We left Feliciana in the morning, and ran down the New Orleans and Ohio railroad to Union City, 18 miles, thence on the Mobile and Ohio road to Humboldt, which we reached by five o'clock in the evening. It had now grown dusk. During this time, I had mastered the working of the engine, when all was in good order; had noted the amount of steam necessary to run the train, the uses of the various parts of the engine, and had actually had the handling of the locomotive much of the way. When we reached Humboldt, where we took the Memphis and Clarksville railroad for Paris and Bowling Green, the engineer, Charles Little, refused to run the train on during the night, as he was not well acquainted with the road, and thought it dangerous. In addition, the head-light of the locomotive being out of order, and the oil frozen, he could not make it burn, and he could not possibly run without it. Colonel Williams grew angry, probably suspecting him of Union sentiments, and of wishing to delay the train, cursed him rather roundly, and at length told him he should run it under a guard; adding, to the guard already on the engine, "If any accident occurs, shoot the cursed Yankee." Little was a Northern man. Upon the threat thus enforced, the engineer seemed to yield, and prepared to start the train. As if having forgotten an important matter, he said, hastily, "Oh, I must have some oil," and stepping down off the locomotive, walked toward the engine-house. When he was about twenty yards from the cars, the guard thought of their duty, and one of them followed Little, and called upon him to halt; but in a moment he was behind the machine-shop, and off in the dense woods, in the deep darkness. The commotion soon brought the colonel and a crowd, and while they were cursing each other all round, the firemen and most of the brakemen slipped off, and here we were with no means of getting ahead. All this time I had stood on the engine, rather enjoying the _melee_, but taking no part in it, when Colonel Williams, turning to me, said, "Can not you run the engine?" I replied, "No, sir." "You have been on it as we came down." "Yes, sir, as a matter of curiosity." "Don't you know how to start and stop her!" "Yes, that is easy enough; but if any thing should go wrong I could not adjust it." "No difference, no difference, sir; I must be at Bowling Green to-morrow, and you must put us through." I looked him in the eye, and said calmly, "Colonel Williams, I can not voluntarily take the responsibility of managing a train with a thousand men aboard, nor will I be forced to do it under a guard who know nothing about an engine, and who would be as likely to shoot me for doing my duty as failing to do it; but if you will find among the men a fireman, send away this guard, and come yourself on the locomotive, I will do the best I can."