"Here is Mosby at last!" he said.
And he went to meet the new-comer. It was the famous chief of partisans
whose name by this time had become a terror to the enemy. He wore a
plain gray uniform, a brace of revolvers in a swaying belt, rode a
spirited gray mare, and I recognized at once the roving glance, and
satirical smile which had struck me on that night when he rescued
Farley and myself in Fauquier.
Stuart rapidly drew him into a private apartment; remained in
consultation with him for half an hour; and then came forth, with a
smile of evident satisfaction.
Mosby's intelligence must have pleased him. It at least dispelled his
gloom.
An hour afterward his head-quarters had disappeared--every thing was
sent toward the mountains. Stuart set out apparently to follow
them--but that was only a ruse to blind busybodies.
A quarter of a mile from head-quarters he leaped a fence, and doubled
back, going in the direction now of Manassas.
At daylight on the next morning he had forced his way through the Bull
Run mountain.
Two hours afterward he had made a sudden attack on the enemy's
infantry. It was the rear of Hancock's corps, which was the rear of
Hooker's army, then retiring toward the Potomac.
XV.
THE SUPPER NEAR BUCKLANDS.
Stuart's fight near Haymarket, here alluded to, was a gay affair; but I
pass over it, to a scene still gayer and decidedly more pleasant.
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