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INDIAN TRAGEDIES AND ROMANCES.

interfere, he swore that he would knife the parson if he came in his way. This was a case after Potter's own heart. He told the fellow that he must never repeat this work. The man whipped out his knife, seized his gun, and was about to fire, when Potter quietly approached, took the weapon out of his hands, and pounded him in the stomach with the muzzle. The ruffian stood pitiable and unresisting, saying, "You have my arms, I can not fight." " Take your gun," said Potter, thrusting it at him, "and ask that woman's forgiveness, or you will never need a gun or knife again."   It was done.

When the war broke out, Potter enlisted in a cavalry regiment. He was a favorite among the soldiers. Long before his commission was issued he was, by common consent, made chaplain. Among the cavalrymen was a six-foot Texan, of powerful build, overbearing, and quarrelsome. He was a desperate character. No one cared to resist any bearable imposition from him.   He became the terror of the camp.

Texan justice is swift. The Fighting Parson resolved to take the matter in hand. A crowd gathered around as he walked toward the bully and shouted, "You are a liar. Now resent it." The stalwart Texan rushed at his antagonist to stamp him in the dust. A hundred soldiers who knew little of the parson, drew their knives to protect him. He pushed the ruffian in the breast, saying, " Coward, stop!" The Texan was cowed into a wilted puppy.

A slanderous statement was made in a Brownsville paper about Wood's regiment, while they were in camp at that place. The chaplain sought out (he editor who had thus defied the troops. The sermon was short, but the congregation grew pale and trembling as it proceeded. The announcement at the close, that the exercises would be resumed in half an hour, when the preacher and a squad of soldiers would pitch the press and audience into the Bio Grande, to be washed of their vileness, completed the conversion of the congregation, and it started through a back window pell-mell for a new field of usefulness.