n the other the cup,
and filing past the cooks, who stand in line, one receives from each some
part of the ration. Then we retire to the most convenient spot to eat, if
we are hungry come for a second helping, and if we are lucky, get it.

Of the dish-washing, since I know your passion for cleanliness and
absolute sanitation, I spare you the details, except this significant
one. The cooks having retired for their own meal, I saw one fellow wash
his meat-can in the abandoned coffee barrel, mistaking its fine rich
contents for the dishwater.

You should have seen our field at the coming of the dusk: the dying
sunset, the silhouetting of the upper tents against the sky, the coming
out of the many fires, and in the light of their flames, reflected in the
drifting smoke, the lively picturesqueness of the camp. This is all
accentuated by the dark. Such coming and going, such talking and
greeting, such stumbling in the shadows and peering against the
fires--well, I never could have imagined it.

I must turn in, though with regret at not being able to buy myself a
knitted cap for the night, against this sharp cold. The felt hat will
suffer by such use, and besides will serve badly. Love from

DICK.

_Postscript._ A rumor is running through the camp (we are specially
warned not to believe rumors, but this one is borne out by the behavior
of the officers) that someone in the regiment has a clip of ball
cartridges, "swiped" from the range. The officers went down the line at
Retreat, and besides inspecting the guns, made every man turn out all the
pockets of his cartridge belt. Nothing found.

PRIVATE RICHARD GODWIN TO HIS MOTHER

West Beekmantown. Tues, Sept. 26.

(The first section of the letter is a mere scrawl.)

DEAR MOTHER:--

It is early dawn on Tuesday, and I have slept better, on "my pallet of
straw," than many a time in my bed at home. The cooks have for some time
been stirring, as I have known by the sound of their axes, the crackling
of their fires, the glow reflected on their tents, and their occasional
voices. In the cavalry camp the horses stamp, I hear a distant train and
a dog's bark, and nearer at hand, from among the pup-tents, come little
morning coughs. My writing is practically invisible to me on the paper. I
can just see that I trace a line.

There are thistles in this straw!

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