her ground.
He saw the general throw away his cigar and with hands clasped behind him
remain watching in rapt silence the scene below him. "I wonder," thought
Penhallow, "of what he is thinking." The face was grave, the man
motionless. The engineer turned to look at the matchless spectacle
below him. The sound of bands rose in gay music from the approaches to
the river, where vast masses of infantry lay waiting their turn to cross.
The guns of batteries gleamed in the sun, endless wagon-trains and
ambulances moved or were at rest. Here and there the wind of morning
fluttered the flags and guidons with flashes of colour. The hum of a
great army, the multitudinous murmurs of men talking, the crack of whips,
the sharp rattle of wagons and of moving artillery, made a strange
orchestra. Over all rose the warning shrieks of the gun-boat signals. Far
or near on the fertile meadows the ripened corn and grain showed in green
squares between the masses of men and stirred in the morning breeze or
lay trampled in ruin by the rude feet of war. It was an hour and a scene
to excite the dullest mind, and Penhallow intensely interested sat
fascinated by a spectacle at once splendid and fateful. The snake-like
procession of infantry wagons and batteries moved across the bridge and
was lost to view in the forest. Penhallow turned again to look at his
general, who remained statuesque and motionless. Then, suddenly the
master of this might of men and guns looked up, listened to Warren's
artillery far beyond the river, and with the same expressionless face
called for his horse and rode away followed by his staff.

The battle-summer of 1864 went on with the wearisome siege of Petersburg
and the frequent efforts to cut the railways which enabled the
Confederates to draw supplies from states which as yet had hardly felt
the stress of war.

Late in the year the army became a city of huts, and there was the
unexampled spectacle of this great host voting quietly in the election
which gave to Lincoln another evidence of the trust reposed in him. The
engineers had little to do in connection with the larger movements of the
army, and save for the siege work were at times idle critics of their
superiors. The closing month of 1864 brought weather which made the
wooden huts, usually shared by two officers, more comfortable than tents.
The construction of these long streets of sheltering quarters brought out
much ingenuity, and Penhallow profited by Jos