o far away to see, yet it was a sight to stir one who had
endured that prison city so long, never seeing a Continental soldier
except as a prisoner marched through the streets to the jails or the
hulks in the river. But there they were--those men of White Plains, of
Princeton, of Camden, and of the Wilderness--the men of Long Island,
and Germantown, and Stony Point!--there they were, wheeling by the
right flank, wheeling by the left, marching and countermarching,
drilling away, busy as bees in the July sun.

"Ah, Elsin," I said, "when they storm New York the man who misses that
splendid climax will miss the best of his life--and never forget that
he has missed it as long as he lives to mask his vain regret!"

"Why is it that you are not content?" she asked. "For four years you
have moved in the shadow of destruction."

"But I have never fought in battle," I said; "never fired a single shot
in earnest, never heard the field-horn of the light infantry nor the
cavalry-trumpet above the fusillade, never heard the officers shouting,
the mad gallop of artillery, the yelling onset--why, I know nothing of
the pleasures of strife, only the smooth deceit and bland hypocrisy,
only the eavesdropping and the ignoble pretense! At times I can
scarcely breathe in my desire to wash my honor in the rifle flames--to
be hurled pell-mell among the heaving, straining melee, thrusting,
stabbing, cutting my fill, till I can no longer hear or see. Four
years, Elsin! think of it--think of being chained in the midst of this
magnificent activity for four years! And now, when I beg a billet among
the dragoons, they tell me I am fashioned for diplomacy, not for war,
and hint of my usefulness on the frontier!"

"What frontier?" she asked quickly.

"Tryon County, I suppose."

"Where that dreadful work never ceases?"

"Hatchet and scalping-knife are ever busy there," I said grimly. "Who
knows? I may yet have my fill and to spare!"

She sat silent for so long that I presently turned from the distant
martial spectacle to look at her inquiringly. She smiled, drawing a
long breath, and shaking her head.

"I never seem to understand you, Carus," she said. "You have done your
part, yet it appears already you are planning to go hunting about for
some obliging savage to knock you in the head with a death-maul."

"But the war is not ended, Elsin."

"No, nor like to be until it compasses your death. Then, indeed, will
it be ended for me, and the wor