it was ours, and that I thought I
could get nearer to it than I had been before, and speak to the men
without great danger. Truth is, that I had begun to fear sarcasm. What
if, to-morrow morning, we should see a line of gray pickets in our
front? Should I ever hear the last of it?

Again the lieutenant approved. He would have approved of anything. He
was a brave officer. I verily believe that if I had proposed an advance
of Company A up the hill, he would have approved, and would have led
the advance.

The company stood still, and I started again. I reached the place where
I had been before, and crawled on a few yards farther. Again the thought
came that there would have been some communicating between that line and
ours if that were Confederate. If they were our men, we had been in
their rear for three hours. Impossible to suppose that nobody in that
time should have come back to the rear. Clearly it was a Federal line,
and I was in its front. Then it occurred to me that it was possible they
had a man or two in the fence-row between me and their line. There could
be no need for that, yet the idea made me shiver. At every yard of my
progress I raised my head, and the black spots were larger--and not less
black. They were very silent and very motionless--the sombre
night-picture of skirmishers on extreme duty; whoever they were, they
felt strongly the presence of the enemy.

Ten yards in front, and ten feet to the right, I saw a post--a
gate-post, I supposed. There was no gate. This fence-row, along which I
was crawling, indicated a fence rotted down or removed. There had once
been a gate hanging to that post and closing against another post now
concealed by the bushes of the fence-row. I would crawl to that post out
there, and speak to the men in front. They would suppose that I was in
the fence-row, and, if they fired, would shoot into the bushes, while I
should be safe behind the post--such was my thought.

I reached the post. It was a hewn post of large size--post-oak, I
thought. I lay down behind it; I raised my head and looked. The black
spots were very near--perhaps thirty or forty yards in front. The line
stretched on to my right. I could not now see toward the left--through
the fence-row.

It was not necessary to speak very loud.

I asked, "Whose picket is that?"

My voice sounded strangely tremulous.

There was no answer.

If they were Confederates, I was in their rear, and there would be no
sense i