"Lots of the Virginia mud is a rich, ripe red.

Bet you anything that before tomorrow night we will have turned to some hue of scarlet." "We won't take the wager," said Dick, "because you bet on a certainty." That afternoon the scouts surprised a telegraph station on the railroad, and found in it a dispatch from General Early.

To the great amazement of Sheridan, Early was not far away.

He had only two hundred men, but with them the grim old fighter prepared to attack the Union army.

Sheridan himself felt a certain pity for his desperate opponent, but he promptly sent Custer in search of him.