ny of
recognition, which seemed also a plaintive appeal for an explanation of
the changed condition of affairs.

The Sergeant was a pleasant, gentlemanly boy of about my own age.
He rode up to me and inquired if it was my horse, to which I replied in
the affirmative, and asked permission to take from the saddle pockets
some letters, pictures and other trinkets. He granted this, and we
became friends from thence on until we separated. He rode by my side as
we plodded over the steep, slippery hills, and we beguiled the way by
chatting of the thousand things that soldiers find to talk about, and
exchanged reminiscences of the service on both sides. But the subject he
was fondest of was that which I relished least: my--now his--horse. Into
the open ulcer of my heart he poured the acid of all manner of questions
concerning my lost steed's qualities and capabilities: would he swim?
how was he in fording? did he jump well! how did he stand fire?
I smothered my irritation, and answered as pleasantly as I could.

In the afternoon of the third day after the capture, we came up to where
a party of rustic belles were collected at "quilting." The "Yankees"
were instantly objects of greater interest than the parade of a menagerie
would have been. The Sergeant told the girls we were going to camp for
the night a mile or so ahead, and if they would be at a certain house,
he would have a Yankee for them for close inspection. After halting,
the Sergeant obtained leave to take me out with a guard, and I was
presently ushered into a room in which the damsels were massed in force,
--a carnation-checked, staring, open-mouthed, linsey-clad crowd, as
ignorant of corsets and gloves as of Hebrew, and with a propensity to
giggle that was chronic and irrepressible. When we entered the room
there was a general giggle, and then a shower of comments upon my
appearance,--each sentence punctuated with the chorus of feminine
cachination. A remark was made about my hair and eyes, and their
risibles gave way; judgment was passed on my nose, and then came a ripple
of laughter. I got very red in the face, and uncomfortable generally.
Attention was called to the size of my feet and hands, and the usual
chorus followed. Those useful members of my body seemed to swell up as
they do to a young man at his first party.

Then I saw that in the minds of these bucolic maidens I was scarcely,
if at all, human; they did not understand that I belonged to