, Major Ashley rode up to where Vincent
and five or six of his comrades of the cavalry were lying wounded.

"How are you getting on, lads? Pretty well, I hope?" he asked as he
dismounted.

"First-rate, major," one of the men answered. "We all of us took a turn
as soon as we heard that the Yanks were whipped."

"Yes, we have thrashed them handsomely," the major said. "Ah, Wingfield!
I am glad to see you are alive. I thought, when you fell, it was all
over with you."

"I am not much hurt, sir," Vincent replied. "A flesh wound and some ribs
are broken, I hear; but they won't be long mending, I hope."

"It's a nasty wound to look at," the major said, as Dan lifted the pad
of wet linen. "But with youth and health you will soon get round it,
never fear."

"Ah, my poor lad! yours is a worse case," he said as he bent over a
young fellow who was lying a few paces from Vincent.

"It's all up with me, major," he replied faintly; "the doctor said he
could do nothing for me. But I don't mind, now we have beaten them. You
will send a line to the old people, major, won't you, and say I died
doing my duty? I've got two brothers, and I expect they will send one on
to take my place."

"I will write to them, my lad," the major said, "and tell them all about
you." He could give the lad no false hopes, for already a gray shade was
stealing over the white face, and the end was close at hand; in a few
minutes he ceased to breathe.

Late in the evening the surgeons, having attended to more urgent cases,
came round. Vincent's wound was now more carefully examined than before,
but the result was the same. Three of the ribs were badly fractured, but
there was no serious danger.

"You will want quiet and good nursing for some time," the principal
surgeon said. "There will be a train of wounded going off for Richmond
the first thing in the morning, and you shall go by it. You had better
get a door," he said to some of the troopers, who had come across from
the spot where the cavalry were bivouacked to see how their comrades
were getting on, "and carry him down and put him in the train. One has
just been sent off and another will be made up at once, so that the
wounded can be put in it as they are taken down. Now I will bandage the
wound, and it will not want any more attention until you get home."

A wad of lint was placed upon the wound and bandaged tightly round the
body.

"Remember you have got to lie perfectly quiet, and not atte