"It's simple," said Warner, who was binding up his little wound with his
own hand. "It's just a question in mathematics. I see now how Stonewall
Jackson won so many triumphs in the Valley of Virginia. Give Jackson,
say, fifteen thousand men. We have fifty thousand, but we divide them
into five armies of ten thousand apiece. Jackson fights them in detail,
which is five battles, of course. His fifteen thousand defeat the ten
thousand every time. Hence Jackson with fifteen thousand men has beaten
our side. It's simple but painful. In time our leaders will learn."
"After we're all killed," said Pennington sadly.
"And the country is ripped apart so that it will take half a century to
put the pieces back together again and put 'em back right," said Dick,
with equal sadness.
"Never mind," said Sergeant Whitley with returning cheerfulness. "Other
countries have survived great wars and so will ours."
Some food was obtained for the exhausted men and they ate it nervously,
paying little attention to the crackling fire of the skirmishers which
was still going on in the darkness along their front.
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