It's fine to lie here by the water, and breathe pure air instead of dust." "I've heard that every man eats a peck of dirt in the course of his life," said Happy Tom, "but I know that I've already beat the measure a dozen times over.

Why, I took in a bushel at least at the Second Manassas, but I still live, and here I am, surveying this peaceful domestic scene.

Arthur is mending his best uniform, Harry stretched on the leaves is resting and dreaming dreams, George is wondering how he will get a new pair of shoes for the season, and the army is doing its autumn washing." Harry glanced up and down the stream, and he smiled at the homely sight.
Thousands of soldiers were washing their ragged clothes in the little river and the equally ragged clothes of many others were drying on the banks or on the bushes.

The sun-browned lads who skylarked along the shores or in the water, playing pranks on one another, bore little resemblance to those who had charged so fiercely and so often into the mouths of the cannon at Antietam.
Harry marvelled at them and at himself.

It seemed scarcely possible that human nature could rush to such violent extremes within so short a space.