hings." The
Doctor was in a fix. Help his companions would not give. He could not
hold the boar by one hand alone. After being considerably bruised, he
was compelled to release his hold, to his intense disgust, which he
evinced as he raised himself up, puffing like a porpoise, by
gesticulating furiously, and muttering a jargon in which the only thing
intelligible was the oft-repeated word, "tam." A well-directed shot from
the Major, shortly afterwards, brought down a royal "Virginia mutton,"
as the camp phrase is. Another from the Lieutenant grazed the rear of a
fine young porker's ham; but considerable firing, a long chase, and many
ludicrous falls occurred, before that pig was tightly gripped between
the legs of the Lieutenant.

The expedition was so successful that the aid of some privates was
called in to help carry to quarters the rich spoils of the chase. As for
the Doctor,--after the refusal of assistance in his struggle, he walked
homeward in stately but offended dignity, and shocked the Chaplain, as
he was occasionally in the habit of doing, by still muttering "tam."

A person enjoying the comforts of home, testy as to the broiling of a
mutton-chop perhaps, for real, unalloyed enjoyment of appetite should
form one of a camp circle, toasting, at a blazing fire, as the shades
of evening gather round, steaks freshly cut with a camp-knife from flesh
that quivered with remaining life but a moment before, assisting its
digestion by fried hardees, and washing both down by coffee innocent of
cream. That is a feast, as every old campaigner will testify; but to be
properly appreciated a good appetite is all essential. To attain that,
should other resources fail, the writer can confidently recommend a
march, say of about fifteen miles, over rough or dusty roads.

And then, as the appetites of the men are sated by the hardy provender
of Uncle Sam, varied, as in this instance, by Virginia venison, and they
respectively fall back and take to

"Sublime Tobacco! glorious in a pipe;"

what more pleasant than the discussion of the doings of the day, or of
the times, the recital of oft-repeated and ever-gaining yarns, or the
heart-stirring strains of national ballads, while each countenance is
lit with the ever-varying glow of the fire.

Upon this evening not only Head-quarters but the Regiment was exultant
in the feast upon the fat of a rebellious land. To add to their comfort
several large stacks of hay and stra