Down the hill swept the 37th, and without pausing to wheel into line, fired one volley and charged. Before that withering fire the gunners melted away from the gun like snow in the sun, and with a yell that set the old hills ringing, the Virginians rushed across the bridge.
‘Fire!’ roared the Federal commander, and one thin sputtering volley rattled from the ranks where Luce and Ephraim stood. But ere they could reload, from every cannon on the height burst forth an iron hail, from the streets in rear of them came crashing deadly volleys, from the bridge in front of them the Virginians poured upwards, mad, vengeful, resistless. That flashing line of steel, that terrible ear-piercing yell—they were more than mortal man could stand. The gun by the bridge was taken, the gun in the streets was deserted. It was hopeless to wait, for their supports had not come up. Panic seized the Federal infantry, and as the cold steel gleamed in their eyes, they broke and fled.
CHAPTER IX.
HOW GENERAL SHIELDS SENT A DESPATCH TO GENERAL FRÉMONT.
When the stampede before the onrush of the Virginians occurred, Ephraim and Lucius would have been heartily glad to bolt in the opposite direction—namely, towards their friends; but two circumstances precluded the possibility of such a course. The one, that without any consultation on the subject, they both recognised the danger they ran of being shot down or bayoneted by the men of the 37th, if they ventured to run towards them, dressed as they were in Federal uniforms. For in the fury of that charge but little opportunity was likely to arise for either offering or receiving explanations. Another and even more potent reason was that, however their inclinations might have prompted them to such a step, it was absolutely impossible for them to carry it out, for the rush of the Federal troops behind them swept them forward with such an irresistible impulse that they had no choice but to take to their heels in the direction of Lewiston. And this they did with a hearty good-will which the roar of cannon and rattle of musketry behind them kept very fully alive.
The retreat was not conducted in what is called good order. It was a regular sauve qui peut, and it was not until the fugitives ran into the fresh troops coming up to their support that a stand was made and something like a rally effected. But even these were of no avail, and the advance was promptly checked by the well-directed shot from the Confederate batteries, which were now all in position upon the opposite heights across the river; and the supporting columns, shattered by the murderous discharge, wavered, recoiled, broke, and in their turn bolted back to the shelter of the woods near Lewiston. As they fled, the Confederates limbered up and pursued them, keeping, of course, to the north side of the river, till at last the discomfiture of the Federals was complete; and Shields, recognising the futility of any further attempt upon a position so well defended, and which he could only attack at such absolute disadvantage to himself, was compelled to remain quiet all day, actually within sound of the cannonade which told of the struggle in which Frémont was engaged alone at Cross Keys.
When the second repulse and consequent flight took place, Ephraim and Lucius followed the example of most of their comrades by compulsion, and sought the shelter of the woods, where they were at least safer from the cannonade than in the open. Looking up the valley from Lewiston towards Port Republic, a bird’s-eye view would have revealed three marked topographical features, roughly speaking, parallel to one another. On the right was the Shenandoah River; next to this, and to the left of it, open country and cultivated fields; and farther still to the left, the dense forest, three miles wide, which extended to the base of the Blue Ridge. When forced to descend in the balloon, the boys had entered the wood on the side next the mountain, and their flight from the colonel and subsequent wanderings had carried them clear across it to the side facing the river, where they had fallen in with the little hut in the clearing, which was really a woodsman’s cabin on the Lewiston estate. They were now, therefore, still on the same side as the hut, but a mile or so above it.
‘I tell ye what it is, Luce,’ said Ephraim in his companion’s ear, as they hurried along, ‘we air goin’ too fast. We’ll be in the Yankee camp at this rate before many minnits is over. Let’s hang back a bit.’