A court-martial was ordered, "to try such cases as may be brought before it." The court convened with all the form and ceremony prescribed by the Army Regulations for tribunals which pass judgment upon the pay, honor and lives of officers and men. The officers detailed for the court sent back to the baggage wagons, and got their wrinkled dress-suits out of the valises, they buttoned these to their throats, donned their swords, sashes and white gloves, and gathered stiffly and solemnly about a long, rough table, which had been put up under the spreading limbs of giant oaks. Guards pacing at a little distance kept all the curious and inquisitive out of earshot. The camp gossips, full of interest as to the fate of those who were to be tried, could see an aggravating pantomime acted out, but hear no word. A squad of offenders of various degrees of turpitude ranging from absence without leave to sleeping on post, were huddled together under the Provost Guard, while Si and Shorty, being non-commissioned officers, were allowed to remain with their company, to be produced by Capt. McGillicuddy when wanted. They kept themselves rigidly apart from the rest of the company, repelling the freely-offered sympathy of their comrades. Si was most deeply concerned about Shorty, who was so desperate over his fall from grace, that he regretted that he had not killed the young Aid, while he was at him, so as to have relieved his comrades of him, and made his own condemnation and execution sure. "Old Maj. Truax, of the 1st Oshkosh, is President of the court," said the Orderly-Sergeant, as the company was anxiously canvassing the boys' chances. "Gosh, that settles it," groaned Jerry Wilkinson; "that old bull o' the woods 'd rather shoot a man than not. He's always lookin' around for some excuse for sculping a man, and the less he has the savager he is." "I don't believe it," said the Orderly, "I've watched old Truax, when he's been roaring around, and I always found that he was after somebody that deserved it. Men of that kind are pretty certain to be very soft on good soldiers, like Si and Shorty, and I think he's all right. The boys of the 1st Oshkosh all swear by him, and you can trust a man's own regiment to know him surer than anybody else. And then there's Capts. Suter and Harris, of the Maumee Muskrats." "Terrible strict," muttered Jerry despairingly. "Lieuts. Newton and Bonesteel, of the Kankakees," continued the Orderly. "Good men--promoted from the ranks, and remember that they once carried a gun themselves." "Lieut. McJimsey, of the staff." "A wasp-waisted West Pointer, raw from school; thinks he's learned all there's to know about war out of a book on triggernometry. Has no more feelin' for a private soljer than I have for a mule. Calls 'em 'my men,' roared Jerry.