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41 Journal adapted from the camp diary of ThomasWentworth Higginson,December 1862 As winter advances, butterflies gradually disappear. One species (a Vanessa) lingers; three others have vanished since I came.The colored people all say that it will be much cooler, but my officers do not think so, perhaps because last winter was so unusually mild—with only one frost, they say. K Last night the water froze in the adjutant’s tent, but not in mine.To-day has been mild and beautiful. The blacks say they do not feel the cold so much as the white officers do, and perhaps it is so. K 42 Beside the superb branch of uneatable bitter oranges which decks my tent-pole, I have to-day hung up a long bough of finger-sponge, which floated to the riverbank. K Many things glide by without the time to narrate them. K I should think the colored people would suffer and complain these cold nights; but they say nothing, though there is a good deal of coughing. I should fancy that the scarlet trousers must do something to keep them warm, and wonder that they dislike them so much, when they are so much like their beloved fires. They certainly multiple firelight in any case. I often notice that an infinitesimal flame, with one soldier standing by it, looks like quite a respectable conflagration. ...

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