hey demand that a great victory be won in the
east right away."

"I feel sorry for a general who is pushed on like that."

"So do I, because he hasn't a ghost of a chance. He'll be able to cross
the river under cover of his great batteries, but look, Harry, look at
those frowning heights around Fredericksburg, covered with the finest
riflemen in the world, the ditches and trenches sown with artillery,
and the best two military brains on the globe there to direct. What
chance have they, Harry? What chance have they?"

"Very little that I can see, but a battle is never won or lost until
it's fought. We'd better report now to General Jackson."

They saluted General Stuart, and rode away over the icy mud. General
Jackson received their report with pleasure.

"Excellent! Excellent!" he said. "General Stuart has routed them with
horse artillery! A capable man! A most wonderful man!"

He said the last words to himself, rather than to Harry, and Stuart soon
proved that his horse artillery was not underrated by winning a second
encounter with the gunboats a day or two later. Early also beat back an
attempt to cross the river at a third place, and it became apparent now
that the Union army could make no flanking attack upon its enemy south
of the Rappahannock. It must be made, if at all, directly on its front
at Fredericksburg.

But Harry had no doubt that it would be made. The reports of their
numerous scouts and spies told with detail of the immense preparations
going on in the Union camp. He could often watch them himself with his
glasses from the hills. He did not see much of St. Clair and Langdon
these days, as they remained closely with their regiment, the
Invincibles, but Dalton and he were much together.

It was well into December when they were watching through the glasses
the concentration of Union cannon on Stafford Heights across the river.
One hundred and fifty great guns were in position there and they could
easily blow Fredericksburg to pieces. Harry looked down again at this
little city which had jumped suddenly into fame by getting itself
squarely between the two armies arrayed for battle.

He felt the old sensation of pity as he gazed at the closed shutters and
the smokeless chimneys. Nobody was stirring in the streets, except some
Mississippi soldiers who had been placed there to oppose the passage,
and who were fortifying themselves in the houses and cellars along the
river front.