Our life at English Turn, was varied by little of special interest. Of course there was no enemy at hand except those foes which a hot climate breeds so rapidly. A mysterious order came one day, to detail one hundred men "to join the expedition," and we were notified that a steamer would call for them on the morrow. Details of picked men were selected from each company. Five days' rations and forty rounds of ammunition, were dealt out to each, and in light marching order they waited several days for the steamer to appear. It was in vain, however, and we reluctantly gave up the prospect of some little excitement. We came to the conclusion that somebody at headquarters had forgotten to countermand the order, or, like Mr. Toots, had deemed it of no consequence. We discussed the varying prospects of change, sometimes coming as a rumor that we should be ordered to Texas, where was the first battalion of our regiment; sometimes that we should join the Red River expedition, which was then forming, or the expedition against Mobile which was in contemplation. But after six weeks delay at English Turn, we received orders to move up the river to Plaquemine, a point some one hundred and twenty miles above New Orleans, a few miles below and on the opposite bank from Baton Rouge. This town was at the entrance of the Bayou Plaquemine, of which Longfellow makes mention in the story of Evangeline's search for her lover; a description which gives so good an idea of the bayous by which Louisiana is intersected, that I quote it in this connection. "They * * * entering the Bayou of Plaquemine, Soon were lost in a maze of sluggish and devious waters, Which, like a network of steel, extended in every direction. Over their heads the towering and tenebrous boughs of the cypress Waved like banners that hang on the walls of ancient cathedrals. Deathlike the silence seemed, and unbroken save by the herons Home to their roosts in the cedar trees returning at sunset, Or by the owl, as he greeted the moon with demoniac laughter." Here we relieved the Forty-Second Ohio, and went into camp. As we marched through the streets of the village to the site of our camp, the scowling looks of the white spectators, sufficiently indicated their sentiments and especially their wrath at being guarded by "niggers."