Chapter XIII. Gettysburg - Page 2

were the invader, and it was the men in blue who defended.

As he passed over that battlefield, on which the dead and the badly hurt yet lay, his heart was dissolved for the time in sadness. The dead were thick all around him, and there were many hurt seriously who were so still that he did not know whether they were alive or not. He heard very few groans. He noticed often on the battlefields that the hurt usually shut their teeth together and endured in silence. As he approached one of the little streams, a form twisted itself suddenly from his path, and a weak voice exclaimed:

"For God's sake don't step on me!"

Harry looked down. It was a boy with yellow hair, younger than himself. He could not have been over sixteen, but he wore a blue uniform and a bullet had gone through his shoulder. Harry had a powerful sensation of pity.

"I would not have stepped on you," he said. His duty urged him on, but his feelings would not let him go, and he added:

"I'll help you."

He lifted the lad, rapidly cut away his coat, and slicing it into strips, bound up tightly the two wounds in his shoulder where the bullet had gone in and where it had come out.

"You've lost a lot of blood," he said, "but you've got enough left to live on until you gather another supply, and you won't lose any more now."

"Thank you," murmured the boy; "but you're very good for--for a rebel."

Harry laughed.

"Why, you innocent child!" he said. "Have they been filling your head with tales of our ferocity and cruelty?"

He went down to the stream, dipped up water in his cap, and brought it back to the boy, who drank eagerly. Then he placed him in a more comfortable position on the turf, and patting his head, said:

"You'll get well sure, and maybe you and I will meet after the war and be friends."

All of which came true. Its like happened often in this war. But he went out of Harry's mind, as he walked on and delivered his message in the edge of Gettysburg. He could not return before seeking the Invincibles, who were surely here in the vanguard--if they were yet alive. Harry shuddered. All his friends might have perished in that whirlwind of death. He soon learned that they had suffered greatly, but that those who were left were lying on the grass of what had been a lawn.

He found the lawn quickly and saw dark figures strewed about upon the ground. They were so still and silent that they looked like the dead, but Harry knew that it was the stupor of exhaustion. As they were inside the lines and needing no watch, there was no sentinel.

Harry stepped over the low fence and looked again at the figures. The moonlight silvered them and they did not stir. He could not see a single form move. It was weird, uncanny, and the blood chilled in