SOLDIER 45 



Sometimes he would write in ludicrous and pathetic strains 

 on the importance of the ministerial office, and then, as- 

 suming the position of a penitent sinner, would ask ad- 

 vice for the guidance of his conduct, as absurd as to ask 

 for a dispensation before drinking a glass of water from 

 the Mississippi River. From Barre's Landing he writes 

 to this friend: 



BELOVED D. D., How was my heart delighted yester- 

 day on receiving the "Atlantic " directed in thine own hand. 

 It smacked so strongly of a bookseller's shelves, that Daddy 

 Goodell, like some worn-out war horse at the sound of a 

 trumpet, pricked up his ears and for the space of an hour 

 sat sniffing the leaves without reading a single word. I am 

 promising myself all manner of feasts when I come to read 

 it, but just at present I am terribly busy, for in addition 

 to being the only officer in command of Co. A (both its of- 

 ficers being put hors de combat on the field of Irish Bend), 

 I am sitting on a court-martial, trying those thrice un- 

 happy cusses who have violated all law, civil, religious 

 and military. We are in a very interesting condition, for 

 our baggage-trains were seized at Franklin to carry ammu- 

 nition, and all our baggage left there; consequently, this 

 being the llth hour, in which my shirt is washed, your 

 uncle has to lie abed while it is drying. I have numbered 

 my shirt No. 6, but it is a pleasing delusion from which I 

 constantly awake to naked facts. Had a letter from Pater 

 Gridley 1 the other day. He is in for three years. Asked 

 all about you and what you were doing. I wrote him that 

 our D. D. was fighting the devil at Cambridge right man- 

 1 Henry Gridley, a classmate. 



