Bayou._)--Early this morning our boat was taken out of the Mississippi
and put on Mr. Fetler's ox-cart. After breakfast we followed on foot.
The walk in the woods was so delightful that all were disappointed when
a silvery gleam through the trees showed the bayou sweeping along, full
to the banks, with dense forest trees almost meeting over it. The boat
was launched, calked, and reloaded, and we were off again. Toward noon
the sound of distant cannon began to echo around, probably from
Vicksburg again. About the same time we began to encounter rafts. To get
around them required us to push through brush so thick that we had to
lie down in the boat. The banks were steep and the land on each side a
bog. About one o'clock we reached this clear space with dry shelving
banks, and disembarked to eat lunch. To our surprise a neatly dressed
woman came tripping down the declivity, bringing a basket. She said she
lived above and had seen our boat. Her husband was in the army, and we
were the first white people she had talked to for a long while. She
offered some corn-meal pound-cake and beer, and as she climbed back told
us to "look out for the rapids." H. is putting the boat in order for our
start, and says she is waving good-by from the bluff above.

_Thursday, July 17._ (_On a raft in Steele's Bayou._)--Yesterday we went
on nicely awhile, and at afternoon came to a strange region of rafts,
extending about three miles, on which persons were living. Many saluted
us, saying they had run away from Vicksburg at the first attempt of the
fleet to shell it. On one of these rafts, about twelve feet square,[1]
bagging had been hung up to form three sides of a tent. A bed was in one
corner, and on a low chair, with her provisions in jars and boxes
grouped round her, sat an old woman feeding a lot of chickens.

[Footnote 1: More likely twelve yards.--G.W.C.]