Page:Into Mexico with General Scott (1920).djvu/206

 in the village houses and shacks. Jerry's mess—First Sergeant Mulligan, Corporal Finerty, Fifer O'Toole, Privates "Scotty" MacPheel, John Doane (who had served in the British army) and Henry Brewer from New Jersey—got quarters equal to the best: the same being a room with stout clay walls and mud roof, and a fireplace, and sheep pelts on the dirt floor for softness. To be sure, the pelts smelled rather strong when warmed up, but what difference?

Sergeant Mulligan sent out Scotty and Henry to forage, with Jerry as interpreter. They three came back bringing a shoulder of mutton, two chickens and an armful of corn. Under orders from the sergeant, in a gruff voice, but delivered by Jerry, the Mexican who owned the hut supplied firewood. Speedily the mess was cooking and eating.

"The only thing that bothers me now is, jest how are we goin' to call on Santy Annie?" said Fifer O'Toole, munching; "for, as I understand, all the roads leadin' in to him are dikes, like, through the bogs, wid wather on both hands an' cannon overhead."

"Why can't you l'ave that to Gin'ral Scott?" Corporal Finerty reproved. "Faith, he'll find the way in an' we'll take it. Meself, I ain't paid to do a gin'ral's work; I've my own business, an' that's fightin' whin the officers give the word. They're the lads who know."

"By the way the folks in this town are acting, keeping so aloof and not over friendly, they consider us as good as licked already," put in Henry Brewer. "'You are all dead men'—wasn't that the comfort