my stomach rebelled and I grabbed one side of the hard-tack
while the horse held the other side in his teeth. Something had to give,
and as the horse's teeth nor my hands would give, the hard-tack had to,
and I saved half of it, and placed it in the inside pocket of my vest,
as choice as though it were a thousand dollar bill.

I have listened to music, in my time, that has been pretty bad, and
which has sent cold chills up my back, and caused me pain, but I never
heard any bad music that seemed to grate on my nerves as did the noise
my horse made in chewing the half of my last hard-tack, and the look of
triumph the animal gave me was adding insult to injury. Several times
during the day I took that piece of hard-tack from my pocket carefully,
wiped it on my coat-sleeve, and took a small bite, and the horse would
look around at me wickedly, as though he would like to divide it with
me again. People talk about guarding riches carefully, and of placing
diamonds in a safe place, but no riches were ever guarded as securely as
was that piece of hard-tack, and riches never took to themselves wings
and new, regretted more than did my last hard-tack. Each bite made it
smaller, and finally, the last bite was taken, with a sigh, and nothing
remained for me to eat but the halter. Some of the boys went out
foraging, and were moderately successful, while others did not get a
thing to eat. The country was pine woods, with few settlers, and those
that lived there were so poor that it seemed murder to take what they
had. One of the men of our company came back with about two quarts of
corn meal, that night, and I traded him a silver watch for about a pint
of it. I mixed it up in some water, and after the most of the men had
fallen asleep, I made two pancakes of the wet meal, and put them in the
ashes of the camp-fire to bake, but fell asleep before it was done, and
when I woke up and reached into the ashes for the first pancake, it was
gone. Some Union soldier, whom it were base flattery to call a thief,
had watched me, and stole my riches as I slept, robbed me of all I
held dear in life. With trembling hands I raked the ashes for my other
pancake, hopelessly, because I thought that, too, was gone, but to my
surprise I found it. The villain who had pursued me as I slept, had
failed to discover the second pancake, and I was safe, and my life was
saved. I have seen a play in a theater in which a miser hides his gold,
first in one place, th