ore than twenty yards in front of
us!"

The scattered rifle fire continued, and the weary soldiers raised their
heads which they had bent to shelter their eyes from the driving snow
and hail. Pulses leaped up again, and blood sparkled. The whole army
rushed forward. The roofs of houses came into view, and there was Bath.

But the firing had been merely that of a small rear guard, skirmishers
who surrendered promptly. The garrison, warned doubtless by Shepard,
and then the scouting troop, had escaped across the river, but Jackson's
wintry march was not wholly in vain. The fleeing Union troops had no
time either to carry away or destroy the great stores of supplies,
accumulated there for the winter, and the starving and freezing
Southerners plunged at once into the midst of plenty, ample compensation
to the young privates.

The population, ardently Southern, as everywhere in these Virginia
towns, welcomed the army with wild enthusiasm. Officers and soldiers
were taken into the houses, as many as Bath could hold, and enormous
fires were built in the open spaces for the others. They also showed the
way at once to the magazines, where the Union supplies were heaped up.

Harry, at the direction of his general, went with one of the detachments
to seize these. Their first prize was an old but large storehouse,
crammed full of the things they needed most. The tall mountain youth,
Seth Moore, was one of his men, and he proved to be a prince of looters.

"Blankets! blankets!" cried Moore. "Here they are, hundreds of 'em! An'
look at these barrels! Bacon! Beef! Crackers! An' look at the piles of
cheese! Oh, Lieutenant Kenton, how my mouth waters! Can't I bite into
one o' them cheeses?"

"Not yet," said Harry, whose own mouth was watering, too, "but you can,
Seth, within ten minutes at the farthest. The whole army must bite at
once."

"That's fa'r an' squar', but ain't this richness! Cove oysters, cans an'
cans of 'em, an' how I love 'em! An' sardines, too, lots of 'em! Why,
I could bite right through the tin boxes to get at 'em. An' rice, an'
hominy, an' bags o' flour. Why, the North has been sendin' whole train
loads of things down here for us to eat!"

"And she has been sending more than that," said Harry. "Here are five
or six hundred fine breech-loading rifles, and hundreds of thousands
of cartridges. She's been sending us arms and ammunition with which to
fight her!"

His boyish spirit burst forth. Even though an of