Dick shivered all over. His head burned and his nerves throbbed.
Too late now! He had hoped all through the long night that something
would happen to carry a warning to that unsuspecting army. Nothing had
happened, and in five minutes the attack would begin.
He stood up at his full height and sought to pierce with his eyes the
foliage in front of him, but the massed ranks of the Southerners now
stood between, and the batteries were wheeling into line.
A great throb and murmur ran through the forest. Dick looked upon faces
brown with the sun, and eyes gleaming with the fierce passion of victory
and revenge. They were going to avenge Henry and Donelson and all the
long and mortifying retreat from Kentucky. Dick saw them straining and
looking eagerly at their officers for the word to advance.
As if by a concerted signal the long and mellow peal of many trumpets
came from the front, the officers uttered the shout to charge, the wild
and terrible rebel yell swelled from forty thousand throats, and the
Southern army rushed upon its foe.
The red dawn of Shiloh had come.
CHAPTER XV
THE RED DAWN OF SHILOH
Dick stood appalled when he heard that terrible shout in the dawn,
and the crash of cannon and rifles rolling down upon the Union lines.
It was already a shout of triumph and, as he gazed, he saw through the
woods the red line of flame, sweeping on without a halt.
The surprise had been complete.
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