The Long Roll Part 57

"General A. P. Hill and his division will make that. The batteries on the Chickahominy will cover his pa.s.sage of the bridge. General Longstreet will support him. General Magruder with General Huger and the reserve artillery will be left before Richmond. They will so demonstrate as to distract General McClellan's attention from the city and from his right and General Porter. General Stuart will take position on your line of march from Ashland, and General D. H. Hill will support you."

"Good! good! This is the afternoon of the twenty-third."

"Yes. Frederickshall is forty miles from this point--" He touched the map again. "Now, general, when can you be here?"

"Thursday morning, the twenty-sixth, sir."

"That is very soon."

"Time is everything in war, sir."

"That is perfectly true. But the time is short and the manoeuvre delicate. You and your troops are at the close of a campaign as arduous as it is amazing. The fatigue and the strain must be great. You and General Hill are far apart and the country between is rough and unmapped. Yet victory depends on the simultaneous blow."

Jackson sat rigid again, his hand stiffly placed upon the sabre. "It is not given to man to say with positiveness what he can do, sir. But it is necessary that this right be turned before McClellan is aware of his danger. Each day makes it more difficult to conceal the absence of my army from the Valley. Between the danger of forced marching and the obvious danger that lies in delay, I should choose the forced marching.

Better lose one man in marching than five in a battle not of our selecting. A straw may bring failure as a straw may bring victory. I may fail, but the risk should be taken. Napoleon failed at Eylau, but his plan was correct."

"Very well," said Lee. "Then the morning of the twenty-sixth be it!

Final orders shall await you at Ashland."

Jackson rose. "Good! good! By now my horses will have been changed. I will get back. The army was to advance this morning to Beaver Dam Station."

He rode hard through the country all night, it being the second he had spent in the saddle. Beaver Dam Station and the bivouacking Army of the Valley saw him on Tuesday morning the twenty-fourth. "Old Jack's back from wherever he's been!" went the rumour. Headquarters was established in a hut or two near the ruined railroad. Arriving here, he summoned his staff and sent for Ewell. While the former gathered he read a report, forwarded from Munford in the rear. "Scout Gold and Jarrow in from the Valley. Fremont still fortifying at Strasburg--thinks you may be at Front Royal. Shields at Luray considers that you may have gone to Richmond, but that Ewell remains in the Valley with forty thousand men.

Banks at Winchester thinks you may have gone against Shields at Luray, or King at Catlett's, or Doubleday at Fredericksburg, or gone to Richmond--but that Ewell is moving west on Moorefield!"

"Good! good!" said Jackson. Staff arrived, and he proceeded to issue rapid and precise orders. All given, staff hurried off, and the general spoke to Jim. "Call me when General Ewell comes." He stretched himself on a bench in the hut. "I am suffering," he said, "from fever and a feeling of debility." He drew his cloak about him and closed his eyes.

It was but half an hour, however, that he slept or did not sleep, for Ewell was fiery prompt.

The Army of the Valley entered upon a forced march through country both difficult and strange. It had been of late in the possession of the enemy, and the enemy had stretched felled trees across forest roads and burned the bridges spanning deep and sluggish creeks. Guides were at fault, cross-roads directions most uncertain. The wood grew intolerably thick, and the dust of the roads was atrocious; the air cut away by the tall green walls on either hand; the sun like a furnace seven times heated. Provisions had not come up in time at Beaver Dam Station and the troops marched upon half-rations. Gone were the mountains and the mountain air, present was the languorous breath of the low country. It had an upas quality, dulling the brain, r.e.t.a.r.ding the step. The men were very tired, it was hot, and a low fever hung in the air.

They marched until late of a night without a moon, and the bugles waked them long ere dawn. A mist hung over all the levels, presaging heat.

_Column Forward!_ To-day was a repet.i.tion of yesterday, only accented.

The sun girded himself with greater strength, the dust grew more stifling, the water was bad, gnats and mosquitoes made a painful cloud, the feet in the ragged shoes were more stiff, more swollen, more abraded. The moisture in the atmosphere weakened like a vapour bath. The entire army, "foot cavalry" and all, marched with a dreadful slowness.

_Press Forward--Press Forward--Press Forward--Press Forward!_ It grew to be like the humming insects on either hand, a mere noise to be expected.

"Going to Richmond--Going to Richmond--Yes, of course we're going to Richmond--unless, indeed, we're going a roundabout way against McDowell at Fredericksburg! Richmond will keep. It has kept a long time--ever since William Byrd founded it. General Lee is there--and so it is all right--and we can't go any faster. War isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Oh, hot, hot, hot! and skeetery! and General Humidity lives down this way. _Press Forward--Press Forward--Press Forward. If that noise don't stop I'll up with my musket b.u.t.t and beat somebody's brains out!_"

Ashland was not reached until the late evening of this day. The men fell upon the earth. Even under the bronze there could be seen dark circles under their eyes, and their lips were without colour. Jackson rode along the lines and looked. There were circles beneath his own eyes, and his lips shut thin and grey. "Let them rest," he said imperturbably, "until dawn." There rode beside him an officer from Lee. He had now the latter's General Order, and he was almost a day behind.

Somewhat later, in the house which he occupied, his chief of staff, Ewell and the brigadiers gone, the old man, Jim, appeared before him.

"Des you lis'en ter me er minute, gineral! Ob my sartain circ.u.mspection I knows you didn't go ter bed las' night--nurr de night befo'--nurr de night befo' dat--'n' I don' see no preperation for yo' gwine ter bed dish-yer night! Now, dat ain' right. W'at Miss Anna gwine say w'en she heah erbout hit? She gwine say you 'stress her too much. She gwine say you'll git dar quicker, 'n' fight de battle better, ef you lie down erwhile 'n' let Jim bring you somethin' ter eat--"

"I have eaten. I am going to walk in the garden for awhile."

He went, all in bronze, with a blue gleam in his eye. Jim looked after him with a troubled countenance. "Gwine talk wif de Lawd--talk all night long! Hit ain' healthy. Pray an' pray 'n' look up ter de sky 'twel he gits paralysis! De gineral better le' me tek his boots off, 'n' go ter bed 'n' dream ob Miss Anna!"

At three the bugles blew. Again there was incalculable delay. The sun was up ere the Army of the Valley left Ashland. It was marching now in double column, Jackson by the Ashcake road and Merry Oaks Church, Ewell striking across country, the rendezvous Pole Green Church, a little north and east of Mechanicsville and the Federal right. The distance that each must travel was something like sixteen miles.

The spell of yesterday persisted and became the spell of to-day. Sixteen miles would have been nothing in the Valley; in these green and glamoury lowlands they became like fifty. Stuart's cavalry began to appear, patrols here, patrols there, vedettes rising stark from the broom sedge, or looming double, hors.e.m.e.n and shadow, above and within some piece of water, dark, still, and clear. Time was when the Army of the Valley would have been curious and excited enough over Jeb Stuart's troopers, but now it regarded them indifferently with eyes glazed with fatigue. At nine the army crossed the ruined line of the Virginia Central, Hood's Texans leading. An hour later it turned southward, Stuart on the long column's left flank, screening it from observation, and skirmishing hotly through the hours that ensued. The army crossed Crump's Creek, pa.s.sed Taliaferro's Mill, crossed other creeks, crept southward through hot, thick woods. Mid-day came and pa.s.sed. The head of the column turned east, and came shortly to a cross-roads. Here, awaiting it, was Stuart himself, in his fighting jacket. Jackson drew up Little Sorrel beside him. "Good-morning, general."

"Good-morning, general--or rather, good-afternoon. I had hoped to see you many hours ago."

"My men are not superhuman, sir. There have occurred delays. But G.o.d is over us still."

He rode on. Stuart, looking after him, raised his brows. "In my opinion A. P. Hill is waiting for a man in a trance!"

The army turned southward again, marching now toward Totopotomoy Creek, the head of the column approaching it at three o'clock. Smoke before the men, thick, pungent, told a tale to which they were used. "Bridge on fire!" It was, and on the far side of the creek appeared a party in blue engaged in obstructing the road. Hood's Texans gave a faint cheer and dashed across, disappearing in flame, emerging from it and falling upon the blue working party. Reilly's battery was brought up; a sh.e.l.l or two fired. The blue left the field, and the grey pioneers somehow fought the flames and rebuilt the bridge. An hour was gone before the advance could cross on a trembling structure. Over at last, the troops went on, southward still, to Hundley Corner. Here Ewell's division joined them, and here to the vague surprise of an exhausted army came the order to halt. The Army of the Valley went into bivouac three miles north of that right which, hours before, it was to have turned. It was near sunset. As the troops stacked arms, to the south of them, on the other side of Beaver Dam Creek, burst out an appalling cannonade. Trimble, a veteran warrior, was near Jackson. "That has the sound of a general engagement, sir! Shall we advance?"

Jackson looked at him with a curious serenity. "It is the batteries on the Chickahominy covering General Hill's pa.s.sage of the stream. He will bivouac over there, and to-morrow will see the battle--Have you ever given much attention, general, to the subject of growth in grace?"

CHAPTER x.x.x

AT THE PRESIDENT'S

A large warehouse on Main Street in Richmond had been converted into a hospital. Conveniently situated, it had received many of the more desperately wounded from Williamsburg and Seven Pines and from the skirmishes about the Chickahominy and up and down the Peninsula. Typhoid and malarial cases, sent in from the lines, were also here in abundance. To a great extent, as June wore on, the wounded from Williamsburg and Seven Pines had died and been buried, or recovered and returned to their regiments, or, in case of amputations, been carried away after awhile by their relatives. Typhoid and malaria could hardly be said to decrease, but yet, two days before the battle of Mechanicsville, the warehouse seemed, comparatively speaking, a cool and empty place.

It was being prepared against the battles for which the beleaguered city waited--waited heartsick and aghast or lifted and fevered, as the case might be. On the whole, the tragic mask was not worn; the city determinedly smiled. The three floors of the warehouse, roughly divided into wards, smelled of strong soap and water and home-made disinfectants. The windows were wide; swish, swish! went the mops upon the floors. A soldier, with his bandaged leg stretched on a chair before him, took to scolding: "Women certainly are funny! What's the sense of wiping down walls and letting James River run over the floors? Might be some sense in doing it _after_ the battle! Here, Sukey, don't splash that water this a-way!--Won't keep the blood from the floor when they all come piling in here to-morrow, and makes all of us d.a.m.ned uncomfortable to-day!--Beg your pardon, Mrs. Randolph! Didn't see you, ma'am.--Yes, I should like a game of checkers--if we can find an island to play on!"

The day wore on in the hospital. Floors and walls were all scrubbed, window-panes glistening, a Sunday freshness everywhere. The men agreed that housecleaning was all right--after it was over. The remnant of the wounded occupied the lower floor; typhoid, malaria, and other ills were upstairs. Stores were being brought in, packages of clothing and lint received at the door. A favorite surgeon made his rounds. He was cool and jaunty, his hands in his pockets, a rose in his b.u.t.tonhole. "What are you malingerers doing here, anyhow? You're eating your white bread, with honey on it--you are! Propped up and walking around--Mrs. McGuire reading to you--Mrs. Randolph smilingly letting you beat her at her own game--Miss Cooper writing beautiful letters for you--Miss Cary leaving really ill people upstairs just because one of you is an Albemarle man and might recognize a home face! Well! eat the whole slice up to-day, honey and all! for most of you are going home to-morrow. Yes, yes!

you're well enough--and we want all the room we can get."

He went on, Judith Cary with him. "Whew! we must be going to have a fight!" said the men. "Bigger'n Seven Pines."

"Seven Pines was big enough!"

"That was what I thought--facing Casey's guns!--Your move, Mrs.

Randolph."

The surgeon and nurse went on through cool, almost empty s.p.a.ces. "This is going," said the surgeon crisply, "to be an awful big war. I shouldn't be surprised if it makes a Napoleonic thunder down the ages--becomes a mighty legend like Greece and Troy! And, do you know, Miss Cary, the keystone of the arch, as far as we are concerned, is a composition of three,--the armies in the field, the women of the South, and the servants."

"You mean--"

"I mean that the conduct of the negroes everywhere is an everlasting refutation of much of the bitter stuff which is said by the other side.

This war would crumble like that, if, with all the white men gone, there were on the plantations faithlessness to trust, hatred, violence, outrage--if there were among us, in Virginia alone, half a million incendiaries! There aren't, thank G.o.d! Instead we owe a great debt of grat.i.tude to a dark foster-brother. The world knows pretty well what are the armies in the field. But for the women, Miss Cary, I doubt if the world knows that the women keep plantations, servants, armies, and Confederacy going!"

"I think," said Judith, "that the surgeons should have a n.o.ble statue."

"Even if we do cut off limbs that might have been saved--hey? G.o.d knows, they often might! and that there's haste and waste enough!--Here's Sam, bringing in a visitor. A general, too--looks like a t.i.tian I saw once."

"It is my father," said Judith. "He told me he would come for me."

A little later, father and daughter, moving through the ward, found the man from Albemarle--not one of those who would go away to-morrow. He lay gaunt and shattered, with strained eyes and fingers picking at the sheet. "Don't you know me, Mocket?"

Mocket roused himself for one moment. "Course I know you, general! Crops mighty fine this year! Never saw such wheat!" The light sank in his eyes; his face grew as it was before, and his fingers picked at the sheet. He spoke in a monotone. "We've had such a hard time since we left home--We've had such a hard time since we left home--We've had such a hard time since we left home--We--"