Behind the prostrate lines sounded the hoofbeats of galloping horses; the men turned to look.  A dozen staff officers were riding to the various brigade and regimental commanders, who had remounted.  A moment more and there was a chorus of voices, all uttering out of time the same words—­“Attention, battalion!” The men sprang to their feet and were aligned by the company commanders.  They awaited the word “forward”—­ awaited, too, with beating hearts and set teeth the gusts of lead and iron that were to smite them at their first movement in obedience to that word.  The word was not given; the tempest did not break out.  The delay was hideous, maddening!  It unnerved like a respite at the guillotine.

Captain Graffenreid stood at the head of his company, the dead man at his feet.  He heard the battle on the right—­rattle and crash of musketry, ceaseless thunder of cannon, desultory cheers of invisible combatants.  He marked ascending clouds of smoke from distant forests.  He noted the sinister silence of the forest in front.  These contrasting extremes affected the whole range of his sensibilities.  The strain upon his nervous organization was insupportable.  He grew hot and cold by turns.  He panted like a dog, and then forgot to breathe until reminded by vertigo.

Suddenly he grew calm.  Glancing downward, his eyes had fallen upon his naked sword, as he held it, point to earth.  Foreshortened to his view, it resembled somewhat, he thought, the short heavy blade of the ancient Roman.  The fancy was full of suggestion, malign, fateful, heroic!

The sergeant in the rear rank, immediately behind Captain Graffenreid, now observed a strange sight.  His attention drawn by an uncommon movement made by the captain—­a sudden reaching forward of the hands and their energetic withdrawal, throwing the elbows out, as in pulling an oar—­he saw spring from between the officer’s shoulders a bright point of metal which prolonged itself outward, nearly a half-arm’s length—­a blade!  It was faintly streaked with crimson, and its point approached so near to the sergeant’s breast, and with so quick a movement, that he shrank backward in alarm.  That moment Captain Graffenreid pitched heavily forward upon the dead man and died.

A week later the major-general commanding the left corps of the Federal Army submitted the following official report: 

“SIR:  I have the honor to report, with regard to the action of the 19th inst, that owing to the enemy’s withdrawal from my front to reinforce his beaten left, my command was not seriously engaged.  My loss was as follows:  Killed, one officer, one man.”

GEORGE THURSTON

THREE INCIDENTS IN THE LIFE OF A MAN