y captive: but during many months of the year these huts
are wholly unoccupied, being erected, as their name denotes,
merely to shelter a few fishermen while the fishing season lasts.

Here at length we were ordered to halt; and perhaps I never
rejoiced more sincerely at any order than at this. Wearied with
my exertions, and oppressed with want of sleep, I threw myself on
the ground without so much as pulling off my muddy garments, and
in an instant all my cares and troubles were forgotten. Nor did
I wake from that deep slumber for many hours, when I rose cold
and stiff, and creeping beside a miserable fire of reeds,
addressed myself to the last morsel of salt pork which my wallet
contained.

HALT.

The whole army had now come up, the piquets having escaped
without notice, or at least without annoyance. Forming along the
brink of the lake, a line of outposts was planted, and the
soldiers were commanded to make themselves as comfortable as they
could. But, in truth, the word comfort is one which cannot in
any sense be applied to people in such a situation. Without
tents or huts of any description (for the few from which the
place is named were occupied by the General and other heads of
departments), our bed was the morass, and our sole covering the
clothes which had not quitted our backs for upwards of a month.
Our fires, upon the size and goodness of which much of a
soldier's happiness depends, were composed solely of reeds; a
species of fuel which, like straw, soon blazes up, and soon
expires again, almost without communicating any degree of warmth.
But, above all, our provisions were expended, and from what
quarter to obtain an immediate supply it defied the most
inventive genius to discover. Our sole dependence was upon the
boats. Of these a flotilla lay ready to receive us, in which
were embarked the black corps, with the 44th; but they had
brought with them only food for their own use. It was therefore
necessary that they should reach the fleet and return again
before they could furnish us with what we so much wanted. But
the distance to the nearest of the shipping could not be less
than eighty miles; and if the weather should become boisterous or
the winds obstinately adverse we might starve before any supply
could arrive.

These numerous grievances were, however, without remedy, and we
bore them with patience; though for two whole days the only
provisions issued to the troops were some crumbs of