It was when that long line of men emerged once more from the birches and set off up the slope, after Arnold, that we, led by Morgan, slipped nearer and ever nearer to the blue-coated Germans—so near that we could no longer see Arnold rallying his troops at the bottom of the slope.

We crawled from stump to stump, from girdled tree to girdled tree. Through the smoke we could see the artillery horses: the gun-crews working on the guns. The horses reared and plunged as our bullets reached them. The gun-crews were in confusion.

“Black horse,” I heard Cap shout behind me, “I call a black horse!” I heard, too, the quavering voice of Doc Means: “Horses don’t count! You can’t miss a horse!”

“Get the horses!” Nason said. “They can’t move the guns without the horses!”

Two of the horses were down and kicking—three of them—four of them. The gun-crews ran and fell and rose to run again. The whole wheat field was a turmoil of shouts and groans and clattering and cursing—of confused and violent movement—of the screams of horses and the roar of cannon.

Over the crest of the wheat field came Arnold on his bay mare. He seemed to lean out above her head and lift her forward with the reins—lift her forward and hurl her at a gun-crew. He hacked at them with his sword, seeming to throw it rather than swing it. Close behind him, cheering and roaring with excitement, pressed a mass of brown-shirted Continentals.

The gun-crew scuttled from under Arnold’s sword. The wheat field was alive with running men—men in blue coats and white breeches. Leaping over stumps and dead horses, diving under guns, stumbling and shouting, open-mouthed with consternation, they ran to the rear, toward the forest, and we ran after them, led on by Arnold and Morgan.

At the back edge of the wheat field was a rail fence. Behind it we could see British infantrymen, their muskets poked through the rails. The fleeing Germans went tumbling over the fence.

Among the infantrymen moved an officer on a gray horse. An aide rode at his elbow, so we knew he was a general. We could see him halting the fleeing Germans: showing them where to take post: stopping here and there to speak to his men. The rattle of musketry came from the rail fence and wisps of smoke rose from it, drifting across the dark wall of forest. We heard the bullets whipping past us, flirting through the trampled wheat.

“Officers!” we heard Morgan roaring in that carter’s voice of his. “Get those officers or they’ll get you!”

The British general looked suddenly behind him, as though something had gone wrong with his crupper. His hat fell off; and as it fell, he seized it and clapped it back on his head. It fell off again. He bent over in his saddle, putting his hands to his stomach; then pitched forward on his horse’s neck. His aide leaped to the ground, held the general in the saddle and led him rapidly off through the trees.