We rode back in another chariot of revolution--a death-cart.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
THE SECOND DAY
It was a dreadful night. Crowds of farmers from the surrounding country kept pouring into the city. They were no longer the honest yeomanry who had filled, in the old time, the armies of Washington, and Jackson, and Grant, and Sherman, with brave patriotic soldiers; but their brutalized descendants--fierce serfs--cruel and bloodthirsty peasants. Every man who owned anything was their enemy and their victim. They invaded the houses of friend and foe alike, and murdered men, women and children. Plunder! plunder! They had no other thought.
One of our men came to me at midnight, and said:
"Do you hear those shrieks?"
"Yes," I replied.
"They are murdering the family next door."
These were pleasant, kindly people, who had never harmed any one. But this maelström swallows good and bad alike.
Another came running to me, and cried: