h some
brother officers--and they took that direction for a rest after their
hot promenade.

Somewhat to the apparent mortification of Woodruff, when they reached
the tent none of the brother officers to whom he had promised to
introduce his friends, were to be found; but they had left their traces
behind them. Two or three empty bottles and as many uncleaned glasses
lay about the table, and the remains of spilt liquor wetted and stained
the boards of the seats, while a very dirty pack of cards, half on the
table and the remainder on the ground, showed that the officers were not
only a little unscrupulous as to the character of their Sunday
amusements, but equally indifferent as to the cleanliness of the tools
with which they performed the arduous labors of old-sledge, euchre and
division-loo. Woodruff cleared away the debris from the table, and flung
it into one corner with some petulance which did not escape the notice
of his visitors. Finally part of a box of bad cigars was introduced, and
among the fumes engendered by those indispensable "weeds," a little
conversation followed.

"Well, when do you get off?" asked Smith, who had been very anxious to
come on that Sunday, instead of waiting for the next, under the
impression that the regiment might move at any time and thus deprive
them of the visit. He had been led to suppose so, partially from
conversations with Woodruff in the city, and partially by the statements
in the newspapers, before alluded to, made with reference to this and
other "favorite regiments."

"Get off!" answered Woodruff, with no concealment of the vexation in his
tone. "Humph! well, I think we shall need to get on a little faster,
before we get off at all!"

"Not full yet, eh?" asked Brown.

"Not _exactly_," was the answer of the Lieutenant, with a satirical
emphasis on the second word which indicated that some other would have
been quite as well in place.

"Why, I thought you were!" said Smith. "The papers had you up to seven
hundred some time ago, and with all your big posters and advertisements
and the large bounties offered, you ought to be bringing them in very
rapidly."

"Yes, I suppose so!" answered Woodruff. "We _ought_ to do a good many
things in this world, that we do not find it convenient to do. We
_ought_ to have been full, and off to Washington, a month ago, and would
have been, if there had been any management."

"Why you speak as if you were discouraged and dissatisfied