their money, and a voice, somewhat the worse for a liquid
not water, sang:

"Little McClellan sat eating a melon
The Chickahominy by;
He stuck in his spade,
Then a long while delayed,
And cried: 'What a brave general am I!'"

"I'll wager that you had nothing to do with driving back McClellan,"
thought Prescott, and then his mind turned to that worn army by the
Rapidan, fighting with such endurance, while others lived in fat ease
here in Richmond.

Half a dozen men, English in face and manner and rolling in their walk
like sailors, passed him. He recognized them at once as blockade runners
who had probably come up from Wilmington to sell their goods for a
better price at the capital. While wondering what they had brought, his
attention was distracted by one of the auctioneers, a large man with a
red face and tireless voice.

"Come buy! Come buy!" he cried. "See this beautiful new uniform of the
finest gray, a sample of a cargo made in England and brought over five
days ago on a blockade runner to Wilmington."

Looking around in search of a possible purchaser, his eye caught
Prescott.

"This will just suit you," he said. "A change of a strap or two and it
will do for either captain or lieutenant. What a figure you will be in
this uniform!" Then he leaned over and said persuasively: "Better buy
it, my boy. Take the advice of a man of experience. Clothes are half the
battle. They may not be so on the firing line, but they are here in
Richmond."

Prescott looked longingly at the uniform which in colour and texture was
all that the auctioneer claimed, and fingered a small package of gold in
his pocket. At that moment some one bid fifty dollars, and Prescott
surveyed him with interest.

The speaker was a man of his own age, but shorter and darker, with a
hawk-like face softened by black eyes with a faintly humourous twinkle
lurking in the corner of each. He seemed distinctly good-natured, but
competition stirred Prescott and he offered sixty dollars. The other man
hesitated, and the auctioneer, who seemed to know him, asked him to bid
up.

"This uniform is worth a hundred dollars if it's worth a cent, Mr.
Talbot," he said.

"I'll give you seventy-five dollars cash or five hundred on a credit,"
said Talbot; "now which will you take?"

"If I had to take either I'd take the seventy-five dollars cash, and I'd
be mighty quick about making a choice," replied the auctioneer.

Talbot turned to P