nd spread
out through the town of Fredericksburg. The fateful morning of the 13th
of December, 1862, dawned in another heavy fog. Its grey mantle of
mystery shrouded the town, clung wet and heavy to the ground in the
silent valley before the crescent-shaped hills and veiled the face of
their heights.

Under the cover of this fog the long waves of blue spread out in the
edge of the valley and took their places in battle line. The grey men in
the brown grass on the hills crouched behind their ditches and stone
walls, gripped their guns and waited for the foe to walk into the trap
their commanders had set.

An unseen hand slowly lifted the misty curtain and the sun burst on the
scene. The valley lay like the smooth ground of some vast arena prepared
for a pageant and back of it rose the silent hills, tier on tier like
the seats of a mighty amphitheatre. But the men crouching on those seats
were not spectators--they were the grimmest actors in the tragedy.

For a moment it was a spectacle merely--the grandest display of the
pageantry of war ever made on a field of death.

Franklin's division suddenly wheeled into position for its united
assault on the right.

Ned Vaughan, from his lair on the hill, could see the officers in their
magnificent new uniforms, their swords flashing as they led their men. A
hundred thousand bayonets were gleaming in the sparkling December sun.
Magnificent horses in rich tasselled trappings were plunging and
prancing with the excitement of marching hosts, some of them keeping
time to the throb of regimental bands.

The bands were playing now, all of them, a band for every thousand men,
the shrill scream of their bugles and the roar of their drums sending a
mighty chorus into the heavens that echoed ominously against the silent
hills.

And flags, flags, flags, were streaming in billowy waves of red, white
and blue, as far as the eye could reach!

"Isn't that pretty, boys!" Ned sighed admiringly.

Tom lifted his solemn eyes from the grass.

"Lord, Lord, look at them new warm clothes, an' my elbows a-freezin' in
this cold wind!"

"Ain't it a picture?"

"What a pity to spile it!"

A ripple of admiration ran along the crouching lines as fingers softly
felt for the triggers of their guns.

A quick order from John Vaughan's Colonel sent their battery of
artillery rattling and bounding into position. The cannoneers sprang to
their mounts. A handsome young fellow missed his foothold and