ce,--"there ain't no
shore after ye get to't. It's nothin' but salt ma'sh, all trod to pudd'n'
by the fellers that have been in ahead of us. I thought we was to be
_landed_; 'stead of that, we're swamped!"

The men pushed on, through marsh and swamp, sometimes in mire and water
knee-deep, and now in tall, rank grass up to their eyes; the darkness
adding to their dismal prospect.

"By Grimes!" mutters Jack Winch, "I don't think an island of this kind is
worth taking. It's jest fit for secesh and niggers, and nobody else."

"We must have the island, because it's a key to the coast," says Frank.

"I wouldn't talk war, if I couldn't carry a gun," retorts Jack, made
cross by the cold and wet.

"Perhaps before we get through you'll be glad to lend me yours," is
Frank's pleasant response, as he hastens forward through grass which
waves about his ears or lies trodden and tangled under foot.

"The gunboats have stopped firing," observes Atwater.

In fact, both gunboats and battery were now silent, the former having
drawn off for the night.

XXIV.

THE BIVOUAC.

"There's a good time coming, and near, boys! there's a good time coming,
and near!" sings out Tucket, holding his head high as he strides along,
for he has caught a sight of fires beyond, and the company are now
emerging upon a tract of sandy barrens, thinly covered with pines.

A road runs through the island. The advance of the column has already
taken possession of it. Skirmishers have been thrown forward into the
woods, and pickets are posted on the flanks.

The troops prepare to bivouac for the night. Fires are kindled, and soon
the generous flames blaze up, illumining picturesque groups of men, and
casting a wild glare far into the depths of the great, black, silent
woods. The trees seem to stand out like startled giants, gazing at the
unusual scene; and all above and around the frightened shadows lurk, in
ghostly boughs, behind dark trunks, among the deep grasses, and in
hollows of the black morass. And the darkness of the night overhangs the
army like a vast tent, sombrely flickering.

A dry fence of cypress and pine rails is, without hesitation,
appropriated to feed the fires of the bivouac; and the chilled, soaked
soldiers gather around them to get warm and dry.

"My brave fellows," says Captain Edney, passing among them, "do the best
you can for yourselves for the night. Try to k