The Battle Ground

He shook his head, patted her affectionately upon the shoulder, and smiled down into her upraised face. “No, no, my dear, I've a little work to do,” he replied kindly. “There ar...

After midnight, Dan, who had dozed in his chair from weariness, was awakened by the excited tones of the Governor's voice. The desire was vanquished at last and the dying man ha...

“Do you know I really believe Dan likes you best,” she carelessly remarked. “I asked him the other afternoon what colour hair he preferred, and he snapped out, 'red' as suddenly...

“It is all over, I think,” said Dan with a quivering lip, as he stared at the ruined meadows. The smart was still fresh, and it was too soon for him to add, with the knowledge t...

He was still knocking when a window was raised suddenly above him, and a man's voice called out, “if he wanted a place for night-hawks to go on to hell.” Then, being evidently a...

“They're shelling the town,” he cried, waving a dirty hand, “an' you'll be prisoners in an hour if you don't git up and move. The Yankees are comin', I seed 'em cross the river....

The boy nodded. He felt suddenly afraid of the spare old man with his long Roman nose and his fierce black eyebrows. A mist gathered before his eyes and the lamp shone like a gr...

“Then I should never see my views in print, Major,” he added, smiling; and a moment afterward, disregarding Mrs. Ambler's warning gestures, he plunged headlong into a discussion...

“Oh, yes, you can keep a secret--for a girl,” he returned, and added, “I tell you what, I like you better than anybody about here, except grandpa and Big Abel.”

“By George, we're glad to get here,” was his greeting. “Morson's been cursing our hospitality for the last three miles. Grandpa, this is my friend Morson--Jack Morson, you've he...

The old lady listened with a smile, though she spoke in a severe voice. “You mustn't let them teach you how to flatter, Mr. Morson,” she said warningly, as she filled the Major'...

He crossed to the mirror and carefully brushed a stray lock of hair into place; then he took up his hat and gloves and turned toward the door. “I think it is waiting for me now,...

The hovering enemy, grown bolder, had fallen upon the flank, and the stragglers and the rear guard were beating off the cavalry, when a regiment was sent back to relieve the pre...

“Oh, I don't mean that. What is it he says about the girls; they are real beauties aren't they? By the way, Champe, why don't you marry one of them and settle down?”

Dan, stretched exhausted beside the road, ate his ear of corn, and idly watched the regiment that was marching by--marching, not with the even tread of regular troops, but with...

“There, there, Betty,” was Mrs. Ambler's rejoinder. “I'm afraid he's a wicked boy, and you mustn't get such foolish thoughts into your head. If the Lord had wanted you to be cle...

“I didn't love him because he ought to be loved,” said Betty. “I loved him because I couldn't help it--because he was himself and I was myself, I suppose. I was born to love him...

Betty quickened her pace to his, and they went on in silence. Through the thick grove that ended at the roadside she saw the windows of her home flaming amid the darkness. Farth...

“I don't doubt that I should have gotten home somehow,” responded Betty, ungratefully, “so don't flatter yourself that you have saved even my bonnet.” From its blue-lined shadow...

On the last day of the year the young men from Chericoke, as they rode down the turnpike, came upon Betty bringing holly berries from the wood. She was followed by two small neg...

“I hope their officers will get them,” she remarked vindictively, “and the next time they offer us a guard, I shall accept him for good and all, if he happens to have been born...

For Mrs. Ambler, who had kept her strength for a year after the Governor's death, seemed at last to be gently withdrawing from a place in which she found herself a stranger. The...

Behind him, and beside him, row after row of gray men leaped from the shadow--the very hill seemed rising to his support--and it was almost gayly, as the dead fighters lived aga...

At the tavern he found Jack Hicks and a neighbouring farmer or two, seated upon the porch discussing the raid upon Harper's Ferry. They would have drawn him into the talk, but h...

“Why the devil don't we move? We ought to move,” he said angrily, as he glanced round the crowded field where the men were arraying themselves in all the useless trappings of th...

“Since Dan went away.” As the Governor completed her sentence, he turned and looked thoughtfully into her face. “It's hard to judge the young, my dear, but--” he broke off as Be...

I. “De Hine Foot er a He Frawg” II. At the Full of the Moon III. The Coming of the Boy IV. A House with an Open Door V. The School for Gentlemen VI. College Days

“I reckon it does,” said Dan, and filling his tin cup, he drank scalding coffee in short gulps. When he had finished it, he piled fresh rails upon the fire and lay down to sleep...

In the intense heat that hung above the town she sat at her southern window, where the river breeze blew across the garden, and watched placidly the palm-leaf fan which Mammy Ri...

Dan wept with them--tears of weakness, of anguish, of faint hope amid the dark. As their hands closed over his, he grasped them as if his eyes had gone suddenly blind.