The firing in the immediate vicinity had diminished, though the din of battle resounded on both sides. The boys were rather nervous, as men are when standing idle under fire; but it was the nervousness of restrained enthusiasm, not of fear, unless it was in the case of invalid Phineas, and a very few others whose physical health had not been completely established.

“Well, Somers, my dear boy, how do you get on?” asked Captain de Banyan, as he sauntered leisurely up to the lieutenant, whose command stood next to his own.

“First-rate; only I should like to have something a little more active than standing here.”

“It takes considerable experience to enable a man to stand still under fire. When I was at the battle of Alma, I learned that lesson to a charm. We stood up for forty-two hours under a fierce fire of grape and canister, to say nothing of musketry.”

“Forty-two. . . Read More