Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 28.djvu/51

 The Jjiist Days of Lee ntx! ///.- /'nf'nlins. 45

the morning and nothing since. Having light stomachs and great I'.itigue, we slept well and did not awake until sunrise of the day following. The next morning nine, ten, eleven o'clock came, and no rations. Our friend Simpson came to us and divided some com- pressed vegetable cake with us, showed us how to make a sort of soup or medley with it, gave us a piece of corn-bread, and giving him grateful thanks, we made a light breakfeast.

About sunset, a beef or two were driven up and shot on the out- skirts of the camp, and skinned and flayed on the ground. So much of the quivering flesh was dispensed to each mess, one member of the mess going under guard to get it. We received ours, broiled a portion of it on sticks, without salt, ate it for supper, and put the other away for breakfast. Having no closets or other conveniences for stowing away supplies, we put our rations in our caps, and so slept with them. It was voted, after conference with our neighbors,

as the only safe place we had. Poor Captain G had cap and

rations both stolen in the night, and the last I saw of him he was marching to prison bare-headed.

The next morning a Yankee, who had been busy about our mess the day before and asking a good many questions and talking gen- erally in a manner which led us to treat him as a nuisance, came up to me and said he had an invitation for me to take breakfast with Dr. Richardson, of New York State, and showed a permit for me to pass the lines, on my honor to return. How my friend ever knew who I was, or to what circumstance I was indebted for this mark of distinction, I could never tind out. I found Dr. Richardson, with some half dozen officers surgeons, quartermasters, &c. , some few hundred yards from the prisoners' camp, about to sit down to a very comfortable breakfast of broiled pig, bread and coffee, spread on an extemporized table under the trees. They received me very kindly, and one of the officers remarked, " Help yourself, Doctor, your people furnished the menu " (with a smile as if to intimate that the provender before us was impressed); "we have no rations; your Fitz Lee burned all of our wagon trains Sunday, and I don't know when you will get anything more." We made a square meal, and having talked very pleasantly for a few minutes, both sides avoiding topics that might excite disagreeable discussion, I thanked my stranger friend and returned to camp.

It is needless to say that I was the lion, and the envy of all imme- diately about me. But I was invited out no more. We had a little fresh beef issued to us every day, nothing more. We did not know