lo8 HORSE, FOOT, AND DRAGOONS. 



eon and the rattle of a pair of " bones," accompanying some 

 amateur minstrel in the rendering of a comic song, while 

 under another canvas a pair of "boys in blue" are engaged' 

 in an animated discussion, which threatens to wax warm, until 

 the warning growl of some passing non-commissioned officer 

 puts an abrupt end to the conversation. 



Gradually our party around the fire is increased by the 

 arrival of other ofTficers from their cjuarters down the line, 

 until a large and merry circle surrounds the cheerful blaze. 

 The conversation becomes general, and the great flames, 

 lighting up the animated countenances of the speakers, and 

 reflected a hundred times in the bright buttons of their uni- 

 forms, cast great shadows back from the dark figures up to 

 the walls of the tents in our rear, that are glowing in the 

 warm light, the more intensely so from the blackness of the 

 gloom behind them. And strong and manly faces they are 

 that gleam in the fire-light — from our chief, seated in his 

 camp-chair, wrapped in his cape, and the snows of forty years 

 of active service in field and garrison crowning his head ; 

 from the merry-hearted junior major, with his twinkling eyes 

 and laughter-provoking jokes and yarns ; the stalwart adjutant, 

 stretching his great frame on the grass, puffing at his cigar 

 and chuckling at the sallies of his senior, down to the young 

 subaltern fresh from the discipline of West Point, and on his 

 first service in the field. The good-humored, w^eather-beaten 

 face of the trusty scout and guide beams out from under the 

 great flapping brim of his felt hat as he tells with modest 

 and homely eloquence of many a brave deed and stirring 

 adventure in the Virginia mountains and on the Western 

 frontier under his gallant leader Sheridan ; and the grim, 

 cjuiet humor of the senior major, our second in command — a 

 brave and unassuming soldier, whose bloody encounters with 



