recognized our friend, having seen her at Harbin, the home of her aunt, so accosted her with “Halloo Leize and Sallie. There are Leize and Sallie.” They had mistaken me for her sister. My sister in a quiet manner and voice asked to speak to their commanding officer. This caused them to stand back while one went for the officer. After a while, which seemed much longer than it really was, the officer (I believe a colonel) rode up and asked her business. She told him we were on our way to a neighboring plantation to make a friendly visit and return, and asked his protection for the trip. He told her he was obliged to detain us where we were for a time, but we should be protected. That as he had to march on with his command he would leave us in charge of a guard. This he did at once, so that in a very short time our guards were the only soldiers in sight except one that was sent back with a dispatch to the Major of the fifty-fifth. While he was waiting for the major and his men to come up he sat at the root of a large pine and played beautiful music on a very sweet flute that he had stolen from one of the plantations. I had heard that flute so often, it belonged to Rene Jervey. As we were circumstanced it was better to assume a friendliness of manner with our guard who was a very polite Canadian named Alfred Brett. He said he was only fighting for his pay, that he did not care which side whipped. After listening to his yarns for some hours my sister asked him why he was detaining us and how long he meant to keep us there. He replied “I must keep you until General Hartwell’s division passes. He has many regiments of colored troops and if you should meet them I could not answer for the consequences, they are coming by the same road you are going.” My sister said “But if you will allow us, we will return straight home by the same road we came.” He agreed to this and told Tom to hitch up, which Tom did with the sorry horse he gave in place of our beautiful one he stole. He did not wish the other so let us keep him. This certainly gave us a pair of wretchedly matched horses, one large gray and the other a small red hack that loped all the time in harness that was so large it could scarcely be kept on. While guarding us Mr. Brett had an eye to self. He asked Tom very particularly about one of my father’s sulky horses, a very fine iron gray named “Beauregard,” where he was kept and so on, and said he wanted him. Tom suspecting mischief consulted with our foreman as soon as we reached home and between them they determined to save the horse, and lost no time about it. They took my father into their confidence.