that they were born free citizens as good as
anybody, and never hesitating to comment, often in an unflattering way,
upon their officers. Harry saw a boy who had just taken off his shoes
and who was tenderly rubbing his feet.

"I never marched so fast before," he said complainingly. "My feet are
sore all over."

"Put on your shoes an' shut up," said another boy. "Stonewall Jackson
don't care nothin' about your feet. You're here to fight."

Harry walked on, but the words sank deep in his mind. It was an
uneducated boy, probably from the hills, who had given the rebuke, but
he saw that the character of Stonewall Jackson was already understood by
the whole army, even to the youngest private. He found Langdon and
St. Clair sitting together on a log. They were not tired, as they were
mounted officers, but they were full of curiosity.

"What's passing through Old Jack's head?" asked Langdon, the irreverent
and the cheerful.

"I don't know, and I don't suppose anybody will ever know all that's
passing there."

"I'll wager my year's pay against a last year's bird nest that he isn't
leading us away from the enemy."

"He certainly isn't doing that. We're moving on two little towns, Bath
and Hancock, but there must be bigger designs beyond."

"This is New Year's Day, as you know," said St. Clair in his pleasant
South Carolina drawl, "and I feel that Tom there is going to earn the
year's pay that he talks so glibly about wagering."

"At any rate, Arthur," said Langdon, "if we go into battle you'll be
dressed properly for it, and if you fall you'll die in a gentleman's
uniform."

St. Clair smiled, showing that he appreciated Langdon's flippant
comment. Harry glanced at him. His uniform was spotless, and it was
pressed as neatly as if it had just come from the hands of a tailor. The
gray jacket of fine cloth, with its rows of polished brass buttons, was
buttoned as closely as that of a West Point cadet. He seemed to be in
dress and manner a younger brother of the gallant Virginia captain,
Philip Sherburne, and Harry admired him. A soldier who dressed well amid
such trying obstacles was likely to be a soldier through and through.
Harry was learning to read character from extraneous things, things that
sometimes looked like trifles to others.

"I merely came over here to pass the time of day," he said. "We start
again in two or three minutes. Hark, there go the bugles, and I go with
them!"

He ran back, sprang on his h