28th.—The girls are in Richmond, staying at Dr. G’s. They went in to attend a tournament to be given to-day by General Jenkins’s Brigade, stationed near Richmond; but this morning the brigade was ordered to go South, and great was the disappointment of the young people. They cannot feel as we do during these gloomy times, but are always ready to catch the “passing pleasure as it flies,” forgetting that, in the best times,
“Pleasures are like poppies spread:
You seize the flower, the bloom is shed.”
And how much more uncertain are they now, when we literally cannot tell what a day may bring forth, and none of us know, when we arise in the morning, that we may not hear before noonday that we have been shorn of all that makes life dear!