Memory made a vehement protest.

He recalled all the pleasant things that life had in store for him; all that he could enjoy and accomplish; all that he might be to others; all that others might be to him.

Every enjoyment of the past, every happy possibility of the future took on a more entrancing roseatenesss.
Could he give all this up, and die there on the mountain top, in this dull, brutal, unheroic fashion, in the filthy mud and dreary rain, with no one to note or care whether he acted courageously or otherwise?
It did not seem that he was expected to fling his life away like a dumb brute entering the reeking shambles.

His youth and abilities had been given him for some other purpose.

Again palsying fear and ignoble selfishness tugged at his heart-strings, and he felt all his carefully cultivated resolutions weakening.
"A Sergeant must be left in command of the men guarding this property," said the Colonel.