I was in my room, getting ready for our last walk among scenes endeared to us by thousands of associations, my husband standing by, hat in hand, when a terrific report split the brooding air and rent the very heavens. Another and another followed. We stood transfixed, without motion or speech, until we counted, silently, seven.
It was the number of the seceding States! As if pandemonium had waited for the seventh boom to die sullenly away among the hills, the pause succeeding the echo was ended by an outburst of yells, cheers, and screams that beggars description. The streets in our quiet quarter were alive with men, women, and children. Fire-crackers, pistols, and guns were discharged into the throbbing air.
“The fort has fallen!” broke in one breath from our lips. And simultaneously: “The Lord have mercy upon the country!”
We ran down-stairs and into the street.
My sister “Mea” was upon the front porch, and the steps were thronged by children and servants, wild with curiosity.
I have not mentioned that my sister had married, two years before, Mr. John Miller, a Scotchman by birth. He was much liked and respected by us all, and it spoke volumes for his breeding and the genuine good feeling prevailing among us, that although he was the only “original secessionist” in our household band, our cordial relations remained unbroken in spite of the many political arguments we had had with him.
His wife was holding aloft her baby boy, a pretty year-old, in her arms. A Secession cockade was pinned upon his breast; in his chubby hand he flourished a rebel flag, and he laughed down into her radiant face.
We feigned not to see them as we hurried past. But a gulf seemed to open at my feet. As in a baleful dream, I comprehended, in the sick whirl of conflicting sensations, what Rebellion, active and in arms, would mean in hundreds of homes on both sides of the border.
“Is the world going mad?” muttered my husband, between his teeth, and I knew that the same horror was present with him.
Secession flags blossomed in windows and from roofs; were waved from doors and porches by girls and women; were shaken in mad exultation by boys on the sidewalks; hung upon lamp-posts, and were stretched from side to side of the street. It was like the magical upspringing of baneful fungi. Where had they all come from? And at what infernal behest had they leaped into being?