be no doubt of it. It had also moved its arms, for, look, they are
both in the shadow! A breath of cold air struck Byring full in the
face; the boughs of trees above him stirred and moaned. A strongly
defined shadow passed across the face of the dead, left it luminous,
passed back upon it and left it half obscured. The horrible thing
was visibly moving! At that moment a single shot rang out upon the
picket-line--a lonelier and louder, though more distant, shot than
ever had been heard by mortal ear! It broke the spell of that
enchanted man; it slew the silence and the solitude, dispersed the
hindering host from Central Asia and released his modern manhood.
With a cry like that of some great bird pouncing upon its prey he
sprang forward, hot-hearted for action!

Shot after shot now came from the front. There were shoutings and
confusion, hoof-beats and desultory cheers. Away to the rear, in the
sleeping camp, were a singing of bugles and grumble of drums.
Pushing through the thickets on either side the roads came the
Federal pickets, in full retreat, firing backward at random as they
ran. A straggling group that had followed back one of the roads, as
instructed, suddenly sprang away into the bushes as half a hundred
horsemen thundered by them, striking wildly with their sabres as they
passed. At headlong speed these mounted madmen shot past the spot
where Byring had sat, and vanished round an angle of the road,
shouting and firing their pistols. A moment later there was a roar
of musketry, followed by dropping shots--they had encountered the
reserve-guard in line; and back they came in dire confusion, with
here and there an empty saddle and many a maddened horse, bullet-
stung, snorting and plunging with pain. It was all over--"an affair
of outposts."