Watch Yourself Go By

by Al. G. Field

It was during the dark days of the reconstruction period, immediately following the war. Only those of the south can fully realize what those days meant to a people already impoverished by the most gigantic war of Christendom.

Colonel Charlotte, once wealthy, now reduced to almost want, (we will place his residence, oh anywhere, in Virginia, Georgia or Alabama); his once productive plantation neglected for want of tenants and help to cultivate it, stock and products confiscated. Many and earnest were the conferences held by the Colonel and his unfortunate neighbors, to devise ways and means to recuperate their lost fortunes. After each conference with his friends the Colonel would wend his way homeward to confer with his good wife, who was a most sensible and therefore a lovable woman.

When the Colonel was most despondent the wife was most buoyant, cheering him as best she could. After the Colonel had given vent to his feelings, recounting for the hundredth time his helplessness in the face of the oppressive laws rigidly enforced by the carpet-bag officers; after he had delivered himself of a tirade against those who were responsible for the condition of affairs, the good wife said: "Colonel, I know if the Christian people of the North were aware of the sufferings of our people, we would get relief. I pity you in your troubles and do hope we may see a way to help ourselves. We are out of corn, the meal is almost gone and we have very little bacon left. Our children should be in school but I cannot bear to send them with the toes out of their shoes and their shabby clothes."

The Colonel would compress his lips, cussing every Yankee on earth. He would find his way to the country store to while away another day in useless conference with his neighbors. The same persons met daily and dispersed nightly to carry their woes to their homes. Time and again Colonel Charlotte informed the patient little wife that he was without hope.

"Don't give up," encouraged the wife, "I know it looks dark but it is always darkest before dawn; let us look toward the east and pray for light. I know something will come to us, but for my part, I would not care. I can stand it, but the children, poor innocents, should not be made to suffer; no shoes or clothes fit to go to school or church in. The winter is coming on and our provisions are scant. I worry only on account of the children. Colonel, do the best you can; that is all mortal can do, the Lord will do the rest."

The Colonel left his fireside early the next morning resolved to find something to relieve the wants of his family. Returning home later than usual he was in a towering rage. The good wife was alarmed.

"Why, Colonel, what has disturbed you so?"

"Wife, I'm mad clar through and if Captain Barbour warn't an old friend of the family, I declar' to God I'd assaulted him today."

"Heaven forbid," pleaded the wife, "I know Captain Barbour surely would not wound your feelings intentionally."

The Colonel explained that they were talking over their troubles, bewailing their helplessness, when Captain Barbour said: "Why Colonel Charlotte, you're better off than any of us, you have the means at your command to not only make a living but to lay a little money by."