"Well, we got to a little town in Virginia, I forget the name of it,
where we had to stop a short time. The Captain had told me that his home
was not far from there, and his old company was raised around there.
Quite a number of the old fellows lived about there yet, he said,
and he saw some of them nearly every time he passed through,
as they `kept the run of him.' He did not know that he'd `find any of them
out to-day, as it was Christmas, and they would all be at home,' he said.
As the train drew up I went out on the platform, however,
and there was quite a crowd assembled. I was surprised to find it so quiet,
for at other places through which we had passed they had been
having high jinks: firing off crackers and making things lively.
Here the crowd seemed to be quiet and solemn, and I heard the Captain's name.
Just then he came out on the platform, and someone called out:
`There he is, now!' and in a second such a cheer went up as you never heard.
They crowded around the old fellow and shook hands with him and hugged him
as if he had been a girl."
"I suppose you have reference to the time before you were married,"
interrupted someone, but Lesponts did not heed him. He went on:
"It seemed the rumor had got out that morning that it was the Captain's train
that had gone off the track and that the Captain had been killed in the wreck,
and this crowd had assembled to meet the body.
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