I was quite surprised to see Major Jake Brown jump down into the Bomb-Proof. I guessed, by the way he squinted around, that this was his first time down here. During the last couple days, he ran around all six walls, ordering the sappers hither and yon with their wheelbarrows full of dump-dust. He was determined to build back up the walls faster than Lunarista & Co. could whack `em down. By the way he wrinkled his nose it was easy to figure he had never visited the safety of our underground nest. (It was steerage class for five hundred men and a couple dozen women. This storm over the P. of T. made for a nasty voyage to the Halls of Glory!)

We all crowded in the front of our company dugouts to hear him give a little speech in the gallery. He said, "Some of the men have had a lapse of martial virtue..." (By this he meant they deserted. They jumped the wall and swum over to the lunaritas of Plato's Crater. Some of the Green Moon boys from Phobos got kind of glazy-eyed when they heard their Awful Deity's bells calling them to worship. And some of us sinners swore we could smell perfume when the wind came from the south, from the lunarita's wash hung out to dry...)

As the Major spoke, Prince-President Franklin Stove stood behind him, ticking irregularly, seemingly in lazy contemplation, his tin eyelids blinking as he cranked the totals of his Babbage Calculating Machine brain, and little puffs of coke-smoke rising out of his stove pipe to the regular thump of his boiler-piston.

"I asked our moral surgeon to read the enemy's assertions against our cause," Major Brown smiled mildly. "The light of reason will explode his deceptions like fire to fuse. That, I believe, is the most sensible, democratic and forthright way to defuse lies - bold detonation." He handed a certain circular to the Metal Man and hastened up and out of the Bomb-Proof, Lieutenant Frederickson following close behind.

The Prince-President, whose sash (indicating exactly what kind of surgeon he was, a moral one) was by now a little bit brown stained (with glory). He directed the vectors of his swirling marble eyes on the enemy's demoralizing circular. It was a friendly little note that we all had read or had read to us. Myself, I had read it a couple or three times, secretly - because I was bored and curious, that's all - ever since the old button-peddler from across the Cold Sea had given me my two buttons wrapped up in them. Other Dough-Boys got theirs wrapped around corn flour or bottles of mescal, back before the war started, when the folks from Plato's Crater did a brisk business on us, even as we leaned on our fort shovels and oggled them shy, long- braided lunaritas...

ARMY OF THE SEA OF TRANQUILITY
CRATER OF PLATO, APRIL XXVIII, 1846
CIRCULAR

1. 1. IN THE HEARTS OF ALL GOOD MEN IT IS KNOWN THAT THE WAR CARRIED ON AGAINST THE UNITED STATES OF THE MOON BY THE UNITED STATES OF EARTH ARE UNJUST, ILLEGAL, & AGAINST GOD, FOR WHICH REASON NO CHRISTIAN SHOULD OUGHT TO CONTRIBUTE TO IT LEST HE BE CONTEMNED TO DAMNATION ETERNAL.
2. 2. OUR FEDERAL GOVERNMENT IS NOW PLEASANTLY RE- ESTABLISHED IN THE CAPITAL, & ALL GENERALS MORE OR LESS UNITED FOR THE PATRIOTIC DEFENSE. TO THAT CAUSE HAS ARISEN A GREAT NUMBER OF ARMIES OF CONSCRIPTED PEONS CALLED THE NATIONAL GUARD OF THE CRATERS OF ARCHIMEDES, ERATOSTHENES, COPERNICUS, PTOLEMY, FRACASTORIUS, TYCHO, & THE REST. WE ARE PREPARED TO DIE FOR OUR INDEPENDENCE FROM THE STEAMBALLOON INVADERS WHO WOULD CRUELLY ENSLAVE THE POPULACE WHO VERY HAPPILY WORK OUR GENERAL'S HACIENDAS.
3. 3. IN THE NAME OF MY REPUBLIC I OFFER THE HAND OF FRIENDSHIP TO ALL INDIVIDUALS IF BUT THEY LAY DOWN THEIR ARMS & SEPARATE THEMSELVES FROM THE AMERICAN ARMY. WITH MY WORD OF HONOUR I PLEDGE THAT THEY SHALL BE PROTECTED & WELL TREATED IN ALL PLANTATIONS, TOWNS, CHURCHES, & ROADS WHERESOEVER THEY BE RECEIVED, & COURTEOUSLY ASSISTED FOR THEIR MARCH ACROSS THE LUNAR REPUBLIC. ALL OF THE HUNDREDS OF MEN WHO HAVE CHOSEN TO QUIT THE EVIL CAUSE ALREADY ENJOY OUR GRATITUDE.
4. 4. OUR KIND, BEAUTIFUL, & VIRTUOUS CANTINA GIRLS WILL GENEROUSLY BESTOW EVERY COURTESY THAT IS DUE OUR BRAVE GUESTS.
5. 5. TO ALL THOSE BRAVE MEN WHO WISH TO SERVE IN THE INNUMERABLE, GLORIOUS, & OMNIPOTENT ARMY OF THE MOON, THEIR GRADES, & OFFICES SHALL BE TRANSFERRED. EACH MAN WHO DOES SO SHALL BE BLESSED BY GOD, BUT FROM THE GOVERNMENT OF THE REPUBLIC HE SHALL RECEIVE ONE HUNDRED & SIXTY ACRES OF FERTILE LAND.

As the Prince-President finished reading - the words ticking and whistling out with steam - about a dozen of Lunarista's mortar shells affixed their signature in friendship with the western ramparts of Fort Slow-Polk. Sand, stone, and smoke blew in on us, rattling down from the yard. But before the moral surgeon could hack off any rotten limbs among us, there was a whoop and a hollar from the sentry pits:

"Sam Walker's boys a-comin' in!"

The officers shouted. The bugler played, "To Arms!" as the drums began to rattle. We heard far off musket fire from the Trankie pickets as we rushed out in a mob into the open air again, hastily forming our columns. A hundred of us rushed up in line formation and mounted Wall 5, a second hundred for Wall 6. The rest remained reserved in the yard, scanning the skies for the Rangers' balloons. Far, far off I saw about seven of the Texas irregular Dragoon-Balloons (a brave state militia that wasn't quite yet legally organized into the Army of Observation) - better known as Sam Walker's Flying Rangers - seven tiny balloons, flying low, draggin their ropes, the anchors pulling up dust, their one-man gondola paddles flapping like fish fins as they tried to tack against the wind. The Lunar hussars galloped to cut them off before they reached us. They looked magnificent, those horsemen, with long lances, golden armor, carbines, sabers, and pennants - there was a bunch of confusion in all the smoke raised by hundreds of horses - we heard the crack of the carbines, followed by the pop-pop-popping of the Rangers' Colt-Repeaters - a lance rose up out of the smoke to prick at a balloona lasso caught around a gondola paddle, but the Ranger cut all his ballast and lifted the hussar out of his saddle - we saw the red glare of several stoves as they manufactured torrents of hot air - one by one, all of the balloons retreated upward out of the smoke - except - and then - all of a sudden, real close - a lone ballonist appeared, his gondola bumping along the ground, the rider hugging the rigging. A fast ragged row of hussars rode right behind him, but, as the Ranger lifted a paddle and somehow steered diagonally toward the sea, Captain Seawell touched off a 6-pound ball bounding amidst the now-exposed pursuers, who scattered, and broke away. But their captain - who looked familiar - braved the ball to lean out of his saddle and slash the Ranger's anchor cord. The balloon lurched up and bounced down again joltingly, but the dusty Ranger hung on. The balloon skipped up the slope of Wall 4, and swung low over the yard, twisting. The Ranger tossed a long, long lasso round the flagpole and pulled it tight. That brought the balloon jerkily around as the reserve companies scrambled for the truncated stub of his drag rope. Quick as a wink the Ranger tugged the top flap open, all the hot air swooshed up out of the balloon, and the circus canopy of it slowly came to rest on top the gondola, gently rocking.

And so, though under siege, had we a visitor!

Now a figure dismounted his straw saddle! Now he dusted off his hat, and set it carefully back on. Now he swooped it off again, and bowed:

"Major Brown and Cotton Balers! I'm powerf'ly pleased to be your guest! Allow me to introducify myself. I am - "

" - Sam Walker! You nearly getched yourself kilt!" chided Sarah, rushing over with a cup of coffee. She pushed aside the mob with her gingham elbows right and left. "Y'old prairie pi-rate!"

"Why, Sarah," grinned Captain Walker, pushing up his brim. "Ain't this somethin'! You takin' care of yer boys, now, garl?" he winked, and swung his gnarled paw through the air, mimicking how she had wallopped one of Walker's boys, Wallis Gordon, back in Annex Agonies Crater when he had tried to kiss her without permission. This had earned her the instant admiration of such a discriminating sort as Captain Walker himself, and I reckoned that my wife had given him plenty of permissions.

Sarah blushed and giggled and spat.

"I jest do what I can, same as everybody else," she said mildly. "Want some of my coffee, Captain?"

- Suddenly the coffee shrieked and blew up in her hand!

- She stood stunned, the handle still punched in her fingers. Then she slapped her knees with crazy relieved laughter.

"Strong stuff, that," observed the sunburnt Ranger, mildly. He stood with his hands on his belt, shaking his head. He looked tired.

I let out a long breathe and with my hands covering my ears scanned the sky for more unwelcome visitors. General Lunarista's lone mortar had resumed its slow trickle of shells on our heads.

"Into the Bomb-Proof!" yelled Major Brown as the Rangers ran up and saluted and put out his rawhide-gloved hand for a hearty shake.

"Major, I bring a message from General Taylor - "

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