Chaplain of the Tenth, and rode with him for nearly an hour, apart,
engaged in low and seemingly impassioned discourse. From this interview
Mr. Colquhoun returned to the escort with a strangely solemnized,
tender countenance, while the commandant, with a more cheerful air than
he had yet worn that day, gave himself to his martial duties,
inspecting the landscape incessantly with his glass, and sending
frequently for news to the advance scouts. It may properly be stated
here that the Chaplain never divulged to any one the nature of the
conversation which he had held with his Colonel.

Nothing further of note occurred until the little army, after two hours
of plodding march, wound through a sinuous, wooded ravine, entered a
broad, bare, slightly undulating valley, and for the second time
halted. Waldron galloped to the summit of a knoll, pointed to a long
eminence which faced him some two miles distant, and said tranquilly,
"There is our battle-ground."

"Is that the enemy's position?" returned Captain Ives, his
adjutant-general. "We shall have a tough job if we go at it from here."

Waldron remained in deep thought for some minutes, meanwhile scanning
the ridge and all its surroundings.

"What I want to know," he observed, at last, "is whether they have
occupied the wooded knolls in front of their right and around their
right flank."

Shortly afterward the commander of the scouting squadron came riding
back at a furious pace.