A moment after Myrtle’s exclamation Etta-Belle gave a shriek of terror and grabbed up the pole that Roxy had used for her signal flag; and she was none too soon, for the eagle with a wide swoop now darted down straight toward little Ivy, who with Dinah in her arms was looking up toward this wonderful bird; but Etta-Belle’s strong sweep of the pole struck the bird with sufficient force to send it from its course and its sharp talons did not touch Ivy; and, evidently surprised by the unexpected assault, the bird made no further attack upon the girls but floated off toward the distant mountain top.
“We’s gwine home dis instan’ minute,” Etta-Belle declared, her voice trembling with fear, and the little girls scrambled down the ledge. Roxy carried “Dinah,” for she feared the eagle might return and make off with her treasured doll.
“Beauty” was hurried toward home at a good pace, while Jasmine and Roxy ran on behind him; now and then the little girls spoke of the danger Ivy had escaped, and Roxy began to think that the ledge was not a very safe place; and when they reached home and the older people heard the story of the eagle Grandma Miller promptly declared that Roxy must not again visit the ledge; and Roxy’s mother began to think that her little daughter was in danger whenever she was out of her mother’s sight.
In the late afternoon the Hinhams rode off toward home, telling Roxy that the gray pony could remain at the Miller farm as long as Roxy stayed there.
“It’s just the same as if ‘Beauty’ was really your own pony, Roxy,” Jasmine said smilingly, as the two little girls said good-bye.
At that very moment, on the borders of the Antietam, his back toward the Potomac, Lee was making ready to meet the army of McClellan; and on the following morning, September 16th, 1862, the Confederates found themselves facing the enemy who from the opposite side of the Antietam River opened fire upon them. Equal in courage, Northern and Southern Armies faced each other as the Union divisions, by bridge and ford, crossed the Antietam and met the Confederates on the open field only to be driven back with serious losses. The brave veteran, General Mansfield, was killed, General Hooker severely wounded, and for a time it seemed that Lee would win the battle.
At the stone bridge across the Antietam General Burnside held back Lee’s forces, and pressed forward to the heights, and nightfall brought the battle to an end without either army having triumphed.
All that day Roxy kept close at home. The sound of echoing guns told the people of the hillside farms of the terrible battle, and they could think of nothing else.
On the next morning, September 18th, Lee resolved to retreat, and on the night of the eighteenth he crossed the Potomac by the Shepardstown Ford into Virginia. And now for a time the Union Army remained quiet near Sharpsburg.
It was on September 19th that Roland Hinham rode into the Miller yard with the news that Lee’s troops were crossing the Potomac into Virginia, and Grandma Miller and Mrs. Delfield at once began to pack baskets of food, bandages for the wounded soldiers in the camps beyond Sharpsburg, and packages of clothing upon which they had been at work all the summer; Mrs. Miller and Jacob started off early that afternoon with a well-filled wagon.