“If you ain't pretty quick,” piped one girl-faced boy, with a pensive smile, as he sat weakly down on a stone and pressed a delicate hand over a round red spot that had just appeared on the breast of his blouse, “you'll miss all the fun. We've about licked 'em already. Oh!--” Abe and Kent sprang forward to catch him, but he was dead almost before they could reach him. They laid him back tenderly on the brown dead leaves, and ran to regain their places in the ranks. The regiment was now sweeping around the last curve between it and the line of battle. The smell of burning powder that filled the air, the sight of flowing blood, the shouts of teh fighting men, had awakened every bosom that deep-lying KILLING instinct inherited from our savage ancestry, which slumbers--generally wholly unsuspected--in even the gentlest man's bosom, until some accident gives it a terrible arousing. Now the slaying fever burned in every soul. They were marching with long, quick strides, but well-closed ranks, elbow touching elbow, and every movement made with the even more than the accuracy of a parade. Harry felt himself swept forward by a current as resistless as that which sets over Niagara. They came around the little hill, and saw a bank of smoke indicating where the line of battle was. “Let's finish the canteen now,” said Kent. “It may get bored by a bullet and all run out, and you know I hate to waste.” “I suppose we might as well drink it,” assented Abe--the first time in the history of the regiment, that he agreed with anybody. “We mayn't be able to do it in ten minutes, and it would be too bad to 've lugged that all the way here, just for some one else to drink.” An Aide, powder-grimed, but radiant with joy, dashed up. “Colonel,” he said, “you had better go into line over in that vacant space there, and wait for orders; but I don't think you will have anything to do, for the General believes that the victory is on, and the Rebels are in full retreat.” As he spoke, a mighty cheer rolled around the line of battle, and a band stationed upon a rock which formed the highest part of the mountain, burst forth with the grand strains of “Star-spangled Banner.” The artillery continued to hurl screaming shot and shell down into the narrow gorge, through which the defeated Rebels were flying with mad haste. Chapter X. The Mountaineer's Revenge. And if we do but watch the hour, There never yet was human power Which could evade, if unforgiven, The patient search and vigil long Of him who treasures up a wrong. --Byron.