THE colonel
came running along back of
the line. There were
other officers following him. "We
must charge'm!" they shouted. "We
must
charge'm!" they cried with resentful voices, as if anticipating a rebellion against
this plan by the
men.
The youth, upon hearing the
shouts, began to study the distance
between him and the enemy. He
made vague calculations. He saw
that to be firm soldiers they
must go forward. It would be
death to stay in the present
place, and with all the circumstances
to go backward would exalt too
many others. Their hope was to
push the galling foes away from
the fence.
He expected that his companions,
weary and stiffened, would have
to be driven to this assault,
but as he turned toward them
he perceived with a certain surprise
that they were giving quick and
unqualified expressions of assent.
There was an ominous, clanging
overture to the charge
217 when the shafts of the
bayonets rattled upon the rifle
barrels. At the yelled words
of command the soldiers sprang
forward in eager leaps. There
was new and unexpected force
in the movement of the regiment.
A knowledge of its faded and
jaded condition made the charge
ap- pear like a paroxysm, a display
of the strength that comes before
a final feebleness. The men scampered
in insane fever of haste, racing
as if to achieve a sudden success
before an exhilarating fluid
should leave them. It was a blind
and de- spairing rush by the
collection of men in dusty and
tattered blue, over a green sward
and under a sapphire sky, toward
a fence, dimly outlined in smoke,
from behind which spluttered
the fierce rifles of enemies.
The youth kept the bright colors
to the front. He was waving his
free arm in furious circles,
the while shrieking mad calls
and appeals, urging on those
that did not need to be urged,
for it seemed that the mob of
blue men hurling them- selves
on the dangerous group of rifles
were again grown suddenly wild
with an enthusiasm of unselfishness.
From the many firings starting
toward them, it looked as if
they would merely succeed in
making a great sprinkling of
corpses on the grass between
their former position and the
fence. But they were in a state
of frenzy, perhaps because of
forgotten vanities, and it made
an exhibition of sublime recklessness.
There was no obvious questioning,
nor figurings, nor dia- grams.
There was, apparently, no considered
loopholes. It appeared that the
swift wings of their desires
would have shattered against
the iron gates of the impossible.
He himself felt the daring
spirit of a savage religion mad.
He was capable of profound sacri-
fices, a tremendous death. He
had no time for dissections,
but he knew that he thought of
the bullets only as things that
could prevent him from reaching
the place of his endeavor. There
were subtle flashings of joy
within him that thus should be
his mind.
He strained all his strength.
His eyesight was shaken and dazzled
by the tension of thought and
muscle. He did not see anything
excepting the mist of smoke gashed
by the little knives of fire,
but he knew that in it lay the
aged fence of a vanished farmer
protecting the snuggled bodies
of the gray men.
As he ran a thought of the
shock of contact gleamed in his
mind. He expected a great con-
cussion when the two bodies of
troops crashed together. This
became a part of his wild battle
madness. He could feel the onward
swing of the regiment about him
and he conceived of a thun- derous,
crushing blow that would prostrate
the resistance and spread consternation
and amaze- ment for miles. The
flying regiment was going to
have a catapultian effect. This
dream made him run faster among
his comrades, who were giving
vent to hoarse and frantic cheers.
But presently he could see
that many of the men in gray
did not intend to abide the blow.
The smoke, rolling, disclosed
men who ran, their faces still
turned. These grew to a crowd,
who retired stubbornly. Individuals
wheeled fre- quently to send
a bullet at the blue wave.
But at one part of the line
there was a grim and obdurate
group that made no movement.
They were settled firmly down
behind posts and rails. A flag,
ruffled and fierce, waved over
them and their rifles dinned
fiercely.
The blue whirl of men got very
near, until it seemed that in
truth there would be a close
and frightful scuffle. There
was an expressed disdain in the
opposition of the little group,
that changed the meaning of the
cheers of the men in blue. They
became yells of wrath, directed,
personal. The cries of the two
parties were now in sound an
interchange of scathing insults.
They in blue showed their teeth;
their eyes shone all white. They
launched themselves as at the
throats of those who stood resisting.
The space between dwindled to
an insignificant dis- tance.
The youth had centered the
gaze of his soul upon that other
flag. Its possession would be
high pride. It would express
bloody minglings, near blows.
He had a gigantic hatred for
those who made great difficulties
and complications. They caused
it to be as a craved treasure
of my- thology, hung amid tasks
and contrivances of danger.
He plunged like a mad horse
at it. He was resolved it should
not escape if wild blows and
darings of blows could seize
it. His own em- blem, quivering
and aflare, was winging toward
the other. It seemed there would
shortly be an encounter of strange
beaks and claws, as of eagles.
The swirling body of blue men
came to a sudden halt at close
and disastrous range and roared
a swift volley. The group in
gray was split and broken by
this fire, but its riddled body
still fought. The men in blue
yelled again and rushed in upon
it.
The youth, in his leapings,
saw, as through a mist, a picture
of four or five men stretched
upon the ground or writhing upon
their knees with bowed heads
as if they had been stricken
by bolts from the sky. Tottering
among them was the rival color
bearer, whom the youth saw had
been bitten vitally by the bullets
of the last formidable volley.
He perceived this man fighting
a last struggle, the struggle
of one whose legs are grasped
by demons. It was a ghastly battle.
Over his face was the bleach
of death, but set upon it was
the dark and hard lines of desperate
purpose. With this terrible grin
of resolution he hugged his precious
flag to him and was stum- bling
and staggering in his design
to go the way that led to safety
for it.
But his wounds always made
it seem that his feet were retarded,
held, and he fought a grim fight,
as with invisible ghouls fastened
greedily upon his limbs. Those
in advance of the scam- pering
blue men, howling cheers, leaped
at the fence. The despair of
the lost was in his eyes as he
glanced back at them.
The youth's friend went over
the obstruction in a tumbling
heap and sprang at the flag as
a panther at prey. He pulled
at it and, wrench- ing it free,
swung up its red brilliancy with
a mad cry of exultation even
as the color bearer, gasping,
lurched over in a final throe
and, stiff- ening convulsively,
turned his dead face to the ground.
There was much blood upon the
grass blades.
At the place of success there
began more wild clamorings of
cheers. The men gesticulated
and bellowed in an ecstasy. When
they spoke it was as if they
considered their listener to
be a mile away. What hats and
caps were left to them they often
slung high in the air.
At one part of the line four
men had been swooped upon, and
they now sat as prisoners. Some
blue men were about them in an
eager and curious circle. The
soldiers had trapped strange
birds, and there was an examination.
A flurry of fast questions was
in the air.
One of the prisoners was nursing
a superficial wound in the foot.
He cuddled it, baby-wise, but
he looked up from it often to
curse with an astonishing utter
abandon straight at the noses
of his captors. He consigned
them to red regions; he called
upon the pestilential wrath of
strange gods. And with it all
he was singularly free from recognition
of the finer points of the con-
duct of prisoners of war. It
was as if a clumsy clod had trod
upon his toe and he conceived
it to be his privilege, his duty,
to use deep, resentful oaths.
Another, who was a boy in years,
took his plight with great calmness
and apparent good nature. He
conversed with the men in blue,
studying their faces with his
bright and keen eyes. They spoke
of battles and conditions. There
was an acute interest in all
their faces dur- ing this exchange
of view points. It seemed a great
satisfaction to hear voices from
where all had been darkness and
speculation.
The third captive
sat with a morose counte- nance.
He preserved
a stoical and cold attitude.
To all advances he made one reply
without varia- tion, "Ah, go
t' hell!"
The last of the four was always
silent and, for the most part,
kept his face turned in un- molested
directions. From the views the
youth received he seemed to be
in a state of absolute dejection.
Shame was upon him, and with
it profound regret that he was,
perhaps, no more to be counted
in the ranks of his fellows.
The youth could detect no expression
that would allow him to believe
that the other was giving a thought
to his narrowed future, the pictured
dungeons, perhaps, and starvations
and brutali- ties, liable to
the imagination. All to be seen
was shame for captivity and regret
for the right to antagonize.
After the men had celebrated
sufficiently they settled down
behind the old rail fence, on
the opposite side to the one
from which their foes had been
driven. A few shot perfunctorily
at distant marks.
There was some long grass.
The youth nestled in it and rested,
making a convenient rail support
the flag. His friend, jubilant
and glori- fied, holding his
treasure with vanity, came to
him there. They sat side by side
and congratu- lated each other.
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