Fate has a way of picking unlikely material, Greasy-haired second lieutenants of French artillery, And bald-headed, dubious, Roman rake-politicians. Her stiff hands were busy now with an odd piece of wood, Sometime Westpointer, by accident more than choice, Sometime brevet-captain in the old Fourth Infantry, Mentioned in Mexican orders for gallant service And, six years later, forced to resign from the Army Without enough money to pay for a stateroom home. Turned farmer on Hardscrabble Farm, turned bill-collector, Turned clerk in the country-store that his brothers ran, The eldest-born of the lot, but the family-failure, Unloading frozen hides from a farmer’s sleigh With stoop-shouldered strength, whittling beside the stove, And now and then turning to whiskey to take the sting From winter and certain memories. It didn’t take much. A glass or two would thicken the dogged tongue And flush the fair skin beneath the ragged brown beard. Poor and shabby⁠—old “Cap” Grant of Galena,