War! Everywhere the monotony of this awful panorama, covering her country day after day, month after month, year after year—war, always and everywhere and in every stage—hordes of horses, hordes of men, endless columns of deadly engines! Everywhere, always, death, or the preparation for death—every road and footpath crammed with it, every field trampled by it, every woodland shattered by it, every stream running thick with its pollution. The sour smell of marching men, the stale taint of unclean fires, the stench of beasts—the acrid, indescribable odor that hangs on the sweating flanks of armies seemed to infect sky and earth.
A trooper, munching an apple and carrying a truss of hay, passed, cap cocked rakishly, sabre banging at his heels; and she called to him and he came up, easily respectful under the grin of bodily well being.
“How long have you served in this regiment?” she asked.
He swallowed the bite of apple which crowded out his freckled cheeks: “Three years, sir.”
“‘We was there—I know that, yes, an’ we had a fight.’”
She drew involuntarily nearer the tent door.
“Then—you were at Sandy River—three years ago?”
“Yes, sir.”