there was
any urgent call for him to join them in their undertaking.

"Bob Bennett's always going where there's no need of it," he said to a
companion, as he saw the last of the regiment disappear into the woods
on the mountain side. "He could have staid back here with us just
as well as not, instead of trudging off through the heat over these
devilish roads, and probably get into a scrape for which no one will
thank him."

"Yes," said Ned Burnleigh, with his affected drawl, "what the devil's
the use, I'd like to know, for a fellah's putting himself out to do
things, when there's any quantity of other fellahs, that can't be better
employed, ready and even anxious to do them."

"That's so. But it's getting awful hot here. Let's go over to the shade,
where we were yesterday, and have Dick bring us a bucket of cold spring
water and the bottles and things."

----

"Abe!" said Jake Alspaugh to his file-leader--a red-headed, pock-marked
man, whose normal condition was that of outspoken disgust at every
thing--"this means a fight."

"Your news would've been fresh and interesting last night," growled Abe
Bolton. "I suppose that's what we brought our guns along for."

"Yes; but somebody's likely to get killed."

"Well, you nor me don't have to pay their life insurance, as I know on."

"But it may be you or me."

"The devil'd be might anxious for green wood before he'd call you in."

"Come, now, don't talk that way. This is a mighty serious time."

"I'll make it a durned sight seriouser for you if you don't keep them
splay feet o'your'n offen my heels when we're marching."

"Don't you think we'd better pay, or--something?"

"You might try taking up a collection."

"Try starting a hymn, Jake," said a slender young man at his right
elbow, whose face showed a color more intimately connected with the
contents of his canteen than the heat of the day. "Line it out, and
we'll all join in. Something like this, for example:

'Hark, from the tombs a doleful sound
Mine ears attend the cry.
Ye living men, come view the ground
Where you must shortly lie.'"

Alspaugh shuddered visibly.

"Come, spunk up, Jake," continued the slender young man. "Think how
proud all your relations will be of you, if you die for your country."

"I'm mad at all of my relations, and I don't want to do nothing to
please 'em," sighed Jake.

"But I hope you're not so greedy as to want to live always?" said the
slender