A few rods behind them came a score or two of infantry as a
sort of advance guard, the rest of the company being some distance in
the rear. The gentlemen in that little party of horsemen had nearly
all seen service in the late war and knew what fighting meant, but
that was a war against their country's foes, invaders from over the
sea, not like this, against their neighbors. They had no taste for the
job before them, resolute as they were to perform it. The men they
were going to meet had most of them smelled powder, and knew how to
fight. They were angry and desperate and the conflict would be bloody
and of no certain issue. So far as they knew, it would be the first
actual collision of the insurrection, for the news of the battle at
Springfield had not yet reached them. No wonder they should ride along
soberly and engrossed in thought.
Suddenly a man stepped out from the woods into the road and firing his
musket at them turned and ran. Thinking to capture him the gentlemen
spurred their horses forward at a gallop. Other shots were fired
around them, indicating clearly that they had come upon the picket
line of the enemy. But their blood was up and they rode on pell-mell
after the fugitive sentry.
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