Sketches of the campaign in northern Mexico : in eighteen hundred forty-six and seven / by an officer of the First Regiment of Ohio volunteers.

I-IOMEWARD MARCH. 335
ward march was a joyful one, though over a road then numerously dotted with the skeletons of men and animals. Roofless and ruined ranchos, and many a dark and smoldering
heap of ashes, told the disasters in which the people had
involved themselves by throwing off their neutrality and
entering npon a career of pillage and massacre. Truly' they that plow iniquity and sow wickedness shall reap the
same." The hot season had again returned, and in consequence of the low water in the Rio Grande, the land route
was lengthened to Reynosa and MIatamoros. In the center
of the march we met several detachments of troops who had
lately arrived in the country; and after exchanging the military salutations usual on such occasions, many a merry laugh
would escape from our men, as they contrasted their own
burnt visages, flowing beards and soiled and ragged attire
with the fresh complexions and perfect appointments of the
new levies. But the day after our landing in New Orleans,
the barbers and tailors of that city, accomplished such magical changes in their appearance, that it was no uncommon
thing for officers and men who had served side by side
throughout the campaign to pass each other as strangers in
the streets.
In descending the Rio Grande, then diminished to a mere
creek, it was difficult to realize that it was the same stream
upon whose turbid and swollen current we had floated the
previous summer. Its banks relieved from that inundation,
appeared quite lofty and wore a more inviting and healthful
aspect. It was a bright evening in June, 1847, when our
eyes were once more gladdened by the blu'?wave; "df the