nd on the plantations or in the
wooded swamps; and with branches of live oak and boughs of laurel
and the long gray Spanish moss, they constructed for their camps
a lavish ornamentation of arbors and arches, mimic forts and sham
monitors.

The terms of service of the older regiments enlisted in the early
days of 1861 being about to expire, the government now offered a
bounty and a furlough for thirty days to all veterans who should
again enlist for three years or during the war; and in carrying
out this plan Banks arranged to send home in each month, beginning
with February, at least two regiments of re-enlisted veterans from
each corps. Of the nineteen regiments and six batteries of the
Nineteenth Corps raised in 1861, every one promptly embraced these
terms. In some regiments nearly every man present re-enlisted.
The 7th Vermont enrolled every survivor, save 59, of the original
muster; in the 13th Connecticut out of 406 present 400 signed; the
26th Massachusetts returned 546. To make up, in part, for the
temporary loss to be accounted for from this cause, the government
sent down four fine regiments, well commanded, the 29th Maine, the
30th Maine, the 153d New York, and the 14th New Hampshire, and,
these being assigned to the Nineteenth Corps, the first three joined
the First division, but the 14th New Hampshire came too late for
the campaign, and was assigned to temporary duty near New Orleans.
About the same time Nields's 1st Delaware battery and Storer's 7th
Massachusetts battery joined the corps.

The idea of a foothold in Texas had been gradually swelling until
at length it had attained the dimensions of an overland army of
occupation. For this the nature of the region to be traversed, as
well as the character of the enemy to be met, demanded a large
mounted force. Therefore the government sent from Washington and
from other Northern stations the 2d New York veteran cavalry, the
11th New York, the 18th New York, the 2d Maine, the 3d Rhode Island,
the 12th Illinois, and the 3d Maryland, and from the West many
horses. Banks also mounted seven more regiments of infantry, and
having thus raised Lee's cavalry division, when all had joined, to
nineteen regiments, they were finally organized in five brigades,
with three batteries of horse artillery, namely, Duryea's, Rawles's,
and Nims's. These three batteries were lost to the Nineteenth
Corps, and with them four of the mounted infantry regiments, the
2d Loui