flash. The old man stood a moment on the ridge, the wind blowing his
gray hair back, then staggered, and fell,--that was all.

The column, sweeping up on the double-quick, carried the young disciple
of Jesus with them. The jaws of the Gap were before them,--the enemy.
What difference, if he turned pale, and cried out weakly, looking back
at the man that he had killed?

For a moment the silence was unbroken. The winter's dawn, with pink
blushes, and restless soft sighs, was yet wakening into day. The next,
the air was shattered with the thunder of the guns among the hills,
shouts, curses, death-cries. The speech which this day was to utter in
the years was the old vexed cry,--"How long, O Lord? how long?"

A fight, short, but desperate. Where-ever it was hottest, the men
crowded after one leader, a small man, with a mild, quiet face,--Douglas
Palmer. Fighting with a purpose: high,--the highest, he thought: to
uphold his Government. His blows fell heavy and sure.

You know the end of the story. The Federal victory was complete. The
Rebel forces were carried off prisoners to Romney. How many, on either
side, were lost, as in every battle of our civil war, no one can tell:
it is better, perhaps, we do not know.

The Federal column did not return in an unbroken mass as they went.
There were wounded and dying among them; some vacant places. Besides,
they had work to do on their road back: the Rebels had been sheltered in
the farmers' houses near; the "nest must be cleaned out": every
homestead but two from Romney to the Gap was laid in ashes. It was not a
pleasant sight for the officers to see women and children flying