One dark rainy night, about the 21st, I believe, Willis and I were both on the picket detail. It came my time for vedette duty, and Willis was the sergeant to do the escort act. There had been skirmishing on this part of the line the preceding day, but at sunset, or the hour for sunset if the weather had been fair, the firing had ceased as we marched up and relieved the old pickets. We were in the woods, the most of us, but just here, on the right of our own detail, there were a few rifle-pits in the open, the opposing skirmish, lines being perhaps four hundred yards apart, and our vedette posts--we maintained them only at night--being about sixty yards in advance of our pits, and always composed of three men for each post. We found our three men numb with, cold, two lying near the edge o£ the woods, in a big hole made by a shell, while the other stood guard. They had seen nothing and heard nothing except the ordinary sounds of the night. The clouds reflected the peculiar glow of many fires in front. It was not long till day. The two men, my companions on post, whispered together, and then proposed that I should take the first watch. Willis had returned to the line with the relieved vedettes. I had no objection to taking the first watch, yet I hesitated, simply because the two men had whispered. I fancied there was some reason for the request, and I asked bluntly why they had decided it was my turn without giving me a voice in the matter. You know it is the custom to decide such affairs by lot, unless some man volunteers for the worst place. They replied that they were old friends, and that as I was a stranger to them, the detail being made up from various companies, they preferred lying together. This explanation did not seem very satisfactory, for the reason that in two hours we should all be relieved; yet I consented, and they lay down in the hole, which was little more than a mud-puddle, for fear of some sudden volley from the rebels.