cider to give her? I know what 'tis to lie parching under a wound."

Someone produced one, and as her son shouted "Have with you, mother,"
Steadfast hastily asked Tom Oates to let Patience know that he was gone
to see after Jephthah, and joined Ned Lakin and his mother.

Jeph had indeed left his brothers and sisters in a strange, wild way,
almost cruel in its thoughtlessness; but to Stead it had never seemed
more than that elder brotherly masterfulness that he took as a matter of
course, and there was no resting in the thought of his lying wounded and
helpless on the field--nay, the assurance that Hodge shouted out that
the rebel dogs took care of their own fell on unhearing or unheeding
ears, as Steadfast and Ned Lakin dragged the widow through a gap in the
hedge over another field, and then made their way down a deep stony lane
between high hedges.

It was getting dark, in spite of the harvest moon, by the time they
came out on the open space below, and began to see that saddest of all
sights, a battlefield at night.

A soldier used to war would perhaps have scorned to call this a battle,
but it was dreadful enough to these three when they heard the sobbing
panting, and saw the struggling of a poor horse not quite dead, and his
rider a little way from him, a fine stout young man, cold and stiff, as
Nanny turned up his face to see if it was her Harry's.

A little farther on lay another figure on his back, but as Nanny stooped
over it, a lantern was flashed on her and a gruff voice called out,
"Villains, ungodly churls, be you robbing the dead?" and a tall man
stood darkly before them, pistol in hand.

"No, sir; no, sir," sobbed out Nanny. "I am only a poor widow woman,
come down to see whether my poor lad be dead or alive and wanting his
mother."

"What was his regiment?" demanded the soldier in a kinder voice.

"Oh, sir, your honour, don't be hard on him--he couldn't help it--he
went with Sir George Elmwood."

"That makes no odds, woman, when a man's down," said the soldier.
"Unless 'tis with the Fifth Monarchy sort, and I don't hold with them. I
have an uncle and a cousin or two among the malignants, as good fellows
as ever lived--no Amalekites and Canaanites--let Smite-them Derry say
what he will. Elmwood! let's see--that was the troop that forded higher
up, and came on Fisher's corps. This way, dame. If your son be down,
you'll find him here; that is, unless he be carried into the mill or one
of the house