flying Confederate flank right under their very eyes. Premonitory
symptoms of such a flight were not wanting. Confederate wounded,
stragglers, and skulkers were making for the rear; and the
rallied brigades were again in disorder, with Bee and Bartow, two
first-rate brigadiers, just killed, and other seniors wounded.
Another ominous sign was the limbering up of Confederate guns to
cover the expected retreat from the Henry Hill.

But on its reverse slope lay Jackson's Shenandoahs, three
thousand strong, and by far the best drilled and disciplined
brigade that either side had yet produced apart, of course, from
regulars. Jackson had ridden up and down before them, calm as
they had ever seen him on parade, quietly saying, "Steady, men,
steady! All's well." In this way he had held them straining at
the leash for hours. Now, at last, their time had come. Riding
out to the center of his line he gave his final orders: "Reserve
your fire till they come within fifty yards. Then fire and give
them the bayonet; and yell like furies when you charge!" Five
minutes later, as the triumphant Federals topped the crest, the
long gray line rose up, stood fast, fired one crashing
point-blank volley, and immediately charged home with the first
of those wild, high rebel yells that rang throughout the war. The
stricken and astounded Federal front caved in, turned round, and
fled. At the same instant the last of the Shenandoahs--Kirby
Smith's brigade, detrained just in the nick of time--charged the
wavering flank. Then, like the first quiver of an avalanche, a
tremor shook the whole massed Federals one moment on that fatal
hill: the next, like a loosened cliff, they began the landslide
down.