Trooper Tales — page 236: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

220 ‘The Story of a Cavalry Horse. owner. . . . At times one of his old friends would be missed from the picket line and never seen again. Was there to be an end to this breezy, beautiful life? The sun of a Tampa summer faded the black gloss from Sheridan’s back, and every other animal in the Black Horse troop was hued like the shoulders of a preachers old coat when that summer was ended. But Sherry was mighty still. Not one of the six hundred horses with- stood better the horrors of the transport during an eleven days’ trip from the States to Ponce, Porto Rico. Where the lower tier of horses were kept, the air was heavy with death. The cavalrymen, half. mad through weariness, threw pails of salt water upon the drooping horses. The eyes of the animals were filmy and half closed. Many sank and moved not again until the hoisting gear raised them up through the hatches, suspended them over the vessel’s side, and the rope was severed. And the cavalry- men, who loved their horses, watched them silently as they dropped into the tropical sea. Troopers can live through such a trip, and feel only achings in the head; but no horse has the vitality of his rider. And Sheridan, no longer a four-year-old, climbed the muddy hills of Porto Rico’s interior, as strong of wind and sure of foot as any native pony. Other horses choked and died of pneumonia, caused by the endless rain, but Sherry stood upon his feet in the daytime and whinnied when the feed-call sounded. Sherry did not know that his best days were spent. _ At last there came a morning when many new horses COMMIClOOKS. eC)