And then we had (apparently) a very jolly evening, in the dark.

As this military prison has not a very good name among prisoners, and some who have been confined there have had to wait a day or two for rations, and then a day or two more to get them cooked, I feel bound to say that the guard brought us a very good breakfast the next morning, which I took to be a part of their own. They brought us also word that we should be sent by the morning cars to Camp Groce.

With alacrity we shouldered our knapsacks, and lugged our remaining “traps” to the cars; and with a sense akin to freedom, we hurried away from those picturesque bars and that detestable lock. There was a little detention at the depot, and then we were placed in a “first-class passenger car” with first-class passengers, and rolled along toward the prisoners’ camp. The conductor soon came upon his rounds, and as he passed me, asked in a whisper, if there were any Massachusetts officers among the prisoners. He was a tall, fine-looking man, with the tightness and trimness of dress that no one ever finds in a Southerner. I asked who he was, and learnt that he was Lieutenant-Governor B——, of Massachusetts. The fact was even so—an ex-Lieutenant-Governor of Massachusetts was a conductor on the South Western Railroad of Texas!

“Here is your stopping-place, gentlemen,” said the sergeant of our guard. We looked from the car windows, and saw long barracks of rough boards, like an enclosed cow-shed. In front was a pretty grove, and in the rear a sloping hill. At the doors of the barracks we saw clusters of blue-jackets, and a few sauntered around the buildings. We toiled up a sandy bank; the roll was called, and we were “turned over” to the commanding officer. Captain Buster greeted us kindly, and said he was sorry to see us; he had been a prisoner twenty-two months in the dungeons of Mexico, and knew what it was. He marshalled us down to the barracks, and formally presented us to Captain Dillingham, the senior officer of the naval prisoners. We entered the barracks. They were like most such buildings, long and narrow, with bunks around the sides, and tables for the well and cots for the sick. The officers occupied the first compartment. They crowded around us, with eager questions, and showed us kindness and hospitality beyond our expectations. We selected such bunks as were still empty, unpacked our knapsacks, and made our arrangements for the night, and the many nights that were to follow. We studied the faces of our new companions, and found that they were for the most part sick and sad. We talked to them, and found that they were unhappy and dejected. Half a year’s imprisonment had manifestly changed them from energetic, active men, to listless, idle, irritable invalids. We asked ourselves whether it could have a like effect on us, and answered that it could not.

VI.
CAMP GROCE.

It is not a pleasant thing to be a prisoner; I never enjoyed it, and never made the acquaintance of any prisoner who said that he did. True is it that you have but few cares and responsibilities. In the prisoners’ camp you take no heed of what you shall eat, or what you shall drink, or wherewith you shall be clothed. If the rations come, you can eat them; and if they do not, you can go without; in neither case have your efforts any thing to do with the matter. Your raiment need not trouble you; for there vanity has no place, and rags are quite as honorable as any other style of dress. You are never dunned by importunate creditors, and if, by possibility, you were, it would be a sufficient bar in law and equity to say that you would not pay. There you are not harassed by pressing engagements, or worried by clients or customers. There you have no fear of failure, and may laugh at bankruptcy. And yet, with all these advantages, no man ever seeks to stay in this unresponsible paradise.

“The dews of blessing heaviest fall

Where care falls too.”

I found that there was a horrible sense of being a prisoner—of being in somebody’s possession—of eating, drinking, sleeping, moving, living, by somebody’s permission; and worst of all, that somebody the very enemy you had been striving to overcome. There was a feeling of dependence on those who were the very last persons on whom you were willing to be dependent. There was a dreary sense of constraint in your freest hours, of being shut in from all the world, and having all the world shut out from you.

In the first days of imprisonment the novelty carried the new prisoners along, and buoyed them up. Then came a season of work, when they built cabins and made stools and tables; and then, a restless fit, when they felt most keenly the irksomeness of the life, and made foolish plans to escape, which (so the “old prisoners” said) had been tried before and failed. Then the “new prisoners” would grow quiet and sad. The most of them would become idle, inert, neglectful of their dress and quarters, peevish and listless, despondent of exchange, yet indifferent to all present improvement. A few (about one in ten) would struggle to make matters better; they would take hopeful views of affairs and perform active work on things around them.