The driver whose wheels had stuck, cracked his whip first and yelled. He
yelled again and cracked his whip. And then he began to swear, loudly,
and angrily at first and then in lower, steadier, more polite terms--but
always in an unending nerve-racking torrent.
He cursed his mules individually by name and the whole team
collectively, and consigned it to the lowest depth of the deepest hell
and then the devil for not providing a deeper one. Each trait of each
mule, good and bad, he named without fear or favor and damned each alike
with equal emphasis. He named each part of each mule's anatomy and
damned it individually and as a whole, with full bill of particulars.
He swore in every key in the whole gamut of sound and last of all he
damned himself for his utter inability to express anything he really
felt.
The last big gun up the hill and the infantry poured into the town of
Fredericksburg, halting in regiments and brigades in its streets. Only a
few shots had been exchanged with the men in grey. They had withdrawn to
the heights a mile beyond. The assault had been a mere parade. Many of
the inhabitants had fled in terror at the approach of the men in blue.
Some of the lower types of soldiers in the Northern army broke into
these deserted houses and began to rob and pillage.
Julius "found" many delicacies lying about on lawns and in various
unheard-of places.
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