Saturday. Two letters to-day. Aunt Maria and Jane were the senders. They had just got my letters, written Dec. 9, so it takes just a month for a letter to come and go. I went up town and had my phiz taken again. Jane didn't like the one I sent her. Coming back I met with a strange adventure, and although there wasn't much to it, it someway impressed me so I have thought of little else since. A fairly well-dressed man, old and venerable-looking, tapped me on the shoulder and asked for five cents to buy some crackers. He did not look or appear like a beggar, and something about him and his manner struck me as no other such plea ever did. I had spent nearly all the money I had with me, but what I did have I handed over, and was going on when he stopped me to know if I would receive an old man's blessing. I stopped, not knowing what to say or do, when he raised his hands above my head, and as near as I can recall the words said, "God Almighty bless and protect you and yours. The Cross of Christ shall stand between you and all harm, a bullet shall never hit that head; you have helped a poor old man, and as you have helped him so shall you be helped. You have cast bread upon the water and though it be late in life, your reward shall come." I thanked him and hurried away. Quite a crowd had collected while this was going on. I was all togged out in my new uniform, having been to have my picture taken, and I suppose the sight was a little unusual. I haven't told a soul but you, diary, for anyone but you would laugh at me. But you and I are confidants and you have never yet betrayed me. Lieutenant Gorton is about sick to-night, and I have been doctoring him up the best I know how. Have got him to bed and given him a part of my covering, for though the night is cold he needs it the most. I don't feel a bit like sleep. In spite of me I can't get the old man and his strange conduct out of my head.
By way of experiment a squad of sergeants was sent out to-night to try their hand at recruiting. They have come in with about sixty good-looking negroes. This shows they can beat us at the business, and if they are kept at it we will soon have a full regiment.
January 10, 1864.
Sunday. Sergeant Brant thought sure he would go to-day and after a good-bye all round started for the boat. He came back soon after, saying he had given up the trip for to-day. It seems the boat is held back for some reason and will sail to-morrow. That will give me time to write some more letters. The quartermaster and I went to church to-day. He knew where to go, and though it was a long walk there and back, I felt well paid for going. As near as I could tell it was a Methodist church. At any rate the language used was United States, while those I had before attended used Latin. We were seated in a pew with a handsome young lady, who gave us a hymn book, even finding the place for us. I was never more sorry I could not sing. After church she invited us to come again, saying how glad she was we had come to-day. We promised her we would, and came back. If I can find the way there I certainly mean to go again. We now expect to start for Texas this week sometime. Only a part are to go and we are all impatience to know who will be taken and who left. If I knew my leave of absence wouldn't come I should want to go, but suppose it did come and had to follow me up, the time would be up before I could get started. I am very often thankful for the things I don't know.
January 11, 1864.
Monday. I sneaked off this morning, and hunted up Madam Black, the "Great Indian Astrologist," as the papers call her. I had been boiling over with curiosity to know how near she and the other one—I have forgotten her name—agree as to my future. I found her without trouble, and was surprised to find her, not a squaw, as I expected, but one of the sweetest-looking and most motherly-acting old women I have seen since I saw my own dear mother. She simply took me by storm. I couldn't disbelieve her if I tried. I had always been an unbeliever in fortune-telling, but in the state of mind I was in I was ready to catch at any straw she held out. She took me into an elegantly furnished room, and the only question she asked about myself was the day and month of my birth. This I told her, and she sat down before me and closed her eyes as if going to sleep. Soon she began, and gave me as good a history of my past life as I could have told her, without going into particulars more than she did. Of course I was then ready to gulp down anything she might say, and was tempted to run away and leave my future as it had always been to me, a closed book. But my desire to hear about my going home, or going to Texas was strong upon me, and I held my breath while she continued. She told me I was born to disappointment, that my plans had been upset as fast as I made them, and this would continue until after my forty-fifth birthday; that happily for me I was also born with a disposition that did not allow disappointments to sink in as it otherwise would, and for that reason I had never been so discouraged as not to try again. After my forty-fifth birthday things would change and I would wind up rich and contented. As she said this she added, "but it won't take as much to make you rich and contented as it does most people." She told me I was to have two wives (she didn't say both at one time) and five children. Then she said, as the other one did, that I was going on a journey in a few days, from which I would return to New Orleans again; that inside of seven months I would go on a journey from which I would never return to this place; that after that I would be happy and the world would be kinder to me than ever before. Aside from a chat we had on other subjects, that was all I got for my $5. I believe now I am to go somewhere very soon, but whether to Matagorda or to Dutchess County I know no more than before. I came back and went to work getting ready for a start, because that was what the others were doing, but to save me I couldn't put much heart in my preparations. It rained to-day, as usual. Altogether it has not been a cheerful day for me. I am five dollars poorer and the little knowledge I swapped it for does not cheer me as I hoped it might. Good night, diary. Remember you are not to tell a living soul of this, and when Gorton next proposes my going to consult my future, I shall tell him I don't believe a thing in it, and that the whole thing is a swindle. The question, Texas or home, is still unanswered.
January 12, 1864.
Tuesday. "Glory, Hallelujah!" I'm going home. Just as I was crawling under my blanket to-night, after a miserable cold, wet day of routine duty, the colonel's servant came and said the colonel wanted me to come to his tent. I got up and dressed, wondering what it could mean. Just then I recalled hearing a horseman ride in and out, and I said to myself—that means Texas sure. I found pretty much all the colonel's family packed in his tent and all with long, sober faces on them. The colonel asked me what sort of a caper I had been up to when out on a pass yesterday, adding, before I could reply, that I was the last one he expected to get such a report about from headquarters, at the same time handing me an official-looking document and requested me to read for myself. In a sort of a daze I opened it and at a glance saw it was my leave of absence. I came to life then. Whether they are glad to be rid of me for a while, or what, I don't know, but they all appeared as glad as I was. Appeared, I say, for it is not possible they could feel as I did, and do, about it. We kept the colonel up until he drove us off and then the most of them went home with me, and we kept up the clatter of talk until almost morning. The errands and the messages I have promised to do and deliver will make a hole in my vacation, but I don't care, for anyone of them would do the same for me. The day had been so dull that I was not going to write a word about it, but the wind-up was too momentous not to mention it on the day and date thereof. And now for a nap, or a try for one.
January 13, 1864.
Wednesday. In spite of late hours last night I was up early, and as soon as I had eaten, was off to look up the matter of transportation. If a transport is to sail soon I can go through for nothing. I found it was barely possible one might go this week, but it was quite uncertain. Knowing how very uncertain these army uncertainties are, I went to the office of the Creole and found she sails on Friday. I engaged passage and came back and have since been getting ready to go. Gorton wants me to take his Henry Holmes along to help Mrs. Gorton, and says I can pass him through as my servant free of cost. I told him if that was the case I would take him along, and the darkey is almost as glad to go as I am. Marching orders came to-day, and preparations for a move are already under way. Two regiments of mounted infantry have come in to camp with us and this makes neighbors pretty close.