transcribe these new horrors. Suffice it to say that the men whom I now
beheld had been freshly brought from the fight of New Market, and were
suffering the first agonies of their wounds. One hour before, they had
felt all the lustiness of life and adventure. Now, they were whining
like babes, and some had expired in the ambulances. The act of lifting
them to the ground so irritated their wounds that they howled dismally,
and yet were so exhausted that after lying upon the ground awhile, they
quietly passed into sleep. Such are the hardening results of war, that
some soldiers, who were unhurt, actually refused to give a trifle of
river water from their canteens to their expiring comrades. At one time
a brutal wrangle occurred at the well, and the guard was compelled to
seek reinforcement, or the thirsty people would have massacred them.

I was now momentarily adding to my notes of the battles, and the wounded
men very readily gave me their names; for they were anxious that the
account of their misfortunes should reach their families, and I think
also, that some martial vanity lingered, even among those who were
shortly to crumble away. A longboat came in from the Galena, after a
time, and General McClellan, who had ridden down to the pier, was taken
aboard. He looked to be very hot and anxious, and while he remained
aboard the vessel, his staff dispersed themselves around the banks and
talked over the issues of the contest. As the General receded from the
strand, every sweep of the long oars was responded to from the hoarse
cannon of the battle-field, and when he climbed upon deck, the steamer
moved slowly up the narrow channel, and the signal-man in the foretop
flourished his crossed flag sturdily. Directly, the _Galena_ opened fire
from her immense pieces of ordnance, and the roar was so great that the
explosions of field-guns were fairly drowned. She fired altogether by
the direction of the signals, as nothing could be seen of the
battle-field from her decks. I ascertained afterward that she played
havoc with our own columns as well as the enemy's, but she brought hope
to the one, and terror to the other. The very name of gunboat affrighted
the Confederates, and they were assured, in this case, that the
retreating invaders, had at length reached a haven. The _Galena_ kept up
a steady fire till nightfall, and the Federals, taking courage, drove
their adversaries toward Richmond, at eve. Meanwhile the Commanding
General