Take the lesson to heart, O Vanity! It is but a little time, at the longest, that the immortal soul thou art will animate this bone; but the hour comes quickly when to have been a good soldier of the truth on any field, whether resounding with arms, or silent with the calm strong struggle of love and patience, and to have given thy life to the cause, will be sweeter to thee than the fatness of the earth and length of days. No, heroic soldier! you I do not pity, though your mortal part lies here neglected and at the mercy of swine.
The cornfield, and another field from which it was separated by a fence at the time of the battle, are now thrown together, forming a lot of about fifty acres. The upper part was dotted with little dry brown cocks of seed-clover. No hogs were on it at the time; they had been turned out, to save the clover-seed, I presume, for that was of some consequence.
We found plenty more bones and skulls of Union soldiers rooted up and exposed, as we ascended the ridge. Beside some lay their head-boards. I noted the names of a few: “Sergt. Mahaffey, Co. C, 9th Regt. P. R. C.,” for one.
“The Rebs had all the fence down ’cept a strip by the pike,” said the ploughman. “That was jist like a sifter. Some of the rails have been cut up and carried away for the bullet-holes.”
He showed me marks still remaining on the fence. Some of our soldiers had cut their names upon it; and on one post some pious Roman Catholic had carved the sacred initials:—
“I. H. S.”
“I reckon that was a soldier’s name too,” said my honest ploughman. And so indeed it was,—Jesus Hominum Salvator.
Beyond the pike, between it and the woods, was a narrow belt of newly ploughed ground.
“You see them green spots over yon’ covered with weeds? Them are graves that I skipped.” In the edge of the woods beyond lay two unexploded shells which relic-hunters had not yet picked up.
Whilst I was exploring the fields with my good-natured ploughman, Lewy Smith brought his horse around by the roads. He was waiting for me on the pike. “The last time I drove by yer,” he said, “there was a nigger ploughing in that field, and every time he came to a grave he would just reach over his plough, jerk up the head-board, and stick it down behind him again as he ploughed along; and all the time he never stopped whistling his tune.”