thousand Regulars, and fifteen thousand
of the other kind, and they're cutting Evans to pieces!" He pulled
himself together and saluted. "General Bee's compliments to General
Jackson, and he is going into action."

"General Jackson's compliments, and I will support him."

The 65th entered the wood. The trees were small--bundles of hard, bright
green needles aloft on slender trunks, out of which, in the strong
sunshine, resin was oozing. They were set well apart, the grass beneath
dry and slippery, strewn with cones. The sky was intensely blue, the air
hot and without moisture, the scent of the pines strong in the nostril.
Another step and the 65th came upon the wounded of Evans's brigade. An
invisible line joined with suddenness the early morning picture, the
torn and dying mule, the headless driver, to this. Breathless, heated,
excited, the 65th swept on, yet it felt the cold air from the cavern. It
had, of course, seen accidents, men injured in various ways, but never
had it viewed so many, nor so much blood, and never before had it rushed
past the helpless and the agonizing. There were surgeons and
ambulances--there seemed to be a table of planks on which the worst
cases were laid--the sufferers had help, of course, a little help. A
Creole from Bayou Teche lay writhing, shot through the stomach, beneath
a pine. He was raving. "Melanie, Melanie, donnez-moi de l'eau! Melanie,
Melanie! donnez-moi de l'eau!"

Stragglers were coming over the hilltop--froth and spume thrown from a
great wave somewhere beyond that cover--men limping, men supported by
their comrades, men gasping and covered with sweat, men livid with
nausea, men without arms, men carrying it off with bluster, and men too
honestly frightened for any pretence. A number were legitimately there,
wounded, ill, exhausted, useless on the field of battle; others were
malingerers, and some were cowards--cowards for all time, or cowards for
this time only. A minority was voluble. "You all think yo' going to a
Sunday-school picnic, don't you? Well, you ain't. Just _you_ all wait
until you get to the top of the hill! What are you going to see? You're
going to see hell's mouth, and the devil wearing blue! We've been
there--we've been in hell since daybreak--damned if we haven't! Evans
all cut to pieces! Bee and Bartow have gone in now. They'll find it
hell, jest like we did. Twenty thousand of them dressed in blue." A man
began to weep. "All cut to pieces. Major Wheat