At this second drawing, although I had only one chance in two of escaping, I did not feel that abject fear that first overcame me, and I stepped forward when ordered and drew another blank piece of paper. My feeling was one of intense pity for the poor fellow who drew the fatal number, and I hardly heard Mosby say: ‘Well, you are a lucky fellow, captain.’ We were removed from the condemned that night. After two or three days, with the aid of some friendly negroes and some burnt cork, I made my escape, reaching our own lines in nine days. Of the five condemned, two escaped, one by feigning death after being shot, and the other was rescued by a friendly negro before death ensued. These two men reached our army later on, and corroborated my strange story of the ‘Lottery of Death.’ I think you will agree with me that I had cause for showing fear at least once in my life. ABOUT WEEDS. Somebody once characterised ‘dirt’ as matter in a wrong place. Now, a weed is a plant in the wrong place. It has a place in the economy of nature, no doubt, unprofitable or even noxious as it may appear to the farmer or gardener. It must not be forgotten, moreover, that even the humblest weed is worthy of patient examination, and is a marvel of physiological structure. Then, again, some of our hedgerow wildings vie in beauty of form and elegance of habit with the cherished garden plants. What have we more charming, for instance, than traveller’s joy (_Clematis vitalba_), bryony, dogrose, or the large white bindweed? And as to some other weeds, which of our garden plants figure so largely in pictures as the foxglove, purple loosestrife (_Lithrum salicaria_), the teasel, or the dock? Nevertheless, they are weeds, and as such, are entirely out of place on the garden or farm. Robbers and usurpers are they, to be ignominiously decapitated or uprooted, and consigned to the rubbish-heap or the flames.