He's left it already and gone on, anxious to reach the Gulf before winter, I suppose." The Union army in its turn entered Chattanooga, a little town of which Dick had seldom heard before, although he greatly admired its situation.
The country about it was bold and romantic.

It stood in a sharp curve of the great river, the Tennessee.

Not far away was the lofty uplift of Lookout Mountain, a half-mile high, and there were long ridges between which creeks or little rivers flowed down to the Tennessee.
One of these streams was the Chickamauga, which in the language of the Cherokee Indians who had once owned this region means "the river of death." Why they called it so no one knew, but the name was soon to have a terrible fitness.

Chattanooga itself meant in the Cherokee tongue "the hawk's nest," and anybody could see the aptness of the term.
While Lookout Mountain was the loftiest summit, some of the other ridges rose almost as high, through the gaps of which the Northern army must pass if it continued the pursuit of Bragg.
September had now come and the winds were growing crisper in the high country.

The feel of autumn was in the air, and the coolness made the marching brisker.