f this unwholesome stuff, and lose appetite for
more substantial food. Finding that all desire for hard bread and bacon
has disappeared, they conclude that they must be ill, and instead of
taking exercise, lie in their tents until they finally become really
sick. A contented, temperate, cheerful, cleanly man will live forever in
the army; but a despondent, intemperate, gluttonous, dirty soldier, let
him be never so fat and strong when he enters the service, is sure to
get on the sick list, and finally into the hospital.

The dance on the green is progressing with increased vigor. The music is
excellent. At this moment the gentlemen are going to the right; now
they promenade all; in a minute more the ladies will be in the center,
and four hands round. That broth of an Irish boy, Conway, wears a
rooster's feather in his cap, and has for a partner a soldier twice as
big as himself, whom he calls Susan. As they swing Conway yells at the
top of his voice: "Come round, old gal!"

28. General Mitchell returned from Nashville on a hand-car.

30. This is a pleasant Sunday. The sun shines, the birds sing, and the
air stirs pleasantly.

The colored people of Murfreesboro pour out in great numbers on Sunday
evenings to witness dress parade, some of them in excellent holiday
attire. The women sport flounces and the men canes. Many are nearly
white, and all slaves.

Murfreesboro is an aristocratic town. Many of the citizens have as fine
carriages as are to be seen in Cincinnati or Washington. On pleasant
week-day evenings they sometimes come out to witness the parades. The
ladies, so far as I can judge by a glimpse through a carriage window,
are richly and elegantly dressed.

The poor whites are as poor as rot, and the rich are very rich. There is
no substantial well-to-do middle class. The slaves are, in fact, the
middle class here. They are not considered so good, of course, as their
masters, but a great deal better than the white trash. One enthusiastic
colored man said in my hearing this evening: "You look like solgers. No
wonder dat you wip de white trash ob de Southern army. Dey ced dey
could wip two ob you, but I guess one ob you could wip two ob dem. You
is jest as big as dey is, and maybe a little bigger."

A few miles from here, at a cross roads, is a guide-board:
"[Illustration: Symbol: right index] 15 miles to Liberty." If liberty
were indeed but fifteen miles away, the stars to-night would see a
thousand negroes