“Yep. We made them just alike, and you can sew on buttons and everything.”
Thus the children made the leave-taking less somber, to the relief of every one.
Grandfather and grandmother Clide had friends of their own whom they had come all the forty miles to see,––neighbor boys from many of the farms around their home, and their daughter-in-law’s own brother, who was like a son to them. There he stood, lithe and strong and genial, and, alas! too easy-going to be safe among the temptations of the camp.
Quickly the hour passed and the call came to form ranks for the march to the town square, where speeches were to be made and prayers were to be read before the march to the station.
Our little party waited until the last company had left the camp ground and the excited children had seen them all and heard the sound of the fife and drum to their last note and beat as the “boys in blue” filed past them and off down the winding country road among the trees. Nothing 48 was said by the older ones of what might be in the future for those gallant youths––yes, and for the few men of greater years with them––as they wound out of sight. It was better so. Bobby fell asleep in Mary Ballard’s arms as they drove back, and a bright tear fell from her wide-open, far-seeing eyes down on his baby cheek.
It was no lack of love for his son that kept Elder Craigmile away at the departure of the boys from their camp on the bluff. He had virtually said his say and parted from his son when he gave his consent to his going in the first place. To him war meant sacrifice, and the parting with sons, at no matter what cost. The dominant idea with him was ever the preservation of the Union. At nine o’clock as usual that morning he had entered the bank, and a few minutes later, when the troops formed on the square, he came out and took his appointed place on the platform, as one of the speakers, and offered a closing prayer for the confounding of the enemy after the manner of David of old––then he descended and took his son’s hand, as he stood in the ranks, with his arm across the boy’s shoulder, looked a moment in his eyes; then, without a word, he turned and reëntered the bank.