y should remain until they agreed to work.

We found another alternative for them.--There was a piece of file and
a scrap of stove-pipe in our room, which we took, and buying a candle
from the commissary, watched our opportunity, when taken out to wash,
to slip them into the cell. As soon as these necessaries were
received, the boys begun faithfully to dig their way out under the
wall. All day and night they worked, but did not get through. The next
day, we supplied them with another candle, and they labored on. Toward
morning, they broke upward through the crust of the ground outside.
The foremost one wormed his way out, and glided off. He was never
heard from, and no doubt reached the Union lines. The next man was
just under the wall, when the barking of a dog, that happened to be
prowling around, drew the attention of the guard that way, and
prevented his escape. But though the stampede was thus arrested, it
was a lesson that prevented the confinement of any more in the cell.

Yet they were not content to give up the idea of making us their
servants. I happened to be on the next list prepared. This time the
task was to dig in Captain Alexander's garden, which we would have
been obliged to perform with an armed guard standing over us.

Of course, we refused to go. As a punishment, we were ordered into the
yard, which was only a vacant corner of the building, enclosed by high
brick walls, on the top of which guards walked. It was a cold day in
February, and was raining. We were nearly naked, having only the
remnant of the rags that had already served for more than their time.
The bottoms were out of my shoes, and the water stood in the yard
several inches deep. The cold, wet wind, swept down with biting
sharpness, and almost robbed us of sensation. We paced the narrow
bounds, through the mud and water, until too weary to walk any more,
and then resigned ourselves to our misery!

Here we remained from early in the morning till in the evening. They
told us we would have to stay there till we agreed to work, or froze
to death! The first we resolved never to do. The latter was prevented
by relief from an unexpected source.

The old commissary, who had been so harsh to us when we first arrived,
now went to Captain Alexander, and remonstrated with him for his
cruelty.

Said he, "If you want to kill the men, and I know the rascals deserve
it, do it at once. Hanging is the best way. But don't keep them there
to die by i