Though it has been nearly three months since your sainted father’s death, this is the first time I have felt strong enough to rouse myself from my tears and grief, that I may write to you. My heart is broken, and I have nothing now to live for. I can only pray God for patience to wait His summons. But, my dear child, only those who are bereaved know how hard it is to say “Thy will be done!”
Sometimes I feel, so full of deep despair, as I look to the dark, lonely life before me, that I cannot help murmuring; and did I not know, from all our past, that God does all in love and infinite wisdom, He would seem now my bitterest enemy. O Christ! pardon the feeble rebellion of my burdened soul!
Dear Carlotta is as kind and tender as she can be, and does all she can to comfort and cheer me, but there are times when I feel that I shall die, when I think of your poor father’s languishing on his coarse prison bed, with no comforts near, and only his enemies to smooth his pillow and attend to his wants. I know how he longed for me at his bedside, and how his dying thoughts came back to his dear old home. O John! it almost kills me to think I shall never see him again, never hear his voice calling “Mary” any more.
I hope and pray now for the close of the war, that I may go with you to Elmira and bring home his dear remains to our quiet graveyard—where mine, I trust, will soon rest beside them.
But I must not fill my whole letter with sadness. Dear little Johnnie is running all about now, and lisps our names very sweetly. Carlotta is holding him on her knee near me as I write, and he says, “Tiss papa for me.”
You see from the date of our letter that we are up at the plantation. We brought most of our valuables up with us, and left the house in charge of Miss Wiggs, our housekeeper, who has taken her brother, the cripple, to stay with her, and says she is not afraid of the Yankees. All our servants left us except Horace and Hannah, who are touchingly faithful in their devotion. The negroes up here are too far from Federal influence to be much demoralized, and Mr. Bemby is gathering a very fine crop. Since we left Wilmington we have heard some very sad news about Lulie Mayland. Frank Paning, you know, has been in Wilmington for more than a year, in some position that exempted him from service. He and Lulie have been very intimate, and every one expected that they would soon be married. Lulie made a cloister of her home, and would see no one but Frank, who almost lived under her roof. Of late, dark rumors began to be whispered about them, but no one believed their slanderous import. At last, however, her shame could be no longer concealed, and your once bright, guileless little playmate is ruined for ever. Frank has fled, no one knows whither, though many believe he has gone to the Federal lines, which is, I think, probable. It is but the result of Frank’s long studied designs of evil and Lulie’s too implicit trust and confidence.
The blow has almost killed Dr. Mayland, whose health is very feeble. Carlotta has written to the poor girl, begging her to come up here to us, as her ruin will be less marked in this retired neighborhood. Lulie’s mother was my dearest friend, and I would love and protect her child for her sake.
Alas! all the news we hear now is sad and gloomy. Fort Fisher must soon fall and Wilmington be evacuated; and I fear that even our home here will not be safe from the invasion of the enemy. But we are in the hands of the Lord. May He deliver our struggling country!
Write to us often, my dear boy, for you can never know what a comfort are your letters to your mother’s sorrowing heart. May God enfold you with His arms of mercy! is her earnest prayer.
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