h humility to the lurid descriptions of
a bearded sergeant. His lean features wore an expression of awe and
admiration. He was like a listener in a country store to wondrous
tales told among the sugar barrels. He eyed the story-teller with
unspeakable wonder. His mouth was agape in yokel fashion.

The sergeant, taking note of this, gave pause to his elaborate history
while he administered a sardonic comment. "Be keerful, honey, you 'll
be a-ketchin' flies," he said.

The tattered man shrank back abashed.

After a time he began to sidle near to the youth, and in a different
way try to make him a friend. His voice was gentle as a girl's voice
and his eyes were pleading. The youth saw with surprise that the
soldier had two wounds, one in the head, bound with a blood-soaked rag,
and the other in the arm, making that member dangle like a broken bough.

After they had walked together for some time the tattered man mustered
sufficient courage to speak. "Was pretty good fight, wa'n't it?" he
timidly said. The youth, deep in thought, glanced up at the bloody and
grim figure with its lamblike eyes. "What?"

"Was pretty good fight, wa'n't it?

"Yes," said the youth shortly. He quickened his pace.

But the other hobbled industriously after him. There was an air of
apology in his manner, but he evidently thought that he needed only to
talk for a time, and the youth would perceive that he was a good fellow.

"Was pretty good fight, wa'n't it?" he began in a small voice, and then
he achieved the fortitude to continue. "Dern me if I ever see fellers
fight so. Laws, how they did fight! I knowed th' boys 'd like when
they onct got square at it. Th' boys ain't had no fair chanct up t'
now, but this time they showed what they was. I knowed it 'd turn out
this way. Yeh can't lick them boys. No, sir! They're fighters, they
be."

He breathed a deep breath of humble admiration. He had looked at the
youth for encouragement several times. He received none, but gradually
he seemed to get absorbed in his subject.

"I was talkin' 'cross pickets with a boy from Georgie, onct, an' that
boy, he ses, 'Your fellers 'll all run like hell when they onct hearn a
gun,' he ses. 'Mebbe they will,' I ses, 'but I don't b'lieve none of
it,' I ses; 'an' b'jiminey,' I ses back t' 'um, 'mebbe your fellers 'll
all run like hell when they onct hearn a gun,' I ses. He larfed. Well,
they didn't run t' day, did they, hey? No, sir! They