needs very nice calculation to do one's work at precisely the right
time. To vary the experiment, I had often thought of trying a personal
reconnaissance by swimming, at a certain point, whenever circumstances
should make it an object.

The opportunity at last arrived, and I shall never forget the glee with
which, after several postponements, I finally rode forth, a little
before midnight, on a night which seemed made for the purpose. I had, of
course, kept my own secret, and was entirely alone. The great Southern
fire-flies were out, not haunting the low ground merely, like ours, but
rising to the loftiest tree-tops with weird illumination, and anon
hovering so low that my horse often stepped the higher to avoid them.
The dewy Cherokee roses brushed my face, the solemn "Chuck-will's-widow"
croaked her incantation, and the rabbits raced phantom-like across the
shadowy road. Slowly in the darkness I followed the well-known path to
the spot where our most advanced outposts were stationed, holding a
causeway which thrust itself far out across the separating river,--thus
fronting a similar causeway on the other side, while a channel of
perhaps three hundred yards, once traversed by a ferry-boat, rolled
between. At low tide this channel was the whole river, with broad, oozy
marshes on each side; at high tide the marshes were submerged, and the
stream was a mile wide. This was the point which I had selected. To
ascertain the numbers and position of the picquet on the opposite
causeway was my first object, as it was a matter on which no two of our
officers agreed.

To this point, therefore, I rode, and dismounting, after being duly
challenged by the sentinel at the causeway-head, walked down the long
and lonely path. The tide was well up, though still on the flood, as I
desired; and each visible tuft of marsh-grass might, but for its