By Ambrose Bierce
ReadOasis Step 3
(Part 1)

Carter Druse was born in Virginia. He loved his parents, his home and the South. But he loved his country, too. And in the autumn of 1861, when the United States was divided by a terrible civil war, Carter Druse, a southerner, decided to join the Union Army of the North.

He told his father about his decision one morning at breakfast.

The older man looked at his only son for a moment, too shocked to speak. Then he said, "As of this moment you are a t...