Page:Bacheller--D'ri and I.djvu/268

D'RI AND I written me, and her tenderness cut me like a sword for the way I had neglected her. Well, it is ever so with a young man whose heart has found a new queen. I took the missive with wet eyes to our good farmer-general of the North. He read it, and spoke with feeling of his own mother gone to her long rest.

"Bell," said he, "you are worn out. After mess in the morning mount your horses, you and the corporal, and go and visit them. Report here for duty on October 16."

Then, as ever after a kindness, he renewed his quid of tobacco, turning quickly to the littered desk at headquarters.

We mounted our own horses a fine, frosty morning. The white earth glimmered in the first touch of sunlight. All the fairy lanterns of the frost king, hanging in the stubble and the dead grass, glowed a brief time, flickered faintly, and went out. Then the brown sward lay bare, save in the shadows of rock or hill or forest that were still white. A great glory had fallen over the far-reaching woods. Looking down a long valley, we could see towers of evergreen, terraces of red and brown, golden steeple-tops,