ere were welcomes for his Colonel, a
welcome to Corporal Jack--his mother was there, some one said; she was
up in the general's tent.

Suddenly a few words startled G. W. They seemed to him to ring out of
the confusion of greetings like an alarm:

"Oh, look! there are Colonel Austin and his little hero!"

It was a woman's voice.

The heavy brown eyes of the little fellow in blue on the litter opened.

The procession of sick men was passing between lines of sympathizing
people, but to G. W. they faded like visions. He turned his head and
fixed his solemn gaze upon the one face in all the world dear to him.

"Colonel!" he gasped, "did yo' hear dem words--dem hero-words? Yo'
better tell dem dat it ain't so!"

"Why, my child, they know all about it. You are as big a hero as ever
was brought home--didn't you know it?"

"No, sah!" Again the lids closed--the battle with tears was renewed.

The next stage of little G. W.'s journey was made in an army ambulance.
Over the hills and down the sandy valleys the big wagon went softly
until it stopped before the long hospital tent on the hill overlooking
the merry waves. Then G. W. was carried in and placed upon a bed, and a
woman with a wonderful face came and bent over him. She wore a blue gown
and a snowy cap and apron and kerchief. G. W. had never seen anybody in
the world in the least like her. She stood and smiled down at him, and
he smiled weakly up at her.

"Well, my little hero," she laughed in the most cheerful manner, as if
it were quite a joke to see heroes carried about like babies, "it isn't
so very bad! I think I can get you on your feet in--let me see--well,
three days at the farthest."

Three days! If she had said three years the boy would have felt
doubtful, for his legs were but waving strings.

This smiling woman in blue and white fed him--about every two minutes,
he thought; as soon as he had swallowed one thing she went away for
another, and came back and fed him again; and he swallowed all the
things down, and began soon to laugh as merrily as she.

Sure enough, upon the third day, and in the morning, too, she came
walking up to G. W.'s cot with Colonel Austin, and over her arm hung the
fine new uniform.

"My boy," she laughed,--she always laughed,--and drew a screen about the
bed, "we're going to put your clothes on you, and if you lean upon both
Colonel Austin and me, I think you can manage to take a bit of a walk.
We have something very impor