New Orleans daily crescent. [volume] ([New Orleans, La.]) 1851-1866, 1854-08-09
oofrespondenoe Of the Crescent.

Temporal mutantur-as the old Latin reader
used to say. am forced to the exclamation.
One year ago was luxuriating in fine quarters
down in q COMPOUNDED little, old, adobe hut,
living on bull-beef and bacon and supervising
the physical, mental, moral and military char
acter of sundry of Uncle Sans tblue-mixed I"
in the wilds of California! Verify, Temporal
mutantitr, and confound the mutantur. sup
pose you think you are having somewhat hot
weather in New Orleans, about these days.
Why, the hot weather has not commenced here
yet, and we have already had the freezometer
up to los degrees in the shade. To-day it is
very cool, being only 9oA And then the chills
and fever! We brag some on our chills and
fevers here; about fourth Of us are down with
it all the time, and we have to take it &c turn
and turn about" in shaking. We have been
obliged to substitute hooks and eyes for buttons,
as they don't shake off SO readily. To tell the
whole truth, have just got into one of the con-
fomdedest mean holes in all California 1t is a
very beautiful and romantic spot to look upon,
to be sure, but regular whitened sepulchre,
as full of chills and fever as any other portion OF
this foot stool Ar
Fort Reading is station Of the United States,
in the Sacramento Valley, about five hundred
miles from San Francisco by water and three
hundred by land Small steamers run up to
Red Bluffs, thirty miles below, and expect, next
year, to 60 as far as the mouth of Clear Creek,
which is ten miles above. The Fort is built on
a tolerably high bank of Cow Creek-the only
place for some distance that is not, occasionally
flooded-one mile from where the Creek empties
into the Sacramento. 1t is fine, swift-running
stream Of clear, cold water, and never gets very
low, being fed by the melting SHOWS of the
Sierra Nevada, which is in plain sight and not
very far from the Fort, and among whose snow
capped peaks old Shasta towers preeminent
with its eternal covering of dazzling white.
The barracks are built in oak openings, and
there are many fine, old, oaken shade trees
standing in the parade and about the quarters
while on every side, as far as the eye can reach
are detached clusters of oaks with little, inter
vening dots of open grass ground, There is nc
brush or underground of any kind, and the
whole looks as though some landscape gardener
had been trying his hand at improving nature
Above the barracks, for hundreds of miles
mining of all kinds is going on actively, and
there are "placers," and gulehes," and " dry
diggings," and canons,'' Z" fats tsbars y
's creeks runs" and the Lord knows what
other villainously named spots for extracting
the root tits the richest mining district in all
California, and it is also about the dullest and
most disagreable. am heartily sick of it and
trying to get transfer into New Mexico. How
would like to be back in the States, at the
places and among the friends visited last year
By the way, one of our Liftenants lent his
gun to an Irish soldier the other day, to go out
after birds. When he came back, Patrick
brought a few very small birds and one very
big swelling on his lip On being asked how he
hurt himself he said that just as he was coming
back, he saw two birds close together; so, in
order to kill them both he just rammed down
another load, on top of the one already in, and
firing it off he got kicked over and his mouth
pretty well bunged up! Ingenious philosophy
for killing 1.-TWO birds at one shot," wasnt
it, 1 think he must be blood relation of an
other Patrick who, during the Mexican war,
was in the front rank of his company, when Or
dered to close with the enemy. He was OBJ
served to be very much excited and, lingering his
musket nervously at the outset, but when they
got SO they could see the whites of their anita
gonists eyes, and no order to fire came, he could
stand it no longer, and throwing down his
gun, he jumped out of the ranks with regular
Irish yell, exclaiming--ss Hourly Jasus, giee as
a rock!" =.
You must take this letter with all due allow
ancea: that is to say, rather with ga grain of
salt" or glass of brandy and water, just as
you prefer. It is written with the Thermometer
at 100 degrees in the shade, under the vexation
and annoyance of numberless blue bottle and
other kind of flies, gnats, feas and ants cutting
up their antics on every side; running over
me and my paper, bathing in my ink and get
ting transfxed by my pen.
For Heavens sake, send me out plenty of
papers. They are the only consolation we have
here. The Adjutant has just brought in an
order for the staff to appear at inspection and
review tomorrow morning, in full dress, but
toned up to the throat in blue broadcloth, Just
as if we hadn't botheration enough without
dress parades, here, and now The Inspector
General is, however, expected daily, and
brushing up" with battalion drills, reviews
and parades is all the go.
We hear nothing of Indian troubles, and can
not report any murders or other startling news
in the vicinity. Gen. Wool has concluded to
take the advice of the San Francisco papers !;
and after ordering headquarters from San
Francisco to Benioia, pursuant to orders re-
ceiyed from Washington, has countermanded
his first orders, and will not move until he
hears again from Washington. 1t is thought he
has rather "put his foot in it."
Yours truly, S.
A CURIOUS LAW CAsE-Ffee Passes-A re-
porter employed on Bells Life in London, ira
Al. ny