Captain Bennett glanced from one to another of his five Sergeants. Harry's heart gave a swift leap, with hope that he might be ORDERED to remain behind. Then the blood crimsoned his cheeks, for the first time since the sound of the firing struck his ears; he felt that every eye in the Company was upon him, and that his ignoble desire had been read by all in his look of expectancy. Shame came to spur up his faltering will. He set his teeth firmly, pulled the tompion out of his gun, and flung it away disdainfully as if he would never need it again, blew into the muzzle to see if the tube was clear, and wiped off the lock with a fine white handkerchief--one of the relics of his by-gone elegance--which he drew from the breast of his blouse. “Sergeant Glan--Sergeant Glancey will remain,” said the Captain peremptorily. Glancey, the Captain knew, was the only son and support of a widowed mother. “Now, boys,” said the Colonel in tones that rang like bugle notes, “the time has come for us to strike a blow for the Union, and for the fame of the dear old Buckeye State. I need not exhort you to do your duty like men; I know you too well to think that any such words of mine are at all necessary. Forward! QUICK TIME! MARCH!” The mountain sides rang with the answering cheers from a thousand throats. The noise of the battle on the distant crest was at first in separate bursts of sound, as regiment after regiment came into position and opened fire. The intervals between these bursts had disappeared, and it had now become a steady roar. A wild mob came rushing backward from the front. “My God, our men are whipped!” exclaimed the young Adjutant in tones of Anguish. “No, no,” said Captain Bennett, with cheerful confidence. “These are only the camp riff-raff, who run whenever so much as a cap is burst near them.” So it proved to be. There were teamsters upon their wheel-mules, cooks, officers' servants, both black and white, and civilian employees, mingled with many men in uniform, skulking from their companies. Those were mounted who could seize a mule anywhere, and those who could not were endeavoring to keep up on foot with the panic-stricken riders. All seemed wild with one idea: To get as far as possible from the terrors raging around the mountain top. They rushed through the regiment and disordered its ranks. “Who are you a-shovin', young fellow--say?” demanded Abe Bolton, roughly collaring a strapping hulk of a youth, who, hatless, and with his fat cheeks white with fear came plunging against him like a frightened steer. “O boys, let me pass, and don't go up there! Don't! You'll all be killed. I know it, I'm all the one of my company that got away--I am, really. All the rest are killed.”