er.

Vincent had indeed escaped without a wound, having been only stunned by
the passage of the shot that had carried away his cap, and missed him by
the fraction of an inch. He had begun to recover consciousness just as
his captors came up, and the action of carrying him completely restored
him. That he had fallen into the hands of the Northerners he was well
aware; but he was unable to imagine how this had happened. He remembered
that the Confederates had been, up to the moment he fell, completely
successful, and he could only imagine that in a subsequent attack the
Federals had turned the tables upon them.

How he himself had fallen, or what had happened to him, he had no idea.
Beyond a strange feeling of numbness in the head he was conscious of no
injury, and he could only imagine that his horse had been shot under
him, and that he must have fallen upon his head. The thought that his
favorite horse was killed afflicted him almost as much as his own
capture. As soon as his captors perceived that their prisoner's
consciousness had returned they at once reported that an officer of
Stuart's cavalry had been taken, and at daybreak next morning General
McClellan, on rising, was acquainted with the fact, and Vincent was
conducted to his tent.

"You are unwounded, sir," the general said in some surprise.

"I am, general," Vincent replied. "I do not know how it happened, but I
believe that my horse must have been shot under me, and that I must have
been thrown and stunned; however, I remember nothing from the moment
when I heard the word halt, just as we reached the side of the stream,
to that when I found myself being carried here."

"You belong to the cavalry?"

"Yes, sir."

"Was Lee's force all engaged yesterday?"

"I do not know," Vincent said. "I only came up with Jackson's division
from Harper's Ferry the evening before."

"I need not have questioned you," McClellan said. "I know that Lee's
whole army, 100,000 strong, opposed me yesterday."

Vincent was silent. He was glad to see that the Federal general, as
usual, enormously overrated the strength of the force opposed to him.

"I hear that the whole of the garrison of Harper's Ferry were released
on parole not to serve again during the war. If you are ready to give me
your promise to the same effect I will allow you to return to your
friends; if not you must remain a prisoner until you are regularly
exchanged."

"I must do so, then, general," Vincent sa