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I was again back at the “Cedars,” after the rapid and shifting
scenes which I have endeavored to place before the reader.

The tragic incidents befalling the actors in this drama, had
most absorbed my attention; but sitting now in my tent, with
the newspapers before me, I looked at the fight in which I had
participated, from the general and historic point of view.

That heavy advance on the Boydton road, beyond Lee's right,
had been simultaneous with a determined assault on the Confederate
left, north of James River, and on Lee's centre opposite
Petersburg; and now the extracts from Northern journals clearly
indicated that the movement was meant to be decisive.

“I have Richmond by the throat!” General Grant had telegraphed;
but there was good ground to believe that the heavy
attack, and the eloquent dispatch, were both meant to “make capital”
for the approaching Presidential election.

These memoirs, my dear reader, are written chiefly to record
some incidents which I witnessed during the war. I have neither
time nor space for political comments. But I laid my hand
yesterday, by accident, on an old number of the Examiner newspaper;
and it chanced to contain an editorial on the fight just
described, with some penetrating views on the “situation” at
that time.

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Shall I quote a paragraph from the yellow old paper? It will
be bitter—we were all bitter in those days! though to-day we
are so fraternal and harmonious. With his trenchant pen, Daniel
pierced to the core of the matter; and the paper may give some
idea of the spirit of the times.

I could fancy the great satirist sitting in his lonely study, and
penning the lines I shall quote, not without grim smiles at his
own mordant humor.

Here is the slip I cut out. The old familiar heading may recall
those times to some readers, as clearly as the biting sentences,
once read, perhaps, by the camp-fire.

DAILY EXAMINER.

MONDAY MORNING OCT. 31, 1864.

“Every day must now bring its brilliant bulletin to the Yankee
nation. That nation does not regard the punctual rising of the
sun as more lawfully due to it than a victory every morning.
And those glorious achievements of Sheridan in the Valley were
grown cold and stale, and even plainly hollow and rotten—insomuch
that after totally annihilating the army of Early at least
three times, and so clearing the way to Lynchburg, instead of
marching up to Lynchburg the heroick victor goes whirling down
to Winchester. Then the superb victory obtained on Sunday of
last week over Price in Missouri, has taken a certain bogus tint,
which causes many to believe that there was, in fact, no victory
and no battle. This would not do. Something fresh must be
had; something electrifying; above all, something that would
set the people to cheering and firing off salutes about the very
day of the election;—something, too, that could not be plainly
contradicted by the events till after that critical day—then let
the contradiction come and welcome: your true Yankee will only
laugh.

“From this necessity came the great `reconnoissance in force'
of last Thursday on our lines before Richmond and Petersburg; a
`reconnoissance' in very heavy force indeed upon three points

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of our front at once both north and south of the James river; so
that it may be very properly considered as three reconnoissances
in force; made with a view of feeling, as it were, Lee's position;
and the object of the three reconnoissances having been fully attained—
that is, Lee having been felt—they retired. That is the
way in which the transactions of Thursday last are to appear in
Stanton's bulletin, we may be all quite sure; and this representation,
together with the occupation of a part of the Boydton
plank-road (which road the newspapers can call for a few days
the Southside Road) will cause every city from Boston to Milwaukee
to fire off its inevitable hundred guns. Thus, the Presidential
election will be served, just in the nick of time; for that
emergency it is not the real victory which is wanted, so much as
the jubliation, glorification and cannon salutes.

“Even when the truth comes to be fully known that this was
the grand pre-election assault itself: the resistless advance on
Richmond which was to lift the Abolitionists into power again
upon a swelling high-tide of glory unutterable—easily repulsed
and sent rolling back with a loss of about six or seven thousand
men in killed, wounded and prisoners; even when this is known,
does the reader imagine that the Yankee nation will be discouraged?
Very far from it. On the contrary it will be easily made
to appear that from these `reconnoissances in force,' an advantage
has been gained, which is to make the next advance a sure
and overwhelming success. For the fact is, that a day was chosen
for this mighty movement, when the wind was southerly, a soft
and gentle breeze, which wafted the odour of the Yankee
whiskey-rations to the nostrils of Confederate soldiers. The Confederates
ought to have been taken by surprise that morning;
but the moment they snuffed the tainted gale, they knew what
was to be the morning's work. Not more unerring is the instinct
which calls the vulture to the battle-field before a drop of blood
is shed; or that which makes the kites `know well the long
`stern swell, that bids the Romans close;' than the sure induction
of our army that the Yankees are coming on, when morn or
noon or dewy eve breathes along the whole line a perfumed
savour of the ancient rye. The way in which this discovery
may be improved is plain. It will be felt and understood

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throughout the intelligent North, that it gives them at last the
key to Richmond. They will say—Those rebels, to leeward of
us, smell the rising valour of our loyal soldiers: the filling and
emptying of a hundred thousand canteens perfumes the sweet
South as if it had passed over a bed of violets, stealing and giving
odours:—when the wind is southerly it will be said, rebels know
a hawk from a handsaw. Therefore it is but making our next
grand assault on some morning when they are to windward of
us—creeping up, in the lee of Lee, as if he were a stag—and
Richmond is ours.”

That is savage, and sounds unfraternal to-day, when peace and
good feeling reign—when the walls of the Virginia capitol reecho
the stately voices of the conscript fathers of the great commonwealth
and mother of States: conscript fathers bringing
their wisdom, mature study, and experience to the work of still
further improving the work of Jefferson, Mason, and Washington.

“I have Richmond by the throat!” General Grant wrote in
October, 1864.

In February, 1868, when these lines are written, black hands
have got Virginia by the throat, and she is suffocating; Cuffee
grins, Cuffee gabbles—the groans of the “Old Mother” make him
laugh.

Messieurs of the great Northwest, she gave you being, and
suckled you! Are you going to see her strangled before your
very eyes?

In truth, if not held by the throat, as General Grant announced,
Richmond and all the South in that autumn of 1864, was staggering,
suffocating, reeling to and fro under the immense incubus
of all-destroying war.

At that time black was the “only wear,” and widows and

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orphans were crying in every house throughout the land. Bread and
meat had become no longer necessaries, but luxuries. Whole
families of the old aristocracy lived on crusts, and even by charity.
Respectable people in Richmond went to the “soup-houses.” Men
once rich, were penniless, and borrowed to live. Provisions
were incredibly dear. Flour was hundreds of dollars a barrel;
bacon ten dollars a pound; coffee and tea had become unknown
almost. Boots were seven hundred dollars a pair. The poor
skinned the dead horses on battle-fields to make shoes. Horses
cost five thousand dollars. Cloth was two hundred dollars a
yard. Sorghum had taken the place of sugar. Salt was sold by
the ounce. Quinine was one dollar a grain. Paper to write upon
was torn from old blank books. The ten or twenty dollars which
the soldiers received for their monthly pay, was about sufficient
to buy a sheet, a pen, and a little ink to write home to their starving
families that they too were starving.

In town and country the atmosphere seemed charged with
coming ruin. All things were in confusion. Everywhere something
jarred. The executive was unpopular. The heads of departments
were inefficient. The army was unfed. The finances
were mismanaged. In Congress the opposition bitterly criticised
President Davis. The press resounded with fierce diatribes, pro
and con, on all subjects. The Examiner attacked the government,
and denounced the whole administration of affairs. The
Sentinel replied to the attacks, and defended the assailed officials.
One could see nothing that was good. The other could see
nothing that was bad. Their readers adopted their opinions;
looking through glasses that were deep green, or else couleur de
rose. But the green glasses outnumbered the rose-colored more
and more every day.

Thus, in the streets of the city, and in the shades of the country,
all was turmoil, confusion—a hopeless brooding on the hours
that were coming. War was no longer an affair of the border
and outpost. Federal cavalry scoured the woods, tearing the
last mouthful from the poor people. Federal cannon were thundering
in front of the ramparts of the cities. In the country, the
faint-hearted gathered at the court-houses and cross-roads to comment
on the times, and groan. In the cities, cowards croaked in

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the market-places. In the country, men were hiding their meat
in garrets and cellars—concealing their corn in pens, lost in the
depths of the woods. In the towns, the forestallers hoarded flour,
and sugar, and salt in their warehouses, to await famine prices.
The vultures of troubled times flapped their wings and croaked
joyfully. Extortioners rolled in their chariots. Hucksters
laughed as they counted their gains. Blockade-runners drank
their champagne, jingled their coin, and dodged the conscript
officers.

The rich were very rich and insolent. The poor were wantstricken
and despairing. Fathers gazed at their childrens' pale
faces, and knew not where to find food for them. Mothers
hugged their frail infants to bosoms drained by famine. Want
gnawed at the vitals. Despair had come, like a black and poisonous
mist, to strangle the heart.

The soldiers were agonized by maddening letters from their
families. Their fainting loved ones called for help. “Father!
come home!” moaned the children, with gaunt faces, crying for
bread. “Husband, come home!” murmured the pale wife, with
her half-dead infant in her arms. And the mothers—the mothers—
ah! the mothers! They did not say, “Come home!” to their
brave boys in the army; they were too proud for that—too faithful
to the end. They did not summon them to come home; they
only knelt down and prayed: “God, end this cruel war! Only
give me back my boy! Do not bereave me of my child! The
cause is lost—his blood not needed! God, pity me and give me
back my boy!”

So that strange autumn of that strange year, 1864, wore on.
The country was oppressed as by some hideous nightmare; and
Government was silent.

The army alone, kept heart of hope—Lee's old soldiers defied
the enemy to the last.

[figure description] Page 325.[end figure description]

They called themselves “Lee's Miserables.”

That was a grim piece of humor, was it not, reader? And the
name had had a somewhat curious origin. Victor Hugo's work, Les
Misérables, had been translated and published by a house in Richmond;
the soldiers, in the great dearth of reading matter, had
seized upon it; and thus, by a strange chance the tragic story of
the great French writer, had become known to the soldiers in the
trenches. Everywhere, you might see the gaunt figures in their
tattered jackets bending over the dingy pamphlets—“Fantine,”
“Cosette,” or “Marius,” or “St. Denis,”—and the woes of
“Jean Valjean,” the old galley-slave, found an echo in the
hearts of these brave soldiers, immured in the trenches and fettered
by duty to their muskets or their cannon.

Singular fortune of a writer! Happy M. Hugo! Your fancies
crossed the ocean, and, transmitted into a new tongue, whiled
away the dreary hours of the old soldiers of Lee, at Petersburg!

Thus, that history of “The Wretched,” was the pabulum of the
South in 1864; and as the French title had been retained on the
backs of the pamphlets, the soldiers, little familiar with the Gallic
pronunciation, called the book “Lees Miserables!” Then another
step was taken. It was no longer the book, but themselves whom
they referred to by that name. The old veterans of the army
thenceforth laughed at their miseries, and dubbed themselves
grimly “Lee's Miserables!”*

The sobriquet was gloomy, and there was something tragic in
the employment of it; but it was applicable. Like most popular
terms, it expressed the exact thought in the mind of every one—
coined the situation into a phrase.

Truly, they were “The Wretched,”—the soldiers of the army
of Northern Virginia, in the fall and winter of 1864. They had a

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quarter of a pound of rancid “Nassau bacon”—from New England—
for daily rations of meat. The handful of flour, or cornmeal,
which they received, was musty. Coffee and sugar were
doled out as a luxury, now and then only; and the microscopic
ration became a jest to those who looked at it. A little “grease”
and cornbread—the grease rancid, and the bread musty—these
were the food of the army.

Their clothes, blankets, and shoes were no better—even worse.
Only at long intervals could the Government issue new ones to
them. Thus the army was in tatters. The old clothes hung on
the men like scarecrows. Their gray jackets were in rags, and
did not keep out the chilly wind sweeping over the frozen fields.
Their old blankets were in shreds, and gave them little warmth
when they wrapped themselves up in them, shivering in the long
cold nights. The old shoes, patched and yawning, had served in
many a march and battle—and now allowed the naked sole to
touch the hard and frosty ground.

Happy the man with a new blanket! Proud the possessor of a
whole roundabout! What millionaire or favorite child of fortune
passes yonder—the owner of an unpatched pair of shoes?

Such were the rations and clothing of the army at that epoch;—
rancid grease, musty meal, tattered jackets, and worn-out shoes.
And these were the fortunate ones! Whole divisions often went
without bread even, for two whole days. Thousands had no jackets,
no blankets, and no shoes. Gaunt forms, in ragged old shirts
and torn pantaloons only, clutched the musket. At night they
huddled together for warmth by the fire in the trenches. When
they charged, their naked feet left blood-marks on the abatis
through which they went at the enemy.

That is not an exaggeration, reader. These facts are of record.

And that was a part only. It was not only famine and hardship
which they underwent, but the incessant combats—and mortal
tedium—of the trenches. Ah! the trenches! Those words
summed up a whole volume of suffering. No longer fighting in
open field; no longer winter-quarters, with power to range; no
longer freedom, fresh air, healthful movement—the trenches!

Here, cooped up and hampered at every turn, they fought
through all those long months of the dark autumn and winter of

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1864. They were no longer men, but machines loading and firing
the musket and the cannon. Burrowing in their holes, and subterranean
covered-ways, they crouched in the darkness, rose at
the sound of coming battle, manned the breastworks, or trained
the cannon—day after day, week after week, month after month,
they were there in the trenches at their grim work; and some
fiat of Destiny seemed to have chained them there to battle forever!
At midnight, as at noon, they were at their posts. In the
darkness, dusky figures could be seen swinging the sponge-staff,
swabbing the cannon, driving home the charge. In the starlight,
the moonlight, or the gloom lit by the red glare, those figures,
resembling phantoms, were seen marshalled behind the breastworks
to repel the coming assault. Silence had fled from the
trenches—the crash of musketry and the bellow of artillery had
replaced it. That seemed never to cease. The men were rocked
to sleep by it. They slept on in the dark trenches, though the
mortar-shells rose, described their flaming curves, and, bursting,
rained jagged fragments of iron upon them. And to many that
was their last sleep. The iron tore them in their tattered blankets.
They rose gasping, and streaming with blood. Then they
staggered and fell; when you passed by, you saw a something
lying on the ground, covered with the old blanket. It was one
of “Lee's Miserables,” killed last night by the mortars—and gone
to answer, “Here!” before the Master.

The trenches!—ah! the trenches! Were you in them, reader?
Thousands will tell you more of them than I can. There, an historic
army was guarding the capital of an historic nation—the
great nation of Virginia—and how they guarded it! In hunger,
and cold, and nakedness, they guarded it still. In the bright days
and the dark, they stood at their posts unmoved. In the black
night-watches as by day—toward morning, as at evening—they
stood, clutching the musket, peering out into the pitchy darkness;
or lay, dozing around the grim cannon, in the embrasures. Hunger,
and cold, and wounds, and the whispering voice of Despair,
had no effect on them. The mortal tedium left them patient.
When you saw the gaunt faces contract, and tears flow, it was because
they had received some letter, saying that their wives and children
were starving. Many could not endure that. It made them

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forget all. Torn with anguish, and unable to obtain furloughs for
a day even, they went home without leave—and civilians called
them deserters. Could such men be shot—men who had fought
like heroes, and only committed this breach of discipline that they
might feed their starving children? And, after all, it was not
desertion that chiefly reduced Lee's strength. It was battle
which cut down the army—wounds and exposure which thinned
its ranks. But thin as they were, and ever growing thinner, the
old veterans who remained by the flag of such glorious memories,
were as defiant in this dark winter of 1864, as they had been in
the summer days of 1862 and 1863.

Army of Northern Virginia!—old soldiers of Lee, who fought
beside your captain until your frames were wasted, and you were
truly his “wretched” ones—you are greater to me in your
wretchedness, more splendid in your rags, than the Old Guard of
Napoleon, or the three hundred of Thermopylæ! Neither famine,
nor nakedness, nor suffering, could break your spirit. You
were tattered and half-starved; your forms were war-worn; but
you still had faith in Lee, and the great cause which you bore
aloft on the points of your bayonets. You did not shrink in the
last hour—the hour of supreme trial. You meant to follow Lee
to the last. If you ever doubted the result, you had resolved, at
least, on one thing—to clutch the musket, to the end, and die in
harness!

Is that extravagance—and is this picture of the great army of
Northern Virginia overdrawn? Did they or did they not fight to
the end? Answer! Wilderness, Spottsylvania, Cold Harbor,
Charles City, every spot around Petersburg where they closed in
death-grapple with the swarming enemy! Answer! winter of'
64,—bleak spring of '65,—terrible days of the great retreat when
hunted down and driven to bay like wild animals, they fought
from Five Forks to Appomattox Court-House—fought staggering,
and starving, and falling—but defiant to the last!

Bearded men were seen crying on the ninth of April, 1865.
But it was surrender which wrung their hearts, and brought tears
to the grim faces.

Grant's cannon had only made “Lee's Miserables” cheer and
laugh.

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These memories are not cheerful. Let us pass to scenes more
sunny—and there were many in that depressing epoch. The
cloud was dark—but in spite of General Grant, the sun would
shine sometimes!

After reading the Examiner's comments, I mounted my horse
and rode into Petersburg, where I spent a pleasant hour in conversation
with a friend, Captain Max. Do you laugh still, my
dear Max? Health and happiness attend you and yours, my
hearty!

As I got into the saddle again, the enemy began a brisk shelling.
The shell skimmed the roofs of the houses, with an unearthly
scream; and one struck a chimney which it hurled down
with a tremendous crash. In spite of all, however, the streets
were filled with young women, who continued to walk quietly,
or to trip along laughing and careless, to buy a riband or some
trifle at the stores.* That seemed singular then, and seems more
singular to-day. But there is nothing like being accustomed to
any thing—and the shelling had now “lost its interest,” and
troubled nobody.

“Good!” I said, laughing, “our friends yonder are paying us
their respects to-day. They have dined probably on the tons of
turkey sent from New England, and are amusing themselves
shelling us by way of dessert.”

And wishing to have a better view of the lines, I rode toward
Blandford.

Do you remember the ivy-draped ruins of the old “Blandford
church,” my dear reader? This is one of our Virginia antiquities,
and is worth seeing. Around the ruins the large graveyard is
full of elegant tombstones. Many are shattered to-day, however,
by the Federal shell, as the spot was near the breastworks, and in
full range of their artillery.

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In fact it was not a place to visit in the fall of 1864, unless you
were fond of shell and a stray bullet. I was somewhat surprised,
therefore, as I rode into the enclosure—with a hot skirmish going
on a few hundred yards off—to see a young officer and a maiden
sitting on a grass bank, beneath a larch tree, and conversing in
the most careless manner imaginable.*

Who were these calmly indifferent personages? Their backs
were turned, and I could only see that the young lady had a profusion
of auburn hair. Having dismounted, and approached, I made
another discovery. The youth was holding the maiden's hand,
and looking with flushed cheeks into her eyes—while she hung
her head, the ringlets rippling over her cheeks, and played absently
with some wild flowers, which she held between her
fingers.

The “situation” was plain. “Lovers,” I said to myself; “let
me not disturb the young ones!”

And I turned to walk away without attracting their attention.

Unfortunately, however, a shell at that instant screamed over
the ruin; the young girl raised her head with simple curiosity—
not a particle of fear evidently—to watch the course of the missile;
and, as the youth executed the like manœuvre, they both
became aware of my presence at the same moment.

The result was, that a hearty laugh echoed among the tombstones;
and that the youth and maiden rose, hastening rapidly
toward me.

An instant afterward I was pressing the hand of Katy Dare,
whom I had left near Buckland, and that of Tom Herbert, whom
I had not seen since the fatal day of Yellow Tavern.

The auburn ringlets of Katy Dare were as glossy as ever; her
blue eyes had still the charming archness which had made me

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love her from the first. Indeed her demeanor toward me had
been full of such winning sweetness that it made me her captive;
and I now pressed the little hand, and looked into the pretty
blushing face with the sentiment which I should have experienced
toward some favorite niece.

Katy made you feel thus by her artless and warm-hearted
smile. How refrain from loving one whose blue eyes laughed
like her lips, and whose glances said, “I am happier since you
came!”

And Tom was equally friendly; his face radiant, his appearance
distinguished. He was clad in a new uniform, half covered
with gold braid. His hat was decorated with a magnificent black
plume. His cavalry boots, reaching to the knee, were small,
delicate, and of the finest leather. At a moderate estimation,
Tom's costume must have cost him three thousand dollars!—
Happy Tom!

He grasped my hand with a warmth which evidently came
straight from the heart; for he had a heart—that dandy!

“Hurrah! old fellow; here you are!” Tom cried, laughing.
“You came upon us as suddenly as if you had descended from
heaven!”

“Whither you would like to send me back! Am I wrong,
Tom?”

And I shot a glance of ancient and paternal affection at these
two young things, whose tête-a-tête I had interrupted.

Katy blushed beautifully, and then ended by laughing. Tom
caressed his slender mustache, and said:—

“My dear fellow, I certainly should like to go to heaven—consequently
to send my friends there—but if it is all the same to
everybody, I think I would prefer—hem!—deferring the journey
for a brief period, my boy.”

“Until an angel is ready to go with you!”

And I glanced at the angel with the ringlets.

“Ah, my dear Surry!” said Tom, smoothing his chin with his
hand, “you really have a genius for repartee which is intolerable,
and not to be endured!”

“Let the angel sit in judgment!”

“Oh, you have most `damnable iteration!”'

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“I learned it all from you.”

“From me, my boy?”

“Certainly—see the beauty of repetition in poetry.”

And looking at the damsel, I began to repeat—

The amount of blushing, laughter, pouting, good humor, and
hilarity generally, which this poem occasioned, was charming.
In a few minutes we were all seated again on the grassy bank,
and Tom had given me a history of his adventures, which had
not been either numerous or remarkable. He had been assigned
to duty on the staff of General Fitzhugh Lee, and it was delightful
to hear his enthusiasm on the subject of that gay and gallant
officer.

“I tell you he's a trump, old fellow,” quoth Tom, with ardor.
“He's as brave as steel, a first-rate officer, a thorough gentleman,
generous, kind, and as jolly as a lark! Give me Fitz Lee to fight
with, or march with, or hear laugh! He was shot in the Valley,
and I have been with him in Richmond. In spite of his wound,
which is a severe one, he is as gay as the sunshine, and it would
put you in good spirits only to go into his chamber!”

“I know General Fitz well, Tom,” I replied, “and you are right
about him; every word you say is true, and more to boot, old
fellow. So you are cruising around now, waiting for your chief
to recover?”

“Exactly, my dear Surry.”

“And have captured the barque Katy!”

“Humph!” quoth Miss Katy, tossing her head, with a blush
and a laugh.

“Beware of pirates,” I said, “who make threats even in their
verses,—and now tell me, Miss Katy, if you are on a visit to Petersburg?
It will give me true pleasure to come and see you.”

“Indeed you must!” she said, looking at me with the most
fascinating smile, “for you know you are one of my old friends
now, and must not neglect me. I am at my aunt's, Mrs. Hall,—

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uncle brought me a month ago from Buckland; but in the
morning I shall go down to a cousin's in Dinwiddie.”

“In Dinwiddie, Miss Katy?”

“Yes, near the Rowanty. My cousin, Mr. Dare, has come for
me.”

“Well, I will visit you there.”

“Please do. The house is called `Disaway's.”'

I bowed, smiling, and turned to Tom Herbert.

“When shall I see you again, Tom, and where? Next week—
at Disaway's?”

Tom colored and then laughed. This dandy, you see, was a
good boy still.

“Well, old fellow,” he replied, “I think it possible I may visit
Dinwiddie. My respected chieftain, General Fitz, is at present
reposing on his couch in Richmond, and I am bearer of bouquets
as well as of dispatches between him and his surgeon. But I am
told he is ordered to Dinwiddie as soon as he is up. The country
is a new one; the thought has occurred to me that any information
I can acquire by—hem!—a topographical survey,
would be valuable. You perceive, do you not, my dear friend?
You appreciate my motive?”

“Perfectly, Tom. There will probably be a battle near `Disaway's.”'

“And I'd better ride over the ground, eh?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I'll do it!

“Only beware of one thing!”

“What, my dear Surry?” asked Tom, anxiously.

“There is probably a conservatory at Disaway's.”

“A conservatory?”

“Like that near Buckland, and the battle might take place
there. If it does—two to one you are routed!”

Katy blushed exquisitely, smiled demurely, and burst into laughter.
Then catching my eye she raised her finger, and shook her
head with sedate reproach, looking at Tom. He was laughing.

“All right, I'll look out, Surry!”

“Resolve on one thing, Tom.”

“What is that?”

[figure description] Page 334.[end figure description]

“That you will never surrender, but be taken in arms!”

With which mild and inoffensive joke I shook hands with
Tom, informing him where to find me; made Miss Katy a bow,
which she returned with a charming smile and a little inclination
which shook together her ringlets; and then leaving the young
people to themselves, I mounted my horse, and returned to the
Cedars.

All the way I was smiling. A charming influence had descended
upon me. The day was brighter, the sunshine gayer,
for the sight of the young fellow, and the pretty little maiden,
with her blue eyes, like the skies, and her ringlets of silken gold!

When I again set out for the cavalry, a few days after the
scene at Blandford church, the youth and sunshine of those two
faces still dwelt in my memory, and I went along smiling and
happy.

Not even the scenes on the late battle-field beyond the Rowanty,
made my mood gloomy; and yet these were not gay.
Graves were seen everywhere; the fences were broken down; the
houses riddled by balls; and in the trampled roads and fields
negroes were skinning the dead horses, to make shoes of their
hides. On the animals already stripped sat huge turkey-buzzards
feeding. My horse shied as the black vultures rose suddenly on
flapping wings. They only circled around, however, sailing back
as I disappeared.

Such is war, reader,—a charming panorama of dead bodies and
vultures!

Turning into the Quaker road, I went on until I reached the
head-quarters of General William H. F. Lee, opposite Monk's Neck.
Here, under the crest of a protecting hill, where the pine thickets
afforded him shelter from the wind, that gallant soldier had “set
up his rest”—that is to say a canvass fly, one end of which was

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closed with a thick-woven screen of evergreens. My visit was
delightful, and I shall always remember it with pleasure.
Where are you to-day, general, and good comrades of the old staff?
You used to laugh as hard as you fought—so your merriment was
immense! Heaven grant that to-day, when the bugles are silent,
the sabres rusting, you are laughing as in the days I remember!

Declining the friendly invitation to spend the night, I went on
in the afternoon; and on my way was further enlivened by a gay
scene which makes me smile even to-day. It was in passing
General Butler's head-quarters near the Rowanty. In the woods
gleamed his white tents; before them stretched the level sandy
road; a crowd of staff officers and others, with the general in
their midst, were admiring two glossy ponies, led up by two
small urchins, evidently about to run a race on them.

Butler—that brave soldier, whom all admired as much as I did—
was limping about, in consequence of a wound received at
Fleetwood. In the excitement of the approaching race he had
forgotten his hurt. And soon the urchins were tossed up on the
backs of their little glossy steeds—minus all but bridle. Then they
took their positions about three hundred yards off; remained an
instant abreast and motionless; then a clapping of hands was
heard—it was the signal to start—and the ponies came on like
lightning.

The sight was comic beyond expression. The boys clung with
their knees, bending over the floating manes; the little animals
darted by; they disappeared in the woods “amid thunders of
applause;” and it was announced that the roan pony had won.

“Trifles,” you say, perhaps, reader; “why don't our friend,
the colonel, go on with his narrative?”

True,—the reproach is just. But these trifles cling so to the
memory! I like to recall them—to review the old scenes—to
paint the “trifles” even, which caught my attention during the
great civil war. This is not a history, friend—only a poor little
memoir. I show you our daily lives, more than the “great
events” of history. That is the way the brave Butler and his
South Carolinians amused themselves—and the figure of this soldier
is worth placing amid my group of “paladins.” He was
brave—none was braver; thoroughbred—I never saw a man

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more so. His sword had flashed at Fleetwood, and in a hundred
other fights; and it was going to flash to the end!

I pushed on after the pony race, and very soon had penetrated
the belt of shadowy pines which clothe the banks of the Rowanty,
making of this country a wilderness as singular almost as that
of Spottsylvania. Only here and there appeared a small house,
similar to that of Mr. Alibi's—all else was woods, woods, woods!
Through the thicket wound the “military road” of General
Hampton; and I soon found that his head-quarters were at a
spot which I had promised myself to visit—“Disaway's.”

Two hours' ride brought me to the place. Disaway's was an
old mansion, standing on a hill above the Rowanty, near the
“Halifax bridge,” by which the great road from Petersburg to
North Carolina crosses the stream. It was a building of considerable
size, with wings, numerous gables, and a portico; and
was overshadowed by great oaks, beneath which gleamed the
tents of Hampton and his staff.

As I rode up the hill, the staff came out to welcome me. I had
known these brave gentlemen well, when with Stuart, and they
were good enough, now, to give me the right hand of fellowship,—
to receive me for old times' sake, with “distinguished consideration.”
The general was as cordial as his military family—and
in ten minutes I was seated and conversing with him, beneath the
great oak.

A charming cordiality inspired the words and countenance of
the great soldier. Nearly four years have passed, but I remember
still his courteous smile and friendly accents.

All at once, the figure of a young woman appeared in the doorway.
At a glance I recognized the golden ringlets of Katy Dare.
She beckoned to me, smiling; I rose and hastened to great her;
in a moment we were seated upon the portico, conversing like old
friends.

There was something fascinating in this child. The little
maiden of eighteen resembled a blossom of the spring. Were
I a poet, I should declare that her azure eyes shone out from her
auburn hair like glimpses of blue sky behind sun-tinted clouds!

I do not know how it came about, or how I found myself there,
but in a few moments I was walking with her in the autumn

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woods, and smiling as I gazed into the deep blue of her eyes.
The pines were sighing above us; beneath our feet a thick carpet
of brown tassels lay; and on the summit of the evergreens the
golden crown of sunset slowly rose, as though the fingers of some
unseen spirit were bearing it away into the night.

Katy tripped on, rather than walked — laughing and singing
gayly. The mild air just lifted the golden ringlets of her hair, as
she threw back her beautiful face; her cheeks were rosy with the
joy of youth; and from her smiling lips, as fresh and red as carnations,
escaped in sweet and tender notes, like the carol of an
oriole, that gay and warbling song, the “Bird of Beauty.”

Do you remember it, my dear reader? It is old—but so many
good things are old!

Do you say that is not very grand poetry? I protest! friend, I
think it superior to the chef d'œuvres of the masters? You do
not think so? Ah! that is because you did not hear it sung in
the autumn forest that evening—see the ringlets of Katy Dare
floating back from the rosy cheeks, as the notes escaped from her
smiling lips, and rang clearly in the golden sunset. Do you
laugh at my enthusiasm? Well, I am going to increase your
mirth. To the “Bird of Beauty” succeeded a song which I
never heard before, and have never heard since. Thus it is a lost
pearl I rescue, in repeating some lines. What Katy sang was
this:—

That was the odd, original, mysterious, incomprehensible poem,
which Katy Dare carolled in the sunset that evening. It may

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seem stupid to some—to me the words and the air are charming,
for I heard them from the sweetest lips in the world. Indeed
there was something so pure and childlike about the young girl,
that I bowed before her. Her presence made me better—banished
all discordant emotions. All about her was delicate and
tender, and pure. Like her “bird of bright plumage” she
seemed to have flitted here to utter her carol, after which she
would open her wings and disappear!

Katy ran on, in the pauses of her singing, with a hundred little
jests, interspersed with her sweet childlike laughter, and I was
more and more enchanted—when all at once I saw her turn her
head over her shoulder. A bright flush came to her cheeks as
she did so; her songs and laughter ceased; then—a step behind
us!

I looked back, and found the cause of her sudden “dignity,”
her demure silence. The unfortunate Colonel Surry had quite
disappeared from the maiden's mind.

Coming on rapidly, with springy tread, I saw—Tom Herbert!
Tom Herbert, radiant; Tom Herbert, the picture of happiness;
Tom Herbert, singing in his gay and ringing voice:—

Wretch!—I could cheerfully have strangled him!

An hour afterward I was at the camp of the Stuart horse
artillery.

Five minutes after greeting Tom, who had sought Katy, at
“Disaway's”—been directed to the woods—and there speedily
joined us—I left the young ones together, and made my way back

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to the mansion. There are few things, my dear reader, more
disagreeable than—just when you are growing poetical—when
blue eyes have excited your romantic feelings—when your heart
has begun to glow— when you think “I am the cause of all this
happiness, and gayety!”—there are few things I say—but why say
it? In thirty seconds the rosy-faced youngster Tom, had driven
the antique and battered Surry quite from the mind of the Bird
of Beauty. That discomfited individual, therefore, took his way
back sadly to Disaway's, leaving the children his blessing; declined
the cordial invitations to spend the night, mounted his horse,
and rode to find Will Davenant, at the horse artillery.

Their camp was in the edge of a wood, near the banks of the
Rowanty; and having exchanged greetings with my old comrades
of the various batteries, and the gallant Colonel Chew, their chieftain,
I repaired to Will Davenant's head-quarters.

These consisted of a breadth of canvass, stretched beneath a
tree in the field—in front of which burned a fire.

I had come to talk with Will, but our conversation was obliged
to be deferred. The brave boys of the horse artillery, officers
and men, gathered round to hear the news from Petersburg;
and it was a rare pleasure to me to see again the old familiar
faces. Around me, in light of the camp-fire, were grouped the
tigers who had fought with Pelham, in the old battles of Stuart.
Here were the heroes of a hundred combats; the men who had
held their ground desperately in the most desperate encounters—
the bull-dogs who had showed their teeth and sprung to the
death-grapple at Cold Harbor, Manassas, Sharpsburg, Fredericksburg,
Chancellorsville, Fleetwood, Gettysburg, in the Wilderness,
at Trevillian's, at Sappony, in a thousand bitter conflicts
with the cavalry. Scarred faces, limping bodies, the one-armed,
the one-legged,—these I saw around me; the frames slashed and
mutilated, but the eyes flashing and full of fight, as in the days
when Pelham thundered, loosing his war-hounds on the enemy.
I had seen brave commands, in these long years of combat—had
touched the hands of heroic men, whose souls fear never entered—
but I never saw braver fighters than the horse artillery—
soldiers more reckless than Pelham's bloodhounds. They went
to battle laughing. There was something of the tiger in them.

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They were of every nation nearly—Frenchmen, Irishmen, Italians,—
but one sentiment seemed to inspire them—hatred of our
friends over the way. From the moment in 1862, when at Barbee's
they raised the loud resounding Marseillaise, while fighting
the enemy in front and rear, to this fall of 1864, when they
had strewed a hundred battle-fields with dead men and horses,
these “swarthy old hounds” of the horse artillery had vindicated
their claims to the admiration of Stuart;—in the thunder of
their guns, the dead chieftain had seemed still to hurl his defiance
at the invaders of Virginia.

Looking around me, I missed many of the old faces, sleeping
now beneath the sod. But Dominic, Antonio, and Rossini were
still there—those members of the old “Napoleon Detachment”
of Pelham's old battery; there still was Guillemot, the erect, military-looking
Frenchman,—Guillemot, with his hand raised to his
cap, saluting me with the profoundest respect; these were the
faces I had seen a hundred times, and never any thing but gay
and full of fight.

Doubtless they remembered me, and thought of Stuart, as others
had done, at seeing me. They gave me a soldier's welcome;
soon, from the group around the camp-fire rose a song. Another
followed, then another, in the richest tenor; and the forests of
Dinwiddie rang with the deep voices, rising clear and sonorous in
the moonlight night.

They were old songs of Ashby and Stuart; unpublished ditties
of the struggle, which the winds have borne away into the night
of the past, and which now live only in memory. There was one
of Ashby, commencing,—

“See him enter on the vailey,”

The air was sad and plaintive. The song rose, and wailed, and
died away like the sigh of the wind in the trees, the murmuring

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airs of evening in the brambles and thickets of the Rowanty. The
singers had fought under Ashby, and in their rude and plaintive
song they uttered their regrets.

Then the music changed its character, and the stirring replaced
the sad.


“If you want to have a good time,
J'ine the cavalry!”
came in grand, uproarious strains; and this was succeeded by the
jubilant—

At that song—and those words, “the thirteen bright stars
round the Palmetto tree!”—you might have seen the eyes of the
South Carolinians flash. Many other ditties followed, filling the
moonlight night with song—“The Bonnie Blue Flag,” “Katy
Wells,” and “The Louisiana Colors.” This last was never printed.
Here are a few of the gay verses of the “Irish Lad from Dixie:”—

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It was nearly midnight before the men separated, repairing to
their tents. Their songs had charmed me, and made the long
hours flit by like birds. Where are you, brave singers, in this year'
68? I know not—you are all scattered. Your guns have ceased
their thunder, your voices sound no more. But I think you sometimes
remember, as you muse, in these dull years, those gay
moonlight nights on the banks of the Rowanty!

These memories are beguiling, and while they possess me, my
drama does not march.

But you have not been wearied, I hope, my dear reader, by
this little pencil sketch of the brave horse artillerymen. I found
myself among them; the moonlight shone; the voices sang; and
I have paused to look and listen again in memory.

These scenes, however, can not possess for you, the attraction
they do for me. To proceed with my narrative. I shall pass over
my long conversation with Will Davenant, whose bed I shared. I

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had promised his father to reveal nothing of the events which I had
so strangely discovered—and was then only able to give the young
man vague assurances of a coming change for the better in his affair
with Miss Conway. He thanked me, blushing, and trying to
smile—and then we fell asleep beside each other.

Just at daylight I was suddenly aroused. The jarring notes of
a bugle were ringing through the woods. I extended my arm in
the darkness, and found that Will Davenant was not beside me.

What had happened? I rose quickly, and throwing my cape
over my shoulders, went out of the tent.

The horse artillery was already hitched up, and in motion. The
setting moon illumined the grim gun-barrels, caissons, and heavy
horses, moving with rattling chains. Behind came the men on
horseback, laughing and ready for combat.

As I was gazing at this warlike scene so suddenly evoked, Will
Davenant rode up and pointed to my horse, which was ready
saddled, and attached to a bough of the great tree.

“I thought I wouldn't wake you, colonel,” he said, with a
smile, “but let you sleep to the last moment. The enemy are
advancing, and we are going to meet them.”

He had scarcely spoken, when a rapid firing was heard two or
three miles in front, and a loud cheer rose from the artillerymen.
In a moment the guns were rushing on at a gallop, and, as I rode
beside them, I saw a crimson glare shoot up above the woods, in
the direction of the Weldon railroad. The firing had meanwhile
grown heavier, and the guns were rushed onward. Will Davenant's
whole appearance had completely changed. The youth, so
retiring in camp, so cool in a hot fight, seemed burnt up with
impatience, at the delay caused by the terrible roads. His voice
had become hoarse and imperious; he was everywhere urging on
the drivers; when the horses stalled in the fathomless mudholes,
he would strike the animals, in a sort of rage, with the flat of his
sabre, forcing them with a leap which made the traces crack, to
drag the piece out of the hole, and onward. A glance told me,
then, what was the secret of this mere boy's splendid efficiency.
Under the shy, blushing face, was the passion and will of the born
soldier—the beardless boy had become the master mind, and
drove on every thing by his stern will.

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In spite of every exertion to overcome the obstacles in the
roads, it was nearly sunrise before we reached open ground.
Then we emerged upon the upland, near “Disaway's,” and saw a
picturesque spectacle. From the hill, we could make out every
thing. A hot cavalry fight was going on beneath us. The enemy
had evidently crossed the Rowanty lower down; and driving in
the pickets, had passed forward to the railroad.

The guns were rushed toward the spot, unlimbered on a rising
ground, and their thunder rose suddenly above the forests. Shell
after shell burst amid the enemy, breaking their ranks, and driving
them back—and by the time I had galloped through a belt of
woods to the scene of the fight, they lost heart, retreated rapidly,
and disappeared, driven across the Rowanty again, with the Confederates
pursuing them so hotly, that many of the gray cavalry
punched them in the back with their empty carbines.*

Their object in crossing had been to burn a small mill; and in
this they had succeeded, after which they retired as soon as possible
to their “own side.” Some queer scenes had accompanied
this “tremendous military movement.” In a house near the mill,
resided some ladies; and we found them justly indignant at the
course of the enemy. The Federal officers—general officers—had
ordered the house-furniture to be piled up, the carriage to be
drawn into the pile, and then shavings were heaped around, and
the whole set on fire, amid shouts, cheers, and firing. The lady
of the mansion remonstrated bitterly, but received little satisfaction.

“I have no time to listen to women!”† said the Federal
general, rudely.

“It is not time you want, sir!” returned the lady, with great
hauteur, “it is politeness!”‡

This greatly enraged the person whom she addressed, and he
became furious, when the lady added that all the horses had been
sent away. At that moment an officer near him said:—

“General if you are going to burn the premises, you had better
commence, as the rebs are pursuing us.”

“Order it to be done at once!” was the gruff reply.

And the mill was fired, in the midst of a great uproar, with which

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mingled shouts of, “The Rebels are coming! The Rebels are
coming!”

Soon they came, a hot fight followed, and during this fight a
young woman watched it, holding her little brother by the hand
near the burning mill. I had afterward the honor of making her
acquaintance, and she told me that throughout the firing she
found herself repeating over and over, unconsciously, the lines of
the song,—

The enemy had thus effected their object, and retreated hotly
pursued. I followed toward the lower Rowanty, and had the
pleasure of seeing them hurried over. So ended this immense
military movement.

I was about to turn my horse and ride back from the stream,
across which the enemy had disappeared, when all at once
Mohun, who had led the pursuit, rode up to me, and we exchanged
a cordial greeting.

“Well, this little affair is over, my dear Surry,” he said; “have
you any thing to occupy you for two or three hours?”

“Nothing; entirely at your service, Mohun.”

“Well, I wish you to accompany me on a private expedition.
Will you follow me blindfold?”

“Confidingly.”

And I rode on beside Mohun, who had struck into a path along
the banks of the Rowanty, leading back in the direction of Halifax
bridge.

As we rode on, I looked attentively at him. I scarcely

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recognized, in the personage beside me, the Mohun of the past. His
gloom so profound on that night when I parted with him, after
the expedition to the lonely house beyond Monk's Neck, had entirely
disappeared; and I saw in him as few traces of the days on
the Rappahannock, in Pennsylvania, and the Wilderness. These
progressive steps in the development of Mohun's character may
be indicated by styling them the first, second, and third phases of
the individual. He had entered now upon the third phase, and
I compared him, curiously with his former self.

On the Rappahannock, when I saw him first, Mohun had been
cynical, bitter, full of gloomy misanthropy. Something seemed
to have hardened him, and made him hate his species. In the
bloom of early manhood, when his life was yet in the flower, and
should have prompted him to all kind and sweet emotions, he
was a stranger to all—to charity, good-will, friendship, all that
makes life endurable. The tree was young and lusty; the spring
was not over; freshness and verdure should have clothed it; and
yet it appeared to have been blasted. What had dried up its sap,
I asked myself—withering and destroying it? What thunder-bolt
had struck this sturdy young oak? I could not answer—but
from the first moment of our acquaintance, Mohun became for me
a problem.

Then the second phase presented itself. When I met him in
the Wilderness, in May, 1864, a great change had come over him.
He was no longer bitter and cynical. The cloud had plainly
swept away, leaving the skies of his life brighter. Gayety had
succeeded gloom. The rollicking enjoyment of the true cavalryman
had replaced the recklessness of the man-hater. Again I
looked at him with attention—for his courage had made me admire
him, and his hidden grief had aroused my sympathy. A
great weight had plainly been lifted from his shoulders; he
breathed freer; the sap long dried up had begun to flow again;
and the buds told that the leaves of youth and hope were about to
reappear. What was the meaning of that?

Now the third phase of the man had come to excite in me more
surprise and interest than the former ones. This time the change
was complete. Mohun seemed no longer himself. Was the man
riding beside me the old Mohun of 1863? Where was the gloomy

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misanthropy—where the rollicking humor? They had quite disappeared.
Mohun's glance was gentle and his countenance filled
with a charming modesty and sweetness. His voice, once so cold,
and then so hilarious, had grown calm, low, measured, almost
soft. His smile was exquisitely cordial; his glance full of earnestness
and sweetness. The heaven-born spirit of kindness—
that balm for all the wounds of human existence—shone in his
eyes, on his lips, in every accent of his voice.

Colonel Mohun had been reckless, defiant, unhappy, or wildly
gay. General Mohun was calm, quietly happy it seemed. You
would have said of him, formerly, “This is a man who fights from
hatred of his enemies, or the exuberant life in him.” Now you
would have said, “This is a patriot who fights from principle, and
is worthy to die in a great cause.”

What had worked this change? I asked myself once more.
Was it love? Or was it the conviction which the Almighty sends
to the most hardened, that life is not made to indulge hatred, but
to love and perform our duty in?

I knew not; but there was the phenomenon before me. Mohun
was certainly a new man, and looked on life and the world
around him with a gentleness and kindness of which I had believed
him incapable.

“I am going to take you to see a somewhat singular character,”
he said.

“Who is he?”

“It is a woman.”

“Ah!”

“And a very strange one, I promise you, my dear Surry.”

“Lead on, I'll follow thee!”

“Good! and I declare to you, I think Shakespeare would have
examined this human being with attention.”

“She is a phenomenon, then?”

“Yes.”

“A witch?”

“No, an epileptic; at least I think so.”

“Indeed1 And where does she live?”

“On the Halifax road, some miles from the Rowanty.”

“In the lines of the enemy, then?”

[figure description] Page 348.[end figure description]

“Something like it.”

“Humph!”

“Don't disturb yourself about that, Surry. I have sent out a
scouting party who are clearing the country. Their pickets are
back to Reams's by this time, and there is little danger.”

“At all events, we'll share any, Mohun. Forward!”

And we pushed on to the Halifax bridge, where, as Mohun expected,
there was no Federal picket.

The bridge—a long rough affair—had been half destroyed by
General Hampton; but we forded near it, pushed our horses
through the swamp, amid the heavy tree trunks, felled to form
an abatis, and gaining the opposite bank of the Rowanty, rode
on rapidly in the direction of Petersburg, that is to say, toward
the rear of the Federal army.

Half an hour's ride through the swampy low grounds rising
to gentle uplands, and beneath the festoons of the great vines
trailing from tree to tree, brought us in front of a small house,
half buried in a clump of bushes, like a hare's nest amid brambles.

“We have arrived!” said Mohun, leading the way to the
cabin, which we soon reached.

Throwing his bridle over a bough near the low fence, Mohun
approached the door on foot, I following, and when close to the
door, he gave a low knock.

“Come in!” said a cheerful and smiling voice.

And Mohun opened the door, through which we passed into a
small and very neat apartment containing a table, some chairs, a
wide fireplace, in which some sticks were burning, a number of
cheap engravings of religious scenes, framed and hanging on the
wall, and a low bed, upon which lay a woman fully dressed.

She was apparently about thirty-five, and her appearance was

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exceedingly curious. Her figure was slender and of medium
height; her complexion that of a Moorish or oriental woman,
rather than that of the quadroon, which she appeared to be; her
hair black, waving, and abundant; her eyes as dark and sparkling
as burnished ebony; and her teeth of dazzling whiteness.
Her dress was neat, and of bright colors. Around her neck she
wore a very odd necklace, which seemed made of carved bone;
and her slender fingers were decorated with a number of rings.*

Such was the personage who greeted us, in a voice of great
calmness and sweetness, as we entered. She did not rise from
the bed upon which she was lying; but her cordial smile clearly
indicated that this did not arise from discourtesy.

“Take seats, gentlemen,” she said, “and please excuse me
from getting up. I am a little poorly to-day.”

“Stay where you are, Amanda,” said Mohun, “and do not
disturb yourself.”

She looked at him with her dark eyes, and said, in her gentle,
friendly voice:—

“You know me, I see, General Mohun.”

“And you me, I see, Amanda.”

“I never saw you before, sir, but—am I mistaken?”

“Not in the least. How did you know me?”

The singular Amanda smiled.

“I have seen you often, sir.”

“Ah—in your visions?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Or, perhaps, Nighthawk described me. You know Mr. Nighthawk!”

“Oh, yes, sir. I hope he is well. He has often been here; he
may have told me what you were like, sir, and then I saw you to
know you afterward.”

I looked at the speaker attentively. Was she an impostor? It
was impossible to think so. There was absolutely no evidence

[figure description] Page 350.[end figure description]

whatever that she was acting a part—rather every thing to forbid
the supposition, as she thus readily acquiesced in Mohun's simple
explanation.

For some moments Mohun remained silent. Then he said:—

“Those visions which you have are very strange. Is it possible
that you really see things before they come to pass—or are
you only amusing yourself, and others, by saying so? I see no
especial harm in the matter, if you are jesting; but tell me, for
my own satisfaction and that of my friend, if you really see
things.”

Amanda smiled with untroubled sweetness.

“I am in earnest, sir,” she said, “and I would not jest with
you and Colonel Surry.”

I listened in astonishment.

“Ah! you know me, too, Amanda!”

“Yes, sir—or I think I do. I think you are Colonel Surry, sir.”

“How do you know that?”

“I have seen you, too, sir?” was the smiling reply.

I sat down, leaned my head upon my hand, and gazed at this
incomprehensible being. Was she really a witch? I do not
believe in witches, and at once rejected that theory. If not an
imposter, then, only one other theory remained—that Nighthawk
had described my person to her, in the same manner that he had
Mohun's, and the woman might thus believe that she had seen
me, as well as my companion, in her “visions.”

To her last words, however, I made no reply, and Mohun
renewed the colloquy, as before.

“Then you are really in earnest, Amanda, and actually see, in
vision, what is coming to pass?” he said.

“I think I do, sir.”

“Do you have the visions often?”

“I did once, sir, but they now seldomer come.”

“What produces them?”

“I think it is any excitement, sir. They tell me that I lay
on my bed moaning, and moving my arms about,—and when I
wake, after these attacks, I remember seeing the visions.”

“I hear that you predicted General Hunter's attack on Lexington
last June.”

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