"How many men would it kill if they were put one behind another?" he can do to write to mother and Annabel and dont write toPerfect quiet reigned in the regiment. The men were mostly asleep. Those who were awake were intently watching the hill for some sign of the enemy, or as silently foreboding the happenings of the morrow.
FORE:She caught Shorty's arm with a fervor that made him thrill all over.Matters had gone so far that even this thought found a tentative lodgment in Cadnan's mind. But, almost at once, it was rejected as a serious concept. "They give us leaves to eat," he said. "They keep us here, warm and dry in this place. How is this bad?"
ONE:
TWO:"Yes, the orders to move has come," said Shorty. "See them big fires, and the boys burnin' up things.""What're you young whelps shootin' for?" demanded Si. They were all so abashed at his sternness that they could not find their tongues for reply, until little Pete piped up:
THREE:Albin's control snapped. "Damn it, you'll learn what you have to!" he yelled. "You don't have to ask questionsyou're a slave. A slave! Get that through your green head and shut up!""What's this?" said Si to Shorty the next day at Jeffersonville, when they had reported to the Provost-Marshal, and had mustered before them the squad of recruits that they were to conduct to their regiment. "Have they bin roundin' up some country school-houses, and enlisted all the boys that was in the fourth reader and Ray's arithmetic?"
FORE:"Come here, Shorty, you dirty little rascal," said the Deacon, assuming a severely maternal tone, at which Si laughed feebly but cheerily, "and let me wash your face and comb your hair.""Pete's plea is sound," contraverted the legal-minded Monty Scruggs. "All men are equal before the law, though they mayn't be a foot high. Rations are a matter of law, and the law's no respecter of persons."
The Colonel permitted this, for he anticipated that a charge on the rebel works would follow the beating down of the artillery fire, and he wanted his regiment to be where it would get a good start in the race to capture a rebel battery. He simply cautioned the Captains to keep their men in hand and ready. As Capt. McGillicuddy called Co. Q closer together, it occurred to Shorty that in the interest he had taken in the artillery duel he had not looked after Pete Skidmore for some time, and he began casting his eyes around for that youth. He was nowhere to be seen, and, of course, no one knew anything about him."Yes; just hold her till I go inside and git my bucket, and I'll milk your cup clean full," answered the Deacon, starting inside the corn-crib."Come on, you infernal pack o' white-livered, nigger-stealin', house-robbin', hell-desarvin' hypocrites," he shouted. "I kin lick the hull bilin' o' yo'uns. This is my wounded pardner here, and yo'uns can't have neither me nor him till yo'uns down me, which y' can't do. Come on, y' pigeon-livered cowards.""Well, why don't you say something? What's become o' your tongue?" began Maria banteringly.