at all
points, except where Sherman stood. Hardee, continuing his rush, broke
the Northern line asunder, and his brigades, wrapping themselves around
Sherman, strove to destroy him.

Although he saw his lines crumbling away before him, Sherman never
flinched. The ravine in front of him and rough ground on one side
defended him to a certain extent. The men fired their rifles as fast as
they could load and reload, and the cannon on their flanks never ceased
to pour shot and shell into the ranks of their opponents. The gunners
were shot down, but new ones rose at once in their place. The fiercest
conflict yet seen on American soil was raging here. North would not
yield, South ever rushed anew to the attack, and a vast cloud of mingled
flame and smoke enclosed them both.

Dick had stood as if petrified, staring at the billows of flame, while
the thunder of great armies in battle stunned his ears. He realized
suddenly that he was alone. Colonel Kenton had said the night before
that he did not know what to do with him, but that he would find a way
in the morning. But he had been forgotten, and he knew it was natural
that he should be. His fate was but a trifle in the mighty event that
was passing. There was no time for any one in the Southern army to
bother about him.

Then he understood too, that he was free. The whole Orphan Brigade
had passed on into the red heart of the battle, and had left him there
alone. Now his mind leaped out of its paralysis. All his senses became
alert. In that vast whirlwind of fire and smoke no one would notice that
a single youth was stealing through the forest in an effort to rejoin
his own people.

Action followed swift upon thought. He curved about in the woods and
then ran rapidly toward the point where the fire seemed thinnest. He did
not check his pace until he had gone at least a mile. Then he paused to
see if he could tell how the battle was going. Its roar seemed louder
than ever in his ears, and in front of him was a vast red line, which
extended an unseen distance through the forest. Now and then the wild
and thrilling rebel yell rose above the roar of cannon and the crash of
rifles.

Dick saw with a sinking of the heart--and yet he had known that it would
be so--that the red line of flame had moved deeper into the heart of the
Northern camp. It had passed the Northern outposts and, at many points,
it had swept over the Northern center. He feared that there was but a
huddled a