The Christmas had been rendered still happier by the reception of a telegram, that another exchange of paroled prisoners had been made, and we were hourly expecting their arrival. In the cold, gray dawn of the 29th of December, the shrill whistle of the "New York" coming up the bay was heard. Every one was soon astir in preparation for a warm welcome. Large quantities of coffee, chocolate, and gruels were to be made, clothes were to be in readiness, and the stretcher corps to be mustered. As the sun arose, a great crowd assembled, and when the New York neared the wharf, shouts and cheers greeted her. The decks were covered with men, whose skeleton forms and vacant countenances told of starvation, the languid glimmer that at moments overspread their faces feebly betokening the gratitude in their hearts at their escape from "Dixie." This time the Rebel authorities had allowed only "well men," as they called them, to come, because so much had been said at the North about "the last lot," who came in November. Those able to walk were landed first, the barefooted receiving shoes. Many were able to crawl as far as Parole Camp, a little beyond the city. The more feeble were received into the hospital, where hot baths awaited them; and when they had been passed under scissors and razor, and were laid in comfortable beds,--only too soft after the hard ground they had lain on for months, with as much earth as they could scrape together for a pillow,--they expressed the change in their whole condition as like coming from the lower regions of misery into heaven itself.