Bragg's army.

The affairs of the Union, she continued, were not going well in
Tennessee and Kentucky. The terrible Confederate cavalryman Forrest had
suddenly raided Murfreesborough in Tennessee, where Union regiments were
stationed, and had destroyed or captured them all. Throughout the west
the Southerners were raising their heads again. General Bragg, it was
said, was advancing with a strong army, and was already farther north
than the army of General Buell, which was in Tennessee. It was said that
Louisville, one of the largest and richest of the border cities, would
surely fall into the hands of the South.

Dick read the letter with changing and strong emotions. Amid the
terrible struggles in the east, the west was almost blotted out of
his mind. The Second Manassas and Antietam had great power to absorb
attention wholly upon themselves. He had wholly forgotten for the time
about Pendleton, the people whom he knew, and even his mother. Now
they returned with increased strength. His memory was flooded with
recollections of the little town, every house and face of which he knew.

And so the Confederates were coming north again with a great army.
Shiloh had been far from crushing them in the west. The letter had
been written before the Second Manassas, and that and Lee's great fight
against odds at Antietam would certainly arouse in them the wish for
like achievements. He inferred that since the armies in the east were
exhausted, the great field for action would be for a while, in the west,
and he was seized with an intense longing for that region which was his
own.

It was not coincidence, but the need for men that made Dick's wish come
true almost at once. A few hours after he received his letter Colonel
Winchester found him sitting in the lobby of the hotel in which Dick had
twice talked with the contractor. But the boy was alone this time, and
as Colonel Winchester sat down beside him he said:

"Dick, the capital has received alarming news from Kentucky. Buoyed
up by their successes in the east the Confederacy is going to make an
effort to secure that state. Bragg with a powerful force is already on
his way toward Louisville, and we fear that he has slipped away from
Buell."

"So I've heard. I found here a letter from my mother, and she told me
all the reports from that section."

"And is Mrs. Mason well? She has not been troubled by guerillas, or in
any other way?"

"Not at all. Mother's health is alwa