To specify the remarkable escapes would unduly lengthen this chapter, but, as near as my recollection serves me, no man entirely escaped. I'll specify two--one an escape and the other an incident. Lieutenant Swan, of the Third Minnesota, now a lawyer of Sioux City, Iowa, was with us on this picnic. He was not ordered to go, neither was he detailed, but he simply went, and he had a very narrow escape. During the sharp firing, and after we had some shallow pits dug, this officer was in one as far as his long legs would admit. He had a fine gold watch in his fob pocket, and one of the boys asked him the time of day. He undoubled as well as he could and got out his watch, but in returning it put it in his vest pocket instead of the fob. It was no sooner in his pocket than an Indian bullet struck it squarely in the center. The concussion knocked the lieutenant over, but the watch saved his life. He keeps it as a valued souvenir of the occasion. The incident relates to Private James Leyde, of Company A, of the Sixth. He was a little fellow who could march longer and eat oftener than any youngster of his size I ever saw. Jimmy was a splendid soldier, always ready for drill or guard, and never forgot his manners when he met a "shoulder-straps." He was a pious little fellow, too, and carried a Bible his mother gave him. Well, "after the battle" Jimmy was looking over the wreck with his comrade, Billy Caine, and in taking up his Bible found a bullet embedded in it. "Hello, Billy, my Bible got struck!" The ball had gone through Genesis, Exodus and Leviticus, until it stopped half way through Deuteronomy. Jimmy says: "God, Billy, it didn't get through Deuteronomy anyway!" There were many close calls, and it really seemed remarkable that so many could escape. I could specify scores, but it is not necessary. Among the incidents on the march before we arrived at Birch Coolie I might mention the finding of a wounded woman by the roadside. She had been without food or water for twelve days, and was the only one of a large party supposed to have been murdered. She did not escape uninjured, however, for the surgeon took fourteen buckshot from her back. During our thirty-six hours' siege this poor woman remained in the wagon where she had been placed the first day, and spent her time in praying for our deliverance. She sustained a broken wrist in addition to her other wounds, but after we got to the fort she was among her own people and soon fully recovered to tell the tale of her twelve days' wanderings and her marvelous escape. CHAPTER XX. BATTLE OF WOOD LAKE.