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CAPTAIN MACKLIN

HIS MEMOIRS

By Richard Harding Davis

Illustrated By Walter Appleton Clark


{Illustration: "Go, Royal!" he cried, "and--God bless you!"}


To MY MOTHER




ILLUSTRATIONS (not available in this file)

"Go, Royal!" he cried, "and--God bless you!" FRONTISPIECE

He made our meeting something of a ceremony

We walked out to the woods

I was sure life in Sagua la Grande would always suit me

The moon rose over the camp... but still we sat

And the next instant I fell sprawling inside the barrack yard

I sprang back against the cabin




I


UNITED STATES MILITARY ACADEMY, WEST POINT

It may seem presumptuous that so young a man as myself should propose
to write his life and memoirs, for, as a rule, one waits until he has
accomplished something in the world, or until he has reached old age,
before he ventures to tell of the times in which he has lived, and of
his part in them. But the profession to which I belong, which is that
of a soldier, and which is the noblest profession a man can follow, is a
hazardous one, and were I to delay until to-morrow to write down what
I have seen and done, these memoirs might never be written, for, such
being the fortune of war, to-morrow might not come.

So I propose to tell now of the little I have accomplished in the first
twenty-three years of my life, and, from month to month, to add to these
memoirs in order that, should I be suddenly taken off, my debit and
credit pages may be found carefully written up to date and carried
forward. On the other hand, should I live to be an old man, this
record of my career will furnish me with material for a more complete
autobiography, and will serve as a safeguard against a failing memory.

In writing a personal narrative I take it that the most important events
to be chronicled in the life of a man are his choice of a wife and his
choice of a profession. As I am unmarried, the chief event in my life
is my choice of a profession, and as to that, as a matter of fact, I
was given no choice, but from my earliest childhood was destined to be
a soldier. My education and my daily environment each pointed to that
career, and even if I had shown a remarkable aptitude for any other
calling, which I did not, I doubt if I would have pursued it. I am
confident that had my education been directed in an entirely different
channel, I should have followed my destiny, and come out a soldier in
the end. For by inheritance as well as by instinct I was foreordained
to follow the fortunes of war, to delight in the clash of arms and the
smoke of battle; and I expect that when I do hear the clash of arms and
smell the smoke of battle, the last of the Macklins will prove himself
worthy of his ancestors.

I call myself the last of the Macklins for the reason that last year,
on my twenty-second birthday, I determined I should never marry. Women I
respect and admire, several of them, especially two of the young ladies
at Miss Butler's Academy I have deeply loved, but a soldier cannot
devote himself both to a woman and to his country. As one of our young
professors said, "The flag is a jealous mistress."

The one who, in my earliest childhood, arranged that I should follow
the profession of arms, was my mother's father, and my only surviving
grandparent. He was no less a personage than Major-General John M.
Hamilton. I am not a writer; my sword, I fear and hope, will always be
easier in my hand than my pen, but I wish for a brief moment I could
hold it with such skill, that I might tell of my grandfather properly
and gratefully, and describe him as the gentle and brave man he was. I
know he was gentle, for though I never had a woman to care for me as a
mother cares for a son, I never missed that care; and I know how brave
he was, for that is part of the history of my country. During many years
he was my only parent or friend or companion; he taught me my lessons by
day and my prayers by night, and, when I passed through all the absurd
ailments to which a child is heir, he sat beside my cot and lulled me to
sleep, or told me stories of