Was there ever such another paradox of a woman?
I knew not how to read her aright, for I scarce ever found her twice the same. Which represented the truth of her character—her cool dignity, her impetuous pride, or that gentle tenderness which befitted her so well? Which was the armor, which the heart of this fair lady of the North? As we rode down the path to the eastward, a snowy handkerchief fluttered for an instant at the library window. I raised my hat in silent greeting, and we were gone.
CHAPTER XXXVIII. — THE FURLING OF THE FLAGS
The close of the long and bitter struggle had come; to those who had cast their fortunes with the South it seemed almost as the end of the world. I had thought to write of those last sad days, to picture them in all their contrasting light and shadow, but now I cannot. There are thoughts too deep for human utterance, memories too sacred for the pen. I rejoice that I was a part of it; that to the lowering of the last tattered battle-flag I remained constant to the best traditions of my house. I cannot sit here now, beneath the protecting shadow of a flag for which my son fought and died, and write that I regret the ending, for years of peace have taught us of the South lessons no less valuable than did the war; yet do I rejoice to-day that, having once donned the gray, I wore it until the last shotted gun voiced its grim message to the North.
It is hardly more than a dream now, sometimes vague and shadowy, again distinct with living figures and historic scenes. I require but to close my eyes to behold once more those slender lines of ragged, weary, hungry men, to whom fighting had become synonymous with life. I pass again through the fiery rain of those last fierce battles, when in desperation we sought to check the unnumbered blue legions that fairly crushed us beneath their weight. The vividness of the memory burns my brain as by fire,—the ghastly faces of the dead, the unuttered agony of the wounded, the patient suffering of the living. Day by day, night by night, we grew less in numbers, and our thin lines contracted; divisions shrank into regiments, companies to platoons. Men knew that the inevitable was upon them, yet smiled into one another's face and went forth to die. It was pitiable; it was magnificent. Hungry we fought, unsheltered we slept; our dead were lying with the enemy, while we who yet lived for the duty of another day fronted the bayonets with hearts of courage and sadly prophetic souls. Everywhere to front and rear, to left and right, stretched that same blue wall tipped with cruel steel; in constant hail of iron the shells fell upon us, darkening the day-sky, and turning night into a hell of flame. There was no retreat, no loophole of escape; we could but stay, suffer, and perish. Like men afflicted with some incurable malady, we who were of that stricken remnant sternly, grimly looked into the eyes of death and waited for the end.
I saw it all; I held a part in it all. Upon that April day which witnessed the turning of the last sad page in this tragedy, I stood without the McLean house, ankle deep in the trampled mud of the yard, surrounded by a group of Federal officers. Within was my commander, the old gray hero of Virginia, together with the great silent soldier of the North.
Few about me spoke as we waited in restless agony. No one addressed me, and I think there must have been a look in my face which held them dumb. We knew well what hung upon the balance then; that within those humble walls was being consummated one of the great events of history. To the men in blue it meant home, and victory, and peace; to those in gray, suffering, and struggle, and defeat.
I know not how long I waited, standing beside my horse, with head half bowed upon his neck, seeing the figures about me as in a dream. At last the door was flung open, and those within came forth. He was in advance of them all. In that pale, stern, kindly face, and within the depths of those sorrowful gray eyes, I read instantly the truth—the Army of Northern Virginia was no more. Yet with what calm dignity did this defeated chieftain pass down that blue lane, his head erect, his eyes undimmed—as dauntless in that awful hour of surrender as when he rode before his cheering legions of fighting men. Only as he came to where I stood, and caught the look of suffering upon my face, did he once falter, and then I noted no more than the slight twitching of his lips beneath the short gray beard.