nd
daring that, if he carries it to the battle-field, will wreathe his brow
with laurels; but like many a rash soldier before him, he did not win.
On the contrary, his eagles took flight with a rapidity suggestive of
the old adage that "gold hath wings," and when, long after midnight, he
stood upon the deserted street alone with Philip Searle and his
reflections, he was a sadder and a soberer man.

"Searle, I'm a ruined man."

"You'll fight all the better for it," replied Philip, knocking the ashes
from his segar. "Come, you'll never mend the matter by taking cold here
in the night air; where do you put up? I'll see you home."

"D--n you, you take it easy," said the colonel, bitterly. Philip could
afford to take it easy, for he had most of the colonel's money in his
pocket. In fact, the unhappy votary of Mars was more thoroughly ruined
than his companion was aware of, for when fortune was hitting him
hardest, he had not hesitated to bring into action a reserve of
government funds which had been intrusted to his charge for specific
purposes.

"Searle," said the colonel, after they had walked along silently for a
few minutes, "I was telling you this evening about that vacant
captaincy."

"Yes, you were telling me I shouldn't have it," replied Philip, with an
accent of injured friendship.

"Well, I fancied it out of my power to do anything about it. But"--

"Well, but?"--

"I think I might get it for you, for--for"----

"A consideration?" suggested Philip, interrogatively.

"Well, to be plain with you, let me have five hundred, and you've won
all of that to-night, and I'll get you the captaincy."

"We'll talk about it to-morrow morning," replied Philip.

And in the morning the bargain was concluded; Philip, with the promise
that all should be satisfactorily arranged, started the same day for
Washington, to await the commission so honorably disposed of by the
gallant colonel.

CHAPTER XVIII.

We will let thirty days pass on, and bear the reader South of the
Potomac, beyond the Federal lines and within rifle-shot of an advanced
picket of the Confederate army, under General Beauregard. It was a
dismal night--the 16th of July. The rain fell heavily and the wind
moaned and shrieked through the lone forests like unhappy spirits
wailing in the darkness. A solitary horseman was cautiously wending his
way through the storm upon the Centreville road and toward the
Confederate Hue. He bore a white handkerch