CHAPTER XI.
Webster Fraternizes with the Rebel Officers.—A Secession Hat.—A Visit to a Rebel Camp.—"The Committee of Safety."—A Friendly Stranger.—A Warning.—The Escape.
Webster's new friends were men whom he believed he could use to good advantage, and he determined to improve the chance that had thrown him in contact with them. He found them not only very well informed, but disposed to be communicative, and he therefore applied the "pumping" process with all the skill at his command. He experienced no difficulty in making this mode of operation effectual, for these officers were exceedingly willing to air their knowledge for the benefit of their Baltimore friend, and enjoyed his frequent expressions of agreeable surprise at the extent of the preparations made by the people of the South to defend their rights.
Dr. Burton was the most conspicuous one of the group, from his very pompousness. He wore a superfluity of gorgeous gold lace on his uniform, and assumed the dignity of a major-general. He was a flabby-faced, bulbous-eyed individual, with a wonderful stomach for harboring liquor, and that unceasing flow of spirits arising from a magnified sense of his own importance. It was evident, even upon a short acquaintance, that the doctor found his chief entertainment in listening to himself talk, a species of recreation in which he indulged with great regularity, sharing the pleasure with as many others as would grant him a hearing.
In Webster he found an attentive auditor, which so flattered his vanity that he at once formed a strong attachment for my operative, and placed himself on familiar and confidential terms with him.
"Webster, we've got to do some hard fighting in these parts, and that before we are many days older," said the Doctor, with a wise shake of the head.
"I think you are right," conceded the scout. "We must fight it out. From what you have told me, however, I am sure the Lincoln troops will find you fully prepared to give them a warm reception here."
"That they will, sir; that they will!" was the emphatic rejoinder. "We have one full regiment and four or five companies besides, at Camp Rector, and General Pillow has thirty-seven hundred men at the camp in the rear of Fort Harris, which is a little above us on this side of the river. We expect to move with him, and if there is an attack made upon us every man in the town will instantly become a soldier."