uish and horror. Was
this, then, the War?

And now there appeared yet other figures among the trees, a straggling,
broken line, which fell back, halted, stood and fired always calmly,
coolly, at some unseen thing in front of them. But this line resolved
itself into individuals, who came back to the edge of the wood,
methodically picking their way through the abattis, climbing the
intervening fences, and finally clambering into the earthworks to take
their places for the final stand. They spoke with grinning respect of
that which was out there ahead, coming on. They threw off their coats
and tightened their belts, making themselves comfortable for what time
there yet remained. One man saw a soldier sitting under a tree,
leaning against the trunk, his knees high in front of him, his pipe
between his lips. Getting no answer to his request for the loan of the
pipe, he snatched it without leave, and then, discovering the truth,
went on none the less to enjoy the luxury of a smoke, it seeming to him
desirable to compass this while it yet remained among the possibilities
of life.

At last there came a continued, hoarse, deep cheering, a roaring wave
of menace made up of little sounds. An officer sprang up to the top of
the breastworks and waved his sword, shouting out something which no
one heard or cared to hear. The line in the trenches, boys and
veterans, reserves and remnants of the columns of defence, rose and
poured volley after volley, as they could, into the thick and
concealing woods that lay before them. None the less, there appeared
soon a long, dusty, faded line, trotting, running, walking, falling,
stumbling, but coming on. It swept like a long serpent parallel to the
works, writhing, smitten but surviving. It came on through the wood,
writhing, tearing at the cruel abattis laid to entrap it. It writhed,
roared, but it broke through. It swept over the rail fences that lay
between the lines and the abattis, and still came on! This was not
war, but Fate!

There came a cloud of smoke, hiding the face of the intrenchments.
Then the boys of Louisburg saw bursting through this suffocating
curtain a few faces, many faces, long rows of faces, some pale, some
red, some laughing, some horrified, some shouting, some swearing--a
long row of faces that swept through the smoke, following a line of
steel--a line of steel that flickered, waved, and dipped.

CHAPTER III

THE VICTORY

The bandmaster mar