Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places | Page 5

of him at least a bursting shell had left. On
a little flat half up sat quaint Dr. Diestelkamp, like Mark Tapley jolly
under difficulties; by his side lay a man who had just bled to death as
the good doctor explained to me. While he had been applying the
tourniquet under a hot fire his right arm had been broken; and before he
could pull himself up and go to the rear another bullet had found its
billet in his thigh. There the little man sat, contentedly smoking till
somebody would be good enough to come and take him away. Von
Zülow too--he of the gay laugh and sprightly countenance--was on his
back a little higher up, with a bullet through the chest. I heard the
ominous sound of the escaping air as I raised him to give him a drink
from my flask. What needs it to become diffuse as to the terrible sights
which that steep and the plateau above it presented on this beautiful
summer evening? It was farther to the right, in ground more broken

with gullies and ravines, that the second battalion of the Hohenzollerns
had gone up; and I wandered along there among the carnage eking out
the contents of my flask as far as I could, and when the wounded had
exhausted the brandy in it filling it up with water and still toiling on in
a task that seemed endless. At last, in a sitting posture, his back against
a hawthorn tree in one of the grassy ravines, I saw one whom I thought
I recognised. "Eckenstein!" I cried as I ran forward; for the posture was
so natural that I could not but think he was alive. Alas! no answer came;
the gallant young Feldwebel was dead, shot through the throat. He had
not been killed outright by the fatal bullet; the track was apparent by
the blood on the grass along which he had crawled to the hawthorn tree
against which I found him. His head had fallen forward on his chest
and his right hand was pressed against his left breast. I saw something
white in the hollow of the hand and easily moved the arm for he was
yet warm; it was the photograph of the little girl he had married but
three short days before. The frank eyes looked up at me with a merry
unconsciousness; and the face of the photograph was spotted with the
life-blood of the young soldier.
I sent the death-token to Saarlouis by post to the young widow. I never
knew whether she received it, for all the address I had was Saarlouis.
Eckenstein I saw buried with two officers in a soldier's grave under the
hawthorn. Any one taking the ascent up the fourth ravine Forbach-ward
from the bluff of the Spicheren, may easily find it about halfway up. It
may be recognised by the wooden cross bearing the rude inscription:
"Hier ruhen in Gott 2 Officiere, 1 Feldwebel, 40ste Hohenzol. Fus.
Regt."

REVERENCING THE GOLDEN FEET
1879
By Christmas 1878 the winter had brought to a temporary standstill the
operations of the British troops engaged in the first Afghan campaign,
and I took the opportunity of this inaction to make a journey into
Native Burmah, the condition of which seemed thus early to portend
the interest which almost immediately after converged upon it, because
of King Thebau's wholesale slaughter of his relatives. Reaching
Mandalay, the capital of Native Burmah, in the beginning of February
1879, I immediately set about compassing an interview with the young

king. Both Mr. Shaw, who was our Resident at Mandalay at the time of
my visit, and Dr. Clement Williams whose kindly services I found so
useful, are now dead, and many changes have occurred since the
episode described below; but no description, so far as I am aware, has
appeared of any visit of courtesy and curiosity to the Court of King
Thebau of a later date than that made by myself at the date specified.
One of my principal objects in visiting Mandalay, or, in Burmese
phrase, of "coming to the Golden Feet," was to see the King of Burmah
in his royal state in the Presence Chamber of the Palace. Certain
difficulties stood in the way of the accomplishment of this object. I had
but a few days to spend in Mandalay. With the approval of Mr. Shaw,
the British Resident, I determined to pursue an informal course of
action, and with this intent I enlisted the good offices of an English
gentleman resident in Mandalay, who had intimate relations with the
Ministers and the Court.
This gentleman, Dr. Williams, was good enough to help me with zeal
and address. The line of strategy to adopt was to interest in my cause