Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Army Life in a Black Regiment

“You will return to your old camping-ground, Colonel,” said the General, placidly. “Now,” he added, with serene satisfaction, “we will have some brigade drills!”

Brigade drills! Since Mr. Pickwick, with his heartless tomato-sauce and warming-pans, there had been nothing so aggravating as to try to solace us, who were as good as on board ship and under way,--nay, in imagination as far up the St. John's as Pilatka at least,--with brigade drills! It was very kind and flattering in him to wish to keep us. But unhappily we had made up our minds to go.

Never did officer ride at the head of a battalion of more wobegone, spiritless wretches than I led back from Beaufort that day. “When I march down to de landin‘,” said one of the men afterwards, “my knapsack full of feathers. Comin‘ back, he lead!” And the lead, instead of the feathers, rested on the heart of every one.

As if the disappointment itself were not sufficient, we had to return to our pretty camp, accustomed to its drawing-room order, and find it a desert. Every board gone from the floors, the screens torn down from the poles, all the little conveniences scattered, and, to crown all, a cold breeze such as we had not known since New-Year's Day blowing across the camp and flooding everything with dust. I sincerely hope the regiment would never behave after a defeat as they behaved then. Every man seemed crushed, officers and soldiers alike; when they broke ranks, they went and lay down like sheep where their tents used to be, or wandered disconsolately about, looking for their stray belongings. The