omfort to you every minute of your life?"

"You certainly are, Shorty," said Si, as he fell asleep.

CHAPTER VIII. A GLOOMY NEW YEAR'S DAY

THE TWO ARMIES LIE FROWNING AT EACH OTHER.

SI WAS awakened the next morning by the rain dashing down squarely on
his upturned face. He was lying on the flat of his back, sleeping the
sleep of the utterly outworn, and he got the full force of the shower.

"Plague take it, Shorty," said he, kicking his snoring partner, "you're
at your old tricks again scrougin' me out o' the tent while I'm asleep.
Why can't you lay still, like a white man?"

"It's you, dod rot you," grumbled Shorty, half-awakening. "You're at
your old tricks o' kickin' the tent down. You need a 10-acre lot to
sleep in, and then you'd damage the fence-corners."

They were both awake by this time, and looked around in amazement.

"We went to sleep nice and comfortable, under a wagon last night," said
Shorty, slowly recalling the circumstances. "The two Lieutenants and the
Orderly had the upper berth, and we slept on the ground-floor."

"Yes," assented Si; "and someone's come along, hitched mules to our
bedroom and snaked it off."

"Just the way in the condemned army," grumbled Shorty, his ill-humor
asserting itself as he sat up and looked out over the rain-soaked
fields. "Never kin git hold of a good thing but somebody yanks it{94}
away. S'pose they thought that it was too good for a private soldier,
and they took it away for some Major-General to sleep under."

[Illustration: A DISAGREEABLE AWAKENING FOR SHORTY AND SI. 94]

"Well, I wonder what we're goin' to do for grub?" said Si, as his
athletic appetite began to assert itself.

"Our own wagons, that we had such a time guarding, are over there in the
cedars, and the rebels are filling themselves up with the stuff that we
were so good to bring up for them."

"It makes me jest sizzle," said Shorty, "to think of all we went through
to git them condemned wagons up where they'd be handiest for them."

Si walked down the line toward where the Regimental Headquarters were
established under a persimmon tree, and presently came back, saying:

"They say there's mighty small chance of gettin' any grub to-day.
Wheeler burnt three or four miles of our wagons yesterday, and's got
possession of the road to Nashville. We've got to fight the battle
out on empty stomachs, and drive these whelps away before we kin get a
square meal."

Jan. 1, 1863, was an exceed