two hundred yards of the warehouse, and presently the Northern soldiers,
hidden behind the trees at that point, opened a heavy rifle fire.
Bullets whistled over the heads of the defenders, and kept up a constant
patter upon the walls of the warehouse, but did little damage.

A few of the men in gray had been killed, and all the wounded were taken
inside the warehouse, into which the great tobacco barn had been turned.
Two competent surgeons attended to them by the light of candles, while
the garrison outside lay still and waiting under the heavy fire.

"A waste of lead," said Sherburne to Harry. "They reckon, perhaps,
that we're all recruits, and will be frightened into retreat or
surrender."

"If we had those guns now we could clear out the woods in short order,"
said Harry.

"And if they had 'em they could soon blow up this barn, everything in it
and a lot of us at the same time. So we are more than even on the matter
of the lack of guns."

The fire from the wood died in about fifteen minutes and was succeeded by
a long and trying silence. The light of the moon deepened, and silvered
the faces of the dead lying in the open. All the survivors of the attack
were hidden, but the defenders knew that they were yet in the forest.

"Kenton," said Captain Sherburne, "you know the way to General Jackson's
camp at Winchester."

"I've been over it a dozen times."