we did not
know what it meant, but General Jackson now has an idea that McClellan
wanted to find out whether we were near enough to the Potomac to dispute
his passage."

"We are not."

"No, we're not, and I don't suppose General Lee and General Jackson wish
to keep him on the other side. But, at any rate, we're sent to find out
whether he is crossing."

"And we'll see."

"We surely will."

CHAPTER II

AHORSE WITH SHERBURNE

Harry was glad that General Jackson had detailed him for this task.
He missed his comrades of the staff, but Sherburne was a host in himself,
and he was greatly attached to him. He rode a good horse and there
was pleasure in galloping with these men over the rolling country, and
breathing the crisp and vital air of autumn.

They soon left the forest, and rode along a narrow road between fields.
Their spirits rose continually. It was a singular fact that the Army of
Northern Virginia was not depressed by Antietam. It had been a bitter
disappointment to the Southern people, who expected to see Lee take
Baltimore and Philadelphia, but the army itself was full of pride over
its achievement in beating off numbers so much superior.

It was for these reasons that Sherburne and those who rode with him felt
pride and elation. They had seen the ranks of the army fill up again.
Lee had retreated across the Potomac after Antietam with less than forty
thousand men. Now he had more than seventy thousand, and Sherburne and
Harry felt certain that instead of waiting to be attacked by McClellan
he himself would go forth to attack.

Harry had seldom seen a day more beautiful. That long hot, dry summer
had been followed by a fine autumn, the most glorious of all seasons in
North America, when the air has snap and life enough in it to make the
old young again.

He was familiar now with the rolling country into which they rode after
leaving the forest. Off in one direction lay the fields on which they
had fought the First and Second Manassas, and off in another, behind the
loom of the blue mountains, he had ridden with Stonewall Jackson on that
marvelous campaign which seemed to Harry without an equal.

But the land about them was deserted now. There were no harvests in the
fields. No smoke rose from the deserted farm houses. This soil had
been trodden over and over again by great armies, and it would be a long
time before it called again for the plough. The stone fences stood,
as sol