NNEngine/Gutenberg-Clean · Datasets at Hugging Face

id stringlengths 16 16	text stringlengths 151 2.3k	word_count int64 30 60	source stringclasses 1 value
twg_000012938400	them!" Billy chanted on, "I ain't a-goin' to quit! I put it here jest like I was putting a hop pole in Christianna's garden, and I ain't a-goin' to dig it up again--" Dave appeared. "Billy boy, don't be such a damned fool! You jest skeedaddle with the rest of us and take it out of them next time. Don't	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938401	ye want to see Christianna again, an' maw an' the dogs?--Thar, now!" A bullet split the standard, another--a spent ball coming from the hillside--struck the bearer in the chest. Billy came to his knees, the great crimson folds about him. Cleave appeared in the red-lit murk. "Pick him up, Allan, and bring him away." It was almost dusk to the	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938402	green and rolling world about the field of Kernstown. Upon that field, beneath the sulphurous battle cloud, it was dusk indeed. The fighting line was everywhere, and for the Confederates there were no reinforcements. Fulkerson yet held the left, Garnett with conspicuous gallantry the centre with the Stonewall regiments. The batteries yet thundered upon the right. But ammunition was low,	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938403	and for three hours Ashby's mistake as to the enemy's numbers had received full demonstration. Shields's brigadiers did well and the blue soldiers did well. A body of troops coming from the wood and crowding through a gap in a stone fence descended upon the Rockbridge battery. Four regiments of the Stonewall brigade clung desperately to the great uneven field	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938404	which marked the centre. The musket barrels were burningly hot to the touch of the men, their fingers must grope for the cartridges rattling in the cartridge boxes, their weariness was horrible, their eyes were glazed, their lips baked with thirst. Long ago they had fought in a great, bright, glaring daytime; then again, long ago, they had begun to	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938405	fight in a period of dusk, an age of dusk. The men loaded, fired, loaded, rammed, fired quite automatically. They had been doing this for a long, long time. Probably they would do it for a long time to come. Only the cartridges were not automatically supplied. It even seemed that they might one day come to an end. The	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938406	dusk deepened. They had, beneath the red-lit battle clouds, a glimpse of Garnett, a general chivalric and loved, standing in his stirrups, looking out and upward toward the dark wood and Sullivan's fresh regiments. A sergeant came along the line stretching a haversack open with his hands. In it were cartridges. "I gathered all the dead had. 'T isn't many.	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938407	You've got to shoot to kill, boys!" A man with a ball through the end of his spine, lying not far from a hollow of the earth, half pool, half bog, began to cry aloud in an agonizing fashion. "Water! water! Oh, some one give me water! Water! For the love of God, water!" A grey soldier started out of	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938408	line toward him; in a second both were killed. Garnett settled down in his saddle and came back to the irregular, smoke-wreathed, swaying line. He spoke to his colonels. "There are three thousand fresh bayonets at the back of these woods. General Jackson does not wish a massacre. I will withdraw the brigade." The troops were ready to go. They	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938409	had held the centre very long; the cartridges were all but spent, the loss was heavy, they were deadly tired. They wanted water to drink and to hear the command, _Break ranks!_ Garnett was gallant and brave; they saw that he did what he did with reason, and their judgment acquiesced. There was momently a fresh foe. Without much alignment,	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938410	fighting in squads or singly, firing as they went from thicket and hollow at the heavy on-coming masses, the Stonewall Brigade fell back upon the wood to the south. The blue wave saw victory and burst into a shout of triumph. Kimbal's batteries, too, began a jubilant thunder. Over the field, from Fulkerson on the left to the broken centre	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938411	and the withdrawing troops came a raw-bone sorrel urged to a furious gallop; upon it a figure all dusk in the dusk, a Cromwell-Quixote of a man, angered now to a degree, with an eye like steel and a voice like ice. He rode up to Garnett, as though he would ride him down. "General Garnett, what are you doing?	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938412	Go back at once, sir!" As he spoke he threw himself from the saddle and closed his gauntleted hand with force on the arm of a drummer boy. "Beat the rally!" he commanded. The rapid and continuous rolling filled like a sound of the sea the ears of the Stonewall Brigade. Garnett, in a strange voice, gave the counter-order. The	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938413	men uttered a hard and painful gasp. They looked and saw Stonewall Jackson lifted above them, an iron figure in a storm of shot and shell. He jerked his hand into the air; he shouted, "Back, men! Give them the bayonet!" The drum beat on. Colonels and captains and lieutenants strove to aid him and to change the retreat into	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938414	an advance. In vain! the commands were shattered; the fighting line all broken and dispersed. The men did not shamefully flee; they retreated sullenly, staying here and there where there were yet cartridges, to fire upon the on-coming foe, but they continued to go back. The 5th and the 42d with Funsten's small cavalry command came hastening to the broken	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938415	centre and there made a desperate fight. The 5th Virginia and the 5th Ohio clanged shields. The 84th Pennsylvania broke twice, rallied twice, finally gave way. Two Indiana regiments came up; the 5th Virginia was flanked; other blue reinforcements poured in. The last grey commands gave way. Fulkerson, too, on the left, his right now uncovered, must leave his stone	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938416	fence and save his men as best he might. Rockbridge and Carpenter and Waters no longer thundered from the heights. The grey infantry, wildly scattered, came in a slow surge back through the woods where dead men lay among the spring flowers, and down the ridge and through the fields, grey and dank in the March twilight, toward the Valley	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938417	pike. Night and the lost battle weighed upon the army. The shadowy ambulances, the lights of the gatherers of the wounded flitting few and far over the smoke-clouded field, made for a ghastly depression. Sick at heart, in a daze of weariness, hunger and thirst, drunk with sleep, mad for rest, command by command stumbled down the pike or through	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938418	the fields to where, several miles to the south, stretched the meadows where their trains were parked. There was no pursuit. Woods and fields were rough and pathless; it was now dark night, and Ashby held the pike above. A camp-fire was built for Stonewall Jackson in a field to the right of the road, three miles from Kernstown. Here	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938419	he stood, summoned Garnett, and put him under arrest. The army understood next day that heavy charges would be preferred against this general. To right and left of the pike camp-fires flamed in the windy night. Passing one of these, Richard Cleave cut short some bewailing on the part of the ring about it. "Don't be so downcast, people! Sometimes	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938420	a defeat in one place equals a victory in another. I don't believe that General Banks will join General McClellan just now. Indeed, it's not impossible that McClellan will have to part with another division. Their government's dreadfully uneasy about Washington and the road to Washington. They didn't beat us easily, and if we can lead them up and down	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938421	this Valley for a while--I imagine that's what General Johnston wants, and what General Jackson will procure.--And now you'd better all go to sleep." "Where are you going, Cleave?" "To see about the colonel. They've just brought him to the farmhouse yonder. Dr. McGuire says he will get well--dear old Brooke!" He went, striding over the furrowed field past groups	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938422	of men sleeping and moaning as they slept. The stars were very bright in the clear, cold, windy night. He looked at them and thought of the battle and of the dead and the wounded, and of Judith and of his mother and sister, and of Will in the 2d, and of to-morrow's movements, and of Stonewall Jackson. A dark	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938423	figure came wandering up to him. It proved to be that of an old negro. "Marster, is you seen Marse Charlie?" "Marse Charlie whom, uncle?" "Marse Charlie Armetage, sah, mah young marster. I 'spec you done seed him? I 'spec he come marchin' wif you down de pike f'om dat damn battlefield? I sure would be 'bleeged ef you could	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938424	tell me, sah." "I wish I could," said Cleave, with gentleness. "I haven't seen him, but maybe some one else has." The old negro drew one hand through the other. "I's asked erbout fifty gent'men ... Reckon Marse Charlie so damn tired he jes' lain down somewhere an' gone ter sleep. Reckon he come down de pike in de mahnin',	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938425	shoutin' fer Daniel. Don' you reckon so, marster?" "It's not impossible, Daniel. Maybe you'll find him yet." "I 'specs ter," said Daniel. "I 'spec ter fin' him howsomever he's a-lyin'." He wandered off in the darkness, and Cleave heard him speaking to a picket, "Marster, is you seen Marse Charlie?" RUDE'S HILL Stonewall Jackson and his army in slow retreat	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938426	up the valley came, the second day after Kernstown, to the gorge of Cedar Creek. A bridge had once been here; there remained the blackened cross-timbers and a portion of the flooring. The water below was cold, deep, and rapid. Rather than breast it, the army made shift to cross on the charred wood. An infantry command, stepping gingerly, heard	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938427	behind it shots and shouts--a Federal cavalry charge upon the rear guard. Several of the men, listening too absorbedly, or not content with the present snail-like motion, suddenly left the timbers and entered the rough and swollen creek that poured beneath. Their exclamations in this berth were piteous, and their comrades fished them out with bayonets and laughter. Upon the	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938428	night of the 26th Banks's troopers occupied the northern shore of Tom's Brook. Ashby held the southern side, and held it fast. Behind that safe and vigilant and valiant screen the Army of the Valley moved quietly and in good spirits to the points its general had in mind. The army never knew what were these points until it found	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938429	itself actually upon the ground. It is morally certain that had he lived, a recalcitrant, in former days, no amount of _peine forte et dure_ would have opened the lips of Stonewall Jackson had he willed to keep them closed. During their earlier acquaintance officers and men alike had made many an ingenious endeavour to learn the plans they thought	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938430	they ought to know. They set quaint traps, they made innocent-seeming remarks, they guided right, they guided left, they blazed beautiful trails straight, they thought, to the moment of revelation. It never came. He walked past and around and over their traps. Inquisitive officers found themselves not only without a straw of information, but under displeasure. Brilliant leading remarks shone	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938431	a moment by their own brilliancy, then went out. The troops conjectured one road--they went by another; natives described the beauties of the village before which they were sure to break ranks--at eve they experienced the hospitalities of quite another town. Generals in the ranks demonstrated that they were going to turn on Shields, or that they were going east	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938432	by the old Manassas Gap and whip Geary, or northeast and whip Abercrombie. They did none of the three. They marched on up the valley to Rude's Hill near Mount Jackson. About this time, or a little later, men and officers gave it up, began to admire, and to follow blindly. A sergeant, one evening, put it to his mess.	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938433	"If we don't know, then Banks and Shields and Fremont and Milroy and McClellan and Lincoln and Stanton don't know, either!" The mess grew thoughtful; presently it took the pipe from its mouth to answer, "Dog-gone it, Martin, that's true! Never saw it just that way before." Rude's Hill formed a strong natural position. There was water, there were woods,	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938434	there was an excellent space for a drill-ground. Jackson's directions as to drill-grounds were always characteristically explicit. "_Major: You will see that a camp is chosen where there are wood, water, and a drill-ground--_" emphasis on the drill-ground. At Rude's Hill they drilled and drilled and drilled. Every morning rang out adjutant's call, every morning there were infantry evolutions, artillery	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938435	evolutions. The artillery had some respite, for, turn by turn, the sections went forward ten miles to do picket duty for Ashby, Chew's Horse Artillery being continually engaged with the Federal outposts. But the infantry drilled on, drilled and wondered at Banks. One week--two weeks!--and the general in blue with nineteen thousand men still on the farther side of Tom's	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938436	Brook! Despite the drilling the Army of the Valley had a good time at Rude's Hill. Below brawled the Shenandoah, just to the east sprang the Massanuttens. There was much rain, but, day by day, through the silver veil or the shattered golden light, lovelier and more lovely grew the spring. The army liked to see her coming. In its	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938437	heart it felt a springtime, too; a gush of hope and ardour. The men hardly counted Kernstown a defeat. It was known that Old Jack had said to one of the aides, "I may say that I am satisfied, sir." And Congress had thanked the Army of the Valley. And all the newspapers sang its praises. The battle of Pea	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938438	Ridge in Arkansas, the shelling of Newbern in North Carolina, the exploits of the Merrimac in Hampton Roads, the battle of Kernstown in the Valley--so at the moment ran the newspapers. And day by day recruits were coming in; comrades as well who had been in hospital or home on furlough. In that fortnight the Army of the Valley grew	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938439	to number nearly six thousand men. At Rude's Hill there was an election of company officers. The proceedings--amazing enough to the professional soldier--put into camp life three days of excitement and salt. Given a people of strong political proclivities suddenly turned soldier; given human grudges and likings, admirations and contempts; given the ballot in military as in civil life; given	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938440	a chance to inject champagne into the ennui of camp existence, and in lieu of gun practice to send off sky-rockets and catherine wheels; given a warm personal interest in each private's bosom as to whom, for the next twelfth month (if the war lasted that long), he was going to obey--and there resulted a shattering of monotony comparable to	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938441	a pitched battle. The elections were held in beautiful, vernal groves. That there would be changes it was believed; change was in the air! For days beforehand the character for conduct, courage, and general agreeableness of every man who wore three bars on his collar, or two, or one, or who carried chevrons of silk or chevrons of worsted, had	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938442	been strictly in the zone of fire. Certain officers nearing certain camp-fires felt caucuses dissolving at their approach into an innocence of debating societies engaged with Fabius Maximus or Scipio Africanus. Certain sergeants and corporals dreamed bars instead of chevrons, and certain high privates, conscious of merit, saw worsted chevrons, silk chevrons, and gold bars all in one blissful night.	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938443	But when election day dawned bright and clear, with a fine chorus of birds and an especial performance by the regimental bands, when roll call was over, and camp duties were over, and morning drill was over (no relaxation here! There was only one day in the week on which Old Jack let up on drill, and that wasn't election	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938444	day!) and the pickets had reluctantly marched away, leaving their votes behind them, and a section of artillery had gone off, swearing, to relieve Chew, and the men could at last get down to work, to happy babbling, happy speechifying, happy minding the polls, and when in the cool of the afternoon the returns were announced, there were fewer changes	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938445	than had been predicted. After all, most of the officers were satisfactory; why let them down with a jolt? And the privates were satisfactory, too. Why take a capital comrade, a good cook and forager and story-teller, and make him uncomfortable by turning him into an officer? He was nice enough as he was. Not that there were no alterations.	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938446	Several companies had new captains, some lieutenants stepped down, and there was a shifting of non-commissioned officers. In Company A of the 65th Lieutenant Mathew Coffin lost out. The men wished to put up Allan Gold for the lieutenancy, but Allan declined. He had rather, he said, be scout than lieutenant--and what was the use in changing, anyhow? Lieutenant Coffin	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938447	was all right. Hadn't he been as brave as a lion at Kernstown--and any man is liable to lose his temper at times--and wouldn't we hate him to have to write back to that young lady at home--? The last plea almost settled it, for the Confederate heart might be trusted to melt at the mention of any young lady	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938448	at home. But all the Thunder Run men were against Coffin, and Thunder Run turned the scale. In the main, however, throughout the army, company officers were retained, and retained because they were efficient. The election was first-rate fun, and the men cheered the returns, then listened to the orders of the evening from the same old bars and chevrons.	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938449	The sun went down on a veritable love feast--special rations, special music, special fires, and, between supper and tattoo, an entertainment in each regiment. The 65th had a beautiful programme, its debating and literary societies, its glee clubs, chess and checker circles, old sledge associations, Thespians and Greek Letter men all joining forces. The stage was a piece of earth,	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938450	purple brown with pine needles. Two huge fires, one at either side, made a strong, copper-red illumination. The soldier audience sat in a deep semicircle, and sat at ease, being accustomed by now to the posture of tailor or Turk. Only recruits sought logs or stones upon which to sit. Tobacco smoke rose like incense. The chief musician "sounded on	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938451	the bugle horn." The Glee Club of Company C filed on the stage with three banjos and two guitars, bowed elegantly, and sang the "Bonny Blue Flag." The applause was thunderous. A large bearded man in the front row lifted a voice that boomed like one of Ashby's cannon. "Encore! Encore!" Company C sang "Listen to the Mocking Bird." The	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938452	audience gently sighed, took the pipe from its lips, and joined in-- "Listen to the mocking bird--Listen to the mocking bird.... The mocking bird still singing o'er her grave. Listen to the mocking bird--Listen to the mocking bird.... Still singing where the weeping willows wave." The pine trees took it up, and the hazel copses and the hurrying Shenandoah. "Twas	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938453	in the mild September--September--September, And the mocking bird was singing far and wide." "_Far and wide_.... That's grand, but it sure is gloomy. Next!" The chief musician, having a carrying voice, made announcements. "No. . Debate. Which will first recognize the Confederacy, England or France? With the historic reasons for both doing so. England, Sergeant Smith. France, Sergeant Duval.--The audience	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938454	is not expected to participate in the debate otherwise than judicially, at the close." The close saw it decided by a rising vote that England would come first--Sergeant Smith, indeed, who chanced to be a professor of belles-lettres at a great school, having declared, with the gesture of Saint John on Patmos, that he saw approaching our shores a white	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938455	winged ship bearing her declaration of amity. "No. ," intoned the first musician. "Recitation by Private Edwin Horsemanden." Private Edwin Horsemanden gave the title of his selection, a poetic selection. Some of his fellow privates looked puzzled. "'Oz Etaliahn?'--What does 'Oz Etaliahn' mean? Cherokee or Choctaw, which? Explain it to us, Eddy. Is it something to eat--or to drink? ''T	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938456	is true, 'tis pity, 'tis pity 'tis 'tis true'--but most of us never went to college!... Oh, an opera house!--In Paris, do you say? Go on, Eddy, go on!" "At Paris it was, at the opera there,-- And she looked like a queen in a book that night--" "Never saw one out of a book, did you?... Yes, I saw	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938457	a gypsy queen once.... And the queen of the circus.... There's a man in Company D once saw the queen of England, saw her just as plain! She was wearing a scoop bonnet with pink roses around her face.... Sh! Shh!" "Of all the operas that Verdi wrote." "Who's Verdi?" "The best, to my taste, is the 'Trovatore.'" "'Trovatore?' Eddy,	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938458	isn't that the serenading fellow who goes on singing till they hang him? Oh, Lord, yes! And the anvil chorus! The anvil chorus comes in there. Go on, Eddy. We feel perfectly at home." "And Mario" "Hm! stumped again." "can sooth with a tenor note The souls in Purgatory." The large bearded man was up once more. "I rise to	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938459	object. There isn't any such place. The com--commanding general'll put him in irons for misrepresenting the sidereal system. There's only heaven, hell, and the enemy.--_Yaaaaih, Yaai.... Yaaai, yaaaah, yaaaaih!_ Certainly, sergeant. The pleasure is mine, sir. Don't mention it, I beg. Mum's the word!" "The moon on the tower slept soft as snow"-- "Gee-whiz! what a snowball! Didn't the tower	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938460	break down? No! You amaze me. Go on, Eddy, go on. We know the natural feelings of a sophomore." "And who was not thrilled in the strangest way As we heard him sing, while the gas burned low, '_Non ti scordar di me?_'" "What's that? Wait a minute, Eddy! Let's get the words. I always did want a chance at	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938461	German.--Now you say them slowly and we'll repeat.... Why, man alive, you ought to be proud of your linguistic accomplishments!... Well, I'll begin, and we'll fire by platoons. "Non ti scordar di me?--" "Attention! Company A!" "Non ti scordar di me?-- Non ti scordar di me?" "Very good! We'll get the meaning after we learn the words. Company B!" "Non	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938462	ti scordar di me?" "Well roared, Bottom! Company C!" "Non ti scordar di me?" "Look out, or General Banks'll be sending over Tom's Brook to know what's the matter! Company D!" "Non ti scordar di me?" "Company D goes to the head of the class! Company E!" "Non ti scordar di me?" "'Ware pine cones! Company E's shaking them down....	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938463	This class's getting too big. Let's all learn the words together, so's Private Horsemanden can go on with his piece! Attention, 65th! Make ready! Take aim! Fire!" "NON TI SCORDAR DI ME?" "Now Eddy.... Oh, yes, you go on! You aren't going to cheat us that way. We want to know what happened when they stopped talking German! Hasn't anything	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938464	happened yet." "Non ti--" "Sh! Go on, Eddy boy, and tell us exactly what occurred." Private Edwin Horsemanden had pluck as well as sentiment, and he went on. Moreover he had his revenge, for at bottom the 65th was itself tender-hearted, not to say sentimental. It believed in lost loves and lost blossoms, muslin dresses, and golden chains, cypress shades	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938465	and jasmine flowers, "And the one bird singing alone to his nest, And the one star over the tower." The 65th sighed and propped its chin on its hand. Presently the 65th grew misty-eyed. "Then I smelt the smell of that jasmine flower She used to wear in her breast It smelt so faint and it smelt so sweet.--" The	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938466	pipe dropped from the 65th's hand. It sat sorry and pleased. Private Edwin Horsemanden went on without interruption and finished with eclat. The chief musician cleared his throat. "The Glee Club of Company H will now--" The Glee Club of Company H was a large and popular organization. It took the stage amid applause. The leader bowed. "Gentlemen, we thank	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938467	you. Gentlemen, you have just listened to a beautiful novelty--a pretty little foreign song bird brought by the trade-wind, an English nightingale singing in Virginian forests.--Gentlemen, the Glee Club of Company H will give you what by now is devil a bit of a novelty--what promises to be as old as the hills before we have done with it--what our	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938468	grandchildren's grandchildren may sing with pride--what to the end of time will carry with it a breath of our armies. Gentlemen, the Glee Club of Company H gives you the Marseillaise of the South. _Attention!_" "Way down South in the land of cotton, 'Simmon seed and sandy bottom--" The 65th rose to its feet. Its neighbour to the right was	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938469	the 2d Virginia, encamped in a great open field; to the left the 5th, occupying a grove of oaks. These regiments were busied with their own genial hour, but when the loudly sung air streamed across from the 65th they suspended their work in hand. They also sung "Dixie." Thence it was taken up by the 4th and the 33d,	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938470	and then it spread to Burk and Fulkerson. The batteries held the top of Rude's Hill, up among the night wind and the stars. The artillerymen took the air from the infantry. Headquarters was situated on the green bank of the Shenandoah. Staff and couriers and orderlies hummed or sang. Stonewall Jackson came to the door of his tent and	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938471	stood, looking out. All Rude's Hill throbbed to "Dixie." On went the programme. "Marco Bozzaris" was well spoken. A blacksmith and a mule driver wrestled for a prize. "Marmion Quitting the Douglas's Hall" was followed by "Lula, Lula, Lula is Gone," and "Lula" by "Lorena," and "Lorena" by a fencing match. The Thespians played capitally an act from "The Rivals,"	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938472	and a man who had seen Macready gave Hamlet's Soliloquy. Then they sang a song lately written by James Randall and already very popular,-- "I hear the distant thunder hum, Maryland! The Old Line bugle, fife and drum--" An orderly from headquarters found Richard Cleave. "General Jackson wishes to see you, sir." The general's tent was not large. There were	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938473	a table and two stools, on one of which sat Jackson in his characteristic position, large feet accurately paralleled. On the table, beside the candle, lay three books--the Bible, a dictionary, and "Napoleon's Maxims." Jackson was writing, his hand travelling slowly across a sheet of dim blue, lined, official paper. The door flap of the tent was fastened back. Cleave,	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938474	standing in the opening, saluted. "Take a seat, sir," said the general, and went on to the end of his page. Having here signed his name, he dropped the quill and slightly turned so as to face the waiting officer. From under his high bronzed forehead his blue eyes looked quietly upon Cleave. The younger man returned the gaze as	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938475	quietly. This was the first time he had been thus summoned since that unlucky winter evening at Bloomery Gap. He remembered that evening, and he did not suppose that his general had forgotten it. He did not suppose that Jackson forgot anything. But apparently it was no longer to be counted against him. Jackson's face wore the quiet, friendly, somewhat	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938476	sweet expression usual to it when all was calm within. As for Cleave himself, his nature owned a certain primal flow and bigness. There were few fixed and rigid barriers. Injured pride and resentment did not lift themselves into reefs against which the mind must break in torment. Rather, his being swept fluid, making no great account of obstacles, accepting	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938477	all turns of affairs, drawing them into its main current, and moving onward toward some goal, hardly self-conjectured, but simple, humane, and universal. The anger he might have felt at Bloomery Gap had long passed away. He sat now attentive, collected, broad-browed, and quiet. "Major Cleave," said Jackson, "you will take an orderly with you and ride across the mountains.	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938478	General Ewell is at Gordonsville with a somewhat larger force than my own. You will take this letter to him," he folded it as he spoke, "and you will talk to him as one intelligent man to another." "Do you mean, sir, that I am to answer his questions?" "Yes, sir. To the best of your ability. There is impending	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938479	a junction between General Ewell and myself. He wishes to know many things, and seems to think it natural that I should tell him them. I am not a great letter writer. You will give him all the information that is common to the army." Cleave smiled. "That, sir, is not a great deal." "Perhaps it is not, sir. You	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938480	are at liberty to give to General Ewell your own observations and expectations. You will, however, represent them as your own." "May I ask, sir, when this junction is to occur?" "I have not decided, sir." "Does General Ewell know when it will occur?" "Not precisely. He will be told in good time." "Whether, when you move, you move north	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938481	or west or south or east, is, I suppose, sir, purely a matter of conjecture?" "Purely, sir." "But the _morale_ of the army, its efficiency and spirit, may be freely praised and imparted?" "Yes, sir, freely. Upon your return I shall want from you your impression of General Ewell and the troops he commands." He drew toward him a map	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938482	which lay on the table. "You will ride through Massanutton Gap by Conrad's Store and Swift Run Gap. Thence you will make a detour to Charlottesville. There are stores there that I wish reported upon and sent on to Major Harman at Staunton. You will spend one day upon that business, then go on to Ewell." CLEAVE AND JUDITH The	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938483	hospital at Charlottesville, unlovely and lovely, ghastly and vital, brutal, spiritual, a hell of pain and weakness, another region of endeavour and helpfulness, a place of horror, and also of strange smiling, even of faint laughter, a country as chill as death and as warm as love--the hospital at Charlottesville saw the weary morning grow to weary noon, the weary	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938484	noon change toward the weary latter day. The women who nursed the soldiers said that it was lovely outside, and that all the peach trees were in bloom. "We'll raise you a little higher," they said, "and you can see for yourself. And look! here is your broth, so good and strengthening! And did you hear? We won on the	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938485	Peninsula to-day!" At four o'clock Judith Cary gave to another her place beside a typhoid pallet and came out into the emerald and rose, the freshness and fragrance of the spring. The Greenwood carriage was waiting. "We'll go, Isham," said Judith, "by the University for Miss Lucy." Isham held open the door. "No'm, Miss Judith. Miss Lucy done sont wuhd	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938486	dat de ladies'll be cuttin' out nuniforms clean 'twel dark. She say don' wait fer her--Mrs. Carter'll bring her home." Judith entered the carriage. An old acquaintance, passing, paused to speak to her. "Isn't there a greater stir than usual?" she asked. "Some of General Ewell's men are over from Gordonsville. There goes General Dick Taylor now--the one in grey	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938487	and white! He's a son, you know, of Zachary--Old Rough and Ready. General Jackson, too, has an officer here to-day, checking the stores that came from Richmond.--How is it at the hospital?" "It is very bad," said Judith. "When the bands begin to play I laugh and cry like all the rest, and I wave and clap my hands, and	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938488	I would fight on and on like the rest of you, and I do not see that, given people as they are, the war could have been avoided, and I would die to win, and I am, I hope, a patriot--and yet I do not see any sense in it! It hurts me as I think it may hurt the	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938489	earth. She would like, I believe, something better than being a battlefield.--There is music again! Yesterday a man died, crying for the band to hush. He said it drowned something he needed to hear." "Yes, yes," replied her friend, nodding his head. "That is perfectly true. That is very true, indeed!--That band's coming from the station. They're looking for a	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938490	regiment from Richmond.--That's a good band! What are they playing--?" "Bright flowers spring from the hero's grave, The craven knows no rest,-- Thrice cursed the traitor and the knave, The hero thrice is blessed--" The Greenwood carriage rolled out of the town into the April country. The fruit trees were in bloom, the woods feathering green, the quiet and the	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938491	golden light inestimable after the moaning wards. The carriage went slowly, for the roads were heavy; moreover the former carriage horses were gone to the war. These were two from the farm, somewhat old and stiff, willing, but plodders. They went half asleep in the soft sunshine, and Isham on the box went half asleep too. Judith would have been	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938492	willing to sleep, but she could not. She sat with her gaze upon the fair spring woods and the amethystine hills rising to blue skies. The carriage stopped. Isham bent down from the box. "Miss Judith, honey, er gent'man's on de road behin' us, ridin' ter overtek de kerridge." "Wait for him, then," said Judith. "There is some message, perhaps."	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938493	While they waited she sat with folded hands, her eyes upon the purple hills, her thoughts away from Albemarle. The sound that Isham made of surprise and satisfaction did not reach her. Until she saw Cleave's face at the window she thought him somewhere in the Valley--fighting, fighting! in battle and danger, perhaps, that very day. Her eyes widened, her	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938494	face had the hush of dawn; it was turned toward him, but she sat perfectly still, without speaking. Only the door was between them, the glass down. He rested his clasped hands on the ledge, and his dark, moved face looked in upon her. "Judith," he said, "I did not know.--I thought it was one of the others.... I hope	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938495	that you are a little glad to see me." Judith looked at him a moment longer, then swayed a little forward. She bent her head. Her cheek touched his clasped hands, he felt her kiss upon them, and her forehead resting there. There was a moment's silence, deep, breathless, then Cleave spoke. "Judith ... Am I mad?" "I believe that	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938496	you love me," she said. "If you do not, it does not matter.... I have loved you for two years." "Maury Stafford?" "I have never believed that you understood--though what it was that made you misunderstand I have never guessed.... There is no Maury Stafford. There never was." He opened the door. "Come out," he said. "Come out with me	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938497	into the light. Send the carriage on." She did so. The road was quiet, deserted, a wide bright path between the evening hills. Dundee following them, they walked a little way until they came to a great rock, sunk in the velvet sward that edged a wood. Here they sat down, the gold light bathing them, behind them fairy vistas,	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938498	fountains of living green, stars of the dogwood and purple sprays of Judas tree. "How I misunderstood is no matter now," said Cleave. "I love you, and you say that you love me. Thank God for it!" They sat with clasped hands, their cheeks touching, their breath mingling. "Judith, Judith, how lovely are you! I have seen you always, always!...	60	gutenberg
twg_000012938499	Only I called it 'vision,' 'ideal.' At the top of every deed I have seen your eyes; from the height of every thought you have beckoned further! Now--now--It is like a wonderful home-coming ... and yet you are still there, above the mountains, beckoning, drawing--There and here, here in my arms!... Judith--What does 'Judith' mean?" "It means 'praised.' Oh, Richard,	60	gutenberg

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them!" Billy chanted on, "I ain't a-goin' to quit! I put it here jest like I was putting a hop pole in Christianna's garden, and I ain't a-goin' to dig it up again--" Dave appeared. "Billy boy, don't be such a damned fool! You jest skeedaddle with the rest of us and take it out of them next time. Don't

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ye want to see Christianna again, an' maw an' the dogs?--Thar, now!" A bullet split the standard, another--a spent ball coming from the hillside--struck the bearer in the chest. Billy came to his knees, the great crimson folds about him. Cleave appeared in the red-lit murk. "Pick him up, Allan, and bring him away." It was almost dusk to the

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green and rolling world about the field of Kernstown. Upon that field, beneath the sulphurous battle cloud, it was dusk indeed. The fighting line was everywhere, and for the Confederates there were no reinforcements. Fulkerson yet held the left, Garnett with conspicuous gallantry the centre with the Stonewall regiments. The batteries yet thundered upon the right. But ammunition was low,

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and for three hours Ashby's mistake as to the enemy's numbers had received full demonstration. Shields's brigadiers did well and the blue soldiers did well. A body of troops coming from the wood and crowding through a gap in a stone fence descended upon the Rockbridge battery. Four regiments of the Stonewall brigade clung desperately to the great uneven field

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which marked the centre. The musket barrels were burningly hot to the touch of the men, their fingers must grope for the cartridges rattling in the cartridge boxes, their weariness was horrible, their eyes were glazed, their lips baked with thirst. Long ago they had fought in a great, bright, glaring daytime; then again, long ago, they had begun to

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fight in a period of dusk, an age of dusk. The men loaded, fired, loaded, rammed, fired quite automatically. They had been doing this for a long, long time. Probably they would do it for a long time to come. Only the cartridges were not automatically supplied. It even seemed that they might one day come to an end. The

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dusk deepened. They had, beneath the red-lit battle clouds, a glimpse of Garnett, a general chivalric and loved, standing in his stirrups, looking out and upward toward the dark wood and Sullivan's fresh regiments. A sergeant came along the line stretching a haversack open with his hands. In it were cartridges. "I gathered all the dead had. 'T isn't many.

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You've got to shoot to kill, boys!" A man with a ball through the end of his spine, lying not far from a hollow of the earth, half pool, half bog, began to cry aloud in an agonizing fashion. "Water! water! Oh, some one give me water! Water! For the love of God, water!" A grey soldier started out of

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line toward him; in a second both were killed. Garnett settled down in his saddle and came back to the irregular, smoke-wreathed, swaying line. He spoke to his colonels. "There are three thousand fresh bayonets at the back of these woods. General Jackson does not wish a massacre. I will withdraw the brigade." The troops were ready to go. They

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had held the centre very long; the cartridges were all but spent, the loss was heavy, they were deadly tired. They wanted water to drink and to hear the command, _Break ranks!_ Garnett was gallant and brave; they saw that he did what he did with reason, and their judgment acquiesced. There was momently a fresh foe. Without much alignment,

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fighting in squads or singly, firing as they went from thicket and hollow at the heavy on-coming masses, the Stonewall Brigade fell back upon the wood to the south. The blue wave saw victory and burst into a shout of triumph. Kimbal's batteries, too, began a jubilant thunder. Over the field, from Fulkerson on the left to the broken centre

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and the withdrawing troops came a raw-bone sorrel urged to a furious gallop; upon it a figure all dusk in the dusk, a Cromwell-Quixote of a man, angered now to a degree, with an eye like steel and a voice like ice. He rode up to Garnett, as though he would ride him down. "General Garnett, what are you doing?

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Go back at once, sir!" As he spoke he threw himself from the saddle and closed his gauntleted hand with force on the arm of a drummer boy. "Beat the rally!" he commanded. The rapid and continuous rolling filled like a sound of the sea the ears of the Stonewall Brigade. Garnett, in a strange voice, gave the counter-order. The

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men uttered a hard and painful gasp. They looked and saw Stonewall Jackson lifted above them, an iron figure in a storm of shot and shell. He jerked his hand into the air; he shouted, "Back, men! Give them the bayonet!" The drum beat on. Colonels and captains and lieutenants strove to aid him and to change the retreat into

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an advance. In vain! the commands were shattered; the fighting line all broken and dispersed. The men did not shamefully flee; they retreated sullenly, staying here and there where there were yet cartridges, to fire upon the on-coming foe, but they continued to go back. The 5th and the 42d with Funsten's small cavalry command came hastening to the broken

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centre and there made a desperate fight. The 5th Virginia and the 5th Ohio clanged shields. The 84th Pennsylvania broke twice, rallied twice, finally gave way. Two Indiana regiments came up; the 5th Virginia was flanked; other blue reinforcements poured in. The last grey commands gave way. Fulkerson, too, on the left, his right now uncovered, must leave his stone

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fence and save his men as best he might. Rockbridge and Carpenter and Waters no longer thundered from the heights. The grey infantry, wildly scattered, came in a slow surge back through the woods where dead men lay among the spring flowers, and down the ridge and through the fields, grey and dank in the March twilight, toward the Valley

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pike. Night and the lost battle weighed upon the army. The shadowy ambulances, the lights of the gatherers of the wounded flitting few and far over the smoke-clouded field, made for a ghastly depression. Sick at heart, in a daze of weariness, hunger and thirst, drunk with sleep, mad for rest, command by command stumbled down the pike or through

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the fields to where, several miles to the south, stretched the meadows where their trains were parked. There was no pursuit. Woods and fields were rough and pathless; it was now dark night, and Ashby held the pike above. A camp-fire was built for Stonewall Jackson in a field to the right of the road, three miles from Kernstown. Here

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he stood, summoned Garnett, and put him under arrest. The army understood next day that heavy charges would be preferred against this general. To right and left of the pike camp-fires flamed in the windy night. Passing one of these, Richard Cleave cut short some bewailing on the part of the ring about it. "Don't be so downcast, people! Sometimes

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a defeat in one place equals a victory in another. I don't believe that General Banks will join General McClellan just now. Indeed, it's not impossible that McClellan will have to part with another division. Their government's dreadfully uneasy about Washington and the road to Washington. They didn't beat us easily, and if we can lead them up and down

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this Valley for a while--I imagine that's what General Johnston wants, and what General Jackson will procure.--And now you'd better all go to sleep." "Where are you going, Cleave?" "To see about the colonel. They've just brought him to the farmhouse yonder. Dr. McGuire says he will get well--dear old Brooke!" He went, striding over the furrowed field past groups

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of men sleeping and moaning as they slept. The stars were very bright in the clear, cold, windy night. He looked at them and thought of the battle and of the dead and the wounded, and of Judith and of his mother and sister, and of Will in the 2d, and of to-morrow's movements, and of Stonewall Jackson. A dark

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figure came wandering up to him. It proved to be that of an old negro. "Marster, is you seen Marse Charlie?" "Marse Charlie whom, uncle?" "Marse Charlie Armetage, sah, mah young marster. I 'spec you done seed him? I 'spec he come marchin' wif you down de pike f'om dat damn battlefield? I sure would be 'bleeged ef you could

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tell me, sah." "I wish I could," said Cleave, with gentleness. "I haven't seen him, but maybe some one else has." The old negro drew one hand through the other. "I's asked erbout fifty gent'men ... Reckon Marse Charlie so damn tired he jes' lain down somewhere an' gone ter sleep. Reckon he come down de pike in de mahnin',

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shoutin' fer Daniel. Don' you reckon so, marster?" "It's not impossible, Daniel. Maybe you'll find him yet." "I 'specs ter," said Daniel. "I 'spec ter fin' him howsomever he's a-lyin'." He wandered off in the darkness, and Cleave heard him speaking to a picket, "Marster, is you seen Marse Charlie?" RUDE'S HILL Stonewall Jackson and his army in slow retreat

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up the valley came, the second day after Kernstown, to the gorge of Cedar Creek. A bridge had once been here; there remained the blackened cross-timbers and a portion of the flooring. The water below was cold, deep, and rapid. Rather than breast it, the army made shift to cross on the charred wood. An infantry command, stepping gingerly, heard

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behind it shots and shouts--a Federal cavalry charge upon the rear guard. Several of the men, listening too absorbedly, or not content with the present snail-like motion, suddenly left the timbers and entered the rough and swollen creek that poured beneath. Their exclamations in this berth were piteous, and their comrades fished them out with bayonets and laughter. Upon the

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night of the 26th Banks's troopers occupied the northern shore of Tom's Brook. Ashby held the southern side, and held it fast. Behind that safe and vigilant and valiant screen the Army of the Valley moved quietly and in good spirits to the points its general had in mind. The army never knew what were these points until it found

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itself actually upon the ground. It is morally certain that had he lived, a recalcitrant, in former days, no amount of _peine forte et dure_ would have opened the lips of Stonewall Jackson had he willed to keep them closed. During their earlier acquaintance officers and men alike had made many an ingenious endeavour to learn the plans they thought

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they ought to know. They set quaint traps, they made innocent-seeming remarks, they guided right, they guided left, they blazed beautiful trails straight, they thought, to the moment of revelation. It never came. He walked past and around and over their traps. Inquisitive officers found themselves not only without a straw of information, but under displeasure. Brilliant leading remarks shone

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a moment by their own brilliancy, then went out. The troops conjectured one road--they went by another; natives described the beauties of the village before which they were sure to break ranks--at eve they experienced the hospitalities of quite another town. Generals in the ranks demonstrated that they were going to turn on Shields, or that they were going east

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by the old Manassas Gap and whip Geary, or northeast and whip Abercrombie. They did none of the three. They marched on up the valley to Rude's Hill near Mount Jackson. About this time, or a little later, men and officers gave it up, began to admire, and to follow blindly. A sergeant, one evening, put it to his mess.

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"If we don't know, then Banks and Shields and Fremont and Milroy and McClellan and Lincoln and Stanton don't know, either!" The mess grew thoughtful; presently it took the pipe from its mouth to answer, "Dog-gone it, Martin, that's true! Never saw it just that way before." Rude's Hill formed a strong natural position. There was water, there were woods,

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there was an excellent space for a drill-ground. Jackson's directions as to drill-grounds were always characteristically explicit. "_Major: You will see that a camp is chosen where there are wood, water, and a drill-ground--_" emphasis on the drill-ground. At Rude's Hill they drilled and drilled and drilled. Every morning rang out adjutant's call, every morning there were infantry evolutions, artillery

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evolutions. The artillery had some respite, for, turn by turn, the sections went forward ten miles to do picket duty for Ashby, Chew's Horse Artillery being continually engaged with the Federal outposts. But the infantry drilled on, drilled and wondered at Banks. One week--two weeks!--and the general in blue with nineteen thousand men still on the farther side of Tom's

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Brook! Despite the drilling the Army of the Valley had a good time at Rude's Hill. Below brawled the Shenandoah, just to the east sprang the Massanuttens. There was much rain, but, day by day, through the silver veil or the shattered golden light, lovelier and more lovely grew the spring. The army liked to see her coming. In its

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heart it felt a springtime, too; a gush of hope and ardour. The men hardly counted Kernstown a defeat. It was known that Old Jack had said to one of the aides, "I may say that I am satisfied, sir." And Congress had thanked the Army of the Valley. And all the newspapers sang its praises. The battle of Pea

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Ridge in Arkansas, the shelling of Newbern in North Carolina, the exploits of the Merrimac in Hampton Roads, the battle of Kernstown in the Valley--so at the moment ran the newspapers. And day by day recruits were coming in; comrades as well who had been in hospital or home on furlough. In that fortnight the Army of the Valley grew

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to number nearly six thousand men. At Rude's Hill there was an election of company officers. The proceedings--amazing enough to the professional soldier--put into camp life three days of excitement and salt. Given a people of strong political proclivities suddenly turned soldier; given human grudges and likings, admirations and contempts; given the ballot in military as in civil life; given

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a chance to inject champagne into the ennui of camp existence, and in lieu of gun practice to send off sky-rockets and catherine wheels; given a warm personal interest in each private's bosom as to whom, for the next twelfth month (if the war lasted that long), he was going to obey--and there resulted a shattering of monotony comparable to

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a pitched battle. The elections were held in beautiful, vernal groves. That there would be changes it was believed; change was in the air! For days beforehand the character for conduct, courage, and general agreeableness of every man who wore three bars on his collar, or two, or one, or who carried chevrons of silk or chevrons of worsted, had

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been strictly in the zone of fire. Certain officers nearing certain camp-fires felt caucuses dissolving at their approach into an innocence of debating societies engaged with Fabius Maximus or Scipio Africanus. Certain sergeants and corporals dreamed bars instead of chevrons, and certain high privates, conscious of merit, saw worsted chevrons, silk chevrons, and gold bars all in one blissful night.

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But when election day dawned bright and clear, with a fine chorus of birds and an especial performance by the regimental bands, when roll call was over, and camp duties were over, and morning drill was over (no relaxation here! There was only one day in the week on which Old Jack let up on drill, and that wasn't election

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day!) and the pickets had reluctantly marched away, leaving their votes behind them, and a section of artillery had gone off, swearing, to relieve Chew, and the men could at last get down to work, to happy babbling, happy speechifying, happy minding the polls, and when in the cool of the afternoon the returns were announced, there were fewer changes

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than had been predicted. After all, most of the officers were satisfactory; why let them down with a jolt? And the privates were satisfactory, too. Why take a capital comrade, a good cook and forager and story-teller, and make him uncomfortable by turning him into an officer? He was nice enough as he was. Not that there were no alterations.

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Several companies had new captains, some lieutenants stepped down, and there was a shifting of non-commissioned officers. In Company A of the 65th Lieutenant Mathew Coffin lost out. The men wished to put up Allan Gold for the lieutenancy, but Allan declined. He had rather, he said, be scout than lieutenant--and what was the use in changing, anyhow? Lieutenant Coffin

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was all right. Hadn't he been as brave as a lion at Kernstown--and any man is liable to lose his temper at times--and wouldn't we hate him to have to write back to that young lady at home--? The last plea almost settled it, for the Confederate heart might be trusted to melt at the mention of any young lady

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at home. But all the Thunder Run men were against Coffin, and Thunder Run turned the scale. In the main, however, throughout the army, company officers were retained, and retained because they were efficient. The election was first-rate fun, and the men cheered the returns, then listened to the orders of the evening from the same old bars and chevrons.

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The sun went down on a veritable love feast--special rations, special music, special fires, and, between supper and tattoo, an entertainment in each regiment. The 65th had a beautiful programme, its debating and literary societies, its glee clubs, chess and checker circles, old sledge associations, Thespians and Greek Letter men all joining forces. The stage was a piece of earth,

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purple brown with pine needles. Two huge fires, one at either side, made a strong, copper-red illumination. The soldier audience sat in a deep semicircle, and sat at ease, being accustomed by now to the posture of tailor or Turk. Only recruits sought logs or stones upon which to sit. Tobacco smoke rose like incense. The chief musician "sounded on

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the bugle horn." The Glee Club of Company C filed on the stage with three banjos and two guitars, bowed elegantly, and sang the "Bonny Blue Flag." The applause was thunderous. A large bearded man in the front row lifted a voice that boomed like one of Ashby's cannon. "Encore! Encore!" Company C sang "Listen to the Mocking Bird." The

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audience gently sighed, took the pipe from its lips, and joined in-- "Listen to the mocking bird--Listen to the mocking bird.... The mocking bird still singing o'er her grave. Listen to the mocking bird--Listen to the mocking bird.... Still singing where the weeping willows wave." The pine trees took it up, and the hazel copses and the hurrying Shenandoah. "Twas

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in the mild September--September--September, And the mocking bird was singing far and wide." "_Far and wide_.... That's grand, but it sure is gloomy. Next!" The chief musician, having a carrying voice, made announcements. "No. . Debate. Which will first recognize the Confederacy, England or France? With the historic reasons for both doing so. England, Sergeant Smith. France, Sergeant Duval.--The audience

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is not expected to participate in the debate otherwise than judicially, at the close." The close saw it decided by a rising vote that England would come first--Sergeant Smith, indeed, who chanced to be a professor of belles-lettres at a great school, having declared, with the gesture of Saint John on Patmos, that he saw approaching our shores a white

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winged ship bearing her declaration of amity. "No. ," intoned the first musician. "Recitation by Private Edwin Horsemanden." Private Edwin Horsemanden gave the title of his selection, a poetic selection. Some of his fellow privates looked puzzled. "'Oz Etaliahn?'--What does 'Oz Etaliahn' mean? Cherokee or Choctaw, which? Explain it to us, Eddy. Is it something to eat--or to drink? ''T

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is true, 'tis pity, 'tis pity 'tis 'tis true'--but most of us never went to college!... Oh, an opera house!--In Paris, do you say? Go on, Eddy, go on!" "At Paris it was, at the opera there,-- And she looked like a queen in a book that night--" "Never saw one out of a book, did you?... Yes, I saw

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a gypsy queen once.... And the queen of the circus.... There's a man in Company D once saw the queen of England, saw her just as plain! She was wearing a scoop bonnet with pink roses around her face.... Sh! Shh!" "Of all the operas that Verdi wrote." "Who's Verdi?" "The best, to my taste, is the 'Trovatore.'" "'Trovatore?' Eddy,

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isn't that the serenading fellow who goes on singing till they hang him? Oh, Lord, yes! And the anvil chorus! The anvil chorus comes in there. Go on, Eddy. We feel perfectly at home." "And Mario" "Hm! stumped again." "can sooth with a tenor note The souls in Purgatory." The large bearded man was up once more. "I rise to

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object. There isn't any such place. The com--commanding general'll put him in irons for misrepresenting the sidereal system. There's only heaven, hell, and the enemy.--_Yaaaaih, Yaai.... Yaaai, yaaaah, yaaaaih!_ Certainly, sergeant. The pleasure is mine, sir. Don't mention it, I beg. Mum's the word!" "The moon on the tower slept soft as snow"-- "Gee-whiz! what a snowball! Didn't the tower

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break down? No! You amaze me. Go on, Eddy, go on. We know the natural feelings of a sophomore." "And who was not thrilled in the strangest way As we heard him sing, while the gas burned low, '_Non ti scordar di me?_'" "What's that? Wait a minute, Eddy! Let's get the words. I always did want a chance at

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German.--Now you say them slowly and we'll repeat.... Why, man alive, you ought to be proud of your linguistic accomplishments!... Well, I'll begin, and we'll fire by platoons. "Non ti scordar di me?--" "Attention! Company A!" "Non ti scordar di me?-- Non ti scordar di me?" "Very good! We'll get the meaning after we learn the words. Company B!" "Non

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ti scordar di me?" "Well roared, Bottom! Company C!" "Non ti scordar di me?" "Look out, or General Banks'll be sending over Tom's Brook to know what's the matter! Company D!" "Non ti scordar di me?" "Company D goes to the head of the class! Company E!" "Non ti scordar di me?" "'Ware pine cones! Company E's shaking them down....

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This class's getting too big. Let's all learn the words together, so's Private Horsemanden can go on with his piece! Attention, 65th! Make ready! Take aim! Fire!" "NON TI SCORDAR DI ME?" "Now Eddy.... Oh, yes, you go on! You aren't going to cheat us that way. We want to know what happened when they stopped talking German! Hasn't anything

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happened yet." "Non ti--" "Sh! Go on, Eddy boy, and tell us exactly what occurred." Private Edwin Horsemanden had pluck as well as sentiment, and he went on. Moreover he had his revenge, for at bottom the 65th was itself tender-hearted, not to say sentimental. It believed in lost loves and lost blossoms, muslin dresses, and golden chains, cypress shades

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and jasmine flowers, "And the one bird singing alone to his nest, And the one star over the tower." The 65th sighed and propped its chin on its hand. Presently the 65th grew misty-eyed. "Then I smelt the smell of that jasmine flower She used to wear in her breast It smelt so faint and it smelt so sweet.--" The

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pipe dropped from the 65th's hand. It sat sorry and pleased. Private Edwin Horsemanden went on without interruption and finished with eclat. The chief musician cleared his throat. "The Glee Club of Company H will now--" The Glee Club of Company H was a large and popular organization. It took the stage amid applause. The leader bowed. "Gentlemen, we thank

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you. Gentlemen, you have just listened to a beautiful novelty--a pretty little foreign song bird brought by the trade-wind, an English nightingale singing in Virginian forests.--Gentlemen, the Glee Club of Company H will give you what by now is devil a bit of a novelty--what promises to be as old as the hills before we have done with it--what our

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grandchildren's grandchildren may sing with pride--what to the end of time will carry with it a breath of our armies. Gentlemen, the Glee Club of Company H gives you the Marseillaise of the South. _Attention!_" "Way down South in the land of cotton, 'Simmon seed and sandy bottom--" The 65th rose to its feet. Its neighbour to the right was

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the 2d Virginia, encamped in a great open field; to the left the 5th, occupying a grove of oaks. These regiments were busied with their own genial hour, but when the loudly sung air streamed across from the 65th they suspended their work in hand. They also sung "Dixie." Thence it was taken up by the 4th and the 33d,

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and then it spread to Burk and Fulkerson. The batteries held the top of Rude's Hill, up among the night wind and the stars. The artillerymen took the air from the infantry. Headquarters was situated on the green bank of the Shenandoah. Staff and couriers and orderlies hummed or sang. Stonewall Jackson came to the door of his tent and

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stood, looking out. All Rude's Hill throbbed to "Dixie." On went the programme. "Marco Bozzaris" was well spoken. A blacksmith and a mule driver wrestled for a prize. "Marmion Quitting the Douglas's Hall" was followed by "Lula, Lula, Lula is Gone," and "Lula" by "Lorena," and "Lorena" by a fencing match. The Thespians played capitally an act from "The Rivals,"

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and a man who had seen Macready gave Hamlet's Soliloquy. Then they sang a song lately written by James Randall and already very popular,-- "I hear the distant thunder hum, Maryland! The Old Line bugle, fife and drum--" An orderly from headquarters found Richard Cleave. "General Jackson wishes to see you, sir." The general's tent was not large. There were

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a table and two stools, on one of which sat Jackson in his characteristic position, large feet accurately paralleled. On the table, beside the candle, lay three books--the Bible, a dictionary, and "Napoleon's Maxims." Jackson was writing, his hand travelling slowly across a sheet of dim blue, lined, official paper. The door flap of the tent was fastened back. Cleave,

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standing in the opening, saluted. "Take a seat, sir," said the general, and went on to the end of his page. Having here signed his name, he dropped the quill and slightly turned so as to face the waiting officer. From under his high bronzed forehead his blue eyes looked quietly upon Cleave. The younger man returned the gaze as

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quietly. This was the first time he had been thus summoned since that unlucky winter evening at Bloomery Gap. He remembered that evening, and he did not suppose that his general had forgotten it. He did not suppose that Jackson forgot anything. But apparently it was no longer to be counted against him. Jackson's face wore the quiet, friendly, somewhat

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sweet expression usual to it when all was calm within. As for Cleave himself, his nature owned a certain primal flow and bigness. There were few fixed and rigid barriers. Injured pride and resentment did not lift themselves into reefs against which the mind must break in torment. Rather, his being swept fluid, making no great account of obstacles, accepting

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all turns of affairs, drawing them into its main current, and moving onward toward some goal, hardly self-conjectured, but simple, humane, and universal. The anger he might have felt at Bloomery Gap had long passed away. He sat now attentive, collected, broad-browed, and quiet. "Major Cleave," said Jackson, "you will take an orderly with you and ride across the mountains.

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General Ewell is at Gordonsville with a somewhat larger force than my own. You will take this letter to him," he folded it as he spoke, "and you will talk to him as one intelligent man to another." "Do you mean, sir, that I am to answer his questions?" "Yes, sir. To the best of your ability. There is impending

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a junction between General Ewell and myself. He wishes to know many things, and seems to think it natural that I should tell him them. I am not a great letter writer. You will give him all the information that is common to the army." Cleave smiled. "That, sir, is not a great deal." "Perhaps it is not, sir. You

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are at liberty to give to General Ewell your own observations and expectations. You will, however, represent them as your own." "May I ask, sir, when this junction is to occur?" "I have not decided, sir." "Does General Ewell know when it will occur?" "Not precisely. He will be told in good time." "Whether, when you move, you move north

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or west or south or east, is, I suppose, sir, purely a matter of conjecture?" "Purely, sir." "But the _morale_ of the army, its efficiency and spirit, may be freely praised and imparted?" "Yes, sir, freely. Upon your return I shall want from you your impression of General Ewell and the troops he commands." He drew toward him a map

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which lay on the table. "You will ride through Massanutton Gap by Conrad's Store and Swift Run Gap. Thence you will make a detour to Charlottesville. There are stores there that I wish reported upon and sent on to Major Harman at Staunton. You will spend one day upon that business, then go on to Ewell." CLEAVE AND JUDITH The

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hospital at Charlottesville, unlovely and lovely, ghastly and vital, brutal, spiritual, a hell of pain and weakness, another region of endeavour and helpfulness, a place of horror, and also of strange smiling, even of faint laughter, a country as chill as death and as warm as love--the hospital at Charlottesville saw the weary morning grow to weary noon, the weary

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noon change toward the weary latter day. The women who nursed the soldiers said that it was lovely outside, and that all the peach trees were in bloom. "We'll raise you a little higher," they said, "and you can see for yourself. And look! here is your broth, so good and strengthening! And did you hear? We won on the

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Peninsula to-day!" At four o'clock Judith Cary gave to another her place beside a typhoid pallet and came out into the emerald and rose, the freshness and fragrance of the spring. The Greenwood carriage was waiting. "We'll go, Isham," said Judith, "by the University for Miss Lucy." Isham held open the door. "No'm, Miss Judith. Miss Lucy done sont wuhd

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dat de ladies'll be cuttin' out nuniforms clean 'twel dark. She say don' wait fer her--Mrs. Carter'll bring her home." Judith entered the carriage. An old acquaintance, passing, paused to speak to her. "Isn't there a greater stir than usual?" she asked. "Some of General Ewell's men are over from Gordonsville. There goes General Dick Taylor now--the one in grey

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and white! He's a son, you know, of Zachary--Old Rough and Ready. General Jackson, too, has an officer here to-day, checking the stores that came from Richmond.--How is it at the hospital?" "It is very bad," said Judith. "When the bands begin to play I laugh and cry like all the rest, and I wave and clap my hands, and

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I would fight on and on like the rest of you, and I do not see that, given people as they are, the war could have been avoided, and I would die to win, and I am, I hope, a patriot--and yet I do not see any sense in it! It hurts me as I think it may hurt the

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earth. She would like, I believe, something better than being a battlefield.--There is music again! Yesterday a man died, crying for the band to hush. He said it drowned something he needed to hear." "Yes, yes," replied her friend, nodding his head. "That is perfectly true. That is very true, indeed!--That band's coming from the station. They're looking for a

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regiment from Richmond.--That's a good band! What are they playing--?" "Bright flowers spring from the hero's grave, The craven knows no rest,-- Thrice cursed the traitor and the knave, The hero thrice is blessed--" The Greenwood carriage rolled out of the town into the April country. The fruit trees were in bloom, the woods feathering green, the quiet and the

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golden light inestimable after the moaning wards. The carriage went slowly, for the roads were heavy; moreover the former carriage horses were gone to the war. These were two from the farm, somewhat old and stiff, willing, but plodders. They went half asleep in the soft sunshine, and Isham on the box went half asleep too. Judith would have been

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willing to sleep, but she could not. She sat with her gaze upon the fair spring woods and the amethystine hills rising to blue skies. The carriage stopped. Isham bent down from the box. "Miss Judith, honey, er gent'man's on de road behin' us, ridin' ter overtek de kerridge." "Wait for him, then," said Judith. "There is some message, perhaps."

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While they waited she sat with folded hands, her eyes upon the purple hills, her thoughts away from Albemarle. The sound that Isham made of surprise and satisfaction did not reach her. Until she saw Cleave's face at the window she thought him somewhere in the Valley--fighting, fighting! in battle and danger, perhaps, that very day. Her eyes widened, her

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face had the hush of dawn; it was turned toward him, but she sat perfectly still, without speaking. Only the door was between them, the glass down. He rested his clasped hands on the ledge, and his dark, moved face looked in upon her. "Judith," he said, "I did not know.--I thought it was one of the others.... I hope

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that you are a little glad to see me." Judith looked at him a moment longer, then swayed a little forward. She bent her head. Her cheek touched his clasped hands, he felt her kiss upon them, and her forehead resting there. There was a moment's silence, deep, breathless, then Cleave spoke. "Judith ... Am I mad?" "I believe that

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you love me," she said. "If you do not, it does not matter.... I have loved you for two years." "Maury Stafford?" "I have never believed that you understood--though what it was that made you misunderstand I have never guessed.... There is no Maury Stafford. There never was." He opened the door. "Come out," he said. "Come out with me

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into the light. Send the carriage on." She did so. The road was quiet, deserted, a wide bright path between the evening hills. Dundee following them, they walked a little way until they came to a great rock, sunk in the velvet sward that edged a wood. Here they sat down, the gold light bathing them, behind them fairy vistas,

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fountains of living green, stars of the dogwood and purple sprays of Judas tree. "How I misunderstood is no matter now," said Cleave. "I love you, and you say that you love me. Thank God for it!" They sat with clasped hands, their cheeks touching, their breath mingling. "Judith, Judith, how lovely are you! I have seen you always, always!...

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Only I called it 'vision,' 'ideal.' At the top of every deed I have seen your eyes; from the height of every thought you have beckoned further! Now--now--It is like a wonderful home-coming ... and yet you are still there, above the mountains, beckoning, drawing--There and here, here in my arms!... Judith--What does 'Judith' mean?" "It means 'praised.' Oh, Richard,

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