Chapter 78 - Page 2

that he was seated upon a
large gunny-bag sack containing the cooked rations of the Rebel officers.

The intelligence that there was something there worth taking Andrews
communicated to me by an expressive signal, of which soldiers campaigning
together as long as he and I had, always have an extensive and well
understood code.

I took a seat in the hole we had made in the end of the car, in reach of
Andrews. Andrews called the attention of the negro to some feature of
the country near by, and asked him a question in regard to it. As he
looked in the direction indicated, Andrews slipped his hand into the
mouth of the bag, and pulled out a small sack of wheat biscuits, which he
passed to me and I concealed. The darky turned and told Andrews all
about the matter in regard to which the interrogation had been made.
Andrews became so much interested in what was being told him, that he sat
up closer and closer to the darky, who in turn moved farther away from
the sack.

Next we ran through a turpentine plantation, and as the darky was
pointing out where the still, the master's place, the "quarters," etc.,
were, Andrews managed to fish out of that bag and pass to me three
roasted chickens. Then a great swamp called for description, and before
we were through with it, I had about a peck of boiled sweet potatos.

Andrews emptied the bag as the darky was showing him a great peanut
plantation, taking from it a small frying-pan, a canteen of molasses,
and a half-gallon tin bucket, which had been used to make coffee in.
We divided up our wealth of eatables with the rest of the boys in the
car, not forgetting to keep enough to give ourselves a magnificent meal.

As we ran along we searched carefully for the place where we had seen the
line-of-battle, expecting that it would now be marked with signs of a
terrible conflict, but we could see nothing. We could not even fix the
locality where the line stood.

As it became apparent that we were going directly toward Wilmington,
as fast as our engines could pull us, the excitement rose. We had many
misgivings as to whether our folks still retained possession of
Wilmington, and whether, if they did, the Rebels could not stop at a
point outside of our lines, and transfer us to some other road.

For hours we had seen nobody in the country through which we were
passing. What few houses were visible were apparently deserted, and
there were no Towns or stations anywhere. We were very anxious to see
some one, in hopes of getting a hint of what the state of affairs was in
the direction we were going. At length we saw a young man--apparently a
scout--on horseback, but his clothes were equally divided between the
blue and the butternut, as to give