Dick,
see all those moving lights to right and left of us. They're the
brigades coming up in the night. Isn't it a weird and tremendous scene?
You and I and Pennington will see this night over and over again, many
and many a time."
"It's so, George," said Dick, "I feel the truth of what you say all
through me. Listen to the rumble of the cannon wheels! I hear 'em on
both sides of us, and behind us, and I've no doubt, too, that it's going
on before us, where the Southerners are massing their batteries. How the
lights move! It's the field of Manassas again, and we're going to win
this time!"
All of Dick's senses were excited once more, and everything he saw was
vivid and highly colored. Warner, cool of blood as he habitually was,
had no words of rebuke for him now, because he, too, was affected in the
same way. The fields and plains of Manassas were alive not alone with
marching armies, but the ghosts of those who had fallen there the year
before rose and walked again.
Despite the darkness everything swelled into life again for Dick.
Off there was the little river of Manassas, Young's Branch, the railway
station, and the Henry House, around which the battle had raged so
fiercely.
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