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Since that time the charred trees had been felled and removed, and the great fire-swept area had begun to deck itself with green along the edges, where it skirted the healthy forest. However, the larger part of the top was still barren and appallingly desolate.
But before we were half-way across the intervening stretch of water a dull "boom" resounded astern of us, and a length of some fifty feet of wharf face suddenly leapt outward and fell with a heavy splash into the water, followed, about half a minute later, by a second "boom" and splash, then a third, fourth, fifth, and so on, until the entire wharf was completely destroyed and the whole place a ghastly, fire-swept ruin.
One chap had seen General Mercer, with his aide-de-camp by his side, crossing a fire-swept field deliberately stop in the middle of it to light his pipe. Everybody agreed that the General was the coolest man in sight that day.
With daring bravery the Scots sought to tear down the wire with their hands; but were forced to fall back and lie in the fire-swept zone until one company forced its way through an opening and destroyed the barrier. The regiment, as a result of this mishap to the plans of the commanding general, lost its commander, Colonel Bliss, and fourteen other officers.
That great, black, charred area extending for miles over the prairie put a damper on the spirits of the locating agents. But these people had come for land, and they were not to be daunted. All over the great reservation groups could be seen investigating the soil, digging under the fire-swept surface, driving on into the regions of tall grass and scattered fields bordering the Rosebud.
The cones are about four inches long and covered with a sort of varnish and gum, rendering them impervious to moisture. No observer can fail to notice the admirable adaptation of this curious pine to the fire-swept regions where alone it is found.
In addition to shells and other missiles, small pieces of steel-piping will be projected by mortars into the fire-swept zone, in order to supplement the defects of natural cover which, of course, are nearly always as great as possible, seeing that the ground has generally been selected by the side against which the attack is being directed.
I did not believe that any one could cross that fire-swept area alive, but before many moments we heard the staccato of bursting bombs and hand grenades which meant that some of the enemy, at least, were within striking distance.
"I want the Revolution." Turnbull looked at the fire-swept sky and the wind-stricken woodlands, and kept on repeating the word voicelessly to himself the word that did indeed so thoroughly express his mood of rage as it had been among those red clouds and rocking tree-tops. "Revolution!" he said to himself.
A city full of people will at one time become panic-stricken over the burning of a rubbish-heap, and at another camp out in the ruins of fire-swept homes, treating their miseries as a huge joke. Philosophers write learnedly of cause and effect. In chemistry certain combinations give certain results. But no man can say: "I will do thus and so, this and that will follow."
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