Orleans independent standard. [volume] (Irasburgh, Vt.) 1856-1871, 1864-03-04

yer sitting on horseback with his staff
a light haired man, with face sufficient
resolute, bis beard cut in peak, ar
wearing cavalier hat. We halt onl
for moment. The generals pointin
hand indicates the direction we are
take /: SO down we go through woode
road, driving before US the sDemy's picl
cts, our hankers in the woods seeing lheI
mount their horses and gallop off as "
come within musket range. Present.
we go by their camps, where they hav
cut on trees some defiance or warning t
us: Beware, Yankee this is har
road to travel"
BY the side of the column rides nj
officer of engineers, who stops every nov
and then to note a by path or prominen
knoll, or draw a rough plan of the wood
The dust was hardly settled yet along
tie road from the tramp Of their fetreat
ing infantry. We press on close be
hind, until at length the column halt
close within the range of the Port Hud
son batteries.
*S
We fell back that Saturday night two
or three miles, then camped in the woods
Later, battery went forward to posi-
ton near that to which we advanced, and
fired shells for while towards the Reb
ell intrencbments. Our blankets and
baggage were four miles behind. We
hung equipments and haversacks on the
gun stocks; and, wet with sweat, lay
down in our clothes, without covering.
Wilson and | laid rails on the ground
then made sloping roof of rails over
head, which was some protection against
the damp.
The eyelids shut together like pair
of scissor blades, and cut the thread of
but, in the midst of my
dreaming, crash after crash broke upon
my ear, like the chorus of doomSday.
We all jumped to our posts; for we
thought the hour of battle had come. ]
looked at my watch by the light of
few embers. 1t was half past eleven.
AT the time, we were in complete igno-
rance of the events that were transpir-
ing. We know now that it was the feet
Just passing the batteries, and all this
was the uproar OF the bomoardment.
Through the trees to the westward arose
.be flashes, incessant, like the winking
heat lightning of hot summer evening.
Through the air rolled reports,-now is
plated, now twenty combining in grand
crash, now continuous roll of them,-
A laundering rub dub, as if the giants
we're going to storm heaven again, and
we're beating reUeille to summon every
ynome and all the genii and each slum-
Dering Titan to fall in for a charge. The
centre of the regiment the color guard,
rested in the road. The pickets four or
i've rods off, could see the falling of
bombs, the streams of comet like rock
ITS, and the out lines of the shore batter
es lit up by the cannon flashes. 1t went
ID, aud we sat listening with our hand
lose at our guns. Then, at last, the
ieavens reddened high and far, with
iercer and steadier glare, that moved
lowly southwark, crimsoning in turn the
moss and old scars on the north, on the
vest, on the southwest, of the tree
runks. Meantime came up the the
,oom of cannon, slowly receding in the
anne direction. So we heard the swan
ong of the stern old 'Mississippi,'-
beaten with shot, ragged
hrough her whole frame where shells
lad torn and burst. On that night,
reight of dead men were on her deck,
md the bodies of drowned men foated
bout her hoary hull for retinue Then
anne crash,--a light making all bright
lung ba c k from the FURNISHED gun
tocks, from the pool by the roadside,
evealing the watching soldiers and the
lain steeds fallen headlong in the road
n the midst of the camp. So passed the
eteran ship through fire and earth quake
hook to an Immortality in history.