212 The Rough Riders 



read the funeral service, and to the band of the 

 Third Cavalry as it played the funeral dirge. Then 

 the port was knocked free, the flag withdrawn, and 

 the shotted hammock plunged heavily over the side, 

 rushing down through the dark water to lie, till the 

 Judgment Day, in the ooze that holds the timbers 

 of so many gallant ships, and the bones of so many 

 fearless adventurers. 



We were favored by good weather during our 

 nine days' voyage, and much of the time when there 

 was little to do we simply sat together and talked, 

 each man contributing from the fund of his own ex- 

 periences. Voyages around Cape Horn, yacht races 

 for the America's cup, experiences on foot-ball 

 teams which are famous in the annals of college 

 sport; more serious feats of desperate prowess in 

 Indian fighting and in breaking up gangs of white 

 outlaws ; adventures in hunting big game, in break- 

 ing wild horses, in tending great herds of cattle, 

 and in wandering winter and summer among the 

 mountains and across the lonely plains the men 

 who told the tales could draw upon countless mem- 

 ories such as these of the things they had done and 

 the things they had seen others do. Sometimes 

 General Wheeler joined us and told us about the 

 great war, compared with which ours was such a 

 small war far-reaching in their importance though 

 its effects were destined to be. When we had be- 



