Virginia Military Institute cadets were younger than they used to be. To suit the times the age of admittance had been dropped. Even so, steadily from the beginning there was a road of travel from the V.M.I. to the battle-fields. Out upon it went many a cadet in his trig white and grey, never to return. In May, 1864, the entire two hundred and fifty had travelled it, travelled down the Valley to New Market to help Breckinridge fight and win that battle. In dead and wounded, V.M.I. lost sixty boys. Now after a time of wild and blissful excitement the lessened corps was back in Lexington, back at the V.M.I., back to the old barracks, the old parade ground, the old studying. To the cadets it seemed hard lines. Hunter and his eighteen thousand came up the pike from Staunton, thirty-five miles away. McCausland and a cavalry brigade, drawn across his front at Midway, did all that could be done in the way of skirmishes for delay. Breckinridge was guarding Lynchburg, an important centre of communications, a place of military stores and hospitals, and filled with refugees. Early and the Second Corps were yet in Tidewater Virginia. There was no help anywhere. V.M.I. received orders to withdraw from Lexington. McCausland had the bridge across North River lined with hay, saturated with turpentine. An alley through was left for his men when, at the last, they must fall back before the blue advance. The night of the eleventh passed, the people of Lexington sleeping little, the cadets under arms all night. Dawn came up in rose and silver. House Mountain had a roof of mist; all the lovely Rockbridge country was as fresh and sweet as any Eden. Out the Staunton road came a burst of firing; then with a clattering of hoofs, with shouts, with turning in saddles and emptying of pistols and carbines, McCausland and his troopers appeared, pressed back upon the bridge. They crossed, horsemen and a section of artillery, then struck a torch into the turpentine-soaked hay. Up roared a pillar of flame, reddening the water. With a great burst of noise Hunter’s vanguard appeared. They galloped up and down the north bank of the river shouting and firing. McCausland answered from the hills across. The bridge burned with a roaring noise and a great cloud of smoke. A Federal battery coming up got into position on a great rise of ground commanding the town, and from it began to shell the most apparent mass of buildings. This was the Virginia Military Institute. The grey and white cadets were drawn up on the parade ground. They stood there with their colours, with their tense young faces. The first shell struck the hall of the Society of Cadets, struck and exploded, working ruin. After this there began a bombardment of the corner towers, and a heavy rain upon the parade ground. “_Attention! Right face! Forward! March!_”