t after dawn. Now kindly lift that
canvasflap, look out and tell me what you see."
Harry did as he was told, and was amazed. The same rolling landscape
still met his eyes, and the sun was just about as high in the sky as
it was when he had climbed into the wagon. But it was in the west now
instead of the east.
"See and know, young man!" said Dalton, paternally. "The entire day
has elapsed and here you have lain in ignorant slumber, careless of
everything, reckless of what might happen to the army. For twelve hours
General Lee has been without your advice, and how, lacking it, he has
got this far, Heaven alone knows."
"It seems that he's pulled through, and, since I'm now awake, you can
hurry to him and tell him I'm ready to furnish the right plans to stop
the forthcoming Yankee invasion."
"They'll keep another day, but we've certainly had a good sleep, Harry."
"Yes, a provision or ammunition wagon isn't a bad place for a wornout
soldier. I remember I slept in another such as this in the Valley of
Virginia, when we were with Jackson."
He stopped suddenly and choked. He could not mention the name of Jackson,
until long afterward, without something rising in his throat.
The driver obscured a good deal of the front view, but he suddenly turned
a rubicund and smiling face upon them.
"Waked up, hev ye?" he exclaimed. "Wa'al it's about time. I've looked
back from time to time an' I wuzn't at all shore whether you two gen'rals
wuz alive or dead. Sometimes when the wagon slanted a lot you would roll
over each other, but it didn't seem to make no diffunce. Pow'ful good
sleepers you are."
"Yes," said Harry. "We're two of the original Seven Sleepers."
"I don't doubt that you are two, but they wuz more'n seven."
"How do you know?"
"'Cause at least seven thousand in this train have been sleepin' as hard
as you wuz. I guess you mean the 'rig'nal Seventy Thousand Sleepers."
Harry's spirits had returned after his long sleep. He was a lad again.
The weight of Gettysburg no longer rested upon him. The Army of Northern
Virginia had merely made a single failure. It would strike again and
again, as hard as ever.
"It's true that we've been slumbering," he said, "but we're as wide awake
now as ever, Mr. Driver."
"My name ain't Driver," said the man.
"Then what is it?"
"Jones, Dick Jones, which I hold to be a right proper name."
"Not romantic, but short, simple and satisfying."
"I recko
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