Speaker 1: A recruit at Christmas. Young Lieutenant Klaughlin left the Brooklyn
Navy Yard at an early hour and arrived at the
recruiting office at ten o'clock. It was the day before Christmas,
and even the bowery the Thieves Highway had taken on
the emblems and spirit of this season, and the young
officer smiled grimly as he saw a hard faced proprietor
of a saloon directing the hanging of wreaths and crosses
over the door of his palace, and telling the assistant
barkeeper to make the red holly berries show up better.
The cheap lodging houses had trailed the green over their
illuminated transoms, and even on Mott Strait, the chinamen had
hung up strings of evergreens over the doors of the
joss House and the gambling house next door, and the
tramp sent good for nothings just back from the island
had an animated, expectant look, as though something certainly was
going to happen. Lieutenant Claflin nodded to Corporal Goddard at
the door of the recruiting office and startled that veteran's rigidity,
and kept his cotton gloved hand at his visor longer
than the regulations required by saying wish you merry Christmas
as he jumped up the stairs. The recruiting office was
a dull, blank looking place. The view from the windows
was not inspiring, and the sight of the plump and
black eyed jewels in front of the pawn shop across
the street, who was a vision of delight to Corporal Goddad,
had no attraction to the officer upstairs. He put on
his blue jacket with the black braid down the front,
lighted a cigar, and wrote letters on every other than
official matters, and forgot about recruits. He was to have
leave of absence on Christmas, and though the others had
denounced him for leaving them mess table on that day,
they had forgiven him when he explained that he was
going to spend it with his people at home. The
others had homes as far away as San Francisco and
as far inland as milwauke Key, and some called the
big ship of war home. But Claflin's people lived up
in Connecticut, and he could reach them in a few hours.
He was a very lucky man, the others said, and
he felt very cheerful over it. And forgot the blank
looking office with its rolls and regulations, and colored prints
of uniforms and models of old warships, and tin boxes
of official documents which were to be filled out and
sent to the Honorable the Secretary of the Navy. Corporal
Godad on the stoop below, shifted from one foot to
the other and chafed his gloved hands softly together to
keep them warm. He had no time to write letters
on unofficial writing paper, nor to smoke cigars or read
novels with his feet on a chair, with the choice
of looking out at the queer stream of human life
moving by below the window on the opposite side of
the boweryy he had to stand straight, which came easily
to him now, and answer questions and urged doubtful minds
to join the ranks of the government's marines. A drunken
man gazed at Ogden's colored pictures of the American infantry,
cavalry and marine uniforms that hung before the door, and
placed an unsteady finger on the cavalry man's picture, and
said he chose to be one of those. Corporal Goddard
told him severely to be off and get sober and
grow six inches before he thought of such a thing,
and frowned him off the stoop. Then two boys from
the country asked about the service, and went off very
quickly when they found they would have to remain in
it for three years at least. A great many more
stopped in front of the gay pictures and gazed admiringly
at Corporal Goddard's bright brass buttons and brilliant complex, which
they innocently attributed to exposure to the sun on long,
weary marches. But no one came to offer himself in earnest.
At one o'clock, Lieutenant Claflin changed his coat and went
downtown to luncheon, and came back, still more content and
in feeling with this season, and lighted another cigar. But
just as he had settled himself comfortably, he heard Corporal
Goddad's step on the stairs, and a less determined step
behind him. He took his feet down from the wrong
of the other chair, pulled his undress jacket into place,
and took up a pen. Corporal Goddad saluted at the
door and introduced with a wave of his hand, the
latest applicant for Uncle Sam's service. The applicant was as
young as Lieutenant Laughlin and asked good looking, but he
was dirty and unshaven, and his eyes were set back
in the sockets, and his fingers twitched at his side.
Lieutenant Claughlin had seen many applicants in this stage. He
called it the remorseful stage and was used to it. Name,
said Lieutenant Claughlin, as he pulled a printed sheet of
paper towards him. The applicant hesitated, then said Walker, John Walker.
The lieutenant noticed the hesitation, but he merely remarked to himself,
it's none of my business, and added a loud nationality
and wrote United States. Before the applicant had sat, the
applicant said he was unmarried, was twenty three years old,
and had been born in New York City. Even Corporal
Goddad knew this last was not so, but it was
none of his business either. He moved the applicant up
against the wall under the measuring rod and brought it
down on his head. So he measured and waged the
applicant and tested his eyesight with printed letters and bits
of colored yarn. And the Lieutenant kept tally on the
sheet and bit the end of his pen and watched
the applicant's face. There were a great many applicants, and
few were chosen, but none of them had quite the
air about him which this one had. Lieutenant Claughlin thought
Corporal Goddad was just a bit too callous in the
way he handled the applicant, and too peremptory in his questions,
but he could not tell why Corporal Goddad treated them
all in that way. Then the young officer noticed that
the applicant's white face was flushing, and that he bit
his lips when Corporal Goddad pushed him towards the weighing
machine as he would have moved a barrel of flower.
Your land, sir, said Lieutenant Claughlin, glancing at the sheet.
Your average is very good. All you've got to do
now is to sign this and then it will be over.
But he did not let go of the sheet in
his hand, as he would have done had he wanted
it over. Neither did the applicant move forward to sign.
After you have signed this, said the young officer, keeping
his eyes down on the paper before him. You will
have become a servant of the United States. You will
sit in that other room until the officers closed for today,
and then you will be led over to the navy
yard and put into a uniform. And from that time on,
for three years, you will have a number the same
number as the one on your musket. You and the
musket will both belong to the government. You will clean
and load the musket and fight with it if God
ever gives us the chance, and the government will feed
you and keep you clean, and fight with you if needful.
The lieutenant looked up at the corporal and said, you
can go, God art, And the corporal turned on his
heel and walked downstairs, wondering. You may spend the three years,
continued the officer, still without looking at the applicant, which
are the best years of a young man's life on
the sea, visiting foreign ports. Or you may spend it
marching up and down the Brooklyn Navy Yard and cleaning
brass work. There are some men who are meant to
clean brass work, and too much up and down in
front of a stone arsenal, and who are fitted for
nothing else but to every man is given something which
should tell him that he is put here to make
the best of himself. Every man has so that even
the men who are only fit to clean brass rods.
But some men kill it or try to kill it
in different ways, generally by rum, and they are as
generally successful if they keep the process up long enough.
The government of which I am a very humble representative,
is always glad to get good men to serve her.
And I may be wrong, and I'm quite sure that
I'm speaking contrary to regulations, that some of her men
can serve her better in other ways than swabbing down decks.
Now you know yourself best. It it may be that
you are just this sort of man to stand up
and salute the ladies when they come on board, to
see the ship, and to watch them from forward as
they walk about with the officers. You won't be allowed
to speak to them. You will be number three hundred
twenty nine or three hundred twenty eight. And whatever benefits
a good woman can give a man will be shut
off from you, more or less for three years. And
on the other hand, it may be that there are
some good women who could keep you on shore and
help you to do something more with yourself than to
carry a musket. And again it may be that if
you stayed on shore, you would drink yourself more or
less comfortably to death and break somebody's heart. I can't tell.
But if I were not a commissioned officer to the
United States and a thing of rules and regulations who
can dance and wear a uniform, and a youth general
unfit to pose as an example, I would advise you
not to sign this, but to go home and brace
up and leave whiskey alone. Now what shall we do,
said the young lieutenant, smiling. Shall we tear this up?
Or will you sign it? The applicant's lips were twitching
as well as his hands now, and he rubbed his
coff over his face and smiled back. I'm much obliged
to you, he said, nervously. That sounds a rather flat
thing to say, I know, but if you knew all
I meant by it, though, it would mean enough. I've
made a damned full of myself in this city, but
nothing worse. And it was a choice of the Navy,
where they'd keep me straight, or going to the devil
my own way. But it won't be my own way
now thanks to you. I don't know how you saw
how it was so quickly, but you see I have
got a home back in Connecticut and women that can
help me there, and I'll go back to them and
ask them to let me started again where I was
when I went away. That's good, said the young officer, cheerfully.
That's the way to talk. Tell me where you live
in Connecticut, and I'll lend you the car fare to
get there. I'll expect it back with interest, you know,
he said, laughing. Thank you, said the rejected applicant. It's
not so far, but that I can walk, And I
don't think you'd believe in me if I took money.
Oh yes I would, said the lieutenant. How much do
you want? Thank you? But I'd rather walk, said the other.
I can get there easily enough by to morrow. I'll
be a nice Christmas present, won't I? He added grimly.
You'll do, said the young officer. I fancy you'll be
about as welcome a one as i'll get. He held
out his hand and the other shook it and walked out,
with his shoulders as stiff as those of Corporal Goddard.
Then he came back and looked into the room. Shyly,
I say, he said, hesitatingly. The lieutenant ran his hand
down into his pocket. You've changed your mind, he asked eagerly,
that's good. How much will you want? The rejected applicant flushed, No,
not that, he said, I just came back to say
wish you a merry Christmas. And of a recruited Christmas
by Richard Harding Davis