glimpses of the Union
camp-fires in the distance, that, low and smoldering, told of the waning
night, and she would look anxiously over her left shoulder for a hint of
the coming of the dreaded dawn. Her mare terrified her with symptoms of
giving out.

At last she saw an unmistakable silvery break in the eastern clouds.
Half-frantic she broke suddenly out of the throng by an abrupt turn to
the right, and lashing her mare savagely, galloped where a graying in
the dense darkness showed an opening between two cedar thickets,
that led to the picket-fires, half a mile away. The mare's hoofs beat
sonorously on the level limestone floor, which there frequently rises
through the shallow soil and starves out the cedar.

"Halt! Go back," commanded a hoarse voice in front of her, which was
accompanied with the clicking of a gunlock. "Ye can't pass heah."

"Lemme pass, Mister," she pleaded. "I'm on'y a gal, with medicine fur my
mammy, an' I'm powerful anxious ter git home."

"No, ye can't git out heah. Orders are strict; besides, ef ye did the
Yankees 'd cotch ye. They're jest out thar."

She became aware that there were heavy lines of men lying near, and
fearing to say another word, she turned and rode away to the left. She
became entangled with a cavalry company moving toward the extreme Union
right, and riding with it several hundred yards, turned off into a
convenient grove just as the light began to be sufficient to distinguish
her from a trooper. She was now, she was sure, outside of the Rebel
lines, but she had gone far to the south, where the two lines were
wide apart. The Union fifes and drums, now sounding what seemed an
unsuspicious and cheerful reveille, were apparently at least a mile away.
It was growing lighter rapidly, and every passing moment was fraught
with the weightiest urgency. She concentrated all her energies for a
supreme effort, and lashed her mare forward over the muddy cotton-field.
The beast's hoofs sank in the loose red loam, as if it were quicksand,
and her pace was maddeningly slow. At last Rachel came in sight of a
Union camp at the edge of a cedar thicket. The arms were stacked, the
men were cooking breakfast, and a battery of cannon standing near had no
horses attached.

Rachel beat the poor mare's flanks furiously, and shouted.

"Turn out! The Rebels are coming! The Rebels are coming!"

Her warning came too late. Too late, also, came that of the pickets, who
were firing their guns and ru