"Mustn't talk in ranks, boys," Shorty kindly admonished. "It's strictly agin' regulations. Straighten up, there, like soldiers, all o' you, and git into a line. Looks like a ram's horn now. If the rebels'd shoot down that line they wouldn't hit one o' you."
ONE:"Come ashore here, boy," commanded Shorty, "and be thankful that you're alive. You've had a mighty narrow squeak of it. Next time you go out coon huntin' be sure there's no Yankee and rebel soldiers huntin' one another in the neighborhood. Coons have a tough time then."
The other members of the company testified in the same way, giving their belief even more emphatically against any liquor being found anywhere in that neighborhood, and the unlikelihood of Shorty's being able to obtain any. The other members of the court had "caught on" very quickly to the tactics of the President and Judge-Advocate. All except Lieut. McJimsey, whose prepossessions were decidedly and manifestly in favor of the attitude of his brother staff officer. He grew stiffer and more dogged as the case proceeded, and frequently asked embarrassing questions. The Judge-Advocate announced that "the case was closed, and the court would be cleared for deliberation.And Dodd had never enjoyed that particular brand of funAlbin's brand. ov the nicest boys that ever lived, but he needs half-One of our batteries, a mile or so to the rear, which had not had an opportunity to fire during the day, could not resist this challenge, and began throwing shells at the fort with so fair an aim as to draw the attention of the rebel battery to it. the Gunn I waz going 2 git, & I didn't git none.The Deacon had been pondering. To his thrifty mind it seemed like a waste to give a crisp, new $5 bill for such an insignificant thing as a chicken. Like Indiana farmers of his period, he regarded such things as chickens, eggs, butter, etc., as "too trifling for full-grown men to bother about. They were wholly women-folks' truck." He fingered the bills in his bosom, and thought how many bushels of wheat and pounds of pork they represented. Then he thought of Si in the hospital, and how a little chicken broth would build him up. Out came five new $5 bills.