April 10. —We have made another move, and are now at “Brashear City,”— on the embouchure of the Atchafalaya, — a city which consists of a wharf and a railroad-depot, and but little besides. My feet rest in the crushed clover, upon which our blankets were spread as we slept last night; and through the opening of the tent, just far enough off” to prevent our being swept away by the tail of some enterprising alligator, I see flowing the bayou, with sugar-houses on the opposite shore, and cypresses behind, — the tall, dark trees that tell of swamps.
We are close on the enemy again. A strong fort, in their hands, is only seven miles distant; and yesterday afternoon we marched to the sound of distant firing from Weitzel’s advanced corps. During the night, too, the air was pervaded with the sublime shiver and boom of distant cannonading. I sit in clover, for the time being: but every minute I expect the drum-call; for we are here only temporarily, in light order, and expecting rapid and severe movements.
We took up the line of march yesterday under circumstances which I have several times described, — brilliant enough, but becoming now an old story; though I own I am not so hardened that I was not thrilled to hear a fine, full band play, “The dearest spot on earth to me is home,” followed by a regiment stepping strongly to the air. It proved to be, by all odds, our hardest march for me; although it was only about nine miles. The sun was bitterly hot, and the dust heavy. For the first time in my soldiering, with a red face and blistered feet, I was obliged to turn aside from the regiment, and stop under a tree to throw away part of my load. It was not, however, until men in whole sections had been wheeling up, and stopping by the roadside for a long time; so that I had a good part of the regiment for company in my first falling-out.
I have now seen numbers of streams and much country, and am familiar with the strange aspects of a Louisiana landscape. Of course, we know, that, on this globe, water plays the principal part, and land is secondary. As Northerners know nature, however, it is land that is most exulting, bounding, as it does, into hills, standing kingly in mountains; while water, more humble, hides in glens, or flows in submissive rivers before the feet of lordly ranges. Here, however, water bears itself arrogantly, — floating sometimes above the level of the soil; sometimes just even with it, as here, where the ripples of the brimful stream threaten the clover-flowers, which are scarcely above them. Meanwhile, a furlong or so in the rear, is the swamp, as ever, close at hand,—the traitor in the heart, ready to help the foe outside. Water is thus haughty and encroaching; while land is a poor, cowed, second-fiddle-playing creature, — only existing, apparently, that water may have something to pour itself out over and exhibit itself upon.
Then, too, the painful sycophancy of the vegetable kingdom! It owes its whole existence and consequence to land, if any thing does; yet here, like a set of falsehearted flatterers, trees and weeds go toadying the ruling power. The forests are watery: old trunks robe themselves in moss, counterfeiting the appearance of discolored growths of coral; and, along the brinks of bayous, stout-hearted live-oaks even, that ought to be ashamed of themselves, bend almost horizontally over the currents, or indeed, sometimes, as in one case right here in our camp, hold on by the roots, and grow downward almost, letting the water flow around and over them, just raising their tops above the stream, a rod or , two out from shore, — all this fawning and hanging-on, instead of growing straight up, and flinging out their tops like independent and self-respecting growths!
