We had had no breakfast, and when the enemy's fire lulled several of the men tried to do a little cooking. A comrade near me was busily engaged in frying a piece of pork in a pan extemporised from an old canteen. Suddenly the batteries reopened; several stacks of muskets were struck, with the effect of making them look like a nest of snakes. Our commander said, "Some of you men might as well move up nearer the ridge where there is better protection." I could see that my friend of the frying-pan was growing anxious. He looked at his pork and then at the shelter. It was hard to abandon his breakfast; but life was growing dearer every moment, and with sudden impulse he left all and ran for refuge. How big Corporal J----, lying near me, laughed as he rescued and appropriated the burning pork! The man did not hear the last of that frying-pan incident for months; yet he was a brave fellow, and afterwards did his duty nobly in the face of far greater danger than any we saw that day. Men will do queer things in battle. I knew of a regiment sent to support a battery when the enemy was about to charge. The men went to their post at the double quick with fixed bayonets, and just in front of the battery they were ordered to lie down so that the guns might fire over their heads. As they did so one man accidentally pricked another with his bayonet and the fellow, enraged, struck at him. They dared not stand up to fight for fear of having their heads blown off by the battery close behind and therefore, on their knees, under the guns they had it out in a fisticuff duel before the officers could interfere and stop them. We lost only a few men at Fredericksburg but we gained a great experience. The battle took place in December and after it the army went into winter quarters. A field officer from one of the old regiments of the brigade was detailed to command us in the protracted absence of our colonel. He knew our defects. We needed drill. He gave it to us without stint and worked us as we had never been worked before--company and skirmish drill in the morning, battalion drill all the afternoon, so that after the evening dress parade we were as weary as bricklayers. Nothing escaped his notice; he made you feel that his eyes were on you personally and his orders came in a sharp, explosive tone that made men jump. After an hour's hard work on the drill ground, some of us would grow careless, and then that rasping voice would startle the whole battalion. "Why don't that man hold that gun _properly_?" and a half dozen muskets would straighten up with a jerk.