exposure. For be it remembered that,
although we had had fresh meat rations served out to us only
forty-eight hours previously, sufficient to last us a couple of days if
not wasted, yet the unexpectedness and suddenness of our resumption of
the march had prevented us, in our inexperience, from availing
ourselves of the provision. Indeed it rarely happened that we carried
in our haversacks from bivouac to bivouac anything more than half a
dozen hard-tack, if so many, which we snatched up hastily as we fell
into line for the forward march. So that the only real refreshment we
found within our reach at the end of each day's march, when, weary,
hungry and sore we dropt down on the rough ground of bivouac, was night
itself and its sweet gift of sleep. Whatever may be the theories of
physiologists on the subject, we felt, as a matter of daily experience,
that a good, wholesome, appetizing meal half an hour or an hour after
coming to a halt would have enabled us to endure much harder marches
with much less fatigue than is here recorded.

All being ready, the boiling pots are slipped off the fire, and the
viands set on the ground in order before the master of ceremonies. A
shout goes forth, "Fall in for rations!" But the call is needless. For
the last half hour fifty pairs of eyes have been following every motion
of the cook and his volunteer aids, and tin plates and cups been giving
forth their dulcet strains. A long cue of black headless devils stands
merry before the flourishing disciple of Soyer. He dips into the
smoking pot of stew and raises a cupful, dripping and delicious; a
plate is ready to receive it. He dips again; another is ready. The
supernumeraries dispense the coffee, bread, apple-butter, and
sweetnin'. The black cue shortens one by one till the last hungry devil
is supplied, and all have assumed the squat posture, and the grove is
filled with black heaps again. But not now as before. Then all were
glum, silent, motionless--the rain pelting them remorselessly. Now
every one is alive with movement and talk. By and bye the weather
clears up a little. One after another, human forms reappear upon the
scene. The drummers sound their call;--it is the Assembly--the summons
to forward march. Tents are struck quickly; luggage rolled and
shouldered; arms taken; and away goes an army of brave youths, three
short hours ago utterly and miserably "played out", now ready to make a
long day's march, or to move upon the enemy,