Altona Camp, Friday, Sep. 29. Waiting for the start. DEAR MOTHER:-- The night, in spite of its possibilities, was not bad. I went to bed in the rain, Bann already snoozing by my side, and was put to sleep by the sounds of men's voices murmuring. Roused by a smart shower, I heard Taps blown, and the top sergeant going up and down the street. "Cut out that talking, men!" Waking in the night I found the sky clear, the wind blowing, and two pins out at my side, with the tent flapping. I put the pins in, but when next I was waked by the rain in my face the side of the tent was flapping heavily, and nothing but the fact that instead of a rifle for the tent pole we used a stake, driven about six inches into the ground, had saved us from a collapse. I held down the corner through the shower, then opening my meat-can, used its long handle for a tent-peg. If our little pins were a couple of inches longer this nuisance could be prevented. The new peg held till morning, the clouds then gradually breaking for a glorious sunrise. On a hillside, near Ellenburg Depot. We rolled our moist blankets, made up our damp packs, ate our hasty breakfasts, and with I company were hustled into motor trucks, two squads to a truck. For forty-five minutes we jolted and squashed over bad roads, and finally bowled along over macadam. After eight or ten miles we were turned out, and marched in the cloudy, windy morning three miles to Ellenburg Depot. Here we left a man on each bridge, to notify pursuers that it was destroyed, and turned into the fields, at last climbing a ridge from which, to the left, we saw at a distance a high hill, its wooded sides beginning to show the mottled reds of autumn, while just below our steep slope lay a wide flat bottom, perfect green, with a brook wandering through it. Here we rested, delighting in the view but shivering in the wind, while the company officers and the major looked over the ground. Then the orders were, "Off with the equipment, get out your tools, and dig a trench." The front rank is working like beavers now, and as our turn is nearly here, I must stop this scribbling. In camp near Ellenburg Depot, Friday afternoon. Again I sit in the tent while outside it rains. We have as yet been able to get no straw, for though I have twice hurried at the first glimpse of a wagon, the fellows nearer got it all. The ground is wet from this morning's rain, my pen has splashed everything with ink, and I am afraid that this rain is no mere shower. But thank Heaven! the soil is better for the pins to hold in, the tents have all been faced away from the wind, we have had a most interesting morning, and I have a full stomach. To resume my story: