Arnold’s bay mare danced impatiently before us; and Arnold himself shouted shrilly at us to come ahead.

We ran after him toward the rail fence. When we got there, there was nobody behind it, only three fallen men in scarlet coats, one of whom was dead.

We stood there stupidly, wondering what to do. “Well,” Cap Huff said hoarsely, “that’s what I call a good day’s work!”

Doc Means seemed disappointed. “Ain’t there nothing more to it than that? I ain’t hardly got myself warmed up.”

I had somewhat the same feeling, and stared wonderingly back at the throng of sweaty, powder-blackened Americans that crowded behind us in half-formed companies—at the militia that still poured up from the ravine by the hundreds; by the thousands.

Three quarters of an hour ago the field on which we stood had been filled with British and Germans in orderly array. Now it was a litter of broken gun-rammers, short German muskets, wrecked ammunition carts, discarded coats and hats, dead men, dead horses, abandoned cannon, knots of prisoners, wounded men who cried out mournfully.

The British light infantry was gone. The British grenadiers who had been under attack when we burst from the forest were gone. The Germans were gone. We had turned them back. In three quarters of an hour we had stopped Burgoyne.

… I think it was true, what Cap said. We had done a good day’s work, though not to Arnold’s way of thinking. He sat there on his horse, backed into an angle of the rail fence. He was leaning over, his sword tucked under his left arm, talking to Morgan: clapping Morgan on the shoulder to emphasize his words.

When Morgan nodded, Arnold rose in his stirrups and shook the hilt of his sword at us. His high, harsh voice carried like a bugle, and could be heard, somehow, above any sort of tumult. Cap, in a thunderous bellow, was asking some of Morgan’s Virginians where Gates and Lincoln might be, and in the same breath announcing that they were where no bullet would ever reach them; but at Arnold’s first word he froze into immobility, his mouth agape.

“You drove ’em!” Arnold shouted. “You drove ’em! They’ve gone back to their camp! We’re less than a mile from it! We’re going there! We’re going to take that camp! We’ve got ’em! We’ll put an end to all the British and all the Burgoynes right now!”

His voice had a rasping, piercing quality to it that sent shivers down my back. At his words a thousand throats sent up a ragged roar.

“Remember this!” Arnold shouted. “Not all the British and all the Burgoynes in the world can stop you this day! The gun isn’t made that can stop us—that can stop you men from Virginia and New England and New York!”

The men before him howled and cheered. Amid their confused shouting I heard the words, “Burgine! Drive ’em! To hell with Burgine! Drive him! Give us a shot at Burgine!”