a fleece of the lightest, whitest wool. These clouds were
very numerous. We could not often see the shell before it burst; but
sometimes, as we faced towards the enemy, and looked above our heads,
the approach would be heralded by a prolonged hiss, which always seemed
to me to be a line of something tangible, terminating in a black globe,
distinct to the eye, as the sound had been to the ear. The shell would
seem to stop, and hang suspended in the air an instant, and then vanish
in fire and smoke and noise. We saw the missiles tear and plow the
ground. All in rear of the crest for a thousand yards, as well as among
the batteries, was the field of their blind fury. Ambulances, passing
down the Taneytown road with wounded men, were struck. The hospitals
near this road were riddled. The house which was General Meade's
headquarters was shot through several times, and a great many horses of
officers and orderlies were lying dead around it. Riderless horses,
galloping madly through the fields, were brought up, or down rather, by
these invisible horse-tamers, and they would not run any more. Mules
with ammunition, pigs wallowing about, cows in the pastures, whatever
was animate or inanimate, in all this broad range, were no exception to
their blind havoc. The percussion shells would strike, and thunder, and
scatter the earth and their whistling fragments; the Whitworth bolts
would pound and ricochet, and bowl far away sputtering, with the sound
of a mass of hot iron plunged in water; and the great solid shot would
smite the unresisting ground with a sounding "thud," as the strong boxer
crashes his iron fist into the jaws of his unguarded adversary. Such
were some of the sights and sounds of this great iron battle of
missiles. Our artillerymen upon the crest budged not an inch, nor
intermitted, but, though caisson and limber were smashed, and guns
dismantled, and men and horses killed, there amidst smoke and sweat,
they gave back, without grudge, or loss of time in the sending, in kind
whatever the enemy sent, globe, and cone, and bolt, hollow or solid, an
iron greeting to the rebellion, the compliments of the wrathful
Republic. An hour has droned its flight since first the war began. There
is no sign of weariness or abatement on either side. So long it seemed,
that the din and crashing around began to appear the normal condition
of nature there, and fighting man's element. The General proposed to go
among the men and over to th