The knowledge of military minutiæ exhibited in this book will be found to be correct, but it is not mine; I took it from _Army Regulations_, ed. 1904; _Hardy’s Tactics_—_Cavalry_, revised ed., 1861; and _Jomini’s Handbook of Military Etiquette_, West Point ed., 1905. It would not be honest in me to encourage by silence the inference that I composed the Horse’s private bugle-call, for I did not. I lifted it, as Aristotle says. It is the opening strain in _The Pizzicato_ in _Sylvia_, by Delibes. When that master was composing it he did not know it was a bugle-call, it was I that found it out. Along through the book I have distributed a few anachronisms and unborn historical incidents and such things, so as to help the tale over the difficult places. This idea is not original with me; I got it out of Herodotus. Herodotus says, “Very few things happen at the right time, and the rest do not happen at all: the conscientious historian will correct these defects.” The cats in the chair do not belong to me, but to another. These are all the exceptions. What is left of the book is mine. MARK TWAIN. LONE TREE HILL, DUBLIN, NEW HAMPSHIRE, _October_, 1905. Part I I SOLDIER BOY—PRIVATELY TO HIMSELF I AM Buffalo Bill’s horse. I have spent my life under his saddle—with him in it, too, and he is good for two hundred pounds, without his clothes; and there is no telling how much he does weigh when he is out on the war-path and has his batteries belted on. He is over six feet, is young, hasn’t an ounce of waste flesh, is straight, graceful, springy in his motions, quick as a cat, and has a handsome face, and black hair dangling down on his shoulders, and is beautiful to look at; and nobody is braver than he is, and nobody is stronger, except myself. Yes, a person that doubts that he is fine to see should see him in his beaded buck-skins, on my back and his rifle peeping above his shoulder, chasing a hostile trail, with me going like the wind and his hair streaming out behind from the shelter of his broad slouch. Yes, he is a sight to look at then—and I’m part of it myself.