It was even a more turbulent river that was pouring west and southwest along the two railroads leading from the Ferry. They were beginning to tear up and burn the northern line, but along the other the trains still moved in puffing succession. To Gard the sense of the part he played was strong almost to reality. The quaint, biblical, old-world phrases which he ever kept reading and repeating reacted upon him. He seemed, even to himself, to become intangible and apart. "What shall a man take in exchange for his soul?" halting his horse and taking out the little white tract. "I don't know. If you've got a plug of tobacco I might trade." "If I had any, friend, I would give it to you freely." The man looked at him curiously. "I reckon you would now. This the best you know how, ain't it?" Others who had stopped laughed and swarmed around. "Give me one!" "Me one!" "There are more who need them." "Oh, all right." "No hogs here." "Good-luck to you, elder." The stream flowed on, some chuckling over their tracts, some silent. An officer said: "You ought to get a pass, elder." So he came to where the Shenandoah murmured its musical name. A range of blue mountains rose beyond it. There seemed to be little going on by the river. The retreat had shifted to the west along the railroads into the Opequan valley, and he turned and rode west among low, wooded hills. It was Wednesday. They were tearing and burning the southern of the two railroads now--an endless row of bonfires of the ties, the iron rails laid across them to be heated for bending. "'Let not your hearts be troubled.'" A man bending over a rail drew his hand back, swore lustily, and straightened up. "What's that? Oh!" He took the tract. "That's what it says, sure enough. Maybe you don't know that rail was hot." The tract was passed around. One read aloud, "He hath taken charge and command. He hath established His law." Gard sat motionless on his horse, looking placidly over their heads to the pale-blue horizon. "Who is the one greatest in authority here?" "This side of God Almighty and Winchester. I reckon you mean the old man. Hi, lieutenant!" The cantering officer pulled up. "He wants the general." "Does, does he? What for?" A pause. Gard dropped his eyes to the officer who was reading the tract. "It is said to be best that I should have his permission to--" "Oh, I see. Come along, then." They rode beside the track through strata of heat and smoke from the fires, Gard following. It occurred to him that he had given his name on an impulse the day before as Moselle, and would possibly need it now. They came to a group of horsemen, talking, except one in front of them, who watched the toiling squads silently. He wore a full black beard, and sat his horse awkwardly. "This seems to be some kind of a missionary, general. He wants to see you."