"Also by this time there must be two or three regiments of State militia on trucks and bound in this direction; and the artillery and machine-guns from Ashland ought to be ready any minute. We've got two more kegs. Are you game?" As if in answer, a dull boom sounded from the northwest, followed by another; and in five minutes the banging was almost continuous. John nodded his head. The lieutenant swung the plane around, and it was less than ten minutes before they saw the trenches of the Fort Crook troops spread below them; and from far into the north there poured column upon column of densely formed Roman troops, with the gleam of the afternoon sun upon the metal of their armor and swords. On the eastern end of the line the Roman infantry had reached the trenches and a sickening carnage was taking place. As they advanced steadily toward the trenches, the Roman troops were mowed down by the machine-guns of the Federal soldiers and the Omaha police, in swaths like meadow-grass laid flat by the blade of the scythe. During the period of a few minutes as they looked down they saw thousands of men fall; great heaps of twitching and bloody dead in armor and plumes were piled before the thin line of khaki. "They don't need us much, but here goes!" Far back over the enemy's lines, where the troops were massed the densest, they sailed, and dropped their black and smoking blasts and scattered several companies of bewildered soldiers. But others took their places and pressed steadily on. "If we only had a few fighting planes and some ammunition for them--wouldn't we clean up the place!" gloated the lieutenant. "But there isn't a plane with a machine-gun on it in this division, and not an aerial bomb except some dummies for practice. The War Department isn't ever so very fast, and this certainly came suddenly. However, I'm sure that they must be getting busy sending things over by now. Let's look westward." The line was flung a dozen miles west of the Missouri River, and gradually was crawling still further west. The artillery from Ashland had stopped ten miles southwest of the place where fighting first began, and by now had set up their pieces and gotten the range with the aid of a commandeered, tri-motored, passenger plane; they were banging shells at the rate of one every three seconds into the thickest of the troops. Even at the height of three thousand feet, the sight was horrible; there were red areas against the green of the landscape, and red areas on the piled up heaps that twitched and gleamed with spots of metal; the heaps piled up and grew into hills, between the gaping holes that the shells dug into the wheatfields. "Ha! Look!" The lieutenant pointed near the line at the middle. "An artillery captain is looking for prisoners."