"I am instructed by these gentlemen not to ask any favors at your hands, but to enforce their clear, legal, unquestionable rights under this parole."
Commissioner Ould indorsed upon this application that he repudiated the parole altogether. In reporting to us, General Marshall said:
"I don't feel at liberty to accept a fee from you, because I consider your case hopeless."
Sentenced to the Salisbury Prison.
Early in the new year, we addressed a memorial to Mr. Seddon, the Rebel Secretary of War, in which we attempted to argue the case upon its legal merits, and to prove what a flagrant, atrocious violation of official faith was involved in our detention. We plumed ourselves a good deal on our legal logic, but Mr. Seddon returned a very convincing refutation of our argument. He simply wrote an order that we be sent to the Rebel penitentiary at Salisbury, North Carolina, to be held until the end of the war, as hostages for Rebel citizens confined in the North, and for the general good conduct of our Government toward them!
Like the historic Roman, content to be refuted by an emperor who was master of fifty legions, we yielded gracefully to the argument of the Secretary who had the whole Confederate army at his back; and thus we were sent to Salisbury.
"Abolitionists Before the War."
On the night before our departure, the warden, a Maryland refugee, named Wiley, ordered us below into a very filthy apartment, to be ready for the morning train. We appealed to Captain Richardson, Commandant of the Castle, who, countermanding the order, permitted us to remain in our own more comfortable quarters during the night. Ten minutes after, one of the little negroes came to our room, and, beckoning me to bend down, he whispered:
"What do you think Mr. Wiley says about Captain Richardson's letting you stay here to-night? As soon as the Captain went out, he said: 'It's a shame for Richardson and Browne to receive so many more favors than the other prisoners. Why, ---- ---- them, they were Abolitionists before the war!'"
On the way to Salisbury we were very closely guarded, but there were many times during the night when we might easily have jumped from the car window.