and ate it. So each of the
diners had an egg. The incident was suggestive of the situation. Here
was a Quartermaster appointing a day for dining a friend--depending for
part of the feast on his confidence that his hen would come to time. The
picture of that formal dinner in the winter quarters on the Rapidan is
worth drawing. It was a fair sign of the times, and of life in the Army
of Northern Virginia; when it came to a Quartermaster giving to an
honored, and specially invited guest, a dinner like that--it indicates a
general scarceness.

=When Fiction Became Fact=

One bright spot in that "winter of our discontent"--lives in my memory.
It was on the Christmas Day of 1863. That was a day specially hard to
get through. The rations were very short indeed that day--only a little
bread, no meat. As we went, so hungry, about our work, and remembered
the good and abundant cheer always belonging to Christmas time; as we
thought of "joys we had tasted in past years" that did _not_ "return" to
us, now, and felt the woeful difference in our insides--it made us sad.
It was harder to starve on Christmas Day than any day of the winter.

When the long day was over and night had come, some twelve or fifteen of
us, congenial comrades, had gathered in a group, and were sitting out of
doors around a big camp fire, talking about Christmas, and trying to
keep warm and cheer ourselves up.

One fellow proposed what he called a _game_, and it was at once taken
up--though it was a silly thing to do, as it only made us hungrier than
ever. The game was this--we were to work our fancy, and imagine that we
were around the table at "Pizzini's," in Richmond. Pizzini was the
famous restauranteur who was able to keep up a wonderful eating house
all through the war, even when the rest of Richmond was nearly starving.
Well--in reality, now, we were all seated on the ground around that
fire, and very hungry. In imagination we were all gathered 'round
Pizzini's with unlimited credit and free to call for just what we
wished. One fellow tied a towel on him, and acted as the waiter--with
pencil and paper in hand going from guest to guest taking orders--all
with the utmost gravity. "Well, sir, what will you have?" he said to the
first man. He thought for a moment and then said (I recall that first
order, it was monumental) "I will have, let me see--a four-pound steak,
a turkey, a jowl and turnip tops, a peck of potatoes, six dozen
biscuits, plenty of bu