One pleasant fellow, more warlike than the rest, suggested that as we had some Enfields on board, we should make "a little bit of a fight," or at least "make one butt at a gunboat." I was relieved to find that these insane proposals were not received with any enthusiasm by the majority.
The plantations, as we went further down the river, looked very prosperous; but signs of preparations for immediate skedaddling were visible in most of them, and I fear they are all destined to be soon desolate and destroyed.
We came to a courier picket every sixteen miles. At one of them we got the information, "Gun-boats drove back," at which there was great rejoicing, and the captain, recovering his spirits, became quite jocose, and volunteered to give me letters of introduction to a "particular friend of his about here, called Mr Farragut;" but the next news, "Still a-fightin'," caused us to tie ourselves to a tree at 8 p.m., off a little village called Columbia, which is half-way between Munroe and Harrisonburg.
We then lit a large fire, round which all the passengers squatted on their heels in Texan fashion, each man whittling a piece of wood, and discussing the merits of the different Yankee prisons at New Orleans or Chicago. One of them, seeing me, called out, "I reckon, Kernel, if the Yankees catch you with us, they'll say you're in d——d bad company;" which sally caused universal hilarity.
[22] The descendants of the French colonists in Louisiana are called creoles; most of them talk French, and I have often met Louisianian regiments talking that language.
[23] General Hebert is the only man of education I met in the whole of my travels who spoke disagreeably about England in this respect. Most people say they think we are quite right to keep out of it as long as we can; but others think our Government is foolish to miss such a splendid chance of "smashing the Yankees," with whom we must have a row sooner or later.
12th May (Tuesday).—Shortly after daylight three negroes arrived from Harrisonburg, and they described the fight as still going on. They said they were "dreadful skeered;" and one of them told me he would "rather be a slave to his master all his life, than a white man and a soldier."
During the morning some of the officers and soldiers left the boat, and determined to cut across country to Harrisonburg, but I would not abandon the scanty remains of my baggage until I was forced to do so.
During the morning twelve more negroes arrived from Harrisonburg. It appears that three hundred of them, the property of neighbouring planters, had been engaged working on the fortifications, but they all with one accord bolted when the first shell was fired. Their only idea and hope at present seemed to be to get back to their masters. All spoke of the Yankees with great detestation, and expressed wishes to have nothing to do with such "bad people."