“Mighty cold April!” said the men. “Even the pear trees and the peach trees and the cherry trees look cold and misty and wavering—No, there isn’t any wind, but they look wavering, wavering ...”—“Dreamed a while back—sleeping on my feet. Dreamed the trees were all filled with red cherries, and the corn was up, and we had a heap of roasting ears ...”—“Don’t talk that-a-way! Don’t tell about dreams! ’T’isn’t lucky! Roasting ears and cherries—O God! O God!”—“Talking about corn? I heard tell about a lady in the country. All the horses were taken and the plantation couldn’t be ploughed, and she wanted it ploughed. And so a battle happened along right there, and when it was over and everybody that could had marched away, she sent out and gathered two of the horses that were just roaming around loose. So she had plough-horses, but they were so hungry they were wicked, and she didn’t have any fodder at all to give them. Not any at all. But women are awful resourceful. There were a lot of shuck beds in the quarter. She had the ticks ripped open and she took the shucks and soaked them in hot water and sprinkled them with a little salt and fed her plough-horses. If anybody stumbles on a shuck bed in this march I speak for it!”—Close up! Close up! Close up, men!
“‘Maxwelton braes are bonny,
Where early fa’s the dew,
And ’twas there that Annie Laurie
Gaed me her promise, true—’”
And on they went—and on they went toward Appomattox.
In every company there was the Controversialist. Not cold nor hunger nor battle could kill the Controversialist. The Controversialist of Company A—the column being halted before a black and cold and swollen stream—appealed to Allan Gold. “I?” said Allan. “What do I think? I think that we were both right and both wrong, and that, in the beginning, each side might have been more patient and much wiser. Life and history, and right and wrong and minds of men look out of more windows than we used to think! Did you never hear of the shield that had two sides and both were precious metal? The traveller who said, ‘This is a gold shield,’ was right—half right. And the traveller who said, ‘This is a silver shield,’ was right—half right. The trouble was neither took the trouble to walk round the shield. So it is, I reckon, in most wars—this one not excepted! Of course, being in, we’ve done good fighting—”
On moved the Army of Northern Virginia, through the cold river and up upon the farther side. Column forward! Column forward! Flowering fruit trees and April verdure and a clearing sky. On and on down a long, long vista.... Tramp, tramp, tramp, tramp!
“‘Way down South in the land ob cotton,
’Simmon seed and sandy bottom—’”