railway and that they could be sent by special trains to Omaha and thence to the West enabled them to begin their rescue-march ahead of all the other foot-troops and behind only the powerful command of cavalry that was whirled to the scene the moment the authorities woke up to the fact that it should have been sent in the first place.  Old Maynard would give his very ears to get to Thornton’s corral ahead of them, but the cavalry has thirty-six hours’ start and four legs to two.  Every moment he looks ahead expectant of tidings from the front that shall tell him the ——­th were there and the remnant rescued.  Even then, he knows, he and his long Springfields will be needed.  The cavalry can fight their way in to the succor of the besieged, but once there will be themselves surrounded and too few in numbers to begin aggressive movements.  He and his will indeed be welcome reinforcements; and so they trudge ahead.

The moon is up and it is nearly ten o’clock when high up on the rolling divide the springs are reached, and, barely waiting to quench their thirst in the cooling waters, the wearied men roll themselves in their blankets under the giant trees, and, guarded by a few outlying pickets, are soon asleep.  Most of the officers have sprawled around a little fire and are burning their boot-leather thereat.  The colonel, his adjutant, and the doctor are curled up under a tent-fly that serves by day as a wrap for the rations and cooking-kit they carry on pack-mule.  Two company commanders,—­the Alpha and Omega of the ten, as Major Sloat dubbed them,—­the senior and junior in rank, Chester and Armitage by name, have rolled themselves in their blankets under another tent-fly and are chatting in low tones before dropping off to sleep.  They have been inseparable on the journey thus far, and the colonel has had two or three long talks with them; but who knows what the morrow may bring forth?  There is still much to settle.

One officer, he of the guard, is still afoot, and trudging about among the trees, looking after his sentries.  Another officer, also alone, is sitting in silence smoking a pipe:  it is Mr. Jerrold.

Cleared though he is of the charges originally brought against him in the minds of his colonel and Captain Chester, he has lost caste with his fellows and with them.  Only two or three men have been made aware of the statement which acquitted him, but every one knows instinctively that he was saved by Nina Beaubien, and that in accepting his release at her hands he had put her to a cruel expense.  Every man among his brother officers knows in some way that he has been acquitted of having compromised Alice Renwick’s fair fame only by an alibi that correspondingly harmed another.  The fact now generally known, that they were betrothed, and that the engagement was openly announced, made no difference.  Without being able to analyze his conduct, the regiment was satisfied that it had been selfish and contemptible;