There's no use in fretting about little things." Miss Wilkins' remarks made a tremendous impression upon my mind and I began to study her philosophy.
At break of day the command marched out, their rifles on their shoulders, swaying along ahead of us, in the sunlight and the heat, which continued still to be almost unendurable.

The dry white dust of this desert country boiled and surged up and around us in suffocating clouds.
I had my own canteen hung up in the ambulance, but the water in it got very warm and I learned to take but a swallow at a time, as it could not be refilled until we reached the next spring--and there is always some uncertainty in Arizona as to whether the spring or basin has gone dry.
So water was precious, and we could not afford to waste a drop.
At about noon we reached a forlorn mud hut, known as Packwood's ranch.
But the place had a bar, which was cheerful for some of the poor men, as the two days' marches had been rather hard upon them, being so "soft" from the long voyage.

I could never begrudge a soldier a bit of cheer after the hard marches in Arizona, through miles of dust and burning heat, their canteens long emptied and their lips parched and dry.

I watched them often as they marched along with their blanket-rolls, their haversacks, and their rifles, and I used to wonder that they did not complain.
About that time the greatest luxury in the entire world seemed to me to be a glass of fresh sweet milk, and I shall always remember Mr.
Packwood's ranch, because we had milk to drink with our supper, and some delicious quail to eat.
Ranches in that part of Arizona meant only low adobe dwellings occupied by prospectors or men who kept the relays of animals for stage routes.
Wretched, forbidding-looking places they were! Never a tree or a bush to give shade, never a sign of comfort or home.
Our tents were pitched near Packwood's, out in the broiling sun.

They were like ovens; there was no shade, no coolness anywhere; we would have gladly slept, after the day's march, but instead we sat broiling in the ambulances, and waited for the long afternoon to wear away.
The next day dragged along in the same manner; the command marching bravely along through dust and heat and thirst, as Kipling's soldier sings: "With its best foot first And the road a-sliding past, An' every bloomin' campin'-ground Exactly like the last".
Beal's Springs did not differ from the other ranch, except that possibly it was even more desolate.