attack; but he also was expecting reinforcements, and a little artillery firing was the only response we provoked. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xii. pt. ii. pp. 506, 507.] As some evidence of the physical exhaustion from the continuous exertions of the preceding day and night, I may mention the fact that during the artillery firing I threw myself for a little rest on the ground, close beside the guns; and though these were firing at frequent intervals, I fell asleep and had a short but refreshing nap almost within arm's length of the wheels of a gun-carriage. Toward evening Scammon arrived with his brigade, reporting that Heth's force had followed his retiring movement as far as French's, and confirming the information that four brigades of the enemy were before us. Shortly after dark the officer of the day, on the right, reported the noise of artillery marching around that flank. Our last day's rations had been issued, and our animals were without forage. Small parties of the enemy had gone far to our rear and cut the telegraph, so that we had had no news from the Kanawha valley for two days. The interruption was likely to create disturbance there and derange all our plans for supply. It was plain that we should have to be content with having foiled the enemy's plan to inflict a severe blow upon us, and that we might congratulate ourselves that with two brigades against four we had regained our line without serious loss. I therefore ordered that the troops be allowed to rest till three o'clock in the morning of the 18th, and that the column then retire behind the Blue-stone River. The movement was made without interruption, and a camp on Flat-top Mountain was selected, from which the roads on every side were well guarded, and which was almost impregnable in itself. [Footnote: _Id_., pt. iii. p. 209.] Our casualties of all kinds in the affairs about Princeton had been only 113, as the enemy had not delivered any serious attack, and the contest on our side had been one of manoeuvre in which our only chance of important results was in attacking either Heth or Marshall when they were so far separated that they could not unite against us on the field of battle. After the 15th this chance did not exist, and wisdom dictated that we should retire to a safe point from which we could watch for contingencies which might give us a better opportunity. Our experience proved what I have before stated, that the facility for railway concentration of the enemy in our front made this line a useless one for aggressive movements, as they could always concentrate a superior force after they received the news of our being in motion. It also showed the error of dividing my forces on two lines, for had Crook's brigade been with me, or my two brigades with him, we should have felt strong enough to cope with the force which was actually in our front, and would at least have made it necessary for the enemy to detach still more troops from other movements to meet us.