The action of the 17th was over before the engineer company arrived. Captain Lee directed me, with a portion of my men and a large detailed working party, to construct a battery that night, in a position he had selected on the heights we had gained that afternoon. This was a work of some difficulty, owing to the rocky nature of the ground and the small depth of earth--in some places none, and nowhere more than a few inches. About 3 A. M. on the 18th I sent one of my men to the foot of the hill to awaken Lieutenant Foster, who was sleeping there with the company, and tell him he must relieve me for the rest of the night. After putting Foster in charge I started to join the company--and became sound asleep whilst walking down the hill. Stumbling into a quarry hole, I found myself sprawling on a dead Mexican soldier--his glazed eyes wide open, within a few inches of mine. For a moment I felt that horror of a corpse which many persons have, at times, experienced. The probability that, in a short time after daylight--in storming the strong position of the enemy--I might be as dead as the man upon whom I was lying, forced itself upon me. Before I could regain my feet streams of men were rushing past me in the darkness; and I heard and recognised, the voice of Lieutenant Peter V. Hagner, of the Ordnance, calling in no measured tone or language, upon these stampeded men to stop. Whilst promptly aiding Hagner to bring the fugitives to a halt, I forgot the dead Mexican, and the whole train of thought connected with the corpse. When something like order was restored on the hillside I learned from Lieutenant Hagner that he had been detailed to take one of our heavy guns up the hill to the battery. A regiment of Volunteers had been placed at his disposal to man the drag-ropes. Their arms had been left at the foot of the hill. On finding his way blocked by trees, Hagner had sent to procure axes from the engineer train; and in the meantime the regiment at the drag-ropes had been permitted to lie down. Of course they went to sleep. Suddenly awakened by a false alarm that the Mexicans were upon them, they rushed down the hill to get their arms. Hagner soon procured the required axes and the gun was delivered at the battery in good time. At daylight I was again at the battery. A slight epaulment had been finished for three pieces of artillery, the platforms were laid, and the guns in position. I was then instructed by Captain Lee, to send ten men to report to him for special service; to order Lieutenant Foster with eight additional men, to report to him (Lee) for the purpose of opening a road for the light artillery around the foot of the heights; and I was ordered, with the rest of the company, to report to Colonel Harney, who was then in command of Persifor Smith's brigade, of Twiggs' division.