At the head of his company Capt. Carleton moved. Firm, erect, and dignified, as if born to command, he did full justice to the Carleton name, of which he was justly proud; but his face was paler than its wont, and a tinge of sadness rested upon it as his regiment halted at last in front of what was supposed to be the hidden foe. Thomas Carleton had wept bitter tears when he laid his Mary to rest beneath South Carolina’s sunny skies, and had thought he could never be reconciled to the loss, but he was half glad now that she was dead, for she was born of Southern blood, and he would rather she should not know the errand which had brought him to Virginia, where first he met and loved her,—rather she should not know how he had come to war with her people. There was another thought, too, which made him sad that July day. The green, beautiful woods standing there so silently before him probably sheltered more than one with whom he had in bygone days struck the friendly hand and bandied the friendly joke, for his home was once in Richmond, and there were there those who once held no small place in his heart. And they were dear to him yet. He was not fighting against them personally, he was contending only for his nation’s rights, his country’s honor. He bore no malice toward his Southern brethren, and like many of our staunchest, bravest Northern men, he would even then have met them more than half way with terms of reconciliation. He knew they were no race of bloodthirsty demons, as some fanatics had madly termed them. They were men, most of them, like himself,—warm-hearted, impulsive men, generous almost to a fault in peace, but firm and terrible in war. _Tom_ had lived among them,—had shared their hospitalities,—had seen them in their various phases, and making allowance for the vast difference which education and habits of society make in one’s opinions, he saw many points wherein the North had misunderstood their actions, and not made due concessions when they might have done so without yielding one iota of their honor. But time for concession was over now. Political fanatics had stirred up the mass of the people till nought but _blood_ could wash away the fancied wrong. And they were there that Sabbath morn to spill it. Tom, however, did not know that the green, silent woods sheltered his _brother_, for his mother had purposely withheld from him the fact that Jimmie had joined the Southern Army. She knew the struggle it had cost him to take up arms against a people he liked so much, and she would not willingly add to his burden by telling him of Jimmie’s sin, and it was well she did not, for had he known how near he was to Jimmie, he could not have stood there so unmoved, awaiting the first booming gun which should herald the opening of the battle.