ived.

Out into the cornfield filed the column, up the river, and nearly
parallel to it, halting a little below the upper one of the two
principal landings. Here there was a further delaying for ferriage.

'Stack arms; every man fill his canteen, then come right back to the
ranks!'

Not to the Tennessee for water--there was no time to go so far--but
close at hand, at a pond, or little bayou of the river; and, returning
to the line of stacks, a few more long, unquiet minutes in waiting,
speculation, and eager gazing toward the battle. And then we saw what
was that dark, turbulent multitude over the river: oh, shame! a confused
rabble, composed chiefly of men whose places were rightly on the field,
but who had turned and fled away from the fight to seek safety under the
coverture of that bluff.

Forward again, and the regiment moved, with frequent little aggravating
halts, up to the point on the river where the Thirty-sixth Indiana had
already embarked, and were now being ferried over. The Twenty-fourth
Ohio crossed at the lower landing. There were a number of country folk
here, clad in the coarse, rusty homespun common in the South, whose
intense anxiety to see every movement visible on the farther side of the
river kept them unquietly shifting their positions continually. One of
these worthies was hailed from our company:

'Say, old fellow! how's the fight going on over there?'

He was an old and somewhat diminutive specimen, grizzle haired, and
stoop shouldered, but yellow and withered from the effects of sun and
tobacco rather than the burden of years. For a moment he hesitated, as
though guarding his reply, and then, with a sidelong glance of the eyes,
answered slowly:

'Well, it aren't hardly decided yet, I reckon; but they're a drivin'
your folks--some.'

Evidently he believed that our army had been badly beaten. The emphatic
rejoinder, 'D--d old secesh!' was the sole thanks his information
brought him: the characterization, aside from the accented epithet, was
doubtless a just one, but for all that his words were in no wise
encouraging.

A minute later we passed a sergeant, whose uniform and bright-red
chevrons showed that he was attached to some volunteer battery. He was
mounted upon a large, powerful horse, and seemed a man of considerable
ability.

'Do the rebels fight well over there?' demanded a voice from the column
a half dozen files ahead of me.

'Guess they do! Anyway, _fit_ well enough to