I was the one that loved you most.  And when I made you think I didn’t I lied.  I lied because I felt that I was not worthy, and I loved you enough to want you to belong to the best man God ever made, and I loved him too.  And that was why it was.  I tell you because I think you must have wondered about it sometimes.  But it was very hard to do, and because I did it, and because Peter is what he is, you must come to him now.  If God will continue to be merciful, you will get here in time.  I hope I may be on hand to see you, but I do not know.  Hamilton is gone, and Peter is going, and there will be a terrible battle to-morrow, and thousands of poor lads will lie on this field forever.  And here, one way or another, the war will be decided.  I have not the heart to write to you any more, my darling.  You will come to Peter, I know, and all will be as well as it can be.  I pray to God that I too shall live to see you again, and I ask him to bless you and keep you for ever and ever.  Always I see your dear face before me in the battle, and sometimes at night God lets me dream of you.  I am without dogma, sweetest of all possible sweethearts, but this creed I say over and over, and this creed I believe:  I believe in one God, Maker of heaven and Margaret.

Angels guard you, darling.

Aladdin. 
Gettysburg, July 2, 1863.

XXXIV

On the morning of the third day of July, young Hannibal St. John shaved his face clean and put himself into a new uniform.  The old nth Maine was no longer a regiment, but a name of sufficient glory.  On three occasions it had been shot to pieces, and after the third the remaining tens were absorbed by other regiments.  Hannibal’s father had obtained for him a lieutenancy in the United States artillery, Beau Larch was second lieutenant in another Maine regiment, and John, the old and honored colonel of the nth, was now, like Aladdin, serving on a staff.

The battle began with a movement against Johnson on the Confederate left, and one against Longstreet on their right.

That against Longstreet became known in history as Farnsworth’s charge, and Aladdin saw it from the signal-station on Little Round Top.

It was a series of blue lines, whose relations to one another could not be justly estimated, because of the wooded nature of the ground, which ran out into open places before fences and woods that spat red fire, and became thinner and of less extension, as if they had been made of wax and were melting under the blaze of the July sun.  In that charge Farnsworth fell and achieved glory.