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THE AQRICULTUBAL JOURNAL. 



other nations. Colonel Dodge declares 

 specificially tliot he has rejected all " hear- 

 say rides, of which there is no end," and 

 has accepted only those proved by official 

 reports. Colonel Dodge says that Capt. 

 S. F. Fountain, United States cavalry, in 

 the year 1891, with a detachment of his 

 troop, rode eighty-four miles in eight 

 hours. This record is vouched for, 

 and it is better than that of the Natal 

 Mounted Rifles by about four hours, the 

 distance being within one mile of that in 

 South Africa. For actual speed this 

 forced march stands, perhaps, at the 

 head of the American army record, though 

 other rides have been more remarkable. 



Remarkable Rides. 



In the year 1879, when the Utes 

 succeeded in getting some United States 

 troops into what was afterwards known 

 as Thornburg's "rat hole," several mounted 

 couriers succeeded in slipping through the 

 circling line of savages. All of them 

 reached Merritt's column, 170 miles dis- 

 tant, in less than twenty-four hours. The 

 exact time was not taken, for, as Colonel 

 Dodge puts it, " rescue was of more import- 

 ance than records." 



It must be understood, of course, that 

 all these American rides were made with- 

 out changing horses. The steed at the 

 start was the steed at the finish. The 

 best rider, according to cavalry experts, 

 is not the man who takes a five-barred 

 gate or who can ride standing, but the 

 man who by instinct feels the condition 

 of his horse, and, though getting the most 

 out of the animal, knows best how to 

 conserve his strength. Colonel Lawton, 

 now the Ge.ieral Lav/ton who is after 

 Aquinaldo, in the year 1876, rode from 

 Red Cloud agency, Nebraska, to Sidney, 

 in the same State, a distance of 125 miles, 

 in twenty-six hours. He was carrying 

 important despatches for General Crook, 

 and, though the road was bad, his mount 

 was in good condition when Lawton, 

 looking five years older than he did the 

 day before, handed over his bundle; of 

 papers to the black-bearded genera . 



A Forced March. 



General Merritt has a forced maich 

 record that has no Amei ican parallel \\ hen 

 the conditions of his journey are con- 

 sidered. He was ordered in the fall of 



1879 to the relief of Payne's command, 

 which was surrounded by hostile Indians. 

 Merritt's command consisted of fourtroops 

 of cavalry, but at the last moment he was 

 ordered to add to his force a battalion of 

 infantry. The " dough boys" were loaded 

 into army wagons drawn by mules, and 

 with the cavalry at the flanks the relief 

 column started. The distance to be 

 traversed was 170 miles, and it was made, 

 notwithstanding the handicap of the 

 wagons, and trails that were muddy and 

 sandy by turns, in just sixty-six hours. 

 At the end of the march the troopers 

 went iuto the fight, and in the entire 

 command not one horse showed a lame 

 leg or a saddle sore. 



Four troopers of the Fourth cavalry, 

 who had volunteered for the particular 

 service, were sent in the summer of 1870 

 from Fort Harney to Fort Warner with 

 despatches, and were told to make the 

 best time possible without killing their 

 horses. The men were on their mettle. 

 They made the distance, 140 miles, 

 twenty miles of the way being through 

 loose sand, in twenty-two hours, the 

 actual marching time being eighteen 

 hours and thirty minutes. At Fort 

 Warner they rested one day, and re- 

 turned to Harney on the same horses at 

 the uniform rate of sixty miles a day. 

 Captain Edmond G. Fechet started at 

 midnight for the relief of the Indian 

 scouts who had been sent out to arrest 

 Sitting Bull, and who, after killing that 

 chief, were beleaguered in a log hut by his 

 followers. Feciiet took an ambulance 

 wagon and a Hotchkiss gun with him. 

 The gun-carriage broke down, and he 

 was compelled to fasten the trail of the 

 piece to the tail-board of the ambulance, 

 and thus drag it along. Notwithstanding 

 this handicap, he made the first forty-five 

 miles in less than seven hours. He fought 

 and drove off the young Sioux bucks, then 

 scouted the country for ten miles, gave his 

 troopers some breakfast, and returned to 

 the fort. Fourteen hours were consum^ed 

 in coverieg ninety miles of ground. 



The cavalry horses of the American 

 army have undergone these endurance 

 and "speed tests carrying weights of more 

 than 2001bs., and without any tiaining 

 other than that received in the (ordinary 

 course of frontier scouting and daily drill 

 evolutions. 



