"Colonel Mosby's soldiers, I reckon, sir."

That was enough. I had a package of reports and papers and some private letters in my pocket, to deliver to Pleasonton and other officers about headquarters. Feeling sure of my belt, pulling my cap down tight over my face, I took a short grip on the reins.

"What are they doing up there?"

"They done captured that wagon-train, sir; and I reckon they will burn the wagons when they get the horses away."

I turned my horse back to the main road, feeling a little nervous, but determined to run for my life.

The moment I got into the road, and without looking up at the burning wagons, I turned my horse's head back and put spurs deeply into his flanks. I had not made five jumps before I heard the cracks of at least a dozen rifles. This only nerved me to more desperate lashings with spurs, leaning forward to the horse's mane as I thrust the spurs into him at every jump. They came after me, yelling like a band of Comanche Indians; but I had a good start, and their guns were empty.

It was a good race for about three miles. I won, and saved my neck again. As I reached the picket-lines that I had passed, I reported to the officer in command that guerrillas were burning our train, but this fellow--a Colonel--refused to cross his men over the run to help to save them.

[Illustration: "COLONEL MOSBY'S SOLDIERS, I RECKON, SIR."]

I rode on back toward Fairfax and met some officers of Hooker's Staff, giving them my adventure. While I was talking to them, we heard sounds as if a distant blast was going off. Looking ahead over the straight road, in the direction whence I had retreated, we saw a dense cloud of white smoke, like a fog-bank, rise over the tops of the trees. Hooker's aide said:

"Well, those fellows will get badly fooled if they are burning that ammunition train."

That was it. They hurried back to Fairfax, and, there being no other cavalry available, Hooker sent out his bodyguard--Rush Lancers--whom I piloted back to the hill-top. When we got near, one or two wagons were yet unburned, but as they were surrounded by the debris of the explosion, we were afraid to go near, lest another wagon-load of ammunition would go off.

I have read Mark Twain's old joke regarding his bravery, in being in the army where cannon-balls and bullets were thickest--right where whole wagon-loads of ammunition were going right past him--but after this experience with a wagon-train, I'm willing to admit this as about as dangerous as anything in an army.

I saved my papers, my life, and got back to Aldie and headquarters that night under the escort of Hooker's bodyguard--or "turkey drivers," as we called them.

It was Pleasonton's cavalry scouts that definitely ascertained that Lee had crossed the Potomac into Maryland. We of the headquarters moved rapidly from Aldie, crossing the Potomac at some point near Leesburg. I think it was the Sunday preceding the contact with Lee that headquarters spent in Frederick, Maryland. We were comfortably quartered at the City Hotel, on a main street of that old town. It was one of the old-fashioned country taverns, with a big yard or court in the rear, for the accommodation of the country teams that visited the city on market days. On this particular Sunday the stables were filled with the horses of the Headquarters Staff, while the yard was crowded with ambulances, baggage-wagons, commissary supplies, etc.

Custer was with us in Frederick all of that Sunday, and spent most of his time at the big parlor window up-stairs flirting with a couple of quite young girls who lived opposite the hotel. The people usually lived above their stores in the town, and I remember very distinctly the name on the sign was spelled "Schley"; so, if there were one or two Misses Schley in Frederick in 1863, their children will have the testimony of a very-much-interested eye-witness that their mothers were beautiful ladies, who so attracted the handsome General Custer that he almost forgot all about his cavalry pickets who were on the South Mountain hunting Stuart's lost cavalry. In those days Custer wore his hair long; it was quite curly, and touched the blue velvet boyish-looking jacket which he always wore; this, with the long, loose ends of the invariable red necktie, gave the cavalry hero a very picturesque appearance, especially when he dashed along on his horse with all the Staff and orderlies spurring after him in the dust. As I remember, we of the cavalry were after J. E. B. Stuart. No one seemed to know where he was; even General Lee was at that time in entire ignorance of Stuart's whereabouts.

CHAPTER XXXII.

SENT TO FIND GENERAL BUFORD--A HASTY RIDE--THE BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG--CEMETERY RIDGE--GENERAL DOUBLEDAY--GENERAL HANCOCK--THE SECOND DAY OF THE BATTLE.

It was the Rebel Scout, Harrison, who gave to General Lee the first information about the close pursuit of Hooker. This one faithful tramp Rebel soldier carried on foot to Lee and Longstreet at Chambersburg the important intelligence that Hooker had crossed the Potomac, and General Lee, on the report of this single scout, in whom he had implicit confidence, issued orders at once recalling his forces from the front at Harrisburg, and concentrating his entire strength at Gettysburg. I mention this fact, because it is the only instance on official record of a great General giving credit to his Scout or Spy for important secret service.

This solitary Scout succeeded in doing for General Lee alone what was expected of Stuart's large cavalry force, and which they failed to accomplish.

I was sent out from Frederick with orders to find General Buford, who commanded the Cavalry Division in the advance. It was expected that I would be of service in military signaling, and especially in opening up communication with Washington and Baltimore by wire. This was my special duty, and when we ran into a country where there were telegraph wires, I became quite an important fellow; all the Generals being so anxious to get or send news, they cheerfully afforded me all the detail of soldiers I could use to help me.

I found Buford, but when I got to him he was so busy out on the hill, on the morning of July 1st, that he didn't have any time to talk to me. The night before the battle I spent with some of Buford's headquarters men near a town called, I think, Middletown or Middleburg, Maryland. It being very late when I got up to them, I turned my horse into a little stable, or barn, belonging to the house at which the boys had quartered themselves. Headquarters usually selected a good, hospitable-looking house for their temporary quarters, you know.

Thoroughly tired out with my hard day's ride in the sun, while hunting Buford all over that part of the country, I lay down in the haymow of the stable, and was soon sound asleep, and wholly oblivious to all surroundings. I think that I must have had two sleeps that night, instead of one long one. Probably it was on account of my secluded position that I was not awakened until late the following morning, and then it was by Buford's first guns at Gettysburg. Rubbing my eyes open, I saw, with astonishment, that the bright sun was peeping through the cracks of the old barn.

The sound of each distant gun served to hasten my hay-loft toilet, and sliding down out of the haymow as quickly as a fireman gets down his pole, I had the saddle on the horse and was ready to travel, in either direction, in as short a time as the fire-engines get their rigs ready when an alarm is sounded. In my hurry I did not take time to count out an exact dozen of eggs from a nest in the manger, from which my sudden appearance had scared the old hen. She expressed her surprise and indignation in a great deal of noise, but I took no notice of her protests, and slipped, with a dexterity that only a cavalryman of the Army of the Potomac had acquired, the whole lot into my haversack, nest-egg and all, and hastily threw it over my shoulder.

Getting outside, I was further surprised to discover that the place had seemingly been abandoned in the night, not only by headquarters, but by the occupants of the house. There was not a soul to be seen, and without being exactly sure whether I was within the enemy's lines or our own, I mounted and hastily spurred on toward the sound of the guns, that was becoming more frequent.

I only knew that I was on Pennsylvania soil, my native State, and within a day's ride from my birthplace, and hoped that I should find myself among friends. There was certainly enemies where the firing was going on. I had not gone far until I met a farmer's wagon loaded, apparently, with every member of his family, and, no doubt, all their worldly goods that they could pile into it.

When I stopped them to ask about the racket down the road, all of them began to talk at once, in broken Pennsylvania Dutch, about "the war down below town." I learned further from some scared natives and some stragglers in blue, that were scurrying along the road, and were becoming thicker the nearer I got, as they put it, "The Rebels are fighting with our men on the other side of town."

That was enough for me. I was young and active, and, as a Pennsylvania boy, I was most anxious to participate in some way in fights that were to take place in my own State. I made that old horse dash along the road to the battlefield of Gettysburg, for about four miles that morning, in a way that would have put to shame General Sheridan's ride down the Valley. If my celebrated ride could have been done up in poetry and set to music, it would, as a parody on Sheridan's ride, go down into the literature of the century after the style of John Gilpin's famous ride at the sound of artillery. I'd give the old nag the spurs and make him jump ahead as if the cannon-balls were after instead of ahead of us.

That beautiful morning of July 1st, as I rode along that old pike, the one fear uppermost in my mind was that the battle of Gettysburg would be all over before I could get there. I felt that I should never be able to meet my Pennsylvania friends again if it should unfortunately happen that Buford would drive the Rebels out of the State without my assistance. That's what made me in such a hurry.

I was delayed a little on the road by an accident. I had noticed, while tearing along, that there was an awful bad air in that part of the country, but I had, as a soldier, become accustomed to bad smells hovering about an army in Virginia, that I didn't take much account of it--rather satisfying myself with the reflection that the smell simply indicated the presence of the Rebel Army in the neighborhood. But it became so oppressive that I checked up my Mad-Anthony-Wayne gait long enough to look around me. It was the eggs in my haversack. In my excitement, I had forgotten all about them, and, of course, every time my horse galloped the haversack, being strung loose to my saddle, tried to keep time, but couldn't always do it, with the result of beating the eggs up into a soft mess, and mixing shell-dry coffee, hard tack and cold meat into a fancy omelette.

When I discovered the horrible condition of things, the eggs were dripping down my horse's flanks, and when the horse stood still the odor wafted itself around me. I got one good whiff and then cut the thing loose, boldly sacrificing my expected breakfast of eggs and also all the good coffee and other nice things my kit was packed with. I have always believed that there must have been more than one bad egg in the dozen.

In writing up this ride in poetry, after Buchanan's Sheridan, this incident should not be made too prominent. I record it simply as one of the necessary ingredients of a true story.

I had a double incentive after this to hurry me along; the awful stench clung to the flanks of my horse and I tried to ride him out of the range of it. When I reached the top of the hill, now so widely known as Cemetery Ridge, on the morning of July 1st, it was as quiet and restful as the old graveyard probably is this July 1st, 1889. Beyond the town, to the west, which was visible from this point, were to be seen in the air over the tops of the trees the too-familiar little curls or puffs of white, steamy-looking smoke, that I knew were from exploding shells. For the moment there seemed to be a lull in the proceedings--only an occasional gun and the more frequent sharp, hammer-like sound of infantry firing on a skirmish line.

But I'm not going to attempt a description of the battle of Gettysburg; that has already been done too thoroughly and well. I'll tell only what I saw that day, in as few words as I can put it.

When I rode through the town the people were gathered in groups in the street; ladies were at the windows talking in a whining, half-crying way to other nervous neighbors, who were, perhaps, at an up-stairs window, praying at intervals, or asking in a beseeching way, "What is to become of us all?" During all this time the soldiers inside of the town, in a sullen, quiet, business way, peculiar to old coffee-coolers, were moving about, indifferently, amidst the excitement that must have struck the inhabitants as being very unconcerned for soldiers.

I remembered one fellow in blue loitering where I had halted for a drink, while the lady of the house was kindly dishing out glasses of water. She appealed to him for something encouraging or hopeful. He looked up at her, and then, turning around in the direction of the occasional musketry, as if he had just discovered that there was something going on, assured her in an easy-going way: "Oh, that's all right; that's only a little squabble. Our army isn't out there."

I forged ahead straight out of the Chambersburg Road, galloped my horse up the hill and on past the Seminary, and might have gone a little too far on that line if I hadn't been summarily stopped by an officer, who was standing close behind the fence beside the road.

"Where in ---- are you going?" was the polite salutation.

When I explained that I was a Staff orderly from headquarters hunting General Buford, he observed: "Well, you go out that road any further and you will find some Rebel General."

Another officer, more polite and obliging, kindly volunteered the information, "Buford's cavalry were in those woods this morning,"

pointing to a grove to the left.

It was further explained that the fence was down a little distance up the road. I made a break for the gap, and got safely out of the now-deserted highway, and ran in behind the big stone barn and dismounted, when I discovered that I was right at the front of our lines. Before me, stretched along the ground at full length, was a brigade of infantry, extending to the grove on the left. This was the advance of our line of battle, under Doubleday. I wanted very much to get into that grove, to communicate with headquarters, but I had run myself, precipitately, into a trap, and couldn't get out without the risk of being shot.

It was safe enough, for the time being, while behind the old stone barn, but there was that awful gap of a quarter of a mile between it and the grove. I dismounted, went inside of the barn, and there witnessed such a scene as can best be described by a reference to a first visit to an insane asylum. It seemed to me that from every corner, crevice and stall of the dark old basement of the barn I saw glaring at me the wild eyes of maniacs. In a word, the barn was full of skulkers--of cowards, who no doubt looked upon me as the leader of a detail to drive them out into their ranks in the front.

I was worse frightened by those fellows than by the line of battle of the Rebels in the front, and, hurrying out of the place, got on my horse and hauled down my cap, felt for the security of my belt, and was making ready for a dash over the Gap, when my attention was attracted by some officer's loud voice, who, in a whining, half-crying tone, was haranguing his men, who were lying down in his front. I shall never forget the expression on the faces of those poor fellows as they would look up at their officer and glance longingly to the rear, and alternately gaze with a frightened, serious look toward the Rebel lines, their pale, blanched faces looking the whiter through the dirt and smoke of battle, that was on them like a war-paint.

In this connection I have a conundrum for the Chaplain: How is the indisputable fact to be accounted for, or reconciled, that the same men in line of battle, facing death, will, in one and the same moment, be praying and cursing, as I heard them in this line--"God have mercy on us," and after the first volley, or when a charge was ordered, the prayer, almost in the same breath, turned to the most terrible oaths--"God damn your souls."

I went up to the Colonel and reported the discovery of the men in the barn. To my surprise, he only said: "Oh, that's nothing; let them alone."

I have looked carefully into all the accounts of the different battles for some mention of the cowards and skulkers, but, somehow, this part of the battle is not brought to the attention of the reading public nowadays, though it is not denied that these form quite a large percentage in each army.

It was imperative that I should obey orders and report to General Buford.

I had found him all right, but there remained between us the little space that I must cross. I screwed up my courage to the sticking point, and, with my head bent low, I made the run safely into the grove, where I found General Buford sitting quietly on his horse, accompanied by one or two of his Staff. He did not seem to have a happy or satisfied look, and I judged at once, from his uneasy manner, that something was going wrong. I soon found out. General Reynolds was lying by the two little elms along side of the fence, dying or dead. This was what put so serious and sorrowful an expression on the faces of all the officers just then. A Rebel sharpshooter from that stone barn had killed the best General the Army of the Potomac contained--he whom we all knew at headquarters should have been its Commander-in-Chief.

Every moment we staid in the grove was a holy terror to me; it seemed as if the whole Rebel artillery had discovered that it was headquarters, and were concentrating their shells into it. They would go crashing through the tree-tops, shrieking and tearing through the branches of the trees as we used to throw clubs into apple trees to knock down the fruit. General Buford, noticing my uneasiness as I'd glance up through the trees, as if expecting to see the apples fall, quietly observed to me: "They have not got the range yet." He said this in a tone indicating that he was only waiting till they _did_ get it, before he should leave.