To clear up the matter, General McPherson told me to take my horse and ride out to Decatur, which was four miles distant, and from there out on the Stone Mountain road, and find out whether the enemy was there. He instructed me to go as far as I could, and not get captured. If I found the enemy, I was to drop back toward our lines, and feel along, at intervals, for the enemy toward our left. This was on the supposition that the enemy might have a line extending around our left flank and along its rear. Three-quarters of a mile out from Decatur, I came upon five rebel soldiers on picket. They challenged me to halt, but I had no intention of halting there; so I wheeled about and "lit out." The rebs might have shot me as well as not. I returned to our lines, and went out on another road, and had proceeded but about half a mile, when I came upon more rebel pickets. They did not fire at me. I tried to get out, in all, at thirteen different places, and every time encountered pickets, none of whom tried to shoot me. I was well satisfied that the noise of moving troops, heard in the night, were infantry and artillery moving round to our rear, intending to surprise us, and for that reason their pickets were forbidden to fire upon individuals or small parties. I then hastened back and reported to General McPherson what I had seen. He wanted to know if I was sure the pickets were infantry, and I told him that I was. He seemed to doubt the possibility of their being infantry. He and his staff then rode out to our rear picket-line, on a road that I had not been out on, and, waiting there, he sent me out to see if I could find any pickets. I went about sixty rods, when I came to a dwelling-house, standing in a little opening in the woods that lined either side of the road. It was then about 11 o'clock, A. M., I had become very thirsty from constant riding in the hot sun since early in the morning; so I rode up to the door of the house, and inquired of a lady there if she would have the kindness to give me a drink of water. Said she, "I have just drawn a bucket of fresh water at the well, back there, and you can have some in welcome; but I reckon you are a Federal soldier, and if you stop to get it, you will get killed, for a Colonel and two of _our_ soldiers have just this minute stepped away from the well." Without stopping to drink, I rode back into the road, and there, about two hundred yards further on, stood the Colonel and two soldiers. They did not fire at me, but the Colonel, who had his sword in his hand, gave it a defiant flourish, as if to say, "You'll catch it directly." I went back to General McPherson, and reported what I had found, who then rode out with me and saw for himself. He said it was about noon, and he would go back to dinner and send out a reconnoitering party.