it. That day has arrived. America has no north, no south, no east,
no west; the sun rises over the hills and sets over the mountains,
the compass just points up and down, and we can laugh now at the absurd
notion of there being a north and a south.

Well, reader, let me whisper in your ear. I was in the row, and the
following pages will tell what part I took in the little unpleasant
misconception of there being such a thing as a north and south.


THE BLOODY CHASM

In these memoirs, after the lapse of twenty years, we propose to fight
our "battles o'er again."

To do this is but a pastime and pleasure, as there is nothing that so
much delights the old soldier as to revisit the scenes and battlefields
with which he was once so familiar, and to recall the incidents, though
trifling they may have been at the time.

The histories of the Lost Cause are all written out by "big bugs,"
generals and renowned historians, and like the fellow who called a turtle
a "cooter," being told that no such word as cooter was in Webster's
dictionary, remarked that he had as much right to make a dictionary as
Mr. Webster or any other man; so have I to write a history.

But in these pages I do not pretend to write the history of the war.
I only give a few sketches and incidents that came under the observation
of a "high private" in the rear ranks of the rebel army. Of course,
the histories are all correct. They tell of great achievements of great