Curious Blunder of the Telegraph.
In January, among the lookers-on in Virginia, was the Hon. Henry J. Raymond, of The Times. He had a brother in the service, and one day he received this telegram:—
"Your brother's corpse is at Belle Plain."
Hastening to the army as fast as steam could carry him, to perform the last sad offices of affection, he found his relative not only living, but in vigorous health. Through the eccentricities of the telegraph, the word corps had been changed into corpse.
On the 22d of January, Burnside attempted another advance, designing to cross the Rappahannock in three columns. The weather for a long time had been fine, but, a few hours after the army started, the heavens opened, and converted the Virginia roads into almost fathomless mire. Advance seemed out of the question, and in two days the troops came back to camp. The Rebels understood the cause, and prepared an enormous sign, which they erected on their side of the river, in full view of our pickets, bearing the inscription, "Stuck in the mud!"
The Batteries at Fredericksburg.
Army of Potomac, near Falmouth, Va., Monday, Nov. 24.
Still on the north bank of the Rappahannock! Upon the high bluffs, along a line of three miles, twenty-four of our guns point threateningly toward the enemy. In the ravines behind them a hundred more wait, ready to be wheeled up and placed in position.
Upon the hills south of the river, distant from them a thousand to five thousand yards, Rebel guns confront them. Some peer blackly through hastily-built earthworks; some are just visible over the crests of sharp ridges; some almost hidden by great piles of brush. Already we count eighteen; the cannonading will unmask many more.
"Ah, what a sound will rise, how wild and dreary, When the Death-angel touches these swift keys! What loud lament and dismal miserere Will mingle with their awful symphonies!"