Sketches of the campaign in northern Mexico : in eighteen hundred forty-six and seven / by an officer of the First Regiment of Ohio volunteers.

THE DONKEY FORDING. 133
flowers. He laughingly replied that he thought it would not
be so bad when it became dry, and with great good humor
turned away to take his place in the ranks.
Among the foremost to reach the stream was the bugler of
one of our flank (rifle) companies. He had obtained a
donkey somewhere and somehow on the route; one of the
most deformed of its ugly species. Its head was nearly as
large as its body, and supported a pair of ears that the
prince of asses or of darkness might have envied. The little
animal was quite a pet with the men, and had been made to
play a part in many comic scenes. It was unusually lively
and musical withal, and seldom failed to lend its melodious
vocal accompaniment to the instrumental performances of
its master. The wags of the regiment pretended to regard
it as the chief musician of the corps, and to incense the
drum-major, sometimes offered mock obedience to its bray.
This wonderful production of the animal kingdom the bugler
had been permitted to ride during the march, much to his
own satisfaction, and the amusement of others. When near
the bank of the muddy creek, the donkey "G smelt a rat'"-a
muskrat, perhaps, in that situation-and halting, suddenly
braced himself back in the usual manner of his stubborn
race; and which graceful attitude was understood to signify:
"here's one donkey that won't go it." Without pausing-in
the words of a popular comic song-"' to give him some hay,
and ax him to go," the rider, by the prompt application of a
stout cudgel, compelled him to enter the water and advance
a few steps from the shore. While in that situation, one
of the heaviest men in the battalion mounted behind the