in wait behind a neat breastwork. A row
of guns were booming at a distant enemy. Shells thrown in reply were
raising clouds of dust and splinters. Horsemen dashed along the line
of intrenchments.

At this point of its march the division curved away from the field and
went winding off in the direction of the river. When the significance
of this movement had impressed itself upon the youth he turned his head
and looked over his shoulder toward the trampled and debris-strewed
ground. He breathed a breath of new satisfaction. He finally nudged
his friend. "Well, it's all over," he said to him.

His friend gazed backward. "B'Gawd, it is," he assented. They mused.

For a time the youth was obliged to reflect in a puzzled and uncertain
way. His mind was undergoing a subtle change. It took moments for it
to cast off its battleful ways and resume its accustomed course of
thought. Gradually his brain emerged from the clogged clouds, and at
last he was enabled to more closely comprehend himself and circumstance.

He understood then that the existence of shot and countershot was in
the past. He had dwelt in a land of strange, squalling upheavals and
had come forth. He had been where there was red of blood and black of
passion, and he was escaped. His first thoughts were given to
rejoicings at this fact.

Later he began to study his deeds, his failures, and his achievements.
Thus, fresh from scenes where many of his usual machines of reflection
had been idle, from where he had proceeded sheeplike, he struggled to
marshal all his acts.

At last they marched before him clearly. From this present view point
he was enabled to look upon them in spectator fashion and criticise
them with some correctness, for his new condition had already defeated
certain sympathies.

Regarding his procession of memory he felt gleeful and unregretting,
for in it his public deeds were paraded in great and shining
prominence. Those performances which had been witnessed by his fellows
marched now in wide purple and gold, having various deflections. They
went gayly with music. It was pleasure to watch these things. He
spent delightful minutes viewing the gilded images of memory.

He saw that he was good. He recalled with a thrill of joy the
respectful comments of his fellows upon his conduct.

Nevertheless, the ghost of his flight from the first engagement
appeared to him and danced. There were small shoutings in his brain
abou