In the vocabulary of a prig, but in the wrath of a fishwoman, I execrated Scott Gholson; his jealousies, his disclosures, his religion, his mispronunciations; and Ned Ferry--that cockerel! Here was I in the barrel, and able only to squeal in irate terror at whoever looked down upon me. I could have crawled under a log and died. At the door of the Major's tent I paused to learn and joy of one to whom comes reprieve when the rope is on his neck, I overheard Harry Helm, the General's nephew and aide de-camp, who had been with us, telling what a howling good joke Smith had just got off on Gholson! "We shall have to get Ned Ferry back here," the Major was saying as I entered, "to make you boys let Scott Gholson alone." The young man laughed and turned to go. "Why doesn't Ned Ferry make _her_ let Gholson alone? He can do it; he's got her round his finger as tight as she's got Gholson round hers." "Harry," replied the Major, from his table full of documents, "don't you know that any man who's got a woman wrapped round his finger has also got her wrapped round his throat?" The aide-de-camp laughed like a rustic and vanished. "Smith," said the Major, "your eyes are--" "I've been awake for forty-eight hours, Major. But--oh, I'm not sleepy." "Well, go get some sleep.--No, go at once; you'll be called when needed." But I was not needed; while I slept, who should come back and do my work in my stead but Ned Ferry. When I awoke it was with a bound of alarm to see clear day. The command was breaking camp. I rushed out of the tent with canteen, soap and comb, and ran into the arms of the mess-cook. We were alone. "Oh, yass, seh," he laughed as he poured the water into my hands, "th'ee days' rairtion. Seh? Lawd! dey done drawed and cook' befo' de fus' streak o' light. But you all right; here yo' habbersack, full up. Oh, I done fed yo' hoss. Here yo' jacket an' cap; and here yo' saddle an' bridle--Oh, you welcome; I dess tryin' to git shet of 'em so's I kin strak de tent." As I mounted, our wagonmaster rode by me, busy as a skipper in a storm. "Oh, here!" he cried, wheeled, and reaching something to me added, "that's your pass. Major Harper wants you as quick as you can show up. He says never mind the column, ride straight after him. Keep this road to Hazlehurst and then go down the main Brookhaven road till you overtake him. He's by himself--nearly." As the rider wheeled away I blurted out with anxious loudness in the general hubbub, "Isn't his brother with him?" He flashed back a glare of rebuke and then bellowed to heaven and earth, "Oh, the devil and Tom Walker! I don't keep run of sutlers and citizens!" He took a circuit, standing in his stirrups and calling orders to his teamsters, and as he neared me again he said very gently, "Good Lord! my boy, don't you know better than to shoot your mouth off like that? You'll find nobody with the Major but Ned Ferry, and I don't say you'll find him."