elter of one of the little curtsying trees. Old Dick's face
twitched, but he could speak. "Of course I've lost that
leg! ----! ---- ----! Old Jackson isn't around, is he? Never mind! Occasion
must excuse. Go along, gentlemen. Need you all there. Doctors and
chaplains and the teamsters, and Dick Ewell will forgather all
right ----! ----! Damn you, Maury, I don't want you to stay! What's that
that man says? Taliaferro badly wounded ----! ---- ----! Gentlemen, one
and all you are ordered back to your posts. I've lost a leg, but I'm not
going to lose this battle!"

Night came with each stark battle line engaged in giving and receiving
as deadly a bombardment as might well be conceived. The orchard grew a
place tawny and red and roaring with sound. And then at nine o'clock the
sound dwindled and the light sank. The blue withdrew in good order,
taking with them their wounded. The battle was drawn, the grey rested on
the field, the loss of both was heavy.

Back of the apple orchard, on the long natural terrace where he had
posted his six guns, that tall, blond, very youthful officer whom, a
little later, Stuart called "the heroic chivalric Pelham," whom Lee
called "the gallant Pelham," of whom Stonewall Jackson said, "Every army
should have a Pelham on each flank"--Major John Pelham surveyed the
havoc among his men and horses. Then like a good and able leader, he
brought matters shipshape, and later announced that the Horse Artillery
would stay where it was for the night.

The farmhouse in the orchard had been turned into a field hospital.
Thither Pelham's wounded were borne. Of the hurt horses those that
might be saved were carefully tended, the others shot. The pickets were
placed. Fires were kindled, and from a supply wagon somewhere in the
rear scanty rations brought. An embassy went to the farmhouse. "Ma'am,
the major--Major Pelham--says kin we please have a few roasting ears?"
The embassy returned. "She says, sir, just to help ourselves. Corn,
apples--anything we want, and she wishes it were more!"

The six guns gleamed red in the light of the kindled fires. The men sat
or lay between them, tasting rest after battle. Below this platform, in
the orchard and on the turnpike and in the woods beyond, showed also
fires and moving lights. The air was yet smoky, the night close and
warm. There were no tents nor roofs of any nature. Officers and men
rested in the open beneath the August stars. Pelham had a log beneath a
Lomb