son yet?"

"No, sir. Not yet."

"Well, I'm going into the house for a morsel of food. Send for me the
moment you hear anything. I wish the artillery were up. Who's this?
Colonel Fauquier Cary? In the darkness, couldn't tell. Yes, General
Winder thinks so, too. We've sent to ask General Jackson. Come with me,
Cary, to the house. Faugh! this stifling heat! And that was Sykes we
were fighting against--George Sykes! Remember he was my roommate at the
Point?"

The short path to McGehee's house was not trodden without difficulty.
All the great plateau was cumbered with debris of the struggle. On the
cut and furrowed ground one stumbled upon abandoned stores and arms.
There were overturned wagons and ambulances with dead horses; there were
ruined gun-carriages; there were wrecked litters, fallen tents, dead men
and the wounded. Here, and on the plain below, the lanterns of the
surgeons and their helpers moved like glowworms. They gathered the
wounded, blue and grey. "Treat the whole field alike," had said Lee.
Everywhere were troops seeking their commands, hoarsely calling, joining
at last their comrades. Fires had been kindled. Dim, dim, in the
southwestern sky beyond the yet rolling vapour, showed a gleaming where
was Richmond. D. H. Hill and Fauquier Cary went indoors. An aide managed
to find some biscuits, and there was water from the well. "I haven't
touched food since daybreak," said the general.

"Nor I. Much as I like him, I am loath to let Fitz John Porter strike
down the York River line to-night, if that's his road, or cross the
Chickahominy if that's the road! We have a victory. Press it home and
fix it there."

"I believe that you are right. Surely Jackson will see it so."

"Where is General Jackson?"

"God knows!--Thank you, Reid. Poor fare, Cary, but familiar. Come, Reid,
get your share."

They ate the hard biscuits and drank the well-water. The air was still
and sultry; through the windows they heard, afar off, the bugles--their
own and those of the foe.

"High, over all the melancholy bugle grieves."

Moths came in to the candle. With his hand Cary warned them away. One
lit on his sleeve. "I wonder what you think of it," he said, and put him
out of window. There was a stir at the door. A sergeant appeared. "We're
gathering up the wounded, general--and we found a Yankee officer under
the trees just here--and he said you'd know him--but he's fainted dead
away--" He moved aside. "Litters