John D. Billings, Hardtack and Coffee: The Unwritten Story of Army Life

[290] in size. But disproportionately large though they may be, there is one other organ in his possession which surpasses them; that is his voice. This is something simply tremendous. That place which the guinea-fowl occupies among the feathered bipeds of the barn-yard in this respect, the mule holds facile princes among the domestic quadrupeds. The poets who lived in the same time with Pericles said of the latter that “he lightened, thundered, and agitated all Greece,” so powerful was his eloquence. So, likewise, when

The rear guard of the regiment.

the mule raised his voice, all opposition was silent before him, for nothing short of rattling, crashing thunder, as it seemed, could successfully compete for precedence with him.

In addition to his great usefulness in the train, he was used a good deal under a pack-saddle. Each regiment usually had one, that brought up the rear on the march, loaded with the implements of the cook-house — sometimes with nothing to be seen but head and tail, so completely was he covered in. They were generally convoyed by a colored man. Sometimes these strong-minded creatures, in crossing a stream, would decide to lie down, all encumbered as they were, right in the middle, and down they would settle in spite of the ludicrous opposition and pathetic protests