nemy in overwhelming numbers. General Wallace sees
that there has been disaster. He does not wait for orders to march.

"Third brigade, by the right flank, double-quick, Forward, March!"
Colonel Thayer commanding the brigade repeats the order. The men break
into a run towards the front along the road. General Wallace gallops in
advance, and meets Colonel Wallace conducting his brigade to the rear.

"We are out of ammunition. The enemy are following. If you will put your
troops into line till we can fill our cartridge-boxes, we will stop
them." He says it so coolly and deliberately that it astonishes General
Wallace. It reassures him. He feels that it is a critical moment, but
with men retiring so deliberately, there is no reason to be discouraged.

He leads Thayer's brigade up to the crest of the hill, just where the
road begins to descend into the ravine, through which gurgles the clear
running brook.

"Bring up Company A, Chicago Light Artillery!" he shouts to an aid. A
few moments, and Captain Wood, who commands the battery, leads it along
the road. The horses are upon the gallop. The teamsters lash them with
their whips. They leap over logs, stones, stumps, and through the
bushes. They halt at the crest of the hill.

"Put your guns here, two pieces in the road, and two on each side, and
load with grape and canister."

The men spring to their pieces. They throw off their coats, and work in
their shirt-sleeves. They ram home the cartridges and stand beside their
pieces, waiting for the enemy.

The battery faces southeast. On the right of the battery, next to it, is
the First Nebraska, and beyond it the Fifty-eighth Illinois. On the left
of the battery is Captain Davison's company of the Thirty-second
Illinois, and beyond it the Fifty-eighth Ohio. A few rods in rear is the
Seventy-sixth Ohio and the Forty-sixth and Fifty-seventh Illinois.

McArthur, Oglesby, Wallace, and Cruft have all fallen back, and their
regiments are reforming in the woods west of Thayer's position, and
filling their cartridge-boxes.

The Rebels halt a little while upon the ground from which they have
driven McClernand, rifling the pockets of the dead and robbing the
wounded. General Pillow feels very well. He writes a despatch, which is
telegraphed to Nashville,--

"On the honor of a soldier, the day is ours!"

Buckner unites his brigades to Pillow's, and they prepare for a second
advance. It gives General Wallace time to perfect his