At ten o'clock we passed within two hundred yards of a Rebel camp. We could hear the neigh of the horses and the tramp of four or five sentinels on their rounds. We trod very softly; to our stimulated senses every sound was magnified, and every cracking twig startled us.
Leaving us in the road a few yards behind, our pilot entered the house of his friend, a young deserter from the Rebel army. Finding no one there but the family, he called us in, to rest by the log fire, while the deserter rose from bed, and donned his clothing to lead us three miles and point out a secluded path. For many months he had been "lying out;" but of late, as the Guards were less vigilant than usual, he sometimes ventured to sleep at home. His girlish wife wished him to accompany us through; but, with the infant sleeping in the cradle, which was hewn out of a great log, she formed a tie too strong for him to break. At parting, she shook each of us by the hand, saying:
"I hope you will get safely home; but there is great danger, and you must be powerful cautious."
At eleven o'clock our guide left us in the hands of a negro, who, after our chilled limbs were warmed, led us on our way. By two in the morning we had accomplished thirteen miles over the frozen hills, and reached a lonely house in a deep valley, beside a tumbling, flashing torrent.
Secreted among the Husks.
The farmer, roused with difficulty from his heavy slumbers, informed us that Boothby's party, which had arrived twenty-four hours in advance of us, was sleeping in his barn. He sent us half a mile to the house of a neighbor, who fanned the dying embers on his great hearth, regaled us with the usual food, and then took us to a barn in the forest.
"Climb up on that scaffolding," said he. "Among the husks you will find two or three quilts. They belong to my son, who is lying out. To-night he is sleeping with some friends in the woods."
The cold wind blew searchingly through the open barn, but before daylight we were wrapped in "the mantle that covers all human thoughts."
XII. Thursday, December 29.