“Thar was one family caught on the battle-field. They had staid, because the man was laying dangerously sick, and they dreaded to move him. After the fighting begun, they started to get away. The little boy was shot through the head, and the horse killed. The weemun then just took up the sick man and run with him down into the swamp.”
“We had a nephew living on the battle-field,” said Mrs. ——. “The family was down with the measles at the time. But when they see thar was to be a fight, they just moved a plank in the ceiling over head, and hid up all their bacon, and lard, and corn-meal, and everything to eat they couldn’t take with ’em. Then they tuke up a child apiece and come on for us; we’d done gone when they got hyere, and they come tearing through the swampy ground after us, toting their babes. They staid with us in the cabin till after the battle. But by that time his house was occupied by soldiers. He’d been right ingenious hiding his provisions, so nobody could find ’em; but the soldiers went to tearing off ceilings to get planks to make boxes, and down come the corn-meal and bacon; so they had a pretty rich supply.”
“After that,” said Mr. ——, “his house got burnt. Nearly all the houses and fences for miles, on the battle-field, was burnt, so that it was just one common. Thar was nobody left. You never see such desolation. Then the armies moved off, leaving a rich pasture. I had my cattle pastured thar all that summer.”
Mrs. —— proposed that the children should sing for me a little piece called “The Drummer Boy of Shiloh.” Her husband favored the suggestion, saying it was “a right nice composed little song.”
“I’ve plumb forgotten it,” said Zeek. And the little girls, who blushingly undertook it after much solicitation, could remember only a few lines here and there, greatly to the parents’ chagrin.
Mrs. —— was at times very thoughtful; and she told me a newly married elder daughter had that day left home with her husband.
“We’ll go by their house in the morning, and I’ll show it to you,” said Zeek.
I congratulated the parents on having their child settled so near them; yet Mrs. —— could scarcely speak of the separation without rising tears. All were eloquent in their praises of the young husband. He was doing right well, when the war, the cruel, wasteful war, swept him in, and he fought for the slave despotism four years, without a dollar of pay. That left him plumb flat. But he was a right smart worker. He was a splendid hand to make rails. He could write also. After the surrender, he just let in to work, and made a crop; and after the crop was laid by, (i. e., when the corn was hoed for the last time,) he pitched into writing. He employed himself as a teacher of that art. He had already taught nine schools, of ten successive lessons each, at two dollars a scholar. He had had as many as sixty pupils of an evening. I sympathized sincerely with the satisfaction they all felt in having their Maggie married to so smart a man. Indeed, I was beginning greatly to like this little family, and to feel a personal interest in all their affairs. It delights me now to recall that December evening, spent in the red firelight of that humble farm-house; and if I record their peculiarities of speech and manners, it is because they were characteristic and pleasing.
At eight o’clock, Zeek, weary with his long ride that day, said, “I believe I’ll lie down,” and, without further ceremony, took off his clothes and got into one of the beds in the room. Mrs. —— thought I also must be tired, and said I could go to bed when I pleased. Thinking it possible I might be assigned to the same apartment, I concluded to sit up until the audience became somewhat smaller. The girls presently went up-stairs, lighted to their beds by the fire, which shone up the stairway and through the cracks in the chamber floor. I took courage then to say that I was ready to retire; and, to my gratification, saw a candle lighted to show me to my chamber,—though I marvelled where that could be, for I supposed I had seen every room in the house, except the loft to which the girls had gone, when I had seen the sitting-room and kitchen.
Mr. —— took me first out-doors, to a stoop on the side of the house opposite the great opening. Thence a door opened into a little framed box of a room built up against the log-house, as an addition. There was scarcely space to turn in it. The walls consisted of the naked, rough boards. There was not even a latch to the door, which opened into the universal night, and which the wind kept pushing in. Mr. —— advised me to place the chair against it, which I did. I set the candle in the chair, and blew it out after I had got into bed. Then looking up, I saw with calm joy a star through the roof. It was interesting to know that this was the bridal chamber.