"The Lord, he makes the rain come down, The rain come down, the rain come down, Afternoon and morning." But poetry is the last thing I think of, for my thoughts run on the roads; and some drenched pickets, who look as though they wanted to be hung on a fence to dry, inform me that I will have hard work to get through, and that it has rained all night as it is raining now. At home, what a hardship, what an outrage it would be to send us off in such weather and on such roads. Now, we fear something may prevent, and hurry lest it come, for the road is not more uncomfortable than the camp, or the rain wetter elsewhere than it is here. The doctor is a grey-headed, prudent, experienced man, and is something of an invalid; but he stoutly discredits a rumor that the wounded men have died, and whispers to me that we had better be off, before any more such stories come in. A flag of truce is not kept ready-made in camp, and we are rather puzzled of what to make one now. "I'd lend you my white handkerchief" (says a man who has been listening with great gravity to various suggestions)--"I'd lend you my white handkerchief, only I'm afeard if you put it up, the rebels 'ud think you'd histe-tud the black flag, and give you no quarter." We do not borrow the white handkerchief. But at length we remember the hospital tent, and the hospital steward produces a piece of white something from his stores, which is bound around a stick and made into a flag. Under circumstances such as these, the doctor climbs into the ambulance, I mount my horse, and we start. The rain somewhat abates, and diminishes to a drizzle, which is a great relief; but the ambulance drags along snail-like through the mud. We, who are mounted, do not ride faster than a walk, yet repeatedly have to wait, and watch it crawling after us among the trees. This slow movement gives little exercise, and when one starts wet, he soon becomes cold and stiff, sitting thus motionless in a damp saddle. Nor can we trot off a mile or two, and then wait for the ambulance to catch up, for some straggling rebel soldiers may be on any cross-road, or in any thicket, and pounce upon the ambulance as so much plunder, and shoot the doctor before they inquire into the facts. A surgeon is a non-combatant, and not required to be shot at, and we must stay near by and shield him, if nothing more.