orders, we were on the move. We left Baton Rouge at five o'clock
and reached this place at nine, (as luck would have it) in a
rain-storm. Lay on the ground under the trees all night.

March 28th. We just received marching orders again. Where we were going
to nobody seemed to know. I supposed our destination was Brashear City
and Burwick Bay, but beyond that nothing was known. Rumor said, Texas
and Red River. We took tents and all our baggage and did not expect
again to see Baton Rouge.

Sunday morning, March 29th. Arrived in Donaldsonville about nine
o'clock last evening. Slept on the ground all night. In the morning had
some hard-tack and coffee. We received a mail. I got several letters,
one was from mother. I went to a Catholic meeting. Donaldsonville is an
exceedingly pretty place, very old-fashioned, shingled-roofed town. A
bayou extends through the center, some three hundred yards wide; it
runs to the gulf and is so deep that a frigate lies in it about a mile
from where it sets in from the Mississippi. The catalpa and China-bell
trees were in full blossom and the pecans were leafing out. There was a
Catholic church here that looked like a barn outside but quite pretty
inside, as I saw for myself, and thither the people who were mostly
French and Spanish, were flocking. We here enjoyed the luxury of seeing
ladies, in clean white petticoats, walking the streets. And really we
had to laugh, for actually those petticoats were the most home-like
things we had seen for some months. "Billy" Wilson's Zouaves, who were
in our division, were placed under arrest and had their arms taken from
them. They got very drunk coming down on the boat and mutinied.

March 30th. You can't imagine how beautiful the flowers were looking.
Cherokee roses, jessamines, jonquils, and a great variety of flowers
were in blossom. We lived out under the trees with the rain pattering
upon us. We were greatly bothered with vermin, which it is almost
impossible to pick off. Campaigning evidently agreed with me, for I had
gained several pounds since leaving New York.

April 1st. We were on the march very early. Our brigade went ahead as
skirmishers. We went through a very pleasant country. We started about
seven o'clock on the morning of April 2nd. Our company was guard of the
baggage train. We went through a place called Thibodeaux, a very pretty
village. We stopped "a right smart way," from Thibodeaux, as the
contrabands used to tell us when we