Scarcely were the words out of his lips, when his face became ghastly like death, his eyes half closed, his mouth half opened. His head drooped; and speechless, almost fainting, he sank down gradually from his saddle into Fraser’s arms. The corporal carried him to the road-side—why, he was but a boy—and seated, or rather laid him upon the bank. Pledget was promptly in attendance, got off the patient’s coat, and examined the wounded arm, amidst the clatter of fixing bayonets and ramming down cartridges. “Oh, ain’t we going at it in yarnest, though?” said Jones. “The system,” said Pledget, with all his usual deliberation—“the system has received a severe shock; that is the cause of these alarming symptoms—they will not last. So it often happens with gunshot wounds. The wound itself is not dangerous. The ball has gone clean through the arm, and at short distance too, but without fracturing the bone or injuring any important vessel.” Oh, had you seen that lad languishing on the sod, with the black blood trickling from two holes at once, and joining in a sluggish stream which went rippling down his arm, and dripped into the grass! I don’t know what he thought of; I thought of his mother. Enough: the foe is in front. But affairs now assumed a new phase. While I was anxiously surveying our wounded commander, Corporal Eraser stepped up to me, saluting in due form, _à la militaire_! He stood waiting and looking at me, as if he expected to receive directions. The nature of the position in which I was so unexpectedly placed, broke upon me in a moment. I’ll tell you just everything, exactly as it occurred. Mr Chesterfield was _hors de combat_. Pledget, in discharge of his professional duty, was wholly occupied in attending upon him. The corporal, and, it was clear, the men also, looked to me for direction in our present fix. Gingham, when the corporal approached me, backed his horse. From many persons such an action might have gone for nothing. But Gingham had a reason for all he did; and, from him, it seemed to say, “Now, Mr Y—, take the management of this little business, and go through with it. Don’t you see, my dear sir? It has devolved upon you.” “The men are ready, sir,” said Corporal Fraser; “shall we now proceed to clear the banks?” It was evident I must direct, or nothing could be done. “Wait a minute, Fraser.” I beckoned to the cavalry sergeant, and desired him to place a few of his men, with swords drawn, in the rear of the convoy, giving them strict directions to suffer no one to fall behind, mule or muleteer. He was then to divide the rest of our mounted force into two equal parties, under his two corporals, who, when the infantry advanced, were to descend along the top of the banks, and halt at its extremity. I then gave the word to Corporal Fraser to move forward at once with the infantry, and clear the underwood, but to halt where the cavalry halted, and by no means to go beyond.