ugh they were nearly cut to pieces. Hill now passed
along the Southern line, and like the other Southern leaders, uncertain
what to do in this battle brought on so strangely and suddenly, ceased
to push the Union lines with infantry, but opened a tremendous fire from
eighty guns. The whole valley echoed with the crash of the cannon,
and the vast clouds of smoke began to gather again. The Union forces
suffered heavy losses, but still held their ground.

Harry thought, while this comparative lull in close fighting was going
on, that Dalton and he should get back to General Lee with news of what
was occurring, although he had no doubt the commander-in-chief was now
advancing as fast as he could with the full strength of the army. Still,
duty was duty. They had been sent forward that they might carry back
reports, and they must carry them.

"It's time for us to go," he said to Dalton.

"I was just about to say that myself."

"We can safely report to the general that the vanguards have met at
Gettysburg and that there are signs of a battle."

Dalton took a long, comprehensive look over the valley in which thirty
or forty thousand men were merely drawing a fresh breath before plunging
anew into the struggle, and said:

"Yes, Harry, all the signs do point that way. I think we can be sure of
our news."

They had not been able to catch any of the riderless horses galloping
about the field, and they started on foot, taking the road which they
knew would lead them to Lee. They emerged from some bushes in which
they had been lying for shelter, and two or three bullets whistled
between them. Others knocked up the dust in the path and a shell
shrieked a terrible warning over their heads. They dived back into the
bushes.

"Didn't you see that sign out there in the road?" asked Harry.

"Sign! Sign! I saw no sign," said Dalton.

"I did. It was a big sign, and it read, in big letters:
'No Thoroughfare.'"

"You must be right. I suppose I didn't notice it, because I came back
in such a hurry."

They had become so hardened to the dangers of war that, like thousands
of others, they could jest in the face of death.

"We must make another try for it," said Dalton. "We've got to cross
that road. I imagine our greatest danger is from sharpshooters at the
head of it."

"Stoop low and make a dash. Here goes!"

Bent almost double, they made a hop, skip and jump and were in the
bushes on the other side, where they