56 Audubon's Western Journal 



The good men went at it with a will, the dandies 

 looked at their hands, touched a bacon barrel, 

 rubbed their palms together, looked again, and put 

 on gloves ; but it would not do, and out of our nine- 

 ty-eight men, only about eighty were at their work 

 with good will and cheerful hearts, but all was 

 soon done, and I gave a sort of melancholy glance 

 at the "Corvette" as she started off. The Captain 

 had been very kind to us and we gave him three 

 cheers, and turned to set up our tents for the first 

 time. We adhered closely to military style, and 

 our straight line of tents did not vary; dry sand or 

 wet mud had no effect on our position. In the 

 cool of the evening after I had done all I could for 

 the comfort of those around me, I stretched myself 

 out, with hat, coat and boots off, to look at the 

 busy scene around me. Gaily and cheerfully 

 everything went on, under a clear sky like that of 

 August at home, with all the soft, balmy, summer- 

 like feeling. About me were the familiar notes of 

 dozens of mocking-birds and thrushes. I opened 

 out the nucleus of my collections, a little package 

 of birdskins; a new thrush, a beautiful green jay, a 

 new cardinal, were side by side with two new 

 wood-peckers and a little dove, all new to our 

 fauna, and I carefully spread them out to dry, and 

 admired them. The sun went down, our supper 

 was ready, and never did a company enjoy their 

 meals more than we did for the first two days we 



