At first, the narrator looks on the Civil War with distrust, as if it were some “play affair.” What happens to change his mind about the war, and encourage him to enlist?

The narrator wanted to take part in the glory and victory of battle.

The newspapers, the talk of the village, his own imaginings, had excited him to an uncontrollable degree. They were in truth, fighting finely down there. Almost every day the newspapers talked of victory.