t you, and is always telling me of some unpleasant dream. I
almost think she is over-fanciful; and then she reads everything about
the army, and talks almost like a man about soldiering. Do you know she
is making a soldier of me? I am constantly reading military books, and
practising drill, and laying out fortifications, just as if I was going
into camp. My father doesn't know a word of it; his time is taken up
with these English officers, writing to them, and every now and then
there are some of them at our house. Mildred knows them--a famous spy
she would make! Isn't she an excellent girl, Major Butler?"

"You and I should guard her, Henry, with more care than we guard our
lives," replied Butler, with a serious emphasis.

"I hope," returned Henry, "she will be in better spirits after she sees
you."

"I would to heaven," said Butler, "that we all had more reason to be of
good cheer, than we are likely to have. It is as cloudy a day, Henry, as
you may ever behold again, should you live, as I pray you may, to the
ripest old age."

Henry looked up towards the west.

"There are clouds upon the sky," he said, "and the sun has dropped below
them; but there is a streak of yellow light, near to the line of the
mountain, that our wise people say is a sign that the sun will rise in
beauty to-morrow."

"There is a light beyond the mountain," replied Butler, half speaking to
himself, "and it is the best, the only sign I see of a clear to-morrow.
I wish, Henry, it were a brighter beam."

"Don't you know Gates has passed South?" said Henry, "and has some
pretty fellows with him, they say. And ar'n't we all mustering
here--every man most? Ask Stephen Foster what I am?"

"And what will he tell me?"

"Why, that I am his deputy-corporal in the mounted riflemen; Stephen is
the lieutenant."

"Oh, I crave your favor, brother officer, good master deputy-corporal,
Henry Lindsay! and does your father allow you to ride in the ranks of
the friends of liberty?"

"Sister Mildred persuaded him that as I am a mere lad, as she
says,--look at me, major,--a pretty well grown lad, I take it, there is
no harm in my playing soldier. So I ride always with Stephen Foster, and
Mildred got me this light rifle-carbine. Now, major, I fancy I am pretty
nearly as good a marksman as rides in the corps. Who is this with you?"
asked Henry, looking back at Robinson, who loitered some distance in the
rear purposely to avoid what might be deemed an intru