The last now seemed impossible and the first improbable.
The crackling fire came nearer.

Owing to the lack of percussion caps, Pemberton had ordered his men to use their rifles sparingly, but evidently a considerable body of sharpshooters near Dick were attempting a flanking movement of some kind, and meant to carry it out with bullets.

He was impatient to see, but prudence kept him in his covert, a prudence that was soon justified, as presently he heard voices very near him and then the sound of footsteps.
He rose up a little and saw several hundred Confederate soldiers passing on the slopes not more than a hundred yards away.

They went south of him, and he recognized with growing alarm that the wall across his way was growing higher.

When they were gone and he could no longer hear their tread among the bushes he slipped from his hiding place and went directly toward Vicksburg.