And there was a great uncertainty about his knee joints.
The words that comrades had uttered previous to the firing began to recur to him.

"Oh, say, this is too much of a good thing! What do they take us for--why don't they send supports?
I didn't come here to fight the hull damned rebel army." He began to exaggerate the endurance, the skill, and the valor of those who were coming.

Himself reeling from exhaustion, he was astonished beyond measure at such persistency.

They must be machines of steel.
It was very gloomy struggling against such affairs, wound up perhaps to fight until sundown.
He slowly lifted his rifle and catching a glimpse of the thickspread field he blazed at a cantering cluster.

He stopped then and began to peer as best as he could through the smoke.