e replied.

For a moment his eyes flashed with anger; but, on second thought, the
joke struck him as being too good, and the pleasant smile so
characteristic of the Colonel wreathed his face in a moment.

"Well, Corporal," continued he, "I suppose that is some of the
'poured-out' in your canteen, eh?"

"Yes, sir," he replied, with the utmost _sang froid_, and, at the same
time, gracefully disengaging the strap from his neck, said, "Won't you
try some, Colonel?"

"I don't care if I do," said the Colonel; whereupon he imbibed,
saying, as he lowered the vessel, "Not a bad article--not a bad
article; but, Corporal, next time I send you to pour out whisky I will
tell you _where_ to pour it."

CHAPTER XXIV.

War and Romance -- Colonel Fred Jones -- Hanging in the Army
-- General A. J. Smith vs. Dirty Guns.

WAR AND ROMANCE.

During the late movement against Vicksburg the national transports
were fired upon by a rebel battery at Skipwith Landing, not many miles
from the mouth of the Yazoo. No sooner was the outrage reported at
head-quarters than the Admiral sent an expedition to remove the
battery and destroy the place. The work of destruction was effectually
done; not a structure which could shelter a rebel head was left
standing in the region for several miles around.

Among other habitations destroyed was that of a Mrs. Harris, a widow
lady, young, comely, and possessed of external attractions in the
shape of a hundred and fifty "negroes," which she had contrived to
save from the present operation of "the decree," by sending them up
the Yazoo River. But Mrs. Harris was a rebel--intense, red-hot in her
advocacy of Southern rights and her denunciation of Northern wrongs.
Although she had not taken up arms against the Government, she was
none the less subject to the indiscriminating swoop of the
Proclamation; her niggers, according to that document, were free, and
if the Confederacy failed, she could only get pay for them by
establishing her loyalty in a court of justice. Her loyalty to the
Yankee nation?--not she! She was spunky as a widow of thirty can be.
She would see Old Abe, and every other Yankee, in the happy land of
Canaan before she would acknowledge allegiance to the Washington
Government. Nevertheless, being all she possessed of this world's
valuables, she would like to save those niggers.

"Nothing easier," suggested Captain Edward W. Sutherland, of the
United States steam-ram Queen