residence
and her house in the city are both closed." Anne no longer hoped for any
softening of that hard nature; yet the chance lines hurt her, and gave
her a forsaken feeling all day.

CHAPTER XXIII.

"War! war! war!
A thunder-cloud in the south in the early spring--
The launch of a thunder-bolt; and then,
With one red flare, the lightning stretched its wing,
And a rolling echo roused a million men."

--EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN.

April. The sound of military music; the sound of feet keeping step
exactly, and overcoming by its regularity the noise of thousands of
other feet hurrying on irregularly in front of them, abreast of them,
and behind them. A crowd in the square so dense that no one could pass
through; the tree branches above black with boys; the windows all round
the four sides filled with heads. And everywhere women pressing forward,
waving handkerchiefs, some pallid, some flushed, but all deeply excited,
forgetful of self, with eyes fixed on the small compact lines of
military caps close together, moving steadily onward in the midst of the
accompanying throng. And happy the one who had a place in the front
rank: how she gazed! If a girl, no matter how light of heart and
frivolous, a silence and soberness came over her for a moment, and her
eyes grew wistful. If a woman, one who had loved, no matter how hard and
cold she had grown, a warmer heart came back to her then, and tears
rose. What was it? Only a few men dressed in the holiday uniform these
towns-people had often seen; men many of whom they knew well, together
with their shortcomings and weaknesses, whose military airs they had
laughed at; men who, taken singly, had neither importance nor interest.
What was it, then, that made the women's eyes tearful, and sent the
great crowd thronging round and after them as though each one had been
crowned king? What made the groups on the steps and piazzas of each
house keep silence after they had passed, and watch them as long as they
could distinguish the moving lines? It was that these men had made the
first reply of this town to the President's call. It was because these
holiday soldiers were on their way to real battle-fields, where balls
would plough through human flesh, and leave agony and death behind. The
poorest, dullest, soldier who was in these ranks from a sense of
loyalty, however dim and inarticulate it might be, gave all he had:
martyr or saint nev