XIII. — THE CEDARS.
Twenty-four hours after, I had passed over the same number of miles, and found myself at the staff head-quarters, on the left bank of the Appomattox, above Petersburg.
I had soon pitched my tent, with the assistance of a servant; had erected a hedge of cedar boughs to protect it from the cutting blasts of the coming winter; and, a few days afterwards, was surrounded with many objects of comfort. My tent had been floored; at one end rose an excellent chimney; strips of planks, skillfully balanced on two logs, supplied a spring bed; I had secured a split bottom chair, and my saddle and bridle were disposed upon a rough rack, near a black valise containing my small stock of apparel, and the pine table and desk holding official papers.
Having christened this castle “The Cedars,” I settled down for a long winter,—and it was not a great while before I congratulated myself on the good fortune which had provided me with that warm nest. More than once, however, I experienced something like a sentiment of shame, when, in the dark and freezing nights, with the hail rattling on my tent, I sat by my warm fire, and heard the crack of the sharp-shooters, along the lines beyond Petersburg. What right had I to be there, by that blazing fire, in my warm tent, when my brethren—many of them my betters—were yonder, fighting along the frozen hills? What had I done to deserve that comfort, and exemption from all pain? I was idling, or reading by my blazing fire,—they were keeping back the enemy, and, perhaps, falling and dying in the darkness. I was musing in my chair, gazing into the blaze, and going back in memory to the fond scenes of home, so clearly, that I laughed the heart’s laugh, and was happy. And they? They, too, were thinking of home, perhaps,—of their wives and children, to sink down the next moment shivering with cold, or stagger and fall, with spouting blood, as the bullet pierced them. Why should I be thus favored by a good Providence? I often asked myself that question, and I could not answer it. I could only murmur, “I did not sneak here to get out of the way of the bullets,—those, yonder, are my betters,—God guard and keep the brave soldiers of this army!”
And now, worthy reader, having given you some idea of the manner in which the more fortunate ones wintered near Petersburg, in 1864, I am going to drop the subject of army head-quarters, and my surroundings there. Jackson and Stuart are dead, and have become figures of history. I have drawn them as well as I could,—I dare not attempt to do the same with the great commander-in-chief. He is alive. May he live long!—and, saluting him, I pass on.
So if I speak of General Lee, it will be of the individual in his official character. What he utters, he will have uttered in the hearing of many.
With these words of preface, I resume the thread of my history.