Page:The Reminiscences of Carl Schurz (Volume Two).djvu/436

 “Where did you get it?” I asked. “I have found it, General!” he answered with a broad grin. I told him to go to the rear, and try not to get killed, and to hold on to the ham like grim death until we should have time to eat it. Schiele scampered off amid the laughter of the soldiers happening to be around. Schiele was “a character,” and a great favorite with the whole division. When I first took command, I asked the Colonel of the Seventy-fifth Pennsylvania whether he had not a man in his regiment who was not good for much in the ranks, but might make a suitable attendant at headquarters. He furnished me Schiele, a Suabian, who was a little too old and too fat for field service, but might be good enough for blacking boots and brushing clothes and keeping my tent or hut in order, and waiting upon the mess-table. Schiele turned out to be not an ideal servant, not over-tidy, nor very clever at the duties he had to perform. Among other things, he used to darn my stockings with a thick, hard twine he had found somewhere, which he considered very strong, but which caused very unpleasant sensations to my feet. In spite of his defects, I could not think of exchanging him for a more suitable person, for he had become so warmly attached to me that it would have broken his heart. This, of course, I could not do. He was “an original,” and gave us no end of amusement. His puffy face and corpulent figure might have served as an admirable model for a picture of Sancho Panza. To perfect the likeness, he rode in my headquarters train on a big donkey which he had “found” somewhere. He assumed great authority over the rest of the headquarters attendants. They would often gather around him, and it was “as good as a play” to hear him expound to them in his Suabian dialect the higher strategy of the war, or the strict measures he had to take to keep me in good health. On the present occasion he had certainly deserved