overrated by the colonel and Truman and others; he had held all summer that the lieutenant was a "molly-coddle;" he had been reproved more than once for what they termed his injustice to his subaltern, and now Davies had proved just exactly what he knew he would prove—a carpet knight, a prayer-meeting soldier, with neither grit nor brawn nor backbone; and if he was killed, at least he had died in time to save the regiment from having to blush for him in the future. Devers had served throughout the war of the rebellion in a regiment that saw no end of hard fighting, but always when he happened to be on sick-leave or detached service of some kind, for in all of his years of service no man in his grade or corps had so seldom been under fire, either in the South or on the plains. With abilities unquestioned and opportunities second to none, it was nevertheless observed of him at the close of the four years' struggle that there, at least, was a man who hadn't even mustering or recruiting service to fall back upon when "brevets" went scattering broadcast over the army, showering like the rain upon the just and the unjust. He had lived all through it without having become distinguished for anything that might become a man, winning a name for himself principally for consummate skill in getting out of what he was told to do without getting into a scrape or out of the service. He became a tremendous paper-fighter in the days that followed, however, and like some of our war generals, could find the weak points in the armor of his comrades if he couldn't in that of the enemy. He became a club-room critic of other fellows' campaigns, companies, or conduct, as probably the most effective way of diverting attention from his own. He sneered at the war record of every contemporary who had achieved rank superior to his own, as with hardly an exception every one of them had done so, and made the burden of his song among the younger men the blunders, faults, and follies of the elders. Without a drop of Irish blood in his veins, he inspired the belief that he must be own cousin to the newly-landed Hibernian who announced himself as "agin the governmint," for post and regimental commanders without exception found him the most adroit, crafty, sinuous, and troublesome of captains—one who was forever doing something to try them, yet nothing on which they could try him. Well he knew his unpopularity and sagely judged his opportunities. The liberties he had dared with Warren he would not now have ventured with Riggs, or Black Bill, or old Tintop, one and all of whom had learned to know him well, and would have been prepared for some such betrayal of the trust reposed in him.
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