intervals of carving below (the hospital operating room was immediately beneath us), sends up word that, if we will write out our parole of the yard, he will sign it. And old —— not being on hand to botch the thing, I cooked up a document, got it signed and sent down, to which the illustrious chief then affixed his sign-manual, and we are henceforward free of yard and grounds. Bully for that! [I remember now, I was the first to test the document’s efficacy, for we could hardly believe that it would really pass us out. The guard stopped me, of course, called the corporal, and finally decided that it was a genuine thing; and I hobbled painfully down four steep flights and out,—looked up and saw the rest all crowding to the window and waving hands and hats to see me actually emerge, like a rat, from the trap which had held us through long weary months.] I find that the art of crutch progression is quite a science, and has its outside edges and its backward rolls, etc., which are not to be learned without much practice and balancing. Up and down stairs with ease, confidence, and grace, is somewhat of an attainment.

Thursday, 9th.—Struggled out to pond and washed; first decent wash for three months. Had to steal a piece of black soap, and push out a board over the mud,—hard work for a cripple. Stopped in at carpenter’s shop and saw Dr. Hay slice an arm off, secundum artem.

October 13.—Suffering with the first cold snap. The sergeant’s wound keeps every window open, and we might as well or better be sub Jove frigido. Rumors of small-pox pervade the air.

Tuesday, 14th.—An alarm of small-pox yesterday afternoon in our ward turned out false, I believe, but has scared everybody most out of their wits. It seems, however, there were cases elsewhere; for, endeavoring to visit the pond again, I was stopped by a guard, and told that some tents just pitched by the shore contained the small-pox patients, whom no one was allowed to approach within one hundred yards. After they had recovered or died, the tents were set on fire as they stood.

Wednesday, 15th.—To-day, I followed Dr. Hay’s trail all day, bent on a personal interview, until I earthed him at last in his office; and the result is that we are off for Richmond to-morrow. [I had seen the Richmond paper with the official list of Yankees paroled from the Libby, among whom were several whom I knew to be Pope’s officers; and I determined not to rot another day, as food for Confederate vermin, without claiming my rights as prisoner of war. So when, after repeated rebuffs, my obstinacy prevailed and Hay gave orders to let me in, he wasn’t in a good humor. But I told him, I forget in what terms, that I had discovered that I was no longer a hostage liable to be hanged in retaliation for the execution of guerrillas, but a prisoner of war, with all that that implied, and that, in behalf of all who were able to travel, I demanded to be sent to the Libby. He said we were better off where we were. I agreed, but told him I would suffer anything to know that my name was on the list to be paroled when my turn came, and that it was my right to have it there. Finally he said, “Will you be ready to start before light to-morrow?” “Let me go back for my blanket,” said I, “and I’ll start now.” “Well,” said he, “go back, and tell all who the ward surgeon says are able, to be ready by half-past four.” I saluted, faced about, and was in the doorway when he stopped me and, seeming to recover his temper, asked me and any of my friends who could to come over to his office after supper and take a farewell drink.] In the evening [the journal resumes], we attended in Dr. Hay’s office, to take a social drink. Hay talked fire and fury, “secesh” running up as the whiskey ran down. A lawyer and colonel joined in, and the telegram of the Governor of North Carolina to the Governor of South Carolina was so often quoted that I was fain to back down from what was fast becoming a three-minute crowd. We had an amputation to diversify the spree,—soldier brought in, who I suspect had applied for a discharge by shooting off two fingers of his right hand. They were badly mangled, so Hay put him down on the floor and took them off again, short metre, not without cutting his own in the operation, he was so tight. I came away then, fearing that my crutches might not be as whiskey-proof as erst was wooden leg of Sawin, and the descent of the front steps requiring that eye, hand, and foot (literally, foot) should keep true time. There wasn’t much sleep in No. 7 that night, and early next morning we were off, leaving George and the skeleton sergeant, who is fast going down to the dead, though he doesn’t know it. We had an awful trip, being detained six hours by a smash-up of the night before, killing seven and wounding seventy-five,—a mere skirmish. Shortly before we arrived, at about 1 A.M., an officer came through the car, caught sight of my shoulder-straps, stopped: “You are a captain?” “Yes.” “Have you got any federal greenbacks?” “Yes, a few.” “Well, I want some to pay a debt I owe at the North, and I’ll give you Confederate money for them. You’ll want some, for you’ll probably lie for months in the Libby, and you’ll die if you don’t send out and buy good food.” Said I, “Thank you, I guess I’ll hold on to my greenbacks till I get there.”

The fact that nearly all the hospital officials had made the same request on various pretexts was significant enough to me. At 2 A.M., we arrived, where I now write, in the Libby prison, being received with the once familiar cry of “Corporal of the Guard, Post No. 1.” The corporal came and let us in. The officer, cross and sleepy (the infernal traitor, Peacock, by the way), sent us to the hospital department, up three flights,—immense room in large tobacco warehouse, lighted with a single dip, which only made darkness visible. A ragged young nurse, with his hair on end, welcomed us to the scene of despair. We were put on cots of sacking, with nothing under or over us, and shivered ourselves into oblivion. The next morning, the familiar notes of reveille on the fife, accompanied by the bass and snare-drum of the side-show, which Andrews used to detest so, brought us again to consciousness. I was about to put my head out of the window, but was forcibly informed that I’d better not, unless I wanted it shot off. This day, a party went off which we had hoped to join, but were disappointed; and a squad of sixty odd came in from Macon, Georgia. I thought that I had seen filth, squalor, and wretchedness before, but I never even conceived the meaning of the words; and what these men had been through would have been incredible, except to those who saw them. They said the Libby was heaven, in comparison to what they had come from. Saw a dress-parade of the regiment on duty here, which would have shamed the cadets for measliness of turnout.

Saturday.—In hell, alias the Libby prison.

Sunday.—This morning before breakfast, little spitfire clerk came up to take our paroles. I could have embraced the little devil, but I didn’t, only waited till my name was called, when I toed the mark instanter, and quite won his heart with the promptitude with which I recited my descriptive list, insomuch that he asked me to take a letter to his sweetheart. After this, the wretched crew were packed into coaches and wagons, under command of the black-hearted traitor Captain Peacock, and we left Libby, the sergeant and I being in with two half-dead wretches of the Macon crowd, swarming with vermin.

But after a miserable jolt of fifteen miles, our nigger driver pointed out the boat lying in a distant bend. “And dar de flag,” said he with a grin, “ober de