I had turned away from the scene sick with horror, even though the fiendish work had not yet begun; but as I stood near the barracks, trembling in every limb, the thought came that perhaps our deserters were not the ones for whom the stakes were intended.

This deserter, Banker by name, was an American, who had been a gold-digger, a gambler, a rough, and a dead shot in California, and he was very well able to take care of himself in any part of the world.