Thus the time passes till I post the next man on guard, and thus the night wears away, till at 4 A.M. I rouse the last one. Soon after I hear sounds about the house, for the contrabands rise early, then come signs of breakfast, then the grey light of morning, and with it the voice of our old host and a warning that his wife is up and breakfast almost ready. It is a right good breakfast, and we start as soon as it is done, repass the factory, travel over a couple of miles of muddy road, and come in sight of Paris.
There are brick houses in view, four church spires, large trees and a court house; but we discover no Confederate flag. In another moment we have entered, and are going up the main street. The first man stops and looks at us, so does the second and the third. The moment a man catches a glimpse of us he seems to freeze fast to the sidewalk and lose all power over himself, save that of staring vacantly at the Yankee cavalry. We seem to be riding up an avenue of these staring, frozen images. The red brick court house has a little square around it and forms a natural halting place. I ride up and ask one of the frozen if there is any Confederate officer in town. He says "No," in a frightened way; "they all retired this morning, a couple of hours ago." This relieves me of my flag of truce. We find that two of our wounded men have been removed to Memphis, and the third is too low to bear moving. The doctor, and the physician who has been attending him, start off to see him, and I draw my men up to the fence and let them dismount. My North Moore street education has made me much more particular in "deportment" than volunteer officers generally are, and my squadron, when on duty, generally bears the same appearance to some other squadrons that North Moore street does to some other schools. These townspeople are therefore very much astonished to see a man left on guard with the horses, and perfectly amazed when he draws his sabre and marches steadily up and down his beat, and I hear one whisper, "Perhaps they be United States reg'lars."
In a few minutes there is quite a crowd of congealed citizens around us, all staring solemnly in icy silence. They say nothing to us or to each other, but steadily stare. I feel their looks crawling down my back and round my sides, and turn which way I will, there is no shaking them off. I have faced the eyes of many an audience, but never such as this. They neither smile nor frown, nor agree nor disagree; but have a vague, stupid look of frightened wonder, as though we were dangerous serpents escaped from a travelling menagerie, which they can see for nothing at the risk of being swallowed alive.
It is best to be cool and comfortable under all sorts of circumstances, so I take out my pipe, exhibit a North Moore street bag to these gay Parisians, and strike a light. Picking out the most sensible man near me, I commence a conversation complimenting them on the appearance of their little town, which is more northernly neat than I expected to find. Some men then come up and hand to me the little effects of our dead soldiers, and give many assurances of their kindness to our wounded. The doctor about this time comes back, and we start immediately on our return. For some miles I march rapidly, urging the ambulance horses to their utmost, for there is no saying but the rebel cavalry may return and amuse themselves by a pursuit. Then we drop in to our previous slow gait, and calculate that we shall reach camp by sunset.
There is a long bridge on this road crossing a stream, with the pretty name of "The Holly Fork;" on our way out, it struck me that our road to Paris might be very easily barred by a little bridge-burning, and at Paris some questions were asked which indicated that it was to have been burned ere this. I measure it as we recross, and finding that it is 255 feet long, and that the stream cannot be forded, send on two men with a report to the colonel.
It is now five o'clock, and we are two miles from camp. My horse has been going almost uninterruptedly for ten hours, and I am promising him a good bed of leaves and a long night's rest, when, through the trees, come two troopers riding on a gallop. They pull up, and hand me a letter from the colonel: "Captain (it says), your squadron is detailed to guard the bridge at Holly Fork; you will take all proper measures to defend it if attacked, and will remain there until relieved by some other squadron."
"Did you see anything of my men?" I say to the messengers. "Yes; they were saddling up, and will be along soon." I may as well keep on; they may be bringing me a fresh horse, and then I can send this one back by these men. In half an hour I find the man who leads has lead us on to a wrong road. He tries a cross-cut, and the cross-cut leads to a field. We must turn the ambulance round and retrace both errors. It is vexatious in the extreme, to have this additional load put on my willing horse after two such days' work and besides, the squadron may have passed while we were wandering about here. I curb my impatience as well as I can, and at length we reach the road. There, plain enough, is a cavalry trail, freshly made since we turned off, and it tells its own story—the squadron has gone by.
"Captain," says the doctor from the ambulance, "must you go back?"
"Yes, doctor, I suppose I must."
"Well, if you must, here is your haversack."