They were men. They crept upon their hands and knees. They used their
hands only, dragging their legs. They used their knees only, their arms
hanging idle at their sides. They strove to rise to their feet, but fell
prone in the attempt. They did nothing naturally, and nothing alike,
save only to advance foot by foot in the same direction. Singly, in
pairs and in little groups, they came on through the gloom, some halting
now and again while others crept slowly past them, then resuming their
movement. They came by dozens and by hundreds; as far on either hand as
one could see in the deepening gloom they extended and the black wood
behind them appeared to be inexhaustible. The very ground seemed in
motion toward the creek. Occasionally one who had paused did not again
go on, but lay motionless. He was dead. Some, pausing, made strange
gestures with their hands, erected their arms and lowered them again,
clasped their heads; spread their palms upward, as men are sometimes
seen to do in public prayer.

Not all of this did the child note; it is what would have been noted by
an elder observer; he saw little but that these were men, yet crept like
babes. Being men, they were not terrible, though unfamiliarly clad. He
moved among them freely, going from one to another and peering into
their faces with childish curiosity. All their faces were singularly
white and many were streaked and gouted with red. Something in this--
something too, perhaps, in their grotesque attitudes and movements--
reminded him of the painted clown whom he had seen last summer in the
circus, and he laughed as he watched them. But on and ever on they
crept, these maimed and bleeding men, as heedless as he of the dramatic
contrast between his laughter and their own ghastly gravity. To him it
was a merry spectacle. He had seen his father's negroes creep upon their
hands and knees for his amusement--had ridden them so, "making believe"
they were his horses. He now approached one of these crawling figures