forth oracularly
to the group crouching over the fire, "but when he does start, great
Scott, but he's a goer. I'll put every cent I may have for the next 10
years on him, even though he's handicapped by a Noah's deluge for 40
days and 40 nights. And when it comes to playin' big checkers, with
a whole State for a board, and brigades and divisions for men, he kin
skunk old Bragg every time, without half tryin'. He's busted his front
row all to pieces, and is now goin' for his king-row. We'll have Bragg
before Grant gits Pemberton, and then switch around, take Lee in the
rear, capture Richmond, end the war, and march up Pennsylvania Avenue
before Old Abe, with the scalps o' the whole Southern Confederacy
hangin' at our belts."

"Wish to Heaven," sighed Si, "Old Rosey'd thought to bring along a lot
of Ohio River coal scows and Wabash canal-boats to make our campaign
in. What fun it'd be jest to float down to Shelbyville and fight those
fellers with 100 rough-and-ready gunboats. Then, I'd like awfully to
know once more what it feels like to have dry feet. Seems to me my feet
are swelling out like the bottom of a swamp-oak."

"Hope not, Si," said Shorty. "If they git any bigger there won't be room
enough for anybody else on the same road, and you'll have to march in
the rear o' the regiment. Tires me nearly to death now to walk around
'em."

"There goes the bugle. Fall in, Co. Q," shouted the Orderly-Sergeant.

As the 200th Ind. had the advance, and could leave the bothersome
problems of getting the wagons across the creeks to the unlucky regiment
in the rear, the men stepped off blithely through the swishing showers,
eager to find the enemy and emulate the achievements on previous days by
their comrades on other parts of the line.

Being as wet as they could be, they did not waste any time about
crossing streams. The field officers spread out and rode squarely at the
most promising crossings in sight. The men watched their progress, and
took the best they found. If the water did not get above the middle
of the sides of the Colonel's medium-sized horse, they took off their
haversacks and unbuckled their cartridge-boxes, and plunged in after
him, the shorter men pairing off with the taller men, and clinging to
them.

So eager was their advance that by the time they halted at noon for
a rest and a cup of coffee, they were miles ahead of the rest of
the brigade, and beginning to look forward to catching glimpses of
Shel