With the ardor of young manhood I looked forward to the coming battle, when I knew the mighty armies of North and South would once again contest for the fertile Shenandoah. It was to be American pitted against American, a struggle ever worthy of the gods. Slowly I rode back down the files of my men, marking their alignment and accoutrements with practised eye, smiling grimly as I noted their eager faces, war-worn and bronzed by exposure, yet reanimated by hope of active service. Boys half of them appeared to be, yet I knew them as fire-tested veterans of many hard-fought fields, lads who would die without a murmur beneath their beloved Southern flag, as undaunted in hour of peril as were the Old Guard at Waterloo. In spite of frayed and ragged uniforms, tarnished, battered facings, dingy, flapping hats, they looked stanch and true, soldiers every inch of them, and I marked with the jealous pride of command their evenly closed ranks and upright carriage. How like some giant machine they moved--horses and men--in trained and disciplined power!