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One
sunny afternoon in the autumn of the year 1861, a soldier lay in a clump
of (1)
laurel, by the side of a road in western Virginia. He
lay at full length upon his stomach, (2)
his feet resting upon the toes, his head upon the left forearm. His extended(3)
right hand loosely grasped his rifle. But for a slight
rhythmic movement of the cartridge box at the back of his belt he might
have been thought to be dead. (4)
He was asleep at his post of duty. (5)
If detected he would be dead shortly afterward, death
being the just and legal penalty for his crime. (6)
The clump of laurel in which the criminal lay was
in the angle of a road which went zigzagging downward through the forest.
(7) At
a second angle in the road was a large flat rock, jutting out northward,
overlooking the deep valley from which the road ascended.(8)
The rock capped a high cliff; (9)
a stone dropped from its outer edge would have fallen sheer
(10)
downward one thousand feet to the tops of the pines. The angle where the
soldier lay was on the same cliff. Had he been awake,
it might well have made him giddy to look below. (11)
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English
Intensive Reading 
Introduction
