"We were going to have boiled lion heart for supper, Harry," says Joe Ruhl with mock apology for the fare, "but we couldn't catch any lions. They seem to be scarce in these parts. Maybe we can catch a tiger to-morrow, though."
Little do we think, as we sit thus cheerily talking about the blazing fire behind the stone-wall, that it is our last supper together, and that ere another nightfall two of us will be sleeping in the silent bivouac of the dead.
"Colonel, close up your men, and move on as rapidly as possible."
It is the morning of July 1st, and we are crossing a bridge over a stream, as the staff-officer, having delivered this order for us, dashes down the line to hurry up the regiments in the rear. We get up on a high range of hills, from which we have a magnificent view. The day is bright, the air is fresh and sweet with the scent of the new-mown hay, and the sun shines out of an almost cloudless sky, and as we gaze away off yonder down the valley to the left—look! Do you see that? A puff of smoke in mid-air! Very small, and miles away, as the faint and long-coming "boom" of the exploding shell indicates; but it means that something is going on yonder, away down in the valley, in which, perhaps, we may have a hand before the day is done. See! another—and another! Faint and far away comes the long-delayed "boom!" "boom!" echoing over the hills, as the staff-officer dashes along the lines with orders to "double-quick! double-quick!"
Four miles of almost constant double-quicking is no light work at any time, least of all on such a day as this memorable first day of July, for it is hot and dusty. But we are in our own State now, boys, and the battle is opening ahead, and it is no time to save breath. On we go, now up a hill, now over a stream, now checking our headlong rush for a moment, for we must breathe a little. But the word comes along the line again, "double-quick," and we settle down to it with right good-will, while the cannon ahead seem to be getting nearer and louder. There's little said in the ranks, for there is little breath for talking, though every man is busy enough thinking. We all feel, somehow, that our day has come at last—as indeed it has!
We get in through the outskirts of Gettysburg, tearing down the fences of the town-lots and outlying gardens as we go; we pass a battery of brass guns drawn up beside the Seminary, some hundred yards in front of which building, in a strip of meadow-land, we halt, and rapidly form the line of battle.
"General, shall we unsling knapsacks?" shouts some one down the line to our division-general, as he is dashing by.
"Never mind the knapsacks, boys; it's the State now!"
And he plunges his spurs into the flanks of his horse, as he takes the stake-and-rider fence at a leap, and is away.