Haggard, wasted, weary, and worn were those prisoners as they filed down the stairs and out into the streets, but with each moment which brought them nearer home, their spirits rose, and when at last they stood again on Federal soil and saw the Stars and Stripes waving in the morning breeze, long and deafening were the huzzas which rent the air as one after another gave vent to his great joy at finding himself free once more. Isaac, however, could neither shout, nor laugh, nor speak, and only the large eyes, brimming with tears, told of joy unutterable, but when arrived at Washington, his two stalwart brothers took him in their arms, hugging and crying over him as over one come back to them from the grave, his calmness all gave way, and laying his tired head on Eli’s bosom, while John held and caressed his wasted hands, he sobbed out the happiness too great to be expressed in words. To him a full discharge from service was readily accorded, while to Tom a furlough of several weeks was given, and after a few days at Washington both started northward to join the friends waiting so impatiently for their arrival. CHAPTER XIX. TOM’S RECEPTION. The people of Rockland had become somewhat accustomed to the “Rebel lion,” as they had playfully called Jimmie Carleton, and the latter could now go quietly through the streets without attracting attentions which at first had been vastly disagreeable to the sensitive young man. Gradually, as he mingled more with the people, they had learned to like him, and were fast forgetting that he had ever joined the ranks of the foe and struck at his mother country. With the rabble who had met him at the depot on his first arrival at Rockland he was vastly popular, for forcing down his pride, he had been very conciliatory toward them, and they still adhered to their olden promise of making him their next police justice, provided he would consent to run. With his usual impudence, Bill Baker continued to annoy the proud Bostonian with his good-humored familiarities, some of which Jimmie permitted, while others he quietly repulsed, for Bill’s constant allusions to the past were exceedingly disagreeable, and as far as possible he avoided his quondam associate, who, without the least suspicion that his manner was disgusting in the extreme, would hail him across the street, addressing him always as “Corp’ral,” and if strangers were in hearing, inviting him to “call ’round and see a fellar once in a while for old acquaintance sake.”