“The sight of you is welcome, Harry,” said Colonel Leonidas Talbot in even tones.  “It is pleasant to know at such a time that one’s friend is alive, because the possibilities are always against it.  Still, Harry, I’ve always felt that you bear a charmed life, and so do St. Clair and Langdon.  Tell me, is it true that we evacuate Petersburg tonight?”

“It’s no secret, sir.  The orders have been issued and we do.”

“If we must go, we must, and it’s no time for repining.  Well, the town has been defended long and valiantly against overwhelming numbers.  If we lose it, we lose with glory.  It can never be said of the South that we were not as brave and tenacious as any people that ever lived.”

“The Northern armies that fight us will be the first to give us that credit, sir.”

“That is true.  Soldiers who have tested the mettle of one another on innumerable desperate fields do not bear malice and are always ready to acknowledge the merits of the foe.  Ah, see how closely that shell burst to us!  And another!  And a third!  And a fourth!  Hector, you read the message, do you not?”

“Certainly, Leonidas, it’s as plain as print to you and me.  John Carrington—­good old John! honest old John!—­is now in command of that group of batteries on the right.  He has been in charge of guns elsewhere, and has been suddenly shifted to this point.  The great increase in volume and accuracy of fire proves it.”

“Right, Hector!  He’s as surely there as we are here.  The voice of those cannon is the voice of John Carrington.  Well, if we’re to be crushed I prefer for good old John to do it.”

“But we’re not crushed, Leonidas.  We’ll go out of Petersburg tonight, beating off every attack of the enemy, and then if we can’t hold Richmond we’ll march into North Carolina, gather together all the remaining forces of the Confederacy, and, directed by the incomparable genius of our great commander, we’ll yet win the victory.”

“Right, Hector!  Right!  Pardon me my moment of depression, but it was only a moment, remember, and it will not occur again.  The loss of a capital—­even if it should come to that—­does not necessarily mean the loss of a cause.  Among the hills and mountains of North Carolina we can hold out forever.”

Harry was cheered by them, but he did not fully share their hopes and beliefs.

“Aren’t they two of the greatest men you’ve ever known?” whispered St. Clair to him.

“If honesty and grandeur of soul make greatness they surely are,” replied Harry feelingly.

He returned now to his general’s side, and watched the great bombardment.  Scores of guns in a vast half circle were raining shells upon the slender Confederate lines.  The blaze was continuous on a long front, and huge clouds of smoke gathered above.  Harry believed that the entire Union army would move forward and attack their works, but the charge did not come.  Evidently Grant remembered Cold Harbor, and, feeling that his enemy was in his grasp, he refrained from useless sacrifices.