HE became aware that the furnace roar of thebattle was growing louder. Great brown cloudshad floated to the still heights of air before him.The noise, too, was approaching. The woodsfiltered men and the fields became dotted.

As he rounded a hillock, he perceived that theroadway was now a crying mass of wagons,teams, and men. From the heaving tangle issuedexhortations, commands, imprecations. Fear wassweeping it all along. The cracking whips bitand horses plunged and tugged. The white-topped wagons strained and stumbled in theirexertions like fat sheep.

The youth felt comforted in a measure by thissight. They were all retreating. Perhaps, then,he was not so bad after all. He seated himselfand watched the terror-stricken wagons. Theyfled like soft, ungainly animals. All the roarersand lashers served to help him to magnify thedangers and horrors of the engagement that he

107might try to prove to himself that the thing withwhich men could charge him was in truth asymmetrical act. There was an amount of pleas-ure to him in watching the wild march of thisvindication.

Presently the calm head of a forward-goingcolumn of infantry appeared in the road. Itcame swiftly on. Avoiding the obstructions gaveit the sinuous movement of a serpent. The menat the head butted mules with their musketstocks. They prodded teamsters indifferent toall howls. The men forced their way throughparts of the dense mass by strength. The blunthead of the column pushed. The raving team-sters swore many strange oaths.

The commands to make way had the ring of agreat importance in them. The men were goingforward to the heart of the din. They were toconfront the eager rush of the enemy. They feltthe pride of their onward movement when theremainder of the army seemed trying to dribbledown this road. They tumbled teams aboutwith a fine feeling that it was no matter so longas their column got to the front in time. Thisimportance made their faces grave and stern.And the backs of the officers were very rigid.

As the youth looked at them the black weightof his woe returned to him. He felt that he wasregarding a procession of chosen beings. Theseparation was as great to him as if they hadmarched with weapons of flame and banners ofsunlight. He could never be like them. Hecould have wept in his longings.

He searched about in his mind for an ade-quate malediction for the indefinite cause, thething upon which men turn the words of finalblame. It--whatever it was--was responsible forhim, he said. There lay the fault.

The haste of the column to reach the battleseemed to the forlorn young man to be some-thing much finer than stout fighting. Heroes, hethought, could find excuses in that long seethinglane. They could retire with perfect self-respectand make excuses to the stars.

He wondered what those men had eaten thatthey could be in such haste to force their way togrim chances of death. As he watched his envygrew until he thought that he wished to changelives with one of them. He would have liked tohave used a tremendous force, he said, throw offhimself and become a better. Swift pictures ofhimself, apart, yet in himself, came to him--ablue desperate figure leading lurid charges withone knee forward and a broken blade high--ablue, determined figure standing before a crimsonand steel assault, getting calmly killed on a highplace before the eyes of all. He thought of themagnificent pathos of his dead body.

These thoughts uplifted him. He felt thequiver of war desire. In his ears, he heard thering of victory. He knew the frenzy of a rapidsuccessful charge. The music of the tramplingfeet, the sharp voices, the clanking arms of thecolumn near him made him soar on the red wingsof war. For a few moments he was sublime.

He thought that he was about to start for thefront. Indeed, he saw a picture of himself, dust-stained, haggard, panting, flying to the front atthe proper moment to seize and throttle the dark,leering witch of calamity.

Then the difficulties of the thing began todrag at him. He hesitated, balancing awkwardlyon one foot.

He had no rifle; he could not fight with hishands, said he resentfully to his plan. Well,rifles could be had for the picking. They wereextraordinarily profuse.

Also, he continued, it would be a miracle if hefound his regiment. Well, he could fight withany regiment.

He started forward slowly. He stepped as ifhe expected to tread upon some explosive thing.Doubts and he were struggling.

He would truly be a worm if any of his com-rades should see him returning thus, the marks ofhis flight upon him. There was a reply that theintent fighters did not care for what happenedrearward saving that no hostile bayonets ap-peared there. In the battle-blur his face would,in a way be hidden, like the face of a cowledman.

But then he said that his tireless fate wouldbring forth, when the strife lulled for a moment,a man to ask of him an explanation. In imagina-tion he felt the scrutiny of his companions as hepainfully labored through some lies.

Eventually, his courage expended itself uponthese objections. The debates drained him of hisfire.

He was not cast down by this defeat of hisplan, for, upon studying the affair carefully, hecould not but admit that the objections were veryformidable.

Furthermore, various ailments had begun tocry out. In their presence he could not persistin flying high with the wings of war; theyrendered it almost impossible for him to see him-self in a heroic light. He tumbled headlong.

He discovered that he had a scorching thirst.His face was so dry and grimy that he thoughthe could feel his skin crackle. Each bone of hisbody had an ache in it, and seemingly threatenedto break with each movement. His feet werelike two sores. Also, his body was calling forfood. It was more powerful than a direct hunger.There was a dull, weight like feeling in his stom-ach, and, when he tried to walk, his head swayedand he tottered. He could not see with distinct-ness. Small patches of green mist floated beforehis vision.

While he had been tossed by many emotions,he had not been aware of ailments. Now theybeset him and made clamor. As he was at lastcompelled to pay attention to them, his capacityfor self-hate was multiplied. In despair, hedeclared that he was not like those others. Henow conceded it to be impossible that he shouldever become a hero. He was a craven loon.Those pictures of glory were piteous things. Hegroaned from his heart and went staggering off.

A certain mothlike quality within him kepthim in the vicinity of the battle. He had a greatdesire to see, and to get news. He wished toknow who was winning.

He told himself that, despite his unprecedentedsuffering, he had never lost his greed for a victory,yet, he said, in a half-apologetic manner to hisconscience, he could not but know that a defeatfor the army this time might mean many favor-able things for him. The blows of the enemywould splinter regiments into fragments. Thus,many men of courage, he considered, would beobliged to desert the colors and scurry likechickens. He would appear as one of them.They would be sullen brothers in distress, and hecould then easily believe he had not run anyfarther or faster than they. And if he himselfcould believe in his virtuous perfection, he con-ceived that there would be small trouble in con-vincing all others.

He said, as if in excuse for this hope, thatpreviously the army had encountered greatdefeats and in a few months had shaken off allblood and tradition of them, emerging as brightand valiant as a new one; thrusting out of sightthe memory of disaster, and appearing with thevalor and confidence of unconquered legions.The shrilling voices of the people at home wouldpipe dismally for a time, but various generalswere usually compelled to listen to these ditties.He of course felt no compunctions for proposinga general as a sacrifice. He could not tell whothe chosen for the barbs might be, so he couldcenter no direct sympathy upon him. Thepeople were afar and he did not conceive publicopinion to be accurate at long range. It wasquite probable they would hit the wrong manwho, after he had recovered from his amazementwould perhaps spend the rest of his days in writ-ing replies to the songs of his alleged failure. Itwould be very unfortunate, no doubt, but in thiscase a general was of no consequence to theyouth.

In a defeat there would be a roundaboutvindication of himself. He thought it wouldprove, in a manner, that he had fled early becauseof his superior powers of perception. A seriousprophet upon predicting a flood should be thefirst man to climb a tree. This would demon-strate that he was indeed a seer.

A moral vindication was regarded by theyouth as a very important thing. Without salve,he could not, he thought, wear the sore badge ofhis dishonor through life. With his heart con-tinually assuring him that he was despicable, hecould not exist without making it, through hisactions, apparent to all men.

If the army had gone gloriously on he wouldbe lost. If the din meant that now his army'sflags were tilted forward he was a condemnedwretch. He would be compelled to doomhimself to isolation. If the men were advancing,their indifferent feet were trampling upon hischances for a successful life.

As these thoughts went rapidly through hismind, he turned upon them and tried to thrustthem away. He denounced himself as a villain.He said that he was the most unutterably selfishman in existence. His mind pictured the soldierswho would place their defiant bodies before thespear of the yelling battle fiend, and as he sawtheir dripping corpses on an imagined field, hesaid that he was their murderer.

Again he thought that he wished he was dead.He believed that he envied a corpse. Thinkingof the slain, he achieved a great contempt forsome of them, as if they were guilty for thusbecoming lifeless. They might have been killedby lucky chances, he said, before they had hadopportunities to flee or before they had beenreally tested. Yet they would receive laurelsfrom tradition. He cried out bitterly that theircrowns were stolen and their robes of glori-ous memories were shams. However, he stillsaid that it was a great pity he was not asthey.

A defeat of the army had suggested itself tohim as a means of escape from the consequencesof his fall. He considered, now, however, that itwas useless to think of such a possibility. Hiseducation had been that success for that mightyblue machine was certain; that it would makevictories as a contrivance turns out buttons. Hepresently discarded all his speculations in theother direction. He returned to the creed ofsoldiers.

When he perceived again that it was notpossible for the army to be defeated, he triedto bethink him of a fine tale which he could takeback to his regiment, and with it turn the expectedshafts of derision.

But, as he mortally feared these shafts, itbecame impossible for him to invent a tale he felthe could trust. He experimented with manyschemes, but threw them aside one by one asflimsy. He was quick to see vulnerable places inthem all.

Furthermore, he was much afraid that somearrow of scorn might lay him mentally low beforehe could raise his protecting tale.

He imagined the whole regiment saying:"Where's Henry Fleming? He run, didn't 'e?Oh, my!" He recalled various persons whowould be quite sure to leave him no peaceabout it. They would doubtless question himwith sneers, and laugh at his stammering hesi-tation. In the next engagement they wouldtry to keep watch of him to discover when hewould run.

Wherever he went in camp, he would en-counter insolent and lingeringly cruel stares. Ashe imagined himself passing near a crowd ofcomrades, he could hear some one say, "Therehe goes!"

Then, as if the heads were moved by onemuscle, all the faces were turned toward himwith wide, derisive grins. He seemed to hearsome one make a humorous remark in a low tone.At it the others all crowed and cackled. He wasa slang phrase.