On the right, through the morning, the fiery surges ebbed and flowed, and dashed to and fro, now against the ledges in the woods, and now against the ridge by Poffenberger's. They have left crimson stains upon the threshold of the church. The sunken road has drunk the blood of thousands. The cornfields, changing from the green of Summer to the russet of Autumn are sprinkled with magenta dyes. The battle is at this hour indecisive, but the artillery of both armies put on new vigor as the sun goes down, as if each was saying to the other, "We are not beaten." Once more the firing is renewed. Standing on the high hill east of the Antietam, occupied by Porter, I can see almost up to Poffenberger's. The batteries upon the hill in rear of his house are thundering. I can see the glimmer of the flashes, and the great white cloud rising above the trees, by Miller's. And there in the cornfield, Porter's, Williston's, and Walcott's batteries are pounding the ledges behind the church, and sweeping the hillside. The woods which shade the church where Jackson stands, are smoking like a furnace. Richardson's batteries, in front of Lee, are throwing shells into the cornfield beyond Rulet's. The twenty-pounder Parrotts on the hill by my side open once more their iron lips. The hills all around Sharpsburg are flaming with Rebel guns. The sharpshooters all along the line keep up a rattling fire. Near the town, hay-stacks, barns, and houses are in flames. At my left hand, Burnside's heavy guns, east of the river, are at work. His lighter batteries are beyond the bridge. His men are along the hillside, a dark line, dimly seen, covered by a bank of cloud, illuminating it with constant flashes. All the country is flaming, smoking, and burning, as if the last great day, the judgment day of the Lord, had come. Gradually the thunder dies away. The flashes are fewer. The musketry ceases, and silence comes on, broken only by an occasional volley, and single shots, like the last drops after a shower. Thirty thousand men, who in the morning were full of life, are bleeding at this hour. The sky is bright with lurid flames of burning buildings, and they need no torches who go out upon the bloody field to gather up the wounded. Thousands of bivouac fires gleam along the hillsides, as if a great city had lighted its lamps. Cannon rumble along the roads. Supply wagons come up. Long trains of ambulances go by. Thousands of slightly wounded work their way to the rear, dropping by the roadside, or finding a bed of straw by wheat-stacks and in stables. There is the clatter of hoofs,--the cavalry dashing by, and the tramp, tramp, tramp of Couch's and Humphrey's divisions, marching to the field. There are low wails of men in distress, and sharp shrieks from those who are under the surgeon's hands.