“Don't know. I only got him yesterday afternoon. He belonged to an infantry doctor who was shot.”
“That accounts for it; a doughboy horse don't know anything about this kind of work! Take your place at the rear of the detachment, and if that horse neighs again, break his head with your carbine.”
“All right, sir.”
Another man was sent to the front, and we moved on. We did not run into the rebel pickets, and the officer said we must be further to the left than the right of Lee's line. We halted on the top of a hill where the road turned westward and waited for daylight.
As soon as it became light enough for the officer to take observations with his field-glass, he rode to the highest point he could find and surveyed the broken country in our front. He could not see far in any direction, us the woods were thick and there was little cleared land.
“Come here, Sergeant,” the lieutenant called to Murphy, after looking off to the west for a few seconds through his glass. “Look over there.”
“Rebels, sir,” said the sergeant.
“Yes; cavalry moving over this way. We will return at once.”
We went back up the turnpike at a gallop.
“What's up?” inquired the officer in charge, of the outposts when we reached our pickets.