63
                 The Dayton Plantation.
negro-brigade in the absence of its chief -
set off to visit the colored regiment.  I found
it immensely exhilarating to be in the saddle
again with a good horse under me, and we
went ahead at a slapping pace.  As I had oc-
casion to describe the locality and the place I
visited in a                                            
future letter                                           
the the Trib-                                          
une (inserted                                          
at page 85-7-9)                                     
I need say                                              
nothing of it                                           
here.  We                                               
gained the                                              
Drayton                                                 
plantation                                               
just in time                                             
to escape a                                              
violent storm
which we

[photograph]
Major-General David Hunter.

[Gunn�s diary continued]
	had forseen
	all along
	Having wit-
	nessed an ex-     
	tempore re-
	view or dress
	parade of the
	negro troops
	afterwards,
	we stopped
	about the vi-
	cinity, among
	the trees by
	the pond, and
	out, by a
shell-path through the marshes to the restless
sea, the shore of which was paved with innumer-
able gigantic oysters, growing upwards perpendi-
cularly; adhering below, as it were, by their hin-
ges. (I had never thought how oysters did
grow and the discovery was a revelation to me.)