After the battle of Chickamauga, one of "our mess" found a needle case which had belonged to some poor fellow, probably among the killed. He did not place much value upon the contents, although there was a paper of No. 8 needles, several buttons, and a skein or two of thread, cut at each end and neatly braided so that each thread could be smoothly drawn out. He put the whole thing in his breast-pocket, and thought no more about it. But one day while out foraging for himself and his mess, he found himself near a house where money could have procured a meal of fried chicken, corn-pone, and buttermilk, besides a small supply to carry back to camp. But Confederate soldiers' purses were generally as empty as their stomachs, and in this instance the lady of the house did not offer to give away her nice dinner. While the poor fellow was inhaling the enticing odor, and feeling desperately hungry, a girl rode up to the gate on horseback, and bawled out to another girl inside the house, "Oh, Cindy, I rid over to see if you couldn't lend me a needle. I broke the last one I had to-day, and pap says thar ain't nary 'nother to be bought in the country hereabouts!" Cindy declared she was in the same fix, and couldn't finish her new homespun dress for that reason. The soldier just then had an idea. He retired to a little distance, pulled out his case, sticking two needles on the front of his jacket, then went back and offered one of them, with his best bow, to the girl on the horse. Right away the lady of the house offered to trade for the one remaining. The result was a plentiful dinner for himself; and in consideration of a thread or two of silk, a full haversack and canteen. After this our mess was well supplied, and our forager began to look sleek and fat. The secret of his success did not leak out till long afterward, when he astonished the boys by declaring he "had been 'living like a fighting-cock' on a paper of needles and two skeins of silk." "And," added father, "if he had paid for all the meals he got in Confederate money, the amount would have been far more than ten dollars." I know other boys and girls will think this a queer story, but I hope they will like it as well as mother and Loo and I did. DESPAIR AT HOME--HEROISM AT THE FRONT [Major Robert Stiles, in Four Years Under Marse Robert, pages 349-350.] There is one feature of our Confederate struggle, to which I have already made two or three indirect allusions, as to which there has been such a strange popular misapprehension that I feel as if there rested upon the men who thoroughly understand the situation a solemn obligation to bring out strongly and clearly the sound and true view of the matter. I refer to an impression, quite common, that the desertions from the Confederate armies, especially in the latter part of the war, indicated a general lack of devotion to the cause on the part of the men in the ranks.