The patriotic motives which induced Sergeant May to quit his pleasant home in the beautiful valley of the Tomhannock, for the privations, hardships, and dangers of military life, have always proved him to be a true and warm sympathizer in his country's cause. It was evidently not the mere love of adventure, or the mere pageantry or glory of war, that led him to make the great sacrifice. He has been with us in every conflict, and shared with us the varied fortunes of the Harris Light. His death, which he would rather have met on the field of strife, battling manfully against traitors, was reserved for the calm and quiet of the camp, where he spent his last moments urging his comrades to "cheer up and fight on," offering as his dying reason, that "our cause is just, and must triumph." Such a death is a rich legacy to a command. "He being dead, yet speaketh." We would emulate his virtues. _February 12._--On recommendation of Lieutenant Frederick C. Lord, I was to-day appointed by Colonel Kilpatrick First Sergeant of Company E, vice Henry Temple, promoted to Sergeant Major. My appointment is to date from the first of January, making me a very desirable New Year's gift, which I shall strive to honor. _February 22._--Snow has been falling uninterruptedly the livelong day, and yet the boys have been unusually merry, as they were wont to be on this anniversary before the war. Our celebration has been on a scanty scale, and yet we have felt the patriotic stimulus which comes from the great men and days of the past. And truly, the birth of the great Washington gives birth to many interesting thoughts, especially at this period of our history. A national salute has been fired from our fortifications on the Potomac, and the whole country round about us has been made to reverberate with the sound that welcomes in the day. But all these patriotic manifestations have not prevented the snow-storm and the cold. When we left our home in the North for what was termed "the sunny South," we little expected to find such storms as this here. While the summers are much cooler than we expected to find them, the days being generally fanned by a beautiful sea-breeze, the winters exceed for cold our highest expectation. The cold is not continuous, but very severe. We have seen the soft ground and water-puddles freeze sufficiently in one night to bear a horse; and in several days and nights the frost has penetrated the earth several inches deep. The snow-storm of to-day is as severe as most storms experienced in the North. The wind has howled from the north-west, burdened with its cold, feathery flakes, which to-night lie at least twelve inches deep in places undisturbed. It is such a storm as our suffering pickets, and indeed our entire army, cannot soon forget.