nearly noon
Dick also had a pair and he , too , examined the country before them . It was a fine , rolling region and all the forest was gone , except clumps of trees here and there . The whole country would have been heavy with forest had it not been for the tramp of war . It was now nearly noon and the sunlight was brilliant and intense . The glasses carried far . Dick saw a line of trees which he surmised marked the course of the Antietam , and he saw small detachments of cavalry which he knew were watching the advance of the Army of the Potomac . Their purpose convinced him that Lee had not retreated across the Potomac , but that he would fight and surely lose .