A Horseman in the Sky
by Ambrose Bierce
So Carter Druse, bowing reverently to his father, who returned the salute with a stately courtesy which masked a breaking heart, left the home of his
childhood to go soldiering. By conscience and courage, by deeds of devotion and daring, he soon commended himself to his fellows and his officers; and it
was to these qualities and to some knowledge of the country that he owed his selection for his present perilous duty at the extreme outpost. Nevertheless,
fatigue had been stronger than resolution, and he had fallen asleep. What good or bad angel came in a dream to rouse him from his state of crime, who
shall say? Without a movement, without a sound, in the profound silence and the languor of the late afternoon, some invisible messenger of fate touched
with unsealing finger the eyes of his consciousness—whispered into the ear of his spirit the mysterious awakening word which no human lips ever have
spoken, no human memory ever has recalled. He quietly raised his forehead from his arm and looked between the masking stems of the laurels,
instinctively closing his right hand about the stock of his rifle.
Which sentence from the passage develops the theme that a good soldier is brave and dutiful?
“He quietly raised his forehead from his arm and looked
between the masking stems of the laurels, instinctively
closing his right hand about the stock of his rifle.”
“Without a movement, without a sound, in the profound
silence and the languor of the late afternoon, some invisible
messenger of fate touched with unsealing finger the eyes of
his consciousness . . .”
“By conscience and courage, by deeds of devotion and
daring, he soon commended himself to his fellows and his
officers . . .”
“Nevertheless, fatigue had been stronger than resolution, and
he had fallen asleep.”