"I've learned that already," said Harry, as he took his advice.

A half hour later he was on his horse near Jackson, ready to receive his
commands, and in the early hours of the New Year the army marched out of
Winchester, the eager wishes of the whole population following it.

It was the brightest of winter mornings, almost like spring it seemed.
The sky was a curving and solid sheet of sunlight, and the youths of the
army were for the moment a great and happy family. They were marching
to battle, wounds and death, but they were too young and too buoyant to
think much about it.

Harry soon learned that they were going toward Bath and Hancock, two
villages on the railway, both held by Northern troops. He surmised that
Jackson would strike a sudden blow, surprise the garrisons, cut the
railway, and then rush suddenly upon some greater force. A campaign
in the middle of winter. It appealed to him as something brilliant and
daring. The pulses which had beat hard so often lately began to beat
hard again.

The army went swiftly across forest and fields. As the brigade had
marched back the night before, so the whole army marched forward to-day.
The fact that Jackson's men always marched faster than other men was
forced again upon Harry's attention. He remembered from his reading an
old comment of Napoleon's referring to war that there were only two or
three men in Europe who knew the value of time. Now he saw that at least
one man in America knew its value, and knew it as fully as Napoleon ever
did.

The day passed hour by hour and the army sped on, making only a short
halt at noon for rest and food. Harry joined the Invincibles for a
few moments and was received with warmth by Colonel Leonidas Talbot,
Lieutenant-Colonel Hector St. Hilaire and all his old friends.

"I am sorry to lose you, Harry," said Colonel Talbot, "but I am glad
that you are on the immediate staff of General Jackson. It's an honor. I
feel already that we're in the hands of a great general, and the feeling
has gone through the whole army. There's an end, so far as this force is
concerned, to doubt and hesitation."

"And we, the Southerners who are called the cavaliers, are led by a
puritan," said Lieutenant-Colonel St. Hilaire. "Because if there ever
was a puritan, General Jackson is one."

Harry passed on, intending to speak with his comrades, Langdon and
St. Clair. He heard the young troops talking freely everywhere, never
forgetting the fact