"Opinions, Hector, are--opinions. Time alone decides whether they
are or are not facts. But our corps is to fall back, you say, Harry?
What does it signify?"

"I think, Colonel, that it means a great battle very soon. It is
apparent that General Lee thinks so, or he would not be concentrating
his troops so swiftly. The Army of the Potomac is somewhere on our
flank, and we shall have to deal with it."

"So be it. The Invincibles are few but ready."

Harry rode rapidly back to Lee with the return message from Ewell,
and found him going into camp on the eve of the last day of June.
The weather was hot and scarcely any tents were set, nearly everybody
preferring the open air. Harry delivered his message, and General Lee
said to him, with his characteristic kindness:

"You'd better go to sleep as soon as you can, because I shall want you
to go on another errand in the morning to a place called Gettysburg."

Gettysburg! Gettysburg! He had never heard the name before and it
had absolutely no significance to him now. But he saluted, withdrew,
procured his blankets and joined Dalton.

"The General tells me, George, that I'm to go to Gettysburg," he said.
"What's Gettysburg, and why does he want me to go there?"

"I'm to be with you, Harry, and we're both going with a flying column,
in order that we may report upon its conduct and achievements. So I've
made inquiries. It's a small town surrounded by hills, but it's a
great center for roads. We're going there because it's got a big shoe
factory. Our role is to be that of shoe buyers. Harry, stick out your
feet at once!"

Harry thrust them forward.

"One sole worn through. The heel gone from the other shoe, and even
then you're better off than most of us. Lots of the privates are
barefooted. So you needn't think that the role of shoe buyer is an
ignominious one."

"I'll be ready," said Harry. "Call me early in the morning, George.
We're a long way from home, and the woods are not full of friends.
Getting up here in these Pennsylvania hills, one has to look pretty
hard to look away down South in Dixie."

"That's so, Harry. A good sleep to you, and to-morrow, as shoe buyers,
we'll ride together to Gettysburg."

He lay between his blankets, went quickly to sleep and dreamed nothing
of Gettysburg, of which he had heard for the first time that day.

CHAPTER XII

THE ZENITH OF THE SOUTH

The sun of the first day of July, which was to witn