After the retreat of the enemy across Cedar Creek, on the 13th, the brigade returned to Fisher’s Hill, and encamped in a beautiful grove.  It was now expected that we would have a long, sweet rest—­a rest so much needed and devoutly wished for, after two months of incessant marching and fighting.  The foragers now struck out right and left over the mountains on either side to hunt up all the little delicacies these mountain homes so abounded in—­good fresh butter-milk, golden butter—­the like can be found nowhere else in the South save in the valleys of Virginia—­apple butter, fruits of all kinds, and occasionally these foragers would run upon a keg of good old mountain corn, apple jack, or peach brandy—­a “nectar fitting for the gods,” when steeped in bright, yellow honey.  These men were called “foragers” from their habit of going through the country, while the army was on the march or in camp, buying up little necessaries and “wet goods,” and bringing them into camp to sell or share with their messmates.  It mattered not how long the march, how tired they were, when we halted for the night’s camp, while others would drop, exhausted, too tired to even put up their tents or cook a supper, these foragers would overcome every obstacle, climb mountains, and wade rivers in search of something to eat or drink, and be back in camp before day.  In every regiment and in almost every company you could find these foragers, who were great stragglers, dropping in the rear or flanking to the right or left among the farm houses in search of honey, butter, bread, or liquors of some kind.  Some of these foragers in the brigade were never known to be without whiskey during the whole war.  Where, how, or when they got it was as a sealed book to the others.  These foragers, too, when out on one of their raids, were never very particular whether the owner of the meat or spring house, or even the cellar, was present or not, should they suspicion or learn from outside parties that these places contained that for which they were looking.  If at night, they would not disturb the old man, but while some would watch, others would be depredating upon his pig pen, chicken roost, or milk house.  It was astonishing what a change in the morals of men army life occasioned.  Someone has said, “A rogue in the army, a rogue at home;” but this I deny.  Sometimes that same devilish, schoolboy spirit that actuates the truant to filch fruit or melons from orchards of others, while he had abundance at home, caused the soldier oftentimes to make “raids,” as they called these nocturnal visits to the farm houses outlying the army’s track.  I have known men who at home was as honorable, honest, upright, and who would scorn a dishonest act, turn out to be veteran foragers, and rob and steal anything they could get their hands on from the citizens, friend or foe alike.  They become to look upon all as “fish for a soldier’s net.”  I remember the first night on Fisher’s Hill, after fighting