Accordingly, after dinner I strolled up to where the men were, and said, carelessly, to the first-sergeant, that one-half of us were to stay as rear guard, and he had better pick out those who had the freshest horses--there might be a good deal of riding to do. In a little while the detachment started, leaving me with my party, little thinking how soon we were to be a rear guard in reality. As the last of the column vanished down the road, my anxiety of the previous evening returned, and I sent a vidette up the Caledonia road. It was then three, and we should not start till six; so I went into the barn and lay down, hoping to have a little sleep to make up for the three previous nights. But I was soon roused to see a Union man, whose brother had been arrested, and then to see another who was to act as guide; and then Mr. Hurt came in to insist on my going back to his house and sleeping there; so I rose and walked back. At the house we found a young man, a cousin of Mrs. Hurt, who had heard of our arrival and ventured in from the woods. We sat down upon the piazza and fell into an interesting conversation. Three of her brothers were in the Southern army--"as good Union men as you," she said, "but forced in." Their little boy was named Emerson Etheridge, after the Tennessee member of Congress, who has stood so firmly for the Union; and on the large tree in the yard was hoisted the last flag that had waved in Western Tennessee. As we thus talked, a little man was seen coming up the road, and thereupon the whole family left me and rushed out to meet him. They came back laughing, shaking hands, and asking questions, while the little man both laughed and cried, and said, "Oh, my dear friends, you do not know what sufferings I have been through since I left you!" He was their Yankee schoolmaster. For ten years he had lived quietly there, but a year before had been ordered off, and narrowly escaped being hung. He had left a child behind, and now, hearing the country was quiet, had ventured back to see his old friends and his child. The afternoon glided away, and it was nearly six. Mrs. Hurt had left us to hasten tea, but we still sat on the piazza, talking as before. Suddenly Mr. Hurt sprang up and said, "What are those men?" I looked and saw my vidette coming in between two countrymen: whether they were bringing him, or he them, seemed doubtful. I seized my sabre and pistol, and walked to the gate. "There is bad news, captain," said the man. "What is it?" "These men say there are three thousand rebel cavalry at Caledonia." I suppose I looked incredulous, for one of the men said, very earnestly, "It's so, sir. Ask Mr. Hurt; he knows me." "He's a good man," said Mr. Hurt; "but I don't believe three thousand any more than you do." "It's really so!" cried the man with great earnestness. "Mr. Ashby saw them, and sent us over here to tell you, and the other Union people; and we have run our horses all the way across."