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As each regiment passed, General Mitchel addressed his men; then when the last of them was on the road, he and his aides pressed towards the front. When daylight came, the cavalry was four miles from Huntsville. The first section of cavalry galloped to the west of the town, the second to the east, while the remaining cavalrymen, led by General Mitchel, dashed for the station.

Such were the words which issued from Pawnee Brown's lip as he swung around and saw the cavalrymen sitting on their horses at attention. His disappointment was keen. In speaking of it afterwards he said: "I never felt so bad in my life. I had promised to take the boomers through and I felt that I had disappointed nearly four thousand people who were looking to me with utmost confidence."

Quitting Washington at 2 o'clock P. M. on Monday, the detectives and cavalrymen disembarked at Belle Plain, on the border of Stafford county, at 10 o'clock, in the darkness. Belle Plain is simply the nearest landing to Fredericksburg, seventy miles from Washington city, and located upon Potomac creek.

Riderless horses galloped out of the smoke and, with the curious attraction that horses have for the battlefield, hovered near, their empty saddles on their backs. A groan burst from Harley. "My God," he cried, "those cavalrymen are going to retreat!" Then he saw something that struck him with a deeper pang, though he was silent for the moment. He knew those men.

The bodies lay thickly piled here at the spots where the struggle had been fiercest. For a time they found none save those of the men of the city, but after two hours' search they came upon a number of Arabs, whose white garments showed up clearly in the moonlight. Lying among them were many bodies of French cavalrymen, showing that the Bedouins had sold their lives dearly.

To heighten the interest of the occasion, the colors captured by the Harris Light at Urbanna, and those taken by the First Maine in their memorable charge at Brandy Station on the ninth instant, were displayed amid the cheers of the enthusiastic cavalrymen, whose past deeds give encouraging promise for the future. Sunday, June 14. We are still encamped on the plains near Warrenton Junction.

Sutlers showed their wares, guard details went by, cavalrymen clanked their spurs through the streets, laughter and talk rang through the place. A company of strolling players had come down from the North, making its way from Washington to Harper's Ferry, held by three thousand Federals; from Harper's Ferry to Winchester, held by fifteen hundred; and from Winchester to Strasburg.

The black cavalrymen who rode into Richmond, the first of the Northern troops to enter the Southern capital, went in waving their sabres and crying to the negroes on the sidewalks, "We have come to set you free!" They were from the division of Godfrey Weitzel, and American history has no more stirring moment. Then no straw could be overlooked.

The cavalrymen were all too heavy; but an odd character had turned up, the second son of an English baronet, a dissipated youth, barely a hundred pounds in weight; an agglomeration of most weak vices, but thin, tough, and a born and trained horseman. He was selected for one, and Little Breeches, a cowboy of diminutive proportions, for the other. All the material was now in sight for the scheme.

They quickly joined General Stuart, who was eager for the duty, and falling in line with the troop of Sherburne rode swiftly toward Port Royal, the cavalrymen carrying with them several light guns. As they galloped along, mixed mud and snow flew in every direction, but most of them had grown so used to it that they paid little attention.