Page:Into Mexico with General Scott (1920).djvu/145

 were plenty of wagons but few animals remaining for the First Division. The Mexican horses and mules were small, poor creatures. Beside them the American animals were giants. A siege train of six heavy guns was being prepared also. And the First Division had had to wait.

But now—

"The general gone?" Lieutenant Grant answered. "That's good news. We'll soon be gone, too, then."

"Yes; and we're in for a lively brush, according to reports. Twiggs and Patterson have run up against the whole Mexican army at Plan del Rio, fifty miles inland. Santa Anna's said to be there in person, with all the troops he can muster, on the hills commanding the road where it passes through a gorge in climbing the mountains. So the general has set out with Lee and Phil Kearny's First Dragoons to see for himself. We'll be needed, all right."

"I'll make application to be relieved of this quartermaster duty and permitted to serve with my company," Lieutenant Grant declared. "I wouldn't miss that battle for a thousand dollars."

"Lieutenant Grant, he want to fight," Pompey chuckled, while he and Jerry cleared away the mess dishes after dinner. "What you gwine to do, when dey's a-fightin' dem Mexicans?".

"Going to keep along where I can see, anyhow," Jerry asserted.

"Sho', now; battlefield's no place fo' boys," Pompey rebuked. "Ain't no place fo' dis nigger, neither. You an' me is nuncumbatants. We got to tend to camp, so's to have hot victuals ready. Fightin' is powerful hungry work."