It was nearly midnight before the men separated, repairing to their tents. Their songs had charmed me, and made the long hours flit by like birds. Where are you, brave singers, in this year ‘68? I know not--you are all scattered. Your guns have ceased their thunder, your voices sound no more. But I think you sometimes remember, as you muse, in these dull years, those gay moonlight nights on the banks of the Rowanty. VIII. “CHARGE! STUART! PAY OFF ASHBY’S SCORE!” These memories are beguiling, and while they possess me, my drama does not march. But you have not been wearied, I hope, my dear reader, by this little pencil sketch of the brave horse artillerymen. I found myself among them; the moonlight shone; the voices sang; and I have paused to look and listen again in memory. These scenes, however, can not possess for you, the attraction they do for me. To proceed with my narrative. I shall pass over my long conversation with Will Davenant, whose bed I shared. I had promised his father to reveal nothing of the events which I had so strangely discovered--and was then only able to give the young man vague assurances of a coming change for the better in his affair with Miss Conway. He thanked me, blushing, and trying to smile--and then we fell asleep beside each other. Just at daylight I was suddenly aroused. The jarring notes of a bugle were ringing through the woods. I extended my arm in the darkness, and found that Will Davenant was not beside me. What had happened? I rose quickly, and throwing my cape over my shoulders, went out of the tent. The horse artillery was already hitched up, and in motion. The setting moon illumined the grim gun-barrels, caissons, and heavy horses, moving with rattling chains. Behind came the men on horseback, laughing and ready for combat. As I was gazing at this warlike scene so suddenly evoked, Will Davenant rode up and pointed to my horse, which was ready saddled, and attached to a bough of the great tree. “I thought I wouldn’t wake you, colonel,” he said, with a smile, “but let you sleep to the last moment. The enemy are advancing, and we are going to meet them.”