The Little Regiment

ficers. Batteries were waiting in the mud, and the men of them, exasperated by the bustle of this ambitious infantry, shook their fi

nto the fog. The regiment swung out into skirmish lines, and the fringe of b

rcing an invisible curtain. A battery on the hill was crashing with such tumult that it was as if the guns had quarrelled and had fallen pell-mell and snarling upon each other. The

e of musketry began to dominate the purring of the hostile bullets. Dan, in the front rank, held his rifle poised, and looked into the fog keenly, coldly, with the air of a sportsman. His

general attack. Once another blue regiment was apprehended on the very edge of firing into them. Once a friendly battery began an elaborate and scientific process of extermination. Always as busy as brokers, the men sli

s, a small group of the grey skirmishers, silent, statuesque, were suddenly disclosed to Dan and

had been a telescope. The short black beard, the slouch hat, the pose of the man as he sighted to shoot, made a quick picture in Dan's mind. The same moment, it would seem, he pulled his own trigger, and the

gh," said a comrade to Dan. Da