The "Sky Pilot" and the "Dutch" Corporal.--The Mule that Sounded the
Charge.--"Bull's-Eye" Kelley and the Fire-Bug.
War, with all its horrors, laconically described by General Sherman as
hell, is not without its comedy. The marching through rain and mud;
camping in marshes; digging in trenches, using the bayonet for a
pick and the meat-ration can for a shovel; wading rivers by day and
sleeping exposed to the elements by night, are all sandwiched with
numerous mirthful incidents. Soldiers, above all people, have an eye
for the ridiculous, and are ever ready to make merry and laugh over
the most trivial matter. Even the horrors of battle are unable to
quench the spark of gaiety ever present in the make-up of a "Yankee
Doodle" soldier.
There are even times when comrades are lying about dead and dying,
and the missives of death yet speeding by, searching for new victims,
or to penetrate the quivering form of the already wounded, that
something occurs to bring forth peals of laughter.