It would perhaps be impertinence on my part to attempt to eulogise the character of this excellent man and good soldier, who, most thoroughly believing in the justice of the Southern cause, had sacrificed everything he possessed in its behalf, and had thrown all his energy and talent into the scale in its favour.  Many who knew him well have done and will continue to do justice to his patriotism and self-denial.  I had a very long conversation with him, which I wish I could repeat without being guilty of a breach of confidence, as evidence of the sensible notions he had formed of the state of affairs in the South.  He was the only man I met during my travels who took a somewhat gloomy view of the military prospects of the country—­of which, as a soldier, there could be no better judge.

After spending twenty-four hours in the camp, we went to the railway station to see if we could get places for Wilmington.  We found that the line was in the hands of the Southerners, and that although the ’boys in blue’ had a vulgar habit of firing into the carriages as they passed, the trains were running each night.  But a train running and a non-combatant passenger getting a place in a carriage were widely different things, every available seat being taken up by sick and wounded soldiers.  I made a frantic effort to get into the train somehow, and after a severe struggle succeeded in scrambling into a sort of horse-box and sat me down on a long deal box, which seemed rather a comfortable place to sleep on.  It was pitch dark when I got into the train, and we were obliged to keep in the dark until we had run the gauntlet of the Northern pickets, who favoured us with a volley or two at a long range from the hills overlooking the railway.  When we were clear of them I lighted a match, and to my horror found that I was comfortably lounging on a coffin.  I wished I had not thrown a light on the subject, but by degrees, becoming accustomed I suppose to my position, I sank into a comfortable sleep and was really quite sorry when, on arriving at some station just before daylight, people came to remove my peculiar though far from uncomfortable couch.  I felt its loss the more, for in its place they put a poor fellow wounded nearly to death, whose moans and cries were, beyond anything, distressing.  We were a long time getting to Wilmington, as it was necessary to stop and repair most of the bridges on the line before the train could venture over them, an operation at which all passengers sound in wind and limb had to assist.

On arriving there we found all the world in a state of great excitement, on account of there having been a terrible fire among the cotton lying on the quays ready for embarkation, supposed to have been the work of an incendiary.

The recollections of my last proceedings in the blockade-running are far from pleasant, and I shall pass them over as briefly as possible.

When we had only the American Government cruisers to fear, we enjoyed the excitement in the same way as a man enjoys fox-hunting (only, by the way, we were the fox instead of the huntsmen), but when dire disease, in the worst form that Yellow Jack could take, stalked in amongst us, and reduced our numbers almost hourly, things became too serious to be pleasant.