n authority on
knowledge, marveled at.

The escort passed, and the officers and staffs drew on. The fine-figured
old commander-in-chief, when he came abreast, turned and looked full at
the Weyland piazza, seemed to search it for a face, and swept his plumed
hat to his stirrup in a profound bow. The salute was greeted on the
porch with a burst of hand-clapping and a great waving of flags.

"That was for my grandmother. He was in love with her in 1850," said
Sharlee to Queed, and immediately whisked away to tell something else to
somebody else.

One of the first groups of veterans in the line, heading the Virginia
Division, was the popular R.E. Lee Camp of Richmond. All afternoon they
trod to the continual accompaniment of cheers. No exclusive "show"
company ever marched in better time than these septuagenarians, and this
was everywhere the subject of comment. A Grand Army man stood in the
press on the sidewalk, and, struck by the gallant step of the old
fellows, yelled out good-naturedly:--

"You boys been drillin' to learn to march like that, haven't you?"

Instantly a white-beard in the ranks called back: "No, sir! _We never
have forgot!_"

Other camps were not so rhythmic in their tread. Some of the lines were
very dragging and straggly; the old feet shuffled and faltered in a way
which showed that their march was nearly over. Not fifty yards away from
Queed, one veteran pitched out of the ranks; he was lifted up and
received into the house opposite which he fell. Sadder than the men were
the old battle-flags, soiled wisps that the aged hands held aloft with
the most solicitous care. The flag-poles were heavy and the men's arms
weaker than once they were; sometimes two or even three men acted
jointly as standard-bearer.

These old flags, mere unrecognizable fragments as many of them were,
were popular with the onlookers. Each as it marched by, was hailed with
a new roar. Of course there were many tears. There was hardly anybody in
all that crowd, over fifty years old, in whom the sight of these fast
dwindling ranks did not stir memories of some personal bereavement. The
old ladies on the porch no longer used their handkerchiefs chiefly for
waving. Queed saw one of them wave hers frantically toward a drooping
little knot of passing gray-coats, and then fall back into a chair, the
same handkerchief at her eyes. Sharlee, who was explaining everything
that anybody wanted to know, happened to be standing near him;