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Real Soldiers of Fortune by Richard Harding Davis
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of brigade of the army of King Milan of Servia. These are only a
few of his military titles. In 1884 was published a book giving the
story of his life up to that year. It was called "Under Fourteen
Flags." If to-day General MacIver were to reprint the book, it
would be called "Under Eighteen Flags."

MacIver was born on Christmas Day, 1841, at sea, a league off the
shore of Virginia. His mother was Miss Anna Douglas of that
State; Ronald MacIver, his father, was a Scot, a Rossshire
gentleman, a younger son of the chief of the Clan MacIver. Until
he was ten years old young MacIver played in Virginia at the home
of his father. Then, in order that he might be educated, he was
shipped to Edinburgh to an uncle, General Donald Graham. After
five years his uncle obtained for him a commission as ensign in the
Honorable East India Company, and at sixteen, when other boys
are preparing for college, MacIver was in the Indian Mutiny,
fighting, not for a flag, nor a country, but as one fights a wild
animal, for his life. He was wounded in the arm, and, with a
sword, cut over the head. As a safeguard against the sun the boy
had placed inside his helmet a wet towel. This saved him to fight
another day, but even with that protection the sword sank through
the helmet, the towel, and into the skull. To-day you can see the
scar. He was left in the road for dead, and even after his wounds
had healed, was six weeks in the hospital.

This tough handling at the very start might have satisfied some
men, but in the very next war MacIver was a volunteer and wore
the red shirt of Garibaldi. He remained at the front throughout that
campaign, and until within a few years there has been no campaign
of consequence in which he has not taken part. He served in the
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