking bad
water and by over-eating.
General Scott reorganized the army for the march inland. The general
orders changed the assignment of the regiments very little, and left
them as follows:
First Regular Division, Brevet Major-General William J. Worth
commanding: Light Battery A, Second Artillery; Second Artillery, eight
companies, as infantry; Third Artillery, four companies, as infantry;
Fourth Infantry, six companies; Fifth Infantry, six companies; Sixth
Infantry, five companies; Eighth Infantry, seven companies.
Second Regular Division, Brigadier-General David E. Twiggs commanding:
Light Battery K, First Artillery; howitzer and rocket company; Mounted
Rifles, nine companies; First Artillery as infantry; Fourth Artillery,
six companies, as infantry; Second Infantry, nine companies; Third
Infantry, six companies; Seventh Infantry, six companies.
Third or Volunteer Division, Major-General Robert Patterson commanding:
Third Illinois, Fourth Illinois; Second New York, ten companies;
First Tennessee, Second Tennessee; First Pennsylvania, ten companies;
Second Pennsylvania, ten companies; South Carolina, eleven companies;
Kentucky, and a detachment of Tennessee cavalry.
The enlistment term of the Georgians and Alabamans had almost expired,
so they were not included.
The company of engineers, which contained Captain Lee and Lieutenant
McClellan and Lieutenant Beauregard and other smart young officers, was
independent; and so were the ordnance or heavy artillery company and
the dragoons.
Each division had been broken into brigades as before; and although
Jerry’s Fourth Infantry and Hannibal’s Eighth Infantry were still in
separate brigades they were in the First Division, anyway.
Subtracting the General Quitman brigade of South Carolinans (the
Palmettos), Alabamans and Georgia Crackers, and the Tennessee cavalry,
who were to garrison Vera Cruz, the army numbered between eight and
nine thousand officers and men――not many for a march into Mexico and a
fight with General Santa Anna’s thirty or fifty thousand.
Jerry proceeded to learn the drum, with Hannibal as instructor. The
drumsticks proved tricky――there seemed to be a lot of rigmarole and
Hannibal was a hard drillmaster; but who might tell what would happen
in the coming battles? Young Rome, drummer boy in the Twiggs division,
had been disabled already. So it behooved a fellow to be prepared to
fill a vacancy.
For the army there were drills and evolutions “in masse,” as they were
styled, with General Scott himself commanding. And a grand spectacle
that was, when the infantry wheeled, and the artillery galloped, and
the dragoons spurred, all upon the plain under the walls of Vera Cruz
crowded with townspeople, gathered to view the sight.
On the evening of April 7 there was a last parade by the troops
together, and a speech by General Scott, in which he promised that if
the men would follow him he would take them through.
In his gold-buttoned blue frock coat, and his gold-braided blue
trousers, with gold epaulets on his broad shoulders and a gold sash
around his waist and a plumed cockaded chapeau upon his grizzled head,
his tasseled sword in its engraved scabbard hanging at his side, he
sat his horse and thundered his words so that almost every ear could
hear. He called the troops “My brave boys”――and at the close of the
speech they roundly cheered their “Old Fuss and Feathers,” the “Hero
of Chippewa”――that battle in the War of 1812 where he showed the enemy
that the American infantry was equal to the best.