On reaching camp, I concluded that it was my duty to report to some body; but not having been officially sent out, I reported to Colonel Force. He listened to my report, and when I had finished, told me to report to General Ross. I did so, and he told me to have myself in readiness the next morning to guide a force of cavalry around to the rear of the rebel force, and that he would send a regiment of infantry in front, and try to capture the whole of them. Morning came, and I was ready to go, but received no orders. I have since learned that the plan fell through because the Colonel wanted his regiment to go, and the General wanted his old regiment to go, and finally did not send any. CHAPTER VIII. Sent to find the enemy's pickets--Suspicious circumstance--Sick child--Captures three citizens standing picket--Releases them--Falls asleep--Perilous situation--Fortunate turn of affairs--Attack on the pickets--A very pious man--He proves a rebel spy. About a week after my attempts to get into the rebel camp near Wash. Newbern's, General Ross sent me down to the corners, at Newbern's lane, to ascertain whether the enemy had any pickets there. I was ordered to take three men with me, and to be very cautious in my movements, and, if I found any pickets near the place designated, not to fire into them, but to come immediately back and report. The place I was to visit was seven miles from Bolivar; we started out after 9 o'clock in the evening; I was mounted on a mule, but the three men that accompanied me were on foot. It was a starlight night--not so dark but that we could discern objects at a considerable distance, and yet dark enough to facilitate our movements. Five miles from Bolivar, we came to a house occupied by Mr. John Ursury, and, as we approached it, we observed in it a light. We had moved along very slowly, and it had then got to be past 11 o'clock. Thinking it was rather strange that a light should be burning there at that hour of the night, I resolved to ascertain the cause of it. Taking one man with me, and sending the other two to the rear of the house, to capture any persons that might undertake to escape, I rode up to the front door, with my revolver drawn, and, without dismounting, lifted the latch and shoved the door wide open. The persons present were Mrs. Ursury and children, one of them a small child, and a brother of John Ursury, about fifteen years old. "What are you doing here with a light at this time of night?" I inquired. "We have got a sick child," replied Mrs. Ursury, "and we are doctoring it." "It's best to see whether the child is sick or not," said the man that accompanied me. He then went in and found it awake in the cradle, and, stranger as he was, soon had the child in a frolic, laughing and playing. "It's a curious sickness that that child has got," said the man, coming out.