o had been
killed, and the hundreds of confederates they had all shot or killed
with sabres, until my hair just stood right up. It seems that twelve or
fifteen men, more or less, had been shot off the horse I was riding, and
one fellow who rode next to me said no man who ever rode that old yellow
horse had escaped alive. This was cheering to me, and I would have given
my three hundred dollars bounty, and all I could borrow, if I could get
out of the army. However, I found out afterwards that the soldier lied.
In fact they all lied, and they lied for my benefit. We struck into the
woods, and traveled until after dark, with no road, and the march was
enlivened by remarks of the soldiers near me to the effect that we would
probably never get out of the woods alive. They said we were trying to
surround an army of rebels, and cut them off from the main army, and the
chances were that when tomorrow's sun rose it would rise on the ghostly
corpses of the whole regiment, with jackals and buzzards eating us.
One of the soldiers took something from his pocket, about the size of
a testament, pressed it to his heart, and then kissed it, and I felt as
though I was about to faint, but by the light of a match which another
soldier had scratched on his pants to light his pipe, I saw that what I
supposed to be a testament, was a box of sardines the soldier had bought
of the sutler. I was just about to die of hunger, exhaustion, and fright
at the fearful stories the veterans had been telling, when there was
a shout at the head of the regiment, which was taken up all along the
line, my horse run under the limb of a tree and raked me out of the
saddle, and I hung to the limb, my legs hanging down, and

CHAPTER II.

I Am Rudely Awakened from Dreams of Home--I Go on Picket--
The Foe Advances--A Desperate Conflict--The Union--
Confederate Breakfast on the Alabama Race-Track--A Friendly
Partin

The careful readers of this history have no doubt been worried about the
manner in which the first chapter closed, leaving me hanging to a limb
of a tree, like Absalom weeping for her children, my horse having gone
out from under me. But I have not been hanging there all this time. The
soldiers took me down, and caught my horse, and the regiment dismounted
and a council of war was held. I suppose it was a council of war, as I
noticed the officers were all in a group under a tree, with a candle,
examining a map, and drinking o