“Poor Tom, I dare say, has written to you of our encounter in the woods, but he does not know the shock it was to me to meet him there, and know I could not help him. Dear Tom, my heart aches more for him than for myself, for the Richmond Prison Guards are not like those who keep watch over us. There are humane people there,—kind, tender hearts,—which feel for any one in distress, but the jailers, the common soldiers, and the rabble, are not, I fear, as considerate as they might be. Many of them have been made to believe the war entirely of the North’s provoking, that Hamlin is a mulatto, and Lincoln a foul-hearted knave, whose whole aim is to set the negroes free. But enough of Southern politics. It will all come clear at last, and the Star Spangled Banner wave again over every revolted State.
“Write to me, mother. Say you forgive your Rebel-boy. Say that, when I am exchanged, as I hope to be, I may come home, and that you will not turn away from your sinful, erring
“Jimmie”
There was a message of love for Rose, and then the letter closed with one last, touching entreaty that the mother would forgive her child and take him back again to her confidence and love.
“Of course she’ll do it,” Rose said, vehemently, and seizing a pen and paper she wrote to Will, inclosing a note to Jimmie, full of pardon and tender love, bidding him when he should be released come directly to Rockland, where their mother should be waiting for him, and where she, forgetting all the past, would nurse him back to health.
Nearly a week went by, and then there came a letter from Will, telling how he had visited the Rebel Jimmie in his prison, and Rose wept frantically as she read the particulars of that interview when her brother first met the sister’s husband, of whom he had never heard.
“I found him sitting apart from the others,” William wrote, “apparently absorbed in disagreeable reflections, for there was an abstracted look upon his face and deep wrinkles upon his forehead. If he had not been pointed out to me, I should have known him by his striking resemblance to your family. The Carleton features could not be mistaken, particularly the proud curve about the mouth, and the arching of the eyebrows, while I recognized at once the soft, curling hair and brilliant complexion, which you will remember once attracted me toward a certain little girl, who is now all the world to the old bachelor Will.
“But this isn’t a love letter, darling. I’m only going to tell you how sorry your brother looked sitting there alone in that noisy multitude, whose language and manners are not the most refined that could be desired, and how my heart warmed toward the solitary being, and forgave him at once for all his errors past. Very haughtily he bowed to me when I was introduced, and then in silence awaited to hear my errand, the proud curve around his mouth deepening as he surveyed me with a hauteur which, under ordinary circumstances, would have annoyed me exceedingly. As it was, I could almost fancy myself the prisoner and he the freeman, he seemed so cool, so collected, while I was embarrassed and uncertain how to act.
“‘Is your visit prompted by curiosity to see how a so-called Rebel can bear confinement, or did you come on business?’ he asked, and then all my embarrassment was at an end.
“‘I came,’ I said, ‘partly at your sister’s request, and partly to ascertain how much you are willing to do toward the attainment of your freedom.’