"Good God!" cried Dick. "Why don't we advance to help them!"

"Here we go now, and we may need help ourselves!" said Warner.

Again the trumpets were sending forth their shrill call to battle and
death, and, as the colonel waved his sword, the regiment charged forward
with others to rescue the men in the crater. A bright sun was shining
now, and the Southern leaders saw the heavy, advancing column. They were
rapidly bringing up more guns and more riflemen, and, shifting a part of
their fire, a storm of death blew in the faces of those who would go to
the rescue.

As at Cold Harbor, the men in blue could not live before such a fire at
close quarters, and the regiments were compelled to recoil, while those
who were left alive in the crater surrendered. The trumpets sounded the
unwilling call to withdraw, and the Winchester men, many of them shedding
tears of grief and rage, fell back to their old place, while from some
distant point, rising above the dying fire of the cannon and rifles,
came the long, fierce rebel yell, full of defiance and triumph.

The effect upon Dick of the sight in the crater was so overwhelming that
he was compelled to lie down.

"Why do we do such things?" he exclaimed, after the faintness passed.
"Why do we waste so many lives in such vain efforts?"

"We have to try," replied Warner, gloomily. "The thing was all right as
far as it went, but it broke against a hedge of fire and steel, crowning
a barrier that we had created for ourselves."