THE trees began softly to sing a hymn of twi-light. The sun sank until slanted bronze raysstruck the forest. There was a lull in the noisesof insects as if they had bowed their beaks andwere making a devotional pause. There wassilence save for the chanted chorus of the trees.

Then, upon this stillness, there suddenly brokea tremendous clangor of sounds. A crimson roarcame from the distance.

The youth stopped. He was transfixed bythis terrific medley of all noises. It was as ifworlds were being rended. There was the rip-ping sound of musketry and the breaking crashof the artillery.

His mind flew in all directions. He conceivedthe two armies to be at each other pantherfashion. He listened for a time. Then he beganto run in the direction of the battle. He sawthat it was an ironical thing for him to be run-ning thus toward that which he had been at such

82pains to avoid. But he said, in substance, to him-self that if the earth and the moon were about toclash, many persons would doubtless plan to getupon the roofs to witness the collision.

As he ran, he became aware that the foresthad stopped its music, as if at last becomingcapable of hearing the foreign sounds. The treeshushed and stood motionless. Everything seemedto be listening to the crackle and clatter and ear-shaking thunder. The chorus pealed over thestill earth.

It suddenly occurred to the youth that thefight in which he had been was, after all, butperfunctory popping. In the hearing of thispresent din he was doubtful if he had seen realbattle scenes. This uproar explained a celes-tial battle; it was tumbling hordes a-struggle inthe air.

Reflecting, he saw a sort of a humor in thepoint of view of himself and his fellows duringthe late encounter. They had taken themselvesand the enemy very seriously and had imaginedthat they were deciding the war. Individualsmust have supposed that they were cutting theletters of their names deep into everlasting tabletsof brass, or enshrining their reputations forever inthe hearts of their countrymen, while, as to fact,the affair would appear in printed reports under ameek and immaterial title. But he saw that it wasgood, else, he said, in battle every one wouldsurely run save forlorn hopes and their ilk.

He went rapidly on. He wished to come tothe edge of the forest that he might peer out.

As he hastened, there passed through his mindpictures of stupendous conflicts. His accumulatedthought upon such subjects was used to formscenes. The noise was as the voice of an eloquentbeing, describing.

Sometimes the brambles formed chains andtried to hold him back. Trees, confronting him,stretched out their arms and forbade him to pass.After its previous hostility this new resistance ofthe forest filled him with a fine bitterness. Itseemed that Nature could not be quite ready tokill him.

But he obstinately took roundabout ways, andpresently he was where he could see long graywalls of vapor where lay battle lines. The voicesof cannon shook him. The musketry sounded inlong irregular surges that played havoc with hisears. He stood regardant for a moment. Hiseyes had an awestruck expression. He gawkedin the direction of the fight.

Presently he proceeded again on his forwardway. The battle was like the grinding of animmense and terrible machine to him. Its com-plexities and powers, its grim processes, fascinatedhim. He must go close and see it producecorpses.

He came to a fence and clambered over it.On the far side, the ground was littered withclothes and guns. A newspaper, folded up, layin the dirt. A dead soldier was stretched withhis face hidden in his arm. Farther off therewas a group of four or five corpses keepingmournful company. A hot sun had blazed uponthe spot.

In this place the youth felt that he was aninvader. This forgotten part of the battle groundwas owned by the dead men, and he hurried, inthe vague apprehension that one of the swollenforms would rise and tell him to begone.

He came finally to a road from which hecould see in the distance dark and agitatedbodies of troops, smoke-fringed. In the lanewas a blood-stained crowd streaming to the rear.The wounded men were cursing, groaning, andwailing. In the air, always, was a mighty swellof sound that it seemed could sway the earth.With the courageous words of the artillery andthe spiteful sentences of the musketry mingledred cheers. And from this region of noises camethe steady current of the maimed.

One of the wounded men had a shoeful ofblood. He hopped like a schoolboy in a game.He was laughing hysterically.

One was swearing that he had been shot in thearm through the commanding general's misman-agement of the army. One was marching withan air imitative of some sublime drum major.Upon his features was an unholy mixture ofmerriment and agony. As he marched he sanga bit of doggerel in a high and quavering voice:

"Sing a song 'a vic'try,A pocketful 'a bullets,Five an' twenty dead menBaked in a--pie."

Parts of the procession limped and staggered tothis tune.

Another had the gray seal of death alreadyupon his face. His lips were curled in hard linesand his teeth were clinched. His hands werebloody from where he had pressed them upon hiswound. He seemed to be awaiting the momentwhen he should pitch headlong. He stalked likethe specter of a soldier, his eyes burning with thepower of a stare into the unknown.

There were some who proceeded sullenly, fullof anger at their wounds, and ready to turn uponanything as an obscure cause.

An officer was carried along by two privates.He was peevish. "Don't joggle so, Johnson, yehfool," he cried. "Think m' leg is made of iron?If yeh can't carry me decent, put me down an'let some one else do it."

He bellowed at the tottering crowd whoblocked the quick march of his bearers. "Say,make way there, can't yeh? Make way, dickenstake it all."

They sulkily parted and went to the road-sides. As he was carried past they made pertremarks to him. When he raged in reply andthreatened them, they told him to be damned.

The shoulder of one of the tramping bearersknocked heavily against the spectral soldier whowas staring into the unknown.

The youth joined this crowd and marchedalong with it. The torn bodies expressed theawful machinery in which the men had beenentangled.

Orderlies and couriers occasionally brokethrough the throng in the roadway, scatteringwounded men right and left, galloping on fol-lowed by howls. The melancholy march wascontinually disturbed by the messengers, andsometimes by bustling batteries that came swing-ing and thumping down upon them, the officersshouting orders to clear the way.

There was a tattered man, fouled with dust,blood and powder stain from hair to shoes, whotrudged quietly at the youth's side. He was lis-tening with eagerness and much humility to thelurid descriptions of a bearded sergeant. Hislean features wore an expression of awe and ad-miration. He was like a listener in a countrystore to wondrous tales told among the sugarbarrels. He eyed the story-teller with unspeak-able wonder. His mouth was agape in yokelfashion.

The sergeant, taking note of this, gave pauseto his elaborate history while he administered asardonic comment. "Be keerful, honey, you 'llbe a-ketchin' flies," he said.

The tattered man shrank back abashed.

After a time he began to sidle near to theyouth, and in a different way try to make him afriend. His voice was gentle as a girl's voiceand his eyes were pleading. The youth sawwith surprise that the soldier had two wounds,one in the head, bound with a blood-soaked rag,and the other in the arm, making that memberdangle like a broken bough.

After they had walked together for some timethe tattered man mustered sufficient courage tospeak. "Was pretty good fight, wa'n't it?"he timidly said. The youth, deep in thought,glanced up at the bloody and grim figure withits lamblike eyes. "What?"

"Was pretty good fight, wa'n't it?

"Yes," said the youth shortly. He quick-ened his pace.

But the other hobbled industriously after him.There was an air of apology in his manner, buthe evidently thought that he needed only to talkfor a time, and the youth would perceive that hewas a good fellow.

"Was pretty good fight, wa'n't it?" he beganin a small voice, and then he achieved the forti-tude to continue. "Dern me if I ever see fellersfight so. Laws, how they did fight! I knowedth' boys 'd like when they onct got square at it.Th' boys ain't had no fair chanct up t' now, butthis time they showed what they was. I knowedit 'd turn out this way. Yeh can't lick them boys.No, sir! They're fighters, they be."

He breathed a deep breath of humble ad-miration. He had looked at the youth for en-couragement several times. He received none,but gradually he seemed to get absorbed in hissubject.

"I was talkin' 'cross pickets with a boy fromGeorgie, onct, an' that boy, he ses, 'Your fellers'll all run like hell when they onct hearn a gun,'he ses. 'Mebbe they will,' I ses, 'but I don'tb'lieve none of it,' I ses; 'an' b'jiminey,' I ses backt' 'um, 'mebbe your fellers 'll all run like hellwhen they onct hearn a gun,' I ses. He larfed.Well, they didn't run t' day, did they, hey? No,sir! They fit, an' fit, an' fit."

His homely face was suffused with a light oflove for the army which was to him all thingsbeautiful and powerful.

After a time he turned to the youth. "Whereyeh hit, ol' boy?" he asked in a brotherly tone.

The youth felt instant panic at this question,although at first its full import was not borne inupon him.

"What?" he asked.

"Where yeh hit?" repeated the tattered man.

"Why," began the youth, "I--I--that is--why--I--"

He turned away suddenly and slid throughthe crowd. His brow was heavily flushed, andhis fingers were picking nervously at one of hisbuttons. He bent his head and fastened his eyesstudiously upon the button as if it were a littleproblem.

The tattered man looked after him in aston-ishment.