“What in the world are you thinking of, Jeanie!” said her father, in his turn surprised at this sudden resolution; “what duties can call you to Accomac?”
“I go to save life,” replied Virginia. “Can you wonder, my father, that when I see all that I hold dearest in life just trembling on the verge of destruction, I should desire to do all in my power to save it.”
“You are right, my child,” replied her father, tenderly; “if it were possible for you to accomplish any good. But what can you do to rescue Hansford from the hand of justice?”
“Of justice!” said Virginia, “and can you unite with those, my dear father, who profane the name of justice by applying it to the relentless cruelty with which blind vengeance pursues its victims?”
“Ah, Jeanie!” said her father, smiling, as he pressed her hand tenderly; “you should remember, in language of the quaint old satirist, Butler,
'No thief e'er felt the halter draw,
With good opinion of the law;'
and although I would not apply the bitter couplet to my little Jeanie in its full force, yet she must own that her interest in its present application, prevents her from being a very competent judge of its propriety and justice.”
“But surely, dear father, you cannot think that these violent measures against the unhappy parties to the late rebellion, are either just or politic?”
“I grant, my child, that to my own mind, a far more humane policy might be pursued consistent with the ends of justice. To inspire terror in a subject is not the surest means to secure his allegiance or his love for government. I am sure, if you were afraid of your old father, and always in dread of his wrath and authority, you would not love him as you do, Jeanie—and government is at last nothing but a larger family.”
“Well, then,” returned the artless girl, “why should I not go to Sir William Berkeley, and represent to him the harshness of his course, and the propriety of tempering his revenge with mercy?”