AN OLD CABIN HOME IN GEORGIA.—The old log cabin is a familiar sight in Georgia, as well as other parts of the South. Often it is vine-wreathed, showing signs of great antiquity, with roof of clapboards, upon which the rain patters like the long-roll beat of the snare drum. Homely, battered by time, and affording few comforts, yet in such cabins greatness has often had its birth, nor scorned such humble nativity. How many men of high estate lie down in the drapery of fine linen and, when night has folded the earth in her sable arms, think of the old cabin home in Georgia; of the long-time ago; of the bubbling spring in the hollow and the gourd that hung by it; of the grape-vine swing, and the cows mooing in the pasture; of father and mother, and the graves on the hillside. And there is a sigh from the heart for these pleasures of a past that have departed forever.
DRUMMOND’S LAKE, IN GREAT DISMAL SWAMP, VIRGINIA.
From Fredericksburg our route was northwest to Appomattox and thence east by way of Richmond to Fortress Monroe, on the peninsula. We were a little disappointed to find the site of the culminating event of the war destitute of any special feature of interest of either a natural or artificial character. The scene of surrender is not even marked by a monument, and the country thereabout is a pale and somber stretch of poorly-cultivated lands. Yet there are exceptions; for occasionally the monotony of cabin and broken fence is relieved by prolific tobacco-fields, pretty towns, and inviting manors adorned with colonial houses that still preserve their old-time air of comfort and Southern hospitality. Virginia well deserves the title of the Dominion State, not only because she is the mother of Presidents, but because she is also distinguished as the native state of many of the greatest men and women born on American soil. “To be a Virginian, is to be a gentleman,” has passed into an adage; and the country is proud of her for a hundred reasons, which reference to history will explain. If her soil is not the most fertile, yet her legacy is the richest, for she gave to the world such men as Washington, Madison, Jefferson, Randolph, Clay, Lee and a thousand others whose names and deeds are alike imperishable. Fortress Monroe is reached by the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad, over which route we traveled from Appomattox. It is located at the point of a peninsula, formed by the Fork and James Rivers, which projects into Chesapeake Bay where it joins the Atlantic. The situation is particularly favorable for a Government fortress, and its natural and commanding advantages have been fully utilized, for it is the largest and strongest fortification in America. Hampton Roads separates the point of the peninsula from the opposite land. This body of water is about five miles wide and forms the outlet of James River. It was in the Roads that the most famous of modern naval battles, between the Monitor and the Merrimac (Virginia), took place, March 9, 1862. Two miles below Fortress Monroe is Old Point Comfort, a very popular resort and the seat of the National Soldiers’ Home. Newport News is nine miles above the Fortress, on Hampton Roads; and Yorktown, the place of Cornwallis’ surrender to Washington, October 19, 1781, is twenty-five miles north, on York River, both places possessing great historic interest for events of which they were the scene during the Revolutionary war.
OLD FORT AND SEA WALL AT ST. AUGUSTINE, FLORIDA.—This old fort possesses a peculiar interest for Americans, being the oldest historic fortification of our country. Its construction was begun by Menendez de Aviles, a Spaniard, in 1565, but it was not completed until two centuries later. It was then called Fort San Marco, but with a ruthless disregard of historic associations characteristic of our people, it has been changed to Fort Marion, without in the least adding to the lustre of the renown of the great Revolutionary patriot of the South. The walls of the fort are composed of a conglomerate called coquina, which is formed of shells and sand brought from the island of Anastasia. Originally soft and pliable as plaster, it becomes almost of granitic hardness by exposure, affording a safe protection against the primitive artillery of that period.