(In _Marjorie Daw, and Other Stories_)


I

Of course that was not his name. Even in the State of Maine, where it is
still a custom to maim a child for life by christening him Arioch or
Shadrach or Ephraim, nobody would dream of calling a boy "Quite So." It
was merely a nickname which we gave him in camp; but it stuck to him
with such bur-like tenacity, and is so inseparable from my memory of
him, that I do not think I could write definitely of John Bladburn if I
were to call him anything but "Quite So."

It was one night shortly after the first battle of Bull Run. The Army of
the Potomac, shattered, stunned, and forlorn, was back in its old
quarters behind the earth-works. The melancholy line of ambulances
bearing our wounded to Washington was not done creeping over Long
Bridge; the blue smocks and the gray still lay in windrows on the field
of Manassas; and the gloom that weighed down our hearts was like the fog
that stretched along the bosom of the Potomac, and infolded the valley
of the Shenandoah. A drizzling rain had set in at twilight, and, growing
bolder with the darkness, was beating a dismal tattoo on the tent,--the
tent of Mess 6, Company A, --th Regiment, N.Y. Volunteers. Our mess,
consisting originally of eight men, was reduced to four. Little Billy,
as one of the boys grimly remarked, had concluded to remain at
Manassas; Corporal Steele we had to leave at Fairfax Court-House, shot
through the hip; Hunter and Suydam we had said good-by to that
afternoon. "Tell Johnny Reb," says Hunter, lifting up the leather
sidepiece of the ambulance, "that I'll be back again as soon as I get a