Captured: The Story of Sandy Ray
Charles King
Hardcover
(R. F. Fenno & Co, March 15, 1906)
The latest arrival at the post stood by the broad open doorway, within sound of the thunder - almost within touch of the salt spray - of the long rollers that broke in white, hissing foam upon the gleaming sands. The red gold disk of the setting sun had just vanished below the westward sea. The smoke of the evening gun was still drifting slowly up the leafy heights bordering the cantonment on the east. Out on the broad level of the parade the battalion stood motionless at attention as the beautiful flag, to the crashing accompaniment of "The Star Spangled Ban- ner," sank slowly beneath the cross trees. Fringing the quadrangle on three sides long ranks of dusky heads were bared in silent homage, the men as a rule dressed in ropas of spotless white, the women in skirts of livelier hue. Here and there the black cassock of a padre or the dun-colored frocks of a brace of shaven friars broke the lane of brighter color. Half way out across the open space, clad like his command in "khaki" with campaign hat and leggings to match, stood the commanding officer, a soldierly, statuesque personage, whose arms and hands close-held and extended - so differed from the unconstrained American pose - betokened an earlier training in some rigid European school.