not
fix his mind, nor could he banish the condemned soldier boy from his
thoughts.

At last, feeling that he MUST KNOW that the lad was safe, he ordered
the carriage and rode rapidly ten miles over a dusty road and beneath
a scorching sun. When he reached the camp he found that the pardon had
been received and the execution stayed.

The sentinel was released, and his heart was filled with lasting
gratitude. When the campaign opened in the spring, the young man was
with his regiment near Yorktown, Virginia. They were ordered to attack a
fort, and he fell at the first volley of the enemy.

His comrades caught him up and carried him bleeding and dying from the
field. "Bear witness," he said, "that I have proved myself not a coward,
and I am not afraid to die." Then, making a last effort, with his dying
breath he prayed for Abraham Lincoln.

THE COLONEL OF THE ZOUAVES

BY NOAH BROOKS (ADAPTED)

Among those who accompanied Mr. Lincoln, the President-elect, on his
journey from Illinois to the national capital, was Elmer E. Ellsworth,
a young man who had been employed in the law office of Lincoln and
Herndon, Springfield.

He was a brave, handsome, and impetuous youth, and was among the first
to offer his services to the President in defense of the Union, as soon
as the mutterings of war were heard.

Before the war he had organized a company of Zouaves from the Chicago
firemen, and had delighted and astonished many people by the exhibitions
of their skill in the evolutions through which they were put while
visiting some chief cities of the Republic.

Now, being commissioned a second lieutenant in the United States Army,
he went to New York and organized from the firemen of that city a
similar regiment, known as the Eleventh New York.

Colonel Ellsworth's Zouaves, on the evening of May 23, were sent with
a considerable force to occupy the heights overlooking Washington and
Alexandria, on the banks of the Potomac, opposite the national capital.

Next day, seeing a Confederate flag flying from the Marshall House,
a tavern in Alexandria kept by a secessionist, he went up through the
building to the roof and pulled it down. While on his way down the
stairs, with the flag in his arms, he was met by the tavern-keeper, who
shot and killed him instantly. Ellsworth fell, dyeing the Confederate
flag with the blood that gushed from his heart. The tavern-keeper was
instantly killed by a shot from Private Brownell, of th