His West Point comrades were scattered far, and the fancy seized him that the bugle brought them together every day of their lives as it sounded the morning calls that would soon begin echoing down the coast from Kennebec Arsenal and Fort Preble in Maine, through Myer and Monroe, to McPherson, in Georgia, and back through Niagara and Wayne to Sheridan, and on to Ringgold and Robinson and Crook, zigzagging back and forth over mountain and plain to the Pacific, and thence ringing on to Alaska, and echoing again from Hawaii to lonely outposts in Asian seas.
He was so intent with the thought that he hummed reveille, and was about to rebuke himself for unsoldierly behavior on duty when Armitage whistled for him to advance.
"It's all right; they haven't passed yet.

I met a railroad track-walker down there and he said he had seen no one between here and Lamar.

Now they're handicapped by the big country horse they had to take for that Servian devil, and we can push them as hard as we like.

We must get them beyond Lamar before we crowd them; and don't forget that we want to drive them into my land for the round-up.

I'm afraid we're going to have a wet morning." They rode abreast beside the railroad through the narrow gap.