bantering James, whom they took for a ser- had hailed Rudolf as its king and the queen vant of the constable's.

The minutes seemed very long as we waited in utter perplexity, almost in consternation. The same thought was in the mind of all of us, silently imparted by one to another in the glances we exchanged. What could have brought them from their guard of the great secret, save its discovery? They would never have left their post while the fulfilment of their trust was possible. By some mishap, some unforeseen chance, the king's body must have been discovered. Then the king's death was known, and the news of it might any moment astonish and bewilder the city.

At last the door was flung open, and a servant announced the Constable of Zenda. Sapt was covered with dust and mud, and James, who entered close on his heels, was in no better plight. Evidently they had ridden hard and furiously; indeed they were still panting. Sapt, with a most perfunctory bow to the queen, came straight to where Rudolf stood.

"Is he dead?" he asked, without preface. "Yes, Rupert is dead," answered Mr. Rassendyll: "I killed him."

Well, and Bauer?" he asked. "Bauer's at large," I answered. "Hum! Well, it's only Bauer," said the constable, seeming tolerably well pleased. Then his eyes fell on Rudolf and Bernenstein. He stretched out his hand and pointed to their riding-boots. "Whither away so late at night?" he asked.

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First together to the lodge, to find you, then I alone to the frontier," said Mr. Rassendyll.

received him as her husband before the eyes of all. Again the hope and vision, shattered by Rudolf's calm resolution, inspired me. Sapt said little, but he had the air of a man with some news in reserve. He seemed to be comparing what we told him with something already known to him but unknown to us. The little servant stood all the while in respectful stillness by the door; but I could see by a glance at his alert face that he followed the whole scene with keen attention.

At the end of the story, Rudolf turned to

Nobody has seen what you had to hide ?" "No; and nobody knows that the king is dead," answered Sapt.

"Then what brings you here?"

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Why, the same thing that was about to bring you to the lodge: the need of a meeting between yourself and me, sire."

"But the lodge is it left unguarded?" "The lodge is safe enough," said Colonel Sapt.

Unquestionably there was a secret, a new secret, hidden behind the curt words and brusque manner. I could restrain myself no longer, and sprang forward, saying: "What is it? Tell us, Constable!"

He looked at me, then glanced at Mr. Rassendyll.

"I should like to hear your plan first," he said to Rudolf. "How do you mean to account for your presence alive in the city to-day, when the king has lain dead in the shooting-box since last night?"

We drew closer together as Rudolf began his answer. Sapt alone lay back in his chair. The queen also had resumed her seat; she seemed to pay little heed to what we said. I think that she was still engrossed with the struggle and tumult in her own soul. The sin of which she accused herself, and the joy to which her whole being sprang in a greeting which would not be abashed, "I want so to contrive that I shall be no were at strife between themselves, but longer your Majesty," said Rudolf. joined hands to exclude from her mind any other thought.

"One thing at a time. The frontier will wait. What does your Majesty want with me at the lodge?"

Sapt flung himself in a chair and took off his gloves.

"Come, tell me what has happened today in Strelsau," he said.

We gave a short and hurried account. He listened with few signs of approval or disapproval, but I thought I saw a gleam in his eyes when I described how all the city

"In an hour I must be gone from here," began Rudolf.

"If you wish that, it's easy," observed Colonel Sapt.

"Come, Sapt, be reasonable," smiled Mr. "Early to-morrow, we-you

Rassendyll.

and I

"The plan's a pretty one, but it breaks down at one point," said he in a strange "Or does his faithful attendant, Herbert, voice, even harsher than his was wont to shoot him?”

do?

At last James started off in the hope melted to a molten mass, told us that it had of getting help. He found a party of char- been Herbert the forester. And there was coal-burners, and they came with him. The another corpse, almost shapeless, utterly flames were burnt down now; and we and unrecognizable. We saw it; the charcoalthey approached the charred ruins. Every- burners saw it. Then more peasants came thing was in ashes. But"-he lowered his round, drawn by the sight of the flames. voice "we found what seemed to be the None could tell who it was; only I and James body of Boris the hound; in another room knew. And we mounted our horses and was a charred corpse, whose hunting horn, have ridden here to tell the king." (To be concluded next month.)

THE HOUSEHOLD OF THE HUNDRED THOUSAND.

SOCIAL LIFE IN THE ARMY OF THE UNION.

BY IRA SEYMOUR,

Author of "The Song of the Rappahannock," ""The Making of a Regiment," etc.

HE site of the old home camp, as our officers were from the same mass,
the first mustering ground knowing their men for old neighbors, often
of many regiments, is now for intimate friends, frequently for those
covered with pretty subur- who had been at least their social equals,
ban homes, about which, I they could not hold themselves far aloof, and
sometimes think, the ghosts few of them cared to do so. They could
of war times must play at form no separate caste, and this, perhaps,
midnight.
had its disadvantages; but for these there
were certainly large compensations. It be-
came necessary for an officer to prove his
right to rank by qualities of leadership.
The best officers were those who, without
sacrifice of dignity, kept a lively sense of
comradeship with their men.

For us young fellows it was a rude beginning of real life when we found ourselves inside the great board fence and line of sentries which enclosed the rows of rough, wooden barracks. The members of our own company were indeed mostly neighbors, their faces were familiar, we had grown up together; yet never before had we been thrown into such intimate association. It is one thing to meet a man every day on the street or even at work; it is quite another to be compelled to bunk with him and take your breakfast out of the same camp kettle. For the youth who had been kept in a glass case at home this experience was trying and often disastrous, but for the most of us it was wholesome. We learned our own hitherto unsuspected faults, we discovered the good qualities of even our most faulty comrades, we saw human nature at close range. Even the officers could not escape the influence of this enforced commingling. They had indeed separate quarters and their own mess; they stood also on a vantage ground of almost despotic authority, for from the moment we were mustered into service we were subject to the same military law which governed the regular army. But drawn

The work of drill began before we received either arms or uniforms, and from the very first we managed to go through that essential of camp life, the evening dress parade. Then the grounds would be filled with spectators, mostly home friends: fathers, mothers, wives, sisters, and sweethearts, bringing with them dainties to supplement what seemed to them the hard fare of camp. We lived well, and were not a little spoiled in those days; and when we departed for the front, the mistaken kindness of those who loved us loaded us down with all sorts of knick-knacks for comfort and convenience. Though loth to part with these, our first marching days made us more loth to carry them. When a man's back becomes his only storehouse, he soon finds that riches do not consist in the abundance of the things which he possesses. Patent writing-cases, extra socks and mittens," ponchos" for the shoulders, "havelocks" for the head, etc., etc., began to strew the road, and in a short time

we were reduced to an absolutely socialistic quality in this world's goods. Whatever diferences remained were those purely personal ones which can be discovered only by experience of each other's ways and characters.

In a regiment of a thousand men any extensive acquaintance outside one's own company comes slowly; yet many things served to bring us into fellowship. There was little clannishness, every man in blue was a comrade; yet, after all, each company was a family by itself, and in the company little coteries collected like the eddies in a river pool.

On the march two men usually tented together. In camp, when logs or brush were available, four could use their tent pieces to better advantage than two or three, and the camp was thus made more compact.

drum and fife was conspicuously audible. We were wakened at daybreak by the shrill tune of the reveille; the last sound at night was that of the drum perambulating the camp with "taps," commanding "lights out" and sleep; while all day long frequent summons to varied duties came by "call ' of drum and fife. There was sick call," which brought all the indisposed who were able to walk into forlorn squads to be conducted by the orderly sergeants to the surgeon's tent for treatment. Its absurdly merry notes seemed to say:

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And get your castor oil."

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From one

Then" guard call," inevitable as the day, but always unwelcome. Drill call or asMen came together as tent mates by a sembly" meant simply our daily work. process of natural or social selection. They At dress parade, which closed the day's had been schoolmates or work-fellows in the active duties, the band discoursed its most same shop; perhaps they were related as martial strains, and after supper we heard brothers or cousins; or they had been near it once more in the pleasant tones of neighbors and old friends. So it was at retreat," the music of which comes most first; but new experiences in toil and peril impressively into recollection. were often solvents out of which new asso- camp after another the measured minor ciations crystallized. Kindred spirits found strains would sound forth; from near and each other; more and more the company far, from camps away beyond our sight, it became a greater family within which lesser would melt into distance, and then beyond and more intimate families grew up. Some- the westward woods the artillery bugles times there were disagreements which broke up first arrangements; but commonly a quiet, almost unnoticed attraction of affinity drew the final groups together in bonds seldom broken save by death or disabling wounds or sickness. A few of these soldierly friendships bind old men even to-day; many more are cherished by lonely survivors as memories too sacred for common talk.

When for months you and your comrade have slept at night under one blanket and shared each other's daily bread, even though it were but hard-tack; when you have learned to depend on him and he upon you for help in trouble or comfort in sickness; when together you have entered the hell of deadly battle after which the first question would be: "Is Joe safe?" "Where is Sam?" "Is little Gus alive?"-when together you have suffered hunger, thirst, heart-breaking weariness; above all, when, huddled together in storm or cold, you have had to endure long days of dreary, monotonous, comfortless idleness, then you know what it means to live a common life with a fellow man; and if he and you meet the test, then you know what friendship means.

In the routine of camp life the music of

would take it up until it died away with their mellow notes. It was the voice of the comradeship of a mighty, invisible host.

One can readily understand how persistently, how intimately this music of drum and fife wove itself into our lives. Some of those queer, old-fashioned, half melancholy, half merry tunes sing themselves in my memory even now.

What of the band on the day of battle? Was not martial music the soldier's inspiration? Did we not charge to its thrilling strains? We did nothing of the kind. There was other work for the musicians. On the approach of battle they were always sent to the rear for duty as stretcher-bearers and helpers in the field hospital. One pretty sure sign that bloody work was before us was the disappearance of the band; and the grimmest, most sickening, yet most merciful work of war was theirs at such times.

In active campaigning, our camps were apt to be hasty, though never disorderly, bivouacs, and even if a few days' halt were made and the camp duly formed, rest for weary and foot-sore men took precedence of drill and, in fact, of everything not absolutely necessary. But one thing

was inevitable as day and night. This was cheerfully. But the climax was the slaughroll-call. In storm or sunshine, in camp or on the march, before and after battle, the first thing in the morning and the last at night, we had to answer to our names. The first sergeant calls the roll. He knows the list by heart, and calls it off without book, in the dark, if need be.