und the curve. Six abreast they came,
a regiment of strong, straight riders, hungry for battle, hot to
retrieve the losing fortune of the day. The road was too narrow for a
concentrated rush, so they streamed into the fields on either side,
re-formed, and swept like an avalanche of blue upon their prey. The guns
in the woods now thundered forth afresh, their echoes rolling out
across the hills, and the attacking Rebels turned and fled, like leaves
before a storm.

On one side of the road, Morrison and Cary shrank down beside the wall
to let the Union riders pass; on the other, all that was left of the
Rebel force ran helter-skelter for a screen of protecting trees. But
before the last one disappeared he threw up his gun and fired,
haphazard, in the direction whence he had come.

As if in reply came the sound of a saber falling from a man's hand and
striking on a stone. Under his very eyes and just as he was putting out
his hand to grip the others Morrison saw Herbert Cary sinking slowly to
the ground.

And then, through the yellow dust clouds and the powder smoke and all
the horrid reek of war, a child came running with outstretched arms and
piteous voice--a frightened child, weeping for the father who had thrown
himself headlong into peril to save another's life and who, perhaps, had
lost his own.

CHAPTER IX

The headquarters of the Army of the Potomac on the morning of August 4,
1864, were at City Point near where the Appomattox meets the James. Here
the grim, silent man in whose hands lay the destinies of the United
States sent out the telegrams which kept the Federal forces gnawing at
the cage in which Lee had shut himself and meanwhile held to his
strategic position south of Richmond. To his left and west lay
Petersburg still unconquered, but Petersburg could wait, for Early's
gray clad troopers were scourging the Shenandoah and the menace must be
removed. To this end Grant had sent a telegram to Washington three days
before expressing in unmistakable terms what he wished General Sheridan
and his cavalry to accomplish. They were to go over into the Shenandoah
and, putting themselves _south_ of the enemy, follow him to the death.
To which telegram the tall, lank, furrow-faced man in the White House
whose kindly heart was bursting with the strain replied in
characteristic fashion and told him that his purpose was exactly right.
And then, with a gleam of humor, warned him against influences in
Washingt