A Soldier of Virginia | Page 5

week before, when I had received from Colonel Washington a letter
in which he stated that he had procured my appointment as lieutenant in
Captain Waggoner's Virginia company. I had been ahungered to make
the campaign, and had donned my uniform with a light heart,--the same
I had worn the year before, now much faded but inexpressibly dear to
me,--mounted my horse, and ridden hotfoot to join the force here at
Winchester. I had been received kindly enough by my companion
officers of the provincial companies, many of whom were old friends.

The contempt which the officers of the Forty-Fourth felt for the
Virginia troops, and which they were at no pains to conceal, had vexed
me somewhat from the first, yet it was not until to-night at the officers'
mess, to which I had foolishly accepted Pennington's invitation, that
this contempt had grown unbearable. I had chanced to pull
Pennington's horse out of a hole the day before, and so saved it a
broken leg, but I saw now that I should have done better to refuse that
invitation, courteously as it was given, and sincere as his gratitude had
undoubtedly been.
So I walked up and down with a sore heart, as a child will when it has
been punished for no fault, and prayed that we provincials might yet
teach the regulars a lesson. Yet they were brave men, most of them,
whom I could not but admire. A kindlier, gallanter roan than Sir Peter
Halket I had never seen, no, nor ever shall see. I noted the sentries
pacing their beats before the colonel's quarters, erect, automatons, their
guns a-glitter in the moonlight, their uniforms immaculate. I had seen
them drill the day before, whole companies moving like one man, their
ranks straight as a ramrod,--tramp, tramp,--turning as on a pivot moved
by a single will. It was a wonderful sight to me who had never seen the
like before, they were so strong, so confident, so seemingly invincible.
I turned and glanced again at the sentries, almost envying them their
perfect carriage. Had they been men of iron, worked by a spring, they
could not have moved with more clock-like regularity. And yet, no
doubt, they had one time been country louts like any others. Truly there
was much virtue in discipline. Yet still, and here I shook my head, the
Virginia troops were brave as any in the world, and would prove it.
From the officers' quarters came the sound of singing and much
laughter, and I flushed as I thought perchance it was at me they laughed.
I have learned long since that no man's laughter need disturb rue, so my
heart be clear, but this was wisdom far beyond my years and yet
undreamed of, and I shook my fist at the row of lighted windows.
"What, still fuming, Tom?" cried a voice at my elbow, and I turned to
find Colonel Washington there; "and staring over toward the barracks
as though you would like to gobble up every one within! Well, I admit

you have cause," he added, and I saw that his face grew stern. "You
may have to bear many such insults before the campaign is ended, but I
hope and believe that the conduct of the Virginia troops will yet win
them the respect of the regulars. You seem to have lost no time in
getting to camp," he added, in a lighter tone.
"There was nothing to keep me at Riverview," I answered bitterly. "My
absence is much preferred to my presence there. Had I not come to
Winchester, I must have gone somewhere else. Your letter came most
opportunely."
"You are out of humor to-night, Tom," said Washington, but his tone
was kindly, and he placed one hand upon my arm as we turned back
toward the cabin where my quarters were. He was scarce three years
my senior, yet to me he seemed immeasurably the elder. I had always
thought of him as of a man, and I verily believe he was a man in mind
and temper while yet a boy in body. I had ridden beside him many
times over his mother's estate, and I had noticed--and chafed somewhat
at the knowledge--that women much older than he always called him
Mr. Washington, while even that little chit of a Polly Johnston called
me Tom to my face, and laughed at me when I assumed an air of
injured dignity. I think it was the fact that my temper was so the
opposite of his own which drew him to me, and as for myself, I was
proud to have such a friend, and of the chance to march with him again
over the mountains against the French.
He knew well how to humor me, and