scene, the elements of heaven marshaled their forces,--a fitting
accompaniment of the tempest of human desolation and passion which
was raging. A cold, drizzling rain commenced about nightfall, and
soon came harder and faster, then turned to pitiless blinding hail.
This storm raged with unrelenting violence for three hours. I passed
long wagon trains filled with wounded and dying soldiers, without
even a blanket to shield them from the driving sleet and hail, which
fell in stones as large as partridge eggs, until it lay on the
ground two inches deep.

Some three hundred men died during that awful retreat, and their
bodies were thrown out to make room for others who, although
wounded, had struggled on through the storm, hoping to find shelter,
rest, and medical care.

By eight o'clock at night I had passed the whole retreating column,
and was now in advance, hoping to reach Corinth, still four miles
ahead. But my powers of endurance, though remarkable, were
exhausted, and I dismounted at a deserted cabin by the wayside,
scarce able to drag myself to the doorway. Here a surgeon was
tending some wounded men who had been sent off the field at an early
hour of the first day. To his question, "Are you wounded?" I
replied that my wound was slight, and that I needed refreshment and
sleep more than surgical aid. Procuring two hard crackers and a cup
of rye Coffee, I made a better meal than I had eaten in three days,
and then lay down in a vacant room and slept.

When I awoke it was broad daylight, and the room was crowded full of
wounded and dying men, so thickly packed that I could hardly stir. I
was not in the same place where I had lain down; but of my change of