He said nothing to this.  He was abashed.  His eyes sought the ground.

“Why don’t you answer me, sir?” I asked.

He replied timidly, “I am not doing any harm.”

“What do you mean by being here at all?”

“I got lost in the woods last night,” he said, “and went to sleep here, waiting for day.”

“Then get back to your company at once,” said I; “what is your regiment?”

“The Seventh,” he replied.

“And your brigade?”

He looked up wonderingly at this, and I feared that I had made an unnecessary mistake through over-carefulness in trying to secure another corroboration of what I already knew well enough.  I thought I could perceive his idea, and I added in an instant:  “Don’t you know that troops have come up in the night?  What brigade is yours?”

“Branch’s,” he said.

“Then you will find your camp just in this direction,” said I, pointing to the rear and left.  He slunk away, seemingly well pleased to be quit at so cheap a cost.

Fearing that our voices had been heard by the pickets, I plunged through the bushes directly toward the east, and ran for a minute without pausing.  Again the cold sweat was dropping from my face; again I had felt the mysterious mental agony attendant upon a too violent transition of personality.  Perhaps it was this peculiar condition which pressed me to prolonged and unguarded energy.  I went through thicket and brier patch, over logs and gullies, and when I paused I knew not where I was.

After some reflection I judged that I had pursued an easterly direction so far that Jones was now not to the northeast, but more to the north; I changed my course then, bending toward the north, and before sunrise reached the creek which, on the preceding night, I had crossed after leaving Jones.  I did not know whether he was above me or below, so I crossed the stream at the place where I struck it, and went straight away from it through the swamp.

After going a long distance I began to fear that I was missing my course, and I did not know which way to turn.  I whistled; there was no response.

No opening could be seen in any direction through the swamp.  My present course had led me wrong; it would not do at all to go on; I should get farther and farther away from Jones.  If I should assume any direction as the right one, I should be likely to have guessed wrong.  I spent an hour working my way laboriously through the swamp, making wide and wider sweeps to reach some opening or some tree on higher ground.  At last I saw open ground on my left.  I went rapidly to it, and found a field, with a fence separating it from the woods,—­the fence running east and west,—­and saw, several hundred yards toward the west, the corner of the field at which I had stationed Jones.

At once I began to go rapidly down the hill toward the place.  As I came near, I saw both horses prick their ears.  Jones was sitting on the ground, with his gun in his lap, alert toward the west; I was in his rear.  Suddenly he, too, saw the movement of the horses; he sprang quickly to a tree, from behind which I could now see the muzzle of his gun ten paces off.  I whistled.  The gun dropped, and Jones advanced, frightened.