handsome he is! With what careless grace he sits his horse!

He reins up within a respectful distance of the corps commander and
salutes. The old soldier nods familiarly; he evidently knows him. A
brief colloquy between them is going on; the young man seems to be
preferring some request which the elder one is indisposed to grant. Let
us ride a little nearer. Ah! too late - it is ended. The young officer
salutes again, wheels his horse, and rides straight toward the crest of
the hill. He is deadly pale.

A thin line of skirmishers, the men deployed at six paces or so apart,
now pushes from the wood into the open. The commander speaks to his
bugler, who claps his instrument to his lips. Tra-la-la! Tra-la-la! The
skirmishers halt in their tracks.

Meantime the young horseman has advanced a hundred yards. He is riding
at a walk, straight up the long slope, with never a turn of the head.
How glorious! Gods! what would we not give to be in his place - with his
soul! He does not draw his sabre; his right hand hangs easily at his
side. The breeze catches the plume in his hat and flutters it smartly.
The sunshine rests upon his shoulder-straps, lovingly, like a visible
benediction. Straight on he rides. Ten thousand pairs of eyes are fixed
upon him with an intensity that he can hardly fail to feel; ten thousand
hearts keep quick time to the inaudible hoof-beats of his snowy steed.
He is not alone - he draws all souls after him; we are but "dead men
all." But we remember that we laughed! On and on, straight for the
hedge-lined wall, he rides. Not a look backward. Oh, if he would but
turn - if he could but see the love, the adoration, the atonement!

Not a word is spoken; the populous depths of the forest still murmur