atient heavens above heard the voices of army teamsters in
plain and ornamental swearing! Such profanity was probably never heard
on this earth before and it may well be hoped will not be heard again.

The driver whose wheels had stuck, cracked his whip first and yelled. He
yelled again and cracked his whip. And then he began to swear, loudly,
and angrily at first and then in lower, steadier, more polite terms--but
always in an unending nerve-racking torrent.

He cursed his mules individually by name and the whole team
collectively, and consigned it to the lowest depth of the deepest hell
and then the devil for not providing a deeper one. Each trait of each
mule, good and bad, he named without fear or favor and damned each alike
with equal emphasis. He named each part of each mule's anatomy and
damned it individually and as a whole, with full bill of particulars.

He swore in every key in the whole gamut of sound and last of all he
damned himself for his utter inability to express anything he really
felt.

The last big gun up the hill and the infantry poured into the town of
Fredericksburg, halting in regiments and brigades in its streets. Only a
few shots had been exchanged with the men in grey. They had withdrawn to
the heights a mile beyond. The assault had been a mere parade. Many of
the inhabitants had fled in terror at the approach of the men in blue.
Some of the lower types of soldiers in the Northern army broke into
these deserted houses and began to rob and pillage.

Julius "found" many delicacies lying about on lawns and in various
unheard-of places. His master never pressed him with rude questions when
his zeal bore such good results for their table.

Ned Vaughan had been very much amused at an old woman who had been
driven from her home by marauders. She had piled such goods and chattels
as she could handle into an ox cart and drove past the grey battle
lines, hurrying as fast as she could Southward. Her wrinkled old face
beamed with joy at the sight of their burnished muskets and her eyes
flashed with the gleam of an Amazon as she shouted:

"Give it to the damned rascals, boys! Give 'em one fer me--one fer me
and don't you forget it!"

Far down the line she could be heard delivering her fierce exhortation.
The men smiled and answered her good-naturedly. The day of wrath and
death had dawned. It was too solemn an hour for boastful words.

For two days the grand army in blue poured across the river a