OBEDIENT TO THE CALL.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XIX, Issue XVI, 9 October 1897, Page 511

OBEDIENT TO THE CALL.

The editor of Thierfreund relates the following story, drawn from his personal experience of the high training of military horses. In the year 1872, during a skirmish with the Sioux Indians, the Third Cavalry Regiment had formed an encampment in a valley on the southern border of Dakota. At nightfall the horses were tethered to the ground by a long line. Towards daybreak a violent storm of rain and hail burst over the valley. The unsheltered animals, terrified at the violence of the storm, broke loose, and tore away in a wild stampede up the steep sides of the valley, their fear driving them right into the territory of the enemy. Without horses the soldiers would l>e at the mercy of the enemy, yet it was impossible, in the half-darkness, to go after them into an unknown region probably full of Indians. Everything seemed lost, when the captain, as a last resource, ordered the stable call to be sounded. In a few minutes every horse had returned to the encampment, and the men were saved.