WHAT THE MASSACHUSETTS EIGHTH HAD BEEN DOING.
Meantime General Butler's command, the Massachusetts Eighth, had been busy knocking disorder in the head.
Presently after their landing, and before they were refreshed, they pushed companies out to occupy the railroad-track beyond the town.
They found it torn up. No doubt the scamps who did the shabby job fancied that there would be no more travel that way until strawberry-time. They fancied the Yankees would sit down on the fences and begin to whittle white-oak toothpicks, darning the rebels, through their noses, meanwhile.
I know these men of the Eighth can whittle, and I presume they can say "Darn it," if occasion requires; but just now track-laying was the business on hand.
"Wanted, experienced track-layers!" was the word along the files.
All at once the line of the road became densely populated with experienced track-layers, fresh from Massachusetts.
Presto change! the rails were relaid, spiked, and the roadway levelled and better ballasted than any road I ever saw south of Mason and Dixon's line. "We must leave a good job for these folks to model after," say the Massachusetts Eighth.
A track without a train is as useless as a gun without a man. Train and engine must be had. "Uncle Sam's mails and troops cannot be stopped
