girl, with a wealth of dark brown hair, the
loveliest eyes and the sweetest face.

"Mistress Nancy," I cried, "you are my guardian angel." Placing the
miniature over my heart, I threw her a kiss, and rode on my way
rejoicing.

I rode from Chestertown to Fairlee, where I bade my mother good-bye,
and from there I took up the trail to the North, riding into camp one
evening just as the sun was setting.

I reported immediately to the great General, who thanked me for the
speed with which I had carried the despatches and returned. And then I
was once more among my old comrades of the Line.

They crowded around me, one and all, for I had messages for many of
them, and they were eager for the news of old Kent and the shore, and
my welcome was right royal.

And now, for a month or so, disasters came crowding upon our arms;
defeat and death stalked through our ranks, and cast a gloom over the
cause.

We fought the fight at White Plains, and when Fort Washington fell
many of our Maryland boys went to the hulks of old Jersey to find a
last resting-place under the cold gray waters of Wallabout Bay. Amid
constant marching, skirmishes, and defeats the months slipped away,
and the cold gloomy winter was upon us. Ah, how cold and bleak and
barren the hillsides looked after the smiling fields of Maryland,
touched and warmed by the Southern sun! And then the cold, the bitter
cold of it all, the white winding sheet of the snow and the ice made
us shiver and hug the fire of dry fence-rails and button our
threadbare coats more tightly around us, while we looked in despair at
the toes peeping through the ends of our boots. But the great General
knew how to warm the blood in our veins and drive the despair from our
hearts, when on that bitterly cold Christmas night he led us across
the Delaware and hurled us against the Hessians.

It is true that we left a trail of blood as we marched, dyeing the
snow with its crimson. Yet the fight itself was glorious, and when we
came back in our triumph the cold and the snow were as nothing. We
made sport of our rags and tatters and laughed the English to scorn.

Then again when we struck them at Princeton seven days later, threw
the dust in Cornwallis's eyes, and played with him as we willed, we
were ready to follow our leader wherever he pointed the way.

And so, after humbling the English, we returned to our camp for the
winter, and there made ready for the spring, when we saw my Lord
Cornw