§ 162 The Voice of a Prophet
A company of a division of colored troops were in heavy marching order awaiting the word to start for the front. It was to be their first actual contact with the enemy. One of the privates had somewhere picked up a copy of the Paris edition of the New York Herald.
“Does dat air paper say anything about us boys?” inquired a sergeant.
“It sho’ do,” answered the private, improvising. “It sez yere dat twenty-five thousand cullid troops is goin’ over de top to-night, suppo’ted by fifty thousand Frenchmen.”
From down the line came a third voice, saying:
“Well, I knows whut to-morrow’s number of dat paper’s gwine say. It’s gwine say, in big black letters, ‘Fifty thousand Frenchmen trompled to death by twenty-five thousand niggers.’”