It had been easy to form the determination to write; the desire to do so was irresistible, but never before had he been confronted with a task which seemed so overwhelming. Compared with it, struggling with a mule-train all day through the mud and rain, working with pick and shovel on the fortifications, charging an enemy's solid line-of-battle, appeared light and easy performances. He would have gone at either, on the instant, at the word of command, or without waiting for it, with entire confidence in his ability to master the situation. But to write a half-dozen lines to a strange girl, whom he had already enthroned as a lovely divinity, had more terrors than all of Bragg's army could induce. But when Shorty set that somewhat thick head of his upon the doing of a thing, the thing was tolerably certain to be done in some shape or another. "I believe, if I knowed whore Bad Ax was, I'd git a furlough, and walk clean there, rather than write a line," he said, as he wiped from his brow the sweat{133} forced out by the labor of his mind. "I always did hate writin'. I'd rather maul rails out of a twisted elm log any day than fill up a copy book. But it's got to be done, and the sooner I do it the sooner the agony 'll be over. Here goes." He began laboriously forming each letter with his lips, and still more laboriously with his stiff fingers, adding one to another, until he had traced out: "Headquarters Co. Q, 200th Injianny Volunteer Infantry, Murfreesboro, Aprile the 16th eighteen hundred & sixty three." The sweat stood out in beads upon his forehead after this effort, but it was as nothing compared to the strain of deciding how he should address his correspondent. He wanted to use some term of fervent admiration, but fear deterred him. He debated the question with himself until his head fairly ached, when he settled upon the inoffensive phrase: "Respected Lady." The effort was so exhausting that he had to go down to the spring, take a deep drink of cold water, and bathe his forehead. But his determination was unabated, and before the sun went down he had produced the following: "i talk mi pen in hand 2 inform U that ive reseeved the SOX U so kindly cent, & i thank U 1,000 times 4 them. They are boss sox & no mistake. They are the bossest sox that ever wuz nit. The man is a lire who sez they aint. He dassent tel Me so. U are a boss nitter. Even Misses Linkun can't hold a candle 2 U. "The sox fit me 2 a t, but that is becaws they are nit so wel, & stretch."{134} "I wish I knowed some more real strong words to praise her knitting," said Shorty, reading over the laboriously-written lines. "But after I have said they're boss what more is there to say? I spose I ought to say something about her health next. That's polite." And he wrote: "ime in fair helth, except my feet are" locoed, & i weigh 156 pounds, & hope U are injoying the saim blessing."