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other friends. But our supplies were wholly insufficient to meet any but the most limited demand, and we could extend our invitations to but few. Most of the prisoners had to put up with the hard bread and coffee, during the two days and nights we remained on board.
Just before dark, the clerk of the boat came on the after-deck to distribute the keys of the few state-rooms assigned to us, which until then had been kept locked. The North Carolina officers had the berths in the dining saloon. There were,, as already mentioned, about twenty-two state-rooms altogether, in the upper after cabin, and one or two of these were used for different purposes by the officers of the boat, and one or two others could accommodate but one person each. It was obvious that not more than one-third of us would get any beds. Here again I was very fortunate, for I happened to be standing by Governor Morehead, to whom the clerk gave the first key, and I was able to secure one. Those who failed to obtain berths, either in the dining saloon or state-rooms, and they constituted a very large majority of the party, had no alternative, but to drop down wherever they could, and try to sleep. After those who had beds had retired, the cabin presented a scene that no man who was present will be likely to forget. It was densely packed with men, in every possible position. Upon each of the hard wooden settees two or three persons had contrived to stow themselves in half recumbent positions, that were little likely to afford them the desired rest. Those who had chairs were sleeping on them, some sitting bolt upright, and some leaning back against the sides of the cabin. But many could get neither chairs nor places on the settees, and these were lying or sitting upon the floor. Over the latter had been strewn bread and pieces of fat pork, all of which being saturated with the expectorations of numberless tobacco chewers, had been trampled into a consistent mass of filth, by the feet of one hundred and fifty men. Some of the unfortunates, whom absolute weariness had compelled to lie down on the floor, were lucky enough, as they esteemed themselves, to obtain some newspapers, which they spread
