ily engaged in cracking them that it reminded me of an old woman
knitting. At first the boys would go off in the woods and hide to louse
themselves, but that was unnecessary, the ground fairly crawled with
lice. Pharaoh's people, when they were resisting old Moses, never
enjoyed the curse of lice more than we did. The boys would frequently
have a louse race. There was one fellow who was winning all the money;
his lice would run quicker and crawl faster than anybody's lice. We
could not understand it. If some fellow happened to catch a fierce-
looking louse, he would call on Dornin for a race. Dornin would come and
always win the stake. The lice were placed in plates--this was the race
course--and the first that crawled off was the winner. At last we found
out D.'s trick; he always heated his plate.

Billy P. said he had no lice on him.

"Did you ever look?"

"No."

"How do you know then?"

"If ignorance is bliss 'tis folly to be wise," said Billy.

"Why, there is one crawling on your bosom now."

Billy took him and put him back in his bosom and said to the louse,
"You stay there now; this makes the fourth time I have put you back,
and if I catch you out again today I'll martyr you."

Billy was philosophic--the death of one louse did not stop the breed.

THE COURT MARTIAL AT TUPELO

At this place was held the grand court-martial. Almost every day we
would hear a discharge of musketry, and knew that some poor, trembling
wretch had bid farewell to mortal things here below. It seemed to be
but a question of time with all of us as to when we too would be shot.
We were afraid to chirp. So far now as patriotism was concerned, we had
forgotten all about that, and did not now so much love our country as we
feared Bragg. Men were being led to the death stake every day. I heard
of many being shot, but did not see but two men shot myself. I do not
know to what regiment they belonged, but I remember that they were mere
beardless boys. I did not learn for what crime or the magnitude of their
offenses. They might have deserved death for all I know.

I saw an old man, about sixty years old, whose name was Dave Brewer,
and another man, about forty-five, by the name of Rube Franklin, whipped.
There was many a man whipped and branded that I never saw or heard tell
of. But the reason I remembered these two was that they belonged to
Company A of the 23rd Tennessee Regiment, and I knew many men in the
regimen