About that time a North Carolina general rode up to his brigade and called aloud: “Men, are you going to allow these guns to be captured? They say we North Carolinians have tar on our heels; let’s show them that tar _sticks_. Forward! March!” Five minutes later that hill was occupied by three thousand North Carolinians, the tar on whose heels STUCK. Half a dozen more batteries were ordered up, and the young sergeant-major was directed to move his guns by hand to the rear. _By hand._ Because of his twenty-four horses only two remained alive; while there were only thirteen left out of his twenty-six men to handle the guns by hand. This is what we called “life” in the Confederate army. “LITTLE LAMKIN’S BATTERY” For twenty-four hours I had had a man on my mind. He had been court-martialled and was sentenced to be shot. He was in the guardhouse. I know of no good reason why I should have objected to his execution; he certainly deserved all that he was to get. But I had been his counsel before the court-martial, and it is never a pleasant thing for a lawyer to have his client executed. He belonged officially to me. I had assumed a responsibility for him, and I felt that it would not be fully discharged if he should be led out and shot. I had known Beavers for a very brief time; but as his counsel I had learned much from him in confidence as to his career. He was a person of elective affinities. It was his habit to desert. He had served on both sides and in many capacities. He always fought well on whichever side he might happen to be serving. As a gambler, he always “played his game for all it was worth.” Why he had deserted back and forth in this way without any cogent reason, I never knew. I used to think sometimes that he had done so at first just to try how a new style and color of uniform might suit his particular kind of beauty. His beauty was not in itself conspicuous. I learned from him incidentally that his various reasons for desertion from one side to the other had not been of a kind that would have controlled the action of a less fastidious man. On one occasion he had deserted because he smelt mutton from the camp-kettles of the enemy. He had a predilection for mutton. I learned that he returned to us once, because one night, when he was not quite himself, a comrade had put him to bed and reversed the order of his blankets. Beavers explained to me with great particularity that a certain gray blanket had been placed on top of a certain brown one. He could not be expected to remain with a regiment under such conditions. At last he had been caught in the act of deserting. He had been tried, and, in spite of such legal acumen as I could bring to bear, had been convicted, sentenced, and the next day but one was to be shot.