Her first impulse is to draw back and retire,
shuddering, far into the garden. But, behold! the gate swings back of
its own accord, and in the face of that fact, and with the remembrance
of the words she has heard, she dare not do other than pass through the
open way.
What a strange, wide world, and how dreary! A great, mad battle is
raging; the grass, sloping up to the horizon, is scorched with the heat
of the sun--the sun which only made a pleasant warmth in the shady
garden. There is the fierce galloping of horses, and wrestling and
fighting of men. Shouts and groans fill the air and drown the song of
the birds. There are heaps of dying and wounded. Ah! there is one man
not a stone's throw from her; his must have been the voice that reached
her within her gates. How remarkable that she should have heard nothing
before of all the great din. Another groan, followed by some inaudible
words, causes Hazel timidly to approach the wounded man. He is evidently
one of the very poorest of the "common" soldiers; and there is a look in
his face which speaks the word death with a shudder in the girl's heart.
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