August 26, 1863.
Wednesday. Ration day again. As we drew five days' rations again it looks as if we might stay some time yet. Mail came late last night. No letters, but an old New York paper. No news good or bad. Everything seems to have come to a stop. A darkey, named Jack, who has been furnishing the cooks with wood, came in to-day with a log on his back bigger than himself. When he threw it down a cottonmouth moccasin crawled out of a hole in it. It made Jack almost turn white, he was so scared. The log was full of holes as if mice had eaten their way through it in every direction, and was most as light as cork. It is strange how the negroes fear a cottonmouth, and yet they go everywhere barefoot, and never seem to think of a snake until they see one. This is the first one I have seen since we left Port Hudson. I thought we had got out of the snake country.