Ebook in formato Kindle (mobi) - Kindle File Ebook (mobi)

Formato per Iphone, Ipad e Ebook (epub) - Ipad, Iphone and Ebook reader format (epub)

Versione ebook di Readme.it powered by Softwarehouse.it






The Red Badge of Courage

by Stephen Crane

An Episode of the
American Civil War

CHAPTER I.

THE cold passed reluctantly from the earth
and the retiring fogs revealed an army stretched
out on the hillsresting. As the landscape
changed from brown to greenthe army awakened
and began to tremble with eagerness at the
noise of rumors. It cast its eyes upon the roads
which were growing from long troughs of liquid
mud to proper thoroughfares. A riverambertinted
in the shadow of its bankspurled at the
army's feet; and at nightwhen the stream had
become of a sorrowful blacknessone could see
across it the redeyelike gleam of hostile campfires
set in the low brows of distant hills.

Once a certain tall soldier developed virtues
and went resolutely to wash a shirt. He came
flying back from a brook waving his garment
bannerlike. He was swelled with a tale he had
heard from a reliable friendwho had heard it
from a truthful cavalrymanwho had heard it
from his trustworthy brotherone of the orderlies
at division headquarters. He adopted the
important air of a herald in red and gold.
We're goin' t' move t' morrah--sure,he
said pompously to a group in the company
street. "We're goin' 'way up the rivercut
acrossan' come around in behint 'em."

To his attentive audience he drew a loud
and elaborate plan of a very brilliant campaign.
When he had finishedthe blue-clothed men
scattered into small arguing groups between the
rows of squat brown huts. A negro teamster who
had been dancing upon a cracker box with the
hilarious encouragement of twoscore soldiers
was deserted. He sat mournfully down. Smoke
drifted lazily from a multitude of quaint chimneys.


It's a lie! that's all it is--a thunderin' lie!
said another private loudly. His smooth face was
flushedand his hands were thrust sulkily into his
trousers' pockets. He took the matter as an
affront to him. "I don't believe the derned old


army's ever going to move. We're set. I've
got ready to move eight times in the last two
weeksand we ain't moved yet."

The tall soldier felt called upon to defend
the truth of a rumor he himself had introduced.
He and the loud one came near to fighting
over it.

A corporal began to swear before the assemblage.
He had just put a costly board floor in
his househe said. During the early spring he
had refrained from adding extensively to the
comfort of his environment because he had felt
that the army might start on the march at any
moment. Of latehoweverhe had been impressed
that they were in a sort of eternal camp.

Many of the men engaged in a spirited debate.
One outlined in a peculiarly lucid manner all the
plans of the commanding general. He was opposed
by men who advocated that there were
other plans of campaign. They clamored at each
othernumbers making futile bids for the popular
attention. Meanwhilethe soldier who had
fetched the rumor bustled about with much
importance. He was continually assailed by
questions.

What's up, Jim?

Th' army's goin' t' move.

Ah, what yeh talkin' about? How yeh know
it is?

Well, yeh kin b'lieve me er not, jest as yeh
like. I don't care a hang.

There was much food for thought in the manner
in which he replied. He came near to convincing
them by disdaining to produce proofs.
They grew excited over it.

There was a youthful private who listened
with eager ears to the words of the tall soldier
and to the varied comments of his comrades.
After receiving a fill of discussions concerning
marches and attackshe went to his hut and
crawled through an intricate hole that served it
as a door. He wished to be alone with some
new thoughts that had lately come to him.

He lay down on a wide bank that stretched
across the end of the room. In the other end
cracker boxes were made to serve as furniture.
They were grouped about the fireplace. A picture
from an illustrated weekly was upon the log
wallsand three rifles were paralleled on pegs.
Equipments hunt on handy projectionsand some
tin dishes lay upon a small pile of firewood. A
folded tent was serving as a roof. The sunlight
withoutbeating upon itmade it glow a light
yellow shade. A small window shot an oblique


square of whiter light upon the cluttered floor.
The smoke from the fire at times neglected the
clay chimney and wreathed into the roomand
this flimsy chimney of clay and sticks made endless
threats to set ablaze the whole establishment.

The youth was in a little trance of astonishment.
So they were at last going to fight. On
the morrowperhapsthere would be a battleand
he would be in it. For a time he was obliged
to labor to make himself believe. He could not
accept with assurance an omen that he was about
to mingle in one of those great affairs of the earth.

He hadof coursedreamed of battles all
his life--of vague and bloody conflicts that had
thrilled him with their sweep and fire. In visions
he had seen himself in many struggles. He had
imagined peoples secure in the shadow of his
eagle-eyed prowess. But awake he had regarded
battles as crimson blotches on the pages of the
past. He had put them as things of the bygone
with his thought-images of heavy crowns and
high castles. There was a portion of the world's
history which he had regarded as the time of
warsbut ithe thoughthad been long gone over
the horizon and had disappeared forever.

From his home his youthful eyes had looked
upon the war in his own country with distrust.
It must be some sort of a play affair. He had
long despaired of witnessing a Greeklike struggle.
Such would be no morehe had said. Men were
betteror more timid. Secular and religious
education had effaced the throat-grappling instinct
or else firm finance held in check the passions.


He had burned several times to enlist. Tales
of great movements shook the land. They might
not be distinctly Homericbut there seemed to
be much glory in them. He had read of marches
siegesconflictsand he had longed to see it all.
His busy mind had drawn for him large pictures
extravagant in colorlurid with breathless deeds.

But his mother had discouraged him. She
had affected to look with some contempt upon
the quality of his war ardor and patriotism. She
could calmly seat herself and with no apparent
difficulty give him many hundreds of reasons
why he was of vastly more importance on the
farm than on the field of battle. She had had
certain ways of expression that told him that her
statements on the subject came from a deep conviction.
Moreoveron her sidewas his belief
that her ethical motive in the argument was
impregnable.

At lasthoweverhe had made firm rebellion
against this yellow light thrown upon the color of
his ambitions. The newspapersthe gossip of the
villagehis own picturings had aroused him to
an uncheckable degree. They were in truth


fighting finely down there. Almost every day
the newspapers printed accounts of a decisive
victory.


One nightas he lay in bedthe winds had
carried to him the clangoring of the church bell
as some enthusiast jerked the rope frantically to
tell the twisted news of a great battle. This
voice of the people rejoicing in the night had
made him shiver in a prolonged ecstasy of ex-
citement. Laterhe had gone down to his
mother's room and had spoken thus: "MaI'm
going to enlist."


Henry, don't you be a fool,his mother had
replied. She had then covered her face with the
quilt. There was an end to the matter for that
night.


Neverthelessthe next morning he had gone
to a town that was near his mother's farm and
had enlisted in a company that was forming there.
When he had returned home his mother was
milking the brindle cow. Four others stood
waiting. "MaI've enlisted he had said to her
diffidently. There was a short silence. The
Lord's will be doneHenry she had finally
replied, and had then continued to milk the
brindle cow.


When he had stood in the doorway with his
soldier's clothes on his back, and with the light of
excitement and expectancy in his eyes almost
defeating the glow of regret for the home bonds,
he had seen two tears leaving their trails on his
mother's scarred cheeks.


Still, she had disappointed him by saying
nothing whatever about returning with his shield
or on it. He had privately primed himself for a
beautiful scene. He had prepared certain sen-
tences which he thought could be used with
touching effect. But her words destroyed his
plans. She had doggedly peeled potatoes and
addressed him as follows: You watch out
Henryan' take good care of yerself in this here
fighting business--you watch outan' take good
care of yerself. Don't go a-thinkin' you can
lick the hull rebel army at the startbecause yeh
can't. Yer jest one little feller amongst a hull lot
of othersand yeh've got to keep quiet an' do what
they tell yeh. I know how you areHenry.


I've knet yeh eight pair of socks, Henry, and
I've put in all yer best shirts, because I want my
boy to be jest as warm and comf'able as anybody
in the army. Whenever they get holes in 'em, I
want yeh to send 'em right-away back to me, so's
I kin dern 'em.


An' allus be careful an' choose yer comp'ny.
There's lots of bad men in the armyHenry.
The army makes 'em wildand they like nothing
better than the job of leading off a young feller



like youas ain't never been away from home
much and has allus had a motheran' a-learning
'em to drink and swear. Keep clear of them
folksHenry. I don't want yeh to ever do anything
Henrythat yeh would be 'shamed to let
me know about. Jest think as if I was a-watchin'
yeh. If yeh keep that in yer mind allusI guess
yeh'll come out about right.

Yeh must allus remember yer father, too,
child, an' remember he never drunk a drop of
licker in his life, and seldom swore a cross oath.

I don't know what else to tell yehHenry
excepting that yeh must never do no shirking
childon my account. If so be a time comes when
yeh have to be kilt or do a mean thingwhy
Henrydon't think of anything 'cept what's right
because there's many a woman has to bear up
'ginst sech things these timesand the Lord 'll
take keer of us all.

Don't forgit about the socks and the shirts,
child; and I've put a cup of blackberry jam with
yer bundle, because I know yeh like it above all
things. Good-by, Henry. Watch out, and be a
good boy.

He hadof coursebeen impatient under the
ordeal of this speech. It had not been quite what
he expectedand he had borne it with an air of
irritation. He departed feeling vague relief.

Stillwhen he had looked back from the gate
he had seen his mother kneeling among the potato
parings. Her brown faceupraisedwas
stained with tearsand her spare form was quiver


10 RED BADGE OF COURAGE.

ing. He bowed his head and went onfeeling
suddenly ashamed of his purposes.

From his home he had gone to the seminary
to bid adieu to many schoolmates. They had
thronged about him with wonder and admiration.
He had felt the gulf now between them and had
swelled with calm pride. He and some of his
fellows who had donned blue were quite overwhelmed
with privileges for all of one afternoon
and it had been a very delicious thing. They had
strutted.

A certain light-haired girl had made vivacious
fun at his martial spiritbut there was another and
darker girl whom he had gazed at steadfastlyand
he thought she grew demure and sad at sight of
his blue and brass. As he had walked down the
path between the rows of oakshe had turned his
head and detected her at a window watching his
departure. As he perceived hershe had immediately
begun to stare up through the high
tree branches at the sky. He had seen a good


deal of flurry and haste in her movement as she
changed her attitude. He often thought of it.

On the way to Washington his spirit had
soared. The regiment was fed and caressed at
station after station until the youth had believed
that he must be a hero. There was a lavish expenditure
of bread and cold meatscoffeeand
pickles and cheese. As he basked in the smiles
of the girls and was patted and complimented by
the old menhe had felt growing within him the
strength to do mighty deeds of arms.

After complicated journeyings with many
pausesthere had come months of monotonous
life in a camp. He had had the belief that real
war was a series of death struggles with small
time in between for sleep and meals; but since his
regiment had come to the field the army had done
little but sit still and try to keep warm.

He was brought then gradually back to his old
ideas. Greeklike struggles would be no more.
Men were betteror more timid. Secular and
religious education had effaced the throat-grappling
instinctor else firm finance held in check
the passions.

He had grown to regard himself merely as a
part of a vast blue demonstration. His province
was to look outas far as he couldfor his personal
comfort. For recreation he could twiddle
his thumbs and speculate on the thoughts which
must agitate the minds of the generals. Alsohe
was drilled and drilled and reviewedand drilled
and drilled and reviewed.

The only foes he had seen were some pickets
along the river bank. They were a sun-tanned
philosophical lotwho sometimes shot reflectively
at the blue pickets. When reproached for this
afterwardthey usually expressed sorrowand
swore by their gods that the guns had exploded
without their permission. The youthon guard
duty one nightconversed across the stream with
one of them. He was a slightly ragged manwho
spat skillfully between his shoes and possessed a
great fund of bland and infantile assurance. The
youth liked him personally.

Yank,the other had informed himyer a
right dum good feller.This sentimentfloating
to him upon the still airhad made him temporarily
regret war.

Various veterans had told him tales. Some
talked of graybewhiskered hordes who were
advancing with relentless curses and chewing
tobacco with unspeakable valor; tremendous
bodies of fierce soldiery who were sweeping
along like the Huns. Others spoke of tattered
and eternally hungry men who fired despondent
powders. "They'll charge through hell's fire an'
brimstone t' git a holt on a haversackan' sech


stomachs ain't a-lastin' long he was told. From
the stories, the youth imagined the red, live bones
sticking out through slits in the faded uniforms.

Still, he could not put a whole faith in veterans'
tales, for recruits were their prey. They
talked much of smoke, fire, and blood, but he
could not tell how much might be lies. They
persistently yelled Fresh fish!" at himand were
in no wise to be trusted.

Howeverhe perceived now that it did not
greatly matter what kind of soldiers he was going
to fightso long as they foughtwhich fact no one
disputed. There was a more serious problem. He
lay in his bunk pondering upon it. He tried to
mathematically prove to himself that he would
not run from a battle.

Previously he had never felt obliged to wrestle
too seriously with this question. In his life he had
taken certain things for grantednever challenging
his belief in ultimate successand bothering
little about means and roads. But here he was
confronted with a thing of moment. It had suddenly
appeared to him that perhaps in a battle he
might run. He was forced to admit that as far as
war was concerned he knew nothing of himself.

A sufficient time before he would have allowed
the problem to kick its heels at the outer portals
of his mindbut now he felt compelled to give
serious attention to it.

A little panic-fear grew in his mind. As his
imagination went forward to a fighthe saw hideous
possibilities. He contemplated the lurking
menaces of the futureand failed in an effort to
see himself standing stoutly in the midst of them.
He recalled his visions of broken-bladed glory
but in the shadow of the impending tumult he
suspected them to be impossible pictures.

He sprang from the bunk and began to pace
nervously to and fro. "Good Lordwhat's th'
matter with me?" he said aloud.

He felt that in this crisis his laws of life were
useless. Whatever he had learned of himself was
here of no avail. He was an unknown quantity.
He saw that he would again be obliged to experiment
as he had in early youth. He must accumulate
information of himselfand meanwhile he resolved
to remain close upon his guard lest those
qualities of which he knew nothing should everlastingly
disgrace him. "Good Lord!" he repeated
in dismay.

After a time the tall soldier slid dexterously
through the hole. The loud private followed.
They were wrangling.

That's all right,said the tall soldier as he
entered. He waved his hand expressively. "You


can believe me or notjest as you like. All you
got to do is to sit down and wait as quiet as you
can. Then pretty soon you'll find out I was right."

His comrade grunted stubbornly. For a moment
he seemed to be searching for a formidable
reply. Finally he said: "Wellyou don't know
everything in the worlddo you?"

Didn't say I knew everything in the world,
retorted the other sharply. He began to stow
various articles snugly into his knapsack.

The youthpausing in his nervous walklooked
down at the busy figure. "Going to be a battle
sureis thereJim?" he asked.

Of course there is,replied the tall soldier.
Of course there is. You jest wait 'til to-morrow,
and you'll see one of the biggest battles ever was.
You jest wait.

Thunder!der!said the youth.

Oh, you'll see fighting this time, my boy,
what'll be regular out-and-out fighting,added
the tall soldierwith the air of a man who is
about to exhibit a battle for the benefit of his
friends.

Huh!said the loud one from a corner.

Well,remarked the youthlike as not this
story'll turn out jest like them others did.

Not much it won't,replied the tall soldier
exasperated. "Not much it won't. Didn't the
cavalry all start this morning?" He glared about
him. No one denied his statement. "The cavalry
started this morning he continued. They
say there ain't hardly any cavalry left in camp.
They're going to Richmondor some placewhile
we fight all the Johnnies. It's some dodge like
that. The regiment's got orderstoo. A feller
what seen 'em go to headquarters told me a little
while ago. And they're raising blazes all over
camp--anybody can see that."

Shucks!said the loud one.

The youth remained silent for a time. At last
he spoke to the tall soldier. "Jim!"

What?

How do you think the reg'ment 'll do?

Oh, they'll fight all right, I guess, after they
once get into it,said the other with cold judgment.
He made a fine use of the third person.
There's been heaps of fun poked at 'em because
they're new, of course, and all that; but they'll
fight all right, I guess.


Think any of the boys 'll run?persisted the
youth.

Oh, there may be a few of 'em run, but
there's them kind in every regiment, 'specially
when they first goes under fire,said the other
in a tolerant way. "Of course it might happen
that the hull kit-and-boodle might start and run
if some big fighting came first-offand then again
they might stay and fight like fun. But you can't
bet on nothing. Of course they ain't never been
under fire yetand it ain't likely they'll lick the
hull rebel army all-to-oncet the first time; but I
think they'll fight better than someif worse than
others. That's the way I figger. They call the
reg'ment 'Fresh fish' and everything; but the
boys come of good stockand most of 'em 'll fight
like sin after they oncet git shootin' he added,
with a mighty emphasis on the last four words.

Ohyou think you know--" began the loud
soldier with scorn.

The other turned savagely upon him. They
had a rapid altercationin which they fastened
upon each other various strange epithets.

The youth at last interrupted them. "Did
you ever think you might run yourselfJim?" he
asked. On concluding the sentence he laughed
as if he had meant to aim a joke. The loud soldier
also giggled.

The tall private waved his hand. "Well said
he profoundly, I've thought it might get too hot
for Jim Conklin in some of them scrimmagesand
if a whole lot of boys started and runwhyI
s'pose I'd start and run. And if I once started to
runI'd run like the deviland no mistake. But
if everybody was a-standing and a-fightingwhy
I'd stand and fight. Be jimineyI would. I'll
bet on it."

Huh!said the loud one.

The youth of this tale felt gratitude for these
words of his comrade. He had feared that all of
the untried men possessed a great and correct
confidence. He now was in a measure reassured.

CHAPTER II.

THE next morning the youth discovered that
his tall comrade had been the fast-flying messenger
of a mistake. There was much scoffing at
the latter by those who had yesterday been firm
adherents of his viewsand there was even a little
sneering by men who had never believed the
rumor. The tall one fought with a man from
Chatfield Corners and beat him severely.


The youth felthoweverthat his problem was
in no wise lifted from him. There wason the
contraryan irritating prolongation. The tale
had created in him a great concern for himself.
Nowwith the newborn question in his mindhe
was compelled to sink back into his old place as
part of a blue demonstration.


For days he made ceaseless calculationsbut
they were all wondrously unsatisfactory. He
found that he could establish nothing. He final-
ly concluded that the only way to prove himself
was to go into the blazeand then figuratively to


18
watch his legs to discover their merits and faults.
He reluctantly admitted that he could not sit
still and with a mental slate and pencil derive an
answer. To gain ithe must have blazeblood
and dangereven as a chemist requires thisthat
and the other. So he fretted for an opportunity.


Meanwhile he continually tried to measure
himself by his comrades. The tall soldierfor
onegave him some assurance. This man's se-
rene unconcern dealt him a measure of con-
fidencefor he had known him since childhood
and from his intimate knowledge he did not see
how he could be capable of anything that was
beyond himthe youth. Stillhe thought that
his comrade might be mistaken about himself.
Oron the other handhe might be a man here-
tofore doomed to peace and obscuritybutin
realitymade to shine in war.


The youth would have liked to have discov-
ered another who suspected himself. A sympa-
thetic comparison of mental notes would have
been a joy to him.


He occasionally tried to fathom a comrade
with seductive sentences. He looked about to
find men in the proper mood. All attempts
failed to bring forth any statement which looked
in any way like a confession to those doubts
which he privately acknowledged in himself.
He was afraid to make an open declaration of
his concernbecause he dreaded to place some
unscrupulous confidant upon the high plane of
the unconfessed from which elevation he could
be derided.


In regard to his companions his mind wa-
vered between two opinionsaccording to his
mood. Sometimes he inclined to believing them
all heroes. In facthe usually admitted in secret
the superior development of the higher qualities
in others. He could conceive of men going very
insignificantly about the world bearing a load of
courage unseenand although he had known
many of his comrades through boyhoodhe be-
gan to fear that his judgment of them had been
blind. Thenin other momentshe flouted these



theoriesand assured himself that his fellows
were all privately wondering and quaking.

His emotions made him feel strange in the
presence of men who talked excitedly of a prospective
battle as of a drama they were about to
witnesswith nothing but eagerness and curiosity
apparent in their faces. It was often that he suspected
them to be liars.

He did not pass such thoughts without severe
condemnation of himself. He dinned reproaches
at times. He was convicted by himself of many
shameful crimes against the gods of traditions.

In his great anxiety his heart was continually
clamoring at what he considered the intolerable
slowness of the generals. They seemed content
to perch tranquilly on the river bankand leave
him bowed down by the weight of a great problem.
He wanted it settled forthwith. He could
not long bear such a loadhe said. Sometimes
his anger at the commanders reached an acute
stageand he grumbled about the camp like a
veteran.

One morninghoweverhe found himself in
the ranks of his prepared regiment. The men
were whispering speculations and recounting the
old rumors. In the gloom before the break of
the day their uniforms glowed a deep purple
hue. From across the river the red eyes were
still peering. In the eastern sky there was a yellow
patch like a rug laid for the feet of the coming
sun; and against itblack and patternlike
loomed the gigantic figure of the colonel on a
gigantic horse.

From off in the darkness came the trampling
of feet. The youth could occasionally see dark
shadows that moved like monsters. The regiment
stood at rest for what seemed a long time.
The youth grew impatient. It was unendurable
the way these affairs were managed. He wondered
how long they were to be kept waiting.

As he looked all about him and pondered
upon the mystic gloomhe began to believe that
at any moment the ominous distance might be
aflareand the rolling crashes of an engagement
come to his ears. Staring once at the red eyes
across the riverhe conceived them to be growing
largeras the orbs of a row of dragons advancing.
He turned toward the colonel and saw
him lift his gigantic arm and calmly stroke his
mustache.

At last he heard from along the road at the
foot of the hill the clatter of a horse's galloping
hoofs. It must be the coming of orders. He
bent forwardscarce breathing. The exciting
clickety-clickas it grew louder and louder
seemed to be beating upon his soul. Presently a
horseman with jangling equipment drew rein be



fore the colonel of the regiment. The two held
a shortsharp-worded conversation. The men in
the foremost ranks craned their necks.

As the horseman wheeled his animal and galloped
away he turned to shout over his shoulder
Don't forget that box of cigars!The colonel
mumbled in reply. The youth wondered what a
box of cigars had to do with war.

A moment later the regiment went swinging
off into the darkness. It was now like one of
those moving monsters wending with many feet.
The air was heavyand cold with dew. A mass
of wet grassmarched uponrustled like silk.

There was an occasional flash and glimmer
of steel from the backs of all these huge crawling
reptiles. From the road came creakings and
grumblings as some surly guns were dragged
away.

The men stumbled along still muttering speculations.
There was a subdued debate. Once a
man fell downand as he reached for his rifle a
comradeunseeingtrod upon his hand. He of
the injured fingers swore bitterly and aloud. A
lowtittering laugh went among his fellows.

Presently they passed into a roadway and
marched forward with easy strides. A dark
regiment moved before themand from behind
also came the tinkle of equipments on the bodies
of marching men.

The rushing yellow of the developing day
went on behind their backs. When the sunrays
at last struck full and mellowingly upon the
earththe youth saw that the landscape was
streaked with two longthinblack columns
which disappeared on the brow of a hill in front
and rearward vanished in a wood. They were
like two serpents crawling from the cavern of the
night.

The river was not in view. The tall soldier
burst into praises of what he thought to be his
powers of perception.

Some of the tall one's companions cried with
emphasis that theytoohad evolved the same
thingand they congratulated themselves upon
it. But there were others who said that the tall
one's plan was not the true one at all. They persisted
with other theories. There was a vigorous
discussion.

The youth took no part in them. As he
walked along in careless line he was engaged
with his own eternal debate. He could not hinder
himself from dwelling upon it. He was despondent
and sullenand threw shifting glances
about him. He looked aheadoften expecting to
hear from the advance the rattle of firing.


But the long serpents crawled slowly from
hill to hill without bluster of smoke. A dun-col-
ored cloud of dust floated away to the right.
The sky overhead was of a fairy blue.


The youth studied the faces of his compan-
ionsever on the watch to detect kindred emo-
tions. He suffered disappointment. Some ardor
of the air which was causing the veteran com-
mands to move with glee--almost with song--
had infected the new regiment. The men began
to speak of victory as of a thing they knew.
Alsothe tall soldier received his vindication.
They were certainly going to come around in
behind the enemy. They expressed commisera-
tion for that part of the army which had been
left upon the river bankfelicitating themselves
upon being a part of a blasting host.


The youthconsidering himself as separated
from the otherswas saddened by the blithe and
merry speeches that went from rank to rank.
The company wags all made their best endeav-
ors. The regiment tramped to the tune of
laughter.


The blatant soldier often convulsed whole
files by his biting sarcasms aimed at the tall one.


And it was not long before all the men seemed
to forget their mission. Whole brigades grinned
in unisonand regiments laughed.


A rather fat soldier attempted to pilfer a horse
from a dooryard. He planned to load his knap-
sack upon it. He was escaping with his prize
when a young girl rushed from the house and
grabbed the animal's mane. There followed a
wrangle. The young girlwith pink cheeks and
shining eyesstood like a dauntless statue.


The observant regimentstanding at rest in
the roadwaywhooped at onceand entered
whole-souled upon the side of the maiden. The
men became so engrossed in this affair that they
entirely ceased to remember their own large war.
They jeered the piratical privateand called
attention to various defects in his personal ap-
pearance; and they were wildly enthusiastic in
support of the young girl.


To herfrom some distancecame bold advice.
Hit him with a stick.


There were crows and catcalls showered
upon him when he retreated without the horse.
The regiment rejoiced at his downfall. Loud
and vociferous congratulations were showered
upon the maidenwho stood panting and regard-
ing the troops with defiance.


At nightfall the column broke into regimental
piecesand the fragments went into the fields to



camp. Tents sprang up like strange plants.
Camp fireslike redpeculiar blossomsdotted
the night.

The youth kept from intercourse with his
companions as much as circumstances would
allow him. In the evening he wandered a few
paces into the gloom. From this little distance
the many fireswith the black forms of men passing
to and fro before the crimson raysmade
weird and satanic effects.

He lay down in the grass. The blades
pressed tenderly against his cheek. The moon
had been lighted and was hung in a treetop.
The liquid stillness of the night enveloping him
made him feel vast pity for himself. There was
a caress in the soft winds; and the whole mood
of the darknesshe thoughtwas one of sympathy
for himself in his distress.

He wishedwithout reservethat he was at
home again making the endless rounds from the
house to the barnfrom the barn to the fields
from the fields to the barnfrom the barn to the
house. He remembered he had often cursed the
brindle cow and her matesand had sometimes
flung milking stools. Butfrom his present point
of viewthere was a halo of happiness about each
of their headsand he would have sacrificed all
the brass buttons on the continent to have been
enabled to return to them. He told himself that
he was not formed for a soldier. And he mused
seriously upon the radical differences between
himself and those men who were dodging implike
around the fires.

As he mused thus he heard the rustle of grass
andupon turning his headdiscovered the loud
soldier. He called outOh, Wilson!

The latter approached and looked down.
Why, hello, Henry; is it you? What you doing
here?

Oh, thinking,said the youth.

The other sat down and carefully lighted his
pipe. "You're getting bluemy boy. You're
looking thundering peeked. What the dickens
is wrong with you?"

Oh, nothing,said the youth.

The loud soldier launched then into the subject
of the anticipated fight. "Ohwe've got
'em now!" As he spoke his boyish face was
wreathed in a gleeful smileand his voice had
an exultant ring. "We've got 'em now. At
lastby the eternal thunderswe'll lick 'em
good!"

If the truth was known,he addedmore
soberlyTHEY'VE licked US about every clip up to


now; but this time--this time--we'll lick 'em
good!

I thought you was objecting to this march
a little while ago,said the youth coldly.

Oh, it wasn't that,explained the other. "I
don't mind marchingif there's going to be fighting
at the end of it. What I hate is this getting
moved here and moved therewith no good coming
of itas far as I can seeexcepting sore feet
and damned short rations."

Well, Jim Conklin says we'll get a plenty of
fighting this time.

He's right for once, I guess, though I can't
see how it come. This time we're in for a big
battle, and we've got the best end of it, certain
sure. Gee rod! how we will thump 'em!

He arose and began to pace to and fro excitedly.
The thrill of his enthusiasm made him
walk with an elastic step. He was sprightly
vigorousfiery in his belief in success. He
looked into the future with clearproud eyeand
he swore with the air of an old soldier.

The youth watched him for a moment in
silence. When he finally spoke his voice was as
bitter as dregs. "Ohyou're going to do great
thingsI s'pose!"

The loud soldier blew a thoughtful cloud of
smoke from his pipe. "OhI don't know he
remarked with dignity; I don't know. I s'pose
I'll do as well as the rest. I'm going to try like
thunder." He evidently complimented himself
upon the modesty of this statement.

How do you know you won't run when the
time comes?asked the youth.

Run?said the loud one; "run?--of course
not!" He laughed.

Well,continued the youthlots of gooda-'
nough men have thought they was going to do
great things before the fight, but when the time
come they skedaddled.

Oh, that's all true, I s'pose,replied the
other; "but I'm not going to skedaddle. The
man that bets on my running will lose his money
that's all." He nodded confidently.

Oh, shucks!said the youth. "You ain't
the bravest man in the worldare you?"

No, I ain't,exclaimed the loud soldier indignantly;
and I didn't say I was the bravest
man in the world, neither. I said I was going to
do my share of fighting--that's what I said. And
I am, too. Who are you, anyhow. You talk as


if you thought you was Napoleon Bonaparte.
He glared at the youth for a momentand then
strode away.

The youth called in a savage voice after his
comrade: "Wellyou needn't git mad about it!"
But the other continued on his way and made no
reply.

He felt alone in space when his injured com-
rade had disappeared. His failure to discover
any mite of resemblance in their view points
made him more miserable than before. No one
seemed to be wrestling with such a terrific personal
problem. He was a mental outcast.

He went slowly to his tent and stretched himself
on a blanket by the side of the snoring tall
soldier. In the darkness he saw visions of a thousand-
tongued fear that would babble at his back
and cause him to fleewhile others were going
coolly about their country's business. He admitted
that he would not be able to cope with this
monster. He felt that every nerve in his body
would be an ear to hear the voiceswhile other
men would remain stolid and deaf.

And as he sweated with the pain of these
thoughtshe could hear lowserene sentences.
I'll bid five.Make it six.Seven.
Seven goes.

He stared at the redshivering reflection of
a fire on the white wall of his tent untilexhausted
and ill from the monotony of his suffering
he fell asleep.

CHAPTER III.

WHEN another night came the columns
changed to purple streaksfiled across two pontoon
bridges. A glaring fire wine-tinted the
waters of the river. Its raysshining upon the
moving masses of troopsbrought forth here and
there sudden gleams of silver or gold. Upon
the other shore a dark and mysterious range of
hills was curved against the sky. The insect
voices of the night sang solemnly.

After this crossing the youth assured himself
that at any moment they might be suddenly and
fearfully assaulted from the caves of the lowering
woods. He kept his eyes watchfully upon the
darkness.

But his regiment went unmolested to a camping
placeand its soldiers slept the brave sleep
of wearied men. In the morning they were
routed out with early energyand hustled along
a narrow road that led deep into the forest.


It was during this rapid march that the regi


ment lost many of the marks of a new command.


The men had begun to count the miles upon
their fingersand they grew tired. "Sore feet
an' damned short rationsthat's all said the
loud soldier. There was perspiration and grumblings.
After a time they began to shed their
knapsacks. Some tossed them unconcernedly
down; others hid them carefully, asserting their
plans to return for them at some convenient
time. Men extricated themselves from thick
shirts. Presently few carried anything but their
necessary clothing, blankets, haversacks, canteens,
and arms and ammunition. You can now eat
and shoot said the tall soldier to the youth.
That's all you want to do."

There was sudden change from the ponderous
infantry of theory to the light and speedy infantry
of practice. The regimentrelieved of a burden
received a new impetus. But there was much
loss of valuable knapsacksandon the whole
very good shirts.

But the regiment was not yet veteranlike in
appearance. Veteran regiments in the army
were likely to be very small aggregations of men.
Oncewhen the command had first come to the
fieldsome perambulating veteransnoting the
length of their columnhad accosted them thus:
Hey, fellers, what brigade is that?And when
the men had replied that they formed a regiment
and not a brigadethe older soldiers had laughed
and saidO Gawd!

Alsothere was too great a similarity in the
hats. The hats of a regiment should properly
represent the history of headgear for a period of
years. Andmoreoverthere were no letters of
faded gold speaking from the colors. They were
new and beautifuland the color bearer habitually
oiled the pole.

Presently the army again sat down to think.
The odor of the peaceful pines was in the men's
nostrils. The sound of monotonous axe blows
rang through the forestand the insectsnodding
upon their perchescrooned like old women.
The youth returned to his theory of a blue demonstration.


One gray dawnhoweverhe was kicked in
the leg by the tall soldierand thenbefore he
was entirely awakehe found himself running
down a wood road in the midst of men who were
panting from the first effects of speed. His canteen
banged rhythmically upon his thighand his
haversack bobbed softly. His musket bounced
a trifle from his shoulder at each stride and made


his cap feel uncertain upon his head.

He could hear the men whisper jerky sentences:
Say--what's all this--about?What
th' thunder--we--skedaddlin' this way fer?
Billie--keep off m' feet. Yeh run--like a cow.
And the loud soldier's shrill voice could be
heard: "What th' devil they in sich a hurry for?"

The youth thought the damp fog of early
morning moved from the rush of a great body
of troops. From the distance came a sudden
spatter of firing.

He was bewildered. As he ran with his comrades
he strenuously tried to thinkbut all he knew
was that if he fell down those coming behind
would tread upon him. All his faculties seemed
to be needed to guide him over and past obstructions.
He felt carried along by a mob.

The sun spread disclosing raysandone by
oneregiments burst into view like armed men
just born of the earth. The youth perceived
that the time had come. He was about to be
measured. For a moment he felt in the face of
his great trial like a babeand the flesh over
his heart seemed very thin. He seized time to
look about him calculatingly.

But he instantly saw that it would be impossible
for him to escape from the regiment. It inclosed
him. And there were iron laws of tradition
and law on four sides. He was in a moving
box.

As he perceived this fact it occurred to him
that he had never wished to come to the war.
He had not enlisted of his free will. He had
been dragged by the merciless government. And
now they were taking him out to be slaughtered.

The regiment slid down a bank and wallowed
across a little stream. The mournful current
moved slowly onand from the watershaded
blacksome white bubble eyes looked at the men.

As they climbed the hill on the farther side
artillery began to boom. Here the youth forgot
many things as he felt a sudden impulse of curiosity.
He scrambled up the bank with a speed
that could not be exceeded by a bloodthirsty
man.

He expected a battle scene.

There were some little fields girted and
squeezed by a forest. Spread over the grass and
in among the tree trunkshe could see knots and
waving lines of skirmishers who were running
hither and thither and firing at the landscape.
A dark battle line lay upon a sunstruck clearing
that gleamed orange color. A flag fluttered.


Other regiments floundered up the bank. The
brigade was formed in line of battleand after a
pause started slowly through the woods in the
rear of the receding skirmisherswho were continually
melting into the scene to appear again
farther on. They were always busy as bees
deeply absorbed in their little combats.

The youth tried to observe everything. He
did not use care to avoid trees and branches
and his forgotten feet were constantly knocking
against stones or getting entangled in briers.
He was aware that these battalions with their
commotions were woven red and startling into
the gentle fabric of softened greens and browns.
It looked to be a wrong place for a battle field.

The skirmishers in advance fascinated him.
Their shots into thickets and at distant and
prominent trees spoke to him of tragedies--hidden
mysterioussolemn.

Once the line encountered the body of a dead
soldier. He lay upon his back staring at the sky.
He was dressed in an awkward suit of yellowish
brown. The youth could see that the soles of his
shoes had been worn to the thinness of writing
paperand from a great rent in one the dead foot
projected piteously. And it was as if fate had
betrayed the soldier. In death it exposed to his
enemies that poverty which in life he had perhaps
concealed from his friends.

The ranks opened covertly to avoid the corpse.
The invulnerable dead man forced a way for himself.
The youth looked keenly at the ashen face.
The wind raised the tawny beard. It moved as
if a hand were stroking it. He vaguely desired
to walk around and around the body and stare;
the impulse of the living to try to read in dead
eyes the answer to the Question.

During the march the ardor which the youth
had acquired when out of view of the field rapidly
faded to nothing. His curiosity was quite easily
satisfied. If an intense scene had caught him with
its wild swing as he came to the top of the bank
he might have gone roaring on. This advance
upon Nature was too calm. He had opportunity
to reflect. He had time in which to wonder
about himself and to attempt to probe his sensations.


Absurd ideas took hold upon him. He
thought that he did not relish the landscape.
It threatened him. A coldness swept over his
backand it is true that his trousers felt to him
that they were no fit for his legs at all.

A house standing placidly in distant fields
had to him an ominous look. The shadows of
the woods were formidable. He was certain that
in this vista there lurked fierce-eyed hosts. The
swift thought came to him that the generals did


not know what they were about. It was all a
trap. Suddenly those close forests would bristle
with rifle barrels. Ironlike brigades would appear
in the rear. They were all going to be
sacrificed. The generals were stupids. The
enemy would presently swallow the whole command.
He glared about himexpecting to see
the stealthy approach of his death.

He thought that he must break from the ranks
and harangue his comrades. They must not all
be killed like pigs; and he was sure it would
come to pass unless they were informed of these
dangers. The generals were idiots to send them
marching into a regular pen. There was but one
pair of eyes in the corps. He would step forth
and make a speech. Shrill and passionate words
came to his lips.

The linebroken into moving fragments by the
groundwent calmly on through fields and woods.
The youth looked at the men nearest himand
sawfor the most partexpressions of deep inter-
estas if they were investigating something that
had fascinated them. One or two stepped with
overvaliant airs as if they were already plunged
into war. Others walked as upon thin ice. The
greater part of the untested men appeared quiet
and absorbed. They were going to look at war
the red animal--warthe blood-swollen god. And
they were deeply engrossed in this march.

As he looked the youth gripped his outcry at
his throat. He saw that even if the men were
tottering with fear they would laugh at his warning.
They would jeer himandif practicable
pelt him with missiles. Admitting that he might
be wronga frenzied declamation of the kind
would turn him into a worm.

He assumedthenthe demeanor of one who
knows that he is doomed alone to unwritten responsibilities.
He laggedwith tragic glances at
the sky.

He was surprised presently by the young lieutenant
of his companywho began heartily to
beat him with a swordcalling out in a loud and
insolent voice: "Comeyoung manget up into
ranks there. No skulking'll do here." He mended
his pace with suitable haste. And he hated
the lieutenantwho had no appreciation of fine
minds. He was a mere brute.

After a time the brigade was halted in the
cathedral light of a forest. The busy skirmishers
were still popping. Through the aisles of
the wood could be seen the floating smoke from
their rifles. Sometimes it went up in little balls
white and compact.

During this halt many men in the regiment
began erecting tiny hills in front of them. They
used stonessticksearthand anything they


thought might turn a bullet. Some built comparatively
large oneswhile others seemed content
with little ones.

This procedure caused a discussion among the
men. Some wished to fight like duelistsbelieving
it to be correct to stand erect and befrom
their feet to their foreheadsa mark. They said
they scorned the devices of the cautious. But
the others scoffed in replyand pointed to the
veterans on the flanks who were digging at the
ground like terriers. In a short time there was
quite a barricade along the regimental fronts.
Directlyhoweverthey were ordered to withdraw
from that place.

This astounded the youth. He forgot his
stewing over the advance movement. "Well
thenwhat did they march us out here for?" he
demanded of the tall soldier. The latter with
calm faith began a heavy explanationalthough
he had been compelled to leave a little protection
of stones and dirt to which he had devoted much
care and skill.

When the regiment was aligned in another
position each man's regard for his safety caused
another line of small intrenchments. They ate
their noon meal behind a third one. They were
moved from this one also. They were marched
from place to place with apparent aimlessness.

The youth had been taught that a man became
another thing in a battle. He saw his salvation
in such a change. Hence this waiting
was an ordeal to him. He was in a fever of impatience.
He considered that there was denoted
a lack of purpose on the part of the generals.
He began to complain to the tall soldier. "I
can't stand this much longer he cried. I
don't see what good it does to make us wear
out our legs for nothin'." He wished to return
to campknowing that this affair was a blue
demonstration; or else to go into a battle and
discover that he had been a fool in his doubts
and wasin trutha man of traditional courage.
The strain of present circumstances he felt to be
intolerable.

The philosophical tall soldier measured a sandwich
of cracker and pork and swallowed it in a
nonchalant manner. "OhI suppose we must go
reconnoitering around the country jest to keep
'em from getting too closeor to develop 'emor
something."

Huh!said the loud soldier.

Well,cried the youthstill fidgetingI'd
rather do anything 'most than go tramping 'round
the country all day doing no good to nobody and
jest tiring ourselves out.

So would I,said the loud soldier. "It ain't


right. I tell you if anybody with any sense was
a-runnin' this army it--"

Oh, shut up!roared the tall private. "You
little fool. You little damn' cuss. You ain't had
that there coat and them pants on for six months
and yet you talk as if--"

Well, I wanta do some fighting anyway,
interrupted the other. "I didn't come here to
walk. I could 'ave walked to home--'round an'
'round the barnif I jest wanted to walk."

The tall onered-facedswallowed another
sandwich as if taking poison in despair.

But graduallyas he chewedhis face became
again quiet and contented. He could not rage
in fierce argument in the presence of such sandwiches.
During his meals he always wore an air
of blissful contemplation of the food he had swallowed.
His spirit seemed then to be communing
with the viands.

He accepted new environment and circumstance
with great coolnesseating from his haversack
at every opportunity. On the march he
went along with the stride of a hunterobjecting
to neither gait nor distance. And he had
not raised his voice when he had been ordered
away from three little protective piles of earth
and stoneeach of which had been an engineering
feat worthy of being made sacred to the name
of his grandmother.

In the afternoon the regiment went out over
the same ground it had taken in the morning.
The landscape then ceased to threaten the
youth. He had been close to it and become
familiar with it.

Whenhoweverthey began to pass into a
new regionhis old fears of stupidity and incompetence
reassailed himbut this time he doggedly
let them babble. He was occupied with
his problemand in his desperation he concluded
that the stupidity did not greatly matter.

Once he thought he had concluded that it
would be better to get killed directly and end
his troubles. Regarding death thus out of the
corner of his eyehe conceived it to be nothing
but restand he was filled with a momentary
astonishment that he should have made an
extraordinary commotion over the mere matter
of getting killed. He would die; he would go
to some place where he would be understood.
It was useless to expect appreciation of his profound
and fine senses from such men as the lieutenant.
He must look to the grave for comprehension.


The skirmish fire increased to a long chattering
sound. With it was mingled far-away cheer



ing. A battery spoke.

Directly the youth would see the skirmishers
running. They were pursued by the sound of
musketry fire. After a time the hotdangerous
flashes of the rifles were visible. Smoke clouds
went slowly and insolently across the fields like
observant phantoms. The din became crescendo
like the roar of an oncoming train.

A brigade ahead of them and on the right
went into action with a rending roar. It was
as if it had exploded. And thereafter it lay
stretched in the distance behind a long gray wall
that one was obliged to look twice at to make
sure that it was smoke.

The youthforgetting his neat plan of getting
killedgazed spell bound. His eyes grew wide
and busy with the action of the scene. His
mouth was a little ways open.

Of a sudden he felt a heavy and sad hand laid
upon his shoulder. Awakening from his trance
of observation he turned and beheld the loud
soldier.

It's my first and last battle, old boy,said
the latterwith intense gloom. He was quite
pale and his girlish lip was trembling.

Eh?murmured the youth in great astonishment.


It's my first and last battle, old boy,
continued the loud soldier. "Something tells
me--"

What?

I'm a gone coon this first time and--and I
w-want you to take these here things--to--my-folks.
He ended in a quavering sob of pity for
himself. He handed the youth a little packet
done up in a yellow envelope.

Why, what the devil--began the youth
again.

But the other gave him a glance as from the
depths of a tomband raised his limp hand in a
prophetic manner and turned away.

CHAPTER IV.

THE brigade was halted in the fringe of a
grove. The men crouched among the trees and
pointed their restless guns out at the fields.
They tried to look beyond the smoke.


Out of this haze they could see running men.
Some shouted information and gestured as they
hurried.

The men of the new regiment watched and
listened eagerlywhile their tongues ran on in
gossip of the battle. They mouthed rumors that
had flown like birds out of the unknown.

They say Perry has been driven in with big
loss.

Yes, Carrott went t' th' hospital. He said he
was sick. That smart lieutenant is commanding
'G' Company. Th' boys say they won't be
under Carrott no more if they all have t' desert.
They allus knew he was a--

Hannises' batt'ry is took.

It ain't either. I saw Hannises' batt'ry off on
th' left not more'n fifteen minutes ago.

Well--

Th' general, he ses he is goin' t' take th' hull
cammand of th' 304th when we go inteh action,
an' then he ses we'll do sech fightin' as never
another one reg'ment done.

They say we're catchin' it over on th' left.
They say th' enemy driv' our line inteh a devil of
a swamp an' took Hannises' batt'ry.

No sech thing. Hannises' batt'ry was 'long
here 'bout a minute ago.

That young Hasbrouck, he makes a good
off'cer. He ain't afraid 'a nothin'.

I met one of th' 148th Maine boys an' he ses
his brigade fit th' hull rebel army fer four hours
over on th' turnpike road an' killed about five
thousand of 'em. He ses one more sech fight as
that an' th' war 'll be over.

Bill wasn't scared either. No, sir! It wasn't
that. Bill ain't a-gittin' scared easy. He was
jest mad, that's what he was. When that feller
trod on his hand, he up an' sed that he was willin'
t' give his hand t' his country, but he be dumbed
if he was goin' t' have every dumb bushwhacker
in th' kentry walkin' 'round on it. Se he went t'
th' hospital disregardless of th' fight. Three
fingers was crunched. Th' dern doctor wanted
t' amputate 'm, an' Bill, he raised a heluva row, I
hear. He's a funny feller.

The din in front swelled to a tremendous
chorus. The youth and his fellows were frozen
to silence. They could see a flag that tossed in


the smoke angrily. Near it were the blurred and
agitated forms of troops. There came a turbulent
stream of men across the fields. A battery changing
position at a frantic gallop scattered the
stragglers right and left.

A shell screaming like a storm banshee went
over the huddled heads of the reserves. It landed
in the groveand exploding redly flung the brown
earth. There was a little shower of pine needles.

Bullets began to whistle among the branches
and nip at the trees. Twigs and leaves came
sailing down. It was as if a thousand axeswee
and invisiblewere being wielded. Many of the
men were constantly dodging and ducking their
heads.

The lieutenant of the youth's company was
shot in the hand. He began to swear so wondrously
that a nervous laugh went along the regimental
line. The officer's profanity sounded
conventional. It relieved the tightened senses of
the new men. It was as if he had hit his fingers
with a tack hammer at home.

He held the wounded member carefully away
from his side so that the blood would not drip
upon his trousers.

The captain of the companytucking his sword
under his armproduced a handkerchief and
began to bind with it the lieutenant's wound.
And they disputed as to how the binding should
be done.

The battle flag in the distance jerked about
madly. It seemed to be struggling to free itself
from an agony. The billowing smoke was filled
with horizontal flashes.

Men running swiftly emerged from it. They
grew in numbers until it was seen that the whole
command was fleeing. The flag suddenly sank
down as if dying. Its motion as it fell was a
gesture of despair.

Wild yells came from behind the walls of
smoke. A sketch in gray and red dissolved into
a moblike body of men who galloped like wild
horses.

The veteran regiments on the right and left of
the 304th immediately began to jeer. With the
passionate song of the bullets and the banshee
shrieks of shells were mingled loud catcalls and
bits of facetious advice concerning places of safety.

But the new regiment was breathless with horror.
Gawd! Saunders's got crushed!whispered
the man at the youth's elbow. They
shrank back and crouched as if compelled to
await a flood.


The youth shot a swift glance along the blue
ranks of the regiment. The profiles were motionless
carven; and afterward he remembered that
the color sergeant was standing with his legs
apartas if he expected to be pushed to the
ground.

The following throng went whirling around
the flank. Here and there were officers carried
along on the stream like exasperated chips. They
were striking about them with their swords
and with their left fistspunching every head
they could reach. They cursed like highwaymen.


A mounted officer displayed the furious anger
of a spoiled child. He raged with his headhis
armsand his legs.

Anotherthe commander of the brigadewas
galloping about bawling. His hat was gone and
his clothes were awry. He resembled a man
who has come from bed to go to a fire. The
hoofs of his horse often threatened the heads of
the running menbut they scampered with singular
fortune. In this rush they were apparently
all deaf and blind. They heeded not the largest
and longest of the oaths that were thrown at
them from all directions.

Frequently over this tumult could be heard
the grim jokes of the critical veterans; but the
retreating men apparently were not even conscious
of the presence of an audience.

The battle reflection that shone for an instant
in the faces on the mad current made the youth
feel that forceful hands from heaven would not
have been able to have held him in place if he
could have got intelligent control of his legs.

There was an appalling imprint upon these
faces. The struggle in the smoke had pictured
an exaggeration of itself on the bleached cheeks
and in the eyes wild with one desire.

The sight of this stampede exerted a floodlike
force that seemed able to drag sticks and stones
and men from the ground. They of the reserves
had to hold on. They grew pale and firmand
red and quaking.

The youth achieved one little thought in the
midst of this chaos. The composite monster
which had caused the other troops to flee had
not then appeared. He resolved to get a view
of itand thenhe thought he might very likely
run better than the best of them.

CHAPTER V.


THERE were moments of waiting. The youth
thought of the village street at home before the
arrival of the circus parade on a day in the
spring. He remembered how he had stooda
smallthrillful boyprepared to follow the dingy
lady upon the white horseor the band in its
faded chariot. He saw the yellow roadthe
lines of expectant peopleand the sober houses.
He particularly remembered an old fellow who
used to sit upon a cracker box in front of the
store and feign to despise such exhibitions. A
thousand details of color and form surged in his
mind. The old fellow upon the cracker box appeared
in middle prominence.

Some one criedHere they come!

There was rustling and muttering among the
men. They displayed a feverish desire to have
every possible cartridge ready to their hands.
The boxes were pulled around into various positions
and adjusted with great care. It was as if
seven hundred new bonnets were being tried on.

The tall soldierhaving prepared his rifleproduced
a red handkerchief of some kind. He was
engaged in knitting it about his throat with exquisite
attention to its positionwhen the cry was
repeated up and down the line in a muffled roar
of sound.

Here they come! Here they come!Gun
locks clicked.

Across the smoke-infested fields came a brown
swarm of running men who were giving shrill
yells. They came onstooping and swinging
their rifles at all angles. A flagtilted forward
sped near the front.

As he caught sight of them the youth was
momentarily startled by a thought that perhaps
his gun was not loaded. He stood trying to
rally his faltering intellect so that he might recollect
the moment when he had loadedbut he
could not.

A hatless general pulled his dripping horse to
a stand near the colonel of the 304th. He shook
his fist in the other's face. "You 've got to hold
'em back!" he shoutedsavagely; "you 've got
to hold 'em back!"

In his agitation the colonel began to stammer.
A-all r-right, General, all right, by Gawd! Wewe'll
do our--we-we'll d-d-do--do our best, General.
The general made a passionate gesture
and galloped away. The colonelperchance to
relieve his feelingsbegan to scold like a wet
parrot. The youthturning swiftly to make
sure that the rear was unmolestedsaw the com



mander regarding his men in a highly regretful
manneras if he regretted above everything his
association with them.

The man at the youth's elbow was mumbling
as if to himself: "Ohwe 're in for it now! oh
we 're in for it now!"

The captain of the company had been pacing
excitedly to and fro in the rear. He coaxed in
schoolmistress fashionas to a congregation of
boys with primers. His talk was an endless
repetition. "Reserve your fireboys--don't
shoot till I tell you--save your fire--wait till
they get close up--don't be damned fools--"

Perspiration streamed down the youth's face
which was soiled like that of a weeping urchin.
He frequentlywith a nervous movementwiped
his eyes with his coat sleeve. His mouth was
still a little ways open.

He got the one glance at the foe-swarming
field in front of himand instantly ceased to debate
the question of his piece being loaded. Before
he was ready to begin--before he had announced
to himself that he was about to fight-he
threw the obedientwell-balanced rifle into
position and fired a first wild shot. Directly he
was working at his weapon like an automatic
affair.

He suddenly lost concern for himselfand forgot
to look at a menacing fate. He became not a
man but a member. He felt that something of
which he was a part--a regimentan armya
causeor a country--was in a crisis. He was
welded into a common personality which was
dominated by a single desire. For some moments
he could not flee no more than a little
finger can commit a revolution from a hand.

If he had thought the regiment was about to
be annihilated perhaps he could have amputated
himself from it. But its noise gave him assurance.
The regiment was like a firework that
once ignitedproceeds superior to circumstances
until its blazing vitality fades. It wheezed and
banged with a mighty power. He pictured the
ground before it as strewn with the discomfited.


There was a consciousness always of the presence
of his comrades about him. He felt the
subtle battle brotherhood more potent even than
the cause for which they were fighting. It was a
mysterious fraternity born of the smoke and danger
of death.

He was at a task. He was like a carpenter
who has made many boxesmaking still another
boxonly there was furious haste in his movements.
Hein his thoughtwas careering off in
other placeseven as the carpenter who as he


works whistles and thinks of his friend or his
enemyhis home or a saloon. And these jolted
dreams were never perfect to him afterwardbut
remained a mass of blurred shapes.

Presently he began to feel the effects of the
war atmosphere--a blistering sweata sensation
that his eyeballs were about to crack like hot
stones. A burning roar filled his ears.

Following this came a red rage. He developed
the acute exasperation of a pestered animal
a well-meaning cow worried by dogs. He had a
mad feeling against his riflewhich could only be
used against one life at a time. He wished to
rush forward and strangle with his fingers. He
craved a power that would enable him to make a
world-sweeping gesture and brush all back. His
impotency appeared to himand made his rage
into that of a driven beast.

Buried in the smoke of many rifles his anger
was directed not so much against the men whom
he knew were rushing toward him as against the
swirling battle phantoms which were choking
himstuffing their smoke robes down his parched
throat. He fought frantically for respite for his
sensesfor airas a babe being smothered attacks
the deadly blankets.

There was a blare of heated rage mingled with
a certain expression of intentness on all faces.
Many of the men were making low-toned noises
with their mouthsand these subdued cheers
snarlsimprecationsprayersmade a wildbarbaric
song that went as an undercurrent of sound
strange and chantlike with the resounding chords
of the war march. The man at the youth's elbow
was babbling. In it there was something soft and
tender like the monologue of a babe. The tall
soldier was swearing in a loud voice. From his
lips came a black procession of curious oaths. Of
a sudden another broke out in a querulous way
like a man who has mislaid his hat. "Wellwhy
don't they support us? Why don't they send
supports? Do they think--"

The youth in his battle sleep heard this as one
who dozes hears.

There was a singular absence of heroic poses.
The men bending and surging in their haste and
rage were in every impossible attitude. The steel
ramrods clanked and clanged with incessant din
as the men pounded them furiously into the hot
rifle barrels. The flaps of the cartridge boxes were
all unfastenedand bobbed idiotically with each
movement. The riflesonce loadedwere jerked
to the shoulder and fired without apparent aim
into the smoke or at one of the blurred and shifting
forms which upon the field before the regiment
had been growing larger and larger like
puppets under a magician's hand.


The officersat their intervalsrearwardneglected
to stand in picturesque attitudes. They
were bobbing to and fro roaring directions and
encouragements. The dimensions of their howls
were extraordinary. They expended their lungs
with prodigal wills. And often they nearly stood
upon their heads in their anxiety to observe the
enemy on the other side of the tumbling smoke.

The lieutenant of the youth's company had encountered
a soldier who had fled screaming at
the first volley of his comrades. Behind the lines
these two were acting a little isolated scene. The
man was blubbering and staring with sheeplike
eyes at the lieutenantwho had seized him by the
collar and was pommeling him. He drove him
back into the ranks with many blows. The soldier
went mechanicallydullywith his animallike
eyes upon the officer. Perhaps there was to
him a divinity expressed in the voice of the other
--sternhardwith no reflection of fear in it. He
tried to reload his gunbut his shaking hands prevented.
The lieutenant was obliged to assist him.

The men dropped here and there like bundles.
The captain of the youth's company had been
killed in an early part of the action. His body
lay stretched out in the position of a tired man
restingbut upon his face there was an astonished
and sorrowful lookas if he thought some friend
had done him an ill turn. The babbling man was
grazed by a shot that made the blood stream
widely down his face. He clapped both hands
to his head. "Oh!" he saidand ran. Another
grunted suddenly as if he had been struck by a
club in the stomach. He sat down and gazed
ruefully. In his eyes there was muteindefinite
reproach. Farther up the line a manstanding
behind a treehad had his knee joint splintered
by a ball. Immediately he had dropped his rifle
and gripped the tree with both arms. And there
he remainedclinging desperately and crying for
assistance that he might withdraw his hold upon
the tree.

At last an exultant yell went along the quivering
line. The firing dwindled from an uproar to
a last vindictive popping. As the smoke slowly
eddied awaythe youth saw that the charge had
been repulsed. The enemy were scattered into
reluctant groups. He saw a man climb to the
top of the fencestraddle the railand fire a parting
shot. The waves had recededleaving bits of
dark debris upon the ground.

Some in the regiment began to whoop frenziedly.
Many were silent. Apparently they were
trying to contemplate themselves.

After the fever had left his veinsthe youth
thought that at last he was going to suffocate.
He became aware of the foul atmosphere in
which he had been struggling. He was grimy
and dripping like a laborer in a foundry. He


grasped his canteen and took a long swallow of
the warmed water.

A sentence with variations went up and down
the line. "Wellwe 've helt 'em back. We 've
helt 'em back; derned if we haven't." The men
said it blissfullyleering at each other with dirty
smiles.

The youth turned to look behind him and off
to the right and off to the left. He experienced
the joy of a man who at last finds leisure in which
to look about him.

Under foot there were a few ghastly forms
motionless. They lay twisted in fantastic contortions.
Arms were bent and heads were turned
in incredible ways. It seemed that the dead men
must have fallen from some great height to get
into such positions. They looked to be dumped
out upon the ground from the sky.

From a position in the rear of the grove a battery
was throwing shells over it. The flash of
the guns startled the youth at first. He thought
they were aimed directly at him. Through the
trees he watched the black figures of the gunners
as they worked swiftly and intently. Their labor
seemed a complicated thing. He wondered how
they could remember its formula in the midst of
confusion.

The guns squatted in a row like savage chiefs.
They argued with abrupt violence. It was a
grim pow-wow. Their busy servants ran hither
and thither.

A small procession of wounded men were going
drearily toward the rear. It was a flow of
blood from the torn body of the brigade.

To the right and to the left were the dark
lines of other troops. Far in front he thought he
could see lighter masses protruding in points
from the forest. They were suggestive of unnumbered
thousands.

Once he saw a tiny battery go dashing along
the line of the horizon. The tiny riders were
beating the tiny horses.

From a sloping hill came the sound of cheerings
and clashes. Smoke welled slowly through
the leaves.

Batteries were speaking with thunderous oratorical
effort. Here and there were flagsthe
red in the stripes dominating. They splashed
bits of warm color upon the dark lines of
troops.

The youth felt the old thrill at the sight of
the emblem. They were like beautiful birds
strangely undaunted in a storm.


As he listened to the din from the hillsideto
a deep pulsating thunder that came from afar to
the leftand to the lesser clamors which came
from many directionsit occurred to him that
they were fightingtooover thereand over
thereand over there. Heretofore he had sup-
posed that all the battle was directly under his
nose.


As he gazed around him the youth felt a flash
of astonishment at the bluepure sky and the
sun gleamings on the trees and fields. It was
surprising that Nature had gone tranquilly on
with her golden process in the midst of so much
devilment.


CHAPTER VI.


THE youth awakened slowly. He came grad-
ually back to a position from which he could re-
gard himself. For moments he had been scruti-
nizing his person in a dazed way as if he had
never before seen himself. Then he picked up
his cap from the ground. He wriggled in his
jacket to make a more comfortable fitand kneel-
ing relaced his shoe. He thoughtfully mopped
his reeking features.


So it was all over at last! The supreme trial
had been passed. The redformidable difficulties
of war had been vanquished.


He went into an ecstasy of self-satisfaction.
He had the most delightful sensations of his life.
Standing as if apart from himselfhe viewed that
last scene. He perceived that the man who had
fought thus was magnificent.


He felt that he was a fine fellow. He saw
himself even with those ideals which he had con-
sidered as far beyond him. He smiled in deep
gratification.


Upon his fellows he beamed tenderness and
good will. "Gee! ain't it hothey?" he said
affably to a man who was polishing his stream-
ing face with his coat sleeves.


You bet!said the othergrinning sociably.
I never seen sech dumb hotness.He sprawled
out luxuriously on the ground. "Geeyes! An'
I hope we don't have no more fightin' till a week
from Monday."


There were some handshakings and deep
speeches with men whose features were familiar
but with whom the youth now felt the bonds of



tied hearts. He helped a cursing comrade to
bind up a wound of the shin.


Butof a suddencries of amazement broke
out along the ranks of the new regiment. "Here
they come ag'in! Here they come ag'in!" The
man who had sprawled upon the ground started
up and saidGosh!


The youth turned quick eyes upon the field.
He discerned forms begin to swell in masses out
of a distant wood. He again saw the tilted flag
speeding forward.


The shellswhich had ceased to trouble the
regiment for a timecame swirling againand ex-
ploded in the grass or among the leaves of the
trees. They looked to be strange war flowers
bursting into fierce bloom.


The men groaned. The luster faded from
their eyes. Their smudged countenances now
expressed a profound dejection. They moved
their stiffened bodies slowlyand watched in sul-
len mood the frantic approach of the enemy. The
slaves toiling in the temple of this god began to
feel rebellion at his harsh tasks.


They fretted and complained each to each.
Oh, say, this is too much of a good thing! Why
can't somebody send us supports?


We ain't never goin' to stand this second
banging. I didn't come here to fight the hull
damn' rebel army.


There was one who raised a doleful cry. "I
wish Bill Smithers had trod on my handin-
steader me treddin' on his'n." The sore joints of
the regiment creaked as it painfully floundered
into position to repulse.


The youth stared. Surelyhe thoughtthis
impossible thing was not about to happen. He
waited as if he expected the enemy to suddenly
stopapologizeand retire bowing. It was all a
mistake.


But the firing began somewhere on the regi-
mental line and ripped along in both directions.
The level sheets of flame developed great clouds
of smoke that tumbled and tossed in the mild
wind near the ground for a momentand then
rolled through the ranks as through a gate. The
clouds were tinged an earthlike yellow in the
sunrays and in the shadow were a sorry blue.
The flag was sometimes eaten and lost in this
mass of vaporbut more often it projectedsun-
touchedresplendent.


Into the youth's eyes there came a look that
one can see in the orbs of a jaded horse. His
neck was quivering with nervous weakness and
the muscles of his arms felt numb and bloodless.



His handstooseemed large and awkward as if
he was wearing invisible mittens. And there was
a great uncertainty about his knee joints.

The words that comrades had uttered previous
to the firing began to recur to him. "Ohsay
this is too much of a good thing! What do they
take us for--why don't they send supports? I
didn't come here to fight the hull damned rebel
army."

He began to exaggerate the endurancethe
skilland the valor of those who were coming.
Himself reeling from exhaustionhe was astonished
beyond measure at such persistency. They
must be machines of steel. It was very gloomy
struggling against such affairswound up perhaps
to fight until sundown.

He slowly lifted his rifle and catching a
glimpse of the thickspread field he blazed at a
cantering cluster. He stopped then and began
to peer as best he could through the smoke. He
caught changing views of the ground covered
with men who were all running like pursued
impsand yelling.

To the youth it was an onslaught of redoubtable
dragons. He became like the man who lost
his legs at the approach of the red and green
monster. He waited in a sort of a horrified
listening attitude. He seemed to shut his eyes
and wait to be gobbled.

A man near him who up to this time had been
working feverishly at his rifle suddenly stopped
and ran with howls. A lad whose face had borne
an expression of exalted couragethe majesty of
he who dares give his lifewasat an instant
smitten abject. He blanched like one who has
come to the edge of a cliff at midnight and is suddenly
made aware. There was a revelation. He
toothrew down his gun and fled. There was no
shame in his face. He ran like a rabbit.

Others began to scamper away through the
smoke. The youth turned his headshaken from
his trance by this movement as if the regiment
was leaving him behind. He saw the few fleeting
forms.

He yelled then with fright and swung about.
For a momentin the great clamorhe was like a
proverbial chicken. He lost the direction of
safety. Destruction threatened him from all
points.

Directly he began to speed toward the rear in
great leaps. His rifle and cap were gone. His
unbuttoned coat bulged in the wind. The flap of
his cartridge box bobbed wildlyand his canteen
by its slender cordswung out behind. On his
face was all the horror of those things which he
imagined.


The lieutenant sprang forward bawling. The
youth saw his features wrathfully redand saw
him make a dab with his sword. His one thought
of the incident was that the lieutenant was a peculiar
creature to feel interested in such matters
upon this occasion.

He ran like a blind man. Two or three times
he fell down. Once he knocked his shoulder so
heavily against a tree that he went headlong.

Since he had turned his back upon the fight
his fears had been wondrously magnified. Death
about to thrust him between the shoulder blades
was far more dreadful than death about to smite
him between the eyes. When he thought of it
laterhe conceived the impression that it is better
to view the appalling than to be merely within
hearing. The noises of the battle were like
stones; he believed himself liable to be crushed.

As he ran he mingled with others. He
dimly saw men on his right and on his leftand
he heard footsteps behind him. He thought that
all the regiment was fleeingpursued by these
ominous crashes.

In his flight the sound of these following footsteps
gave him his one meager relief. He felt
vaguely that death must make a first choice of
the men who were nearest; the initial morsels for
the dragons would be then those who were following
him. So he displayed the zeal of an insane
sprinter in his purpose to keep them in the rear.
There was a race.

As heleadingwent across a little fieldhe
found himself in a region of shells. They hurtled
over his head with long wild screams. As he
listened he imagined them to have rows of cruel
teeth that grinned at him. Once one lit before
him and the livid lightning of the explosion
effectually barred the way in his chosen direction.
He groveled on the ground and then
springing up went careering off through some
bushes.

He experienced a thrill of amazement when
he came within view of a battery in action. The
men there seemed to be in conventional moods
altogether unaware of the impending annihilation.
The battery was disputing with a distant
antagonist and the gunners were wrapped in
admiration of their shooting. They were continually
bending in coaxing postures over the
guns. They seemed to be patting them on the
back and encouraging them with words. The
gunsstolid and undauntedspoke with dogged
valor.

The precise gunners were coolly enthusiastic.
They lifted their eyes every chance to the smokewreathed
hillock from whence the hostile battery


addressed them. The youth pitied them as he
ran. Methodical idiots! Machine-like fools! The
refined joy of planting shells in the midst of the
other battery's formation would appear a little
thing when the infantry came swooping out of
the woods.

The face of a youthful riderwho was jerking
his frantic horse with an abandon of temper
he might display in a placid barnyardwas impressed
deeply upon his mind. He knew that
he looked upon a man who would presently be
dead.

Toohe felt a pity for the gunsstandingsix
good comradesin a bold row.

He saw a brigade going to the relief of its pestered
fellows. He scrambled upon a wee hill and
watched it sweeping finelykeeping formation in
difficult places. The blue of the line was crusted
with steel colorand the brilliant flags projected.
Officers were shouting.

This sight also filled him with wonder. The
brigade was hurrying briskly to be gulped into
the infernal mouths of the war god. What manner
of men were theyanyhow? Ahit was some
wondrous breed! Or else they didn't comprehend--
the fools.

A furious order caused commotion in the artillery.
An officer on a bounding horse made maniacal
motions with his arms. The teams went
swinging up from the rearthe guns were whirled
aboutand the battery scampered away. The
cannon with their noses poked slantingly at the
ground grunted and grumbled like stout men
brave but with objections to hurry.

The youth went onmoderating his pace since
he had left the place of noises.

Later he came upon a general of division
seated upon a horse that pricked its ears in
an interested way at the battle. There was a
great gleaming of yellow and patent leather
about the saddle and bridle. The quiet man
astride looked mouse-colored upon such a splendid
charger.

A jingling staff was galloping hither and
thither. Sometimes the general was surrounded
by horsemen and at other times he was quite
alone. He looked to be much harassed. He had
the appearance of a business man whose market
is swinging up and down.

The youth went slinking around this spot.
He went as near as he dared trying to overhear
words. Perhaps the generalunable to comprehend
chaosmight call upon him for information.
And he could tell him. He knew all concerning
it. Of a surety the force was in a fixand any


fool could see that if they did not retreat while
they had opportunity--why--

He felt that he would like to thrash the general
or at least approach and tell him in plain
words exactly what he thought him to be. It
was criminal to stay calmly in one spot and make
no effort to stay destruction. He loitered in a
fever of eagerness for the division commander to
apply to him.

As he warily moved abouthe heard the general
call out irritably: "Tompkinsgo over an'
see Tayloran' tell him not t' be in such an allfired
hurry; tell him t' halt his brigade in th'
edge of th' woods; tell him t' detach a reg'ment
--say I think th' center 'll break if we don't help
it out some; tell him t' hurry up."

A slim youth on a fine chestnut horse caught
these swift words from the mouth of his superior.
He made his horse bound into a gallop almost
from a walk in his haste to go upon his mission.
There was a cloud of dust.

A moment later the youth saw the general
bounce excitedly in his saddle.

Yes, by heavens, they have!The officer
leaned forward. His face was aflame with excitement.
Yes, by heavens, they 've held 'im!
They 've held 'im!

He began to blithely roar at his staff: "We 'll
wallop 'im now. We 'll wallop 'im now. We 've
got 'em sure." He turned suddenly upon an aid:
Here--you--Jones--quick--ride after Tompkins
--see Taylor--tell him t' go in--everlastingly-like
blazes--anything.

As another officer sped his horse after the first
messengerthe general beamed upon the earth
like a sun. In his eyes was a desire to chant a
paean. He kept repeatingThey 've held 'em,
by heavens!

His excitement made his horse plungeand he
merrily kicked and swore at it. He held a little
carnival of joy on horseback.

CHAPTER VII.

THE youth cringed as if discovered in a crime.
By heavensthey had won after all! The imbecile
line had remained and become victors.
He could hear cheering.

He lifted himself upon his toes and looked in
the direction of the fight. A yellow fog lay wallowing
on the treetops. From beneath it came
the clatter of musketry. Hoarse cries told of an


advance.

He turned away amazed and angry. He felt
that he had been wronged.

He had fledhe told himselfbecause annihilation
approached. He had done a good part in
saving himselfwho was a little piece of the army.
He had considered the timehe saidto be one in
which it was the duty of every little piece to rescue
itself if possible. Later the officers could fit
the little pieces together againand make a battle
front. If none of the little pieces were wise enough
to save themselves from the flurry of death at such

75
a timewhythenwhere would be the army? It
was all plain that he had proceeded according to
very correct and commendable rules. His actions
had been sagacious things. They had been
full of strategy. They were the work of a master's
legs.

Thoughts of his comrades came to him. The
brittle blue line had withstood the blows and won.
He grew bitter over it. It seemed that the blind
ignorance and stupidity of those little pieces had
betrayed him. He had been overturned and
crushed by their lack of sense in holding the position
when intelligent deliberation would have
convinced them that it was impossible. Hethe
enlightened man who looks afar in the darkhad
fled because of his superior perceptions and
knowledge. He felt a great anger against his
comrades. He knew it could be proved that
they had been fools.

He wondered what they would remark when
later he appeared in camp. His mind heard
howls of derision. Their density would not enable
them to understand his sharper point of
view.

He began to pity himself acutely. He was
ill used. He was trodden beneath the feet of an
iron injustice. He had proceeded with wisdom
and from the most righteous motives under
heaven's blue only to be frustrated by hateful
circumstances.

A dullanimal-like rebellion against his fellows
war in the abstractand fate grew within
him. He shambled along with bowed headhis
brain in a tumult of agony and despair. When
he looked loweringly upquivering at each
soundhis eyes had the expression of those of
a criminal who thinks his guilt and his punishment
greatand knows that he can find no
words.

He went from the fields into a thick woodsas
if resolved to bury himself. He wished to get
out of hearing of the crackling shots which were
to him like voices.


The ground was cluttered with vines and
bushesand the trees grew close and spread out
like bouquets. He was obliged to force his way
with much noise. The creeperscatching against
his legscried out harshly as their sprays were
torn from the barks of trees. The swishing saplings
tried to make known his presence to the
world. He could not conciliate the forest. As
he made his wayit was always calling out protestations.
When he separated embraces of trees
and vines the disturbed foliages waved their arms
and turned their face leaves toward him. He
dreaded lest these noisy motions and cries should
bring men to look at him. So he went farseeking
dark and intricate places.

After a time the sound of musketry grew faint
and the cannon boomed in the distance. The sun
suddenly apparentblazed among the trees. The
insects were making rhythmical noises. They
seemed to be grinding their teeth in unison. A
woodpecker stuck his impudent head around the
side of a tree. A bird flew on lighthearted wing.

Off was the rumble of death. It seemed now
that Nature had no ears.

This landscape gave him assurance. A fair
field holding life. It was the religion of peace.
It would die if its timid eyes were compelled to
see blood. He conceived Nature to be a woman
with a deep aversion to tragedy.

He threw a pine cone at a jovial squirreland
he ran with chattering fear. High in a treetop
he stoppedandpoking his head cautiously from
behind a branchlooked down with an air of trepidation.


The youth felt triumphant at this exhibition.
There was the lawhe said. Nature had given
him a sign. The squirrelimmediately upon recognizing
dangerhad taken to his legs without
ado. He did not stand stolidly baring his furry
belly to the missileand die with an upward
glance at the sympathetic heavens. On the contrary
he had fled as fast as his legs could carry
him; and he was but an ordinary squirreltoo-doubtless
no philosopher of his race. The youth
wendedfeeling that Nature was of his mind.
She re-enforced his argument with proofs that
lived where the sun shone.

Once he found himself almost into a swamp.
He was obliged to walk upon bog tufts and
watch his feet to keep from the oily mire. Pausing
at one time to look about him he sawout at
some black watera small animal pounce in and
emerge directly with a gleaming fish.

The youth went again into the deep thickets.
The brushed branches made a noise that drowned
the sounds of cannon. He walked ongoing from


obscurity into promises of a greater obscurity.

At length he reached a place where the high
arching boughs made a chapel. He softly pushed
the green doors aside and entered. Pine needles
were a gentle brown carpet. There was a religious
half light.

Near the threshold he stoppedhorror-stricken
at the sight of a thing.

He was being looked at by a dead man who
was seated with his back against a columnlike
tree. The corpse was dressed in a uniform that
once had been bluebut was now faded to a melancholy
shade of green. The eyesstaring at the
youthhad changed to the dull hue to be seen on
the side of a dead fish. The mouth was open.
Its red had changed to an appalling yellow.
Over the gray skin of the face ran little ants.
One was trundling some sort of a bundle along
the upper lip.

The youth gave a shriek as he confronted the
thing. He was for moments turned to stone before
it. He remained staring into the liquid-looking
eyes. The dead man and the living man exchanged
a long look. Then the youth cautiously
put one hand behind him and brought it against
a tree. Leaning upon this he retreatedstep by
stepwith his face still toward the thing. He
feared that if he turned his back the body might
spring up and stealthily pursue him.

The branchespushing against himthreatened
to throw him over upon it. His unguided
feettoocaught aggravatingly in brambles; and
with it all he received a subtle suggestion to
touch the corpse. As he thought of his hand
upon it he shuddered profoundly.

At last he burst the bonds which had fastened
him to the spot and fledunheeding the underbrush.
He was pursued by a sight of the black
ants swarming greedily upon the gray face and
venturing horribly near to the eyes.

After a time he pausedandbreathless and
pantinglistened. He imagined some strange
voice would come from the dead throat and
squawk after him in horrible menaces.

The trees about the portal of the chapel
moved soughingly in a soft wind. A sad silence
was upon the little guarding edifice.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE trees began softly to sing a hymn of twilight.
The sun sank until slanted bronze rays


struck the forest. There was a lull in the noises
of insects as if they had bowed their beaks and
were making a devotional pause. There was
silence save for the chanted chorus of the trees.

Thenupon this stillnessthere suddenly broke
a tremendous clangor of sounds. A crimson roar
came from the distance.

The youth stopped. He was transfixed by
this terrific medley of all noises. It was as if
worlds were being rended. There was the ripping
sound of musketry and the breaking crash
of the artillery.

His mind flew in all directions. He conceived
the two armies to be at each other panther
fashion. He listened for a time. Then he began
to run in the direction of the battle. He saw
that it was an ironical thing for him to be running
thus toward that which he had been at such

82
pains to avoid. But he saidin substanceto himself
that if the earth and the moon were about to
clashmany persons would doubtless plan to get
upon the roofs to witness the collision.

As he ranhe became aware that the forest
had stopped its musicas if at last becoming
capable of hearing the foreign sounds. The trees
hushed and stood motionless. Everything seemed
to be listening to the crackle and clatter and earshaking
thunder. The chorus pealed over the
still earth.

It suddenly occurred to the youth that the
fight in which he had been wasafter allbut
perfunctory popping. In the hearing of this
present din he was doubtful if he had seen real
battle scenes. This uproar explained a celestial
battle; it was tumbling hordes a-struggle in
the air.

Reflectinghe saw a sort of a humor in the
point of view of himself and his fellows during
the late encounter. They had taken themselves
and the enemy very seriously and had imagined
that they were deciding the war. Individuals
must have supposed that they were cutting the
letters of their names deep into everlasting tablets
of brassor enshrining their reputations forever in
the hearts of their countrymenwhileas to fact
the affair would appear in printed reports under a
meek and immaterial title. But he saw that it was
goodelsehe saidin battle every one would
surely run save forlorn hopes and their ilk.

He went rapidly on. He wished to come to
the edge of the forest that he might peer out.

As he hastenedthere passed through his mind
pictures of stupendous conflicts. His accumulated
thought upon such subjects was used to form


scenes. The noise was as the voice of an eloquent
beingdescribing.

Sometimes the brambles formed chains and
tried to hold him back. Treesconfronting him
stretched out their arms and forbade him to pass.
After its previous hostility this new resistance of
the forest filled him with a fine bitterness. It
seemed that Nature could not be quite ready to
kill him.

But he obstinately took roundabout waysand
presently he was where he could see long gray
walls of vapor where lay battle lines. The voices
of cannon shook him. The musketry sounded in
long irregular surges that played havoc with his
ears. He stood regardant for a moment. His
eyes had an awestruck expression. He gawked
in the direction of the fight.

Presently he proceeded again on his forward
way. The battle was like the grinding of an
immense and terrible machine to him. Its complexities
and powersits grim processesfascinated
him. He must go close and see it produce
corpses.

He came to a fence and clambered over it.
On the far sidethe ground was littered with
clothes and guns. A newspaperfolded uplay
in the dirt. A dead soldier was stretched with
his face hidden in his arm. Farther off there
was a group of four or five corpses keeping
mournful company. A hot sun had blazed upon
the spot.

In this place the youth felt that he was an
invader. This forgotten part of the battle ground
was owned by the dead menand he hurriedin
the vague apprehension that one of the swollen
forms would rise and tell him to begone.

He came finally to a road from which he
could see in the distance dark and agitated
bodies of troopssmoke-fringed. In the lane
was a blood-stained crowd streaming to the rear.
The wounded men were cursinggroaningand
wailing. In the airalwayswas a mighty swell
of sound that it seemed could sway the earth.
With the courageous words of the artillery and
the spiteful sentences of the musketry mingled
red cheers. And from this region of noises came
the steady current of the maimed.

One of the wounded men had a shoeful of
blood. He hopped like a schoolboy in a game.
He was laughing hysterically.

One was swearing that he had been shot in the
arm through the commanding general's mismanagement
of the army. One was marching with
an air imitative of some sublime drum major.
Upon his features was an unholy mixture of
merriment and agony. As he marched he sang


a bit of doggerel in a high and quavering voice:

Sing a song 'a vic'try,

A pocketful 'a bullets,
Five an' twenty dead men

Baked in a--pie.

Parts of the procession limped and staggered to
this tune.

Another had the gray seal of death already
upon his face. His lips were curled in hard lines
and his teeth were clinched. His hands were
bloody from where he had pressed them upon his
wound. He seemed to be awaiting the moment
when he should pitch headlong. He stalked like
the specter of a soldierhis eyes burning with the
power of a stare into the unknown.

There were some who proceeded sullenlyfull
of anger at their woundsand ready to turn upon
anything as an obscure cause.

An officer was carried along by two privates.
He was peevish. "Don't joggle soJohnsonyeh
fool he cried. Think m' leg is made of iron?
If yeh can't carry me decentput me down an'
let some one else do it."

He bellowed at the tottering crowd who
blocked the quick march of his bearers. "Say
make way therecan't yeh? Make waydickens
take it all."

They sulkily parted and went to the roadsides.
As he was carried past they made pert
remarks to him. When he raged in reply and
threatened themthey told him to be damned.

The shoulder of one of the tramping bearers
knocked heavily against the spectral soldier who
was staring into the unknown.

The youth joined this crowd and marched
along with it. The torn bodies expressed the
awful machinery in which the men had been
entangled.

Orderlies and couriers occasionally broke
through the throng in the roadwayscattering
wounded men right and leftgalloping on followed
by howls. The melancholy march was
continually disturbed by the messengersand
sometimes by bustling batteries that came swinging
and thumping down upon themthe officers
shouting orders to clear the way.

There was a tattered manfouled with dust
blood and powder stain from hair to shoeswho
trudged quietly at the youth's side. He was listening
with eagerness and much humility to the
lurid descriptions of a bearded sergeant. His
lean features wore an expression of awe and ad



miration. He was like a listener in a country
store to wondrous tales told among the sugar
barrels. He eyed the story-teller with unspeakable
wonder. His mouth was agape in yokel
fashion.

The sergeanttaking note of thisgave pause
to his elaborate history while he administered a
sardonic comment. "Be keerfulhoneyyou 'll
be a-ketchin' flies he said.

The tattered man shrank back abashed.

After a time he began to sidle near to the
youth, and in a different way try to make him a
friend. His voice was gentle as a girl's voice
and his eyes were pleading. The youth saw
with surprise that the soldier had two wounds,
one in the head, bound with a blood-soaked rag,
and the other in the arm, making that member
dangle like a broken bough.

After they had walked together for some time
the tattered man mustered sufficient courage to
speak. Was pretty good fightwa'n't it?"
he timidly said. The youthdeep in thought
glanced up at the bloody and grim figure with
its lamblike eyes. "What?"

Was pretty good fight, wa'n't it?

Yes said the youth shortly. He quickened
his pace.

But the other hobbled industriously after him.
There was an air of apology in his manner, but
he evidently thought that he needed only to talk
for a time, and the youth would perceive that he
was a good fellow.

Was pretty good fightwa'n't it?" he began
in a small voiceand then he achieved the fortitude
to continue. "Dern me if I ever see fellers
fight so. Lawshow they did fight! I knowed
th' boys 'd like when they onct got square at it.
Th' boys ain't had no fair chanct up t' nowbut
this time they showed what they was. I knowed
it 'd turn out this way. Yeh can't lick them boys.
Nosir! They're fightersthey be."

He breathed a deep breath of humble admiration.
He had looked at the youth for encouragement
several times. He received none
but gradually he seemed to get absorbed in his
subject.

I was talkin' 'cross pickets with a boy from
Georgie, onct, an' that boy, he ses, 'Your fellers
'll all run like hell when they onct hearn a gun,'
he ses. 'Mebbe they will,' I ses, 'but I don't
b'lieve none of it,' I ses; 'an' b'jiminey,' I ses back
t' 'um, 'mebbe your fellers 'll all run like hell
when they onct hearn a gun,' I ses. He larfed.
Well, they didn't run t' day, did they, hey? No,


sir! They fit, an' fit, an' fit.

His homely face was suffused with a light of
love for the army which was to him all things
beautiful and powerful.

After a time he turned to the youth. "Where
yeh hitol' boy?" he asked in a brotherly tone.

The youth felt instant panic at this question
although at first its full import was not borne in
upon him.

What?he asked.

Where yeh hit?repeated the tattered man.

Why,began the youthI--I--that is-why--
I--

He turned away suddenly and slid through
the crowd. His brow was heavily flushedand
his fingers were picking nervously at one of his
buttons. He bent his head and fastened his eyes
studiously upon the button as if it were a little
problem.

The tattered man looked after him in astonishment.


CHAPTER IX.

THE youth fell back in the procession until
the tattered soldier was not in sight. Then he
started to walk on with the others.

But he was amid wounds. The mob of men
was bleeding. Because of the tattered soldier's
question he now felt that his shame could be
viewed. He was continually casting sidelong
glances to see if the men were contemplating the
letters of guilt he felt burned into his brow.

At times he regarded the wounded soldiers
in an envious way. He conceived persons with
torn bodies to be peculiarly happy. He wished
that hetoohad a wounda red badge of courage.


The spectral soldier was at his side like a
stalking reproach. The man's eyes were still
fixed in a stare into the unknown. His gray
appalling face had attracted attention in the
crowdand menslowing to his dreary pacewere
walking with him. They were discussing his
plightquestioning him and giving him advice.

In a dogged way he repelled themsigning to them
to go on and leave him alone. The shadows of


his face were deepening and his tight lips seemed
holding in check the moan of great despair.
There could be seen a certain stiffness in the
movements of his bodyas if he were taking
infinite care not to arouse the passion of his
wounds. As he went onhe seemed always looking
for a placelike one who goes to choose a
grave.

Something in the gesture of the man as he
waved the bloody and pitying soldiers away
made the youth start as if bitten. He yelled in
horror. Tottering forward he laid a quivering
hand upon the man's arm. As the latter slowly
turned his waxlike features toward himthe
youth screamed:

Gawd! Jim Conklin!

The tall soldier made a little commonplace
smile. "HelloHenry he said.

The youth swayed on his legs and glared
strangely. He stuttered and stammered. Oh
Jim--ohJim--ohJim--"

The tall soldier held out his gory hand. There
was a curious red and black combination of new
blood and old blood upon it. "Where yeh been
Henry?" he asked. He continued in a monotonous
voiceI thought mebbe yeh got keeled
over. There 's been thunder t' pay t'-day. I was
worryin' about it a good deal.

The youth still lamented. "OhJim--ohJim
--ohJim--"

Yeh know,said the tall soldierI was out
there.He made a careful gesture. "An'
Lordwhat a circus! An'b'jimineyI got shot-I
got shot. Yesb'jimineyI got shot." He
reiterated this fact in a bewildered wayas if he
did not know how it came about.

The youth put forth anxious arms to assist
himbut the tall soldier went firmly on as if propelled.
Since the youth's arrival as a guardian
for his friendthe other wounded men had ceased
to display much interest. They occupied themselves
again in dragging their own tragedies
toward the rear.

Suddenlyas the two friends marched onthe
tall soldier seemed to be overcome by a terror.
His face turned to a semblance of gray paste.
He clutched the youth's arm and looked all about
himas if dreading to be overheard. Then he
began to speak in a shaking whisper:

I tell yeh what I'm 'fraid of, Henry--I 'll tell
yeh what I 'm 'fraid of. I 'm 'fraid I 'll fall down
--an' then yeh know--them damned artillery
wagons--they like as not 'll run over me. That 's
what I 'm 'fraid of--


The youth cried out to him hysterically: "I 'll
take care of yehJim! I'll take care of yeh! I
swear t' Gawd I will!"


Sure--will yeh, Henry?the tall soldier
beseeched.


Yes--yes--I tell yeh--I'll take care of yeh,
Jim!protested the youth. He could not speak
accurately because of the gulpings in his throat.


But the tall soldier continued to beg in a
lowly way. He now hung babelike to the
youth's arm. His eyes rolled in the wildness of
his terror. "I was allus a good friend t' yeh
wa'n't IHenry? I 've allus been a pretty good
fellerain't I? An' it ain't much t' askis it? Jest
t' pull me along outer th' road? I 'd do it fer you
Wouldn't IHenry?"


He paused in piteous anxiety to await his
friend's reply.


The youth had reached an anguish where the
sobs scorched him. He strove to express his
loyaltybut he could only make fantastic gestures.


Howeverthe tall soldier seemed suddenly to
forget all those fears. He became again the
grimstalking specter of a soldier. He went
stonily forward. The youth wished his friend to
lean upon himbut the other always shook his
head and strangely protested. "No--no--no--
leave me be--leave me be--"


His look was fixed again upon the unknown.
He moved with mysterious purposeand all of
the youth's offers he brushed aside. "No--no--
leave me be--leave me be--"


The youth had to follow.


Presently the latter heard a voice talking
softly near his shoulders. Turning he saw that it
belonged to the tattered soldier. "Ye 'd better
take 'im outa th' roadpardner. There 's a batt'ry
comin' helitywhoop down th' road an' he 'll git
runned over. He 's a goner anyhow in about five
minutes--yeh kin see that. Ye 'd better take 'im
outa th' road. Where th' blazes does he git his
stren'th from?"


Lord knows!cried the youth. He was
shaking his hands helplessly.


He ran forward presently and grasped the
tall soldier by the arm. "Jim! Jim!" he coaxed
come with me.


The tall soldier weakly tried to wrench himself
free. "Huh he said vacantly. He stared at the
youth for a moment. At last he spoke as if dimly
comprehending. Oh! Inteh th' fields? Oh!"



He started blindly through the grass.

The youth turned once to look at the lashing
riders and jouncing guns of the battery. He was
startled from this view by a shrill outcry from
the tattered man.

Gawd! He's runnin'!

Turning his head swiftlythe youth saw his
friend running in a staggering and stumbling
way toward a little clump of bushes. His heart
seemed to wrench itself almost free from his
body at this sight. He made a noise of pain.
He and the tattered man began a pursuit. There
was a singular race.

When he overtook the tall soldier he began
to plead with all the words he could find. "Jim
--Jim--what are you doing--what makes you do
this way--you 'll hurt yerself."

The same purpose was in the tall soldier's face.
He protested in a dulled waykeeping his eyes
fastened on the mystic place of his intentions.
No--no--don't tech me--leave me be--leave
me be--

The youthaghast and filled with wonder at the
tall soldierbegan quaveringly to question him.
Where yeh goin', Jim? What you thinking
about? Where you going? Tell me, won't you,
Jim?

The tall soldier faced about as upon relentless
pursuers. In his eyes there was a great appeal.
Leave me be, can't yeh? Leave me be fer a
minnit.

The youth recoiled. "WhyJim he said, in
a dazed way, what's the matter with you?"

The tall soldier turned andlurching dangerously
went on. The youth and the tattered
soldier followedsneaking as if whippedfeeling
unable to face the stricken man if he should again
confront them. They began to have thoughts of
a solemn ceremony. There was something ritelike
in these movements of the doomed soldier.
And there was a resemblance in him to a devotee
of a mad religionblood-suckingmuscle-wrenching
bone-crushing. They were awed and afraid.
They hung back lest he have at command a
dreadful weapon.

At lastthey saw him stop and stand motionless.
Hastening upthey perceived that his face
wore an expression telling that he had at last
found the place for which he had struggled. His
spare figure was erect; his bloody hands were
quietly at his side. He was waiting with patience
for something that he had come to meet. He was
at the rendezvous. They paused and stoodex



pectant.

There was a silence.

Finallythe chest of the doomed soldier began
to heave with a strained motion. It increased in
violence until it was as if an animal was within
and was kicking and tumbling furiously to be
free.

This spectacle of gradual strangulation made
the youth writheand once as his friend rolled his
eyeshe saw something in them that made him
sink wailing to the ground. He raised his voice
in a last supreme call.

Jim--Jim--Jim--

The tall soldier opened his lips and spoke.
He made a gesture. "Leave me be--don't tech
me--leave me be--"

There was another silence while he waited.

Suddenlyhis form stiffened and straightened.
Then it was shaken by a prolonged ague. He
stared into space. To the two watchers there
was a curious and profound dignity in the firm
lines of his awful face.

He was invaded by a creeping strangeness
that slowly enveloped him. For a moment the
tremor of his legs caused him to dance a sort of
hideous hornpipe. His arms beat wildly about
his head in expression of implike enthusiasm.

His tall figure stretched itself to its full height.
There was a slight rending sound. Then it began
to swing forwardslow and straightin the manner
of a falling tree. A swift muscular contortion
made the left shoulder strike the ground first.

The body seemed to bounce a little way from
the earth. "God!" said the tattered soldier.

The youth had watchedspellboundthis
ceremony at the place of meeting. His face
had been twisted into an expression of every
agony he had imagined for his friend.

He now sprang to his feet andgoing closer
gazed upon the pastelike face. The mouth was
open and the teeth showed in a laugh.

As the flap of the blue jacket fell away from
the bodyhe could see that the side looked as if it
had been chewed by wolves.

The youth turnedwith suddenlivid rage
toward the battlefield. He shook his fist. He
seemed about to deliver a philippic.

Hell--


The red sun was pasted in the sky like a wafer.

CHAPTER X.

THE tattered man stood musing.

Well, he was reg'lar jim-dandy fer nerve,
wa'n't he,said he finally in a little awestruck
voice. "A reg'lar jim-dandy." He thoughtfully
poked one of the docile hands with his foot. "I
wonner where he got 'is stren'th from? I never
seen a man do like that before. It was a funny
thing. Wellhe was a reg'lar jim-dandy."

The youth desired to screech out his grief.
He was stabbedbut his tongue lay dead in the
tomb of his mouth. He threw himself again
upon the ground and began to brood.

The tattered man stood musing.

Look-a-here, pardner,he saidafter a time.
He regarded the corpse as he spoke. "He 's up
an' goneain't 'ean' we might as well begin t'
look out fer ol' number one. This here thing is
all over. He 's up an' goneain't 'e? An' he 's all
right here. Nobody won't bother 'im. An' I
must say I ain't enjoying any great health m'self
these days."

The youthawakened by the tattered soldier's
tonelooked quickly up. He saw that he was
swinging uncertainly on his legs and that his face
had turned to a shade of blue.

Good Lord!he criedyou ain't goin' t'-not
you, too.

The tattered man waved his hand. "Nary
die he said. All I want is some pea soup an'
a good bed. Some pea soup he repeated
dreamfully.

The youth arose from the ground. I wonder
where he came from. I left him over there."
He pointed. "And now I find 'im here. And
he was coming from over theretoo." He indicated
a new direction. They both turned
toward the body as if to ask of it a question.

Well,at length spoke the tattered man
there ain't no use in our stayin' here an' tryin' t'
ask him anything.

The youth nodded an assent wearily. They
both turned to gaze for a moment at the corpse.

The youth murmured something.


Well, he was a jim-dandy, wa'n't 'e?said
the tattered man as if in response.

They turned their backs upon it and started
away. For a time they stole softlytreading
with their toes. It remained laughing there in
the grass.

I'm commencin' t' feel pretty bad,said the
tattered mansuddenly breaking one of his little
silences. "I'm commencin' t' feel pretty damn'
bad."

The youth groaned. "O Lord!" He wondered
if he was to be the tortured witness of
another grim encounter.

But his companion waved his hand reassuringly.
Oh, I'm not goin' t' die yit! There too
much dependin' on me fer me t' die yit. No, sir!
Nary die! I CAN'T! Ye'd oughta see th' swad
a' chil'ren I've got, an' all like that.

The youth glancing at his companion could
see by the shadow of a smile that he was making
some kind of fun.

As they plodded on the tattered soldier continued
to talk. "Besidesif I diedI wouldn't
die th' way that feller did. That was th' funniest
thing. I'd jest flop downI would. I never seen
a feller die th' way that feller did.

Yeh know Tom Jamison, he lives next door
t' me up home. He's a nice feller, he is, an' we
was allus good friends. Smart, too. Smart as a
steel trap. Well, when we was a-fightin' this
atternoon, all-of-a-sudden he begin t' rip up an'
cuss an' beller at me. 'Yer shot, yeh blamed
infernal!'--he swear horrible--he ses t' me. I
put up m' hand t' m' head an' when I looked at
m' fingers, I seen, sure 'nough, I was shot. I
give a holler an' begin t' run, but b'fore I could
git away another one hit me in th' arm an' whirl'
me clean 'round. I got skeared when they was
all a-shootin' b'hind me an' I run t' beat all,
but I cotch it pretty bad. I've an idee I'd
a' been fightin' yit, if t'was n't fer Tom Jamison.


Then he made a calm announcement: "There's
two of 'em--little ones--but they 're beginnin' t'
have fun with me now. I don't b'lieve I kin walk
much furder."

They went slowly on in silence. "Yeh look
pretty peek-ed yerself said the tattered man at
last. I bet yeh 've got a worser one than yeh
think. Ye'd better take keer of yer hurt. It
don't do t' let sech things go. It might be inside
mostlyan' them plays thunder. Where is it
located?" But he continued his harangue without
waiting for a reply. "I see 'a feller git hit


plum in th' head when my reg'ment was a-standin'
at ease onct. An' everybody yelled out to 'im:
HurtJohn? Are yeh hurt much? 'No ses he.
He looked kinder surprised, an' he went on tellin'
'em how he felt. He sed he didn't feel nothin'.
But, by dad, th' first thing that feller knowed he
was dead. Yes, he was dead--stone dead. So,
yeh wanta watch out. Yeh might have some
queer kind 'a hurt yerself. Yeh can't never tell.
Where is your'n located?


The youth had been wriggling since the intro-
duction of this topic. He now gave a cry of ex-
asperation and made a furious motion with his
hand. "Ohdon't bother me!" he said. He was
enraged against the tattered manand could have
strangled him. His companions seemed ever to
play intolerable parts. They were ever uprais-
ing the ghost of shame on the stick of their
curiosity. He turned toward the tattered man as
one at bay. "Nowdon't bother me he re-
peated with desperate menace.


WellLord knows I don't wanta bother any-
body said the other. There was a little accent
of despair in his voice as he replied, Lord
knows I 've gota 'nough m' own t' tend to."


The youthwho had been holding a bitter de-
bate with himself and casting glances of hatred
and contempt at the tattered manhere spoke in
a hard voice. "Good-by he said.


The tattered man looked at him in gaping
amazement. Why--whypardnerwhere yeh
goin'?" he asked unsteadily. The youth looking
at himcould see that hetoolike that other one
was beginning to act dumb and animal-like. His
thoughts seemed to be floundering about in his
head. "Now--now--look--a--hereyou Tom
Jamison--now--I won't have this--this here
won't do. Where--where yeh goin'?"


The youth pointed vaguely. "Over there
he replied.


Wellnow look--a--here--now said the
tattered man, rambling on in idiot fashion. His
head was hanging forward and his words were
slurred. This thing won't donowTom Jami-
son. It won't do. I know yehyeh pig-headed
devil. Yeh wanta go trompin' off with a bad
hurt. It ain't right--now--Tom Jamison--it ain't.
Yeh wanta leave me take keer of yehTom Jami-
son. It ain't--right--it ain't--fer yeh t' go--
trompin' off--with a bad hurt--it ain't--ain't--
ain't right--it ain't."


In reply the youth climbed a fence and
started away. He could hear the tattered man
bleating plaintively.


Once he faced about angrily. "What?"



Look--a--here, now, Tom Jamison--now--
it ain't--


The youth went on. Turning at a distance he
saw the tattered man wandering about helplessly
in the field.


He now thought that he wished he was dead.
He believed that he envied those men whose
bodies lay strewn over the grass of the fields and
on the fallen leaves of the forest.


The simple questions of the tattered man had
been knife thrusts to him. They asserted a
society that probes pitilessly at secrets until all is
apparent. His late companion's chance persist-
ency made him feel that he could not keep his
crime concealed in his bosom. It was sure to be
brought plain by one of those arrows which
cloud the air and are constantly prickingdis-
coveringproclaiming those things which are
willed to be forever hidden. He admitted that
he could not defend himself against this agency.
It was not within the power of vigilance.


CHAPTER XI.


HE became aware that the furnace roar of the
battle was growing louder. Great brown clouds
had floated to the still heights of air before him.
The noisetoowas approaching. The woods
filtered men and the fields became dotted.


As he rounded a hillockhe perceived that the
roadway was now a crying mass of wagons
teamsand men. From the heaving tangle issued
exhortationscommandsimprecations. Fear was
sweeping it all along. The cracking whips bit
and horses plunged and tugged. The white-
topped wagons strained and stumbled in their
exertions like fat sheep.


The youth felt comforted in a measure by this
sight. They were all retreating. Perhapsthen
he was not so bad after all. He seated himself
and watched the terror-stricken wagons. They
fled like softungainly animals. All the roarers
and lashers served to help him to magnify the
dangers and horrors of the engagement that he


might try to prove to himself that the thing with
which men could charge him was in truth a
symmetrical act. There was an amount of pleas-
ure to him in watching the wild march of this
vindication.


Presently the calm head of a forward-going
column of infantry appeared in the road. It
came swiftly on. Avoiding the obstructions gave



it the sinuous movement of a serpent. The men
at the head butted mules with their musket
stocks. They prodded teamsters indifferent to
all howls. The men forced their way through
parts of the dense mass by strength. The blunt
head of the column pushed. The raving teamsters
swore many strange oaths.

The commands to make way had the ring of a
great importance in them. The men were going
forward to the heart of the din. They were to
confront the eager rush of the enemy. They felt
the pride of their onward movement when the
remainder of the army seemed trying to dribble
down this road. They tumbled teams about
with a fine feeling that it was no matter so long
as their column got to the front in time. This
importance made their faces grave and stern.
And the backs of the officers were very rigid.

As the youth looked at them the black weight
of his woe returned to him. He felt that he was
regarding a procession of chosen beings. The
separation was as great to him as if they had
marched with weapons of flame and banners of
sunlight. He could never be like them. He
could have wept in his longings.

He searched about in his mind for an adequate
malediction for the indefinite causethe
thing upon which men turn the words of final
blame. It--whatever it was--was responsible for
himhe said. There lay the fault.

The haste of the column to reach the battle
seemed to the forlorn young man to be something
much finer than stout fighting. Heroeshe
thoughtcould find excuses in that long seething
lane. They could retire with perfect self-respect
and make excuses to the stars.

He wondered what those men had eaten that
they could be in such haste to force their way to
grim chances of death. As he watched his envy
grew until he thought that he wished to change
lives with one of them. He would have liked to
have used a tremendous forcehe saidthrow off
himself and become a better. Swift pictures of
himselfapartyet in himselfcame to him--a
blue desperate figure leading lurid charges with
one knee forward and a broken blade high--a
bluedetermined figure standing before a crimson
and steel assaultgetting calmly killed on a high
place before the eyes of all. He thought of the
magnificent pathos of his dead body.

These thoughts uplifted him. He felt the
quiver of war desire. In his earshe heard the
ring of victory. He knew the frenzy of a rapid
successful charge. The music of the trampling
feetthe sharp voicesthe clanking arms of the
column near him made him soar on the red wings
of war. For a few moments he was sublime.


He thought that he was about to start for the
front. Indeedhe saw a picture of himselfduststained
haggardpantingflying to the front at
the proper moment to seize and throttle the dark
leering witch of calamity.

Then the difficulties of the thing began to
drag at him. He hesitatedbalancing awkwardly
on one foot.

He had no rifle; he could not fight with his
handssaid he resentfully to his plan. Well
rifles could be had for the picking. They were
extraordinarily profuse.

Alsohe continuedit would be a miracle if he
found his regiment. Wellhe could fight with
any regiment.

He started forward slowly. He stepped as if
he expected to tread upon some explosive thing.
Doubts and he were struggling.

He would truly be a worm if any of his comrades
should see him returning thusthe marks of
his flight upon him. There was a reply that the
intent fighters did not care for what happened
rearward saving that no hostile bayonets appeared
there. In the battle-blur his face would
in a way be hiddenlike the face of a cowled
man.

But then he said that his tireless fate would
bring forthwhen the strife lulled for a moment
a man to ask of him an explanation. In imagination
he felt the scrutiny of his companions as he
painfully labored through some lies.

Eventuallyhis courage expended itself upon
these objections. The debates drained him of his
fire.

He was not cast down by this defeat of his
planforupon studying the affair carefullyhe
could not but admit that the objections were very
formidable.

Furthermorevarious ailments had begun to
cry out. In their presence he could not persist
in flying high with the wings of war; they
rendered it almost impossible for him to see himself
in a heroic light. He tumbled headlong.

He discovered that he had a scorching thirst.
His face was so dry and grimy that he thought
he could feel his skin crackle. Each bone of his
body had an ache in itand seemingly threatened
to break with each movement. His feet were
like two sores. Alsohis body was calling for
food. It was more powerful than a direct hunger.
There was a dullweight like feeling in his stomach
andwhen he tried to walkhis head swayed
and he tottered. He could not see with distinctness.
Small patches of green mist floated before


his vision.

While he had been tossed by many emotions
he had not been aware of ailments. Now they
beset him and made clamor. As he was at last
compelled to pay attention to themhis capacity
for self-hate was multiplied. In despairhe
declared that he was not like those others. He
now conceded it to be impossible that he should
ever become a hero. He was a craven loon.
Those pictures of glory were piteous things. He
groaned from his heart and went staggering off.

A certain mothlike quality within him kept
him in the vicinity of the battle. He had a great
desire to seeand to get news. He wished to
know who was winning.

He told himself thatdespite his unprecedented
sufferinghe had never lost his greed for a victory
yethe saidin a half-apologetic manner to his
consciencehe could not but know that a defeat
for the army this time might mean many favorable
things for him. The blows of the enemy
would splinter regiments into fragments. Thus
many men of couragehe consideredwould be
obliged to desert the colors and scurry like
chickens. He would appear as one of them.
They would be sullen brothers in distressand he
could then easily believe he had not run any
farther or faster than they. And if he himself
could believe in his virtuous perfectionhe conceived
that there would be small trouble in convincing
all others.

He saidas if in excuse for this hopethat
previously the army had encountered great
defeats and in a few months had shaken off all
blood and tradition of thememerging as bright
and valiant as a new one; thrusting out of sight
the memory of disasterand appearing with the
valor and confidence of unconquered legions.
The shrilling voices of the people at home would
pipe dismally for a timebut various generals
were usually compelled to listen to these ditties.
He of course felt no compunctions for proposing
a general as a sacrifice. He could not tell who
the chosen for the barbs might beso he could
center no direct sympathy upon him. The
people were afar and he did not conceive public
opinion to be accurate at long range. It was
quite probable they would hit the wrong man
whoafter he had recovered from his amazement
would perhaps spend the rest of his days in writing
replies to the songs of his alleged failure. It
would be very unfortunateno doubtbut in this
case a general was of no consequence to the
youth.

In a defeat there would be a roundabout
vindication of himself. He thought it would
provein a mannerthat he had fled early because
of his superior powers of perception. A serious
prophet upon predicting a flood should be the


first man to climb a tree. This would demonstrate
that he was indeed a seer.

A moral vindication was regarded by the
youth as a very important thing. Without salve
he could nothe thoughtwear the sore badge of
his dishonor through life. With his heart continually
assuring him that he was despicablehe
could not exist without making itthrough his
actionsapparent to all men.

If the army had gone gloriously on he would
be lost. If the din meant that now his army's
flags were tilted forward he was a condemned
wretch. He would be compelled to doom
himself to isolation. If the men were advancing
their indifferent feet were trampling upon his
chances for a successful life.

As these thoughts went rapidly through his
mindhe turned upon them and tried to thrust
them away. He denounced himself as a villain.
He said that he was the most unutterably selfish
man in existence. His mind pictured the soldiers
who would place their defiant bodies before the
spear of the yelling battle fiendand as he saw
their dripping corpses on an imagined fieldhe
said that he was their murderer.

Again he thought that he wished he was dead.
He believed that he envied a corpse. Thinking
of the slainhe achieved a great contempt for
some of themas if they were guilty for thus
becoming lifeless. They might have been killed
by lucky chanceshe saidbefore they had had
opportunities to flee or before they had been
really tested. Yet they would receive laurels
from tradition. He cried out bitterly that their
crowns were stolen and their robes of glorious
memories were shams. Howeverhe still
said that it was a great pity he was not as
they.

A defeat of the army had suggested itself to
him as a means of escape from the consequences
of his fall. He considerednowhoweverthat it
was useless to think of such a possibility. His
education had been that success for that mighty
blue machine was certain; that it would make
victories as a contrivance turns out buttons. He
presently discarded all his speculations in the
other direction. He returned to the creed of
soldiers.

When he perceived again that it was not
possible for the army to be defeatedhe tried
to bethink him of a fine tale which he could take
back to his regimentand with it turn the expected
shafts of derision.

Butas he mortally feared these shaftsit
became impossible for him to invent a tale he felt
he could trust. He experimented with many
schemesbut threw them aside one by one as


flimsy. He was quick to see vulnerable places in
them all.

Furthermorehe was much afraid that some
arrow of scorn might lay him mentally low before
he could raise his protecting tale.

He imagined the whole regiment saying:
Where's Henry Fleming? He run, didn't 'e?
Oh, my!He recalled various persons who
would be quite sure to leave him no peace
about it. They would doubtless question him
with sneersand laugh at his stammering hesitation.
In the next engagement they would
try to keep watch of him to discover when he
would run.

Wherever he went in camphe would encounter
insolent and lingeringly cruel stares. As
he imagined himself passing near a crowd of
comradeshe could hear some one sayThere
he goes!

Thenas if the heads were moved by one
muscleall the faces were turned toward him
with widederisive grins. He seemed to hear
some one make a humorous remark in a low tone.
At it the others all crowed and cackled. He was
a slang phrase.

CHAPTER XII.

THE column that had butted stoutly at the
obstacles in the roadway was barely out of the
youth's sight before he saw dark waves of men
come sweeping out of the woods and down
through the fields. He knew at once that the
steel fibers had been washed from their hearts.
They were bursting from their coats and
their equipments as from entanglements. They
charged down upon him like terrified buffaloes.

Behind them blue smoke curled and clouded
above the treetopsand through the thickets he
could sometimes see a distant pink glare. The
voices of the cannon were clamoring in interminable
chorus.

The youth was horrorstricken. He stared
in agony and amazement. He forgot that he
was engaged in combating the universe. He
threw aside his mental pamphlets on the philosophy
of the retreated and rules for the guidance
of the damned.

The fight was lost. The dragons were coming
with invincible strides. The armyhelpless
in the matted thickets and blinded by the over



hanging nightwas going to be swallowed. War
the red animalwarthe blood-swollen godwould
have bloated fill.

Within him something bade to cry out. He
had the impulse to make a rallying speechto sing
a battle hymnbut he could only get his tongue to
call into the air: "Why--why--what--what 's
th' matter?"

Soon he was in the midst of them. They
were leaping and scampering all about him.
Their blanched faces shone in the dusk. They
seemedfor the most partto be very burly men.
The youth turned from one to another of them as
they galloped along. His incoherent questions
were lost. They were heedless of his appeals.
They did not seem to see him.

They sometimes gabbled insanely. One huge
man was asking of the sky: "Saywhere de
plank road? Where de plank road!" It was as if
he had lost a child. He wept in his pain and
dismay.

Presentlymen were running hither and
thither in all ways. The artillery booming
forwardrearwardand on the flanks made
jumble of ideas of direction. Landmarks had
vanished into the gathered gloom. The youth
began to imagine that he had got into the
center of the tremendous quarreland he could
perceive no way out of it. From the mouths of
the fleeing men came a thousand wild questions
but no one made answers.

The youthafter rushing about and throwing
interrogations at the heedless bands of retreating
infantryfinally clutched a man by the arm. They
swung around face to face.

Why--why--stammered the youth struggling
with his balking tongue.

The man screamed: "Let go me! Let go
me!" His face was livid and his eyes were rolling
uncontrolled. He was heaving and panting.
He still grasped his rifleperhaps having forgotten
to release his hold upon it. He tugged
franticallyand the youth being compelled to lean
forward was dragged several paces.

Let go me! Let go me!

Why--why--stuttered the youth.

Well, then!bawled the man in a lurid
rage. He adroitly and fiercely swung his rifle.
It crushed upon the youth's head. The man
ran on.

The youth's fingers had turned to paste upon
the other's arm. The energy was smitten from
his muscles. He saw the flaming wings of light



ning flash before his vision. There was a deafening
rumble of thunder within his head.

Suddenly his legs seemed to die. He sank
writhing to the ground. He tried to arise. In
his efforts against the numbing pain he was like a
man wrestling with a creature of the air.

There was a sinister struggle.

Sometimes he would achieve a position half
erectbattle with the air for a momentand
then fall againgrabbing at the grass. His face
was of a clammy pallor. Deep groans were
wrenched from him.

At lastwith a twisting movementhe got
upon his hands and kneesand from thencelike a
babe trying to walkto his feet. Pressing his
hands to his temples he went lurching over the
grass.

He fought an intense battle with his body.
His dulled senses wished him to swoon and he
opposed them stubbornlyhis mind portraying
unknown dangers and mutilations if he should
fall upon the field. He went tall soldier fashion.
He imagined secluded spots where he could fall
and be unmolested. To search for one he strove
against the tide of his pain.

Once he put his hand to the top of his head
and timidly touched the wound. The scratching
pain of the contact made him draw a long breath
through his clinched teeth. His fingers were
dabbled with blood. He regarded them with a
fixed stare.

Around him he could hear the grumble of
jolted cannon as the scurrying horses were lashed
toward the front. Oncea young officer on a
besplashed charger nearly ran him down. He
turned and watched the mass of gunsmenand
horses sweeping in a wide curve toward a gap in
a fence. The officer was making excited motions
with a gauntleted hand. The guns followed the
teams with an air of unwillingnessof being
dragged by the heels.

Some officers of the scattered infantry were
cursing and railing like fishwives. Their scolding
voices could be heard above the din. Into
the unspeakable jumble in the roadway rode a
squadron of cavalry. The faded yellow of their
facings shone bravely. There was a mighty
altercation.

The artillery were assembling as if for a conference.


The blue haze of evening was upon the field.
The lines of forest were long purple shadows.
One cloud lay along the western sky partly
smothering the red.


As the youth left the scene behind himhe
heard the guns suddenly roar out. He imagined
them shaking in black rage. They belched and
howled like brass devils guarding a gate. The
soft air was filled with the tremendous remonstrance.
With it came the shattering peal of
opposing infantry. Turning to look behind him
he could see sheets of orange light illumine the
shadowy distance. There were subtle and sudden
lightnings in the far air. At times he thought he
could see heaving masses of men.

He hurried on in the dusk. The day had
faded until he could barely distinguish place for
his feet. The purple darkness was filled with
men who lectured and jabbered. Sometimes he
could see them gesticulating against the blue and
somber sky. There seemed to be a great ruck of
men and munitions spread about in the forest and
in the fields.

The little narrow roadway now lay lifeless.
There were overturned wagons like sun-dried
bowlders. The bed of the former torrent was
choked with the bodies of horses and splintered
parts of war machines.

It had come to pass that his wound pained him
but little. He was afraid to move rapidlyhowever
for a dread of disturbing it. He held his
head very still and took many precautions against
stumbling. He was filled with anxietyand his
face was pinched and drawn in anticipation of the
pain of any sudden mistake of his feet in the
gloom.

His thoughtsas he walkedfixed intently
upon his hurt. There was a coolliquid feeling
about it and he imagined blood moving slowly
down under his hair. His head seemed swollen
to a size that made him think his neck to be
inadequate.

The new silence of his wound made much
worriment. The little blistering voices of pain
that had called out from his scalp werehe
thoughtdefinite in their expression of danger.
By them he believed that he could measure his
plight. But when they remained ominously
silent he became frightened and imagined terrible
fingers that clutched into his brain.

Amid it he began to reflect upon various
incidents and conditions of the past. He bethought
him of certain meals his mother had
cooked at homein which those dishes of which
he was particularly fond had occupied prominent
positions. He saw the spread table. The pine
walls of the kitchen were glowing in the warm
light from the stove. Toohe remembered how
he and his companions used to go from the schoolhouse
to the bank of a shaded pool. He saw his
clothes in disorderly array upon the grass of the


bank. He felt the swash of the fragrant water
upon his body. The leaves of the overhanging
maple rustled with melody in the wind of youthful
summer.

He was overcome presently by a dragging
weariness. His head hung forward and his
shoulders were stooped as if he were bearing a
great bundle. His feet shuffled along the
ground.

He held continuous arguments as to whether
he should lie down and sleep at some near spot
or force himself on until he reached a certain
haven. He often tried to dismiss the question
but his body persisted in rebellion and his senses
nagged at him like pampered babies.

At last he heard a cheery voice near his
shoulder: "Yeh seem t' be in a pretty bad way
boy?"

The youth did not look upbut he assented
with thick tongue. "Uh!"

The owner of the cheery voice took him firmly
by the arm. "Well he said, with a round
laugh, I'm goin' your way. Th' hull gang is
goin' your way. An' I guess I kin give yeh a
lift." They began to walk like a drunken man
and his friend.

As they went alongthe man questioned the
youth and assisted him with the replies like one
manipulating the mind of a child. Sometimes he
interjected anecdotes. "What reg'ment do yeh
b'long teh? Eh? What's that? Th' 304th N'
York? Whywhat corps is that in? Ohit is?
WhyI thought they wasn't engaged t'-day-they
're 'way over in th' center. Ohthey was
eh? Wellpretty nearly everybody got their
share 'a fightin' t'-day. By dadI give myself up
fer dead any number 'a times. There was shootin'
here an' shootin' therean' hollerin' here an'
hollerin' therein th' damn' darknessuntil I
couldn't tell t' save m' soul which side I was on.
Sometimes I thought I was sure 'nough from
Ohieran' other times I could 'a swore I was
from th' bitter end of Florida. It was th' most
mixed up dern thing I ever see. An' these here
hull woods is a reg'lar mess. It'll be a miracle
if we find our reg'ments t'-night. Pretty soon
thoughwe 'll meet a-plenty of guards an' provostguards
an' one thing an' another. Ho! there they
go with an off'cerI guess. Look at his hand
a-draggin'. He 's got all th' war he wantsI bet.
He won't be talkin' so big about his reputation
an' all when they go t' sawin' off his leg. Poor
feller! My brother 's got whiskers jest like that.
How did yeh git 'way over hereanyhow? Your
reg'ment is a long way from hereain't it? Well
I guess we can find it. Yeh know there was a
boy killed in my comp'ny t'-day that I thought
th' world an' all of. Jack was a nice feller. By


gingerit hurt like thunder t' see ol' Jack jest git
knocked flat. We was a-standin' purty peaceable
fer a spell'though there was men runnin' ev'ry
way all 'round usan' while we was a-standin'
like that'long come a big fat feller. He began
t' peck at Jack's elbowan' he ses: 'Saywhere 's
th' road t' th' river?' An' Jackhe never paid no
attentionan' th' feller kept on a-peckin' at his
elbow an' sayin': 'Saywhere 's th' road t' th'
river?' Jack was a-lookin' ahead all th' time
tryin' t' see th' Johnnies comin' through th'
woodsan' he never paid no attention t' this big
fat feller fer a long timebut at last he turned
'round an' he ses: 'Ahgo t' hell an' find th'
road t' th' river!' An' jest then a shot slapped
him bang on th' side th' head. He was a sergeant
too. Them was his last words. ThunderI wish
we was sure 'a findin' our reg'ments t'-night. It 's
goin' t' be long huntin'. But I guess we kin
do it."

In the search which followedthe man of the
cheery voice seemed to the youth to possess a
wand of a magic kind. He threaded the mazes
of the tangled forest with a strange fortune. In
encounters with guards and patrols he displayed
the keenness of a detective and the valor of a
gamin. Obstacles fell before him and became of
assistance. The youthwith his chin still on his
breaststood woodenly by while his companion
beat ways and means out of sullen things.

The forest seemed a vast hive of men buzzing
about in frantic circlesbut the cheery man conducted
the youth without mistakesuntil at last
he began to chuckle with glee and self-satisfaction.
Ah, there yeh are! See that fire?

The youth nodded stupidly.

Well, there 's where your reg'ment is. An'
now, good-by, ol' boy, good luck t' yeh.

A warm and strong hand clasped the youth's
languid fingers for an instantand then he heard
a cheerful and audacious whistling as the man
strode away. As he who had so befriended him
was thus passing out of his lifeit suddenly occurred
to the youth that he had not once seen his
face.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE youth went slowly toward the fire indicated
by his departed friend. As he reeledhe
bethought him of the welcome his comrades
would give him. He had a conviction that he
would soon feel in his sore heart the barbed
missiles of ridicule. He had no strength to invent
a tale; he would be a soft target.


He made vague plans to go off into the deeper
darkness and hidebut they were all destroyed
by the voices of exhaustion and pain from his
body. His ailmentsclamoringforced him to
seek the place of food and restat whatever cost.

He swung unsteadily toward the fire. He
could see the forms of men throwing black
shadows in the red lightand as he went nearer
it became known to him in some way that the
ground was strewn with sleeping men.

Of a sudden he confronted a black and
monstrous figure. A rifle barrel caught some
glinting beams. "Halt! halt!" He was dis


129
mayed for a momentbut he presently thought
that he recognized the nervous voice. As he
stood tottering before the rifle barrelhe called
out: "WhyhelloWilsonyou--you here?"

The rifle was lowered to a position of caution
and the loud soldier came slowly forward. He
peered into the youth's face. "That you
Henry?"

Yes, it's--it's me.

Well, well, ol' boy,said the otherby
ginger, I'm glad t' see yeh! I give yeh up
fer a goner. I thought yeh was dead sure
enough.There was husky emotion in his
voice.

The youth found that now he could barely
stand upon his feet. There was a sudden sinking
of his forces. He thought he must hasten to produce
his tale to protect him from the missiles
already at the lips of his redoubtable comrades.
Sostaggering before the loud soldierhe began:
Yes, yes. I've--I've had an awful time. I've
been all over. Way over on th' right. Ter'ble
fightin' over there. I had an awful time. I got
separated from th' reg'ment. Over on th' right,
I got shot. In th' head. I never see sech
fightin'. Awful time. I don't see how I could 'a
got separated from th' reg'ment. I got shot,
too.
His friend had stepped forward quickly.
What? Got shot? Why didn't yeh say so
first? Poor ol' boy, we must--hol' on a minnit;
what am I doin'. I'll call Simpson.

Another figure at that moment loomed in the
gloom. They could see that it was the corporal.
Who yeh talkin' to, Wilson?he demanded.
His voice was anger-toned. "Who yeh talkin'
to? Yeh th' derndest sentinel--why--hello
Henryyou here? WhyI thought you was
dead four hours ago! Great Jerusalemthey
keep turnin' up every ten minutes or so! We
thought we'd lost forty-two men by straight


countbut if they keep on a-comin' this waywe'll
git th' comp'ny all back by mornin' yit. Where
was yeh?"

Over on th' right. I got separated--began
the youth with considerable glibness.

But his friend had interrupted hastily. "Yes
an' he got shot in th' head an' he's in a fixan' we
must see t' him right away." He rested his rifle
in the hollow of his left arm and his right around
the youth's shoulder.

Gee, it must hurt like thunder!he said.

The youth leaned heavily upon his friend.
Yes, it hurts--hurts a good deal,he replied.
There was a faltering in his voice.

Oh,said the corporal. He linked his arm
in the youth's and drew him forward. "Come
onHenry. I'll take keer 'a yeh."

As they went on together the loud private
called out after them: "Put 'im t' sleep in my
blanketSimpson. An'--hol' on a minnit--here's
my canteen. It's full 'a coffee. Look at his head
by th' fire an' see how it looks. Maybe it's a
pretty bad un. When I git relieved in a couple
'a minnitsI'll be over an' see t' him."

The youth's senses were so deadened that his
friend's voice sounded from afar and he could
scarcely feel the pressure of the corporal's arm.
He submitted passively to the latter's directing
strength. His head was in the old manner hanging
forward upon his breast. His knees wobbled.

The corporal led him into the glare of the
fire. "NowHenry he said, let's have look at
yer ol' head."

The youth sat down obediently and the corporal
laying aside his riflebegan to fumble in the
bushy hair of his comrade. He was obliged to
turn the other's head so that the full flush of the
fire light would beam upon it. He puckered his
mouth with a critical air. He drew back his lips
and whistled through his teeth when his fingers
came in contact with the splashed blood and the
rare wound.

Ah, here we are!he said. He awkwardly
made further investigations. "Jest as I thought
he added, presently. Yeh've been grazed by a
ball. It's raised a queer lump jest as if some
feller had lammed yeh on th' head with a club.
It stopped a-bleedin' long time ago. Th' most
about it is that in th' mornin' yeh'll feel that a
number ten hat wouldn't fit yeh. An' your
head'll be all het up an' feel as dry as burnt pork.
An' yeh may git a lot 'a other sicknessestooby
mornin'. Yeh can't never tell. StillI don't
much think so. It's jest a damn' good belt on th'


headan' nothin' more. Nowyou jest sit here
an' don't movewhile I go rout out th' relief.
Then I'll send Wilson t' take keer 'a yeh."

The corporal went away. The youth remained
on the ground like a parcel. He stared
with a vacant look into the fire.

After a time he arousedfor some partand
the things about him began to take form. He
saw that the ground in the deep shadows was
cluttered with mensprawling in every conceivable
posture. Glancing narrowly into the
more distant darknesshe caught occasional
glimpses of visages that loomed pallid and
ghostlylit with a phosphorescent glow. These
faces expressed in their lines the deep stupor of
the tired soldiers. They made them appear like
men drunk with wine. This bit of forest might
have appeared to an ethereal wanderer as a scene
of the result of some frightful debauch.

On the other side of the fire the youth
observed an officer asleepseated bolt upright
with his back against a tree. There was something
perilous in his position. Badgered by
dreamsperhapshe swayed with little bounces
and startslike an old toddy-stricken grandfather
in a chimney corner. Dust and stains were upon
his face. His lower jaw hung down as if lacking
strength to assume its normal position. He was
the picture of an exhausted soldier after a feast of
war.

He had evidently gone to sleep with his
sword in his arms. These two had slumbered in
an embracebut the weapon had been allowed
in time to fall unheeded to the ground. The
brass-mounted hilt lay in contact with some parts
of the fire.

Within the gleam of rose and orange light
from the burning sticks were other soldiers
snoring and heavingor lying deathlike in
slumber. A few pairs of legs were stuck forth
rigid and straight. The shoes displayed the mud
or dust of marches and bits of rounded trousers
protruding from the blanketsshowed rents and
tears from hurried pitchings through the dense
brambles.

The fire crackled musically. From it swelled
light smoke. Overhead the foliage moved
softly. The leaveswith their faces turned
toward the blazewere colored shifting hues of
silveroften edged with red. Far off to the right
through a window in the forest could be seen a
handful of stars lyinglike glittering pebbleson
the black level of the night.

Occasionallyin this low-arched halla soldier
would arouse and turn his body to a new position
the experience of his sleep having taught
him of uneven and objectionable places upon the


ground under him. Orperhapshe would lift
himself to a sitting postureblink at the fire for
an unintelligent momentthrow a swift glance at
his prostrate companionand then cuddle down
again with a grunt of sleepy content.

The youth sat in a forlorn heap until his
friend the loud young soldier cameswinging two
canteens by their light strings. "Wellnow
Henryol' boy said the latter, we'll have yeh
fixed up in jest about a minnit."

He had the bustling ways of an amateur
nurse. He fussed around the fire and stirred the
sticks to brilliant exertions. He made his patient
drink largely from the canteen that contained the
coffee. It was to the youth a delicious draught.
He tilted his head afar back and held the canteen
long to his lips. The cool mixture went caressingly
down his blistered throat. Having finished
he sighed with comfortable delight.

The loud young soldier watched his comrade
with an air of satisfaction. He later produced
an extensive handkerchief from his pocket. He
folded it into a manner of bandage and soused
water from the other canteen upon the middle of
it. This crude arrangement he bound over the
youth's headtying the ends in a queer knot at
the back of the neck.

There,he saidmoving off and surveying
his deedyeh look like th' devil, but I bet yeh
feel better.

The youth contemplated his friend with grateful
eyes. Upon his aching and swelling head the
cold cloth was like a tender woman's hand.

Yeh don't holler ner say nothin',remarked
his friend approvingly. "I know I'm a blacksmith
at takin' keer 'a sick folksan' yeh never
squeaked. Yer a good unHenry. Most 'a men
would a' been in th' hospital long ago. A shot in
th' head ain't foolin' business."

The youth made no replybut began to fumble
with the buttons of his jacket.

Well, come, now,continued his friend
come on. I must put yeh t' bed an' see that yeh
git a good night's rest.

The other got carefully erectand the loud
young soldier led him among the sleeping forms
lying in groups and rows. Presently he stooped
and picked up his blankets. He spread the rubber
one upon the ground and placed the woolen one
about the youth's shoulders.

There now,he saidlie down an' git some
sleep.

The youthwith his manner of doglike obe



diencegot carefully down like a crone stooping.
He stretched out with a murmur of relief
and comfort. The ground felt like the softest
couch.

But of a sudden he ejaculated: "Hol' on a
minnit! Where you goin' t' sleep?"

His friend waved his hand impatiently.
Right down there by yeh.

Well, but hol' on a minnit,continued the
youth. "What yeh goin' t' sleep in? I've got
your--"

The loud young soldier snarled: "Shet up
an' go on t' sleep. Don't be makin' a damn' fool
'a yerself he said severely.

After the reproof the youth said no more.
An exquisite drowsiness had spread through him.
The warm comfort of the blanket enveloped him
and made a gentle languor. His head fell forward
on his crooked arm and his weighted lids
went softly down over his eyes. Hearing a
splatter of musketry from the distance, he
wondered indifferently if those men sometimes
slept. He gave a long sigh, snuggled down into
his blanket, and in a moment was like his comrades.


CHAPTER XIV.

WHEN the youth awoke it seemed to him that
he had been asleep for a thousand years, and he
felt sure that he opened his eyes upon an unexpected
world. Gray mists were slowly shifting
before the first efforts of the sun rays. An impending
splendor could be seen in the eastern
sky. An icy dew had chilled his face, and immediately
upon arousing he curled farther down
into his blanket. He stared for a while at the
leaves overhead, moving in a heraldic wind of
the day.

The distance was splintering and blaring with
the noise of fighting. There was in the sound
an expression of a deadly persistency, as if it had
not begun and was not to cease.

About him were the rows and groups of men
that he had dimly seen the previous night. They
were getting a last draught of sleep before the
awakening. The gaunt, careworn features and
dusty figures were made plain by this quaint

light at the dawning, but it dressed the skin of
the men in corpselike hues and made the tangled
limbs appear pulseless and dead. The youth


started up with a little cry when his eyes first
swept over this motionless mass of men, thickspread
upon the ground, pallid, and in strange
postures. His disordered mind interpreted the
hall of the forest as a charnel place. He believed
for an instant that he was in the house of the
dead, and he did not dare to move lest these
corpses start up, squalling and squawking. In a
second, however, he achieved his proper mind.
He swore a complicated oath at himself. He
saw that this somber picture was not a fact of
the present, but a mere prophecy.

He heard then the noise of a fire crackling
briskly in the cold air, and, turning his head, he
saw his friend pottering busily about a small
blaze. A few other figures moved in the fog, and
he heard the hard cracking of axe blows.

Suddenly there was a hollow rumble of
drums. A distant bugle sang faintly. Similar
sounds, varying in strength, came from near and
far over the forest. The bugles called to each
other like brazen gamecocks. The near thunder
of the regimental drums rolled.

The body of men in the woods rustled. There
was a general uplifting of heads. A murmuring
of voices broke upon the air. In it there was
much bass of grumbling oaths. Strange gods
were addressed in condemnation of the early
hours necessary to correct war. An officer's
peremptory tenor rang out and quickened the
stiffened movement of the men. The tangled
limbs unraveled. The corpse-hued faces were
hidden behind fists that twisted slowly in the eye
sockets.

The youth sat up and gave vent to an enormous
yawn. Thunder!" he remarked petulantly.
He rubbed his eyesand then putting up his hand
felt carefully of the bandage over his wound.
His friendperceiving him to be awakecame
from the fire. "WellHenryol' manhow do
yeh feel this mornin'?" he demanded.

The youth yawned again. Then he puckered
his mouth to a little pucker. His headin truth
felt precisely like a melonand there was an unpleasant
sensation at his stomach.

Oh, Lord, I feel pretty bad,he said.

Thunder!exclaimed the other. "I hoped
ye'd feel all right this mornin'. Let's see th'
bandage--I guess it's slipped." He began to
tinker at the wound in rather a clumsy way until
the youth exploded.

Gosh-dern it!he said in sharp irritation;
you're the hangdest man I ever saw! You
wear muffs on your hands. Why in good
thunderation can't you be more easy? I'd rather
you'd stand off an' throw guns at it. Now, go


slow, an' don't act as if you was nailing down
carpet.

He glared with insolent command at his
friendbut the latter answered soothingly.
Well, well, come now, an' git some grub,he
said. "Thenmaybeyeh'll feel better."

At the fireside the loud young soldier
watched over his comrade's wants with tenderness
and care. He was very busy marshaling
the little black vagabonds of tin cups and pouring
into them the streamingiron colored mixture
from a small and sooty tin pail. He had some
fresh meatwhich he roasted hurriedly upon a
stick. He sat down then and contemplated the
youth's appetite with glee.

The youth took note of a remarkable change
in his comrade since those days of camp life upon
the river bank. He seemed no more to be continually
regarding the proportions of his personal
prowess. He was not furious at small words that
pricked his conceits. He was no more a loud
young soldier. There was about him now a
fine reliance. He showed a quiet belief in
his purposes and his abilities. And this inward
confidence evidently enabled him to be
indifferent to little words of other men aimed
at him.

The youth reflected. He had been used to
regarding his comrade as a blatant child with an
audacity grown from his inexperiencethoughtless
headstrongjealousand filled with a tinsel
courage. A swaggering babe accustomed to strut
in his own dooryard. The youth wondered
where had been born these new eyes; when his
comrade had made the great discovery that
there were many men who would refuse to be
subjected by him. Apparentlythe other had
now climbed a peak of wisdom from which he
could perceive himself as a very wee thing. And
the youth saw that ever after it would be easier
to live in his friend's neighborhood.

His comrade balanced his ebony coffee-cup on
his knee. "WellHenry he said, what d'yeh
think th' chances are? D'yeh think we'll wallop
'em?"

The youth considered for a moment. "Dayb'fore-
yesterday he finally replied, with boldness,
you would 'a' bet you'd lick the hull kit-an'boodle
all by yourself."

His friend looked a trifle amazed. "Would
I?" he asked. He pondered. "Wellperhaps I
would he decided at last. He stared humbly at
the fire.

The youth was quite disconcerted at this surprising
reception of his remarks. Ohnoyou
wouldn't either he said, hastily trying to re



trace.


But the other made a deprecating gesture.
Ohyeh needn't mindHenry he said. I be-
lieve I was a pretty big fool in those days." He
spoke as after a lapse of years.


There was a little pause.


All th' officers say we've got th' rebs in
a pretty tight box,said the friendclearing
his throat in a commonplace way. "They all
seem t' think we've got 'em jest where we
want 'em."


I don't know about that,the youth replied.
What I seen over on th' right makes me think
it was th' other way about. From where I was,
it looked as if we was gettin' a good poundin'
yestirday.


D'yeh think so?inquired the friend. "I
thought we handled 'em pretty rough yestir-
day."


Not a bit,said the youth. "Whylord
manyou didn't see nothing of the fight. Why!"
Then a sudden thought came to him. "Oh!
Jim Conklin's dead."


His friend started. "What? Is he? Jim
Conklin?"


The youth spoke slowly. "Yes. He's dead.
Shot in th' side."


Yeh don't say so. Jim Conklin. . . . poor
cuss!


All about them were other small fires sur-
rounded by men with their little black utensils.
From one of these near came sudden sharp
voices in a row. It appeared that two light-
footed soldiers had been teasing a hugebearded
mancausing him to spill coffee upon his blue
knees. The man had gone into a rage and had
sworn comprehensively. Stung by his language
his tormentors had immediately bristled at him
with a great show of resenting unjust oaths.
Possibly there was going to be a fight.


The friend arose and went over to themmak-
ing pacific motions with his arms. "Ohhere
nowboyswhat's th' use?" he said. "We'll
be at th' rebs in less'n an hour. What's th'
good fightin' 'mong ourselves?"


One of the light-footed soldiers turned upon
him red-faced and violent. "Yeh needn't come
around here with yer preachin'. I s'pose yeh
don't approve 'a fightin' since Charley Morgan
licked yeh; but I don't see what business this
here is 'a yours or anybody else."



Well, it ain't,said the friend mildly. "Still
I hate t' see--"

There was a tangled argument.

Well, he--,said the twoindicating their
opponent with accusative forefingers.

The huge soldier was quite purple with rage.
He pointed at the two soldiers with his great
handextended clawlike. "Wellthey--"

But during this argumentative time the de-
sire to deal blows seemed to passalthough they
said much to each other. Finally the friend returned
to his old seat. In a short while the
three antagonists could be seen together in an
amiable bunch.

Jimmie Rogers ses I'll have t' fight him
after th' battle t'-day,announced the friend as
he again seated himself. "He ses he don't
allow no interferin' in his business. I hate t' see
th' boys fightin' 'mong themselves."

The youth laughed. "Yer changed a good
bit. Yeh ain't at all like yeh was. I remember
when you an' that Irish feller--" He stopped
and laughed again.

No, I didn't use t' be that way,said his
friend thoughtfully. "That's true 'nough."

Well, I didn't mean--began the youth.

The friend made another deprecatory gesture.
Oh, yeh needn't mind, Henry.

There was another little pause.

Th' reg'ment lost over half th' men yestirday,
remarked the friend eventually. "I thought
a course they was all deadbutlawsthey kep'
a-comin' back last night until it seemsafter all
we didn't lose but a few. They'd been scattered
all overwanderin' around in th' woodsfightin'
with other reg'mentsan' everything. Jest like
you done."

So?said the youth.

CHAPTER XV.

THE regiment was standing at order arms at
the side of a lanewaiting for the command to
marchwhen suddenly the youth remembered
the little packet enwrapped in a faded yellow
envelope which the loud young soldier with lugubrious
words had intrusted to him. It made him
start. He uttered an exclamation and turned


toward his comrade.

Wilson!

What?

His friendat his side in the rankswas thoughtfully
staring down the road. From some cause
his expression was at that moment very meek.
The youthregarding him with sidelong glances
felt impelled to change his purpose. "Ohnothing
he said.

His friend turned his head in some surprise,
Whywhat was yeh goin' t' say?"

Oh, nothing,repeated the youth.

He resolved not to deal the little blow. It

148
was sufficient that the fact made him glad. It
was not necessary to knock his friend on the head
with the misguided packet.

He had been possessed of much fear of his
friendfor he saw how easily questionings could
make holes in his feelings. Latelyhe had assured
himself that the altered comrade would not
tantalize him with a persistent curiositybut he
felt certain that during the first period of leisure
his friend would ask him to relate his adventures
of the previous day.

He now rejoiced in the possession of a small
weapon with which he could prostrate his com-
rade at the first signs of a cross-examination. He
was master. It would now be he who could
laugh and shoot the shafts of derision.

The friend hadin a weak hourspoken with
sobs of his own death. He had delivered a melancholy
oration previous to his funeraland had
doubtless in the packet of letterspresented various
keepsakes to relatives. But he had not died
and thus he had delivered himself into the hands
of the youth.

The latter felt immensely superior to his
friendbut he inclined to condescension. He
adopted toward him an air of patronizing good
humor.

His self-pride was now entirely restored. In
the shade of its flourishing growth he stood with
braced and self-confident legsand since nothing
could now be discovered he did not shrink from
an encounter with the eyes of judgesand allowed
no thoughts of his own to keep him from an
attitude of manfulness. He had performed his
mistakes in the darkso he was still a man.

Indeedwhen he remembered his fortunes of
yesterdayand looked at them from a distance he


began to see something fine there. He had
license to be pompous and veteranlike.

His panting agonies of the past he put out of
his sight.

In the presenthe declared to himself that it
was only the doomed and the damned who roared
with sincerity at circumstance. Few but they
ever did it. A man with a full stomach and the
respect of his fellows had no business to scold
about anything that he might think to be wrong
in the ways of the universeor even with the
ways of society. Let the unfortunates rail; the
others may play marbles.

He did not give a great deal of thought to
these battles that lay directly before him. It was
not essential that he should plan his ways in
regard to them. He had been taught that many
obligations of a life were easily avoided. The
lessons of yesterday had been that retribution
was a laggard and blind. With these facts before
him he did not deem it necessary that he should
become feverish over the possibilities of the
ensuing twenty-four hours. He could leave
much to chance. Besidesa faith in himself had
secretly blossomed. There was a little flower of
confidence growing within him. He was now a
man of experience. He had been out among the
dragonshe saidand he assured himself that they
were not so hideous as he had imagined them.
Alsothey were inaccurate; they did not sting
with precision. A stout heart often defiedand
defyingescaped.

Andfurthermorehow could they kill him
who was the chosen of gods and doomed to
greatness?

He remembered how some of the men had
run from the battle. As he recalled their terrorstruck
faces he felt a scorn for them. They had
surely been more fleet and more wild than was
absolutely necessary. They were weak mortals.
As for himselfhe had fled with discretion and
dignity.

He was aroused from this reverie by his
friendwhohaving hitched about nervously and
blinked at the trees for a timesuddenly coughed
in an introductory wayand spoke.

Fleming!

What?

The friend put his hand up to his mouth and
coughed again. He fidgeted in his jacket.

Well,he gulpedat lastI guess yeh might
as well give me back them letters.Darkprickling
blood had flushed into his cheeks and brow.


All right, Wilson,said the youth. He
loosened two buttons of his coatthrust in his
handand brought forth the packet. As he extended
it to his friend the latter's face was turned
from him.

He had been slow in the act of producing the
packet because during it he had been trying to
invent a remarkable comment upon the affair.
He could conjure nothing of sufficient point. He
was compelled to allow his friend to escape
unmolested with his packet. And for this he
took unto himself considerable credit. It was a
generous thing.

His friend at his side seemed suffering great
shame. As he contemplated himthe youth felt
his heart grow more strong and stout. He had
never been compelled to blush in such manner
for his acts; he was an individual of extraordinary
virtues.

He reflectedwith condescending pity: "Too
bad! Too bad! The poor devilit makes him
feel tough!"

After this incidentand as he reviewed the
battle pictures he had seenhe felt quite competent
to return home and make the hearts of
the people glow with stories of war. He could
see himself in a room of warm tints telling tales
to listeners. He could exhibit laurels. They
were insignificant; stillin a district where
laurels were infrequentthey might shine.

He saw his gaping audience picturing him as
the central figure in blazing scenes. And he
imagined the consternation and the ejaculations
of his mother and the young lady at the seminary
as they drank his recitals. Their vague feminine
formula for beloved ones doing brave deeds on
the field of battle without risk of life would be
destroyed.

CHAPTER XVI.

A SPUTTERING of musketry was always to be
heard. Laterthe cannon had entered the dispute.
In the fog-filled air their voices made a
thudding sound. The reverberations were continued.
This part of the world led a strange
battleful existence.

The youth's regiment was marched to relieve
a command that had lain long in some damp
trenches. The men took positions behind a curving
line of rifle pits that had been turned uplike
a large furrowalong the line of woods. Before
them was a level stretchpeopled with short
deformed stumps. From the woods beyond


came the dull popping of the skirmishers and
picketsfiring in the fog. From the right came
the noise of a terrific fracas.

The men cuddled behind the small embankment
and sat in easy attitudes awaiting their
turn. Many had their backs to the firing. The
youth's friend lay downburied his face in his

armsand almost instantlyit seemedhe was in a
deep sleep.

The youth leaned his breast against the
brown dirt and peered over at the woods and up
and down the line. Curtains of trees interfered
with his ways of vision. He could see the low
line of trenches but for a short distance. A few
idle flags were perched on the dirt hills. Behind
them were rows of dark bodies with a few heads
sticking curiously over the top.

Always the noise of skirmishers came from
the woods on the front and leftand the din on
the right had grown to frightful proportions.
The guns were roaring without an instant's pause
for breath. It seemed that the cannon had come
from all parts and were engaged in a stupendous
wrangle. It became impossible to make a sentence
heard.

The youth wished to launch a joke--a quotation
from newspapers. He desired to sayAll
quiet on the Rappahannock,but the guns refused
to permit even a comment upon their uproar.
He never successfully concluded the sentence.
But at last the guns stoppedand among the
men in the rifle pits rumors again flewlike birds
but they were now for the most part black
creatures who flapped their wings drearily near
to the ground and refused to rise on any wings of
hope. The men's faces grew doleful from the
interpreting of omens. Tales of hesitation and
uncertainty on the part of those high in place and
responsibility came to their ears. Stories of
disaster were borne into their minds with many
proofs. This din of musketry on the rightgrowing
like a released genie of soundexpressed and
emphasized the army's plight.

The men were disheartened and began to
mutter. They made gestures expressive of the
sentence: "Ahwhat more can we do?" And it
could always be seen that they were bewildered
by the alleged news and could not fully comprehend
a defeat.

Before the gray mists had been totally obliterated
by the sun raysthe regiment was marching
in a spread column that was retiring carefully
through the woods. The disorderedhurrying
lines of the enemy could sometimes be seen down
through the groves and little fields. They were
yellingshrill and exultant.


At this sight the youth forgot many personal
matters and became greatly enraged. He exploded
in loud sentences. "B'jimineywe're
generaled by a lot 'a lunkheads."

More than one feller has said that t'-day,
observed a man.

His friendrecently arousedwas still very
drowsy. He looked behind him until his mind
took in the meaning of the movement. Then he
sighed. "OhwellI s'pose we got licked he
remarked sadly.

The youth had a thought that it would not be
handsome for him to freely condemn other men.
He made an attempt to restrain himself, but the
words upon his tongue were too bitter. He
presently began a long and intricate denunciation
of the commander of the forces.

Mebbeit wa'n't all his fault--not all together.
He did th' best he knowed. It's our
luck t' git licked often said his friend in a weary
tone. He was trudging along with stooped
shoulders and shifting eyes like a man who has
been caned and kicked.

Welldon't we fight like the devil? Don't
we do all that men can?" demanded the youth
loudly.

He was secretly dumfounded at this sentiment
when it came from his lips. For a moment his
face lost its valor and he looked guiltily about
him. But no one questioned his right to deal in
such wordsand presently he recovered his air
of courage. He went on to repeat a statement
he had heard going from group to group at the
camp that morning. "The brigadier said he
never saw a new reg'ment fight the way we
fought yestirdaydidn't he? And we didn't do
better than many another reg'mentdid we?
Wellthenyou can't say it's th' army's faultcan
you?"

In his replythe friend's voice was stern. "'A
course not he said. No man dare say we
don't fight like th' devil. No man will ever dare
say it. Th' boys fight like hell-roosters. But
still--stillwe don't have no luck."

Well, then, if we fight like the devil an'
don't ever whip, it must be the general's fault,
said the youth grandly and decisively. "And I
don't see any sense in fighting and fighting and
fightingyet always losing through some derned
old lunkhead of a general."

A sarcastic man who was tramping at the
youth's sidethen spoke lazily. "Mebbe yeh
think yeh fit th' hull battle yestirdayFleming
he remarked.


The speech pierced the youth. Inwardly he
was reduced to an abject pulp by these chance
words. His legs quaked privately. He cast a
frightened glance at the sarcastic man.

Whyno he hastened to say in a conciliating
voice, I don't think I fought the whole
battle yesterday."

But the other seemed innocent of any deeper
meaning. Apparentlyhe had no information.
It was merely his habit. "Oh!" he replied in the
same tone of calm derision.

The youthneverthelessfelt a threat. His
mind shrank from going near to the dangerand
thereafter he was silent. The significance of the
sarcastic man's words took from him all loud
moods that would make him appear prominent.
He became suddenly a modest person.

There was low-toned talk among the troops.
The officers were impatient and snappytheir
countenances clouded with the tales of misfortune.
The troopssifting through the forest
were sullen. In the youth's company once a
man's laugh rang out. A dozen soldiers turned
their faces quickly toward him and frowned with
vague displeasure.

The noise of firing dogged their footsteps.
Sometimesit seemed to be driven a little way
but it always returned again with increased
insolence. The men muttered and cursed
throwing black looks in its direction.

In a clear space the troops were at last halted.
Regiments and brigadesbroken and detached
through their encounters with thicketsgrew
together again and lines were faced toward the
pursuing bark of the enemy's infantry.

This noisefollowing like the yellings of eager
metallic houndsincreased to a loud and joyous
burstand thenas the sun went serenely up the
skythrowing illuminating rays into the gloomy
thicketsit broke forth into prolonged pealings.
The woods began to crackle as if afire.

Whoop-a-dadee,said a manhere we are!
Everybody fightin'. Blood an' destruction.

I was willin' t' bet they'd attack as soon as
th' sun got fairly up,savagely asserted the
lieutenant who commanded the youth's company.
He jerked without mercy at his little mustache.
He strode to and fro with dark dignity in the
rear of his menwho were lying down behind
whatever protection they had collected.

A battery had trundled into position in the
rear and was thoughtfully shelling the distance.
The regimentunmolested as yetawaited the


moment when the gray shadows of the woods
before them should be slashed by the lines of
flame. There was much growling and swearing.

Good Gawd,the youth grumbledwe're
always being chased around like rats! It makes
me sick. Nobody seems to know where we go
or why we go. We just get fired around from
pillar to post and get licked here and get licked
there, and nobody knows what it's done for. It
makes a man feel like a damn' kitten in a bag.
Now, I'd like to know what the eternal thunders
we was marched into these woods for anyhow,

THE RED BADGE OF COURAGE 161

unless it was to give the rebs a regular pot shot
at us. We came in here and got our legs all
tangled up in these cussed briers, and then we
begin to fight and the rebs had an easy time of it.
Don't tell me it's just luck! I know better. It's
this derned old--

The friend seemed jadedbut he interrupted
his comrade with a voice of calm confidence.
It'll turn out all right in th' end,he said.

Oh, the devil it will! You always talk like a
dog-hanged parson. Don't tell me! I know--

At this time there was an interposition by the
savage-minded lieutenantwho was obliged to
vent some of his inward dissatisfaction upon his
men. "You boys shut right up! There no
need 'a your wastin' your breath in long-winded
arguments about this an' that an' th' other.
You've been jawin' like a lot 'a old hens. All
you've got t' do is to fightan' you'll get plenty 'a
that t' do in about ten minutes. Less talkin' an'
more fightin' is what's best for you boys. I never
saw sech gabbling jackasses."

He pausedready to pounce upon any man
who might have the temerity to reply. No words
being saidhe resumed his dignified pacing.

There's too much chin music an' too little
fightin' in this war, anyhow,he said to them
turning his head for a final remark.

The day had grown more whiteuntil the sun
shed his full radiance upon the thronged forest.
A sort of a gust of battle came sweeping toward
that part of the line where lay the youth's regiment.
The front shifted a trifle to meet it squarely.
There was a wait. In this part of the field
there passed slowly the intense moments that precede
the tempest.

A single rifle flashed in a thicket before the
regiment. In an instant it was joined by many
others. There was a mighty song of clashes and
crashes that went sweeping through the woods.


The guns in the reararoused and enraged by
shells that had been thrown burlike at them
suddenly involved themselves in a hideous altercation
with another band of guns. The battle
roar settled to a rolling thunderwhich was a
singlelong explosion.

In the regiment there was a peculiar kind of
hesitation denoted in the attitudes of the men.
They were wornexhaustedhaving slept but little
and labored much. They rolled their eyes
toward the advancing battle as they stood awaiting
the shock. Some shrank and flinched. They
stood as men tied to stakes.

CHAPTER XVII.

THIS advance of the enemy had seemed to the
youth like a ruthless hunting. He began to fume
with rage and exasperation. He beat his foot
upon the groundand scowled with hate at the
swirling smoke that was approaching like a phantom
flood. There was a maddening quality in
this seeming resolution of the foe to give him no
restto give him no time to sit down and think.
Yesterday he had fought and had fled rapidly.
There had been many adventures. For to-day he
felt that he had earned opportunities for contemplative
repose. He could have enjoyed portraying
to uninitiated listeners various scenes at which he
had been a witness or ably discussing the processes
of war with other proved men. Too it was
important that he should have time for physical
recuperation. He was sore and stiff from his experiences.
He had received his fill of all exertions
and he wished to rest.

But those other men seemed never to grow
weary; they were fighting with their old speed.

163
He had a wild hate for the relentless foe. Yesterday
when he had imagined the universe to be
against himhe had hated itlittle gods and big
gods; to-day he hated the army of the foe with
the same great hatred. He was not going to be
badgered of his lifelike a kitten chased by boys
he said. It was not well to drive men into final
corners; at those moments they could all develop
teeth and claws.

He leaned and spoke into his friend's ear. He
menaced the woods with a gesture. "If they
keep on chasing usby Gawdthey'd better watch
out. Can't stand TOO much."

The friend twisted his head and made a calm
reply. "If they keep on a-chasin' us they'll drive
us all inteh th' river."


The youth cried out savagely at this statement.
He crouched behind a little treewith his
eyes burning hatefully and his teeth set in a curlike
snarl. The awkward bandage was still about
his headand upon itover his woundthere was
a spot of dry blood. His hair was wondrously
tousledand some stragglingmoving locks hung
over the cloth of the bandage down toward his
forehead. His jacket and shirt were open at the
throatand exposed his young bronzed neck.
There could be seen spasmodic gulpings at his
throat.

His fingers twined nervously about his rifle.
He wished that it was an engine of annihilating
power. He felt that he and his companions were
being taunted and derided from sincere convictions
that they were poor and puny. His knowledge
of his inability to take vengeance for it made
his rage into a dark and stormy specterthat possessed
him and made him dream of abominable
cruelties. The tormentors were flies sucking insolently
at his bloodand he thought that he would
have given his life for a revenge of seeing their
faces in pitiful plights.

The winds of battle had swept all about the
regimentuntil the one rifleinstantly followed by
othersflashed in its front. A moment later the
regiment roared forth its sudden and valiant retort.
A dense wall of smoke settled slowly down.
It was furiously slit and slashed by the knifelike
fire from the rifles.

To the youth the fighters resembled animals
tossed for a death struggle into a dark pit. There
was a sensation that he and his fellowsat bay
were pushing backalways pushing fierce onslaughts
of creatures who were slippery. Their
beams of crimson seemed to get no purchase upon
the bodies of their foes; the latter seemed to evade
them with easeand come throughbetween
aroundand about with unopposed skill.

Whenin a dreamit occurred to the youth
that his rifle was an impotent stickhe lost sense
of everything but his hatehis desire to smash
into pulp the glittering smile of victory which he
could feel upon the faces of his enemies.

The blue smoke-swallowed line curled and
writhed like a snake stepped upon. It swung its
ends to and fro in an agony of fear and rage.

The youth was not conscious that he was erect
upon his feet. He did not know the direction of
the ground. Indeedonce he even lost the habit
of balance and fell heavily. He was up again
immediately. One thought went through the
chaos of his brain at the time. He wondered if
he had fallen because he had been shot. But the
suspicion flew away at once. He did not think
more of it.


He had taken up a first position behind the little
treewith a direct determination to hold it
against the world. He had not deemed it possible
that his army could that day succeedand
from this he felt the ability to fight harder. But
the throng had surged in all waysuntil he lost
directions and locationssave that he knew where
lay the enemy.

The flames bit himand the hot smoke broiled
his skin. His rifle barrel grew so hot that ordinarily
he could not have borne it upon his palms;
but he kept on stuffing cartridges into itand
pounding them with his clankingbending ramrod.
If he aimed at some changing form through
the smokehe pulled his trigger with a fierce
gruntas if he were dealing a blow of the fist with
all his strength.

When the enemy seemed falling back before
him and his fellowshe went instantly forward
like a dog whoseeing his foes laggingturns and
insists upon being pursued. And when he was
compelled to retire againhe did it slowlysullenly
taking steps of wrathful despair.

Once hein his intent hatewas almost alone
and was firingwhen all those near him had ceased.
He was so engrossed in his occupation that he
was not aware of a lull.

He was recalled by a hoarse laugh and a sentence
that came to his ears in a voice of contempt
and amazement. "Yeh infernal fooldon't yeh
know enough t' quit when there ain't anything t'
shoot at? Good Gawd!"

He turned then andpausing with his rifle
thrown half into positionlooked at the blue line
of his comrades. During this moment of leisure
they seemed all to be engaged in staring with
astonishment at him. They had become spectators.
Turning to the front again he sawunder
the lifted smokea deserted ground.

He looked bewildered for a moment. Then
there appeared upon the glazed vacancy of his
eyes a diamond point of intelligence. "Oh he
said, comprehending.

He returned to his comrades and threw himself
upon the ground. He sprawled like a man
who had been thrashed. His flesh seemed strangely
on fire, and the sounds of the battle continued
in his ears. He groped blindly for his canteen.

The lieutenant was crowing. He seemed
drunk with fighting. He called out to the youth:
By heavensif I had ten thousand wild cats like
you I could tear th' stomach outa this war in
less'n a week!" He puffed out his chest with
large dignity as he said it.

Some of the men muttered and looked at the


youth in awe-struck ways. It was plain that as
he had gone on loading and firing and cursing
without the proper intermissionthey had found
time to regard him. And they now looked upon
him as a war devil.


The friend came staggering to him. There
was some fright and dismay in his voice. "Are yeh
all rightFleming? Do yeh feel all right? There
ain't nothin' th' matter with yehHenryis there?"


No,said the youth with difficulty. His
throat seemed full of knobs and burs.


These incidents made the youth ponder. It
was revealed to him that he had been a barbarian
a beast. He had fought like a pagan who de-
fends his religion. Regarding ithe saw that it
was finewildandin some wayseasy. He had
been a tremendous figureno doubt. By this
struggle he had overcome obstacles which he
had admitted to be mountains. They had fallen
like paper peaksand he was now what he called
a hero. And he had not been aware of the pro-
cess. He had slept andawakeningfound him-
self a knight.


He lay and basked in the occasional stares of
his comrades. Their faces were varied in de-
grees of blackness from the burned powder.
Some were utterly smudged. They were reek-
ing with perspirationand their breaths came
hard and wheezing. And from these soiled ex-
panses they peered at him.


Hot work! Hot work!cried the lieu-
tenant deliriously. He walked up and down
restless and eager. Sometimes his voice could
be heard in a wildincomprehensible laugh.


When he had a particularly profound thought
upon the science of war he always unconsciously
addressed himself to the youth.


There was some grim rejoicing by the men.
By thunder, I bet this army'll never see another
new reg'ment like us!
You bet!


A dog, a woman, an' a walnut tree,
Th' more yeh beat 'em, th' better they be!


That's like us.

Lost a piler men, they did. If an' ol' woman
swep' up th' woods she'd git a dustpanful.

Yes, an' if she'll come around ag'in in 'bout
an' hour she'll git a pile more.

The forest still bore its burden of clamor.
From off under the trees came the rolling clatter
of the musketry. Each distant thicket seemed a


strange porcupine with quills of flame. A cloud
of dark smokeas from smoldering ruinswent
up toward the sun now bright and gay in the
blueenameled sky.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE ragged line had respite for some minutes
but during its pause the struggle in the
forest became magnified until the trees seemed to
quiver from the firing and the ground to shake
from the rushing of the men. The voices of the
cannon were mingled in a long and interminable
row. It seemed difficult to live in such an atmosphere.
The chests of the men strained for a bit
of freshnessand their throats craved water.

There was one shot through the bodywho
raised a cry of bitter lamentation when came this
lull. Perhaps he had been calling out during
the fighting alsobut at that time no one had
heard him. But now the men turned at the woeful
complaints of him upon the ground.

Who is it? Who is it?

It's Jimmie Rogers. Jimmie Rogers.

When their eyes first encountered him there
was a sudden haltas if they feared to go near.
He was thrashing about in the grasstwisting his

171
shuddering body into many strange postures.
He was screaming loudly. This instant's hesitation
seemed to fill him with a tremendousfantastic
contemptand he damned them in shrieked
sentences.

The youth's friend had a geographical illusion
concerning a streamand he obtained permission
to go for some water. Immediately canteens
were showered upon him. "Fill minewill
yeh?" "Bring me sometoo." "And metoo."
He departedladened. The youth went with his
friendfeeling a desire to throw his heated body
onto the stream andsoaking theredrink quarts.

They made a hurried search for the supposed
streambut did not find it. "No water here
said the youth. They turned without delay and
began to retrace their steps.

From their position as they again faced toward
the place of the fighting, they could of
course comprehend a greater amount of the battle
than when their visions had been blurred by
the hurling smoke of the line. They could see
dark stretches winding along the land, and on
one cleared space there was a row of guns mak



ing gray clouds, which were filled with large
flashes of orange-colored flame. Over some foliage
they could see the roof of a house. One window,
glowing a deep murder red, shone squarely
through the leaves. From the edifice a tall leaning
tower of smoke went far into the sky.

Looking over their own troops, they saw
mixed masses slowly getting into regular form.
The sunlight made twinkling points of the bright
steel. To the rear there was a glimpse of a distant
roadway as it curved over a slope. It was
crowded with retreating infantry. From all the
interwoven forest arose the smoke and bluster
of the battle. The air was always occupied by
a blaring.

Near where they stood shells were flip-flapping
and hooting. Occasional bullets buzzed in
the air and spanged into tree trunks. Wounded
men and other stragglers were slinking through
the woods.

Looking down an aisle of the grove, the
youth and his companion saw a jangling general
and his staff almost ride upon a wounded man,
who was crawling on his hands and knees. The
general reined strongly at his charger's opened
and foamy mouth and guided it with dexterous
horsemanship past the man. The latter scrambled
in wild and torturing haste. His strength
evidently failed him as he reached a place of
safety. One of his arms suddenly weakened, and
he fell, sliding over upon his back. He lay
stretched out, breathing gently.

A moment later the small, creaking cavalcade
was directly in front of the two soldiers. Another
officer, riding with the skillful abandon of a
cowboy, galloped his horse to a position directly
before the general. The two unnoticed foot soldiers
made a little show of going on, but they
lingered near in the desire to overhear the conversation.
Perhaps, they thought, some great
inner historical things would be said.

The general, whom the boys knew as the commander
of their division, looked at the other
officer and spoke coolly, as if he were criticising
his clothes. Th' enemy's formin' over there for
another charge he said. It'll be directed
against Whitersidean' I fear they'll break
through there unless we work like thunder t' stop
them."

The other swore at his restive horseand then
cleared his throat. He made a gesture toward
his cap. "It'll be hell t' pay stoppin' them he
said shortly.

I presume so remarked the general. Then
he began to talk rapidly and in a lower tone. He
frequently illustrated his words with a pointing
finger. The two infantrymen could hear nothing


until finally he asked: What troops can you
spare?"


The officer who rode like a cowboy reflected
for an instant. "Well he said, I had to order
in th' 12th to help th' 76than' I haven't really got
any. But there's th' 304th. They fight like a
lot 'a mule drivers. I can spare them best
of any."


The youth and his friend exchanged glances
of astonishment.


The general spoke sharply. "Get 'em ready
then. I'll watch developments from herean'
send you word when t' start them. It'll happen
in five minutes."


As the other officer tossed his fingers toward
his cap and wheeling his horsestarted awaythe
general called out to him in a sober voice: "I
don't believe many of your mule drivers will get
back."


The other shouted something in reply. He
smiled.


With scared facesthe youth and his compan-
ion hurried back to the line.


These happenings had occupied an incredibly
short timeyet the youth felt that in them he had
been made aged. New eyes were given to him.
And the most startling thing was to learn sud-
denly that he was very insignificant. The officer
spoke of the regiment as if he referred to a
broom. Some part of the woods needed sweep-
ingperhapsand he merely indicated a broom in
a tone properly indifferent to its fate. It was
warno doubtbut it appeared strange.


As the two boys approached the linethe lieu-
tenant perceived them and swelled with wrath.
Fleming--Wilson--how long does it take yeh
to git water, anyhow--where yeh been to.


But his oration ceased as he saw their eyes
which were large with great tales. "We're goin'
t' charge--we're goin' t' charge!" cried the
youth's friendhastening with his news.


Charge?said the lieutenant. "Charge?
Wellb'Gawd! Nowthis is real fightin'." Over
his soiled countenance there went a boastful
smile. "Charge? Wellb'Gawd!"


A little group of soldiers surrounded the two
youths. "Are wesure 'nough? WellI'll be
derned! Charge? What fer? What at? Wil-
sonyou're lyin'."


I hope to die,said the youthpitching his
tones to the key of angry remonstrance. "Sure
as shootingI tell you."



And his friend spoke in re-enforcement. "Not
by a blame sighthe ain't lyin'. We heard 'em
talkin'."

They caught sight of two mounted figures a
short distance from them. One was the colonel
of the regiment and the other was the officer who
had received orders from the commander of the
division. They were gesticulating at each other.
The soldierpointing at theminterpreted the
scene.

One man had a final objection: "How could
yeh hear 'em talkin'?" But the menfor a large
partnoddedadmitting that previously the two
friends had spoken truth.

They settled back into reposeful attitudes
with airs of having accepted the matter. And
they mused upon itwith a hundred varieties of
expression. It was an engrossing thing to think
about. Many tightened their belts carefully and
hitched at their trousers.

A moment later the officers began to bustle
among the menpushing them into a more compact
mass and into a better alignment. They
chased those that straggled and fumed at a few
men who seemed to show by their attitudes that
they had decided to remain at that spot. They
were like critical shepherds struggling with sheep.

Presentlythe regiment seemed to draw itself
up and heave a deep breath. None of the men's
faces were mirrors of large thoughts. The soldiers
were bended and stooped like sprinters before
a signal. Many pairs of glinting eyes peered
from the grimy faces toward the curtains of the
deeper woods. They seemed to be engaged in
deep calculations of time and distance.

They were surrounded by the noises of the
monstrous altercation between the two armies.
The world was fully interested in other matters.
Apparentlythe regiment had its small affair to
itself.

The youthturningshot a quickinquiring
glance at his friend. The latter returned to him
the same manner of look. They were the only
ones who possessed an inner knowledge. "Mule
drivers--hell t' pay--don't believe many will get
back." It was an ironical secret. Stillthey saw
no hesitation in each other's facesand they nodded
a mute and unprotesting assent when a shaggy
man near them said in a meek voice: "We'll
git swallowed."

CHAPTER XIX.


THE youth stared at the land in front of him.
Its foliages now seemed to veil powers and horrors.
He was unaware of the machinery of orders
that started the chargealthough from the corners
of his eyes he saw an officerwho looked
like a boy a-horsebackcome gallopingwaving
his hat. Suddenly he felt a straining and heaving
among the men. The line fell slowly forward
like a toppling wallandwith a convulsive gasp
that was intended for a cheerthe regiment began
its journey. The youth was pushed and jostled
for a moment before he understood the movement
at allbut directly he lunged ahead and
began to run.

He fixed his eye upon a distant and prominent
clump of trees where he had concluded the
enemy were to be metand he ran toward it as
toward a goal. He had believed throughout that
it was a mere question of getting over an unpleasant
matter as quickly as possibleand he ran

179
desperatelyas if pursued for a murder. His
face was drawn hard and tight with the stress of
his endeavor. His eyes were fixed in a lurid
glare. And with his soiled and disordered dress
his red and inflamed features surmounted by the
dingy rag with its spot of bloodhis wildly
swinging rifle and banging accoutermentshe
looked to be an insane soldier.

As the regiment swung from its position out
into a cleared space the woods and thickets before
it awakened. Yellow flames leaped toward
it from many directions. The forest made a tremendous
objection.

The line lurched straight for a moment. Then
the right wing swung forward; it in turn was
surpassed by the left. Afterward the center
careered to the front until the regiment was a
wedge-shaped massbut an instant later the
opposition of the bushestreesand uneven places
on the ground split the command and scattered
it into detached clusters.

The youthlight-footedwas unconsciously in
advance. His eyes still kept note of the clump of
trees. From all places near it the clannish yell
of the enemy could be heard. The little flames
of rifles leaped from it. The song of the bullets
was in the air and shells snarled among the treetops.
One tumbled directly into the middle of a
hurrying group and exploded in crimson fury.
There was an instant's spectacle of a manalmost
over itthrowing up his hands to shield his eyes.

Other menpunched by bulletsfell in grotesque
agonies. The regiment left a coherent
trail of bodies.

They had passed into a clearer atmosphere.


There was an effect like a revelation in the new
appearance of the landscape. Some men working
madly at a battery were plain to themand
the opposing infantry's lines were defined by the
gray walls and fringes of smoke.

It seemed to the youth that he saw everything.
Each blade of the green grass was bold
and clear. He thought that he was aware of
every change in the thintransparent vapor that
floated idly in sheets. The brown or gray trunks
of the trees showed each roughness of their surfaces.
And the men of the regimentwith their
starting eyes and sweating facesrunning madly
or fallingas if thrown headlongto queer
heaped-up corpses--all were comprehended. His
mind took a mechanical but firm impressionso
that afterward everything was pictured and explained
to himsave why he himself was there.

But there was a frenzy made from this furious
rush. The menpitching forward insanelyhad
burst into cheeringsmoblike and barbaricbut
tuned in strange keys that can arouse the dullard
and the stoic. It made a mad enthusiasm thatit
seemedwould be incapable of checking itself
before granite and brass. There was the delirium
that encounters despair and deathand is
heedless and blind to the odds. It is a temporary
but sublime absence of selfishness. And because
it was of this order was the reasonperhapswhy
the youth wonderedafterwardwhat reasons he
could have had for being there.

Presently the straining pace ate up the energies
of the men. As if by agreementthe leaders
began to slacken their speed. The volleys directed
against them had had a seeming windlike
effect. The regiment snorted and blew. Among
some stolid trees it began to falter and hesitate.
The menstaring intentlybegan to wait for some
of the distant walls of smoke to move and disclose
to them the scene. Since much of their
strength and their breath had vanishedthey returned
to caution. They were become men
again.

The youth had a vague belief that he had run
milesand he thoughtin a waythat he was now
in some new and unknown land.

The moment the regiment ceased its advance
the protesting splutter of musketry became a
steadied roar. Long and accurate fringes of
smoke spread out. From the top of a small hill
came level belchings of yellow flame that caused
an inhuman whistling in the air.

The menhaltedhad opportunity to see some
of their comrades dropping with moans and
shrieks. A few lay under footstill or wailing.
And now for an instant the men stoodtheir rifles
slack in their handsand watched the regiment
dwindle. They appeared dazed and stupid. This


spectacle seemed to paralyze themovercome
them with a fatal fascination. They stared woodenly
at the sightsandlowering their eyeslooked
from face to face. It was a strange pauseand a
strange silence.

Thenabove the sounds of the outside commotion
arose the roar of the lieutenant. He strode
suddenly forthhis infantile features black with
rage.

Come on, yeh fools!he bellowed. "Come
on! Yeh can't stay here. Yeh must come on."
He said morebut much of it could not be understood.


He started rapidly forwardwith his head
turned toward the men. "Come on he was
shouting. The men stared with blank and yokellike
eyes at him. He was obliged to halt and
retrace his steps. He stood then with his back
to the enemy and delivered gigantic curses into
the faces of the men. His body vibrated from
the weight and force of his imprecations. And
he could string oaths with the facility of a maiden
who strings beads.

The friend of the youth aroused. Lurching
suddenly forward and dropping to his knees, he
fired an angry shot at the persistent woods. This
action awakened the men. They huddled no
more like sheep. They seemed suddenly to bethink
them of their weapons, and at once commenced
firing. Belabored by their officers, they
began to move forward. The regiment, involved
like a cart involved in mud and muddle, started
unevenly with many jolts and jerks. The men
stopped now every few paces to fire and load,
and in this manner moved slowly on from trees
to trees.

The flaming opposition in their front grew
with their advance until it seemed that all forward
ways were barred by the thin leaping
tongues, and off to the right an ominous demonstration
could sometimes be dimly discerned.
The smoke lately generated was in confusing
clouds that made it difficult for the regiment to
proceed with intelligence. As he passed through
each curling mass the youth wondered what
would confront him on the farther side.

The command went painfully forward until an
open space interposed between them and the
lurid lines. Here, crouching and cowering behind
some trees, the men clung with desperation,
as if threatened by a wave. They looked wildeyed,
and as if amazed at this furious disturbance
they had stirred. In the storm there was an
ironical expression of their importance. The
faces of the men, too, showed a lack of a certain
feeling of responsibility for being there. It was
as if they had been driven. It was the dominant
animal failing to remember in the supreme mo



ments the forceful causes of various superficial
qualities. The whole affair seemed incomprehensible
to many of them.

As they halted thus the lieutenant again began
to bellow profanely. Regardless of the vindictive
threats of the bullets, he went about
coaxing, berating, and bedamning. His lips,
that were habitually in a soft and childlike curve,
were now writhed into unholy contortions. He
swore by all possible deities.

Once he grabbed the youth by the arm.
Come onyeh lunkhead!" he roared. "Come
on! We'll all git killed if we stay here. We've
on'y got t' go across that lot. An' then"--the
remainder of his idea disappeared in a blue haze
of curses.

The youth stretched forth his arm. "Cross
there?" His mouth was puckered in doubt and
awe.

Certainly. Jest 'cross th' lot! We can't
stay here,screamed the lieutenant. He poked
his face close to the youth and waved his bandaged
hand. "Come on!" Presently he grappled
with him as if for a wrestling bout. It was
as if he planned to drag the youth by the ear on
to the assault.

The private felt a sudden unspeakable indignation
against his officer. He wrenched fiercely
and shook him off.

Come on herself, then,he yelled. There
was a bitter challenge in his voice.

They galloped together down the regimental
front. The friend scrambled after them. In front
of the colors the three men began to bawl:
Come on! come on!They danced and gyrated
like tortured savages.

The flagobedient to these appealsbended its
glittering form and swept toward them. The
men wavered in indecision for a momentand then
with a longwailful cry the dilapidated regiment
surged forward and began its new journey.

Over the field went the scurrying mass. It
was a handful of men splattered into the faces of
the enemy. Toward it instantly sprang the yellow
tongues. A vast quantity of blue smoke
hung before them. A mighty banging made ears
valueless.

The youth ran like a madman to reach the
woods before a bullet could discover him. He
ducked his head lowlike a football player. In
his haste his eyes almost closedand the scene was
a wild blur. Pulsating saliva stood at the corners
of his mouth.


Within himas he hurled himself forwardwas
born a lovea despairing fondness for this flag
which was near him. It was a creation of beauty
and invulnerability. It was a goddessradiant
that bended its form with an imperious gesture to
him. It was a womanred and whitehating and
lovingthat called him with the voice of his
hopes. Because no harm could come to it he endowed
it with power. He kept nearas if it
could be a saver of livesand an imploring cry
went from his mind.

In the mad scramble he was aware that the
color sergeant flinched suddenlyas if struck by a
bludgeon. He falteredand then became motionless
save for his quivering knees.

He made a spring and a clutch at the pole.
At the same instant his friend grabbed it from the
other side. They jerked at itstout and furious
but the color sergeant was deadand the corpse
would not relinquish its trust. For a moment
there was a grim encounter. The dead man
swinging with bended backseemed to be obstinately
tuggingin ludicrous and awful waysfor
the possession of the flag.

It was past in an instant of time. They
wrenched the flag furiously from the dead man
andas they turned againthe corpse swayed forward
with bowed head. One arm swung high
and the curved hand fell with heavy protest on
the friend's unheeding shoulder.

CHAPTER XX.

WHEN the two youths turned with the flag
they saw that much of the regiment had crumbled
awayand the dejected remnant was coming
slowly back. The menhaving hurled themselves
in projectile fashionhad presently expended their
forces. They slowly retreatedwith their faces
still toward the spluttering woodsand their hot
rifles still replying to the din. Several officers
were giving orderstheir voices keyed to screams.

Where in hell yeh goin'?the lieutenant was
asking in a sarcastic howl. And a red-bearded
officerwhose voice of triple brass could plainly
be heardwas commanding: "Shoot into 'em!
Shoot into 'emGawd damn their souls!" There
was a melee of screechesin which the men were
ordered to do conflicting and impossible things.

The youth and his friend had a small scuffle
over the flag. "Give it t' me!" "Nolet me
keep it!" Each felt satisfied with the other's possession
of itbut each felt bound to declareby

an offer to carry the emblemhis willingness to


further risk himself. The youth roughly pushed
his friend away.


The regiment fell back to the stolid trees.
There it halted for a moment to blaze at some
dark forms that had begun to steal upon its track.
Presently it resumed its march againcurving
among the tree trunks. By the time the depleted
regiment had again reached the first open space
they were receiving a fast and merciless fire.
There seemed to be mobs all about them.


The greater part of the mendiscouraged
their spirits worn by the turmoilacted as if
stunned. They accepted the pelting of the bul-
lets with bowed and weary heads. It was of no
purpose to strive against walls. It was of no use
to batter themselves against granite. And from
this consciousness that they had attempted to
conquer an unconquerable thing there seemed
to arise a feeling that they had been betrayed.
They glowered with bent browsbut danger-
ouslyupon some of the officersmore particu-
larly upon the red-bearded one with the voice of
triple brass.


Howeverthe rear of the regiment was fringed
with menwho continued to shoot irritably at the
advancing foes. They seemed resolved to make
every trouble. The youthful lieutenant was per-
haps the last man in the disordered mass. His
forgotten back was toward the enemy. He had
been shot in the arm. It hung straight and rigid.
Occasionally he would cease to remember itand
be about to emphasize an oath with a sweeping
gesture. The multiplied pain caused him to
swear with incredible power.


The youth went along with slippinguncertain
feet. He kept watchful eyes rearward. A scowl
of mortification and rage was upon his face. He
had thought of a fine revenge upon the officer
who had referred to him and his fellows as mule
drivers. But he saw that it could not come to
pass. His dreams had collapsed when the mule
driversdwindling rapidlyhad wavered and hes-
itated on the little clearingand then had recoiled.
And now the retreat of the mule drivers was a
march of shame to him.


A dagger-pointed gaze from without his black-
ened face was held toward the enemybut his
greater hatred was riveted upon the manwho
not knowing himhad called him a mule driver.


When he knew that he and his comrades had
failed to do anything in successful ways that might
bring the little pangs of a kind of remorse upon
the officerthe youth allowed the rage of the baf-
fled to possess him. This cold officer upon a
monumentwho dropped epithets unconcernedly
downwould be finer as a dead manhe thought.
So grievous did he think it that he could
never possess the secret right to taunt truly in



answer.

He had pictured red letters of curious revenge.
We ARE mule drivers, are we?And now he
was compelled to throw them away.

He presently wrapped his heart in the cloak
of his pride and kept the flag erect. He harangued
his fellowspushing against their chests
with his free hand. To those he knew well he
made frantic appealsbeseeching them by name.
Between him and the lieutenantscolding and
near to losing his mind with ragethere was felt a
subtle fellowship and equality. They supported
each other in all manner of hoarsehowling protests.


But the regiment was a machine run down.
The two men babbled at a forceless thing. The
soldiers who had heart to go slowly were continually
shaken in their resolves by a knowledge
that comrades were slipping with speed back to
the lines. It was difficult to think of reputation
when others were thinking of skins. Wounded
men were left crying on this black journey.

The smoke fringes and flames blustered always.
The youthpeering once through a sudden
rift in a cloudsaw a brown mass of troops
interwoven and magnified until they appeared to
be thousands. A fierce-hued flag flashed before
his vision.

Immediatelyas if the uplifting of the smoke
had been prearrangedthe discovered troops
burst into a rasping yelland a hundred flames
jetted toward the retreating band. A rolling
gray cloud again interposed as the regiment doggedly
replied. The youth had to depend again
upon his misused earswhich were trembling
and buzzing from the melee of musketry and yells.

The way seemed eternal. In the clouded haze
men became panicstricken with the thought that
the regiment had lost its pathand was proceeding
in a perilous direction. Once the men who
headed the wild procession turned and came pushing
back against their comradesscreaming that
they were being fired upon from points which
they had considered to be toward their own lines.
At this cry a hysterical fear and dismay beset the
troops. A soldierwho heretofore had been ambitious
to make the regiment into a wise little
band that would proceed calmly amid the hugeappearing
difficultiessuddenly sank down and
buried his face in his arms with an air of bowing
to a doom. From another a shrill lamentation
rang out filled with profane allusions to a general.
Men ran hither and thitherseeking with their
eyes roads of escape. With serene regularityas
if controlled by a schedulebullets buffed into
men.

The youth walked stolidly into the midst of


the moband with his flag in his hands took a
stand as if he expected an attempt to push him to
the ground. He unconsciously assumed the atti-
tude of the color bearer in the fight of the pre-
ceding day. He passed over his brow a hand
that trembled. His breath did not come freely.
He was choking during this small wait for the
crisis.


His friend came to him. "WellHenryI
guess this is good-by--John."


Oh, shut up, you damned fool!replied the
youthand he would not look at the other.


The officers labored like politicians to beat
the mass into a proper circle to face the men-
aces. The ground was uneven and torn. The
men curled into depressions and fitted them-
selves snugly behind whatever would frustrate
a bullet.


The youth noted with vague surprise that the
lieutenant was standing mutely with his legs far
apart and his sword held in the manner of a cane.
The youth wondered what had happened to his
vocal organs that he no more cursed.


There was something curious in this little in-
tent pause of the lieutenant. He was like a babe
whichhaving wept its fillraises its eyes and
fixes upon a distant toy. He was engrossed in
this contemplationand the soft under lip quivered
from self-whispered words.


Some lazy and ignorant smoke curled slowly.
The menhiding from the bulletswaited anx-
iously for it to lift and disclose the plight of the
regiment.


The silent ranks were suddenly thrilled by the
eager voice of the youthful lieutenant bawling
out: "Here they come! Right onto us
b'Gawd!" His further words were lost in a roar
of wicked thunder from the men's rifles.


The youth's eyes had instantly turned in the
direction indicated by the awakened and agitated
lieutenantand he had seen the haze of treachery
disclosing a body of soldiers of the enemy. They
were so near that he could see their features.
There was a recognition as he looked at the types
of faces. Also he perceived with dim amazement
that their uniforms were rather gay in effect
being light grayaccented with a brilliant-hued
facing. Toothe clothes seemed new.


These troops had apparently been going for-
ward with cautiontheir rifles held in readiness
when the youthful lieutenant had discovered
them and their movement had been interrupted
by the volley from the blue regiment. From the
moment's glimpseit was derived that they had
been unaware of the proximity of their dark-



suited foes or had mistaken the direction. Almost
instantly they were shut utterly from the
youth's sight by the smoke from the energetic
rifles of his companions. He strained his vision
to learn the accomplishment of the volleybut the
smoke hung before him.

The two bodies of troops exchanged blows in
the manner of a pair of boxers. The fast angry
firings went back and forth. The men in blue
were intent with the despair of their circumstances
and they seized upon the revenge to be
had at close range. Their thunder swelled loud
and valiant. Their curving front bristled with
flashes and the place resounded with the clangor
of their ramrods. The youth ducked and dodged
for a time and achieved a few unsatisfactory
views of the enemy. There appeared to be many
of them and they were replying swiftly. They
seemed moving toward the blue regimentstep
by step. He seated himself gloomily on the
ground with his flag between his knees.

As he noted the viciouswolflike temper of
his comrades he had a sweet thought that if the
enemy was about to swallow the regimental
broom as a large prisonerit could at least have
the consolation of going down with bristles forward.


But the blows of the antagonist began to
grow more weak. Fewer bullets ripped the air
and finallywhen the men slackened to learn of
the fightthey could see only darkfloating
smoke. The regiment lay still and gazed. Presently
some chance whim came to the pestering
blurand it began to coil heavily away. The men
saw a ground vacant of fighters. It would have
been an empty stage if it were not for a few
corpses that lay thrown and twisted into fantastic
shapes upon the sward.

At sight of this tableaumany of the men in
blue sprang from behind their covers and made
an ungainly dance of joy. Their eyes burned
and a hoarse cheer of elation broke from their
dry lips.

It had begun to seem to them that events were
trying to prove that they were impotent. These
little battles had evidently endeavored to demonstrate
that the men could not fight well. When
on the verge of submission to these opinionsthe
small duel had showed them that the proportions
were not impossibleand by it they had
revenged themselves upon their misgivings and
upon the foe.

The impetus of enthusiasm was theirs again.
They gazed about them with looks of uplifted
pridefeeling new trust in the grimalways
confident weapons in their hands. And they
were men.


CHAPTER XXI.

PRESENTLY they knew that no firing threatened
them. All ways seemed once more opened
to them. The dusty blue lines of their friends
were disclosed a short distance away. In the
distance there were many colossal noisesbut in
all this part of the field there was a sudden
stillness.

They perceived that they were free. The
depleted band drew a long breath of relief
and gathered itself into a bunch to complete
its trip.

In this last length of journey the men began
to show strange emotions. They hurried with
nervous fear. Some who had been dark and unfaltering
in the grimmest moments now could not
conceal an anxiety that made them frantic. It
was perhaps that they dreaded to be killed in
insignificant ways after the times for proper
military deaths had passed. Orperhapsthey
thought it would be too ironical to get killed at

199
the portals of safety. With backward looks of
perturbationthey hastened.

As they approached their own lines there was
some sarcasm exhibited on the part of a gaunt
and bronzed regiment that lay resting in the
shade of trees. Questions were wafted to them.

Where th' hell yeh been?

What yeh comin' back fer?

Why didn't yeh stay there?

Was it warm out there, sonny?

Goin' home now, boys?

One shouted in taunting mimicry: "Oh
mothercome quick an' look at th' sojers!"

There was no reply from the bruised and battered
regimentsave that one man made broadcast
challenges to fist fights and the red-bearded
officer walked rather near and glared in great
swashbuckler style at a tall captain in the other
regiment. But the lieutenant suppressed the
man who wished to fist fightand the tall captain
flushing at the little fanfare of the redbearded
onewas obliged to look intently at some
trees.

The youth's tender flesh was deeply stung by
these remarks. From under his creased brows


he glowered with hate at the mockers. He
meditated upon a few revenges. Stillmany in
the regiment hung their heads in criminal fashion
so that it came to pass that the men trudged with
sudden heavinessas if they bore upon their
bended shoulders the coffin of their honor. And
the youthful lieutenantrecollecting himselfbegan
to mutter softly in black curses.

They turned when they arrived at their old
position to regard the ground over which they
had charged.

The youth in this contemplation was smitten
with a large astonishment. He discovered that
the distancesas compared with the brilliant
measurings of his mindwere trivial and ridiculous.
The stolid treeswhere much had taken
placeseemed incredibly near. The timetoo
now that he reflectedhe saw to have been short.
He wondered at the number of emotions and
events that had been crowded into such little
spaces. Elfin thoughts must have exaggerated
and enlarged everythinghe said.

It seemedthenthat there was bitter justice
in the speeches of the gaunt and bronzed veterans.
He veiled a glance of disdain at his fellows
who strewed the groundchoking with dust
red from perspirationmisty-eyeddisheveled.

They were gulping at their canteensfierce to
wring every mite of water from themand they
polished at their swollen and watery features
with coat sleeves and bunches of grass.

Howeverto the youth there was a considerable
joy in musing upon his performances during
the charge. He had had very little time previously
in which to appreciate himselfso that
there was now much satisfaction in quietly thinking
of his actions. He recalled bits of color that
in the flurry had stamped themselves unawares
upon his engaged senses.

As the regiment lay heaving from its hot exertions
the officer who had named them as mule
drivers came galloping along the line. He had
lost his cap. His tousled hair streamed wildly
and his face was dark with vexation and wrath.
His temper was displayed with more clearness
by the way in which he managed his horse. He
jerked and wrenched savagely at his bridlestopping
the hard-breathing animal with a furious
pull near the colonel of the regiment. He immediately
exploded in reproaches which came
unbidden to the ears of the men. They were
suddenly alertbeing always curious about black
words between officers.

Oh, thunder, MacChesnay, what an awful
bull you made of this thing!began the officer.
He attempted low tonesbut his indignation
caused certain of the men to learn the sense of


his words. "What an awful mess you made!
Good Lordmanyou stopped about a hun-
dred feet this side of a very pretty success! If
your men had gone a hundred feet farther you
would have made a great chargebut as it is
--what a lot of mud diggers you've got any-
way!"


The menlistening with bated breathnow
turned their curious eyes upon the colonel.
They had a ragamuffin interest in this affair.


The colonel was seen to straighten his form
and put one hand forth in oratorical fashion.
He wore an injured air; it was as if a deacon
had been accused of stealing. The men were
wiggling in an ecstasy of excitement.


But of a sudden the colonel's manner changed
from that of a deacon to that of a Frenchman.
He shrugged his shoulders. "Ohwellgeneral
we went as far as we could he said calmly.


As far as you could? Did youb'Gawd?"
snorted the other. "Wellthat wasn't very far
was it?" he addedwith a glance of cold con-
tempt into the other's eyes. "Not very farI
think. You were intended to make a diversion
in favor of Whiterside. How well you succeeded
your own ears can now tell you." He wheeled
his horse and rode stiffly away.


The colonelbidden to hear the jarring noises
of an engagement in the woods to the leftbroke
out in vague damnations.


The lieutenantwho had listened with an air
of impotent rage to the interviewspoke suddenly
in firm and undaunted tones. "I don't care what
a man is--whether he is a general or what--if
he says th' boys didn't put up a good fight out
there he's a damned fool."


Lieutenant,began the colonelseverely
this is my own affair, and I'll trouble you--


The lieutenant made an obedient gesture.
All right, colonel, all right,he said. He sat
down with an air of being content with him-
self.


The news that the regiment had been re-
proached went along the line. For a time the
men were bewildered by it. "Good thunder!"
they ejaculatedstaring at the vanishing form of
the general. They conceived it to be a huge
mistake.


Presentlyhoweverthey began to believe that
in truth their efforts had been called light. The
youth could see this conviction weigh upon the
entire regiment until the men were like cuffed
and cursed animalsbut withal rebellious.



The friendwith a grievance in his eye
went to the youth. "I wonder what he does
want he said. He must think we went out
there an' played marbles! I never see sech a
man!"

The youth developed a tranquil philosophy
for these moments of irritation. "Ohwell he
rejoined, he probably didn't see nothing of it at
all and got mad as blazesand concluded we were
a lot of sheepjust because we didn't do what he
wanted done. It's a pity old Grandpa Henderson
got killed yestirday--he'd have known that
we did our best and fought good. It's just our
awful luckthat's what."

I should say so,replied the friend. He
seemed to be deeply wounded at an injustice.
I should say we did have awful luck! There's
no fun in fightin' fer people when everything
yeh do--no matter what--ain't done right. I
have a notion t' stay behind next time an' let
'em take their ol' charge an' go t' th' devil
with it.

The youth spoke soothingly to his comrade.
Well, we both did good. I'd like to see the
fool what'd say we both didn't do as good as we
could!

Of course we did,declared the friend
stoutly. "An' I'd break th' feller's neck if he was
as big as a church. But we're all rightanyhow
for I heard one feller say that we two fit th' best
in th' reg'mentan' they had a great argument
'bout it. Another feller'a coursehe had t' up
an' say it was a lie--he seen all what was goin'
on an' he never seen us from th' beginnin' t' th'
end. An' a lot more struck in an' ses it wasn't
a lie--we did fight like thunderan' they give
us quite a send-off. But this is what I can't
stand--these everlastin' ol' soldierstitterin' an'
laughin'an' then that generalhe's crazy."

The youth exclaimed with sudden exasperation:
He's a lunkhead! He makes me mad.
I wish he'd come along next time. We'd show
'im what--

He ceased because several men had come
hurrying up. Their faces expressed a bringing
of great news.

O Flem, yeh jest oughta heard!cried one
eagerly.

Heard what?said the youth.

Yeh jest oughta heard!repeated the other
and he arranged himself to tell his tidings. The
others made an excited circle. "Wellsirth'
colonel met your lieutenant right by us--it was
damnedest thing I ever heard--an' he ses: 'Ahem!
ahem!' he ses. 'Mr. Hasbrouck!' he ses'by


th' waywho was that lad what carried th' flag?'
he ses. ThereFlemin'what d' yeh think 'a
that? 'Who was th' lad what carried th' flag?'
he sesan' th' lieutenanthe speaks up right
away: 'That's Flemin'an' he's a jimhickey' he
sesright away. What? I say he did. 'A jim-
hickey' he ses--those 'r his words. He didtoo.
I say he did. If you kin tell this story better
than I kingo ahead an' tell it. Wellthenkeep
yer mouth shet. Th' lieutenanthe ses: 'He's a
jimhickey' an' th' colonelhe ses: 'Ahem! ahem!
he isindeeda very good man t' haveahem! He
kep' th' flag 'way t' th' front. I saw 'im. He's a
good un' ses th' colonel. 'You bet' ses th' lieu-
tenant'he an' a feller named Wilson was at th'
head 'a th' chargean' howlin' like Indians all th'
time' he ses. 'Head 'a th' charge all th' time'
he ses. 'A feller named Wilson' he ses. There
Wilsonm'boyput that in a letter an' send it
hum t' yer motherhay? 'A feller named Wil-
son' he ses. An' th' colonelhe ses: 'Were they
indeed? Ahem! ahem! My sakes!' he ses. 'At
th' head 'a th' reg'ment?' he ses. 'They were'
ses th' lieutenant. 'My sakes!' ses th' colonel.
He ses: 'Wellwellwell' he ses'those two
babies?' 'They were' ses th' lieutenant.
'Wellwell' ses th' colonel'they deserve t' be
major generals' he ses. 'They deserve t' be
major-generals.'


The youth and his friend had said: "Huh!"
Yer lyin', Thompson.Oh, go t' blazes!
He never sed it.Oh, what a lie!Huh!
But despite these youthful scoffings and embar-
rassmentsthey knew that their faces were deeply
flushing from thrills of pleasure. They ex-
changed a secret glance of joy and congratula-
tion.


They speedily forgot many things. The past
held no pictures of error and disappointment.
They were very happyand their hearts swelled
with grateful affection for the colonel and the
youthful lieutenant.


CHAPTER XXII.


WHEN the woods again began to pour forth
the dark-hued masses of the enemy the youth felt
serene self-confidence. He smiled briefly when
he saw men dodge and duck at the long screech-
ings of shells that were thrown in giant handfuls
over them. He stooderect and tranquilwatch-
ing the attack begin against a part of the line
that made a blue curve along the side of an adja-
cent hill. His vision being unmolested by smoke
from the rifles of his companionshe had oppor-
tunities to see parts of the hard fight. It was a
relief to perceive at last from whence came some
of these noises which had been roared into his



ears.

Off a short way he saw two regiments fighting
a little separate battle with two other regiments.
It was in a cleared spacewearing a setapart
look. They were blazing as if upon a
wagergiving and taking tremendous blows.
The firings were incredibly fierce and rapid.

These intent regiments apparently were oblivious
of all larger purposes of warand were slugging
each other as if at a matched game.

In another direction he saw a magnificent
brigade going with the evident intention of driving
the enemy from a wood. They passed in out
of sight and presently there was a most awe-inspiring
racket in the wood. The noise was unspeakable.
Having stirred this prodigious uproar
andapparentlyfinding it too prodigious
the brigadeafter a little timecame marching
airily out again with its fine formation in nowise
disturbed. There were no traces of speed in its
movements. The brigade was jaunty and seemed
to point a proud thumb at the yelling wood.

On a slope to the left there was a long row of
gunsgruff and maddeneddenouncing the
enemywhodown through the woodswere
forming for another attack in the pitiless monotony
of conflicts. The round red discharges
from the guns made a crimson flare and a high
thick smoke. Occasional glimpses could be
caught of groups of the toiling artillerymen. In
the rear of this row of guns stood a housecalm
and whiteamid bursting shells. A congregation
of horsestied to a long railingwere tugging
frenziedly at their bridles. Men were running
hither and thither.

The detached battle between the four regiments
lasted for some time. There chanced to
be no interferenceand they settled their dispute
by themselves. They struck savagely and powerfully
at each other for a period of minutesand
then the lighter-hued regiments faltered and
drew backleaving the dark-blue lines shouting.
The youth could see the two flags shaking with
laughter amid the smoke remnants.

Presently there was a stillnesspregnant with
meaning. The blue lines shifted and changed a
trifle and stared expectantly at the silent woods
and fields before them. The hush was solemn
and churchlikesave for a distant battery that
evidently unable to remain quietsent a faint
rolling thunder over the ground. It irritated
like the noises of unimpressed boys. The men
imagined that it would prevent their perched
ears from hearing the first words of the new
battle.

Of a sudden the guns on the slope roared out


a message of warning. A spluttering sound had
begun in the woods. It swelled with amazing
speed to a profound clamor that involved the
earth in noises. The splitting crashes swept
along the lines until an interminable roar was
developed. To those in the midst of it it became
a din fitted to the universe. It was the whirring
and thumping of gigantic machinerycomplications
among the smaller stars. The youth's ears
were filled up. They were incapable of hearing
more.

On an incline over which a road wound he
saw wild and desperate rushes of men perpetually
backward and forward in riotous surges.
These parts of the opposing armies were two
long waves that pitched upon each other madly
at dictated points. To and fro they swelled.
Sometimesone side by its yells and cheers would
proclaim decisive blowsbut a moment later
the other side would be all yells and cheers.
Once the youth saw a spray of light forms go in
houndlike leaps toward the waving blue lines.
There was much howlingand presently it went
away with a vast mouthful of prisoners. Again
he saw a blue wave dash with such thunderous
force against a gray obstruction that it seemed to
clear the earth of it and leave nothing but
trampled sod. And always in their swift and
deadly rushes to and fro the men screamed
and yelled like maniacs.

Particular pieces of fence or secure positions
behind collections of trees were wrangled over
as gold thrones or pearl bedsteads. There were
desperate lunges at these chosen spots seemingly
every instantand most of them were bandied like
light toys between the contending forces. The
youth could not tell from the battle flags flying
like crimson foam in many directions which color
of cloth was winning.

His emaciated regiment bustled forth with
undiminished fierceness when its time came.
When assaulted again by bulletsthe men burst
out in a barbaric cry of rage and pain. They
bent their heads in aims of intent hatred
behind the projected hammers of their guns.
Their ramrods clanged loud with fury as their
eager arms pounded the cartridges into the rifle
barrels. The front of the regiment was a smokewall
penetrated by the flashing points of yellow
and red.

Wallowing in the fightthey were in an
astonishingly short time resmudged. They
surpassed in stain and dirt all their previous appearances.
Moving to and fro with strained
exertionjabbering the whilethey werewith
their swaying bodiesblack facesand glowing
eyeslike strange and ugly friends jigging heavily
in the smoke.

The lieutenantreturning from a tour after a


bandageproduced from a hidden receptacle of
his mind new and portentous oaths suited to the
emergency. Strings of expletives he swung
lashlike over the backs of his menand it was
evident that his previous efforts had in nowise
impaired his resources.

The youthstill the bearer of the colorsdid
not feel his idleness. He was deeply absorbed as
a spectator. The crash and swing of the great
drama made him lean forwardintent-eyedhis
face working in small contortions. Sometimes he
prattledwords coming unconsciously from him
in grotesque exclamations. He did not know
that he breathed; that the flag hung silently over
himso absorbed was he.

A formidable line of the enemy came within
dangerous range. They could be seen plainly-tall
gaunt men with excited faces running with
long strides toward a wandering fence.

At sight of this danger the men suddenly
ceased their cursing monotone. There was an
instant of strained silence before they threw up
their rifles and fired a plumping volley at the
foes. There had been no order given; the men
upon recognizing the menacehad immediately
let drive their flock of bullets without waiting
for word of command.

But the enemy were quick to gain the protection
of the wandering line of fence. They slid down
behind it with remarkable celerityand from this
position they began briskly to slice up the blue men.

These latter braced their energies for a great
struggle. Oftenwhite clinched teeth shone
from the dusky faces. Many heads surged to
and frofloating upon a pale sea of smoke.
Those behind the fence frequently shouted and
yelped in taunts and gibelike criesbut the regiment
maintained a stressed silence. Perhapsat
this new assault the men recalled the fact that
they had been named mud diggersand it made
their situation thrice bitter. They were breathlessly
intent upon keeping the ground and thrusting
away the rejoicing body of the enemy. They
fought swiftly and with a despairing savageness
denoted in their expressions.

The youth had resolved not to budge whatever
should happen. Some arrows of scorn that
had buried themselves in his heart had generated
strange and unspeakable hatred. It was clear
to him that his final and absolute revenge was to
be achieved by his dead body lyingtorn and
glutteringupon the field. This was to be a
poignant retaliation upon the officer who had
said "mule drivers and later mud diggers
for in all the wild graspings of his mind for a
unit responsible for his sufferings and commotions
he always seized upon the man who had
dubbed him wrongly. And it was his idea,


vaguely formulated, that his corpse would be for
those eyes a great and salt reproach.


The regiment bled extravagantly. Grunting
bundles of blue began to drop. The orderly
sergeant of the youth's company was shot through
the cheeks. Its supports being injured, his jaw
hung afar down, disclosing in the wide cavern of
his mouth a pulsing mass of blood and teeth.
And with it all he made attempts to cry out.
In his endeavor there was a dreadful earnestness,
as if he conceived that one great shriek would
make him well.


The youth saw him presently go rearward.
His strength seemed in nowise impaired. He
ran swiftly, casting wild glances for succor.


Others fell down about the feet of their com-
panions. Some of the wounded crawled out and
away, but many lay still, their bodies twisted into
impossible shapes.


The youth looked once for his friend. He
saw a vehement young man, powder-smeared and
frowzled, whom he knew to be him. The lieu-
tenant, also, was unscathed in his position at the
rear. He had continued to curse, but it was now
with the air of a man who was using his last box
of oaths.


For the fire of the regiment had begun to
wane and drip. The robust voice, that had come
strangely from the thin ranks, was growing
rapidly weak.


CHAPTER XXIII.


THE colonel came running along back of the
line. There were other officers following him.
We must charge'm!" they shouted. "We must
charge'm!" they cried with resentful voicesas
if anticipating a rebellion against this plan by the
men.


The youthupon hearing the shoutsbegan to
study the distance between him and the enemy.
He made vague calculations. He saw that to be
firm soldiers they must go forward. It would be
death to stay in the present placeand with all
the circumstances to go backward would exalt
too many others. Their hope was to push the
galling foes away from the fence.


He expected that his companionsweary and
stiffenedwould have to be driven to this assault
but as he turned toward them he perceived with
a certain surprise that they were giving quick
and unqualified expressions of assent. There was
an ominousclanging overture to the charge



when the shafts of the bayonets rattled upon the
rifle barrels. At the yelled words of command
the soldiers sprang forward in eager leaps.
There was new and unexpected force in the
movement of the regiment. A knowledge of its
faded and jaded condition made the charge appear
like a paroxysma display of the strength
that comes before a final feebleness. The men
scampered in insane fever of hasteracing as if to
achieve a sudden success before an exhilarating
fluid should leave them. It was a blind and despairing
rush by the collection of men in dusty
and tattered blueover a green sward and under
a sapphire skytoward a fencedimly outlined in
smokefrom behind which spluttered the fierce
rifles of enemies.

The youth kept the bright colors to the front.
He was waving his free arm in furious circles
the while shrieking mad calls and appealsurging
on those that did not need to be urgedfor it
seemed that the mob of blue men hurling themselves
on the dangerous group of rifles were
again grown suddenly wild with an enthusiasm of
unselfishness. From the many firings starting
toward themit looked as if they would merely
succeed in making a great sprinkling of corpses
on the grass between their former position and
the fence. But they were in a state of frenzy
perhaps because of forgotten vanitiesand it made
an exhibition of sublime recklessness. There was
no obvious questioningnor figuringsnor diagrams.
There wasapparentlyno considered
loopholes. It appeared that the swift wings of
their desires would have shattered against the
iron gates of the impossible.

He himself felt the daring spirit of a savage
religion mad. He was capable of profound sacrifices
a tremendous death. He had no time for
dissectionsbut he knew that he thought of the
bullets only as things that could prevent him
from reaching the place of his endeavor. There
were subtle flashings of joy within him that thus
should be his mind.

He strained all his strength. His eyesight
was shaken and dazzled by the tension of thought
and muscle. He did not see anything excepting
the mist of smoke gashed by the little knives of
firebut he knew that in it lay the aged fence of a
vanished farmer protecting the snuggled bodies
of the gray men.

As he ran a thought of the shock of contact
gleamed in his mind. He expected a great concussion
when the two bodies of troops crashed
together. This became a part of his wild battle
madness. He could feel the onward swing of the
regiment about him and he conceived of a thunderous
crushing blow that would prostrate the
resistance and spread consternation and amaze



ment for miles. The flying regiment was going
to have a catapultian effect. This dream made
him run faster among his comradeswho were
giving vent to hoarse and frantic cheers.

But presently he could see that many of the
men in gray did not intend to abide the blow.
The smokerollingdisclosed men who rantheir
faces still turned. These grew to a crowdwho
retired stubbornly. Individuals wheeled frequently
to send a bullet at the blue wave.

But at one part of the line there was a grim
and obdurate group that made no movement.
They were settled firmly down behind posts and
rails. A flagruffled and fiercewaved over them
and their rifles dinned fiercely.

The blue whirl of men got very nearuntil
it seemed that in truth there would be a close
and frightful scuffle. There was an expressed
disdain in the opposition of the little group
that changed the meaning of the cheers of the
men in blue. They became yells of wrath
directedpersonal. The cries of the two parties
were now in sound an interchange of scathing
insults.

They in blue showed their teeth; their eyes
shone all white. They launched themselves as at
the throats of those who stood resisting. The
space between dwindled to an insignificant distance.


The youth had centered the gaze of his soul
upon that other flag. Its possession would be
high pride. It would express bloody minglings
near blows. He had a gigantic hatred for those
who made great difficulties and complications.
They caused it to be as a craved treasure of mythology
hung amid tasks and contrivances of
danger.

He plunged like a mad horse at it. He was
resolved it should not escape if wild blows and
darings of blows could seize it. His own emblem
quivering and aflarewas winging toward
the other. It seemed there would shortly be
an encounter of strange beaks and clawsas of
eagles.

The swirling body of blue men came to a
sudden halt at close and disastrous range and
roared a swift volley. The group in gray was
split and broken by this firebut its riddled body
still fought. The men in blue yelled again and
rushed in upon it.

The youthin his leapingssawas through a
mista picture of four or five men stretched upon
the ground or writhing upon their knees with
bowed heads as if they had been stricken by bolts
from the sky. Tottering among them was the
rival color bearerwhom the youth saw had been


bitten vitally by the bullets of the last formidable
volley. He perceived this man fighting a last
strugglethe struggle of one whose legs are
grasped by demons. It was a ghastly battle.
Over his face was the bleach of deathbut set
upon it was the dark and hard lines of desperate
purpose. With this terrible grin of resolution he
hugged his precious flag to him and was stumbling
and staggering in his design to go the way
that led to safety for it.

But his wounds always made it seem that his
feet were retardedheldand he fought a grim
fightas with invisible ghouls fastened greedily
upon his limbs. Those in advance of the scampering
blue menhowling cheersleaped at the
fence. The despair of the lost was in his eyes as
he glanced back at them.

The youth's friend went over the obstruction
in a tumbling heap and sprang at the flag as a
panther at prey. He pulled at it andwrenching
it freeswung up its red brilliancy with a
mad cry of exultation even as the color bearer
gaspinglurched over in a final throe andstiffening
convulsivelyturned his dead face to the
ground. There was much blood upon the grass
blades.

At the place of success there began more wild
clamorings of cheers. The men gesticulated and
bellowed in an ecstasy. When they spoke it was
as if they considered their listener to be a mile
away. What hats and caps were left to them
they often slung high in the air.

At one part of the line four men had been
swooped uponand they now sat as prisoners.
Some blue men were about them in an eager and
curious circle. The soldiers had trapped strange
birdsand there was an examination. A flurry of
fast questions was in the air.

One of the prisoners was nursing a superficial
wound in the foot. He cuddled itbaby-wise
but he looked up from it often to curse with an
astonishing utter abandon straight at the noses of
his captors. He consigned them to red regions;
he called upon the pestilential wrath of strange
gods. And with it all he was singularly free
from recognition of the finer points of the conduct
of prisoners of war. It was as if a clumsy
clod had trod upon his toe and he conceived it to
be his privilegehis dutyto use deepresentful
oaths.

Anotherwho was a boy in yearstook his
plight with great calmness and apparent good
nature. He conversed with the men in blue
studying their faces with his bright and keen
eyes. They spoke of battles and conditions.
There was an acute interest in all their faces during
this exchange of view points. It seemed a
great satisfaction to hear voices from where all


had been darkness and speculation.

The third captive sat with a morose countenance.
He preserved a stoical and cold attitude.
To all advances he made one reply without variation
Ah, go t' hell!

The last of the four was always silent and
for the most partkept his face turned in unmolested
directions. From the views the youth
received he seemed to be in a state of absolute
dejection. Shame was upon himand with it
profound regret that he wasperhapsno more
to be counted in the ranks of his fellows. The
youth could detect no expression that would
allow him to believe that the other was giving
a thought to his narrowed futurethe pictured
dungeonsperhapsand starvations and brutalities
liable to the imagination. All to be seen
was shame for captivity and regret for the right
to antagonize.

After the men had celebrated sufficiently they
settled down behind the old rail fenceon the
opposite side to the one from which their foes
had been driven. A few shot perfunctorily at
distant marks.

There was some long grass. The youth
nestled in it and restedmaking a convenient rail
support the flag. His friendjubilant and glorified
holding his treasure with vanitycame to
him there. They sat side by side and congratulated
each other.

CHAPTER XXIV.

THE roarings that had stretched in a long line
of sound across the face of the forest began to
grow intermittent and weaker. The stentorian
speeches of the artillery continued in some distant
encounterbut the crashes of the musketry
had almost ceased. The youth and his friend of
a sudden looked upfeeling a deadened form of
distress at the waning of these noiseswhich had
become a part of life. They could see changes
going on among the troops. There were marchings
this way and that way. A battery wheeled
leisurely. On the crest of a small hill was the
thick gleam of many departing muskets.

The youth arose. "Wellwhat nowI wonder?"
he said. By his tone he seemed to be
preparing to resent some new monstrosity in
the way of dins and smashes. He shaded his
eyes with his grimy hand and gazed over the
field.

His friend also arose and stared. "I bet


we're goin' t' git along out of this an' back over
th' river said he.

WellI swan!" said the youth.

They waitedwatching. Within a little while
the regiment received orders to retrace its way.
The men got up grunting from the grassregretting
the soft repose. They jerked their stiffened
legsand stretched their arms over their heads.
One man swore as he rubbed his eyes. They all
groaned "O Lord!" They had as many objections
to this change as they would have had to a
proposal for a new battle.

They trampled slowly back over the field
across which they had run in a mad scamper.

The regiment marched until it had joined its
fellows. The reformed brigadein columnaimed
through a wood at the road. Directly they were
in a mass of dust-covered troopsand were
trudging along in a way parallel to the enemy's
lines as these had been defined by the previous
turmoil.

They passed within view of a stolid white
houseand saw in front of it groups of their comrades
lying in wait behind a neat breastwork. A
row of guns were booming at a distant enemy.
Shells thrown in reply were raising clouds of
dust and splinters. Horsemen dashed along the
line of intrenchments.

At this point of its march the division curved
away from the field and went winding off in the
direction of the river. When the significance of
this movement had impressed itself upon the
youth he turned his head and looked over his
shoulder toward the trampled and debris-strewed
ground. He breathed a breath of new satisfaction.
He finally nudged his friend. "Wellit's
all over he said to him.

His friend gazed backward. B'Gawdit
is he assented. They mused.

For a time the youth was obliged to reflect
in a puzzled and uncertain way. His mind was
undergoing a subtle change. It took moments
for it to cast off its battleful ways and resume
its accustomed course of thought. Gradually his
brain emerged from the clogged clouds, and at
last he was enabled to more closely comprehend
himself and circumstance.

He understood then that the existence of shot
and counter-shot was in the past. He had dwelt
in a land of strange, squalling upheavals and had
come forth. He had been where there was red
of blood and black of passion, and he was escaped.
His first thoughts were given to rejoicings
at this fact.


Later he began to study his deeds, his failures,
and his achievements. Thus, fresh from
scenes where many of his usual machines of reflection
had been idle, from where he had proceeded
sheeplike, he struggled to marshal all his
acts.

At last they marched before him clearly.
From this present view point he was enabled
to look upon them in spectator fashion and
to criticise them with some correctness, for his
new condition had already defeated certain sympathies.


Regarding his procession of memory he felt
gleeful and unregretting, for in it his public deeds
were paraded in great and shining prominence.
Those performances which had been witnessed
by his fellows marched now in wide purple and
gold, having various deflections. They went
gayly with music. It was pleasure to watch these
things. He spent delightful minutes viewing the
gilded images of memory.

He saw that he was good. He recalled with
a thrill of joy the respectful comments of his fellows
upon his conduct.

Nevertheless, the ghost of his flight from
the first engagement appeared to him and
danced. There were small shoutings in his
brain about these matters. For a moment he
blushed, and the light of his soul flickered with
shame.

A specter of reproach came to him. There
loomed the dogging memory of the tattered
soldier--he who, gored by bullets and faint for
blood, had fretted concerning an imagined wound
in another; he who had loaned his last of strength
and intellect for the tall soldier; he who, blind
with weariness and pain, had been deserted in
the field.

For an instant a wretched chill of sweat was
upon him at the thought that he might be
detected in the thing. As he stood persistently
before his vision, he gave vent to a cry of sharp
irritation and agony.

His friend turned. What's the matter
Henry?" he demanded. The youth's reply was
an outburst of crimson oaths.

As he marched along the little branch-hung
roadway among his prattling companions this
vision of cruelty brooded over him. It clung
near him always and darkened his view of these
deeds in purple and gold. Whichever way his
thoughts turned they were followed by the
somber phantom of the desertion in the fields.
He looked stealthily at his companionsfeeling
sure that they must discern in his face evidences


of this pursuit. But they were plodding in
ragged arraydiscussing with quick tongues the
accomplishments of the late battle.


Oh, if a man should come up an' ask me, I'd
say we got a dum good lickin'.


Lickin'--in yer eye! We ain't licked, sonny.
We're goin' down here aways, swing aroun', an'
come in behint 'em.


Oh, hush, with your comin' in behint 'em.
I've seen all 'a that I wanta. Don't tell me about
comin' in behint--


Bill Smithers, he ses he'd rather been in
ten hundred battles than been in that heluva
hospital. He ses they got shootin' in th' night-
time, an' shells dropped plum among 'em in th'
hospital. He ses sech hollerin' he never see.


Hasbrouck? He's th' best off'cer in this
here reg'ment. He's a whale.


Didn't I tell yeh we'd come aroun' in behint
'em? Didn't I tell yeh so? We--


Oh, shet yeh mouth!


For a time this pursuing recollection of the
tattered man took all elation from the youth's
veins. He saw his vivid errorand he was afraid
that it would stand before him all his life. He
took no share in the chatter of his comradesnor
did he look at them or know themsave when he
felt sudden suspicion that they were seeing his
thoughts and scrutinizing each detail of the scene
with the tattered soldier.


Yet gradually he mustered force to put the sin
at a distance. And at last his eyes seemed to
open to some new ways. He found that he could
look back upon the brass and bombast of his
earlier gospels and see them truly. He was
gleeful when he discovered that he now despised
them.


With this conviction came a store of assur-
ance. He felt a quiet manhoodnonassertive but
of sturdy and strong blood. He knew that he
would no more quail before his guides wher-
ever they should point. He had been to touch
the great deathand found thatafter allit was
but the great death. He was a man.


So it came to pass that as he trudged from
the place of blood and wrath his soul changed.
He came from hot plowshares to prospects of
clover tranquillyand it was as if hot plowshares
were not. Scars faded as flowers.


It rained. The procession of weary soldiers
became a bedraggled traindespondent and
mutteringmarching with churning effort in a



trough of liquid brown mud under a low
wretched sky. Yet the youth smiledfor he saw
that the world was a world for himthough many
discovered it to be made of oaths and walking
sticks. He had rid himself of the red sickness of
battle. The sultry nightmare was in the past.
He had been an animal blistered and sweating in
the heat and pain of war. He turned now with a
lover's thirst to images of tranquil skiesfresh
meadowscool brooks--an existence of soft and
eternal peace.

Over the river a golden ray of sun came
through the hosts of leaden rain clouds.