CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY WiLLARD FiSKE Endowment Cornell University Library F 211 K34 On Sherman's track: or. The South after 3 1924 028 858 863 Cornell University Library The original of this bool< is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924028858863 -f^^- ■ A w \i;i' I'Aci': iti I iiKJ -^1 M ON SHERMAN'S TRACK; OR, THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. JOHN H. KENJSTAWAY, M.A. BALLIOL COLLBOJS, OK^OKD. WITH ILLUSTRATIONS. *' Wise men ne'er sit and wail their loss, But clieerly seek bow to redress their harms." SEELEY, JACKSON, AND HALLIDAY, FLEET STREKT. LONDON. MDCCCLXVIL The Right of 2Vanslation is r<'seri'»d. PREFACE. A SMALL portion only of our fellow-countrymen who have crossed the Atlantic, have been used to extend their visit to the States that compose the Southern portion of the American Union, The dread of summer heats, and fevers in autumn; the great distances which had to be travelled; the inferior accommodation so often met with; and the lagging railways — all militated against Southern travel ; and few have cared to do more than just to catch a glimpse of slavery in its vi PEEFACE. pleasantest aspect on one of the old plantations in Virginia or Maryland. Now, however, the whole extent of what was lately the Confederacy is invested with an interest utterly unknown hefore. For four years there has been acting on that theatre one of the grandest spectacles that the world has ever seen. The soil of the South has become classic ground. The sieges of her cities have made their names for ever famous, and her battle-fields yield in celebrity to none. Her dreams of a separate nationality have indeed been somewhat rudely broken, but in whatever else she may have failed, she, at least, has made herself a history. An aspect of things so entirely new — the opening of a book that has been for four years sealed — the first endeavours of a country to emerge from its state of utter prostration — the future of four millions of freedmen, and the altered relations of the black and the white races, are all PREFACE. vii of them subjects of world-wide interest. Other questions too there are, for which, at an earlier date, amidst the din of arms, and the excited state . of public feeling, it was impossible to obtain an impartial hearing, but which it may not at the present time be without advantage to discuss, when men's blood has somewhat cooled, and they are again capable of exercising an unbiassed judg- ment. Questions purely American, as the treatment of prisoners in the South, the history and meaning of Secession, the conduct of the war, may now fairly be canvassed, no less than those of wider import — of international obligation, and of the most momentous consequence, perhaps, even to ourselves. The importance of some of these subjects, and the interest of others, must be my excuse for rush- ing unbidden into print. Would only that these pages might be the means of inducing any of our Vlll PREFACE. countrymen to see the States for themselves, and to form their own judgment upon the people of America. They will meet, I can promise them, with a hearty reception, and a warmth of feeling of which people on this side of the water have but little idea. And nothing will tend so much to strengthen the bonds of union between the two great families of the Anglo-Saxon race as a mu- tual appreciation, founded upon an improved acquaintance. Temple, October 1866. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. From Liverpool to St. Louis— The Hero of the Great March — The Campaign — Story of his Loves — Tests in Missouri— The Gorilla Country Page 1 CHAPTER II. Kentucky State — The last Abode of Slavery — Mammoth Caves — Fat Man's Misery — Gorran's Dome — The Star Chamber — American Comparison of Caves with Niagara . 17 CHAPTER III. LouisviUe and Nashville Railroad — Camps of Refugees — Ten- nessee during the War — Andrew .Johnson . . 28 CHAPTER IV. The Old Plantation — The Two Races — Mediation of the Bureau — Gen. Howard v. Gen. Grant — Negroes and Children . 42 CHAPTER V. Future of the Freedman — Shall Cotton be King ? — Solutions suggested — A Free Course and no Favour . . 66 CHAPTER VI. Southern Cars — ' Yanks' and ' Rebs' — The Mountain Gibraltar — Chattanooga — The Campaign of 1863 — A Ride upon a MacleUan Saddle . 85 CHAPTER VII. Chioamauga Creeks— Burnt Depots — Lost Luggage — Atlanta — A Moonlight Ride through Georgia — ' Sherman has taken air — Resources and Exhaustion of the State— Visit to a Plantation 104 CHAPTER VIII. Augusta — The Soldier and the Priest — Southern Patriots — Slave Empire— The Platforms of 1800— Suicidal Folly 138 CONTENTS. CHAPTER IX. Notice to Loafers — Votive Offerings — The Helen — ' Cotton, Cot- ton everywhere !' — Down to Savannah — Old Man's Beard — A Narrow Shave — Going to Roost — ' Green grow the Rushes, oh ! ' — Sherman again — Bonaventure . . Page 153 CHAPTER X. ' I'm off to Charleston' — Experiences of an Overseer — The Bar — Running the Blockade — Fort Sumter — The old North State — Wilmington — Butler's Firework — Education in the South . ITO CHAPTER XI. Dangerous Travel — The Conductor and the Cow-hide — Cam- paign of the Carolinas — The Old Dominion — The final Struggle — A Bridal Car — ' On to Richmond ! ' — House of the ex-President .... . 193 CHAPTER XII. The Prisons of the South— Who is to Blame ? . .313 CHAPTER XIII. On the James — Butler in a Bottle — Fortress Monroe — ' Mary- land, my Maryland' — ' The Conquered Banner' . 327 CHAPTER XIV. New York and Boston — Grant's Reception — H. Ward Beecher — Out in the Rain — The Christian Commission . 336 CHAPTER XV. Willard's Hotel, Washington — Meeting of Congress — The Pre- sident's Message ...... 351 CHAPTER XVI. America and England — Old Scores — Conduct of the War — Happier Times — Meeting Half-way . . 262 CHAPTER XVII. Congress adjourns — The White House — Andrew Johnson at Home — Mr. Seward — Homeward Bound — The 'Scotia' — Christmas Eve in Old England . . . 386 APPENDIX. Hints for Travel — Cost and Time — Sport on the Prairies — The Charities of the War .... . 303 OJ SHERMAN'S TRACK. CHAPTEE I. ST.LOUIS OUR EODTE THITHER NEW ENGLAND — OTTAWA THE CANADIAN OIL-WELLS' THE HERO OP THE GREAT MARCH HIS EARLY LIFE HOW HE FARED ON HIS CAMPAIGN THE STORY OF HIS LOVES TESTS IN MIS- SOURI INDIANA RAILWAYS THE GORILLA COUNTRY. Autumn is the time most usually chosen for a visit to the States. The gorgeous beauty of the American forests during the fall — the prospects of sport among the grouse on the prairie, or with the ducks as they wing their flight southwards — the pleasant temperature of that season when the fiery heats and the dust'of summer are somewhat abated, and railway travelling begins to be less intolerable — and the possibility of combining within a short space of time a glimpse of fashion- able society as it is to be seen at Newport and Saratoga, with an insight afterwards into home B ^ THE SOITTH AFTEE THE WAR. life in tke great cities, all fit in with the long vacation. The trip does not require too much time, and no one who can afford himself the holiday and a moderate expenditure,* will regret having devoted two or three months (for a great deal may be seen even in the shorter period) to visiting a country of such boundless resources and prospects, so full of life and energy, so magni- ficent in its natural features, and where, best of all, we can observe how, in all its chief qualities and characteristics, the Anglo-Saxon race ' Still shapes its old course in a country new.' It had long been my desire to cross the Atlantic, and, accordingly, the 24th of October in last year found a party of us at the Lindell House, St. Louis. The two Universities were pretty equally represented there — Oxford by Mark J. Stewart and Herbert Saunders, old Christ Church men, who had been my companions from Liver- pool ; whilst the light-blue coloiirs, carried by E. Gr. Arbuthnot and E. Hoare, had secured, by an earlier arrival at New York, the precedence which, Oxford man as I am, I hope they may, again one day win at Putney. * For the probable cost of a tour, and some few hints for travel, see Appendix A. ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. 3 For two months already we had been on the ' rampage,' (I can use no milder term to express the continual excitement which carried us hither and thither), sparing no trouble to see the varied objects of interest and amusement which meet one at every turn, whether in the States or in Canada. American cities, one so often hears from travellers, are extremely uninteresting, — without individuality, — each one the exact reproduction of its fellow ; so that the sight of a single specimen will enable you to form a very accurate idea of what any or all of the rest may be. Now our experience, as far as it went, did not bring us to the same conclusion. In each city we fouDd its own special objects of interest — each, if you took the trouble to find out what it was, had its peculiar and distinctive character. The schools, perhaps, in one — the political questions stirring, in another — the public works, the charities or institutions, of a third — the society in a fourth — all, in their several departments, fully repaid investigation, and formed a sufficient answer to the exaggerated charge of monotony brought against them. We had left England in August, and after a prosperous run across the Atlantic in the good old Cunarder ' Africa,' had settled down, for the last 4 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. fortnight of really hot weather, among the fashion- able world of Newport, and the more intellectual attractions which Boston includes in the hearty- welcome she gives to Englishmen : and the drives, the bathing, luncheons, hops, at the one place ; and schools, universities, libraries, conventions, with the entree to some of the pleasantest society in the world, at the other, could not fail to leave upon our minds a very favourable impression of the new country. Thence, not having any time to give to the White Mountains, we had gone up through the beautiful scenery of Lakes Champlain and Greorge to the Canadian provinces ; and had there, in a visit to a camp formed at La Prairie, near Montreal, an opportunity of witnessing the earnestness of the exertions which the colony is making in her defence.* There were collected some twelve hundred of the best of her sons, from either province, and from all classes of society, undergoing all the hardships of a soldier's life in camp, to complete the education they had begun at the military colleges, and with the view of qualifying them- selves to act as officers of the militia. Down the St. Lawrence we went, on to Quebec, * See Macmillan's Magazine for May, 1866, ' The Camp in Canada.' CANADIAN OIL-WELLS. 5 and westward again to Ottawa; where, on one of the finest sites imaginable, on the brow of the wooded cliffs which overhang the river, stand the splendid buildings of the two new houses of the Provincial Parliament, together with the Government Ofl&ces, all fast approaching completion. The advantages of the situation were great, yet it was impossible to avoid joining in the universally expressed regret that local jealousies had caused the repe- tition here of the mistake made by the United States, in separating the political from the com- mercial capital ; and that the Government should be banished to a region, on the confines indeed of both provinces, but far removed from the main artery of the country.* Nor was the interest less, though different in kind, of a visit to Bothwell, Canada West, which the recent discovery of oil, and the success of some of the weUs, have changed from an insig- nificant and obscure village into a scene of feverish excitement and speculation. Houses, stores, sheds, and even churches, are rising as if by magic, « If the Ottawa Canal scheme, now projected at a cost of five millions sferling, be ever successfully carried out, and realise the hopes which its promoters entertain of its attracting to itself the carrying trade of the West, the objections to the situation will be materially lessened. 6 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. in all directions. A piece of ground green to- day, pass but sixty hours, will be hidden by a plank-house of fair proportions; and scattered about in the forest-clearing may be seen in every direction the derricks, or wooden shanties, under whose shelter works day and night the engine, plunging its long iron proboscis into the earth, to a depth often of sixty or a hundred feet, and drawing forth, in favoured spots, a con- tinuous stream of a dark-green colour into large vats, whence the water drains off from below, and there rises to the top the greasy scum of the valued oil. Chicago, an Indian village in 1835, but now numbering 200,000 inhabitants, — with its elevators pouring rivers of wheat, the produce of the West, into the vessels waiting to carry it on its lake transit, — and the beauties of the bluffs of the upper Mississippi, have been so well described by Trollope and others as to need no mention here. Enough to say, that our ex- pectations were more than realised. And now, after a view of St. Louis and of her 'levees,' crowded even more than in old times by the stupendous boats which ply on the lower Mis- sissippi, we were about to turn our faces to the east, thinking to spend the rest of our time GENERAL SHERMAN. 7 among her populous cities, when an unexpected interview with General Sherman, who suggested a visit to the Southern States, induced a change in our plans, and made us take a route which we had before considered that the destruction of the railways, and the disorganisation of the country, had made impracticable. The aspect of Greneral Sherman is familiar to us, from the life-like portrait of him which hung this year on the walls of the Eoyal Academy. He is a man between forty and fifty, but, being of a nervous and excitable temperament, he has become seriously aged by care. His looks betray great earnestness of purpose, and in the deep lines of his face, and the stern determination of his mouth, can be seen the unflinching purpose which carried him through the great march, sweeping like a tornado through the heart of the Confederacy, and leaving nothing but destruction and desolation in his rear. Truly might it have been said, ' The land is as the garden of Eden before him, and behind him a desolate wilderness.' The spirit of the South fairly broke down under the infliction, and her soldiers in many cases refused any longer to fight for a Grovemment which had proved itself power less to protect their families and their homes. 8 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. The General's career is curiously illustrative of the versatility or restlessness of the American character, as also of the great variety of occupation which offers to a man of energy in that country. Born in Ohio in 1820, he graduated at the age of twenty at the Military Academy of West Point, after the usual four years' course ; and having been engaged in active service in Florida and California, he gave up his commission in 1853, and entered a bank at St. Louis, where he quickly amassed, and as quickly lost, a large fortune. We next bear of him as a farmer, then as a lawyer in Kansas, till, just before the war, he is filling the ofSce of Pre- sident of a Military Academy in Louisiana, with a good salary : this he resigned on the passing by that State of the ordinance of secession, and re- turned to St. Louis to become superintendent of a street railway, the last stage in his career before re-entering the armies of the United States^ There his course has been marked with signal success. His brigade was the only one which re- tired in order from the rout at Bull's Eun. To him Grant avowedly attributes the success of the affair at Pittsburg landing. At Shiloh, and in the operations at the siege of Vicksburg, he displayed the greatest vigour, and showed signs of talent of tlie highest order. Promoted to the command of A VARIED CAREER. 9 the army of Tennessee, he took part in the battle of Mission Eidge ; and finally was placed at the head of the division of the Mississippi on the appoint- ment of General Grrant, in March 1864, to the rank of lieutenant-general, ■ with command of all the armies of the United States. With a force under him numbering nearly one hundred thousand men full of confidence in their leader, Sherman set forth from Chattanooga on the 6th of May, 1864, on a march which was to lead him, for hundreds of miles, into the very heart of the Confederacy ; through States which had never had the war brought home to them, or even seen the blue uniform of their Yankee foes ; by the forges of Atlanta and Marietta ; through the cotton-fields and the pine-forests of Georgia to the rice-swamps of Savannah : where, after a pause, but as it were to gain breath and to take counsel with the authori- ties at Washington, he set forth again with his army refreshed, and rejoicing that the hour had at length come when the haughty spirits of South Carolina should themselves experience some of the miseries they were so ready to bring upon others : and yet on through the dreary swamps and pine- barrens of North Carolina, till his victorious pro- gress was crowned by the surrender, at Golds- borough, on the 26th of April, of General Joe 10 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. Johnston, his old antagonist — a foeman ' worthy of his steel:' and it only remained to his army to receive at Washington, on the 23rd of May, the applause of a grateful country, as they marched up Pennsylvania Avenue the heroes of the day — though the army of Richmond was there — and distinguished above all others by the unanimous tribute of respect paid by the President, and the party of all nations occupying the stand in front of the White House, who, with one consent, rose to their feet as they passed, and welcomed the ve- terans home. It is not easy to say how much of this was in Sherman's mind, when, after the winter's rest, he set forth from Chattanooga, in May 1864. In an expedition from Vicksburg into the heart of Ala- bama, in February of that year, he had demon- strated the possibility of an invading army pene- trating the rebel States, and supporting itself on the country : but his chief object now was to cripple the resources of the South by destroying the work- shops of Atlanta ; and it was not until the capture of that city that the design was entertained of again cutting the Confederacy in two (as had been done once, when the North obtained the command of the Mississippi), by holding the line of railroads running through Georgia from Atlanta to the THE GREAT MARCH. 1 1 coast, and completely thereby severing the East from the West: — a plan which, though not ac- tually carried out, yet had its object virtually ac- complished by Sherman. Such were the exploits by which the man in whose presence we were, may justly claim to have been a chief instrument in bringing a conflict of such stupendous proportions to a close, and to which he owes his present position as Commander of the Military Division of the Mississippi. No- thing could be more courteous than was his recep- tion of us : he answered most readily and kindly our numerous questions as to the plan and details of his march. He told us h'ow his army, stripped of everything superfluous before leaving Atlanta, took only eighteen days' rations and an extra supply of ammunition, in the expectation of some severe battles : * that even for this slender amount of transportation service there were needed no less than 40,000 cattle, requiring of course a daily supply of fodder. He told us of the disposition of his infantry into four divisions, of from 10,000 to 15,000 men each, covering a breadth of about sixty * Sixty rounds each were carried by the men, and one hundred and forty in the -waggons, besides two hundred rounds more than ordinary for each gun. 12 THE SOUTH ATTER THE WAR. miles of country ; while on either flank, as each in turn happened to be exposed, moved his cavalry, 5500 strong, ready at any moment to take advan- tage of any signs of weakness to attack, whUe at the same time they served the purpose of screening his numbers and his movements from the enemy's observation. We heard from his lips of the plenty, if not the abundance of the supplies, found by him in the country ; so that the rations they carried were not allowed to be used till their approach to the sea : how his soldiers helped themselves daily to fresh meat and sweet potatoes on the plantations, or to the corn, of which they always found a good supply, either stacked near the homestead, or still standing in the fields ; so that at a time when the world was imagining them either starving or cut to pieces, they were marching without hindrance in the midst of supplies as abundant as were ever before enjoyed by an army. Great assistance he derived in the way of information from the negroes, a^ to distances and the situation of the farms which lay within the line of the next day's march. They could not give the distance in miles, but, from having been employed to take the cotton down to the ports or the landings on the rivers, would tell the time it would take them to go with a mule team and load of cotton to any given point. TESTS IN MISSOURI. 13 SO that by calculation it was easy to obtain a fairly correct idea of the distance. He told us, too, one of the jokes of the late President, referring to the march and the cities he had either taken or threatened, when he was out of sight of the world, — ' That the General had been flirting with Augusta, embraciiig Columbia, and, now that he was making approaches to Charlotte, it was time that he should be giving some account of himself to Mrs. Sherman.' All this he narrated with perfect simplicity and kindness, as if some one else and not himself had played the chief part in it, and we could not fail to bring away a most pleasing impression of our visit. We left St. Louis that afternoon, regretting our inability to remain to witness a great Demo- cratic Convention, or meeting of delegates of that party in Missouri, summoned for the next 'day, with the view of bringing about a repeal of the new Constitution lately forced upon the State by the victorious Union or Eepublican party, and ob- noxious from its requiring a stringent test-oath, repudiating any sympathy with the rebellion, from all clergy, lawyers, bankers, or even clerks of insurance offices. Missouri, it must be remem- bered, was a slave state, and the sympathies of probably more than half her people were, at the 14 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAU. first, with secession. Her situation prevented her taking an active part on that side ; but after a time the governor and state officers having been ejected by the military power, and their places filled by staunch Unionists, the greater part of the slaves taking advantage of the general con- fusion to abscond, the Federal (or Eadical) party became strongly in the ascendant, and the so- called Test-constitution was passed under the pressure of the' militia force, and, as the Demo- crats would have you believe, against the wish of the majority of the State. It was in the hope of being able to rid themselves of so galling a yoke that this convention was summoned, to form the nucleus of an Anti-constitution party which should, if possible, secure a majority in the legislature to be elected this year, and so effect their object. We never heard if the meeting were a success. No immediate results were, of course, expected ; and state politics, all-absorbing in their own locality, soon lose their interest and are forgotten in some entirely new phase of things, which is pretty sure to be engaging the attention of their next neighbours. We crossed the river on one of those mar- vellous steam-ferries so well known in America, with apparently an unlimited capacity of accom- THE REBEL RAIDER. 15 modating on her deck omnibuses and four, and huge baggage-carts, which crowded on from all the hotels, and got upon the Ohio and Mississippi railroad — a line of unenviable notoriety in the way of accidents, one of which is said to have numbered 150 victims. The prospects of future travellers on this line will be, however, somewhat brighter under the charge of the Atlantic and Great Western "Eailway, who are about to use it for their extension to the West. It runs principally through the State of Indiana, which, under the fostering care of Governor Morton, out of a population of 1,300,000, boasts to have sent to the war no less than 204,000 volunteers ; and in addition, on a sudden appear- ance of the rebel raider Morgan, to have raised in forty-eight hours 60,000 men. Morgan indeed, slipped through their fingers — it was no easy matter to catch him ; moving with 2000 cavalry in long columns, the foremost men would fall out of the ranks to feed their horses and lie down to rest, taking their places again in rear when the others had passed. Thus each in turn, without halting the column, obtained rest and food, and the expe- dition afforded the nearest approach practicable to perpetual motion. We were turned out of our berths in the sleep- ing- car at two in the morning, and changed at 16 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. Mitchell into the Louisville and Chicago railroad. The trains on this line had to be protected during the war by a guard of soldiers, and in more than one instance were fired into. Sometimes at a station waiting the arrival of the train, we were told by the conductor, would be found a party of these ' Gorillas' (as the word is pronounced here), armed for the most part with squirrel guns, and would take no denial, but that they must have a lift on their way. Such was the unsettled state of the country. 17 CHAPTEE II. THE STATE OF KENTDCKT THE LAST ABODE OF SLAVERY LOUISVILLE CAVE CITY STAGE JOURNEY THE MAM- MOTH CAVE FAT man's MISERY THE HOSPITAL QORRAN'S dome GOTHIC CHAPEL THE STAR CHAMBER AMERICAN COMPARISON OF CAVES WITH NIAGARA. The early morning found us at Jeffersonville, where we crossed the Ohio to LouisviUe lying on the left bank of the river a little further up ; a busy and prosperous town of Kentucky, which in the opinion of many, now that it is freed from the incubus of slavery, will rival Cincinnati in the race of commerce. It had a narrow escape of capture in the autumn of 1862, when the Confe- derates under Bragg only just failed in reaching the city before the Northern General Buell threw himself into it, and saved the place. The races were occupying all attention on the day of our arrival, and finding nothing of particular interest to detain us, we left the same evening by the Louisville and Nashville railroad for Cave city, the point of departure for the far-famed Mammoth c 18 THE SOUTH AJFTEH THE WAE. Caves. We were now in a State which, having continued in the Union, was not affected by Pre- sident Lincoln's emancipation proclamation ; and ■in which consequently, slavery was still fully re- cognised by the law in theory, though virtually ex- tinguished by isolation, and by a system adopted by the military commander, Colonel Palmer, of granting passes over the railways to any negro stating he was in search of employment. We were notified of the existence of the institution by finding here, for the first time, the car nearest to the engine very roughly fitted up, and set apart entirely for the coloured race — a nigger car being an invariable adjunct to the trains in the South- Since the time of our visit however, two-thirds of the States having adopted the amendment to the Constitution, slavery has ceased to exist through- out the whole Union. A run of three weary hours in the filthy, crowded, and sCarcely-lit cars, brought us to Cave city. As it was too late to proceed that night we took up our quarters at the station hotel, the city having resolved itself into a hamlet of half-a-dozen houses; and after the fashion of American country inns, the hour of the evening meal being past, no further refreshment except a ' liquor up ' at the bar, with a cracker or dry A STAGE JOURNEY. 19 biscuit, was to be got, and we went supperless to bed. We embarked next morning upon a stage, or coach, which by the help of four horses was to convey us over the most villainous of roads to the object of our visit. An American stage has been often described, but requires to be seen and tried in order to be realised. Entering an enormous body perched high upon the springs, and intended to hold ten or twelve persons, the passenger who is to retain his seat must wedge himself very firmly in, unless he wishes to be sent flying across the vehicle like a shuttlecock. We attempted a seat on the roof, but after a few miles, happily accom- plished without accident, felt it prudent to accede to the driver's request, and lessen the risk by low- ering the centre of gravity and becoming inglorious insiders. The drive was a very beautiful one, all the way through the wood of Kentucky, dear to the hunter of the squirrel and the turkey, and glowing at that time with the rich tints of autumn. The colouring is very different from that in Canada. There the chief beauty arises from the brilliant contrast of the deep red of the maple and the scarlet of the beech, in juxtaposition with the golden tints of the plane or the tulip, or with the brilliant green of, perhaps, the next 20 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. branch or tree, which, by some strange freak, the frost has left untouched in all its summer glory. The woods of Kentucky, in which the oak and the hickory chiefly abound, were not robed in such gorgeous drapery ; but a rich combination of reds and browns prevailed, lighted up by the brilliant undergrowth of the sumach and dogwood. We were persuaded, when we had come about half way, to visit a comparatively recent discovery called the Indian Cave, the entrance of which lies close to the track ; being assured that, although less extensive, it was far more beautiful than its more famous neighbour. We found however, no- thing in it of a character to justify this assertion : a few stalactites, and what was called the Prison of Chillon — a recess or cage it had been, before the bars were broken off by a set of raiders, or guerillas — were all that served to relieve the monotony of a long underground passage. Another hour in the stage brought us to a large, straggling hotel, at the mouth of the great cave, built to accommodate over a hundred guests. Not a dozen, I think, sat down to dinner with us ; but that would be owing to the lateness of the season. From the disturbed state of the country for the last four years but little business has been done ; life on the earth above has been too full of excite- MAMMOTH CAVES. 21 ment and interest to leave time for pleasure- excursions into the depths below. The visitor to the cave has the choice of two routes, the long or the short : the one occupying eight, the other about four hours. Our time being limited we were obliged to select the latter, which, as far as we could learn, included all the chief points of interest, with the exception of some very beautiful crystallised formations of gypsum, the sight of which we had to be content to forego. At two o'clock the guide, wno had already con- ducted a party that morning, professed himself ready to accompany us, and we started. He was a slave, and hired out by his owner to the land- lord of the hotel, and had spent twenty years of his life in the service. Slavery certainly did not sit heavy upon him ; he doubtless made a good thing of it, and was ever ready with any amount of small jokes and witticisms. Being each pro- vided with a small lamp, we made our descent into the cavern by a longish ladder, which landed us in the entrance to a long passage, about twenty feet in width and thirty in height. For the first half mile there were frequent traces of the work- ings, which some time ago — I believe during the War of Independence — were carried on to a con- siderable extent, to extract saltpetre, but have 22 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. now been for some time discontinued. Our attention was next drawn to a number of large black patches or spots on the roof, which seemed at first sight to be a growth of some lichen, or moss, but in reality was a collection of bats, which had come here together by the thousand, as the most eligible winter quarters they could find. The explored passages through the cave are reckoned to exceed ninety miles in length, and vary from four to forty feet in height. There are, however, but few places in which a six-foot man is obliged to stoop, or which a man of ordinary proportions would have any difficulty in passing. All, how- ever, is not plain sailing ; and the names of ' Fat Man's Misery,' and 'Tall Man's Misery,' will recall to any who have made trial of them, the discomforts of the situation, even though they may repudiate the epithets as applied to them- selves. The temperature of the place stands high — 59 or 60° Fahr., without variation, summer or winter, and with perfect freedom from damp. A few years ago a party of thirteen consumptive patients, chiefly I believe from the Southern States, determined to make the experiment whether a sojourn here would have a beneficial effect upon their complaint. They actually had FANTASTIC SHAPES. 23 small stone huts erected in one of the chambers, in which they took up their abode for three months, shut out from the light of day. The result did not equal their expectations. Three of them were carried out corpses, and the re- mainder survived but a short time their return to the upper air. The stalactites in the cave are not striking in beauty, but the principal charm arises from the strange and weird forms and fantastic shapes which the huge masses of rock assume in the dim light. In some places the resemblance of the rock to a well-known shape is evident at once; to others, the fancy of each visitor assigns in turn a different name — elephants, sword-fishes, leo- pards, poodles, even side-saddles, stand' forth in strange succession from the gloomy sides. There lies the immense coffin of some giant of old, whose spouse, still in the land of the living, is engaged hard by in tossing her youthful progeny. The catalogue is indeed endless, and an imagin- ative mind would quickly people the place with every variety of form known or unknown. But a true conception of the grandeur of the cave is only to be obtained by a visit to the large halls, domes, and corridors, which rise, in some in- stances, to a height of near sixty feet. We must 24 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. visit the Banqueting Hall and the Council Cham- ber, where a blue light, burned by the guide, throws a bright glare on walls and roof for a limited space ; but beyond serves only to make visible the intense darkness of the more remote recesses, and renders it difficult not to believe one's self in the halls of Eblis. How am I to describe Grorran's Dome, rising to a height of two hundred feet? or the Grand Crossing, where the eye vainly attempts to follow the receding arch of two corridors, stretching off in opposite directions into the horror of. unknown darkness? More real, or less unearthly, seemed the Gothic Chapel, complete with stalls and pulpit, whose altar was actually chosen for the celebration of her nuptials by a bride who had recorded a vow that she never would be married on earth, and, then repentant, adopted this happy expedient for releasing herself from so troublesome an engage- ment. A couple of hours' walking brought us to the shores of the Dead Sea, or Infernal Eiver; about as good a representation of the Styx, I should think, as can anywhere be found upon this globe, as it glides along, with barely perceptible current, some three hundred feet below the surface of the earth. Dark and dank appeared its still waters, and silent as the grave its banks. The Charon of STAR CHAMBER. 25 the place was on the other side with his boat ; so we escaped the dangers and the detention which an inexorabile fatwm doubtless exacts as the penalty of idle curiosity, from those who are tempted to cross and bring themselves within his clutches. The river is said to be affected by the rains, and to be subject to very sudden rises. One would not expect to hear of any finny inhabitants in such waters; but they contain nevertheless a curious species, about the size of a large minnow, called, from the entire absence of any optical powers, ' the eyeless fish.' Our sable guide was always on the look-out for them, and sells them preserved in spirits, to those who desire a curious, but certainly unattractive, me- morial of their visit. There yet remains the Star Chamber to be visited, the sight of whose wonders made more impression upon me than almost anything else. It is in shape a crescent, with horns stretching out of sight into the dark- ness. The guide places you against the wall, and then all but obscures the light of the lamps, and bids you look steadily at the roof, which is about forty feet high, and is covered with small crys- talline formations of gypsum. Then, as you continue to keep your looks steadfastly fixed upon it, your eyes becoming accustomed to the dim 2& THE SOUTH AFTEB THE WAR. light, begin to discern the stars peeping out one after another from the black roof, till they seem dotted all over it as thick as in the blue vault of heaven ; and but a small exercise of the imagination makes the illusion perfect, by adding even a milky way to the spectacle. Then our guide left us, carrying awaj with him the lamps, and leaving us in Egyptian darkness — a darkness that could be felt, impalpable and impenetrable, surpassing anything in our experience ; while with it flashed momentarily through the mind the awful apprehension of being left there to perish, unaided and alone, to grope on in the blackness of such night through tortuous passages and inextricable labyrinths, without the faintest clue to guide the wandering steps, till Eeason vacate her seat or blank Despair command to sit down and die. But the echo of our guide's returning steps soon reassured us ; and waiting his approach, with our eyes fijced on the roof, we saw a faint, pale light stealing over it, as the rays of the full moon into the depths of some rocky valley, until all further idea of romantic imagination fled away before the advent of 'Mat,' grinning from ear to ear, and telling us that the play was over. We were not sorry to return to the light of day, and to find ourselves safe at 10 p.m. at Cave city. A FAIR CONTEAST. 27 Americans are fond of comparing the Falls of Niagara with these Caves; or rather I should say, of putting them in juxtaposition. The latter may fairly be done, inasmuch as they are undoubtedly the two greatest wonders of nature on their continent, if not in the world. Both inspire the spectator with feelings of unbounded awe, and with a sublime sense of majesty and grandeur ; but the sublimity and grandeur of each is of so distinct a character, differing — as may not inappropriately be said in this case — as much as light from darkness, that while they may fairly be contrasted they can never be compared. 28 CHAPTEE III. LOUISVILLE AND NASHVILLE EAILBDAD CAMPS OF EEFDGEBS TENNESSEE DUKING THE WAR ANDREW JOHNSON'S RULE AS MILITARY GOVERNOR HE IS ELECTED VICE- PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES SPEECH TO THE COLOURED PEOPLE PRESENT APPEARANCE OF THE CITY. We continued next day our route to Nashville, over a railroad which has proved of the greatest service to the North, in bringing troops and supplies for the vast armies of Tennessee, which were only to be reached by this route from Washington equally as from the West. For the first year of the war the southern half was in the hands of the Con- federates, and later on much of it was torn up by Bragg. Morgan too continually captured the trains, and occasionally sent a driverless engine thundering along the rails northward, in the hope of doing further damage. We passed Bowling Green and Gralatin, where we noticed a collection of very squalid-looking plank-huts, which at- tracted attention from the great contrast they presented to the very neat dwellings we had seen THE CITY OF ROCKS. 29 everywhere in the North. They turned out to be the abode of a number of refugees, coloured people, most of them lately slaves, who had chosen this place for a sort of camp, where they eked out a miserable existence. The mortality among them already has been frightful, and their sufferings last winter were expected to be very great. But we must leave them here for the pre- sent, until we get further south, when their con- dition and prospects will demand our careful consideration. We reached Nashville towards dusk, crossing the Cumberland river, which washes the foot of the rock on which the city is built, by a temporary bridge, which replaces the one destroyed by the Confederates on their evacuating the place. A short notice of a town which has played so im- portant a part during the war for the Union, and has gone through such vicissitudes of fortune, will not I think, be without interest here. The spirit of Secession was dominant in Nash- ville in 1860 and 1861, and Andrew Johnson, on his return hither from Washington in April of the latter year, at the close of Congress — where, in the Senate, he had arraigned his former associates as traitors to their country — was assailed at va- rious places along his route, was threatened with 30 THE SOUTH AFTKR THE WAR. lynching, and repeatedly insulted by mobs of fu- rious men ; a price was even set upon his head, and personal violence threatened if he remained in the State. The Grovernor and the State Legislature had espoused the cause of the South, and the city was asserting its claims to be the seat of the Con- federate government. The country meanwhile, in which the parties were more evenly balanced, became the scene of the most frightful disorder. The Secession party took the initiative, and shot down their Union neighbours to intimidate the rest. A reign of terror followed. Then the Union party recovered themselves, and retaliated with a vengeance embittered by former sufferings. Each man lived in fear of his neighbour, and slept with his bowie knife and revolver under his pillow. Brother's hand was raised against bro- ther's, and the most cruel outrages were perpetrated on defenceless women and children. The State was converted into one vast battle-ground, not only by contending armies, but also by private factions and individuals. Every county, town, and almost every hamlet, has been the scene of some bloody drama or savage murder. But on the morning of Sunday, the 9th of February, 1862, as the bells were sounding for morning service, the unwelcome and unexpected A STAMPEDE. 31 tidings came like a thunderbolt upon the city, that Fort Donnelson had fallen — that the passage of the Cumberland was open to the Federal gunboats, whose arrival might be expected towards evening. Fearful visions arose in the minds of the people of the fate of captured cities — of rapine and pillage, of negro insurrections, and incendiarist torches. The preachers that day had no congre- gations. A general stampede ensued. As many trains as could be put together were despatched in quick succession, crowded to suffocation, to Chattanooga. The Grovernor and his staff, taking with them the archives of the State, joined in the general rush. Every vehicle was put in requisition, and the Streets were strewn with pro- visions and furniture which the people were loth to abandon, but unable to remove. Next day arrived the gunboats, welcomed by the few Union- ists who were in the city, and Federal authority was restored without the dreaded consequences of hostile occupation. On the 12th of March Andrew Johnson entered the city, appointed by the President Provisional Military Governor of Tennessee. The post was a critical and arduous one; and Andrew Johnson, from his thorough knowledge of the people — from his staunch loyalty, and his unflinching firmnesp 32 THE SOUTH AFTEB THE WAR. in the course lie believed right or expedient, was the man to fill it. He was peremptory in his measures. The mayor and city council had to make their choice between the oath of allegiance and the Penitentiary. It was proclaimed that the maltreatment of a Unionist would be followed by the punishment of five Eebel sympathisers ; that the destruction of the property of a loyal man should be made good to him out of Eebel pockets. Many families were starving in Nashville, whose natural supporters — the husband, the sons, the brothers — were fighting in the Southern armies. Eefusing to allow the maintenance of these to be a tax upon the Grovernment, Andrew Johnson levied assess- ments, varying in amount frDm 50 to 300 dollars, upon all the leading Secessionists for their support. The regime was a severe one : it was faithfully and strictly carried out, and it is hard to say that it was not rendered necessary by the circumstances of the case. In September of that same year. General Buell, who commanded the Union forces in Tennessee, was obliged to fall back before the Confederates under Bragg, and Nashville was to have been abandoned ; but the firm determination and the iron will of Andrew Johnson insisted that at all costs it should be held, though in violation ANDREW JOHNSON. 33 of all military precedent. The result proved him to be right. From time to time the city was wholly isolated, its communications cut off, and a state of siege prevailed. But the attacks of the enemy were repelled, and the defence was sus- tained till Eosecranz, who in November relieved the place, found them on half rations indeed, but still unsubdued. A scene of busy activity was Nashville from that time forward. Through it came pouring all the reinforcements for the Western armies, and back from those armies came slowly the long trains of sick and wounded to its many hospitals, or to the large camp established there for convalescents. There, in full work, were the head-quarters in the "West of the Christian and Sanitary Commissions. In camps outside the town huddled together the unfortunate refugees — negroes who had fled from their masters, to meet, in many cases, a worse fate through cold and starvation. Fearful were their sufferings : without occupation or means of subsistence, they were left to die. The whole energies of the country were engaged in providing for her soldiers. But another career was opening to Andrew Johnson. On the 6th of June, 1864, he was D 34 THE SOUTH AFTEE THE WAR. unanimously nominated by the National Union Convention, assembled at Baltimore, as their can- didate for the Vice-Presidency of the United States — ^ Abraham Lincoln having been re-nomi- nated for the Presidency ; and on November 14th the two were, as is well known , elected by immense majorities. An extract or two from his speeches, made in the prospect of occupying a post com- paratively unimportant, may not be uninter- esting if they help us to read his character aright, and give some clue to the line he has taken since his elevation to the highest office in the gift of the American people. Addressing a mass meeting held on the an- nouncement of his nomination, after telling them that slavery was dead, he continued, — ' It was not murdered by me. I told you long ago what the result would be, if you endeavoured to go out of the Union to save slavery — that it would be blood- shed and rapine, devastated fields, plundered villages and cities ; and therefore I urged you to remain in the Union. In trying to save slavery you killed it, and lost your own freedom. Your slavery is dead, but I did not murder it ; as Mac- beth says to Banquo's bloody ghost, — ■ " Thou canst not say I did it ! Never shake Thy gory looks at me." ' THE STEPS OF THE CAPITOL. 35 Of the slave power he further wrote, in accept- ing the nomination : — ' While it remained subordi- nate to the Constitution and laws of the United States, I yielded to it my support ; but when it became riebellious, and attempted to rise above the Grovernment and control its action, I threw my humble influence against it.' Still more remarkable was the speech which soon after, standing at night upon the steps of the Capitol, he addressed to the coloured popula- tion of Nashville, as they stood packed together in one dense mass in the State Yard, and the street beneath him ; their swarthy faces lit up by the ruddy glow of the blazing torches. He told them of President Lincoln's emancipation proclamation, which for certain reasons did not extend to Ten- nessee, and left many of them still in bondage, their limbs still lashed by the scourge, still galled by the fetter. ' Gradually,' he continued, ' has this iniquity been passing away ; but the hour has come when the last vestiges of it must be removed. Consequently, I too, without reference to the Pre- sident or any other person, have a proclamation to make ; and standing here upon the steps of the Capitol, with the past Tiistory of the State to witness, the present condition to guide, and its future to encourage me, — I, Andrew Johnson, do 36 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. hereby proclaim freedom, full, broad, and uncon- ditional, to every man in Tennessee.' It was one of those moments, says an eye- witness who has described the scene, when the speaker seems inspired, and when his -audience, catching the inspiration, rises to his level and be- comes one with him. One simultaneous shout of approval and delight burst from three thousand throats, which had hung with breathless attention on each syllable, till the last word of the grand climax was uttered, and they gave vent to their joyous utterance. The speaker went on to de- nounce the grasping monopoly of the slave-owners, who, while they sneered at negro equality, had not disdained to hold the coloured race in the unlawful grasp of their lust. * Henceforth,' he told them, *■ the sanctity of God's holy law of marriage shall be respected in your persons, and the great State of Tennessee shall no more give her sanction to your degradation and your shame.' ' Thank God ! thank God ! ' came from the lips of a thousand women. ' Thank God ! ' fervently echoed their husbands, their fathers, their bro- thers. ' And if the law protects you in the posses- sion of your wives and children, if the law THE PROMISED MOSES. 37 shields those whom you hold dear, will you en- deavour to be true to yourselves, and shun, as it were death itself, the path of lewdness, vice, and crime ? ' 'We will! we will!' cried the assembled thousands, and another mighty shout went up to heaven. ' Looking at this vast crowd of coloured people,' continued the Governor, ' and reflecting through what a storm of persecution and obloquy they are compelled to pass, I am almost induced to wish that, as in the days of old, a Moses might arise who should lead them to their promised land of freedom and happiness.' 'You are our Moses,' shouted several voices, and the exclamation was caught up and cheered tiU the Capitol rung again. ' Vv^e want no Moses but you.' ' Well, then,' replied the speaker, ' humble and unworthy as I am, if no other better shall be found, I will be indeed your Moses, and lead you through the Eed Sea of war and bondage to a fairer future of liberty and peace. I speak as a citizen of Tennessee. I am here on my own soil, and here I mean to stay and fight this great battle of truth and justice to a triumphant end. When this strife is passed we shall, I trust, I know, have 38 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. a better state of things, and shall rejoice that honest labour reaps the fruits of its own industry, and that every man has a fair chance in the race of life.' It is impossible to describe the enthusiasm which followed on these words. The great Tri- bune of the people descended from the steps of the Capitol. As if by magic the dense throng parted to let him through. And all that night long his name was mingled with the curses and execrations of the traitor and oppressor, and the blessings of the oppressed and the poor. Such was Andrew Johnson at Nashville, when the world knew but little of him — so little that, after Lincoln's death, some of our own papers spoke of him as certain not to accept the Presidency, conscious of his own utter unfitness for it. Such is he now that he is installed in the White House ; and the protection he offered at Nashville to the slave he is now endeavouring to extend to men now not less in need of it — the conquered and ruined South. It would be beyond the scope of this paper to discuss the legality of his procla- mation of freedom, or to define the extent of his authority as governor ; it will suffice if these ex- tracts have helped to throw any light on the character of the tailor of Tennessee. A FINAL EFFORT. 39 But one episode in the history of the city re- mains to be told. On the evening of the 2nd of December, 1864, not six months before the close of the war, a Confederate army, for the first time for two years, was visible from the Capitol. It was the last offensive effort of the Confederacy ; the army of Hood endeavouring to make use of Sher- man's tactics against himself, and to compel him to return upon his base. Nothing could have suited that general better :* relieved of an enemy in front, he detached General Thomas to engage Hood, while he started unimpeded on his march through Georgia. Thomas outnumbered, at first continually fell back towards Nashville, to concen- trate his command, keeping the enemy at bay meanwhile by skilful manceuvering and a deter- mined front. On the 30th of November the rebels attacked him in his entrenchments at Franklin, but were repulsed with the loss of 6000 men, among whom were counted no less than thirteen general « General Grant thus describes the movement in his now famous report, — ' Hood, instead of following Sherman, continued his march northward, which seemed to me to be leading to his certain doom. At all events, had I the power to command both armies, I should not have changed the orders under which he seemed to be acting.' 40 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. officers. Still Thomas fell back, and on Dec. 2nd Hood established his lines in front of Nashville, and awaited the arrival of a force from Missouri under Price. It was important that he should be dislodged. Had the city fallen he would have added 70,000 men to his ranks in Tennessee and Kentucky, and done serious damage to the Union cause. The Commander-in-chief was becoming impatient, and was even himself on the way to the scene of action. But the aid Hood expected from Missouri never came, and on the 15th of the month Thomas attacked him in position, and in a battle lasting two days, utterly defeated and drove him from the field, capturing most of his artillery and many thousand prisoners. Thenceforward Nash- ville was secure. The town itself has not suflFered, and seemed to us full of bustling life and energy. But out- side, within a very short distance, are no scanty signs of the severity of the struggle — ruins of burnt houses, stumps of felled trees, and branches torn by shot, tell undeniable tales of the presence of war. Hard by lie buried 32,000 Union soldiers. The cemeteries are carefully and systematically laid out by the Government, who are even now gathering in the dead from the pits and trenches in which they had hurriedly to be Cast after a THE soldier's GRAVE. 41 battle, and endeavouring as far as possible to dis- tinguish them. A small board in most cases, with the name of the soldier on it, marks the resting- place of each; and plans are carefully made, so that, if time or accident should efiface the inscrip- tion, it may always be possible to ascertain the exact situation of any grave. 42 CHAPTEE IV. THE FKEEDMEN'S BUREAU. CHANGED CONDITION OF THE CODNTBY END OF SLAVERY THE TWO EACES MEDIATION OP THE BDKEAD OON- TBADICTOBT BEPOETS 6ENEBAL HOWARD V. GENEBAL GEANT FEEE LABOUR IN THE SEA ISLANDS ENCOU- EAGING SYMPTOMS NEGROES AS COMPARED TO CHILDREN PROBABLE ATTITUDE OF WHITE RACE. If any one who has been ' down Sotith ' in old times were now to visit the scene of his former travels, he would find it not an easy matter to be- lieve that he was again in the same country, so complete is the change that has passed over the face of it. The plantations at which he used to partake of the profuse hospitality for which the South has long been famed, he would now, in most cases, find dismantled and untenanted. The cotton- fields are uncultivated ; a high crop of waving rushes covers the rice-grounds ; and a few patches THE OLD PLANTATION. 43 here and there of corn or potatoes give the only- sign of provision for the present or care for the future. The gaily-dressed ladies who swept by him in their carriages, or did the honours of a generous table, now sit depressed at home in the plainest attire, compelled themselves to perform the most menial offices, and in many cases to earn by their own exertions a precarious liveli- hood. The old servants who swarmed about the houses in allowed familiarity, all are gone. The field-hands who were to be seen in large gangs, for ever plying their monotonous task under the lash of the driver, now crowd the pavements of the cities, and jostle their masters with a grinning air of defiant superiority; or herd together in wretched camps, depending upon the Grovernment for support; or lounge about, looking as unsol- dierlike as possible in the blue uniform of the Northern army. Such is the legacy of the war. These are the results of the cutting of the Gordian knot of slavery. The problem however, is as yet but half solved. The wound that has been made needs the applica- tion of a healing salve, and the " how ' and the ' when ' are questions of world-wide interest. To overlook them were impossible, and it were best perhaps, that they should engage our attention 44 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. at the outset of our journey, on the very threshold of the late Confederacy. On the conclusion of the war by the surrender of Grenerals Lee and Johnston, Federal authority, which had been for a time impaired, was re-estab- lished over the whole Union. At once President Lincoln's famous proclamation of January 1st, 1862, hitherto of no effect beyond the lines of the Union armies, came into force ; the fetters dropped from the limbs of every slave throughout the Eebel States, and more than three millions of men, unac- customed to reason, to think, to provide for them- selves — used only to obey — became suddenly their own masters, and had to assume the duties as well as the privileges of freemen. To both they were equally new. More helpless than chil- dren, no parent or guardian was at hand for their direction or advice. Naturally indisposed to la- bour, the life of the negro had been one long period of toil. What wonder that idleness should be the summit of his felicity ! Fond of display and company he hurries to the towns, where the gra- tification of the one taste is enhanced by that of the other. Brought up with indistinct notions of family ties, how is he in the first hour of freedom to remember the duty of supporting his parents, hitherto his master's care, not his own? By MASSA NO MOEE. 45 nature sensual, prone to thieving and lying, the only weapons of an oppressed people, and plunged in the depths of ignorance, three millions are freed in a moment, without any of the modifying cir- cumstances of a gradual emancipation. They are freedmen now, and free men. They must be protected, directed, and controlled ; — but who shall assume so Herculean a task, so awful a responsibility ? Nor is the condition of the white man, the late master and owner of the negro, less em- barrassing. Deprived of his slaves, by whose labour the land — his only remaining wealth — can be made profitable, he sees nothing before him but penury and want. Accustomed to have his slightest orders attended to, and able to enforce obedience, he is reduced to the same standard of equality with those who but lately crouched at his feet. The work which he had hitherto exacted as his due can no longer be commanded, but must be contracted for — perhaps asked as a favour. What wonder if the spirit of a proud race refuse to bend to the storm, and prefer to sit with folded hands in the silence of fury or despair, refusing, or unable to adapt itself, to such altered circum- stances ! Something, however, must- be done : policy 46 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. and humanity alike require ttiat men should work, and not starve: the land must be tilled, if the country is to prosper. The winter of the con- tinent renders the idleness, so grateful to the negro in the West India Islands, an impossibility here. 'He that will not work neither shall he eat,' nor find clothing; and without clothing he will freeze. A new systein has to be adopted for the salvation of either or both races, and that without delay. The Government of the United States did not hesitate to grapple with the difficulty ; and an Act of Congress, approved on the 3rd of March, 1865, established in the War Department a- Bureau of Eefugees, Freedmen, and abandoned lands (commonly called the 'Freedmen's Bureau'), to which was given control in all cases relative to freedmen from the Eebel States, or from the territories occupied by the Northern armies. In May the organisation was completed under General Howard, as Chief Commissioner, and subordinate officers were appointed under him to districts comprising two or three States each. Unfor- tunately, however, the chief was not at first happy or sufficiently careful in the selection of his agents, many of whom were men of strong prejudice and little judgment, and succeeded too well in de- THE FEEEDMEN'S BUEEAtT. 47 stroying the confidence of the planters in the fair- ness of the bureau, and in creating the impression that the negro alone would find justice and a hearing at their hands.* This, however, was not the class of men whom we found holding the chief posts of responsibility in the bureau. As far as our experience went, and we had some considerable opportunities of forming a judgment, the principal officials were men fully alive to the delicate nature of the task imposed upon them, and well calculated by the fairness, and the conciliatory spirit they • have evinced, to restore the impaired confidence of the planters, while determined to secure fullest justice for the freedman. We made our first acquaintance with the bureau at Nashville, the head-quarters of the district comprising the States of Kentucky and Tennessee, with a population of freedmen num- * An extract from a Nashville paper will show the form the apprehension has taken : — ' No (white) man will hire a negro when he knows that at any time, on any exparte statement, he may be dragged before a Yankee school- master, and fined or imprisoned without a trial, while the negro is released from his contract; and the planter is vexed by constant demands for taxes, and orders to see that the picaninilies are duly sent to school with faces washed and clothes mended.' 48 THE SOUTH AFTEE THE WAR. bering a million ; and, later on, we witnessed its operations in the States of Georgia and the Caro- linas; while the report made to Congress by General Howard in December last, embracing the whole of the operations of the bureau, gives the oppor- tunity of a survey on a more extended scale. Of the first-mentioned district the products were corn, negroes, and mules ; the latter States were mainly devoted to the growth of cotton and rice. In the former, from the presence or propinquity of the Federal armies, the negroes had long left their masters, and congregated in the towns or camps ; in the latter, they had continued to work on the plantations till they were carried off, if they hap- pened to be found upon the line of Sherman's march, or set free by the conclusion of the war. A few extracts from the instructions given to some of the sub-agents will serve to show the spirit in which they are conceived, the objects at which they aim, and the principles upon which they proposed to act. The Nashville Bureau defines its work to be — ' The promotion of productive industry, the settle- ment of those so lately slaves in homes of their own, with the guarantee of their absolute freedom, and their right to justice before the law.' General Tillson, the Assistant-commissioner for Georgia, feeedmen's conteacts. 49 in an address delivered before the Convention of that State, tells them that ' he is not the champion of the negro but the disinterested umpire between him and the white race, to reconcile conflicting interests, and to adjust properly the great question of free and coloured labour.' With this view both parties are urged to make contracts in writing, and according to a prescribed form, but capable of modification to suit the various cases. By these the employer contracts to find free quarters, rations, fire, and medical attendance, with such wages as may be agreed upon, secured by a lien upon the crop, or by sureties. No fixed rate of wages is prescribed, but the agent is in- structed to see that the contracts are equitable, and their inviolability enforced against employer and employed. A form of indenture is given in Georgia, under which freed children without natural guardians may be bound to apprenticeship up to the age of twenty-one years, with the consent of the bureau, or of the ordinary of the county, if willing to act. In States where negro testimony is received in the courts, the civil magistrates are requested to act as agents in settling differences that may arise on the contracts ; where it is not admitted, E 50 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. the exclusive jurisdiction devolves upon the bureau. Schools are to be encouraged ; provision made for the aged and infirm ; the idle and vagrant punished. Clear rules are laid down as to the legal obligation of the marriage tie ; laws of the State as to paupers, vagrants, &c., are recoguised, if made without distinction of colour ; and the erroneous impression of the prospect of a division of lands among the negroes is clearly corrected. The Nashville Circular concludes thus: — 'The duties devolving upon you as agent of this bureau are delicate, difficult, and important ; upon their proper discharge depends the tranquillity and consequent prosperity of your community. See that simple justice is' done, and follow after the things that make for peace.' All must allow that these instructions breathe the very spirit of moderation and fairness ; and if they have been acted up to, the system will at all events have received a fair trial. Yet the planters shake their heads at the attempt of the Yankees to understand and manage the negro — a power which they assume to be peculiar to themselves. It is, however, satisfactory to know that the experiment has been made ; that in the Tennessee district five thousand contracts had in November COTTON PROSPECTS. 51 last already been entered into, and that in no case had either party come before the bureau to com- plain of the conduct of the other.* From some other districts also we have favourable reports. In Texas, half a crop is spoken of as having been well gathered in last year, principally by the freedmen, and this at a time when they were under the excitement necessarily incident to a state of transition from bdndage to freedom, and while they were more or less unsettled and un- decided in their purposes. Colonel Thomas, the agent of the bureau, writes from Mississippi in December: — ' The freed- men are doing well, their crops are maturing fast; at least 10,000 bales of cotton will be raised by these people, who are working on their own account : a more industrious, energetic body of citizens does not exist.' Writing of another part of the same State he says : — ' The negroes are at home, working quietly ; they have contracted with * The successful working of the Nashville Bureau has been owing so much to the efSciency of its chief officei-, General Fisk — the ' top drawer,' as he calls himself, of the bureau — that the like results can hardly be generally looked for. The conduct of transactions such as these requires a peculiar combination of qualities not often to be found in the same individual. 52 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. their old masters at fair wages. All seem to accept the change without a shock.' G-eneral Howard, after visiting the chief offices in almost all the districts under his charge, avows his complete belief in the eventual success of free labour, and while admitting the prevalence of complaints on the part of property-holders of a want of security, he says, — ' There are so many examples of the complete success of free labour, that I bring them forward as an answer, and I believe the causes of complaint are due as much to the prejudice of the employer, and the want of a practical knowledge of any other system than the one under which he has been brought up, as to the ignorance and suspicion of the labourer.' General Grant however, on his return last Christmas from a visit he paid to the Southern States, reports that the negro refuses to contract at all, or that he soon becomes weary of his work, and, being fickle and improvident, will often leave it incomplete, even at the risk of losing the price of the labour he has performed. When we were in the country, the Atlantic and Gulf Eailway Company was hiring freedmen at so much per day, payable monthly with rations ; not one of them, we were told, had stayed out his time and claimed his wages. Uncertainty of this HOPES AND FEARS, 53 sort will be fatal to any hope of the successful cul- tivation of cotton by the freedman — for the crop is one needing unremitting attention from January to January, and is even said to require thirteen months' labour in the year : the neglect of a single week might ruin the whole. Complaints are also made of the quantity of work performed, and an instance was given me where negroes who, under the old system, used to house with ease ten loads of corn in a day, now barely accomplished four. All this is, perhaps, not to be wondered at, and the most hopeful say that, having enjoyed his freedom for a while, he will return willingly to his work ; or if not, that cold and hunger will leave him no choice in the matter. This view is not borne out however by the conduct of the negroes on the Sea Islands and at Port Eoyal, where many of them have enjoyed their freedom almost since the commencement of the war, with lands allotted to them and the aid of Northern capital and superintendence ; yet a parish, which in old times used to produce 6000 bales .of cotton, will this year only raise 400; and on one of the most famous islands, five miles in extent, they. manage to grow six acres of com. 54 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. The men who have been, during the last three or four years, engaged in raising cotton, are all Northerners ; many of them sent out in 1862 from Boston, by the Freedmen's Aid Society, to under- take the superintendence of plantations. This is the view taken by one of them. He says, — ' Before cotton-raising in the Sea Islands can become a profitable or pleasant occupation, it will be neces- sary to make a complete change in the system of labour. The employer has now no control over his workmen ; they work when they please, and at what they please, and only so long as they please. The present system is unendurable; to try and carry on a plantation in this country is a constant tax on a man's self-respect.' He could not secure the obedience of the men whom he hired, but was under the necessity of coaxing them to do the work they were paid for ; and often he coaxed in vain. For example : he had a good blow of cotton in the field once, and was desirous of getting it picked, so he told the people to go out and pick it ; they were busy at the time ginning the cotton already gathered, and at the end of a week he found not one person had been into the field. He was determined to get the cotton picked, so he locked the gin-house door. That, however, was what suited them exactly ; it was just then time to A BAD LOOK OUT. 55 dig tte slip potatoes, and until that was done the cotton was not touched. Such cases were of weekly occurrence. An- other tells us, under the present system the la- bourer works for his employer rather less than three months in the year ,; he seldom works more than five hours in the day, and half of that time is spent in cultivating his own crop of corn, melons, potatoes, or ground-nuts. ' It was not wonderful, however, that they had become bad labourers ; the only wonder was how so much good came to be left in them, after all the efforts of their enemies and injudicious friends.' A third, a Quaker from Delaware, who had been in the Sea Islands a little more than three years, as a friend of the coloured race, said he should not wish a final judgment of them to be deduced from their present condition in these islands. If he gathered all the cotton he expected it would have cost him a dollar a pound, or nearly double the market price. ' Opinions like these,' writes the correspondent of the Nation, ' which I found to be held by a majority of the gentlemen with whom I conversed, would be expressed per- haps in less temperate language by the greater number of the Korthern planters in Port EoyaL' . The general opinion is certainly not a favour- 56 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR, able one, and was well put by a Federal officer, speaking of the negroes collected in the camps around Atlanta, whom, he said, he found willing to ' work a little, thieve a good deal, and then rest awhile.' But this state of things will not long be possible for the negro ; deprived of its protection, he will be brought into antagonism with a race which has driven all others before it, and unless he can hold his own, he will infallibly share the fate of the Indian. The President last autumn, speaking to a regiment of coloured troops just about to be mustered out, fairly warned them that the race was on its trial. He told them that the country was theirs as much as that of any one else ; but that liberty did not consist in doing as they pleased, but in the privilege of pursuing the ordinary avocations of life and in enjoying the fruits of their labour, and that it was for them to establish the fact that they were fit to be free. It is cheering to see that some, at any rate, amongst them are realising this; more than 70,000 of them are reported to be receiving education under the direction of the bureau. General Fisk de- scribes the coloured population of Tennessee as ' hungering and thirsting after education and re- ligious knowledge.' Their orderly behaviour during the war certainly shows them to be capable VALXJABLE INFORMATION. 57 of self-restraint, if not of some considerable amount of reasoning power.* Northern soldiers seeking to make their way home after escaping from Southern prisons, were sheltered in the day-time by the negroes on the plantations, and passed on in safety by night from one end of a State to the other. By the report of the household servants in New Orleans, Butler was acquainted with the doings of every Secessionist there. Not even a ' bee-party ' could be held by the fair ones, for the purpose of working by stealth on the forbidden palmetto flag, without its coming to his knowledge. The infor- mation brought him by the negroes helped Sher- man to calculate the distance he had to make in * I had from General Butler's lips the following account of a conversation he had with a mulatto, who held the post of a non-commissioned officer in a coloured regiment, which was- one of the first raised at New Orleans : — Gen. B. ' We have heen fighting now two years for you. I want to know how it is you have never raised a finger to help yourselves ? Mulatto {after much hesitation). ' Wall, General", 'spose we do anything, we must make a clean job of it, and kill all the whites, man, woman, and chile. Gen. B. ' Well, I guess half measures would not do. Mulatto. ' And 'spose we 's doing that, what Northern General could we ask to come and help us ? ' 58 THE SOUTH AFTEE THE WAE. his march'; and it was they who disclosed to his eager soldiers the spot where massa had fondly hoped to hide from their greedy hands his trea- sures and his stores. At a mass meeting held at Charleston last autumn, to devise means for the elevation of the coloured race, all feeling of ill-will against their late masters was disavowed ; they decided to pro- mote education, and resolved, 'That our past career as law-abiding subjects shall be strictly adhered to as law-abiding citizens.' Ten thousand negroes had congregated, we were told by a gentleman in Eichmond, at Alex- andria in Virginia. In two years they built four churches — Baptist and Methodist — two of them wooden, and two of brick ; they had invested 50,000 dollars in land, and had entrusted our informant with 8000 dollars for the purchase of United States bonds. Besides all this, three schools with thirty teachers were being main- tained by them, and they had built up 1000 houses of their own. I give this information just as it came to us. We had, of course, no means of testing the accuracy of it, and can only hope that it has not been exaggerated. The Richmond Times gives the following remarks of an old negro, who was requested by GOOD ADVICE. 59 his friends, at a large meeting held in Virginia, to address them upon their changed condition : — ' My fellow-servants, — I come before you this evening to tell you what I think is your duty as coloured people. You are now free, and you have got to work, and work harder than you ever did before. It is my opinion, that unless we work we are worse off now than we were when we were slaves ; for when we were sick our masters took care of us, and we did not have to clothe ourselves, buy our own food, or pay doctors' bills ; and now, in order to make a living, we have got to put our shoulders to the wheel and work hard, and behave ourselves as coloured people : for we are black, and we will be black if we live until the judgment-day. And, fellow-servants, I be- lieve that Grod has cursed us for being so wicked, and that we are now a cursed people. We sinned too much. We did not think that Jesus died on the cross for us, and to save us from damnation. Now, my fellqw-servants, you have all had masters. Go find them, and tell them that you want to work for them, and work hard for them ; for I tell you my master is my best friend, and I am going to stick to him as long as he will let me, and work faithfully for him : for I tell you winter is coming, and you will all feel it if you 60 THE SOUTH ATTER THE WAE. don't have a comfortable home. So I hope you will all go to work, and work hard, and that God will be with you.' From evidence so conflicting as that I have adduced, it is impossible for any one to predicate with certainty the future of the negro question, or to give an answer to the oft-repeated inquiry, ' Will the negro work ? ' The difficulty of arriving at any just conclusion on the matter is in great measure I believe owing to the fact, that the capabilities and inclinations of different indi- viduals amongst them vary to an extent of which we, from our observation only of the differences existing among ourselves, can form no conception. General Fisk, whom no one could suspect of being anything but a friend to the negro, told us they could be divided into three classes ; the first of whom would do well anywhere, and under any circumstances; the second would work fairly under some supervision, and so long as they were not left to themselves ; while compjilsion was the only force that could be brought to bear upon the remainder. Not far removed from this was the opinion of a lady, now settled in Baltimore, but brought up in Boston, who after much experience of negroes, and continual intercourse with her female do- COMPARISON WITH CHILDREN. 61 mestics, had formed the decided opinion that the race were of the same average capacity with white children of the age of twelve years. Now these two views, held by people of widely different ways of thinking, seemed to me practically to coincide. In the case of children, some are precocious and wise beyond their years; others are diligent and industrious so long only as the eye of the parent or master is upon them ; while there will always be a section on whom the last dire alternative presented to the Wykehamist, the 'sors tertia ccedi ' (the rod), will alone have effect : of negroes or children it would be equally impossible to predicate generally that their career will be industrious or indolent. Their future, however, does not depend upon themselves. Tha further question has to be con- sidered, whether the simultaneous existence in the country of the two races is possible;* and assuming that the negro enters into the responsi- bilities and requirements of his new position, and aims at achieving an honourable independence * Olmsted, in his Journey through the Back Country, gives it as his opinion, 'that, taking men as they are, a happy and peaceful association of a large negro with a large white population is not at present to be calculated on as a permanent thing.' 62 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. and respectable position in the society which haa hitherto degraded and enslaved him, how will these efforts be regarded by the whites, who look upon him as belonging to an inferior order, of flesh and blood different to themselves — who, if they have permitted their negroes to approach them with a familiarity unknown in the North, permitted it only because it was in their power to humble them in a moment to the dust ? "With- out a doubt they will barely tolerate the sudden assertion of equality, which often at present as- sumes an offensive attitude, and every effort will be made by their masters to depress the race. In the more remote districts, outrages upon the freedmen are still said to be of frequent occurrence. Murders, whipping, tying up by the thumbs, are reported from the State of South Carolina. ' A heap of 'em' (niggers), said a Georgian to the corre- spondent of the Nation, — 'A heap of 'em out in my country get into the swamps and get lost. I don't know as it 's true, but I 've heard that there 's men out there that haven't got anything else to do, and if you mention any nigger to 'em, and give 'em twelve dollars, the nigger 's sure to be lost in a very few days. I know four, right here in Barnwell, that have been drowned some way within the last two months. Niggers never CIVIL EIGHTS. 63 were so careless before. They go into the swamps and nobody can find out anything about 'em, till by-and-by they 're seen floating down the river. Groing to the coast, I reckon ; that 's where they 're fond of going.' General Howard says in his report, — ' From my own observation I do not infer that such crimes and cruelties are the ordinary thing ; but the criminal list is altogether too great to pass unnoticed, and the antagonism between whites and blacks in this State (South Carolina) is strongly marked.' De Tocqueville, when he wrote upon this subject, anticipated the negation of all civil rights to the negro ; as would probably have been the case if their freedom had been spontaneously given to them, but which could not have been refused when emancipation has been imposed upon a conquered people as one of the fruits of victory. To meet a state of things so unprecedented, and to soften the antagonism of races that could not help arising out of such a condition, the Freedmen's Bureau was created. Admirable as this has proved as a temporary expedient, and en- during as we may hope its effects may prove, still few people could have expected or wished its con- 64 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. tinuance as a permanent institution of the country. Its cost, estimated for this year at near two millions sterling — the military force required for its sup- port — its tendency towards a system of bureau- cracy and centralisation — the difficulty of keeping up so elaborate and artificial a system over an area of such immense extent — and the depressing in- fluence it exerts upon independent efforts, are in such direct opposition to the spirit of American institutions, that it was easy to foresee that its ex- istence could not long be protracted. The Act of Congress which created the bureau, limited its continuance to a year after the close of the war. The President's proclamation of April last has fixed the time from which that year would begin to run, and within twelve months from this date the bureau will have ceased to exist.* This, however, did not sufl&ce to content the Eadicals, who introduced in the spring a Bill which would have enlarged the functions and extended the operations of the pre- sent system. The Bill passed both Houses, but before it could become law the President's sanction was required. That sanction he refused to give, and the Senate and the country have supported * Congress, however, has since decided on its continu- ance for two years. THE president's VETO. 65 his veto, agreeing with him in objecting to a Bill which would have the effect of maintaining mar- tial law for an indefinite period over eleven States in the South, would encourage the freedmen in idleness, would stir up new jealousies and hatreds between the races, and involve an extravagant ex- penditure of public money. 66 CHAPTEE V. FUTURE OF THE FEEEDMAN. STATE LEGISLATION BLACK CODES NEGRO TESTIMONY AND^ NEGRO SUFFRAGE SOUTHERN ESTIMATE OP HIS CAPA- BILITIES SHALL COTTON BERING? DEMANDS OF JUS- TICE CIVIL BIGHTS BILL THE RADICAL PARTY — OUR POLICY IN JAMAICA THE PRESIDENT'S INTERVIEW WITH GENERAL FISK SOCIAL EQUALITY NEVER CONCEDED SOLUTIONS OF THE PROBLEM SEPARATION ? AMALGAMA- TION ? EXTINCTION? — A FREE COURSE AND NO FAVOUR. It has been attempted to be shown in the last chapter that the establishment of the bureau, as a temporary expedient, has been productive of great good ; yet there was much that it was powerless to effect on behalf of the coloured race. The close of the war found the negro free indeed, but without civil rights. These, if his freedom is to exist in aught beside the name, he has a right to demand should be safely secured to him ; and he must look for help from without, from Congress — -for the Southern States have shown themselves inclined to do scarcely anything in this direction. Some BLACK CODES. 67 of the State legislatures adjourned last autumn without even a Bill being presented for a modifi- cation of their codes in favour of the freedmen. Mississippi declared the race incapacitated from holding real estate. By a code which has recently become law in South Carolina, a master may mo- derately correct a servant under twenty-one years of age; but if older, a judge's order is necessary to the performance of the whipping: vagrants — a word which may be made capable of including every coloured person in the State — may be sold into bondage ; and corporal punishment is also to be inflicted for conjugal infidelity. Alabama proceeds on similar principles, she establishes in every town houses of correction, where chain-gangs, reasonable chastisement, and solitary confinement on bread and water, are pro- vided for vagrants: a second offence may be visited with thirty-nine lashes. As to negro testimony, some States have shown themselves not afraid to receive it in court. Louisiana and Alabama, Mississippi and Florida, have set a good example in this respect, by ad- mitting the evidence in all criminal proceedings founded upon injury to a coloured person, and in civil cases where he is a party to the suit. Acting upon the same principles, South Carolina has es- 68 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. t'ablished inferior courts for the hearing of these cases. In all others {i. e. in those between whites) the testimony was not to be received, unless by- future legislation it should be made competent. Virginia too, though late in the day, has followed their example; and probably the whole South, sooner or later, would have felt itself constrained to follow the lead so given. It is curious that so much opposition should have been excited by the idea, but the fact must be attributed to the utter disbelief of the whites in the veracity of the negro, as also the dislike on the part of many to anything that might seem to imply a concession of equality. Better reasons than these however are required, to form any valid grounds for the exclusion of his evidence — on the credibility of which it is, of course, the province of the jury to decide, and in case they think it worthless, to refuse to attach to it any weight. A negro's testimony and a negro's vote have been equally dreaded, whereas to me they seem to stand in reality upon a very different footing ; and for this reason — that while testimony can be weighed, and its true value assigned to it, votes can only be counted ; and this distinction ought to be sufficient to prevent the two questions being ever considered together. THE VIEW OF THE PLANTERS. 69 But taken as a whole, the legislation of th'e State Conventions assembled during last autumn has been manifestly based upon a strong sense of the inferiority of the negro, and of the necessity of his being coerced into obedience and industry. And how should it have been otherwise ? It was not to be expected that legislation should go much in advance of public sentiment, which not in the South only, but amongst a large number of Northerners, takes a very low view of the capacity, both intellectual and moral, of the negro. You will hear on this side of the question that the black race are peculiarly constituted ; that the imitative faculty in them is largely developed, in proportion as the growth of their reasoning powers is dwarfed and stunted ; that the position of the facial angle and the protuberance of their heels show the existence of a marked specific distinction between the coloured and the white races. Some will go so far as to assert that niggers and mules were intended by Providence to work together, endowed with the same qualities, and sharing in the same requirements : ' plenty of work, plenty to eat, and a little whipping.' 'They have their freedom now,' such is the language used; 'the gift will prove a fatal one. The increase in their numbers up to four millions will show how well 70 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. cared for they were under the old system. They have been more than decimated by emancipation. Cheerful and contented, they went whooping and hollering to their work in the morning ; and an evening never passed without the sound of the fiddle being heard in their quarters.' ' I worked a deal harder for my hands than ever they did for me,' was the observation of a planter, ' and I am glad to be rid of them.' ' How different is their present state! — half starved, half frozen in their wretched camps ; suffering too, and demoralised, beyond all conception. You speak of the cruelties inflicted by the separation of families ; I never yet saw a negress who did not rejoice to be relieved of the care of her children. They are an inferior race, sir ; and it is idle to talk of legislating for them on the same footing as you would for the whites. They must be made to work, to know their place, to observe the obligation of the social tie, or they will become sassy and useless — a burden obnoxious to society and destructive to themselves. This is a white man's country, sir ; and if we cannot work the niggers let us be shet of them — the hated cause of all our trouble. White immigration will not be long in supplying their place.' Sentiments such as these, more or less modi- fied, or exaggerated, undoubtedly prevail to a great SHALL COTTON BE KING ? 71 extent. To them it is owing, that in many parts of the country the hostility of the whites to the schools for negroes* has been undisguised, and they find expression in codes such as those to which we have alluded, whose leading principle seems to be the seeking some compulsory process of labour ; i. e. some substitute for slavery. Now the system they propose has one great recommen- dation, viz. that by means of it the production of cotton would probably be carried to a much greater extent than could otherwise be looked for. If therefore. Cotton be king, it is by measures like these that its reign can best be assured. But if, as seems indeed to be the case, that people which have knocked off at so fearful a cost of blood and treasure the fetters of the slave, have higher aspir- ations and more exalted motives than these, they will not be content to sit down and see filched from them by legislation of this character the fruits of their dear-bought victory. ^ General Howard says in his Report, — ' I fnd many- enlightened and learned men in every State advocating a system of education, yet I believe the majority of the white people to be utterly opposed to educating the negroes. The opposition is so great that the teachers, though they be the purest of Christian people, are never- theless visited, publicly and privately, with undisguised marks of odium. 72 THE SOXJTH AFTER THE WAE. Slavery has been indeed abolished, but there is danger lest it should again appear under a new name. ' Men have a right,' we are told by Burke, ' to live by the rule of law : they have a right to justice : they have a right to the fruits of their in- dustry, and to the means of making their industry fruitful : they have a right to the acquisitions of their parents, to the nourishment and improve- ment of their offspring, to instruction in life, and consolation in death. Whatever each man can separately do without trespassing upon others, he has a right to do for himself; and he has a fair right to a portion of all that society, with all its combi- nations of skill and force, can do in his favour.' In considering these claims, it is impossible that any distinction on the ground of colour should any longer be tolerated ; justice and equality before the law must be conceded equally to white and black. With nothing less will the North, which still holds in its hands the reins of power, be con- tented. The amendment to the Constitution by which slavery was abolished, gave authority to Congress to enforce its being carried out by appropriate legislation, and they have not shrunk from making use of the powers thereby conferred upon them. The Civil Eights Bill introduced by Mr. Triimbull, which seems effectually to meet the CIVIL EIGHTS BILL. 73 case, has become law, notwithstanding the veto which the President unfortunately thought fit to lay upon it. By the provisions of the Bill it is enacted, that all inhabitants of the States or territories shall have the right to make and enforce contracts ; to sue, be parties, give evidence ; to inherit, purchase, lease, sell, hold and convey, real and personal property ; shall be entitled to full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of per- son and property; and shall be subject to like pains, penalties, punishment — and to none other — any law regulation or custom to the contrary notwithstanding. This Bill seems fairly to meet the require- ments of the case; and indeed it is the first attempt which the nation has made to put the theory of human rights, on which it professes to be based, into practice. All men henceforth will be equal before the law, entitled to the same pro- tection for person and property, subject to the same penalties, and able to use the same means for the assertion of their rights or the avenging of their wrongs. It will be observed that there is no attempt to restrict the power of State legis- lation, or to define what it must be. All that is insisted on is, that an equal application of it be 74 THE SOUTH AFTEE THE WAR. made to all. The Black Codes, as they are called, proceed upon the assumption that the negroes are a lazy, vagabond race, which requires peculiar treatment and exceptional legislation. Admitting so much for the sake of argument, it is not easy to see the hardship of making one law of general application, as the superior race, being orderly and industrious, will never come under its operations. White men will not com- plain of a stringent vagrant law, if none of them- selves are likely to be beggars or idle. Pbor-laws will have as little effect upon them if they are never to become paupers. The punishment of flogging will have no terror for men whose good conduct saves them harmless from the infliction of the lash. Objections, no doubt, may be urged against the Bill. It brings again upon the scene the old question of State Eights. Judges may be fined for executing the State laws they were ap- pointed to carry out, if they contravene the pro- visions of this Bill. The concession of civil equa- lity to tbe negro will be a bitter pill for his late master to swallow ; but where a great change is alike demanded, both, by justice and humanity, prejudices and susceptibilities of this nature ought not to be allowed to stand in the way. There exists however, a party in the North — VIEWS OF THE RADICALS. 75 of whose views Charles Sumner in the Senate, and Thaddeus Stevens in the House of Eepresentatives, may be taken to be the exponents — who, not content with the concession to the negro of civil rights, go further, and demand for him full political privileges. Their opponents would represent them to be suffering from 'nigger on the brain;' but to Charles Sumner at any rate, no one can refuse to accord the tribute of the highest esteem for single- heartedness and self-devotion, and for his sufferings on behalf of the African race. Their reasons the party do not hesitate to avow ; their belief, namely, that the negroes are to be trusted and the South are not. Their preference is for ' black patriots over white trai- tors.' They declare their conviction that justice will never be done to the negro till he is able to protect himself by voting, and that the first duty of the restored Union is to see to the security of the black race, whose unswerving loyalty has done so much for its sake. I suppose, as we have heard no more of it, Mr. Stevens has withdrawn a Bill which he produced in Congress for the confiscation of the estates of all persons who had been engaged in armed hostility to the Union ; but he would at all events be ready to hand them over to the tender mercies of a Unionist minority, and to the coloured 76 THE SOUTH AFl'ER THE WAR. race. An almost indefinite exclusion of the South from political privileges was the plan propounded by Charles Sumner, at the Eepublican Convention held in September last at Worcester, Massachu- setts, and which called forth the unanimous ap- plause of a New-England audience. But these are not held by a majority of the North, many of whose States do not themselves admit the negro to vote, and who have no wish to trample upon a fallen enemy. For it is one thing to secure civil rights to a people ; to confer upon them political privileges is another. All races and all classes are entitled to justice; but all are not ready for self-government. We granted both to the negroes in Jamaica after we had emancipated them. We threw, so to speak, the reins upon their neck. We gave them a parliamentary government, with the elective franchise on very easy terms. We treated them as if they were fit to take care of themselves, as if they had been free for eight centuries. What has been the result ? ' Lord of himself, that heritage of woe,' exposed to temptations which he had not the strength to resist, to arguments of which he was unable to detect the fallacy, an inflammable and WHAT THE PRESIDENT THINKS. 77 unreasoning race has lent too ready an ear to unscrupulous agitators, has refused to work, and has given to the advocates of slavery and to the enemies of the negro the strongest arguments in favour of their theory.* Can any one wish to see the States of South Carolina and Mississippi handed over to the black race, who are in a majority there in point of num- bers ? The President is fully alive to the question ; he has finally broken with the Eadicals, by restoring civil government to the States lately in rebellion, and by restoring the Freedmen's Bureau and the Civil Eights Bill : but he sees the necessity of the case ; and while he condemns the Bill for granting the suffrage without qualification in the district of Columbia as uncalled for, and calculated to do great harm — as likely to lead to a war between the races, and the extermination of the weaker (an opinion which is also shared by Greneral Grant) — he has yet avowed his belief that the States might gradually extend the franchise to * ' If ever the black population of the "West Indies shall become squatters, or mere cultivators on the pro- vision-lands, instead of labourers for hire, then' slavery and the slave-trade will have received the last and greatest encouragement which it is in the power of man to bestow.' — SiE E. Peel in 1841. 78 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. the superior classes among the negroes, by con- sideration of military service, payment of taxes, and intellectual fitness. The question, he said, was one for the people, and it would be tyrannical for him to attempt to force it upon them against their will. He himself, he says, has perilled everything for the coloured race (ought it not rather to be said, 'for the Union?'), and he does not now like to be arraigned by those theoretical friends of the negro who talk about abstract ideas of liberty, but never risked their own. The negro is now master of the situation ; by his labour alone can the planters' lands be made profitable : the self-interest, therefore, of the latter will be enlisted on the side of the negro, and will ensure him considerate treatment, lest an opposite course should drive him to transfer his services elsewhere. These views are not palatable to the Eadicals, and for venturing to maintain them the President is denounced as a false friend to liberty. General Fisk's account of an interview with him in November last, will help us in forming our judgment as to how far these charges are founded on fact. Speaking about the settlement of the question, he said: — 'We must follow the indi- cations of Providence. They say, I was born South, and was never a friend of the black man, PREJUDICE OF COLOUE. 79 but I am determined to see justice done, and their promised freedom guaranteed them. I will gee that carried out, and they shall have a fair chance. The Freedmen's Bureau -will be dis- continued when the South will deal fairly and honestly with the negro. Would that the people could see the waves surging around me, as telegram after telegram arrives in quick succession from all parts of the Southern States, and quick decision has to be taken ! Deeply do I need your prayers.' The tears were running down his cheeks as he said this — 'and,' added Greneral Fisk, 'I came away with faith in Andrew Johnson greater than I ever had before.' But supposing all to have been done by legis- lation that justice and humanity can demand on behalf of the negro, who is there that will relieve him from the stigma of inferiority, from the glance of contempt, from the ineradicable prejudice of colour ? Negro testimony may be admitted in the courts, but no one can enforce that it shall be believed ; negroes may be made eligible to serv6 upon juries, but the experience of Massachusetts tells us they will never be sum- moned. They may vote, but can never them- selves hope to be candidates for election. As long as he was a slave it was possible to keep 80 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. him in a condition not far removed from the brute ; but with his freedom he acquires instruc- tion enough to render this impossible any longer, and he cannot but resent it. A century of op- pression cannot so utterly have trampled out every spark of self-respect, that the freedman will tamely submit for long to be excluded from the con- veyance, the church, the hotel, of his equal before- the law — on the mere ground of his colour — without his blood boiling at the indignity, and a fearful thirst for vengeance rising up within him. A war of races has ere now been predicted — Hayti and Jamaica show that it is possible ; and to the minds of many there are indications that it wiU not long be delayed in America: a wide-spread dissatisfaction prevails because the lands of the rebels are not portioned out amongst them : Colt's manufactory is said to be turning out revolvers night and day, to supply no ordinary demand. Against what foe are the Southern States, in the midst of their destitution, hastening to reorganise their militia, if not against one in their midst? We do not say that such a contest is probable, but of its possibility there cannot be much doubt. The issue could not be uncertain, for the strength of the Union would now be against the blacks: but when did despair take account AMALGAMATION. 81 of odds? God forbid that it ever should come to this ! There are however other solutions to the problem which demand consideration, and among them has been suggested the amalgamation of the races. But no one who has ever witnessed the utter loathing which such an idea excites in the white man, can for a moment believe it to be possible. ' The social position of the negro/ said Judge Chambers in his charge to a grand jury of Virginia — moderate in its tone, and fully accept- ing the present situation — 'his social position with the white man must and will remain un- changed. Grod and nature have opposed a barrier which no bigotry or misdirected philanthropy can ever overcome. Political equality may be con ceded, but never social.' Last autumn a white man married a negress in Georgia ; his neighbours showed their sense, of what they termed the infamy of the transaction, by tarring and feathering him. Another man ventured on the same experiment in Virginia ; not only was he thrashed by the whites on his bridal day, but the very coloured people rose upon him and pursued him with clubs. However much we may deplore this feeling, it is one that G 82 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. cannot be overlooked in our inquiry into the future.* The general expectation certainly is, that the negro race will not be found fifty years hence on the continent of North America. The mortality among them has been very great during the last three years — not a few place it at a quarter of their number already, or a million of souls. The estimate will hardly seem too high if we take into account the loss of life in war. the ravages of dissipation and debauchery which ensue when men, never taught to control their passions, are suddenly congregated in the cities and every restraint is removed. Want too and destitution, killed their thousands in the camps of the refugees within the Northern line during the war. Certain it is that their numbers have fearfully diminished, and the past winter was expected to make sad havoc amongst th'em. Slavery promoted at all events their natural increase,! which in. freedom, from all accounts, is much more tardy, if it is * ' A coloured pastor in Nashville, on the 28th ult., was fined 500 dollars for marrying a white man to a coloured ■woman, the pair being also fined 50 dollars each, and in (iofault thereof sent to jail.' ■f That the negroes themselves understand the dif- ferent aspect under which they are now regarded, will be understood from the account given by one of them to Mr. EMIGRATION. 83 a.ot actually at a stand-still. It is possible they may save themselves by emigration ; but how is tJiat to be attempted on a scale commensurate with the occasion? And the burning yet fertile plains of a part of Florida, the low lands of the Mississippi bottom, and the rice-swamps of Savan- nah, where he alone can labour and live, seem indicated by nature as his fit abode. But can we hold out no brighter prospect than this ? Is the contest that has been hitherto so successfully waged in the interests of freedom, to have as its result only the extermination of the African race on this continent, or their entire separation from the white community ? Down-trodden they have long been; can we not speak of them as of, at length, an uprising race ? The clouds are undoubtedly breaking, and the horizon is brighter than it has been for many a long day ; but it is not possible to repair in a moment the wrongs of a century. You may withdraw the weapon which has caused the wound, Oliphant : — 'If, when I was a slave, I Lad tumbled over- board the steamer, the boat would have been stopped ; I should have been picked up, put by the fire to dry, because I was property, and then given a thousand lashes for falling overboard. Now if I fall over — "Oh, it's only a cursed nigger ! Go a-head ! " and I should never get picked up at all.' 84 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. but it does not follow that the process of healing- will take place immediately. The sins of the fathers will be visited upon the children, and all that England can do, as she sits watching the fetters being knocked off the limbs of the slave, is to pray that, now he is a freedman, he may have justice — justice and a fair trial. ' Give the negro the same chance as the white man,' says H. Ward Beecher, ' and let him work out his own destiny. If we are not afraid of him, let him come upon the same platform with our- selves. If he is a man, he will quickly show it ; or if he is a monkey, you will not be left long in doubt.'* ' The problem has yet to be solved,' said the President in a speech before quoted, — ' Can the coloured race be incorporated and mixed with the people of the United States, so q,s to form a harmo- niotis nation ? Let us make the experiment ; and. if they cannot agree to live together in peace and prosi^^erity, God will point out the way of separation.' * ' The friends of the freedman claim for him a weight of brain equal to his white fellow-man. A number of medical ofBcers interested in the cause are, when oppor- tunity offers, investigating the subject.' — Report of Freed- men's Bureau. 85 CHAPTEE VI. SODTHEEN CARS TRACES OF THE WAR YANKS AND EEBS THE CDMBEHLAND MOUNTAINS CHATTANOOGA THE HEART OF THE CONFEDERACY CAMPAIGN OP 1863 6ENERAI, GRANT THE MODNTAIN GIBRALTAR THE SIEGE JOE HOOKER IN THE CLODDS — MISSION RIDGE A RIDE ON A MACLELLAN SADDLE — VISIT TO THE BATTLE-FIELD. We left Nashville in pouring rain on the morning of November 1st, carrying away a pleasant re- membrance of the kind reception we had met with at the hands of both Northern and Southern people, and with appetites for further inspection quickened by what we had seen and heard in our short experience of the South. We were bound for Chattanooga, a journey of 150 miles, which the cars were advertised to accomplish in ten hours ; a rather rapid rate of travel in this part of the country, and on a railroad which had been roughly handled by both sides during the late war. The line which, as long as it is in Tennessee runs in a south-easterly direction, and then making a 86 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR, short dip into Alabama turns northward again towards Chattanooga, had experienced as we have said, the usual fate of those along which the Con- federate forces had fallen back before the ad- vancing armies of the North. Unable themselTes to hold it, everything was done to prevent its serving the purpose of their enemies.* The rails were torn up, the bridges burnt, the rolling stock destroyed or sent into the interior. To repair the damage, and to make the line again available for communications with their base, and for the transport of supplies, was the first care of the quarter-master's department in the P"'ederal armies. They relaid the track, rebuilt the bridges, and sent to the North for locomotives and cars. Some idea of the wonderful organization which this branch of the service attained may be formed * The method of destruction is simple, but very effec- tive. Two ingenious instruments have been made for this purpose. Oneofthemisa clasp which locks under the rail ; it has a ring in the top, into which is inserted a long lever, and the rail is thus ripped from the sleepers. The sleepers are then piled in a heap and set on fire, the rails roasting in the flames until they bend by their own weight. When sufficiently heated, each rail is taken off by wrenches fitting closely over the ends, and by turning in opposite directions it is so twisted that even a rolling- machine could not bring it back into shape. QUAKTEEMASTEE S DEPARTMENT. 87 from the fact, that during Sherman's advance upon Atlanta, the bridge over the Etowah, 625 feet long and 75 feet high, was rebuilt by the la- bour of six hundred men of the Construction corps in six days. The Chattahoochee bridge, six miles from Atlanta, is 740 feet long and 90 feet high, and was rebuilt in four days and a half ; and at no time during the march from Chattanooga was a train five days behind the pursuing troops. The lines when restored "were taken charge of as mili- tary roads by Government,* and were retained by them as such until six months after the close of the war; when they were handed over to the rightful owners, whether the State or a private company, with the option of purchasfng rolling stock sufficient for the actual working, and paying for it by instalments, extending over a period of two years. First-rate carriages were not to be looked for under such arrangements; and dirty they were beyond all conception; and to-day the autumn accumulations of apple-parings, nut-shells, and dry tobacco-juice which lay on the floor, seemed fair to be buried under the masses of heavy ad- * During the war the Grovemment had at its command over 40 000 miles of railroad, of which 1769 miles were exclusively military, employing a staff of 24,000 men. 88 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. hesive mud brought in by the feet of each succes- sive arrival. Our train was made up of three of the long cars invariably in use on American railways ; each capable of holding fifty or sixty passengers. Nearest the engine was the ' nigger car,' roughly fitted up with broad seats, and apparently an old baggage-waggon converted into a means of military transport. The other two were, as has been al- ready noticed, filthy and crowded to a degree ; it was difficult to find a vacant place. The company was a curious one : with the exception of ourselves and an occasional Jew or German, all had been more or less engaged in the war. Federals and Confederates were pretty equally represented. There were planters, seeking to retrieve their ruined fortunes by abandoning agricultural pur- suits and going into trade; Union soldiers, who during their campaigns in the South had discerned its capabilities and resources, and, now that the war was over, were bent upon making the most of their knowledge and turning it to good account.* We were immensely struck by the good feeling existing between both parties, each seeming to * Sherman told us, that many of his young ofBcers were going to settle down South. A HAPPY FAMILY. 89 have forgotten the deadly strife in which they had so lately taken part. On the little seats (just capable of holding two persons) might be seen the blue greatcoat of a Yankee side-by-side with the grey cloth of the Eebel * uniform ; the latter colour so familiar to us, as the ordinary grey of our Vo- lunteers at home. Many were the battles fought over again, many a 'whipping' on both sides admitted and accounted for; and we needed to turn our eyes outside and observe the continual traces of ruin and desolation which the war had left along our path, to prevent our forgetting that it had not all been a dream, and that within the space of one year these men had been engaged on the very ground over which we were passing in the most deadly and bitter hostility. It needed how- ever but a glance at the general aspect of the country, to dispel any illusion on the subject. The crowded graveyards in the neighbourhood of Nashville — the rails torn up, bent, and twisted, which were continually to be seen lying along the line throughout the whole course of the journey ^-r the bridges, evidently of hasty construction, and ^ This word is used in no invidious sense ; again and again have I heard it applied by Southerners to them- 90 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. dangerous to a degree in the eyes of European travellers— the little block- or guard-houses with walls loopholed for musketry, and intended to protect these bridges against the attacks of raiders and incendiaries — the earthworks and rifle-pits, constructed at almost every point available fOr attack or defence — the fortifications, which con- sisted in one spot of trusses of hay piled up — the burnt houses and stations destroyed, all told a tale which there was no gainsaying. Murfreesboro, or Stone Eiver, about three hours distant from Nashville, was the first place we came to of any note. Here was the scene of a great battle, begun on December 31st, 1862, by a fierce attack of the Confederate force upon the Northern lines, and vigorously kept up for three days without success, but with the heavy loss to the Rebels of 10,000 men. Then, leaving Man- chester on our left, we cross rivers bearing the names of Duck and Elk, and run on to TuUa- homa, where the line begins to climb by a suc- cession of steep gradients over a ridge of the Cumberland mountains, through forests all a-glow at that time with the gorgeous tints of autumnal colouring, until the highest point is reached, and we shut off steam, and put on all the breaks, to run down carefully to Stevenson in Alabama — where CRUTCHFIELD HOUSE. 91 are still to be seen signs of the great military depot so long established there. A few miles further on and we re-enter Tennessee, crossing the river which bears the name of the State by a trestle-work bridge of the frailest construction ; through the interstices of which, as we stood upon the platforms of the cars, we shuddered to look down a depth of 150 feet to the waters below. An hour later and we were running along a narrow ledge, just giving room to pass between the base of Lookout Mountain and the river, on whose black surface was reflected as we approached Chattanooga towards nightfall, the lurid glare of sparks and flame sent out from the chimneys, of a rolling-mill, busy day and night in turning out railroad iron to replace the waste of the war. As soon as the train stopped and we could jump off the cars, our advanced guard turned off to the Crutchfield House, an hotel of no great re- pute for the honesty of its servants or moderation of its charges, but of which we had little reason to complain. There followed the usual contention with the clerk to secure for each of us separate sleeping accommodation' — it being generally con- sidered that we ought to be satisfied with two beds between our party of four; but a strong remon- strance, I am bound to admit, never failed to 92 THE SOUTH AFTEE THE WAR. produce tbe desired effect. There is a great rusk of travel through the South, and but little hotel accommodation ; and we thought ourselves lucky in this case to escape being quartered in a large barrack, with fifty beds ranged round its sides, which lay immediately beyond the rooms allotted to us. The town, which now numbers 8000 in- habitants, owes half its population and all its notoriety to the war. Situated at the mouth of a mountain pass, the possession of which gives the key to Creorgia and the Gulf States, and with rail- ways converging thither from Virginia and Greorgia, from Mississippi apd Tennessee, Chattanooga may fairly claim to be called the Heart of the Confede- racy. Trusting however to the protection af- forded by the river, but little was done to 'secure So important a position beyond throwing up a few earthwork fortifications, one of which still bears the name of General (Bishop) Polk. So that no resistance was made to the entry of the Union troops under General Eoseneranz, who took po- session of the place without opposition in August, 1863. The position of his army was, notwithstanding, a critical one. Far in advance of his supports, and dependent for supplies upon Nashville by railway communication liable at any moment to be cut THE MOUNTAIN GIBRALTAR. 93 among the mountains, he was soon hard-pressed by Bragg, who had been largely reinforced, until having met with a bloody defeat among the wooded creeks of Chicamanga, he was obliged to fall back in total disorder within the lines of the town. Happily for him, the other side were but little less paralysed by a victory, which had they been able next day to foUow up, must have thrown Chattanooga into their hands and have destroyed the army of the Cumberland. Time, however, was allowed them ; day and night they worked at the fortifications, which together with its natural defences, have earned for the place the name of the 'Mountain Gribraltar.' Meanwhile they began to feel the attacks of another foe, who was pressing them still more severely. The lines of the Con- federate armies, stretching from the Tennessee Eiver above Chattanooga to a point where the heights of Lookout Mountain abut upon the waters after they have passed the town, with their pickets extending along the left or southern bank all the way to Bridgeport, had cut off the railway communications, and necessitated the carrying of all the supplies from Stevenson, over sixty or seventy miles of the most impracticable mountain roads, in the face of a watchful foe, familiar with every pass and ready at any moment to strike. 94 THE SOUTH AFTKK THE WAS, At one swoop seventeen waggon-loads of choice hospital stores, with libraries and other goods be- longing to the Christian Commission, fell a prey to a band of guerillas among the mountains. Hunger was pressing the beleaguered army sore — there was nothing for the officers but a short al- lowance of soup per day, and the men were on half rations. A flank movement also was threatened by the enemy, which would have had the effect of isolating their army, and have reduced it to the alternative of abandoning its strong position and cutting its way out, or risking the necessity of a final surrender. Eetreat would have been certain annihilation, while to remain as they were would have been equally impossible. The transport service had broken down — the heavy rain had made roads impassable — the mud in the streets of Chat- tanooga itself was two feet deep — already more than 10,000 animals had perished, and those that survived were so reduced by work and starvation that they could not be relied upon for moving anything. The army could not have been supplied for another week. Meanwhile the hour of deliverance was draw- ing near. On the 25th of October General Grant reached Chattanooga, as Commander of the Mili- tary Division of theMississippi- — a position to which GENERAL GRANT. 95 the capture of Vicksburg in the previous July had justly entitled him. He sa-w at a glance how critical was the position : not a moment was to be lost if Kentucky and Tennessee were to be pre- served to the Union. The stake was a large one. ' Better give up the sea-coast,' such was the feeling of the Confederates ; ' better abandon the South- west — evacuate even Eichmond itself without a struggle — than lose the golden field whose grain and wool are our sole hope.' But General Grant had no intention of giving back a prize which the enemy had so for- tunately allowed to fa,ll into his hands. His first act was to organise an expedition of 4000 men, who, floating in pontoon boats past the enemy's pickets in the darkness, got possession of Brown's Ferry — a point on the left bank of the river. This they were enabled to hold by the assistance of Hooker, who came up from Bridge- port. A pontoon bridge was thrown across the river, and by the use of steamers the transit was reduced to eight miles of waggoning ; so that actual starvation was averted, although it was impossible to supply all the wants of the army. A few days more were spent in making reconnoissances and waiting the arrival of Sherman, to enable them to resume the offensive. On the 23rd, that General 96 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. came up with three divisions. By noon next day he had crossed the Tennessee Eiver and intrenched the whole of his force in front of the right flank of the enemy posted on Mission Eidge. By the evening Hooker had fought his battle in the Clouds, and driven the enemy from Lookout Moun- tain, on which his left rested. During the night the Confederates concentrated their forces, and when morning dawned they were seen to be in- trenched in an apparently impregnable position along the heights of Mission Eidge. ' Impossible,' however, was not a word to be found in Grant's voca- bulary. Sherman was ordered to begin the attack at once — to turn the enemy's right where the ground was more favourable to the Federals, and then to endeavour to advance along the crown of the ridge. The movement was a failure, owing, as was quickly seen by G-rant, to the strong detachments which the enemy sent off to repel the attack on the right ; the effect of which was considerably to weaken his centre. General Thomas's divisions were lying meanwhile, under cover below, in the valley of Chattanooga. It was late in the afternoon when they got the order to advance. The audacity of the movement seems to have paralysed the Eebel forces, who were reposing in fancied security on the heights above. With scarcely a show of resist- GENERAL GEANT. 97 ance the Eidge was carried, and the battle was won. In the course of one short hour that mighty host, which had seemed to stand its ground so proudly upon the hiU, was scattered as chafif before the wind, and had melted away into an unmanage- able and disorganized crowd. Their own guns, which they had forgotten to spike or to remove, were turned upon their flying ranks. The rout of Bragg's great army was complete — Tennessee was lost to the Confederate cause — Burnside was re- lieved within a few days — and the gate through Georgia to the Gulf stood at length open. The fierceness of this struggle and the im- portance of its issues, must be my excuse for dwelling so long upon the attempt to sketch its more prominent features, which has obliged me to enter upon facts that did not fall under my own observation ; but without some idea of its history, a visit to Chattanooga would be almost a blank. It is interesting also to trace the steps in the rise of a great man ; and it was to the success of this autumn campaign of General Grant at Chatta- nooga, that he owed his promotion to the rank of Lieutenant-General of the armies of the United States ; in which position he was enabled to bring the war, in little more than a twelvemonth from this date, to a successful close. A careful con- H 98 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAK. sideration of the way in which he conducted those difficult operations and extricated himself from a position so hazardous, must dispel the idea so generally held on this side of the water — that he was little more than a butcher, whose only strategy consisted in a reckless expenditure of the lives of his troops. He found Chattanooga as we have seen, invested closely by a victorious enemy, occu- pying an almost impregnable position, and com- manded by one of the ablest of their generals. The Union troops were disheartened ; their transport service broken down, their, supplies all but ex- hausted ; yet within six weeks from the time of his arrival he had defeated and out-manoeuvered the enemy, driven him from his stronghold with frightful loss of men and guns, and a blow had been struck at the very heart of the Confederacy which had caused it to totter to its base. Surely something more than ordinary ability must have been needed to accomplish this ? We left the Crutchfield House on the morning after our arrival, and sallied forth to deliver a letter of introduction to Colonel Graw, who was in command of the post. The rain was falling in a steady downpour ; the streets were nearly a foot deep in mud; the wretched frame-houses were dripping and desolate: nothing seemed to be moving out of doors but untidy nigger soldiers THE MACLELLAN SADDLE. 99 and Grovernment ambulances drawn by teams of mules. We picked our way to head-quarters, where we found the Colonel transacting business in a room open to the street, and out of which orderlies were swaggering and slouching in a way shocking to our ideas of military etiquette. He received us with great civility, and in spite of the rain, offered to mount and accompany us on a ride round the fortifications, and over the field of battle on Mission Eidge. The offer was one we were only too glad to accept, and after waiting an hour or so in the vain hope of a change of weather the horses were brought round. They were very decent animals. The Maclellan saddle which they all had on is a formidable one to look at, but is said to possess the rare merit of never galling the horse's back. It is made almost entirely of wood, with sometimes a thin covering of leather ; the pommel in front very high, and pierced with holes to which a valise may be strapped : and a strong leather cap fixed on to the wooden stirrup prevents the entrance of anything more than the toe. Fortifications, and particularly earthworks, do not call for much description. We visited a suc- cession of them, which guarded the town to the east and south. They seemed to be strong, and mounted we were told 250 guns, requiring to 100 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. man them a force of 8000 men. The nigger guard at one place made rather a difficulty about admitting us, but relented upon hearing from our guide who he was, and even condescended to salute; forgetting, however, to take the other hand out of his pocket. When all the forts had been inspected we left the town and rode across the plain to the eastward, our path winding among low hills covered with brushwood, and taking us through a national cemetery, where are the graves of 11,000 Union soldiers, the resting-place of each one marked by the invariable little tablet of wood. In front of us all the way rose steep and straight the wooded heights of Mission Eidge — not gentle slopes like those whose ascent proved so fatal to our brave troops at Alma, but real heights— places which it would require a good climber to sur- mount; but for this very reason it must be said the party of assailants were exposed the less to the fire of the defenders. Half a mile from the base we turned out of our way and rode up a low conical hill, that we might place ourselves on the very spot whence, within easy range of the Eebel artillery. Grant had directed the eventful ope- rations of the 23rd of November. Here he had taken up his post, waiting the result of Sher- man's attack upon the left, and anxiously looking for the appearance of Hooker from the opposite MISSION RIDGE. 101 quarter. From this point it was, that late in the afternoon, when he thought that the time was come, he gave orders to the centre to advance. With one wild yell, Colonel Gaw described it, the Yankee troops rushed forward. There was no longer question of generalship, it was a soldier's battle. The 'grey Eebels' swarmed out of their rifle-pits. The panic spread itself to the troops which lined the sides and the crest of the ridge. The aim of their artillery, of which they had forty pieces in position along the heights, was vague and uncertain, and utterly powerless to check the continuous advance of the Union troops. These swept across the ravine, and then facing the ascent, in cone-shaped formation whose apex consisted of two or three daring spirits waving the standards in advance, they breasted the hill. The Con- federates were panic-stricken, and fled ; a few only turned and fired their pieces, but the greater number collected into the many roads which cross obliquely up its steep face, and went on to the top. The shelter even of their heavy log-breastworks did not give them confidence enough to make a stand, and they disappeared in utter confusion over the brow of the hill : General Grant followed up in person the advance of his troops to the summit, and then only did he know its height. But how are we to read the riddle? Here 102 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. was a strong and compact army (outnumbered, indeed, but not to an extent sufficient to outweigh the advantages of their position), strongly en- trenched upon a mountain-side, the approaches to which were covered by a powerful force of artillery ; and yet, notwithstanding all these advantages, they fled in dismay without a struggle, and aban- doned all their guns before a single onset of un- supported infantry. Various are the reasons given to account for it. The unpopularity of Bragg, and his inability to inspire his troops with confidence ; the presence in the Confederate ranks of a large body of paroled prisoners, who had been redrafted into the service much against their ■will, while there was still some hitch about their exchange, and who proved themselves not to be relied upon in the hour of danger ; * the sud- den panic which spread through the army, when it awoke from its fancied security to find that an advance of the enemy — which they looked upon as a mere demonstration of strength put • The two Governments were at issue as to the extent to which exchanges had been effected, but the Con- federates, acting upon their view of the case, sent the men again into the army. The event showed this to be a mis- take : they would not encounter the rislcs of recapture, but fled, fearing they might have to siiflfer the penalty of a broken parole. TWO YEAES AFTER. 103 forth to feel the position — was something more than a feint, and required instantly to be met. To these doubtless, and to other causes beyond our ken, must be attributed a result so unex- pected, a defeat so disgraceful. We followed Colonel Graw to the top of the hill, where we came upon a low wooden shanty, which he told us was Bragg's head-quarters. Outside this, during the whole of the fight, stood the owner, a young woman with two or three small children, fearful of going into the cellars lest the house should catch fire over their heads. Strange to say, none of the party were injured by the shot. All these little incidents — the pre- sence of one who had been engaged there, the rifle- pits and lines of works, the date of the battle fought in the same month just two years before — all combined to bring home the scene vividly to us. We could almost fancy we heard the roar of battle and saw the blue and grey coats mingling in the fight ; while the dull drip of the rain, the dank brushwood dyed blood-red by autumn, the silence and desolation, only broken by the tramp of our horses or the whirr of a covey of part- ridges, helped to bring our feelings into unison with the scene, as, draggled and drenched, we plodded our way wearily back to the town. 104 CHAPTEE YII. THE CREEKS OF CHICAMAUGA DEPOTS BUENT MAKIETTA ATLANTA LOST LUGGAGE CAMPS OF KEFUGEES A MOONLIGHT BIDE THROUGH GEORGIA — THE STORY OF THE GREAT MARCH SAFE TRAVELLING SHERMAN HAS TAKEN ALL RESOURCES AND EXHAUSTION OP GEORGIA PROSPECTS OF THE PLANTERS VIGILANCE COMMITTEES VISIT TO A PLANTATION. The ordinary train goes by night to Atlanta, which was to be our next point ; but not wishing to miss the sight of a country of whose desolate condition we had heard so much, we trusted our- selves to a car put on behind a luggage-train, which had at any rate the merit of not being crowded. Our load, which consisted principally of railroad iron and a few trucks of cotton, was more than the engine could properly draw, and we came to a stand-still when half-way up an in- cline, in a cutting through one of the spurs of Mission Eidge. Another train however was following close at our heels, and when it saw our necessity slackened speed, came gently up, and CHICAMAUGA CREEKS. 105 putting forth an iron bar like the proboscis of an elephant, helped us on with a kindly shove. The same scene recurred several times during the day ; whenever we stuck fast the conductor went back, signalled the advancing train, and tbe process was repeated. The journey was wearisome, like those on all Southern railroads, — stopping now in the midst of a forest to take up the firewood, which lay all ready cut and stacked by the side of the track ; now, but a little further on, to take in water from some convenient creek : so that it was no wonder that we took fourteen hours to do the 138 miles that lay between us and Atlanta. Directly after leaving Mission Eidge we found ourselves in the heavily-wooded country of the Chicamauga creeks, over which the line passes no less than eighteen times. Here it was that the Federals received so heavy a repulse from Bragg, in September 1863, which drove them back upon Chattanooga. Dalton, a few miles further on, was the place where the Confederates took up their quarters for the winter, after they were driven from Mission Eidge, and it was from this point that Johnston began his masterly retreat in the following spring before Sherman's over whelming advance. 106 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. The country, though still a good deal in forest, had evidently been extensively cultivated. As we saw it, there was a little patch of corn, once per- haps in every two miles. The condition of the people may be imagined from the account of one who had traversed the distance by road a short time before, and says, ' Between Chattanooga and Atlanta I do not remember to have seen a smile upon a single human face.' We found the stations destroyed or gutted all along the line, and charred ruins met the gaze wherever human habitations had been. At Eesacca, Johnston had made a determined stand ; and here, as elsewhere, re- mains of camp-huts and earthworks were to be seen. At Calhoun, ruins of houses met the view far and near ; and a ' Eeb ' in our car told us a sad tale, how he had been in the depot with a train of wounded men at the very time that the Federals were shelling the place : but all the shot and shell could not keep the women away : there they stood, gentle and simple alike, with little baskets of provisions or medicines for the sufferers, although the fire was raging around them. ' How can we forget or forgive,' he said, ' with those ruins staring us in the face ?' The line presented the usual signs of having been torn up and hastily replaced. We passed MAEIETTA. 107 over the bridges on the Etowah and Chattahoochee rivers, before referred to as marvellous instances of the power of rapid reconstruction attained by the Northerners in the war. Every step of this country had been stoutly contested by Johnston. AUatoona Pass, Kenesaw Eange, Pine Mountain, each formed successive stand-points, whence his forces could only be dislodged at a great disad- vantage. Every little hill became ' a strawng fort elegantly fixed up ' (like one pointed out to me by one of the passengers), to check the enemy's advance. Marietta, which we reached about five, was considered one of the prettiest and most rising towns in Cherokee Greorgia. Little now remained of it but blank walls and skeleton houses. It took us nearly three hours to accomplish the last twenty miles before reaching Atlanta, and dark- ness had set in some time before the train stopped, and we were landed among an inextricable laby- rinth of rails that centred in what had once been the station; whence, under the guidance of a nigger, and with the help of a lantern, we picked our way as we best could through the deep and sticky mud to a lodging called the Sassein House. Here we found fair quarters and Southern fare — beefsteaks of the consistency, of leather, pork 108 THE SOUTH AFTEE THE WAR. fixings (broiled), molasses, corn-bread, and rye- coffee. The weather cleared up next day, and some of the party went off after breakfast to try and procure compensation from the Eailway Company, or the express man, for some articles that had been abstracted from one of our bags, during the journey from Chattanooga, in spite of the much- vaunted security of the check system. The first thing you do on a railway in America, after taking your ticket, is to deliver up your luggage to a man, who attaches to each article a brass check or numbered receipt, the corresponding number being given you to produce as a voucher when the luggage has to be claimed. As you near your destination an express man goes through the cars for orders. To him you give these checks in exchange for fresh ones : he puts your address in his books; relieves you from all re- sponsibility, gets the luggage from the train at the terminus, and delivers it at your hotel within an hour or so of your arrival. The system has its advantages; it certainly gives additional security in a country where thieves and sharpers abound, and makes you in- dependent of porters and hackmen — a notoriously uncivil and extortionate race ; but the time and ATLANTA. 109 trouble it involves would always be a bar to its adoption in England. Life and property are notoriously insecure in Atlanta, and outrages are of frequent occurrence, notwithstanding that a military guard patrols the streets at night. No one is permitted to be out after ten o'clock. Colonel S was in com- mand here ; a letter we had to him was unfor- tunately one of the losses of the previous day : but he was none the less civil when we called, and put an ambulance at our service to take us round the town and the fortifications. He was a rough specimen of a Federal officer ; he con- sidered the Southern people to be the laziest set upon earth, and wished that the North had given them another year of the war and driven them all into the sea. The defences of the place had been very strong ; they could never have been taken by assault, and to invest the place would have required 200,000 men ; but the heavy rains had washed away the light soil of which the earth- works had been composed, and the palisades had, I fancy, been taken for firing. About a mile from the town we came upon an encampment of negro troops. An officer who came out to us said that they made excellent soldiers, and were more obedient to command than the whites. They 110 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. seemed, however, to need pretty sharp discipline, as we gathered from the character of the punish- ments in use, viz. flogging, tying up by the thumbs and ears, with the tips of the toes touch- ing the ground, which our guide described to us with great vivacity. A little further on was a camp containing 1000 freedmen, seemingly in wretched plight, who, together with 800 white families on the other side of the town, were being supported by Grovernment on the surplus rations of the war. Close by was a wood where the fight must have raged fiercely; not a tree but had been scathed by shot, hardly a stick which had not been cut off by grape or canister. Atlanta, it will be remembered, was Sherman's object when he set forth from Chattanooga in May 1864. He had everything in his favour — a splendid army of 100,000 men, a railway to bring up his supplies ; yet such was the generalship of Johnston, who had not 40,000 men to oppose him ; so successful was the Fabian policy he adopted; and, it must be added, so difficult was the country to be crossed, that ten weeks were consumed in advancing 138 miles, and it was not until the middle of July that the Union army found itself in front of Atlanta. Then was committed one of Jefferson Davis's great blunders, which had a most ruinous effect upon A FATAL MISTAKE. 1 1 1 the fortunes of the Confederacy.* He removed Johnston, who was never a favourite with him, and put Hood in command in his place. The latter was a very good division leader, but headstrong and rash ; and utterly unfit, as proved by the tactics he adapted, to compete with a superior force under a general of Sherman's abilities. Abandoning Johnston's policy he at once took the offensive, until the severe handling he received in three successive attacks obliged him to desist. Grradu- ally, meanwhile, did the Federal lines close in about Atlanta, patiently waiting their time; till at last the chance was given, the Eebel cavalry sent far away to the rear beyond recall : Sherman at once seized the opportunity, and Atlanta fell. The great Arsenal there, the Grovernment works, the rolling-mill which had furnished the iron, which had protected the sides of the Merrimac and the Arkansas — the shot, shell, and pistol manu- factories, the railroad machine-shops, all were lost to the Confederate cause, and it was not possible to replace them. The fall of the Gate city opened the way for Sherman to the Gulf on the one hand, and to Charleston on the other ; it gave him the control of the network of Southern railroads, and * The traveller through the South will often hear it said that ' the Confederacy died of Davis.' 112 THE SOUTH AI'TER THE WAR. closed the granaries whence the armies of Lee were supplied. The fall of Eichmond would not have been so fatal. ' To lose the one,' it was said, * would be as the loss of a limb. Should we be driven from the other, it will be a terrible blow at our most vital part. If we lose Atlanta the Confederacy is broken.' When General Lee heard of its fall, he wrote it is said to the Presi- dent, and told him that all hope of ultimate success was at an end. Not on that account however, did he abandon the cause which had been entrusted to him. He fought on nobly to the end, as he believed it to be his duty, and duty was ever the first consideration with him. Some people would yet go so far as to make Greneral Lee responsible for every life that was lost in the war, after that enunciation of his belief. ' Had he then laid down his sword, and he might have done so with honour, resistance would have been at an end. The country would have been spared the devastation of Sherman's march, with the fire and sword that followed in his track; and the lives of the thousands and tens of thousands who fell about the trenches of Petersburg, and in the bloody campaign of Virginia, need not have been sacrificed in vain.' The charge seems plausible ; it is one which it is at any rate easy IS LEE TO BLAME ? 113 to make after the event. The responsibility however, and it doubtless was a heavy one, lay with the President. He it was who had supreme control over the armies of the South. He placed and displaced the generals at his pleasure. From him had Lee received his commission, and until he recalled it Lee's course of duty was plain. When Eichmond had fallen, and Jefferson Davis was a fugitive — when the Government was broken up and had no responsible head — then it was that Lee was called upon to use his own judgment ; and, when he saw that further blood- shed was useless, at the proper time to lay down his sword. Sherman entered Atlanta on the 2nd of Sep- tember — within a week he issued an order that all citizens must leave the place, making their choice between being transported North, or to a place within the Eebel lines. His subsequent destruction of Atlanta must be his justification for an exercise of power apparently so cruel. He was revolving the scheme of the great march, and to that everything had to be subordinate. He feared that Atlanta might again become formidable in the hands of the enemy, and he resolved to wipe it out, and to render it incapable when he turned his ba,ck upon it of any further mischief. I 114 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. For two montlis the army remained quiet, en- joying the rest they so much needed after their summer campaign. Towards the end of that time Hood, who thought by the invasion of Ten- nessee to retort upon Sherman his own tactics, and to cut him off from Georgia, made a rapid march to the northward. Sherman wished no- thing better. He telegraphed at once, ' Hood has crossed the Tennessee — Thomas will take care of him and Nashville — Georgia and South Carolina are at my mercy, and I shall strike.' Then, fol- lowing Hood far enough to cover his own plans, and to assure himself against any interruption of his intended march to the coast, he turned sud- denly back upon Atlanta. On the 12th of November the last train of cars whirled rapidly to Chattanooga past the troops moving south — at Cartersville a message is sent ' All well,' and the last communication is severed with the telegraph wire. On the 15th Atlanta is given to the flames. A Massachusetts regiment is the last to leave, marching out by the light of the flaming build- ings to the tune, — ' John Brown's body lies mouldering in the grave, But his soul is marching on.' Weary of the inaction of the last two months. ' BULLY FOR BILLY.' 115 and eager to take the field, the troops set forth on a journey whose projected end was known only to a few in command. Sufficient to the rest to know that obedience was their duty, and that they trusted their leader — so, ' Bully for old Billy, we foUow him,' was the cry. Sherman himself was confident of success. The only army that could have opposed him was Hood's, and that had been sent far to his rear. Still the undertaking was a most hazardous one. His line of communications cut, his base of operations abandoned, with only thirty days' rations to seek a new one. The his- tory of war bears, it is said, no similar example, except that of Cortes when he burnt his ships. The apparent rashness of the venture has in both cases been justified by success. It was not a year from the date of Sherman's leaving Atlanta a prey to the flames that we entered the city, and we left it next day, hardly knowing whether to wonder most at the completeness of the ruin which had swept over it, or at the rapidity with which its restoration was being efi'ected. The five railways which centred there were all in operation, though the station-buildings had been destroyed. A few battered brick walls, and an occasional chimney looking grim and gaunt, and ashamed of such prominence, were all that re- 116 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. mained to attest the former existence of the great mills and foundries; but wooden-frame work- houses were springing up on all sides ; and along the main street, where frontage was fetching 40 dollars a-foot (nearly 61. sterling), buildings of a more substantial character were beginning to rise. Our lodging-house was one of the few that had escaped as if by miracle. It will not be difficult to conceive that the attractions presented by a city in such a condition were not many, and the prospect of a Sunday there was anything but inviting ; so we gave up all hope of our lost luggage, and decided to move on at once to Augusta, notwithstanding the dismal account we heard of the car, which was the only accommodation provided in the night -train on the Georgia Eailway, and of which we did not find the reality belied by the report. Imagine a long box upon wheels, with a board seat rvmning along the sides, as in an omnibus — a door, of course, at each end — the glass broken in every third or fourth window — every inch of space occupied by a most promiscuous crowd of workmen and darkies, the latter chattering and grinning with that almost fiendish expression of which the negro face is sometimes capable ; and it will be easily understood that the prospect of a A PLEASAJSfT PROSPECT. 1 1 7 seventeen hours' journey was not an inviting one. Not very assuring either was the following printed notice, which we discovered posted up in one of the corners ; defaced a little however, so as to allow us to indulge in the hope that it applied to a state of things now passed away : — 'Passengers are positively forbidden to ride upon the tops or platforms of cars. From the defective condition of the track the cars are very likely to run off, in which case the danger to pas- sengers is much increased in such a position. ' Georgia Railway.' Things however began presently to mend, and by the time we reached Stone Mountain, a curious sugar-loaf which rises 2000 feet above the level of the plain, fuUhalf of our fellow-passengers — most of whom were engaged in building at Atlanta — had left us. By midnight we had the car pretty well to ourselves, and were able to lie at full length along the seat, and try to court sleep in spite of the bitter draughts rushing in on all sides. We got into conversation during the course of the evening with some of the natives, and how they did execrate Sherman ! ' He had robbed them of everything.' One man complained to me of the loss of two negroes, good handicraftsmen. 1 1 8 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. whom he used to hire out for 4Z. or 51. a-week. I confess I had not much pity to bestow upon him. ' Sherman has taken all the cows,' was the answer to our application for milk with the rye- coffee, when we stopped for supper. That they spoke only the truth, there can be no doubt. ' The army will forage liberally upon the country during the march. As for horses, mules, and waggons, the cavalry and artillery may appro- priate them freely, and without limit.' Such was Sherman's order. Of the way in which that order was carried out, the correspondent of the New York Herald, who accompanied the army, gives the following description : — ' The foraging parties scattered over the country without any order or discipline, pounced like har- pies upon the unfortunate inhabitants, stripping them of all provisions, jewelry, and valuables, they could discover. Boxes were burst open — clothes dragged about — the finest silks belonging to the planters' ladies carried off to adorn some negro wenches round the camp — pictures, books, and furniture, all tossed about and torn in pieces. In most instances they burned down houses to cover their depredations, and, in some cases, took the lives of their victims, as they would not reveal concealed treasure.' THE CONDUCT OF THE WAR, 119 This is carrying the war into the enemy's country. Such excesses may not have been in- tended to be allowed, and perhaps it was impos- sible to prevent them in a civil war, where such bitter passions had been aroused. Possibly Sher- man believed that so severe a punishment would in the end prove the truest kindness to the South, if it should be the means of perceptibly short- ening the war.* We cannot wonder that it should have been resented most deeply throughout the whole of the South, who claim for themselves to have conducted the war throughout on civilized principles. And, certainly, the story reads as a strange commentary on the dictum of Wheaton, that private property on land is exempt from confiscation. In marked contrast stands out an order of General Grrant's in ]862, to whatever cause the difference may be attributed ; whether to the nature of the man, or to the fact that, at an earlier stage of the war, the finer feelings of the heart had not been deadened and blunted, as they seem often to have been after the struggle had gone on for three 9 In a letter written last winter he says, ' I know I have been a scourge ; but how much better for the South that it was I rather than Butler, or some one of that school ! ' 120 THE SOOTH AFTER THE WAR. years. The order, bearing date ' Cairo, January, 1862,' is as follows: — ' The rights of citizens having been disregarded by the soldiers when marching through a territory occupied by the enemy, the General commanding intends to enforce a change in this respect. Acts of confiscation by the troops make open and armed enemies of many who, from opposite treatment, would become friends, or at most non-combatants. It is ordered, therefore, that the severest punish- ment be inflicted upon any soldier guilty of taking or destroying private property, while any commis- sioned officer guilty of, or countenancing such conduct, shall be deprived of his sword and expelled the camp.' We must not forget, in comparing Sherman's order with this earlier one of Grant, the great dif- ference of their two positions. The latter was well supplied with provisions, the former had no choice but to live upon the country, or he could never have reached the sea. On a line of march extending over a breadth of sixty miles of country, the maintenance of anything like strict discipline must have been impossible : even had it been otherwise, no General would have ventured to draw the reins too tight, for fear of causing disaffection in the ranks. Soldiers have no very distinct A MOONLIGHT RIDE THEOUGH GEOKGIA. 121 notions of international law — the hardships of the march are many, and they would not easily be per- suaded that the property of their enemies is not legitimate spoil. These things have all to be taken into account, and all due allowance made, when the world is called upon to pronounce its verdict upon the conduct of the Great March. Meanwhile the long night wore away, as we turned uneasily from side to side on our hard couch, or roused ourselves to search for a more sheltered corner — to try and stuff up the windows — or heaped on logs till the round stove glowed red-hot — or, in despair of rest, went out notwith- standing the notice, upon the platform into the cold night air, as we rushed past the moonlit glades of the Georgian pines. Towards morning the car began again to fill ; people dropped in, seemingly going into town for Sunday: an ugly nigger, handcufifed and in custody, further increased the party. Presently the number of residences on either side the line indicated that we were ap- proaching the neighbourhood of Augusta, and before eleven o'clock we were delighted to be free, and safely ' located' at the Planters' Hotel. The State of Georgia was one of the last to feel the pressure of the war, but when the cup was presented to her she had to drain it to the dregs. 122 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. Kich, fertile, and prosperous, she had hesitated for a time before espousing the cause of Secession, of which she became afterwards one of the strongest supporters. She sent into the field a complement of 105,000 soldiers,' besides raising for home ser- vice a force of 15,000 militia troops. Her cotton crop in 1859 was upwards of a million bales : to this we must add fifty million bushels of corn and eight of potatoes, forty million pounds of rice, two of sugar-cane, and one of tobacco, if we are to form some idea of the value of her produce and the wealth of her people. The Western and At- lantic Eailway, commonly called the State Eoad, paid 450,000 dollars (90,000L) as net earnings into the Treasury in 1860. Now, how sad is the contrast ! The country is devastated, its stock destroyed, its currency worthless ! Labour is scarce and crops scanty; and, above all, a moral depression hangs over the soil, and seems for a time to forbid exertion. Augusta was spared a visit from Sherman, and the city stands as it did before the war, yet the value of its property is di- minished by 10,000,000 of dollars. Four millions of Bank Stock, the investment for the most part of monies upon trust, are now worthless; its bills cannot be discounted but at a loss of 85 per cent. Four millions worth of slave property is gone, and AUGUSTA. 123 railway shares fetch half their old price. What- ever may have been the faults of the people, bitter indeed is the punishment that has fallen upon them. Outwardly however, all is as before ; no- thing at least appears upon the surface to indicate the change, except the presence of an idle crowd of niggers in the streets. Business seems to be going on as usual ; grocery, dry goods, and tobacco stores, driving a brisk trade; express companies are in full swing ; and bales of cotton, the last re- mains of the crop of I860,* and the secret of all the stir, are lying about on the banks of the river ready for shipment, or peeping out of the ware- houses. This is the coveted prize, in exchange for which the world is sending its goods to tempt the South by luxuries from which it has long been debarred. The precious commodity has changed hands, but in parting with it the planters have given up their all, and, unless the promise of a share in the crop will induce the negroes to work, or white labour (to which the climate of the up- lands of Georgia presents no obstacle) can be procured by immigration, the lands will lie uncul- tivated this year as they were last, and no more * It is said, that at the close of the war there were 80,000 bales iu and near Augusta. 124 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. cotton being forthcoming the warehouses will be closed, the wharves empty, the stores shut. The steamers will cease to run, and the smart Yankee will seek some other location for the sale of his wooden nutmegs. It is hopeless meanwhile, with our old-world notions, to attempt to speculate as to what will be the condition of the country and the people even a year hence, or to look into futurity to see into what channels the great tide of Southern activity and enterprise will flow. The present price of cotton offers every inducement to the cultivation of that crop — the land is there, and the knowledge and skill requisite to direct the farming operations. Two other things are still needed, labour and capital. Of the first there is undoubtedly a suffi- cient supply at hand if it can only be made available. It is not to be had on the old terms, nor can the ordinary laws of supply and demand be looked to to regulate it. Old prejudices will have to be given up. The new state of things must be ac- cepted and understood. Confidence will have to be strengthened and distrust removed, before his late master can look, under any circumstances, for the hearty co-operation of the negro in an undertaking essential to the welfare of both. How much depends upon the employer of labour ; and A NEW SYSTEM. 125 the diflFerent results produced by a change in the method of setting the freedman to work, will be seen in an extract from a letter written from Louisiana by a man described as a persistent, bitter, and uncompromising Secessionist : — ' Last season I worked my hands by means of an overseer, and all the trouble and tumult com- mon among the other negroes and upon the other plantations ensued. I made up my mind that it was all the fault of the overseer, a good-enough man in his way — better than the average ; but, like the rest, he persisted in ignoring the change that had taken place in affairs, and worked on the old system. So this season I resolved to go into the field myself. I told my hands at the commence- ment of the season just what I would do for them, just what I expected them to do for me. They raised sweet potatoes, eggs, and chickens on their own account. I fed and clothed them, and paid them so much. I have not had the least trouble. They have uniformly treated me with respect, as I have them with justice. They are all perfectly satisfied with their year's work, and I expect to pursue exactly the same course next season, and have no doubt I shall get along just as well. I should not go into the field with my negroes my- self if necessity did not compel me to it : it has 126 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. compelled me to it ; and it will compel me to it for many years to come, I expect. I have about eighty head of negroes. Of these, only some twenty odd work in the field ; the rest are too old or too young, or house-servants. At fifty cents a-pound for cotton I can afford to support not only the negroes but their families. If cotton falls I shall explain to my hands, and they will comprehend me, that not receiving so much, I cannot afford to give them so miich. I am willing always to make a fair division with them.' It is from examples of this kind — and would that there were more of them! — that General Howard deduces his strongly avowed belief in the ultimate success of free labour. But, given the labour supply, where is the Southerner to look for the capital required to carry on his plantation ? The money realised by the sale of the cotton stocks will enable the fortunate holders to supply their own immediate wants, to buy seed, and to pay the wages of labour for this year. These, however, are but the happy few. Those who lived on the line of march of the Northern armies lost not their cotton only but all the machinery necessary for its cultivation. Their presses, gin-houses, field implements, all have to be replaced before they can start afresh. The freedman must be paid MOB LAW. 127 his wages in money, and at short intervals. The prospect of a share in the crop is too remote a con- tingency to enlist his active and continuous ener- gies ; and cases have come to his ears in which, at the end of the season, the labourers have been contemptuously dismissed without payment, or told that the cost of their maintenance has swal- lowed up all the profits of their labour, and left them, if anything, rather in debt to their employer. Money, it will be seen, is indispensable ; and money, as a rule, is not to be got. It was well said the other day, with respect to the prospects of Ireland, ' Aristophanes observed that Plutus was a most timorous person ; and depend upon it, Plutus is too wise to trust himself in a Fenian agitation.' He will not I fear, find a much more attractive prospect in the South, where life and property are notoriously insecure, and where vigilance committees and mob law prevent the expression of opinions not in accordance with those of the majority. Many Yankees, who came down South at the conclusion of the war intend- ing to settle, have been frightened away by the state of things they found prevailing. The following letter is vouched for by the correspondent of the Nation, as having been sent on the 19th of January last to a Mr. Eider, an 128 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. Englishman who has lived for the last thirty-five years in Louisiana : — ' We have been informed that you are 'lowing niggers to squat about on your land ; or, in other words, you are renting niggers' land. One of our committee told you that you would be burnt out, but you would not pay any attention to him. Now, sir, your gin-house is burnt for renting niggers' land. If this is not sufficient warning, we will burn everything on your place. If that don't break it up, we will break your neck. If that don't break it up, we will shoot the niggers. Beware, sir, before it is too late, or you will be waited on by A Committee.' ' " The niggers are not to be blamed. You are the villain. C." ' (In pencil) : " Since writing the above we have decided to burn more than your gin-house, and will kill you if you don't break up your infamous nigger-camps. Committee." ' Mr. Eider is a gentleman of wealth and respectability, who it is believed, has never given his neighbours other grounds of complaint, than they find in this endeavour to introduce upon his estate a system of labour resembling the English tenant system. It was not his gin-house that was burned, but a corn-house with four hundred MAKING THE BEST OF IT. 129 bushels of corn. The fire at the gin-house was put out by the negroes. Colonel Edgerton sent an officer into East Feliciana to investigate this matter, who succeeded in getting the testimony on oath of one of seven men, planters in that parish, who, having met together, had taken Mr. Rider's afiairs into consideration, and had decided on intimidating him. The evidence being sufficient, the Colonel proposes to General Canby that these gentlemen be compelled to pay for the property destroyed, and he is confident that the General wiU adopt the course which he recommends.' Meanwhile the state of things is sufficiently depressing, and will be better understood after a pertisal of the following letter, written in December last from South Carolina, which gives some idea of a grief which is far beyond the cognizance of ordinary travellers : — ' I doubt if you have any idea of the poverty of the people. The land may be restored, but where can its ruined owner procure money to pay taxes, erect buildings, and hire freedmen ? Our young men are gone to work in earnest. We are proud to see them engaged in teaching, ploughing, waggoning, keeping grocery-stores ; in short, doing anything, and doing it cheerfully. Ours is a poverty of which no one is ashamed, and of which K 130 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. very few complain. We are willing to bear it, and its universality makes it more tolerable. When I know that the most refined and intelligent women in the State, deserted by their deluded servants, are doing all kinds of housework — sweep- ing, dusting, making beds, and even in some cases cooking and washing — it is much easier for me to iron the towels my little son has washed, while I turn occasionally a laughing eye towards the fire-place, where an invalid gentleman (son of a former Grovernor) is engaged in churning ! I must confess that his attempt furnished us with more amusement than butter. For, believing this state of things to be only temporary, we make merry over it, compare notes with our friends, and boast of our success in these untried fields. ' Many refugee ladies feed their families by exchanging the contents of their wardrobes for articles of food. " How are your sisters ?" said I last summer to a young man who had left home to become a tutor. "Their complexions look badly," was the reply ; " but that is not surprising, when you consider how long they have been eating old frocks." " Have they any lights ? " was my next query. With perfect gravity he replied, " No ; when the moon does not shine, they go to bed hy lightning." But matters are mending. ALTERED TIMES. 131 In this very family light wood has superseded lightning in the chambers, and in the parlour a small petroleum lamp (price one dollar) diffuses light and happiness around. 'But there are cases over which no one can laugh. I know of a family whose property was counted by hundreds of thousands, who have not tasted meat for months. A gentleman of high scientific attainments, formerly professor in a col- lege, is literally trying to keep the wolf from the door by teaching a few scholars, one of whom, a girl* of sixteen, pays a quart of milk per diem for her tuition ! Innumerable widows, orphans, and single women, whose property was in Confederate bonds, are penniless, and are seeking employment of some kind for bread. ' On the whole, our people are bearing their trials bravely and cheerfully ; but so wide-spread is the ruin, that, even if the new system works well, it will take at least half a century to put us where we were. Georgia will recover much sooner.' The only thing of the sort that came under our imiiiediate notice was a visit we paid to a large plantation belonging to General , who at the beginning of the war was a very rich man, owning large plantations in Tennessee and Ar- 132 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. kansas, where he had property of the value of two million dollars in corn, cotton, cattle, and slaves. The latter numbered 540, and his treatment of them was notoriously humane. The Yankees, he said, had robbed him of all. He had returned home only the week before our visit, having just been pardoned by the President. There, after a separation of three years, he found his family, who had not quitted the place (they knew not indeed where to go) in spite of all the annoyances to which they were subjected. Deserted by their servants, watched at every turn, they were liable at any moment to have to throw open their house to the inspection of Yankee soldiers, search- ing nominally for arms, but in reality carrying off everything they could lay hands on. So strict was the espionage under which they lived, that once, when a packet of letters reached them by some trusty hand, the lady retired to the most secluded part of the house, where she drew down the blinds before venturing to open it ; yet next day she was taxed with the receipt of the, letters, and ordered to give them up. Those days happily were over; but the lands were still occupied by lessees of the Federal Government, who were to retain possession only till they had harvested their crops. The General was preparing to set vigor- THE OLD PLANTATION. 133 ously to work this year, and give the new system a fair trial ; and being known and trusted, he had been able to get money advanced upon his estate. He was going to begin operations with ninety of his negroes, who had written to him from St. Louis, asking him to take them back — all the rest he believed were dead. We were the bearers of a letter to the General from his sister, who promised we should find a warm welcome. Fresh from the North, on which the war had left no trace, we thought only of the proverbial hospitality of their Southern neighbours, and forgot how differently the events of the last four years had affected the one and the other. Had this occurred to us, we should have hesitated much before in- truding ourselves on him ; but everything was forgotten in the hope of being still able to see a real plantation. The drive up to the house and the grounds reminded us more of an English place than any- thing we had yet seen, although a great deal of timber had evidently been cut down, and the turf at the side of the road was very much worn. From the outside the house looked well and substantially built, with a portico, as is almost universally the case in Southern houses of any pretension, resting upon two pillars, carried up to 134 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. the height of the roof. We left our carriage at the gate and walked about twenty yards through an avenue to the house, delivered our letter, and were at once asked by the lady of the house to come in, as the General was expected to return shortly from the neighbouring town. We were introduced to her three daughters, with whom she was sitting working in a room of good size, but scantily and poorly furnished. The carpet was worn out ; the paper, once gilt, was faded and old ; and the only ornaments, a small bronze clock which had stopped, and some piece of plate on the table in the middle of the room. The ladies were sitting around in the plainest cotton dresses, and two little boys, in a sort of Confederate uni- form, were playing in front of the great log fire. They all welcomed us, or tried to do so ; but they could speak of no subject but the war; and there was a settled grief, a heart-broken expression about them, that was most painful. One of them laughed once — a hard, bitter laugh — when she spoke of the ' Alabama ' and ' Shenandoah.' And how their eyes flashed, and they ground their teeth, when they mentioned the name of a Yankee ! ' You seem to have a very bad opinion of us,' said a Federal officer to one of them the other day. ' If you want my opinion, I think ' SIC TRANSIT GLORIA ! ' 135 you the meanest of the mean,' was the reply. Almost as bad was the reproachful way in which they spoke of England's aid and sympathy. Pre- sently came in the son from squirrel ' hunting,' as all sport is called here. He had been in the Confederate army all through the war, and seemed none the worse for the hardships he had under- gone. At our request he took us round the place, for we were glad to escape the melancholy atmo- sphere of the drawing-room. There was little to show — the old nigger quarters, a little village of wooden huts, neat in appearance, but now almost teuantless. The stables, in which were kept in old times, fifteen carriage-horses, besides riding- horses for every one that came, now only con- tained a few mules, bought from Government and intended for the Arkansas plantation. Horses, dogs, carriages, everything had disappeared, but one child's pony. We passed on through a pad- dock much trampled by cavalry, into what had been a large flower-garden, but was now utterly neglected and overgrown; and into a glass-house, which had contained a number of exotics, but now was cold and empty. On our return to the house we were shown into another room, in which a few relics of rich furniture strengthened the impression left on our minds of departed grandeur. We 136 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. drank whisky in silver cups, but poured from a broken decanter. The General came home just as we were about to leave — a handsome, pleasant old man, who made us heartily welcome, and insisted on our staying to dinner. He was busily engaged in the work of reconstruction, and, as we afterwards heard, with every prospect of success. And a grand sight it was to see the grey-headed old gentleman setting to work, with such pluck and determination, to retrieve the shattered fortunes of his family ; and quite affecting to see him stand up before dinner and thank God for the blessings still remaining to him, as he might have done in the times when he had fifty servants about his house, in the place now occupied by two little nigger-boys. The food was plain, but plentiful : we tasted squirrel for the first time, which is some- thing like rabbit, but rather more delicate and rich. After dinner came smoking, and a long chatwith the General. He too spoke bitterly about England, but could give no reason why we ought to have joined or recog-nised the Confederacy, except that it would have been for our interest. He expected that the New-Englanders would now get an export- duty put upon cotton. The Alabama question would, he thought, be pressed to war, and it A MOURNFUL IDYLL. 137 would be much cheaper for us to pay the bill. The obstinacy and favouritism of Jefferson Davis he condemned most sharply, though of his devotion to the Southern cause there could be no doubt. We left towards evening, with a grateful re- membrance of Southern hospitality, but oppressed and pained by the grief and desolation of which we had been made somewhat intrusive witnesses ; — a scene very different from the plantation we had expected to see; an idyll of Southern life, which we are glad to be able to look back upon, but should hardly care to see a second time. 138 CHAPTEE VIII. AUGUSTA GRAVE OF LEONIDAS POLK, THE SOLDIER AND THE PEIEST SOUTHERN PATRIOTS THE ORIGIN OP THE WAR A SLAVE EMPIRE THE PLATFORMS OF 1860 SUICIDAL FOLLY HOPE FOR THE FUTURE. The rains vrere over, and Augusta when we reached it was rejoicing in the bright sunshine. It is a good specimen of one of the chief inland Southern towns, with 19,000 inhabitants — a number which has been increased to a large extent lately by the influx of negroes from the country districts. Two principal streets run the length of the city, crossed at right angles by several lesser ones, leading down to the banks of the Savannah Eiver. Trees are planted along the edge of the pavement, or side- walk as it is more properly called, and one street was wide enough to admit of a broad drive down the middle between a double avenue. Perched high up in an airy campanile swings the great alarm bell, now used only in cases of fire, but recalling to the inhabitants ' the happy days of yore, when its THE SOLDIER AND THE PRIEST. 139 nine-o'clock summons consigned every woolly head to serene and peaceful slumbers.' * At the back of the Episcopal Church we saw a grave, on which the flowers freshly strewn by fond hands, attested the respect paid by the South to the memory of one of the bravest and most con- scientious of her sons. For here lay Leonidas Polk, Bishop of Louisiana and General of the » C. S. A. Lookers-on in Europe were scandalized indeed, when the news reached them of the ano- maly of a Bishop taking up arms ; but when the true history is known we shall, I think, be ready to accord some indulgence to one who was willing to forfeit the esteem of the world when the call, as he regarded it, of duty was made plain to him. Leonidas Polk came originally from Tennessee, where his family still hold large plantations. He owned 400 slaves himself in Louisiana, on whose religious education he bestowed much care.f " Every negro abroad after that hour without a pass used to be liable to punishment. + ' The children were all baptized, and taught the CatechiBm ; all, without exception, attended the church service andperformed the chanting in a creditable manner. Ninety of them are communicants. Marriages are cele- brated according to the church ritual, and the state of morals is satisfactory.' — Quoted in Olmsted's 'Journey through the Back Country: 140 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. Intended originally for the military profession, he was educated at West Point, but soon after entered the Protestant Episcopal Ministry, and was ap- pointed Missionary Bishop to Kansas, from whence he was removed in 1841 to preside over the dio- cese of Louisiana. On the breaking out of the war he, with the rest of the Southern Bishops, gave in his adhesion to the de facto Grovernment, to ' the powers that ■ be;' and at an early period sought an interview with Jefferson Davis, for the purpose of pointing out what, from his knowledge of the country, he conceived ought to be the strategy adopted in the Mississippi district. Then, going on to describe the very peculiar qualifications that were required for the command of such a post, he asked the Pre- sident if he had any one in his mind to whom he thought it might safely be entrusted. Davis hesitated, then said pointedly, 'Bishop, you are the man : I know of no one but yourself.' Polk at once negatived the suggestion, notwith- standing all that could be urged on behalf of the claims of country, and the examples that, doubtless, were adduced of warlike prelates who had stood forth in the good old times as champions of the faith and of the right. Before he left however, he promised to ask LEADINGS OF PROVIDENCE. 141 the advice of Bishop Meade of Virginia, with whom he had shortly afterwards a protracted interview. But little progress had been made in overcoming his scruples, when Meade proposed that they should consult General Lee, as he was a God- fearing man, and one whose opinion might with safety be acted upon. Polk consented, and the two bishops set out together. They had only gone a few yards when Lee himself met them, and of his own accord entered upon the subject, which he knew to have been under consideration, and stated it as his deliberate conviction that it was not in- consistent even with the holy vows of the epi- scopal office to take up arms when a man's country required it of him. On this Polk gave way, and, regarding this seemingly chance-encounter as an Indication of the will of Providence, he consented to forego his scruples, and to exchange the mitre and the crozier for the plumes and the staff of a field-officer. From that time up to his death which occurred in June 1864, on Pine Mountain, where he was in command of a wing of Johnston's army, he was engaged, with the exception of one short interval, in active service. Johnston and Hardee were, it is said, on their horses beside Polk on the height when a shell came in unpleasant proximity to them, and they remarked, ' It is safer 142 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. to alight.' ■ Polk smiled and stayed surveying the situation, until in a few moments another shell exploded still closer, a fragment of which tore through his body and killed him on the spot. His remains were taken to Augusta, but their final resting-place will be in Louisiana, for twenty years the scene of his episcopal labours. They tell a pleasant story of some good-hu- moured sparring that he had with Grant, on some occasion when they met on a matter connected with the exchange of prisoners, and when, business being over, according to the custom of the country they went in for a drink. Polk taking the lead, an- nounced that he was about to give a toast in which both sides could equally join — ' Greorge Wash- ington ; ' to which, when the whole party was fairly committed, he added quietly, 'The first rebel,' raising thereby a hearty laugh at the expense of the Yankees. Grant was determined on having his revenge, and on the occasion of a subsequent meeting led the conversation to the subject of State Eights, a question upon which Southerners were never tired of expatiating. He himself said but little, leaving them to infer that he had some difiiculty in answering the arguments that they advanced, and they were soon ready to accept without hesitation the toast of ' Equal rights to SOUTHERN CHIVALRY. 143 all,' until the laugh was turned and 'the old score paid off, when he added the rider, ' Black as well as white.' It was the support given to the Confederacy by men of this stamp, such as Lee, Stonewall Jackson, Johnston, the Polks, the Pillows, and a few other noble minds, which helped to invest the cause of the South with a sort of chivalric halo in the eyes of Europe. Not one of them, I believe, was in favour of appealing to arms against the election of Lincoln, or of any aggressive move- ment in the slave-holding interest. But other views prevailed ; the cry was raised of ' Southern Eights,' and ' Freedom ' from the so-called ' dicta- tion and interference ' of the North. Eleven States hoisted one after another the palmetto flag of the Confederacy. Then it was that these high- souled men felt that there was no longer room for the expression of individual opinions : their country told them she required their aid, and they re- sponded to the call with an energy and devotion worthy of a better cause than one, the inevitable effect of whose , success must have been to rivet more securely the fetters upon the limbs of the slave. It is impossible to reproach them, however deplorable we may consider to have been the 144 ' THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. effects of their conduct, for without their aid the Confederacy could not have lasted for a year. Of one thing we may well take notice, and observe in the line they took, an illustration of the great perUs to which a Federal Union of States is subject, when threatened with dissension from within. United and strong, the individual States form the pillars, the chief support on which the Constitution rests. But once let the thin end of the wedge of disaffection be inserted into the fabric, let disunion once take root, the garrison should look to it — the foe is within the walls, powerful in organization and influence, and the citadel is almost at his mercy. The States ceasing to render to the Constitution their sixpport, become at once the most active agents in its disruption and collapse. The sovereign powers they possess of legislation, taxation, of military and civil or- ganization, give them a strength all-powerful for mischief. And the nobler spirits whose coun- tenance and support give to any cause so great a moral influence, and from whom rebellion or insurrection would receive neither encouragement or aid, though they are sorely perplexed when their allegiance to the Union and the State leads them in opposite directions, seldom hesitate to obey the call of the latter, with which they have A STRANGE PUZZLE. 145 SO much closer a connexion, and to which they deem their obedience in the first place to be due. The American Union has proved itself able to resist both one and the other of these disturbing influences, exerted as they have been to the utmost; and the fact of its having done so, shows that it possesses a cohesive power beyond that of any Government similarly constituted, which has carried it through its late troubles, and bids fair to steer a no less successful course through the breakers still seen to be looming ahead. The American war was a great puzzle to En- glishmen. We could not bring ourselves to be- lieve that the North really wished to put an end to slavery, nor could we see why the South had not as much right to secede from the North as our old colonies had to throw off their allegiance, provided always they were strong enough to do so ; and therefore our sympathies on the whole went with the weaker party. Then we were told that the South were fighting for independence and the North for empire. The saying was a neat one, and as it harmonized generally with the notions we had formed, we adopted it, and the idea it embodied became fixed in our minds, so as not to be capable of being easily dislodged. That saying, I must avow my belief, is founded L 146 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. upon a total misapprehension of the facts of the case. The contest was one of which, on the part of the South, the issue was at first the extension and afterwards the existence of slavery. The United States, when they elected Lincoln as Pre- sident, declared their adhesion to the principle that Congress had the right to prohibit the ex- tension of slavery to the territories; while they professed to claim for it neither the power nor the inclination to interfere with the institution in the eleven States where it already existed : nothing indeed so opposed to the spirit of the Federal compact on which the Constitution was based, was advanced by any but a very small minority of the Eepublican party, whose candidate Lincoln was. There was however in the South, a section of extreme politicians who had long been waiting for an opportunity to carry out a scheme of their own. Now they thought the time was come for the execution of their projects. For thirty years they had revolved the plan of founding on the North American continent an empire, of which slavery should be at once the key and the corner- stone. True, they had had their own way in Congress ; the Presidents for fifty years had been men of their own choosing : but speech, at any rate, was free in the North, and it was an intoler- A SLAVE EMPIRE. 147 able indignity to be obliged to sit quiet in the Senate and in the House, under the violent attacks of the Abolitionists upon their favourite insti- tution. Not to be endured was it that the Ex- ecutive, with its vast power and patronage — all capable of being turned against themselves ■ — should come even for once into the hands of men so bitterly opposed to them and their interests. In four years, what irreparable mischief might not be done? ' But,' they thought, ' let a slave confederacy be once established, and all these disturbing influences will be at an end ; there would no longer be any danger to be apprehended from the attacks of Abolitionist fury. There would be no Charles Sumner in their Senate, no compromises entered upon their Statute-book, and no fear of adverse decision in courts of law where their property was concerned. Bright views too arose upon their vision of an escape from the tariffs of Northern Protec- tionists ; of the manufactures of Europe flowing into their open ports in exchange for the sugar, the tobacco, and the cotton, which the extension of slavery to the virgin soil of the territories would enable them to raise in almost boundless profusion; of an alliance upon terms such as these with Mexico — Imperial or Eepublican, it mattered 148 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. little which, if but the main point was secure — so that from the Ohio to the Isthmus there should be an entire community of interests and action. Such were the plans and the hopes, none the less deeply rooted because not openly avowed, of the extreme party of the South. The difficulty lay in the execution of them, in raising an issue with the North sufficiently plausible to carry with them the more moderate men of their own side, to ensure them some support even in the camp of their enemies. An election for President was to take place in 1860. If a Northerner were to be elected, upon a platform founded in any way upon interference with or limitation of slavery, a cry might be ra'ised that Southern rights were being trampled on, that their property was no longer safe while they remained in the Union, in separ- ation from which lay their only hope. Events seemed to favour them. At the Ee- publican Convention held at Chicago in the May preceding the election, a man was nominated by that party as their candidate for the Presidency, who boldly asserted his belief in the right of Con- gress to prohibit the extension of slavery to the territories. That man was Abraham Lincoln, the rail-splitter of Illinois — ' a pretty sort of fellow, indeed, to domineer over Southern gentlemen!' A SPLIT IN THE PARTY. 149 The Secessionists saw that their purpose would be answered by his election, and to ensure it they determined to procure a split in their own party. Stephen Douglas, a moderate Democrat, was stand- ing upon a platform that it should rest with the inhabitants of the territories to decide for them-r selves as to slavery, whether they would admit or exclude it ; when Breckenridge was put forward by the extreme party, who insisted upon the right of American citizens to go into that part of the con- tinent, 'taking with them their property,' for which they demanded positive protection against any legislation, whether of Congress or of the people of the territories themselves. Everything seemed to turn out according to the wishes of these men. Lincoln was elected, the cry of Southern independence was raised, the Southern heart was fired. Eleven States passed one after another ordinances of Secession, and their hopes seemed to have reached their accom- plishment. The North, meanwhile, were looking on in dumb amazement. They were conscious of no wish to interfere with slavery in the States where it already existed ; they had no thought of entering upon an abolition crusade; and when they at last took up arms, it was only in behalf of the Union, and in order to avenge the insult offered to the national flag at Fort Sumter. The question 150 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. of slavery occupied in their eyes a position second altogether to this, as was clearly expressed as late as the second year of the war by President Lin- coln, in words to the effect that, if its abolition was necessary for the preservation of the Union, slavery should be abolished; but that if the Union could be preserved only by the continuation of slavery, slavery should continue to exist. That his private views went beyond this was well known ; but he knew that, while he occupied the position of President, it was not for him to act upon his own judgment but to obey the law, and carry out the wishes of the people, whose repre- sentative he was. In fact, the North had yielded so much by submitting to the Dred Scott decision, and consenting to the repeal of the Missouri com- promise, that the South thought they had only to threaten Secession to obtain every security that they needed for the maintaining of their dar- ling institution. They despised the North, of whose fighting qualities they had formed a very low estimate, until their eyes were opened by the sudden indignation and uprising of the whole country that followed upon the news of the attack upon Fort Sumter. It was then too late— the die was cast^ — the sword was unsheathed that was destined to slay the hideous monster which had fastened itself upon the great republic of the New A STRONG DELUSION. 151 World, and was eating out its heart's core. In no other way could the knot have been untied. Had it not been for this, their own act of most suicidal folly, the South would still be in possession of its four millions of slaves, and would still be growing rich upon the fruits of their enforced labour. But it was not so to be. Surely a lying spirit was put into the mouths of their prophets, that they said ' Gro up and prosper ! ' Surely was there sent upon them ' a strong delusion, that they should believe a lie ! ' For the hours of slavery were numbered, and the Southern people themselves were to bring about its consummation. Bitter, indeed, are the pangs they have suffered, heart- searching as those of a patient under the fire or the knife, when they touch the roots of an evil which has grown deep into the system, and which no means more gentle can eradicate or cure. But harder to bear than all must be the remembrance that the troubles were entirely of their own seeking, that themselves only are the authors of their pain, as in the case of the stricken eagle, — ' Keen were his pangs, but keener far to feel He nursed the pinion, that impelled the steel ; "While the same plumage that had warmed his nest, Drank the last life-drop of his bleeding breast' 152 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. The parallel does not, happily, hold good throughout. Freely, indeed, has Southern blood been poured in the fight they fought so long and so nobly against overwhelming odds. Many are the hearts that are widowed, and the homes that are desolate ; but so far from life being extinct, or even ebbing, I venture to indulge — now that slavery no longer, like the upas-tree, sheds its noxious influence over the land, and provided only that the negro has justice done him — to indulge in the prospect of a glorious future for the South ; when, under a happier system of free labour, the unrivalled products of that fruitful soil shall be piled, higher even than in olden time, upon the steamboats of the Mississippi, and shall be stored in surpassing abundance upon the quays of Charleston and the levee of New Orleans; when her mineral resources, hitherto untouched, have begun to be developed; and when her chivalry, purified and made worthy the name, shall have learnt to see wherein truly consists the superiority which it affects ; and when the uses of adversity and the influences of free thought and speech shall have acted upon the mind of the poor white, and raised him from the depths of ignor- ance and prejudice, in which he has lain so long, to a true perception of the dignity of labour. 153 CHAPTEE IX. AUGUSTA TO SAVANNAH. NOTICE TO LOAFERS THE CEMBTBRT VOTIVE OFFERINGS the' HELEN' 'COTTON, COTTON, EVEETWHEEE ' THE SAVANNAH EIVBR OLD MAN'S BEARD A NARROW SHAVE GOING TO ROOST A RACE WITH THE ' LAURA ' SHERMAN AGAIN 'GREEN GROW THE RUSHES, OH ! ' THE SIEGE OF SAVANNAH BONA VENTURE. The line of thought which in the last chapter we did our best to follow out, has taken us meanwhile far away from Augusta. And, indeed, if a notice which appeared in a daily paper one morning during our stay be a true indication of the man- ners and customs of the place, and of the state of order prevailing, there would be little reason to delay our departure. The advertisement read as follows : — ' Notice to Loafers. ' You are respectfully requested to keep your knives in your pockets while about our door, and not to stay longer than a quarter of a second. * Central Hotel.' 154 THE SOUTH AFTEE THE WAE. This warning, as far .our observation went, seemed to have produced the desired effect. We made our usual draw of the Freedmen's Bureau on the morning after our arrival, where, as usual, we met with a kind reception, and were much pleased with what we saw of General Tillson, Assistant-commissioner for the State of Georgia, who seemed to be carrying out successfully his declared programme of acting as a mediator be- tween the two races — not as the champion of either. A stroll to the Cemetery, the only object of interest in the town, took up the afternoon, and we were much struck by the care and taste with which the greater part had been laid out in walks and shrubberies, of which even the depth of their present poverty had not caused them to neglect the care. Beyond the limits of these pleasant shades we came to another spot, not separated indeed by any boundary from the rest, but totally different in character ; where the level monotony of the sandy plain was only broken by the little mounds which indicated the resting-places of the faithful Cassars and Chloes, the Uncle Sams and Aunt Dinahs, who lived and died under the old regiTne. About these graves the piety of the friends of the departed had mani- VOTIVE OFFERINGS. 153 fested itself, in the rather grotesque form of offer- ings to their manes of broken china, cracked jam- pots, and handles of claret-jugs, which, thickly strewn about and stuck into the graves themselves, presented a strange and incongruous appearance. But we were anxious to be moving on. Sa- vannah and Charleston were both within reach ; the railways which connected them with Augusta had been partially restored; but by either route there was a break in the communications which involved fifty miles (a matter of twelve or thirteen hours) of travelling by road, in old military am- bulances purchased from Government at the end of the war. The misery and discomfort of a night so spent were vividly portrayed to us by a traveller fresh from the experience of them, who told us that twenty-four hours in bed were insuflScient to rid him of the aches which the cruel jolting had caused him to suffer in every limb. One other alternative remained, viz. to look out for a berth in one of the steamboats running on the Savannah Eiver, just now made navigable by the recent heavy rains, and flowing past the city in a rich coffee- coloured stream. The few boats however, which were to be seen moored along the banks, were crank, weak-looking craft, deep in the water with their loads of cotton, and not caring to encumber 156 THE sotrrH after the war. themselves with passengers. By good fortune however, we heard of the unexpected arrival of a favourite little steamer, the ' Helen,' just come up on an extra trip from Savannah, and, as freight was plenty, about to return as soon as ever her cargo could be put on board. An interview with the English captain, who welcomed us as fellow- countrymen, settled the matter, and we arranged to be on board by seven next morning. The lading was all but finished when we reached the ship, just as daylight was trying to make some impression upon a November fog, Every inch of space seemed already to be occupied, so that it was with difficulty that we squeezed our way be- tween the huge cotton bales which blocked up all the passages and gangways. It was ' cotton, cotton, everywhere.' The lower deck was occu- pied with upland cotton made up in square bales, tight-corded and bursting, and of the average size of a chest of drawers. Sea-island, or long staple cotton, coming down from the interior ; into which it had been removed for safety, sewn up in huge sacks ; covered all the upper part of the ship and the roof of the little cabin, forming altogether a cargo of immense value. A spare corner was luckily found for the luggage, and the passengers, who numbered about twenty, settled themselves in THE SAVANNAH RIVER. 157 as best they could. The captain did all in his power to make things straight. The cuisine, for a Southern one, was unusually good ; and the ap- pearance on table at breakfast-time of a peculiar vanity, did much to restore the disturbed equa- nimity of some of our party. We had to wait an hour or two until the fog lifted, and it was past eight o'clock before we got under way. The scenery, at iirst, was monotonous. The banks, fringed with belts of willow and cotton-wood, were just high enough to keep the river in its proper channel; and a picturesque-looking boatload of niggers at a ferry, and an occasional team of mules working near the side, served as the solitary objects which engaged our attention. A little further on and the banks receded, and the dark yellow water flowed out over the adjacent land, turning it into a perpetual swamp reeking of fever and pestilence. We were fortunate in the time of our visit ; the sharp frosts of the last two or three nights had purified the air ; and had made it safe to travel and even to sleep upon a river — an experiment which, but a week earlier, could not have been tried without the greatest risk. The same cause had driven the alligators into their winter quarters, from which not even the bright sun, which was now pouring forth its genial heat, could tempt 158 THE SOUTH AFTEB THE WAR. them forth to bask on their favourite snags. Very variegated now became the wood which lined the banks of the river, and of the creeks which were continually branching away from it. The foliage of the lofty csdar (Gupressus dis- ticha), which the frost had browned, stood clear and defined against the blue sky, while from its branches hung in wavy festoons, from ten to twenty feet long, the graceful filaments of Spanish moss — ' old man's beard,' as some will call it, and tell you its presence betokens the sure proximity of the dread yellow fever. In contrast to this shone out the bright tints of the sweet gum-tree, and the straight stem and glistening bark of the button-ball or sycamore, giving an ever-varying freshness to the scene as we lay upon the cotton- bales in the bows, and watched it in the perfection of dreamy enjoyment ; only broken now and then by the rising of a flock of the canvas-back duck, or by the occasional necessity of turning round to encompass the beauty of a sudden bend in the river. But what is all this excitement which is bringing everybody to the look-out? See, we are approaching an obstruction — a line of piles stretching across the river, which have been driven in during the war to bar the passage of the Yankee A NARROW SHAVE. 159 gunboats. A breach has indeed been made this summer, but in the wrong place — close to one of the banks, where the current is strong and the stream shallow. We hold our breath as we just clear the narrow opening ; but immediately below is a hard snag, and trying to avoid it we run with a crash into the bank and sweep off a log of a tree nearly two feet in diameter : but no harm is done, and we are off again. Nor was this our only escape. A little later, and we are running with the last ray of daylight alongside a partially disabled steamer, to which we are carrying a smoke-stack [Anglic^, funnel), when 'crash' we go into her side ! Grrind — crack go the timbers. We think that one of us, at any rate, must be stove in ; but it is only the other vessel's guard — the projecting part of her lower deck — that has suffered. Our captain is the most risky man on the river, but even he must lie-to for a time, for snags* and sawyers, and the sharp bends of * These are the names given to uprooted trees, which have floated down stream till they have stuck in some of the shallows, and are called snags or sawyers, according as their heads lie up or down stream. They form most serious impediments to navigation, and have caused the loss of many boats, whose bows have been stove in by coming into contact with them. 160 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. the river, make navigation impossible, until the moon, now happily at the full, rises over the dense mass of forest which darkens all the course. In the meantime the ' Helen ' lies alongside her injured friend, and we have toibethink ourselves where we shall spend the night, as the greater part of the tiny cabin is curtained off for the ladies, and the few square feet remaining are taken up by mattresses, on which six or eight of our fellow-pas- sengers are already reclining ; while the state which the temperature had already reached gave a pretty fair idea of what it was likely to be later on in the night. So our inventive genius was set to work, and each of us presently, with the captain's help, improvised a little roosting-place among the bales of cotton, where, with the help of a mattress, we made ourselves very snug. Two of the party lay on bales which did not quite reach to the roof; like the lions in Assyrian monuments, guarding on either side the entrance to the door of the cabin ; but the others claimed a great superiority for the resting-place they had secured in some out-of-the- way corner. Most of us, however, slept sound, on beds probably of greater value than we were ever likely to have again, and considered ourselves well out of the stifling atmosphere of the cabin, out of A MIDNIGHT EACE. 1 6 1 which we saw unquiet spirits emerging from time to time throughout the night. ' How did you sleep, sir ?' I asked of one of them. ' Sleep ! ' he answered, in the grumpiest tone. ' How could you sleep with a trumpet sounding in your ears ? Why, the angel Gabriel at the last day won't blow his trumpet louder than that fellow,' indicating the offender, ' has been doing all night ! ' The ' Helen ' was steaming merrily ahead when we came on deck next morning, having left her moorings soon after midnight. We found we had missed a most exciting race with another steamer, the ' Laura,' which we had left far behind. The whole of the river was lit up, they told us, by the sparks from the funnels, and there had been a narrow shave of a collision. The captains of both boats had, it was popularly believed, spent the night sitting upon the safety-valves. We had a long talk in the morning with a young Southerner — ruined like the rest. Poor fellow ! he said he felt himself now without home or country, and his only object was to save enough from the wreck to take him to Europe. In the duration of the American Republic he had little faith — he thought it would follow the example of all others in the history of the world. England was to his mind the best-governed country in the ' M 162 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. universe. As we began to near Savannah the scenery grew much tamer, the varied woods giving way to level, open plains, in old times famous for the growth of the Savannah rice. This crop was one particularly suited for negro labour, for on these fields no white man could labour and Uve, and the overseer who superintended the work never himself slept on the plantation. The negro's health, on the contrary, is not at all affected by the exhalations so detrimental to the white race : and he prefers working upon a crop which does not require the unremitting at^ tention necessary for cotton cultivation, and in which some gleanings, or perquisites, were allowed to fall to his share. But no signs of his present industry met our eye, but everywhere traces of ruin and destruction. The fine clumps of live oaks alone seemed to stand up flourishing as in times of yore. A wretched spectacle was presented by the re- mains of the bridge of the Savannah and Charles- town Eailway — an unmistakable piece of Sher- man's handiwork. No attempt had as yet been made to restore it. The brick piers were still standing, but the iron bridge which rested upon them seemed to have been cut in two places and 'the ends tilted down, in helpless, almost ludicrous SAVANNAH. 163 impotence, into the river. A little further on, and a little island is pointed out, where ' Green grow the rushes, oh ! ' upon the bed formed upon the grave of a British gunboat, sunk there during our invasionof Georgia in 1778. Another collision with a rival boat, whose captain threatens to run lis into the bank, was our last adventure before we reached Savannah, after a very quick passage, at 10 A.M., and ran alongside the quay, already crowded with vessels waiting for cotton freight, or unlading the bales brought down from the interior. The wharves and ware- houses were many of them fine, and seemed not to have sufifered ; indeed the whole scene was a busy one, full of life and interest, and all the in- lets and creeks were swarming with niggers in canoes, who looked very picturesque with their curious craft and little freights of hay. It was on the night of the 15th of November, 1864, that the last brigade of Sherman's army marched out from among the flaming ruins of At- lanta. For three weeks they were lost to the sight of the world, until, on the 10th of December, their leading columns were seen to emerge from the interior, and their forces began to close in about the city of Savannah, within the lines of 164 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. whose fortifications the Confederates had all re- treated, having first flooded the surrounding rice- fields and rendered them totally impassable. The only means of approach to the city was by five narrow causeways, all commanded by ordnance too heavy for the light field-guns which had accompanied the army on its march. Sherman accordingly decided to avoid the loss of life which must necessarily have resulted from an attack at such disadvantage, and invested the city closely ; while he sought to open communications with the fleet, which he knew must be waiting for him in one of the neighbouring sounds. Fort M'AUister, meanwhile, on the Ogeechee Eiver, was taken by assault. Almost at the moment of its capture the smoke of a steamer was seen in the distance. The signals sent up were answered as she approached, and without delay Sherman found a small boat, got together a crew and pulled down the river till he found the tug Dandelion, and heard the joyful news that Admiral Dahlgren was expected hourly in Ossabaw Sound. By noon next day the fleet came up; com- bined operations by land and sea were agreed upon, heavy ordnance was sent for from Hilton Head, till on the 17th, all being ready, a formal demand was made, and declined, for the surrender of the place. A HASTY RETREAT. 165 The fires burned brightly in the Rebel camp on the night of the 20th December, and the boom of their guns was echoing through the dark forests on the right, when a Federal officer, who com- manded a brigade, crept out beyond his picket lines, which were only three hundred yards from the enemy's works. As he approached nearer he missed the sound of voices, and was surprised to see no figures passing in front of the fiames. His suspicions began to be aroused, he went back for reinforcements, scaled the parapets of the outside line and was the first to enter the city, just in time to see the rear-guard of Hardee's army retreating across the marshes of South Carolina on the other side of the river. There was no longer any room for doubt. The Confederates had evacuated the city by a path which led them through swamps supposed to be impracticable ; and Savannah, with more than two hundred guns, magazines, loco- motives, steamboats, and 35,000 bales of cotton, became Sherman's prize. The first chapter of the Grreat March was over, and success had crowned the undertaking. It had not indeed, been barren of results. Of the damage inflicted upon the enemy, Sherman him- self shall tell the tale. After speaking of the great destruction and breaking up of the railways, 166 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. the consumption of corn, fodder, sweet potatoes, cattle, hogs, sheep, and poultry, 'We have carried off,' he says, ' more than 10,000 horses and mules, as well as a countless number of their slaves. I estimate the damage done to the State of Georgia and its military resources at 100,000,000 dollars ; at least 20,000,000 of which was ruined to our ad- vantage, and the rest in simple waste and de- struction. This may seem a hard species of warfare, but it brings the sad realities of war home to those, who have been directly or indirectly instrumental in involving us in its attendant calamities. Satisfied with what he had done, Sherman was content for a time to stay his hand, and Savannah suffered but little from the occupation of his army. The troops bivouacked in the broad streets and numerous squares, under shelter of the shady avenues which run through the city, resting after their late fatigues, and preparing themselves anew for the campaign of the Carolinas — the second chapter of the Great March. The Quarter-master's department, meanwhile, was not idle; the last supplies had been forwarded to the army by way of Nashville and Chattanooga to Atlanta ; but im- mediately on the news of his arrival at Savannah, the great stream of supplies was turned to meet him on the Atlantic coast. In the dead of winter IN THE WOELD AGAIN. 167 a fleet laden with vast stores of all kinds was as- sembled with the utmost celerity, and, within a few days after the fall of Savannah, had removed the formidable obstacles by which the channel of the river had been impeded, and having discharged its cargo upon the wharves of the city, weighed anchor again for the North, deep in the water with its freight of captured cotton. The city itself did not present any feature of peculiar interest. The Pulaski House was a fair hotel, and very full, and we seemed to be quite in the world again after our seclusion in the heart of Georgia, as we found ourselves in the way of direct communication with the North — ocean steamers sailing every day — New York papers, a real luxury after the single column of little bits of gossip, that constituted, if you ex- cept the advertisements, the whole bill of fare of Southern journals. One sight, however, was not to be missed. We had heard a report of the beauty of the cemetery of Bonaventure and set out to walk there on the afternoon of our arrival. Three miles of dusty roads along a level plain brought us to a forest of Georgian pines, and then, leaving the road on our right, we crossed by a wooden bridge over a swampy cane-brake, alive with croaking bull-frogs, and presenting a tangled 168 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. mass of the rankest tropical vegetation. A little further on and we came to the gate, formed of rustic woodwork. Our expectations were not great. The beauty of a cemetery is so often praised when a place has no lion to boaat of, and a visit is generally disappointing; and we certainly were not prepared for the scene which met our gaze on entering. We found ourselves in a succession of avenues of magnificent specimens of the live or river oak, from whose spreading branches drooped in wavy filaments, sometimes thirty feet long, the beautiful skeins of the Spanish moss ( Tillandsia). The ground beneath is covered with a wilderness of growth — palmettos, dogwood, and a tangle of briers and a few cypresses, or pines of a softer green, from out of which peeped here and there the white tombstones, which mark the resting-place of those who have chosen this spot for their last long home. ' Nothing,' says the author of Life and Liberty in America, * can give an adequate idea of its sadness or loveliness. It looks as if the trees instinct with life had veiled themselves like mourners at a grave, or as if the fogs and vapours from the marshes had been solidified by some stroke of electricity, and hung from the trees in palpable wreaths, swinging and swaying to every BONAVENTUEE, 169 motion of the -winds. Not unlike the effect pro- duced by tattered banners hung from the roof of a Grothic cathedral as trophies of war in the olden time, is the effect of these long streamers pending from the overarching boughs of the forest.' The history of the place is a curious one. It was chosen as his seat by one Tatnall, the founder of the colony of Georgia, who built a house here ; planted the avenues of live oak, which together with the cypresses and magnolias share the honours of the forests of the South; and set apart a piece of ground as the burying-place of his family. Some time after his death the house was burnt down ; and the owner, not caring to rebuild it, the ground was sold to the proprietor of the Pulaski Hotel, who set aside a portion of it for a public cemetery, in which capacity it is still, I believe, occasionally used. 170 CHAPTEK X. SAVAl^NAH TO EICHMOND. 'i'm off to Charleston' — 'all foe lizzie baker, oh!' experiences of an overseer the bar of charleston running the blockade the south carolina plant- ations fort sumter attack of the monitors present condition an old campaigner the pine barrens cheer at florence wilmington but- LEE'S FIREWORK — ^A NEGRO PREACHER EDUCATION IN THE SOUTH — AN ANECDOTE OF THE BUREAU. November 5. — The mournful associations into which we fell yesterday gave place this morning to the cheerful strain, ' I 'm off to Charleston ;' for which we had to start ' So early in the morning, Before the break of day.' The ' Lizzie Baker ' was a floating palace after the ' Helen,' and everything seemed to promise a fair voyage as we got under way, soon after seven. Savannah is eighteen miles from the SOUTHEEN SNOWBALLS. 171 mouth of the river, down which we steamed at the rate of fifteen miles an hour, passing Fort Pulaski, which had been taken by the Northerners early in the war, and where, in one of the very few cases in which they had condescended to retaliation, some of the Confederate prisoners had been confined under circumstances of great cruelty. We followed a tortuous course, winding in and out among the low narrow islands, where the famous long staple, or Sea Island, cotton used to grow. Any future production of this seems extremely doubtful, as the cleaning of it requires such continuous and wearisome hand labour as no free agent would undertake. Many of these islands were set apart by Sherman for the negroes, the ' snowballs ' as the soldiers called them, who left their families and followed his army in great numbers. Little or nothing we heard had been done by them beyond raising a little corn and a few melons. ' The nigger,' they say, ' likes something to eat,' We had, of course, a very Secesh lot of pas- sengers. One of the party had been an overseer for twenty-nine years, and had worked plantations in the Mississippi Bottom, as also in South Carolina and Georgia. He disliked the business, he said, but stuck to it because it brought him money. 172 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. The slaves used to be whipped for laziness, but more often for quarrels arising between themselves out of jealousy. For laziness he would give twenty cuts. ' Nothing like the whip, sir, to make 'em work.' The instrument gener- ally used by him was a strap, about an inch and a half in breadth near the lash. From another source I learnt that this strap was dreaded more than anything else. ' The strap was the worst because it raises a great welt on your skin, and the blood was drawed right through the little holes in the straps,' was the view of a nigger, who spoke from experience. The labour exacted in the Eastern States, the overseer told us, was not severe ; each negro had his task, which he could ordinarily finish by two or three in the afternoon ; when he could hunt or fish, or cultivate his own patch of ground. On the sugar -plantations in Louisiana the work was much harder ; in the busy season especially, when the canes were being crushed, sixteen hours a-day was not at all out of the common. Still they bore it very well, and did not complain. The feeding however, was much higher — coffee, rice, and plenty of bacon. Even in the height of the sugar season, they rested for twenty-four hours on Sunday — not like the poor slaves ia Cuba, whose hours of work were eighteen RUNNING THE BLOCKADE. 173 in the day, in a week of seven working-days. So I was told by a gentleman who visited a plantation there said to be worked on humane principles. ' Did you educate them at all ?' I asked of a big Florida planter. ' No, we did not see that that did us any good. They had their Methodist preachers, and were as happy as the day was long. We never worked them till they were twelve years old.' After passing Beaufort and Hilton Head there were forty miles of open sea to be passed, before we made the buoy which marks the passage of the bar at the entrance of Charleston Harbour, which was at once the danger and the safeguard of the blockade-runners frequenting this port during the war. Numbers of them were stranded, wrecked, or taken upon its shoals; but these safely passed, aU pursuit by the Yankee cruisers was at an end. Blockade-running, from all accounts, must have been an exciting business, and one which exercised a strange fascination upon daring spirits, indepen- dently of the great gains which were to be made out of the trade. The long narrow craft, painted of a dark grey col'our to escape observation, burning the Welsh smokeless coal, driven by the most powerful en- 174 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. giaes, and built so low as almost to be running under water, eluded in great numbers a blockade, which was on the whole very efficiently maintained along one of the stormiest coasts in the world. Numbers indeed failed in the attempt, and were taken. But one voyage safely accomplished would amply compensate for two captures. Many, of course, lost everything, when the first venture was unsuccessful ; and few had the fortune of the owners of the ' City of Petersburg ' and the ' Old Dominion,' both of which, after making more than a dozen trips from Halifax, were within a very short time since, plying a more peaceful trade between Liverpool and Dublin. At first they would only make for their ports on dark nights ; but latterly success made them more venturesome, and it was not unusual for the Charleston people to come down in the morning and find as many as half-a-dozen in the harbour. Their system of signals was well arranged with the authorities on shore — the Yankees however found it out, and made good use of their knowledge during the first few days of their occupation of Charleston, and before the news of its capture had reached Nassau or Halifax, so as to prevent the ships from coming out. The signal ' all clear ' was shown, and the boats came in, and, as was usual when they they were A SOUTHERN BOARDING-HOUSE. 175 over the bar, and safe inside — the strain was over — the anchor was let go, and all precaution was abandoned. Champagne began to flow in the cabin, and the g^og in the forecastle, till the blue uni- form of a Yankee officer seen coming down the companion-ladder put an end to their joviality, and showed them the trap into which they had fallen. Eumours of cholera were rife last November, and indeed, it had already broken out on the ' Atalanta ' coming from Europe ; so we had to lie to for a short time in quarantine, till a medical officer came on board and gave us a clean bill of health. Then away we steamed through the narrow and intricate channel, passing close under Fort Sumter, as it stood out a shapeless mass in the dusk of evening ; and ten minutes later were moored along the quay. It was dark by the time we had landed and got our baggage off the boat, and we picked our way as best we could through the unlit streets to a boarding-house, which, in the then state of the hotels, had been strongly recommended to us, and where we had the good fortune to secure the only vacant rooms, which good Mrs. G , who kept the house, stiU had unoccupied. The poor old lady had seen better days, but the war had taken 176 THE SOUTH AFTEE THE WAR. everything from her but her son and her house. She is a ' Eebel ' of course, and would not hear of a Yankee comiag to lodge with her if she knew it. There was but little furniture in the house, but everything was very clean and nice. At the back was a large courtyard with trees growing in it, and overlooking this were verandahs on both first and second floors, into which all the windows opened — giving the house an amount of shade and freshness very grateful in the hot season. Breakfast next morning was rather formidable, the old lady we found sitting at the head of the table, and around her a very staid set of South- erners, who hardly knew what to make of our party. We had formed some idea in our walk from the quay the night before of the character of the city, which was evidently of a very superior class to anything we had yet seen in the South ; but it needed the morning light to show the still re- maining splendour of Main Street ; the beauty of the trees (Pride of India), which lined the pave- ment ; the palatial houses standing, many of them, in their own grounds, surrounded with orange- trees and mangolias ; and the grand esplanade running along the shore in front of South Bay A PLEASANT PROSPECT. 177 Street. The bright sun of the Indian summer was shining out in all its glory on the day of our visit ; and as we turned our back upon all the signs of ruin and desolation, and looked out upon the bright harbour, and the islands whose feet were being kissed by the dancing waves, and pictured to ourselves the city as it was under the old rigime, we could fully comprehend the charm which Charleston used to exercise upon the people of the South, and the enthusiasm which its very name used always to evoke. The city is built upon a neck of land pro- jecting into the bay between the Ashley and Cooper rivers. The population in the days of its prosperity numbered 30,000. In summer the climate is unhealthy, and all who can do so run off to the watering-places of the North, or to the upland country of the Alleghanies in the interior, to escape the heat and fever. The season of Charleston was the winter time, when those who liked gaiety had 'quite a time of it.' South Carolina was the abode par excellence of the Southern aristocracy. No other State could rival the splendour of their town-houses or the com- fortable hospitality shown on their plantations. There were doubtless, richer men at New Orleans, but the climate, I should fancy, was not so plea- N 178 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. sant, while the situation was too remote, and the tone of the place a trifle too commercial. The South Carolina planter lived in patriarchal style upon his estate, where he was delighted to show the happy working of the peculiar 'institution,' and the comfort and ease enjoyed by his house- hold slaves. He forgot probably, to tell his visitors of his plantation far off in the West, from which he derived the chief part of his income^ where the overseer reigned supreme, and no questions were asked so that a sufficient number of bales found their way to the cotton market. Now, however, — ' The old, old times are passed away, And weary are the new.' Dearly has Charleston paid for being the first to attack the national flag, and for leading the van in the path of Secession. True, she resisted successfully all the attacks made upon her by sea, and it was not until the last year of the war that Sherman's advance through the Carolinas com- pelled the evacuation of the town ; but for three years the city was a target for the heaviest ordnance that the North could bring to bear upon her. A third part of the town was destroyed by fire SAD HAVOC. 179 in 1862, and at least half the Yankee missiles are believed to have fallen in the burnt district. But it was a sad sight. Atlanta certainly presented a more complete scene of ruin, but the total clearance effected there, prevented the realization of what the town had been in the days of its prosperity, and Atlanta at its best must have been but a village in comparison with Charleston. Here there is hardly a house that has not suffered more or less. To some the damage seems at first sight to be trifling ; a small hole knocked in the wall is apparently the extent of the mischief, till an examination of the interior shows that the in- jury has been done by the bursting of the shell, which after making its entrance, has made havoc with the partitions, and knocked perhaps two or three rooms into one. In the next house, maybe, it is the outside that has suffered ; every pane of glass broken, the doors battered in, or the hand- some pillars broken short off. In the very midst of the city rises the tall spire of a church, at once the mark for all the enemy's guns and the look- out of the beleaguered city. The charmed life which it is reputed to bear, seems not to have been assigned to it without reason, as it appears still untouched by a single shot. Many of the houses were untenanted at the time of our visit. The 180 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. G-overnment had not been very expeditious in restoring them to their owners, many of whom would, doubtless, be too poor to live in them; but people seemed to be coming back, and trade was again springing up. Half-a-dozen vessels however, were all that were to be seen loading at the quay, as almost all the cotton in that part of the country had been carried out already through the blockade. A visit to Fort Sumter was, of course, a great object of our wishes, but there seemed to be serious obstacles in the way of our getting there. We had heard when too late of a Government steamer, which had gone off with a party in the morning to visit the islands, and it seemed as if we should have to content ourselves with the distant view from the quay. However, through the kindness of the consul we were able to borrow a boat and a coxswain from a British ship, and with some diffi- culty hired four niggers to row us out to the fort. The harbour of Charleston, which is formed by Sullivan's island on the east, and Morris island on the west, is safe and commodious ; but the only access to it for vessels of any draught after they are over the bar, is by a long and tortuous channel leading for several miles between the shoals and islands, until it passes close under the guns of FORT SUMTEE. 181 Fort Sumter, which covers an island about an acre in extent situate at the very mouth of the harbour, and four miles distant from the city. So important a position was naturally an object of continued attack from the Federal squadron, and from the batteries erected by General Grill- more on Morris Island. In June, 1863, a whole fleet of monitors stood in, but after the fort had undergone a fearful pounding they had to retire with considerable damage to themselves. General Beauregard, who was in command of the defence of Charleston, has been much blamed for allowing the Federals to establish themselves undisturbed upon Folly Island, where, under the cover of a wood, some formidable batteries were erected which, when completed and unmasked, made Fort Wagner no longer tenable, and gave the Federals the whole of Morris Island, from which the bombardment of the town was principally effected. Fort Sumter itself was one large casemate, whose brick walls rose to the height of at least forty feet perpendicular. It is now a mass of ruins, and presents in its interior the appearance of a deserted gravel-pit or brick-yard. Only from the Northern or town-ward face can you form any idea of its original condition. The enormous guns 182 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. used against it from Morris Island first battered down the face opposed to them and pounded it into rubble ; and having finished there the work of destruction, and the fort being laid open, the balls passed over and knocked to pieces the other side from behind^ leaving to the guns of the fleet to come and supplement anything that might still be wanting ; until at last they had all done their worst, and three sides of the fort were nothing but sloping banks of rubble, capable of being easily boarded, and therefore requiring to be guarded by chevaux de /rise, chains, and iron spikes, against any at- tempt at a landing. In this state the fort is said to have been stronger than ever, as it was in- capable of receiving any farther injury. It was, however, kept up more as a matter of pride than for the real service it was able to render, as it could only mount two or three guns to guard the channel. A corporal's guard are now the sole oc- cupants of the place, living in some of the bomb- proofs which had sheltered the defenders during the siege, and which used to be kept up by gabions full of earth brought from the town every night. We were amused at the scribbling of the Con- federate soldiers on the walls, who had endeavoured to while away the tedious hours of their confinement by depicting an officer in command of negro PADDY ABEOAD. 183 troops, (G-eneral Hatch), in the agonies of susf. per coll. in every direction. On dropping into a bar one evening in the town, we found it was kept by an Irishman who had served in our army through the Sikh cam- paign under Lord Grough. He had run the blockade to join the Confederates, in whose ser- vice he had risen to the rank of Lieutenant, with prospective hopes of commanding a regiment. He was very enthusiastic about the old country. The niggers, he thought, made poor hands at fighting, but they were always pushed forward in the first rank. He never gave them quarter, and said he killed, six in one day. A great mulatto got up on one occasion when his men were skirmishing, and levelled his piece. He shouted at him to discom- pose his aim, but the man took no notice, and dropped a grey-back with a bullet in the thigh. When he got up to him, he said, " Father, have mercy." " Z"'tt give you quarter indeed," I answered, and drew my old sword, and gave him cut No. 4, and he was dead before he knew he was hurt." Methinks our friend 'blew' a good deal. The anti-nigger feeling was very strong here, especially with regard to the black troops who give themselves great airs. ' Now do tell us,' said A to a lady, 'What do you think of 1 84 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. the negro? Don't you in your heart of hearts think them the same beings with ourselves?' ' If,' she answered, ' you consider them your equals, you are welcome to do so. They are not ours.' Our plan had been to go direct by water from Charleston to New York ; but a north-easter had been blowing for some days, and a storm seemed to be brewing. The boats were not first-rate, the coast was a dangerous one, and the rounding of Gape Hatteras was said to be as bad as the passage round Cape Horn. So hearing a tolerable account of the land route, and thinking it would be pre- ferable to see Eichmond at the end of our South- ern tour, to which it would form the natural conclusion, than to make what would be an un- timely digression from our visits to the Eastern cities, we determined to trust ourselves once more to Southern railway-cars for forty-eight hours, nor had we any reason to regret the decision at which we arrived. Florence, the first resting-place on our route northward, is about a hundred miles from Charles- ton. The journey occupied ten hours, upon a line said not to have a curve in it for seventy miles, as it passes through the dreary pine barrens of Carolina, and over miles and miles of trestle- A STRANGE FERRY. 185 work, through dismal swamps and cane-brakes, without a single opening in the trees, or a glimpse of the Blue Eidge in the distance. The stations seemed nothing but a collection of a few huts in a sparse clearing of the forest, with occasionally some bales of cotton waiting for transport, or barrels of rosin, and perhaps, a heap of little niggers lying about. The only break in the monotony of the journey, for we did not even stop to dine, was the crossing of the Cangaree Eiver ; which, as Johnston had broken down the bridge in his retreat before Sherman, had to be accom- plished in a large flat-bottomed ferry-boat, to which all the passengers and luggage had to be transferred, preparatory to our being tugged over by a rope. No mischance, happily, occurred ; another train was waiting on the other side to take us on, and we were forwarded without much delay. It was six o'clock in the evening before we reached our destination, where we hoped to make up for the privations of the day ; which had it not been for the Southern hospitality extended to us on the journey by a lady with a provision basket, would have pressed heavy upon us. Any expectations, how- ever, of comfort or supper at Florence were doomed to bitter disappointment. Food was, indeed, provided at the inn, of which it is enough 186 THK SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. to say that bread and molasses formed the staple of our repast. The bar-keeper was utterly un- courteous — a very rare occurrence in our experi- ence — and refused to do anything towards pro- viding us with provision for the next stage in our journey, which was to commence at two next morning. An hour or two was spent round a bright log fire, for we had little experience of ' Carolina's sultry clime,' and towards nine o'clock we turned in for a few hours' rest. The crossing of the Santee Eiver in flat-bot- tomed boats at 3 A.M. on a November morning was an event not to be forgotten — the half hour spent shivering on the brink, and the great risk of losing one's baggage, which the niggers might easily have carried off under cover of the dark- ness, and in the confusion incident to the transit; At last we are all safe over, baggage stowed away, and the old lady is hoisted up the steps and set- tled happily down, with her bag by her side. A wonderful specimen was Mrs. . Secesh to the backbone. She had come with us all the way from Savannah, and her wrath has been much ex- cited against the knickerbockers of H , whom she put doMTi as belonging to the corps of Boston , MONEY NO OBJECT. 187 Zouaves. She had now however, become very friendly, and told us all her story. She was of good family ; but had lost everything. A school she had started at Nashville was doing well, but had to be given up because she would not take the Yankee oath. Money however was of little im- portance to her, for by some mysterious free- masonry she managed to get on without it. The conductors were satisfied without her fare — hotel-keepers without their bill. When the tickets were collected or checked, we observed some subdued whisperings ; but no money passed, yet all seemed to be right. At last the conductor began to grow anxious, and confided his diflS- culties to some of the passengers. What was he to do ? The old lady said she had no money to pay, and he could not turn her ofif the train, and so all went off quietly as far as Wilmington. We had the unexpected luxury of breakfast next morn- ing at a road-side station ; and then on through the perpetual forest, with here and there a bit of clearing, and a patch or two of corn, more frequent after we passed the boundary of North Carolina. It was a brilliant day, and sometimes for miles the forest would be carpeted with sand so bright and dazzling as to make one fancy that there had been a fall of snow during the night, while 188 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. the underwood, dyed with tints of the deepest crimson, contrasted beautifully with the fleecy carpeting. Towards afternoon we reached the banks of the Brunswick, or Cape Fear Eiver, from which we looked across a distance of little more than a mile to Wilmington ; but the bridge had met with the usual fate, and we were forced to embark on the ' Hobornok' steamer, and follow the river as it wound among the deserted rice plant- ations for six miles before reaching our destin- ation. The port of Wilmington during the whole war was the principal port for foreign trade of the Confederacy. The town is eighteen miles from the sea, situated at the head of a long inlet, or expansion of Cape Fear Eiver. The advantages of its position defied the most vigorous blockade ; and the strong works and garrison of Fort Fisher, at the mouth of the river, formed the main defences of Wilmington, until its capture on the 15th January, 1866, closed the last outlet of the Confederacy. An expedition had sailed the month before under Butler, which attracted attention from the results expected by that general to follow upon the ex- plosion of a boat laden with an enormous quantity of gunpowder, and towed up by night close under the walls of the fort. Butler must have seen an account of the fearful explosion at Erith, and BUTLER S FIREWORK. 189 he fondly believed that not a trace of the fort would be seen in the morning. The expedition was kept a long time waiting, but at last every- thing was ready, the train was fired, but the result was so insignificant that the garrison were in ignorance of its intended object, until they were enlightened as to it through the Northern press. Butler was so disgusted at the failure of his ' firework,' that after making a hasty recon- noisance, he called off and re-embarked his troops, assigning as a reason his unwillingness uselessly to sacrifice life, as the fort was impregnable. It was, however, successfully assaulted a month later, with a loss of 636 killed and wounded, and, at the request of General Grant, Butler was superseded. There was little of interest to be seen in the city beyond a large park of artillery, which had been given up by General Johnston at his final capitulation. Some of the houses were handsome, and churches seemed plentiful, but the streets were badly paved, and the dust was ankle-deep. We attended the service at the Episcopal church in the afternoon, where we formed part of a con- gregation, to many of whom the prayer ' for the fatherless and the widow,' ' the desolate ' — I can hardly add, the oppressed— was painfully appro- 190 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAH. priate. So much mourning, or so deep, I had never seen in a church on any ordinary occasion, or should wish to see again. In the evening we came in rather late, to a service held in a fine church for ladies and gentlemen of colour, where a large and devout congregation was assembled. Our entrance at- tracted some observation, as we were the only whites ; but the attention was on the whole fully given to the preacher — a coloured man of course — whose sermon was not at all devoid of power ; but the amount of repetition was very wearisome, though not apparently too much for his audience, who were continually murmuring their assent — ' Oh, yes ! oh, yes ! ' to all the sentiments and as- pirations. We could hardly repress a smile when a day of meeting was announced in the week for the ' Ladies' Literary Association,' in connexion with the church. It only occurred to us on our departure the risk we had run of catching small pox, which had been carrying off the freedmen here by hundreds ; but, happily, we escaped any evil consequences of our imprudence. The bureau here was in full operation, more than a thousand refugees were drawing rations from Government; but the number issued was monthly diminishing, though the winter was LITTLE LEAENING. 191 expected to bring it up again. There was great demand for labour, if the blacks cared to work. Efiforts were being made for their education by teachers sent down by the New York Missionary ■ Society; but the whole white community are totally opposed to nigger schools ; nor is that to be won- dered at if we consider how few of the poor South- ern whites have themselves tasted the benefits of education, and would naturally grudge the negro's enjoyment of advantages, which they do not them- selves possess. In a history of the State which I happened upon at Wilmington, the educational statistics of Carolina were put amongst others, in juxtaposition with those of Connecticut. In the latter State the proportion of those who could neither read nor write was, to the rest of the popu- lation, 1 in 267, in CaroHna 1 in 7. Nor was there any reason to doubt the accuracy of these figures, or to disbelieve the stories which were told us of how few of the Confederate soldiers could read or write. This ignorance was not con- fined to the poor whites. A well-dressed lady, of considerable pretensions, came last autumn into the Bureau at Nashville, and asked for the restitution of her lands. She was told she had only to fill up a form of application, and they would be restored. After some hesitation she asked if that 192 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. was absolutely necessary, and was told it could be done for her by an attorney, if she preferred it. 'Can't it be done for me here?' 'I felt a little wicked,' said Greneral Fisk, who related the story, ' as she had been giving herself such airs ; and pointing to a negro as black as a coal, who was sitting upon a bench in the room, I said, " That gentleman, I am sure, will be happy to help you." " What ! that nigger ! " she said, in unfeigned horror. " Oh, we have no niggers now, ma'am ! " Well, she had to make the best of it, and accepted the offer, and the old man sat down so kindly, and took such pains to understand the case. The form was filled up, and as she took off her glove to sign, the jewels flashed upon her hand, but when I came to examine the paper I found only her mark.' Eefinement and edu- cation in the South must have been the property of a small minority; and not a few of those, I fancy, who used to make themselves notorious for their extravagance in the summer watering-places, would have little cause to boast themselves over this poor lady. 193 CHAPTEE XI. 'ON TO Richmond!' DANGEROUS TRAVEL THE OLD LADY AGAIN THE CONDUCTOR AND THE COWHIDE CAMPAIGN OF THE CAROLINAS' THE OLD DOMINION THE FINAL STRUGGLE GENERAL GRANT 'THE COCKADE CITY' BURNSIDE'S CRATER A BRIDAL CAR ' ON TO RICHMOND!' THE SLOPES OF HOLLYWOOD BELLEISLE JEFFERSON DAVIS'S HOUSE LIBBY PRISON. At four that afternoon we had to be in the cars for Petersburg. One weary journey more of twenty- four hours and we should be again within the pale of civilisation. This last stage of Southern travel was the worst of all — many of the seats were broken, and the rails were so worn, and the tracks so shaky, that again and again we woke up with a start, thinking that we were off the line. The old lady was continuing her journey in the same train ; she^had done well for herself at Wilmington, as she came stored with coffee, sugar, and pre- O 194 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. served milk, which she heated on the stove in the centre of the car, and insisted upon our sharing with her. She seemed to be at peace with the conductor, a quiet respectable man, who confided to US, later on, his difficulties regarding her. She had been pnpmised a pass, she told him, but had not received it when the train started. Was he to believe her? When morning came however, we heard from a fiassenger, who had spent the night in the same car with her, that matters had come to a crisis. The old lady had worked her- self up to a state of excitement, had defied the conductor and insulted him, and the consequence was he had impounded her bag. The man himself presently came his rounds, and confirmed in all respects the story we had heard. He had quite made up his mind, he said, to let her pass free, but her behaviour to him last night had rendered it now out of the question. What was to be done ? we had eaten the old lady's salt, or rather drank her coffee, and felt ourselves, therefore, bound to make her some offer of assist- ance, notwithstanding that we believed her con- duct to have been utterly unjustifiable. She refused however, to hear of any such thing, and would only reiterate strongly the intention she had all along expressed of having the conductor well SHERMAN AGAIN. 195 cowhided, and finally, went off at Weldon minus the bag. This was altogether a curious episode of Southern travel, an ebullition of that fiery, spirit impatient of contradiction or control, which burned in Southern breasts, and prompted in old tim^es Mr. Brook's violent attack upon Charles Sumner ; an act — it must be remembered — which was not repudiated, but rewarded by the society from which he came. If this is chivalry, may we be preserved from it. We left Sherman some time back (December 1864), resting with his troops at Savannah after the fatigues of the Georgian campaign, and pre- paring for a fresh start. Here at Groldsborough we again came across his path, a point which he reached safely on the 21st of March, 1865, after being two months in the field. 'History,' says one of his staff, ' will be searched in vain for a parallel to the scathing and destructive effect of the Campaign of the Carolinas.' * Georgia was * ' We have traversed the country from Savannah to Goldsborough with an average breadth of forty miles, con- suming everything. The public enemy, instead of drawing supplies from that re_gion to feed his armies, will be com- pelled to "send provisions from other quarters to feed the inhabitants.' — Sherman's Report. 196 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. never bitter in Secession ; South Carolina was its author and chiefest support. The army were fully- conscious of this, and if in their first march they carried whips, here they were armed with scorpions. The advance was not an easy one. The floods of J;he Savannah, the swamps of the Combalee and Edisto, the high Mils and rocks of the Santee, the quagmires of the Pedee and Cape Fear Elvers, had all to be passed in mid-winter in the face of an accumulating enemy. Johnston too, was before long replaced in command, and 'Sherman knew well that as long as he was in front of him any slip would be fatal. Columbia was the point first made. The beautiful capital of the Palmetto State, rich in mansions and public buildings, fell a prey to the flames, the kindling of which is alike repudiated by both armies, each of them seeking to lay the blame on the other.* Perhaps the conflagration may have been accidental, it cer- tainly was most destructive, and produced an amount of suffering frightful to contemplate. Charleston and Wilmington were successively supposed to be the objects of Sherman's advance ; *' ' I charge General Wade Hampton with having burned his own city of Columbia, from liis folly and want of sense in iilling it with lint, cotton, and tinder.' — Sherman's Report. THE LAST ACT. 197 but he held on his course inland, knowing that the destruction of the lines of travel in the interior would of itself make the places on the sea-coast un- tenable, and compel their evacuation ; his present aim being to bring the war within a small compass and to assist in the defeat of the Southern armies in Virginia. That support he was destined never to be called upon to render- — General Lee, as is well known, with the force under his command laid down their arms at Appomattox Court-House on the 9th of April. As soon as the news of this sur- render reached General Johnston, anxious to pre- vent the needless effusion of blood, he made no further effort to prolong the struggle, but sought at once an interview with Sherman — a capitulation was agreed upon by the two commanders, and with the carrying out of those terms the last hope of the Confederacy passed away. Sherman had now attained his object, and there was nothing for his victorious soldiers but to turn their footsteps home. We reached Weldon the morning after our departure from Wilmington, and made a halt sufficient to allow of our making another break- fast off squirrel and scrambled eggs, which we procured in a shop devoted mainly to the sale of marine stores. A short journey took us thence 198 THE SOUTH APTER THE WAR, to the banks of the Eoanoke Elver at Graston, the i bridge over which had shared the common fate, and once more we had to embark in the flat-bot- tomed barges. There was a considerable delay on the other side, in consequence of the non-arrival of the train from Ealeigh ; and S got into conversation with a poor nigger, now rejoicing in his freedom and hard at work under a contract. He seemed delighted at the prospect of education and religious instruction now opening upon him, his mind having been kept up to this time in a state of utter darkness. He had heard, he said, of a Grod who judged between right and wrong, and believed He had a Son, but had ' paid no particular attention to catch His name.' A pretty conclusive answer this to the theory so often advanced before the war, that slavery is the divinely appointed means of bringing civilisation and- Christianity to the poor descendants of Ham. Soon after leaving the river we crossed the boundary line which divides Virginia from North Carolina, and were soon rejoicing in the change from the swamps and pine barrens of the old North State, to the undulating sweeps and wooded scenery we found in the Old Dominion, to peeps of distant hills, to the autumn reds of the maple and oak, in the clearing of whose forests the neat THE OLD DOMINION. 199 farm-house and the fresh corn-stubbles showed that the tide of destruction had not flowed so far. The scene however, was too fair to last, and we were soon again whirling past entrenchments, rifle-pits, and all the familiar apparatus of attack and defence — an attack, which occupied for six months one of the best-equipped and most powerful armies that the world has seen, commanded by a General in whose ability and determination they had full confidence — a defence which was the last effort of a brave and unyielding people, who had staked their all and believed they were near losing it. There is one short hour yet before we reach Petersburg, and the very fewest words must suf- fice to explain how that place became the theatre on which was fought out the closing struggle of the war. For that purpose, however, it will be necessary to go back to the month of May, 1864, when, almost simultaneously with Sherman's ad- vance into Georgia, the army of the Potomac under Meade crossed the Eapidan and commenced the campaign of Virginia. General Grant had been appointed commander-in-chief in the March previous, after his successful relief of Chattanooga, and now his desire was that Lee's army should be beaten, if possible, north of Kichmond ; or, failing 200 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. that, to transfer his own forces to the south of the James, and to besiege the city from that side. The history of this campaign is well known, and as the result of forty-three days of desperate fighting and marching by day and by night, the Confederate army was driven back upon their en- trenchments, and the army of the Potomac was transferred to the south of Eichmond. The loss of life, meanwhile, had been fearful. Thousands upon thousands had perished in the battles of the Wilderness, of Spottsylvania, and Cold Harbour, and the countless skirmishes ; and the Southerners had no means of replenishing their ranks. The Union forces were little less exhausted by the struggle, and beyond exploding a few mines, and some endeavours at an assault which ought, it is said, to have been successful, little more was done that year by the army of the Potomac. Much, however, had been already effected. The enemy was so crippled as only to be able to act upon the defensive. The cutting of the Wil- mington and Weldon Eailroad, the chief feeder of Eichmond, obliged all its supplies to go by the circuitous route of Danville. City Point, an ex- cellent base of operations on the James Eiver, was secured to the Union army, which, from Oc- tober to March, remained quiet in its entrench- GENEEAL GEANT. 201 ments, until on the morning of the 28th of the latter month, a general movement of the forces around Eichmond began to take place. The campaign lasted but ten days. By the 2nd of April, Eichmond and Petersburg were taken, Jefferson Davis was a fugitive. On the 9th, at Appomattox Court House, General Lee and the army of Virginia laid down their arms, upon terms prescribed by General Grant, and from that time forward the annals of the war have only to record the successive surrender of the Confederate armies. General Grant and his policy were triumphant; his success as a division leader being eclipsed by the skill with which, as commander-in-chief, he conducted this gigantic war to a close. He found on his assumption of command, to use his own words, 'the armies both of the East and West acting independently, and without concert — like a balky team, no two ever pulling together — enabling the enemy to use to great advantage his interior lines of communication for trans- porting troops from east to west, to reinforce the armies most vigorously pressed, and to furlough large numbers during seasons of inactivity on our part, to go to their homes, and do the work of producing for the support of their armies.' 202 THE SOUTH AFTEK THE WAR. To remedy this he determined, in the first place, to bring the greatest number of troops practicable against the enemy, so as to prevent him from using the same men at different sea- sons against each of the attacking forces ; and secondly, to hammer continuously against the force and resources of the enemy, until he should be worn out by ' mere attrition.' This, then, was his plan of continued and concerted attack : it was nearly identical with poor old Lincoln's idea to keep ' pegging away,' derived from the knowledge that the superior resources and nu- merical strength of the North must in the end, if they would only persevere, infallibly prevail. It needed no great abUity to understand this, but Grant's fame seems to rest upon the skill with which he gathered up all the broken and disjointed threads of the different military 'ope- rations ; and if we add to this, his familiarity with all the details of the different expeditions, and the guidance and control which, while leaving full scope to the individual energies of the division commanders, he yet exercised over each, we shall see the grounds on which his countrymen would place him in the first rank of generals. His services have not failed to meet with recognition. He has been made the idol of his ' THE COCKADE CITY. 203 country, and were he ambitious of political dis- tinctioh, no man at the present time would have a chance against him as a candidate for the Presi- dency. It was known last autumn that he was about to visit Philadelphia : subscriptions were raised, and a committee was at once formed, who presented to him on his arrival at the station the key of one of the best houses in the city, which had been purchased for him, and of which they now begged his acceptance. Nor was this an empty gift of bare walls. Furniture, glass, every- thing had been provided ; the cellars were stocked with wine, and the table was laden with an ' ele- gant repast.' Washington and New York have not been slow to follow the example set by the Quaker City. All have vied in bestowing houses, money, and receptions upon the fortunate soldier, to an extent which must have been most embar- rassing to him ; for he is one of the most un- assuming men in the world. But here we are in Petersburg — 'the Cock- ade City,' as it is called — and rejoicing in a good hotel and a change from pork and squirrel fixings, and the bread and treacle of our halting- places in the South. Still we have the bright sun of the glorious Indian summer, and by the kindness of Greneral 204 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. Gribbon, the ofBcer commanding the post, we are provided with a government ambulance, which enables us to visit the principal works thrown up during the siege. Our course lay in a south- easterly direction from the city, along the Jeru- salem plank-road, past the cemetery on the top of the hill, and across the inner lines of the Confe- derate army, till we reached the outworks, from which, across an intervening space of little more than fifty yards, the two armies watched each . other during the winter of 1864-65. The ground is well adapted for earthworks; the soil is deep, though light, and the trenches cannot have re- quired a tithe of the labour necessarily expended upon the works in the shallow soil whicli covers the stony hill-sides of the Crimea. Scattered along the lines at short distances were forts, strengthened with every device of human inge- nuity. Built up of gabions and fascines, with bomb-proofs made of logs, sand-bags, and earth, they were guarded by lines of ditches with stock- ades, by chevaux-de-frise beyond, and, last of all, by rows of trees, thrown in such a position that their un lopped branches — which the application of fire had turned into an impenetrable hedge of charred and sharp points — made an impassable breastwork against the advance of the enemy. buenside's ceater. 205 It was against one of these forts that Burnside directed a mine, which by its explosion sent a whole regiment of Carolina Infantry (600 men) in one moment to their last account — an act of bar- barity bitterly complained of by the South. An enormous crater formed by the explosion remains to testify to the truth of the story : frightful was the carnage of that day. The Confederates were at first surprised and driven back by the advance of the enemy, but after a time made a stand. The coloured troops charging to the attack were pressed forward by those behind, and seem to have been driven en masse down the sloping sides of the crater, whence they could neither be extricated nor re-formed. Those who attempted to escape over the intervening space, were mowed down by the guns of the enemy ; but a few reached their pwn lines in safety, and at length the remainder, 2000 in number, surrendered. We could well be- lieve what they told us, that within the space of forty acres there had fallen 20,000 men. It was all a flourishing farm in the previous June, growing corn, cotton, wheat, and tobacco ; so the owner of 150 acres there informed us. He no longer now attempts to cultivate it, but has set up a little store for the sale of drinks and relics of the battle- field ; but, like so many others, regrets the loss of 206 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. the cause more than the farm. ' It was hard to give up that for which they had fought so long.' Empty cartridge-cases, tattered uniforms, and bits of straps and belts, with here and there a rusty bayonet or the bent barrel of a rifle, were lying about, hardly hidden among the coarse grass which has sprang up since the fight. A mile further, and we came to Forts Sedgwick and Mahone, called by the soldiers, from the severity of the fire. Fort HeU and Fort Damnation. A pleasant change was it to see a little further on, rising out of the midst of a grove of pine, a pretty church, the sole handiwork of the Union soldiers, built of slabs or the outside pieces of fir-wood, and put together without a single nail. The inside was neat, but very plain, with an inscription recording the name of the regiment that constructed it. Close by there was a row of substantial camp huts, now used for refugees and freedmen. A drive of three miles over the rough plank- road brought us back to Petersburg in time to leave by the afternoon train forEichmond, There sure enough, on the platform, was the irrepressible old lady, who had begged or borrowed money enough to pay her fare. We kept clear of her as far as possible, but she did not seem disposed to give up our acquaintance, and was anxious to snLIUKllS' Clll.:l:i;il XKAIl PICTIOKSBIKI:, VA. A BRIDAL PARTY. 207 know where A had been raised, — and the last sentiment that we heard from her was to the effect that she would not care to go to heaven if she thought that any Yankees would be there before her. The town had been all astir this afternoon in consequence of a wedding which was taking place — and a good deal of interest was naturally excited among the passengers by the presence in the cars, before starting of six or eight pretty bridemaids, dressed in white with wild flowers in their hair, who had come to the train to bid adieu to the bride, a pretty little thing in a dark grey dress. It would not be pleasant, I imagine, to any but an American pair to have their newly wedded con- dition brought so prominently before an apprecia- tive public in a railway car full of people. Ad- vertisements there are now of bridal cars on some lines, as there are bridal state-rooms in the steamers, and apartments for that purpose in the hotels. The party cannot have been allowed much time for breakfast, as the marriage ceremony was performed only an hour before the departure of the train ; but that part of the proceedings is said to be often postponed till the return from the honeymoon, which is not usually of long duration. Manchester is reached in an hour and a half 208 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. after starting — we bid a final adieu to Southern railways and to the old lady — then a drive of two miles in the buss brings us to the well-known Spottiswoode House at Kichmond ' On to Eichmond ! ' the prolonged cry of the Northern people, re-echoed by the press, and en- forced upon the army, had at length in April of last year, after four long years of waiting and hoping, received its full accomplishment. Eight short months had passed away, and we were standing among the ruins of that famous city whose defence has been the wonder and admiration of the world. The scene of destruction however, upon which the eye so continually lights is not to be attri- buted to Yankee cannon or to Sherman's torches. The fire which has turned a part of the city into a ' Burnt District ' was the doing of the inhabi- tants themselves at the time of the evacuation, to prevent the tobacco stored in the warehouses from falling into the hands of their hated foe. The negroes were not slow to follow the example set them. Suddenly freed from all restraint they began to plunder and pillage indiscriminately, and, when their booty was secured, carelessness or a desire to obliterate the traces of their crimes might account for many a conflagration. But here also HOLLYWOOD CEMETERY. 209 the recuperative power, of which we have heard so much, was eflfecting wonders, and building was making such progress and rents ruled so high, that there will be but few traces left before long of all the disturbance. The morning after our arrival was devoted to a visit to Hollywood Cemetery, long famed for the beauty of its position, lying about a mile from the city on pleasant slopes over- looking the James Eiver. The place is very prettily laid out, in some parts thickly planted with shrubberies and groves, in others railed off into little gardens neatly kept and entered by wicket-gates, and apparently appropriated to dif- ferent families. We made our exit by a gap broken in the wooden paling which surrounds the cemetery, and emerged upon some grassy downs commanding a good view of the river and the city. Immediately in front of us was Belleisle, an island about eight or ten acres in extent, situated in mid-channel, sparsely wooded and rising to a con- siderable eminence towards the centre. Here had been confined from ten to twelve thousand Northern prisoners, with shelter only for a third of their number, while the rest were exposed to summer heats and winter frost, to river damps and autumn rains, without protection beyond what p 210 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. they found by burrowing in the earth. Blankets were so scarce that the very dead were exhumed for the sake of the covering in which they were buried — a frightful scene of suffering, from the remembrance of which we were glad to turn away our eye towards the city, lying to our left on the slope of a hill whose summit is crowned by the columns of the Capitol and by the graceful spires of one or two of the churches. It was not easy to discern at that distance the ravages of the fires, and the vacant piers of the Petersburg railway bridge gave almost the sole indication of the re- cent presence of war. We were happy to find that even a nearer inspection was not able to dis- close any damage done to the Capitol in which the Legislature of the State meets. Perhaps it may owe its safety to the contiguity of an equestrian statue of Washington, which has pranced away all through the war, unconscious the while of the stirring scenes which have been enacted around it. A little further, on the very brow of the hill and commanding a fine view to the northward, stands the house of Jeff. Davis, over which are now to be seen floating the stars and stripes, while at the door the blue uniform of a Yankee sentinel shows that it has been appropriated by the Federals as military head-quarters. How often must its late occupant. i •IJIF r.innv ri;,s,,x JEFF. DAVIS' HOUSE. 211 in the solitary hours and weary days of his long confinement within the walls of Fortress Monroe, revert to the time when he lived in that house, the chosen President of eight millions of people ; and when he looked forth from its windows to see the smoke of the contending armies and listened for the boom of their cannon and the rattle of their musketry, in the fond hope that each en- gagement would be the last, and would bring to the cause a complete success. From the house of Jefferson Davis to the Libby Prison may seem an abrupt transition. They are not however a mile apart, and an ac- count of Eichmond would be far from complete if it failed to include some notice of this, notorious building, which, originally a tobacco warehouse, still retained the name of the owner, when it was converted to a more ill-favoured use. There is nothing remarkable in the structure, which is built in three stories, communicating with each other by ladders and trap-doors. The rooms into which each floor was portioned off measured each about 35 feet by 15 feet, and were made to con- tain about 500 men. The officers were not packed quite so closely, but the sufferings endured there will never be forgotten they say, by any who had the misfortune to enter those prison-doors. More 212 THE SOUTH AFFER THE WAR. happy in one respect, however, than their comrades on Belleisle, they had at any rate the shelter of a roof over their heads, but the privilege was one perhaps too dearly bought at the cost of such fear- ful crowding under a Virginian sun — in rooms provided with a single ' wash-place,' and where windows could not be approached without the risk of a bullet from the sentries. Some few managed to make their escape by an underground passage which they excavated by stealth ; but an un- fortunate obstacle in the shape of some stout man, who became inextricably jammed between the sides of the tunnel, prevented the further progress of all who had the misfortune to be behind him, and led, I believe, to its discovery by the Confederate guards. 213 CHAPTER XII. AN INQUIEY INTO THE TEEATMENT OF PRISONERS IN THE SOnTH WHO IS TO BLAME? The names of Libby, BeUeisle, and above all of Andersonville, have acquired so unenviable a notoriety from the undoubted sufiferings of the Union prisoners confined in them, and from the alleged complicity of the Confederate Grovernment in causing, or at least in not preventing, these sufferings, that we can hardly leave Eichmond without briefly inquiring what are the real facts of the case. The accusation brought on the part of the North is that their men, when taken, were deli- berately stripped of their clothes and deprived of their money ; that they were either crowded together in a manner fatal to health, as in the Libby prison ; or, as at Andersonville, were confined in pens ; as at Belleisle, upon an island without shelter from the fiery heat of the Southern sun, from the chill 214 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. fogs of their deadly autumn, from the rains of November, and from the winter's frost; — that thousands of them were literally starved to death, in some cases even while provisions sent by the Sanitary Committee of the North were rotting in their sight; — that, even in the midst of the woods of Georgia, fuel was refused them ; that they were shot down without mercy if they ventured to approach a boundary called ' the Dead Line ;' that if they attempted to escape they were hunted and torn by bloodhounds. And in proof of these assertions they point to the prison death-records, of which that of Andersonville alone makes up a roll of 12,913 names; to the report of a com- mittee appointed under the auspices of the Sani- tary Commission, whose honour is beyond question, which proclaims, after careful investigation, that the statements have not been exaggerated, but fall short of the truth; and adduces as part of the evidence, photographs of the prisoners re- duced to the very last stage of emaciation, taken on their exchange or release.* The South, in return, makes answer, that she gave of such things as she had; — that the pri- * These would not of themselves be an infallible proof, as it is said to be possible in any military hospital to find men in a like condition. TWO SIDES TO THE QUESTION. 215 soners received the same rations as her own soldiers; — that, owing to the desolation of her country by the Union armies, she could do no more; — that, owing to the inadequate number of troops available for guards, they were compelled to be severe; — that the dogs used to recapture fugitives were not bloodhounds, but a peculiar breed trained to track but not to tear runaway slaves; — that the insecurity of every part of the country, and their inability to defend themselves against sudden raids, pjrevented their providing suitable accommodation, which, had it been af- forded, they might have had to abandon at an hour's notice. But above all, they say, and on this principally they rest their defence, that they were at all times ready and willing to exchange every prisoner they held, making but one excep- tion, viz. in the case of escaped slaves taken under arms ; and that the obstacles which hindered the carrying out of this arose in every instance on the side of the North, who have therefore but themselves to blame for the sufferings which, from no cruel intent but simply from the poverty and destitution of the South, fell so heavily upon the unoffending prisoners. To this the North again reply, that they had in their service 150,000 coloured troops, with 216 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. whom it was above all things necessary that faith should be kept, it was therefore impossible that any distinction in the matter of exchange should be made between the soldiers fighting under her flag. Such, to use the legal terms, are the declaration, the pleadings, and the replication. It is easy to follow the line of argument on either side; but how are we to sum up, and which side shall have the verdict ? Very difficult indeed, is it to arrive at any just conclusion. Every man jealous for the reputation of our common humanity would wish to find the charge ' Not Proven,' if unable to give the more satisfactory verdict of ' Not Guilty ;' still the logic of facts is inexorable, and truth must be above all things dear to us ; and if the South is unable to meet the charges brought against them, we must not shrink from saying so, but must endeavour to find their excuse in the system of slavery in which it was their unhappy lot to be cast, — a system which presses with yet heavier incubus on the master than on the slave. In the case of the latter, freedom from care and want is at least some compensation for the loss of his liberty ; but the master suffers without com- pensating advantage, from the fearful effects which must follow upon the unrestrained exercise of power over his fellow-creatures. ANDEESONVILLE, 217 All will admit, that it is the duty of captors to provide the prisoners whom the fortune of war has given into their keeping with the necessaries of life ; that these must have adequate food, clothing, shelter, and medical attendance — a thankless ohli- gation, especially in a case like this, where the captors could barely provide for their own soldiers, but one on which Christianity and civilisation alike insist. That the Union prisoners were in want of these necessaries at Andersonville (I take the chief instance) is acknowledged by both sides ; as the miost damning evidence on this score was given by the surgeons in the Confederate service, who were examined on the trial of the gaoler Wirz. The question before us is, ' Were these necessaries negligently or ignorantly withheld, or was the South simply unable to provide them ? ' A glance at the map will show Andersonville to be situated in the south of Greorgia, a state which before Sherman's march had scarcely felt the war; and one in which he found provisions so plentiful that he was enabled to support his army entirely upon the country, which was full of corn, sweet potatoes, and store cattle. At the same time it must be remembered, to use the Greneral's own words, that the Government had 218 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE, little credit or means of concentration, and these supplies might not have been available for its purposes. The feeding of 40,000 mouths would soon exhaust the resources of the neighbourhood, and the already overburdened railways might not easily be able to comply with further demands for trans- port. Yet the duty of providing for these helpless unfortunates was so urgent, so paramount, that with food in the country nothing can exonerate a Grovernment which practically allowed them to steirve. Then as to the statement that the prisoners had the same rations as the Southern troops; if this be capable of substantiation, it may be said that the experience of our own gaols tells us that men need more nourishment when in confinement and deprived of occupation for body or mind, than they do when at liberty. And further, I was assured by a General of great reputation, and all but the highest command in the North, that the prisoners he took were all in good fighting con- dition,* and showed no signs of famine or emaci- ation. Besides, if themselves unable to provide food, ' Better, indeed, than his own soldiers, who were notoriously overfed. THE DEAD LINE. 219 I can conceive no valid excuse for a G-overnment which, after a time, refused to receive the supplies which the Sanitary and Christian Commissions of the North were only too ready to afford. Still more unanswerable seems to be the charge that a roof and firing were both practically denied. The pine-forests of Georgia are boundless ; Ander- sonville is in the midst of a clearing ; yet of over 30,000 men confined within the stockade, two- thirds were without any means of shelter ; and for firing the prisoners were fain to grub the roots of trees that had stood within the enclosure. I will not discuss the hunting with dogs of those who endeavoured to escape. The practice was admitted to me to be inexcusable by a general appointed by the South, Chief Commissary of their prisons towards the close of the war, and one which he stated he lost no time in putting an end to : nor will I allude to the horrors of the Dead Line, a matter depending not so much upon the policy of the Government as on the individual respon- sibility of the gaoler, who has paid in this case the penalty with his life. The question should rather be examined from a more extended point of view. The fortune of war had, in the autumn of 1863, thrown into the hands of the Confederates '220 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. somewhere about 40,000 prisoners, a number less by 15,000 than that of their own men held by the North. A moment's reflection will show how greatly it was to the interest of the South to exchange every man in her power, and to relieve herself from the necessity of guarding and maintaiaing so large a number of prisoners in idleness, while the return of her own soldiers would replenish her diminished ranks. She could not afford to lose a man. Pressed on all sides at the opening of the spring campaign of 1864, she had, on this side of the Mississippi, but two armies of any strength to oppose to the overwhelming battalions of her adversary. Yet was there no sign of surrender. For two months, with 40,000 troops, did General Joe Johnston (in one of the most famous retreats the world has seen), using the rifle by day and the spade by night, and without the loss of a gun or a wagon, and selling the life of every man that fell for three of his foes, dispute the advance of General Sherman from Chattanooga to Atlanta, with an army, admitted by the Federals, to number 100,000 men. "With a force not less over- matched did Lee, throughout the long summer, hurl back the continued assaults and the renewed battalions of Grant, in the bloody campaign of Virginia, If so much could be done by the valour EXCHANGE OF PRISONERS. 221 and determination of these little armies, what might not have been effected by a reinforcement of (say) 30,000 men, old soldiers rested and refreshed, who, as the conscription was strictly enforced, would immediately on their return be re-drafted into the service? The North were keenly alive to this. They had themselves little to gain, from a military point of view, by the return of their own men ; for the time of service of many of them had expired, and they were not likely to re-enlist ; and besides, what perceptible addition would have been made to an army numbering almost a million ? So matters stood in March 1864, when General Butler, on the part of the North, met Mr. Ould, the Confederate agent of exchange, at Fortress Monroe. Complaints had already begun to be heard from the Southern prisons, and the people of the North were clamorous that the exchanges should go on. Difficulties, however, had arisen, chief among them being the one before mentioned, viz. the persistent practice of the Confederates that negroes heretofore in bondage, when captured, should be held and set to work as slaves under their former masters. These however numbered but 500 ; and the Commissioners had come to an agreement to do the best they could under the circumstances ; 222 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. i. e. to exchange white man for white man as far as they would go. When this should have been carried out to the utmost, the North would still hold 15,000 Confederate prisoners against these 500 slaves ; and by that time some solution of the question would it was hoped, have been arrived at, furthered perhaps, by the threat of the Northern Commissioner of possible retaliation, of forced labour to be required by the North from the men they held. So the arrangement stood, subject of course to approval from head-quarters ; it was referred to the Secretary of War, and by him to General Grant. But the looked-for sanction did not arrive, and on the 14th of April came a tele- gram from Washington, ' Break off all negoti- ations on the subject of exchange — not another man to be given to the Eebels ;' and again a few days later, in answer to further inquiries. General Grant sends a message, 'Do not give the Eebels a single able-bodied man.' These orders were obeyed, and the exchanges ceased until the end of the autumn, when the voice of the Northern people again made itself heard, insisting on an alteration in the policy of the War OflSce, which was slowly, but certainly, consigning their hus- bands, their sons, and their brothers, to a living death in the prison-pens of the South. The cry CxOING HOME. 223 was too imperious to be resisted, and the question of the negro being postponed, exchanges went on, man for man, with great rapidity, and 33,120 were effected before the close of the war. Then, as the tide of released prisoners set northward, and the boats arrived on the banks of the Potomac and the Delaware with their living load, and as the emaciated forms staggered, or were carried, to the hospital or their homes, arose a long and bitter cry that they were not men who were given back, but living skeletons. All was forgotten in the sight of their sufferings but a desire for vengeance on those who had been the cause of them. They forgot that it was the policy, if not the act, of their own Grovernment which had consigned these unfortunates to their living tomb. They forgot, or perhaps they never knew of, the anxiety of the South to relieve themselves of a duty they could not properly fulfil. They had never heard of a deputation sent direct from An- dersonville to represent the misery of their plight, which was never granted audience of President Lincoln ; and it did not occur to them that it was natural, that after a time, embittered by the refusal of exchanges, the South should come to value the life of a Yankee prisoner at no higher price than was set upon it by his own Government; that 224 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. wearied and harassed under every sort of privation, pressed on all sides, and barely able to provide for their own soldiers, the South should forget for a time* the unfortunate prisoners, committed to the tender mercies and the safe-keeping of a Swiss gaoler. A fortunate thing for the South was the nationality of Wirz ; the accumulated vials of Northern wrath were poured upon his head, and they rejoiced to visit on an alien the sins of the Southern people. One word is necessary as to the state of the prisons in the North, which, if you were to believe some accounts, were little better than those of the Confederacy. Suffering there undoubtedly was ; the mortality was high at Chicago ; the supplies of food and clothing were not too abundant ; but I never could hear of an instance where there was not sufiScient to support life, and where shelter was not afforded. The Southern prisoners seem also to have kept good heart. They knew that they were not wholly without sympathy, even in an enemy's land. They were cheered by the smiles, which, when the back of the Provost Mar- shal and his satellites were turned, greeted their * The appointment towards the close of the war of Gen. Pillow, a beneficent and humane man, to superintend the prisons, must be remembered to the credit of the South. EETALUTION. 225 appearance in Baltimore, and even in New York ; and by the comforts with which their friends were permitted to alleviate their privations and the necessary tedium of confinement. Not so was it with the poor soldier boy from Maine or Minnesota, from Indiana or Illinois, when he, for the first time, made acquaintance with the South ; far otherwise than sunny would be his experience of it. No smile of sympathy or recognition cheered nis dismal prospect; but averted looks, and ominous scowls, and muttered curses, were the portion of the detested Yankees, and told him plainer than words the feeling of utter abhorrence with which he was regarded. ' We despised you before you fought us, we hate you now,' was the too general feeling during the war, and still, I fear, lies deep in the hearts of the women of the South. Can we wonder that the poor soldier, enduring at once the bitter hatred of his foes, and, what he felt still more, the cruel neglect of his own Grovernment, should lose heart, and fall a more easy victim to famine, to want, and disease ? To retaliation the North did not, as far as I could learn, condescend, except in a single in- stance, as I learnt from the lips of a sufferer who was confined with others in a pen exposed to the fire of the guns of Charleston batteries to avenge Q 226 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. the cause of some Federal officers kept in a bouse that was not safe (and what part of Charleston was?) from the missiles of the Northern guns. When, after forty days of this eligible situation, the pleasurable excitement might be supposed to have palled upon these victims, they were allowed the benefit of a voyage and change of air and diet, by their removal to Fort Pulaski, on the Savannah river, where they were daily regaled for six weeks on 10 ounces of condemned meal, with an occasional onion as an anti-scorbutic. But one-third of them on their return were able to walk from the ship to their prison. But enough of this sad story of sorrow and suffering, it is but one of the hecatombs which the god of war requires to be offered at His shrine — a mass of human flesh crushed before the cruel car of a worse than Juggernauth. The North are ready to forgive, but it would be too much to expect that the friends of the sufferers should hastily forget what has been endured. Many of them cannot trust themselves to speak on the subject, and who can 'wonder at it ? We must look to Time, which moves there with lightning speed, to bear the remembrance far away in his healing- bosom, or to the yet more powerful influence of Christian charity and brotherhood. 227 CHAPTEE XIII. EICHMOND TO NEW YOEK. THE JAMES EIVEE OBSTRUCTIONS DUTCH GAP GENERAL BUTLER IN A BOTTLE HAMPTON EDADS — THE ' MERRI- MAC ' AND ' MONITOR '^ THE ' (JEORGIANNA ' ^"FORTRESS MONROE ' MARYLAND, MY MARYLAND ' SOUTHERN FEELING ' THE CONQUERED BANNEE ' BALTIMOEE TRAIN TO NEW YORK. Next morning we were on board the steamer, ' City of Eichmond,' at six ; but the fog lay close and heavy upon the waters, and two hours elapsed before it lifted sufficiently to admit of a start. The atmosphere all day was thick and hazy, and the banks of the river were often shrouded in mist, so as to prevent our seeing fully the formid- able character of the obstructions which had barred the way of the Yankee gunboats. What we did see, however, was enough to take away our wonder that they should never have been overcome. The strongly-fortified earthworks at Drury's Bluff, and at all the commanding points along the coui-se of 228 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. the river's banks — the obstructions, still but par- tially removed, in the channel, and the frequent wrecks of the vessels which had attempted the passage, and paid forfeit for their temerity, bore an indubitable testimony to the severity of the struggle. The course of the river is most tortuous, and a point called Dutch Grap was selected by Greneral Butler for the cutting of a canal, some 300 yards in length, which if successful would have saved eight miles of the most perilous and obstructed navigation. Owing, however, to some error in the construction, the water refused to enter the canal sufficiently to allow of the passage of vessels, and the vast trench stands there, a conspicuous monument of misdirected energy. General Butler commanded in 1864 the army of the James, by which, had it been properly handled, Eichmond it is said, ought to have been taken without difficulty, at a time when every man of the Confederates who was available for its defence, was engaged with General Lee in con- testing the advance of the army of the Potomac. But while Butler hesitated the opportunity slipped away ; and Beauregard was enabled to bring up men from Carolina, and by their means to resume the offensive, to recover the ground that had been ^ .:W^:"'^^' ''' L I 1 TIN' ■llIK M r CD (iAPl'ANAL. J '05c "as. GENERAL BUTLEE. 229 lost, and to drive Butler and his army into en- trenchments between the forks of the James and the Appomattox rivers ; where they were in a position of great security, but 'as completely shut off from participating in any further operations against Eichmond as if they had been in a bottle strongly corked, and where it required but a small force of the enemy to hold them.' Such is the account given in General Grant's report of the command of the army of the James, the publication of which in December last, con- taining as it did, also, the account of the story of the powder-boat at Wilmington, made Butler the laughing-stock of the States, and was shortly after followed by his retirement from the army. The world perhaps has dealt a little hardh' by the General. His ability is undoubted*, and whatever may be the other charges brought against him for the use he made of his position at New Orleans, his treatment of the ladies there has been much misunderstood. Their conduct, it is ad- mitted, was such that he was compelled to take some means of putting a stop to it. He effected his pxirpose by an order which he felt sure he should never be obliged to enforce, and which, doubtless, proved a complete success. His admi- nistrative talents are certainly of a high order. 230 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. and good scope will be found for them in the command which has been entrusted to him of the militia of Massachusetts. The G-azebo, or Look-out, a scaffolding of great height, from which he used to command a view of vast extent over the surrounding country, was still standing at the time of our visit, but it has since been taken down and sold for firewood. Grant's complaint against him is, that he ' looked out,' but did nothing more. It was evening before we found ourselves in the comparatively open water of Hampton Eoads, where the tops of the masts of the ' Monitor,' standing just out of the water, told the tale of her conflict with the ' Merrimac,' which took place here. Now, however, the contest lay between two rival boats, which had come up from Norfolk to meet us, and were waiting with steam up, each anxious to have the honour of conveying us to Baltimore. The new boat seemed to have the general preference, but at the recommendation of a Southern gentleman, whose acquaintance we had made on board, we chose the old line, and transferred ourselves and our baggage to the ' Greorgianna,' a fine steamer, but the freshness of whose youth was past ; and she was very inferior, as we found afterwards, to the other in speed. MARYLAND. 231 Owing to the delays caused by the fog, it was not until night had set in that we touched at Fortress Monroe, and were prevented thereby from seeing more than the lights, and a blurred and dim outline of the prison where Jefferson Davis is confined. We settled in early for our last night in a ' state-room,' and so heard nothing of an accident to the boiler, which made us se- veral hours late, and prevented our reaching Bal- timore till ten next morning. No one, however, could regret the detention who surveyed the scene of surpassing loveliness presented to our eyes on that November morning, lit up as it was by the brilliant glow of the last hours of the Indian summer. "We steamed up the bay of the Chesapeake, between the fair shores of ' Maryland, my Maryland,' over laughing waters thickly dotted with the white sails of countless oyster-boats running down be- fore the fresh breeze, which just filled their snowy sails. An hour later and the presence of heavier craft, iron-clads and gunboats guarding the ap- proach, showed us to be nearing our destination ; and we are quickly moored alongside the quays of Baltimore. 232 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. And now we bid adieu to the South, for the State we are in, though Secesh to the backbone, has been prevented by her geographical position from taking any part in the war. The privation has been most deeply felt : nowhere else does such intense bitterness against the North prevail as among the fair daughters of Maryland. The cause they loved, ' not wisely, but too well,' has been lost, and they meanwhile were bound hand and foot, and unable to give it aught beside their prayers. No wonder that they resent it, when nothing is left, to them but to accept their fate ; as they weep in sUence over the fall of the Confederacy, or send such succour as they can to their friends who have had the happiness to be in the front of the fray, but on whom has fallen the burden and desolation of war. The song of ' Maryland ' is hushed and silent, and in its stead they chant only the mournful lament of ' The Conquered Banner.' Furl that banner — for 'tiB weary — ■ Round its stafif, 'tis drooping dreary Furl it, fold it : it is best. For there 's not a man to wave it, And there 's not a sword to save it, ' THE CONQUERED EAIWER.' 233 And there 's not one left to lave it In the blood which heroes gave it : And its foes now scorn and brave it, Furl it — bide it : it is best. Take that banner down, 'tis tatter'd, Broken is its staff and shatter'd. And the valiant hosts are scatter'd, O'er whom it floated high. Oh ! 'tis hard for us to fold it, Hard to think there 's none to hold it. Hard that those who once nnroll'd it Now must fold it with a sigh. Furl that banner, furl it sadly, Once ten thousands hailed it gladly. And ten thousands wildly, madly, Swore it should for ever wave : Swore that foeman's sword should never Hearts entwined like theirs dissever, Till that flag should float for ever O'er their freedom or their grave. Furl it, for the hands that grasped it And the hearts that fondly clasped it. Cold and dead are lying now. And that banner it is trailing, While around it sounds the wailing Of its people in their, woe. For though conquered they adore it ; Low the cold, dead hands that bore it ; Weep for those who fell before it. Pardon those who trailed and tore it ; But, oh, wildly they deplore it. Men who furl and fold it so. 234 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. Furl that banner. True, 'tis gory, Yet 'tis wreathed around with glory, And 'twill live in song and story, Though its folds are in the dust. For its fame or brightest pages, Penned by poets and by sages. Shall go sounding down the ages. Furl its folds though now we must. Furl that banner, softly, slowly. Treat it gently, it is holy. For it droops above the dead. Touch it not, unfold it never. Let it droop there, furled for ever. For its people's hopes are dead.' Baltimore, howeYer, with all its charrfis, was not able to detain us, and within three hours of the landing from the steamer we were whirling away in the cars to New York, at a pace which seemed something terrific and 'frightfal to our nerves, so long accustomed to the fifteen miles an hour of Soutliern railways. There was no longer now any fear of starvation. One of the cars was fitted up with a counter, behind which there stood a da;rkey, doing a brisk business as a restaurateur, and ready to supply you anything, from mutton- chops and poached eggs to that glutinous com- pound called ice-cream candy. Another novelty awaited lis at Gunpowder Creek, for a gigantic steam-ferry was in readiness to receive the whole THE BREVOORT HOUSE. 235 train, which was safely carried over an arm of the sea a full mile in width. At Philadelphia the arrangements were most unsatisfactory. We were turned out of the train, and had to perform in the dark, and in a crowded street-car, a most uncom- fortable trajet of six miles from one terminus to another. At last however, the express man comes to inquire the destination of our baggage at the end of the journey, and no sooner does the train stop than we rush out into another huge ferry, which carries us across North Eiver from Jersey City to New York. We clamber up into one of the lumbering coaches ; and after a rattle on the uneven pavements, and calling, as it seemed, at every other hotel in the city, we find ourselves, our troubles all over, housed comfort- ably in the Brevoort House, one of the best hotels in the world, and rejoicing in the receipt of a budget from home with five weeks' news, which was waiting here for our arrival. 236 CHAPTEE XIV. NEW YORK AND BOSTON GENERAL GRANT'S RECEPTION — H. WARD BEECHER OUT IN THE RAIN CHARACTER OF HIS SERMONS DEXTER CITY POLITICS GUY FAWKES' DAT IN NEW YORK THE QUAKER CITY THE CHRISTIAN COMMISSION. It would be foreign to the purpose of this sketch and an uncalled-for tax upon the patience of one's readers to attempt to inflict upon them a descrip- tion of New York. The splendour of the Fifth Avenue, and the hotel that bears its name — the crowd that throngs the side-walks of Broadway — the extortion of the hack drivers— the comfort of the street cars — the curious stages, through a hole in whose roof you hand your fare up to the driver — the dinners at Delmonico's — the showy stores, and the enormous hotels, are familiar to us in the pages of Trollope, Dickens, and Sala. For myself, I must own, I was not taken with New York, and regretted the comparative quiet and the friendly hospitality of Boston. Many Englishmen, I be- KEW YORK AND BOSTON. 237 lieve, would agree with me in this opinion ; some- thing however, might in our case be attributable to peculiar circumstances, as also to the fact that we landed at Boston, and saw it, therefore, in the fresh- ness of an earlier stage of our journey, while New York was reached when the ardour of a first love was passed, and when we were beginning after tra- velling hard for ten weeks to look wistfully home- ward, and to dwell with pleasure on the thought of the berth we had secured in the good steamship ' Scotia.' Not that anything could have been kinder than the reception that we met with. Here, as everywhere else in the States and Canada, our letters of introduction secured us at once a hearty welcome, and the most cordial offers of hospitality ; one and all seemed most anxious to do everything in their power, and no trouble was spared to put us in the way of seeing everything in the country to the very best advantage. I can only, therefore, confess my inability to say what there was in New York, or what there was not, which throws some little shadow over the recollection of our stay there, and which makes it compare imfavourably with Boston ; unless the surmise is a correct one, that the tone that prevails in the latter place approaches much more nearly to that of the society to which we are accustomed in England ; and if this idea be 238 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. borne out by the facts •(as to which my stay was not long enough to enable me to decide) it would go too far to account for the general preference. We found on our arrival in New York that the whole city was gone wild about General Grant, who was making a short stay at the Metropolitan Hotel. His every movement was chronicled, his every hour mapped out and forestalled in the sen- sational columns of the daily press. On Sunday be did escape his tormentors, and got quietly into the country, while all the city streamed over to Brooklyn expecting to find him at Ward Beecher's church. Next day however he had to face them. A committee of enthusiastic admirers had or- ganised for him an evening reception at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, for which two thousand tickets had been issued, which were all so eagerly caught up, that our chance of obtaining admission seemed for some time hopeless, till at last we were obliged by some member of the committee, who, having got the credit of subscribing handsomely, thought he would try and see the colour of some of his money again, and let us have some tickets at ten dollars each. Such a crush I never saw. The ' party of progress ' was hopelessly at a discount, and all THE general's EECEPTION. 239 were tightly jammed together in a corridor, where, indeed to no purpose, did ' Those behind cry " Forward," And those before cried " Back." ' The ladies especially had a very bad time of it, and cruelly must their dresses have suffered. At last there was a move, owing partly to people passing on, and partly to the exertions of a knot of officers, who put their shoulders to the crowd and forced their way regardless of consequences. We found ourselves at length in the presence of the hero, and received a shake from his hand, warmed by this time by the grasp of the hundreds who had thronged to see him, claiming each of them the right of a separate salutation. Naturally of a retiring disposition he seemed almost over- come under the frightful ordeal. The perspiration stood thick upon his brow, and, I have no doubt, he would sooner face a second time the fiery storm that poured from the heights of Mission Eidge, than the oppressive enthusiasm of his admirers in New York. Mrs. Grant was there to help him, but a slight defect of vision made it difficult for us to catch the exact moment at which to bow. ' Tell the General what you have been saying about him in your prayers night and morning for 240 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. SQ long,' said Paterfamilias, who had brought his young hopeful with him to receive a blessing at the hands of the great man ; but the interesting revelation never reached the ears of him for whom it was intended. ' Come move on, sir,' said the inexorable M. C. ' We 've no time for that sort of thing.' At last we emerged into freedom, and found comparative facility of motion in a large hall where refreshments, oysters, and ices, were pro- vided ; while a favoured few were invited to meet the General in another room, where the company was select enough to admit of speaking and toasts. The last straw it is that breaks the camel's back, so this last infliction must almost have made an end of poor Grant, who has a mortal aversion to this kind of thing, and never consents to yield to the popular demand of a speech. Among other celebrities we were introduced to the Eev. H. Ward Beecher, at whose invitation we attended a few days later a large meeting in the Music Hall at Brooklyn, held in aid of a society for the relief of the distress so fearfully prevalent in the South. We were glad of the op- portunity of hearing so great an orator, and it was satisfactory to find one who had strongly supported the cause of the North showing no signs of bitter- ness now that the war is over, nor any inclination OUT IN THE RAIN, 241 to trample upon a fallen enemy. Ward Beecher's speech was a powerful one, and after appealing eloquently for the aid that was so much needed, he drew a humorous picture of an incident in his early boyhood, of which he was reminded by the present situation of the South. He never was fond, he told us, of learning by heart, and one day it occurred to him to try and escape some cate- chising in church that was imminent, by pretending that he was in a trance. His parents, however, were equal to the occasion, and he was gently forced out of doors and left standing in the open air — where the rain was falling thick and fast. He began presently to feel a trifle uneasy — par- ticularly when sounds reached his ears which he almost fancied were those of suppressed laughter, and he at last opened the corner of an eye, saw what amusement he was creating, became tho- roughly ashamed of himself, and slunk back as soon as possible to church. ' So it will be,' he said, ' with the South ; they are out in the rain now, but they will soon be tired of standing there ; they will soon open one eye we shall see, and they will only be too glad to come back with all their hearts into the Union.' Dr. Bellows, President of the Sani- tary Commission, followed much in the same tone ; and our old friend General Fisk concluded an E 242 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. eloquent and affecting speech, in which he had described the destitution and ignorance of the un- happy country, and the brighter prospects . of the coloured race, with an appeal ' Let us go down to them with food, with Bibles and spelling-books in our hands, and, more than all, with hearts full of love.' I did not hear Beecher in the pulpit. S , who went to his church on the Sunday following, liked a good deal of the sermon, in which, how- ever, there was much to shock English notions of the solemnity to be observed in the House of Grod. Some told us it was as good as going to the play to hear him. Politics too, are said to occupy a very prominent place in his sermons, as they do in so large a number of American pulpits. I cannot say whether all his, sentiments are equally racily expressed with the one contained in the fol- lomng extract from a sermon he preached during our stay at Washington, on the 7th of December, the day appointed for the national thanksgiving, while the Mexican questions and the ' Alabama ' were occupying a prominent place in the minds of the public : — ' France,' he said, if the reporters did him justice, 'France was meaner than Eng- land ; with sneaking ingenuity she took advantage of our misfortunes to creep in at the back-door TWO-FORTY. 243 of our necessities, and establish her rag with a vulture upon it in the heart of a neighbouring republic.' But it is hardly perhaps, fair to give an iso- lated extract like this, without at least adverting to a sermon breathing the truest spirit of Christian charity, delivered by the same preacher on the oc- casion of the Fenian invasion of Canada. A visit which we paid to another New York celebrity must not be passed over in silence. Trotting-matches are in great vogue in America, being almost the only form in which the people patronise racing. The pace of all famous horses is known almost to a second, and the price, of course, varies accordingly. To be fast, a horse must be at least- able to do a mile in 2 min. 40 sec* ' Flora Temple ' and ' General Butler ' have till lately been unsurpassed, but this year there came upon the course a new competitor, called ' Dexter,' who accomplished in the autumn the feat, hitherto unparalleled, of trotting a mile in 2 min. 18i sec. He had been heavily backed to do it under 2 min. 19 sec, and won accordingly by something less than a second. 'Jhenceforward he divided with Grant the admiration and affection of New York. o When a lady is inclined to go ahead she is spoken of sometimes as ' a two-forty.' 244 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. When we saw the horse the season was over, and he was running in a paddock with his shoes off. His appearance was rather disappointing. He is a brownish bay gelding, standing about 15.1, with four white feet. The shoulder however was un- deniable, and his sloping quarters showed signs of great strength. He is eight years old, and they hope this season he will make still better trotting, as the horses are not supposed to be at their best till they are ten or twelve. ' Flora Temple ' is, I believe, twenty-four. The municipal elections take place at New York in November, and city politics were running very high during our stay. The Democrats, who are able to reckon upon the Irish vote, have al- ways the majority ; but the Paddies are fond of a quarrel, and there seemed to be great probability of the Republicans carrying their candidate for the mayoralty, as the opposing party was split up into three sections. I attended a mass meeting, held in an enormous building called Cooper's In- stitute, and occupied on successive nights by the different factions. Here the notorious Fernando Wood was the chief speaker op behalf of one of the Democratic candidates, whose cause he was said to have taken up with a view of splitting the party which had declined to give him their nomi- GUY FAWKES' DAY. 245 nation. His opponents he denounced in no mea- sured terms, describing them as ' men who have never earned a dollar honestly in their lives — men who have not the sense or the capacity to earn a dollar.' The candidate himself played a very second fiddle, and cut a poor figure indeed, as he mildly read a most feeble speech. I under- stood him however to promise that he would keep off the cholera, and reduce the city taxes from 17 dollars to 2 dollars a-head. It is unfor- tunate, doubtless, for the city that these advan- tages will not be hers, the day of election finding the poor man at the bottom of the poll. One other incident and I have done with New York. They celebrate their Gruy Fawkes on the 30th of November — the never-to-be-forgotten anniversary of the evacuation of the city by the British. So glorious an association was not lightly to be passed over : all day long the streets were full of the train-bands and city militia, proud to show off their uniforms and snub the poor British Lion, without incurring any risk by their amuse- ment. The Fenia-n flag seemed that day more ver- dant than ever — more anxious to flaunt proudly under the influence of a stiff breeze ; so that al- together, we ought to have felt ourselves very 246 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. small, and have hidden our diminished heads : but the British Lion takes a good deal to put him down, and we managed, somehow or other, to survive the occasion. y' The evening train on the 30th of November \ took us to Philadelphia; and the two or three days spent among the various interests afforded by the Quaker City, will always command a most pleasing recollection. Not that there was much of novelty which might demand more than a passing notice in these pages. The Hall of Inde- pendence ; the Penitentiary, said by the Americans to be the only place where the principle of solitary confinement has been successfully carried out ; the Grirard College, within whose walls, by the will of the founder, no ecclesiastic is under any pretence allowed to set foot ; have been too often described to require any comment here. But the Christian Commission, whose head-quarters, under the presidency of Mr. George H. Stuart, were fixed in this city, ought not to be passed over by any one who would write in relation to the war, or attempt to give an idea of the wonderful power of organization which seems to be a part of the American character, as well as of the spirit by which, in cases such as these, their labours are inspired. THE CHRISTIAN COMMISSION. 247 To be brief then, the Christian Commission collected money and goods to the extent of nearly a million sterling, and occupied itself in the dis- tribution of relief, both spiritual and temporal, in the field and in the camp, in the hut and the hospital, to all alike who might stand in need of its ministrations. A voluntary system of un- paid labour, cheerfully undertaken by men who stood forward out of all classes and ranks, was the peculiar and novel characteristic of this gteat institution. These delegates, to the number in all of 4803, cheerfully responded to the call for help, and devoted themselves, for periods of two months and upwards, to the prosecution of this splendid work of Christian charity. Gentlemen of the learned professions, preachers in city pul- pits, men of business and pleasure, were found willing to leave the quiet of their study, or the work of the law-courts and the Exchange, and to devote their holidays to the seeking not rest in- deed, but change of scene and life among the wounded and the dying, amidst pain and privation. ' Do you see that man ? ' it was said to a visitor to the army, as a delegate passed by, with the sleeves of his blood-stained shirt tucked up and a pail of gruel or coffee in each hand. ' That is Mr ,' mentioning the name of a well-known divine. 248 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAB. ' I have never before seen him following so closely in his Master's footsteps,' was the appropriate response. But it is impossible within our present limits, to follow out and do justice to the story of the Christian Commission. The wounds that it has bound up, the stores supplied, the letters written, and the aching hearts it has comforted, can never adequately be made known ;* but one of the prin- ciples on which the society's work has been orga- nised, and up to which they have endeavoured to act, seems to give so clear an insight into their ob- ject and aims that I cannot forbear transcribing the instructions given under the head of ' Personal distribution with personal ministrations:' — ' Stores should be given always, if possible, direct to the delegate from the soldier, and always adding such personal service to the value of the gift as may be needed. Is the gift a shirt, drawers, and socks for the soldier, wounded or sick ? wash him first, and then put them on. Is it a bed ? make it up in order, and tenderly place him in it., * If the reader cares to know more on this subject he will find in Appendix (B), some of the more touching incidents known in connexion with it, as also a most in- teresting letter from a lady who was working on behalf of the elder sister of this society, the Sanitary Commission. PERSONAL MINISTRATION. 249 Is it only a blanket ? wrap Mm in it. Is it some delicacy for the sick, or coffee or soup for the worn or the wounded, or a meal for the hungry wayfarer? prepare it nicely and serve it. The reward will come when in heaven the table shall be spread, and the King of kings shall come forth and serve you. ' Enhance the value of both gifts and services by kind words to the soldier as a man, not as a machine : as a man beloved for his heroic devotion to the Union, not despised as mere hireling food for powder and shot. Set his heart all aglow with thoughts of the loving ones at home, who send the gifts and send the delegates to give them, and who wait for tidings, and pray for the soldiers, and long for the time when, the war ended, peace restored, the Union saved, liberty achieved, re- publican government rescued and guaranteed, the soldiers shall be welcomed back again, and the unsullied, coming forth like pure gold from the crucible, shall be loved and trusted as long as they live, and honoured long after they are dead, as the heroes who helped to save the nation. ' Then, when good gifts and kind words and deeds have made their impress, the soldier ex- claims, "Well, this is religion!" and says, " Tell me all about it, how I can become a real 250 THE SOUTH AFTEE THE WAE. Christian : " then tell him of Jesus, His love, His sacrifice for sin, His power to save. His abundant grace, His readiness to pardon. His perfect right- eousness, all, all the sinner's own by simple faith, and induce him to accept of the unspeakable gift, and let the news of a sinner saved ascend on angel wing to give new joy in the presence of God above, and let it go home to fill the waiting, longing hearts of loving ones with glad surprise, and there also awaken the inquiry for the way of life, and bring others to repentance. ' Then go stand in the chapel-tent, with its red, white, and blue flag afloat above it, inscribed, " U. S. Christun Commission Chapel," crowded inside and around by men who have learned to reverence religion from such fruits, and there proclaim the gospel of peace to these men of war ; preach Jesus and eternal life to these bronzed, battle-scarred heroes of many hairbreadth escapes, who know that there is but a step between them and death, and, oh, how they listen ! How their breasts heave, and tears course their cheeks ! ' 251 CHAPTEE XV. WASHINGTON NOTICES AT WILLAEd's A MOTLEY CROWD MEETING OF CONGRESS — THE GALLERIES CHOOSING PLACES ELECTION OF THE CHAPLAIN THE PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE. One more night in the sleeping cars from Philadel- phia, and we are landed at Washington just before daybreak on a drizzly December morning. Half- an-hour's ride from the station ovei rutty roads in a jolting omnibus brings us to Willard's Hotel, notorious for the motley crowd that congregates within its walls. Few members of Congress bring their families to Washington ; the distances are too great in most cases, and the expenses of living too high to allow of their coming there. So Wil- lard's is crammed during the Session. Graunt- looking men from the woods of Oregon and the gold-diggings of CaHfomia, free-traders from the Western States, and New England protectionists — Democrats of New York, and Eadicals from Mas- sachusetts, jostle against each other in the long corridors, and liquor up in the crowded bar. Then there are placemen and would-be placemen. 252 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. postmasters in expectancy, and Custom-house agents, and officers whose services in the late war have not been sufficiently appreciated, and who may be heard declaiming against an ungrateful country. Speculators lastly, and vendors of pa- tents, ready to entrap the unwary on any or no conceivable pretext, helped to make up a con- gregation of a character, that notices such as the following posted about in conspicuous places in the corridors and on the staircases excite little or no wonder: — Notice to Thieves. Every thief seen about the house will be shown up to all the guests by the detectives em- ployed by the proprietors, and then locked up in prison for further hearing. Sykes, Chadwick & Co., Proprietors, Willard's Hotel. ^25 reward. having during the last six months lost from the halls and passages of the hotel several pairs of boots, we now offer the above reward, twenty-five dollars, to any one catching the said thief, SYKES & CO. GENTLEMEN WITHOUT BAGGAGE. 253 The usual anouncement that 'Grentlemen without baggage are required to pay in advance,' not wanting ; but this is not peculiar to Washing- ton, but is to be seen in the first hotels of Phila- delphia and Chicago. It is the fashion to abuse Willard's, but we came away with an undiminished stock of shoe leather, and having found the rooms clean, the table and attendance good. Bedrooms in Ameri- can hotels, although they are apt to be a long way up, certainly do deserve a word of praise, as they compare very favourably with the accommodation generally afforded in this respect in England. The furniture in them is good and simple, and neat French bedsteads and clean linen are the rule, except in a few out-of-the-way places in the West and South, where a close inspection is often required, unless a man is prepared to abandon his insular notions on the subject. The meeting of Congress is always fixed for the first Monday in December. The first day or two is generally taken up in organising, as the term is — forming committees, I suppose, and swearing in the members, and until that is done, the Presi- dent's message remains unread. The preliminary business however, had made good progress when we got to Washington on the Tuesday, and the 254 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. galleries of the House of Eepresentatives, which run along three sides of the building and accom- modate a great number of people, began to fill soon after 10 A.M., in expectation of the message. Strangers who occupy these galleries are brought into much greater prominence than they are in our House of Commons, and their position is more like that of those members of the House who sit in the galleries upstairs; and further, as there are no officious door-keepers to repress the smallest signs, whether of interest or of inattention, no obstacle is .opposed to the free vent of expressions of sympathy. The gallery in which we took our seats, we found after a time to be that set apart for the ladies, who are not, as they are with us, caged birds. They seemed, however, to have little objection to our presence, and we stayed with them until we moved by invitation into the places set apart for the diplomatic body, very few of whom seemed to think the occasion sufficiently important to justify their attendance. Hour after hour passed away and still no message ; but as we were permitted to read and write, time did not hang very heavy on our hands, and the less so as there were occasional diversions going on below. First, there was the process of drawing lots for the mem- CHOOSING A CHAPLAIN. 255 bers' places, which was done by a boy blindfold, who drew the names one after another out of a basket, or hat. As each was drawn in succession the member advances from out the crowd, which stands at the lower end of the house, and makes his selection of a seat, which then is secured to him throughout the session. Each one has a separate arm-chair and writ- ing-table, with every appearance of comfort about them ; but they do not sit on different sides of the house according to party, but just where fancy leads them. The process of drawing being at length over, and the seats all filled, with the exception of those which ought to be occupied by the excluded mem- bers from the Southern States, the house proceeded to elect a chaplain. To our amusement and sur- prise member after member rises from his chair, and in succession, proposes each some fresh candidate, expatiating always upon his political tendencies, his sound loyalty, his devotion to the Union, his services possibly during the war, omitting only to mention the creed or sect to which he be- longs. At last the list is exhausted, the vote is taken, and one happy man is preferred over seven- teen other competitors for the post. His name History knows not ; but his duties were well per- 256 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. formed by preaching in the same week a sermon in the House, on Thanksgiving day. When patience was' all but exhausted, at length the message came. It was clearly read by the clerk of the house, and was interrupted but little by applause. Each member was supplied with a printed copy, in which they followed diligently the reading. Never had the authoritative declaration of a President's policy been more anxiously expected. Andrew Johnson had been eight months in office, but the circumstances under which he became the chief magistrate of the American Eepublic had been strange and unusual, and no opportunity had been given him of making a general exposition of the views he held on many of the most important sub- jects. He had made indeed, two or three speeches; but it seemed hard to believe that they could have proceeded from the same man, so different were they in tone and character. All the summer and autumn he had been carrying on his plan of re- construction, secure from the interference of Con- gress ; but that time was p9.st and gone, and as the elected ruler of a great nation he had to take the people into his confidence, to account to them for the use he had made of the power entrusted to them, and to declare the principles which should guide his future conduct. Other questions too. BREAIiERS AHEAD. 257 Scarcely second in importance to that of the re- storation of the Union, were pressing for a settle- ment. The ' everlasting nigger ' was going to be a trouble. What status should be given to the freedman ? Affairs abroad were looking dark. The American people were becoming very jealous of the continuance in Mexico of the French bayonets sent to protect Maximilian on the throne. The Monroe doctrine and its enforcement was in the mouths of the people. More serious still, to us at any rate, was the question of the ' Alabama,' which was rankling deep in the minds of men, and which was discussed with a calmness said to be one of the worst signs of coming trouble. These subjects, and they were no ordinary ones, the message had to grapple with ; and one after another, in a paper of great force and ability, they were handled pretty much in the order in which I have adverted to them. The perpetual obligation of the Federal Union, the right or wrong of Secession, are questions about which it is not easy to keep up one's interest in face of the fact that the Union still exists, and that the ordinances of Secession have been declared null and void by the States themselves which passed them. The views held by the President about the freedman have been dwelt upon already; andatlpst turning 258 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. to foreign affairs we hear, after a preliminary flourish, that very satisfactory relations have been established with the Emperor of China ! What a bathos ! Next the message tells us that a line of steamers to South America has been started — a little more palaver about neutrality, and then there follows, — ' Our domestic contest, now happily ended, has left some traces in our relations with one, at least, of the great maritime powers. The formal accordance of belligerent rights to the insurgent States was unprecedented, and has not been justi- fied by the issue. But in the systems of neutrality pursued by the powers which made that conces- sion there was a marked difference. The materials of war for the insurgent States were furnished in a great measure from the workshops of Great Britain ; and British ships, manned by British subjects, and prepared for receiving British ar- • maments, sailed from the ports of Great Britain to make war on American commerce, under the slielter of a commission from the insurgent States. These ships, having once escaped from British ports, ever afterward entered them in every part of the world to refit, and so to renew their depre- dations. The consequences of this conduct were most disastrous to the States then in rebellion. THE president's MESSAGE. 259 increasing their desolation and misery by the pro- longation of our civil contest. It had, moreover, the effect, to a great extent, of driving the Ame- rican flag from the sea, and to transfer much of our shipping and our commerce to the very power whose subjects had created the necessity for such a change. These events took place before I was called to the administration of the Grovernment. The sincere desire for peace by which I am ani- mated led me to approve the proposal, already made, to submit the questions which had thus arisen between the countries. to arbitration. These questions are of such moment that they must have commanded the attention of the great powers, and are so interwoven with the peace and interests of every one of them as to have insured an impartial decision. I regret to inform you that Great Bri- tain declined the arbitrament ; but, on the other hand, invited us to the formation of a joint com- mission to settle mutual claims between the two countries, from which those for the depredations before mentioned should be excluded. The pro- position, in that very unsatisfactory form, has been declined. ' The United States did not present the sub- ject as an impeachment of the good faith of a power which was professing the most friendly dis- 260 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. positions, but as involving questions of public law of which the settlement is essential to the peace of nations; and though pecuniary reparation to their injured citizens would have followed inci- dentally on a decision against Grreat Britain, such compensation was not their primary object. They had a higher motive, and it was in the interests of peace and justice to establish important prin- ciples of international law. The correspondence will be placed before you. The ground on which the British Minister rests his justification is, sub- stantially, that the municipal law of a nation and the domestic interpretations of that law are the measure of its duty as a neutral ; and I feel bound to declare my opinion, before you and before the world, that that justification cannot be sustained before the tribunal of nations. At the same time I do not' advise to any present attempt at redress by acts of legislation. For the future, friendship between the two countries must rest on the basis of mutual justice.' ^ The message was delivered, and we came away from the Capitol with an assured belief that its tone was a peaceful one, that the sound good sense of the American people would outlast the bluster of the newspapers and the buncombe talked in the bars ; and that, in spite of the efforts A PEACEFUL ENDING. 261 of unscrupulous agitators and disappointed poli- ticians, seeking in their own interest to stir up animosity against England, the Grovernment of the United States would shrink from the suicidal folly and wickedness of a war, to be fought, I will not say for an idea, nor yet for a few million dol- lars, but on account of the assumed obligation of a disputed point of international law. 262 CHAPTEE XVI. THE FEELING OP AMERICA TOWARDS ENGLAND OUR IMPAR- TIALITY WANT OF SYMPATHY A SECOND WAR OP INDE- PENDENCE OLD SCORES THE BALANCE OF POWER GALLANT DEFENCE OF THE SOUTH CONDUCT OF THE WAR THE COLLAPSE — REVULSION OP PEELING NEWS OF ASSASSINATION OP LINCOLN HOW IT AFFECTED US QUESTION OF THE 'ALABAMA' HAPPIER TIMES MEETING HALF-WAY: — A CLOSER BOND AN ASSURED POSITION GIVES HOPES FOR THE FUTURE CHANGE IN CONDUCT OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS AT WASHINGTON DIS- TURBING CIRCUMSTANCES A HARD MASTER AMERICAN NEUTRALITY DURING THE FENIAN INVASION. It would be idle, in the face of all that has been said and done during the last four years, to at- tempt to disguise the fact that, whether justly or not, the people of the North have taken deep umbrage at the conduct of this country and the tone she assumed during the war ; notwithstanding it may be possibly even on account of the un- bending fairness with which we claim to have acted. Impartial certainly, we do deem ourselves to have been ; and in the fact that England has OUR IMPAHTIALITY. 263 been accused by either party in turn of favouring the other, we have been accustomed to see the strongest vindication of the consistency of our conduct. If on one side the concession — somewhat has- tily as it is alleged — of belligerent rights to the South ; the escape from our shores of the ' Ala- bama;' the demands we felt ourselves bound to make at the time of the ' Trent ' affair, have been laid to our charge as showing our undue predi- lection for the Confederacy, what shall be said of the arms we so lavishly supplied to the Federal Grovernment? of the embargo, laid in excess of our legal powers, upon the notorious steam-rams ? of an act which reduced us to a position so un- tenable that we were glad, by the purchase of them for ourselves, to escape from the horns of a most awkward dilemma ? These surely, are no sKght evidences in our favour, if breaches of neutrality, or even charges of the non-observance of a strict line of impartial conduct, are brought against us; and there are not many sensible men in America who really believe that we could have acted, I will not say spoken, otherwise than we did, and who would not now admit that our conduct is capable of a good defence. Yet we are no nearer popularity. 264 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. and a bitter feeling against us as a nation un- doubtedly prevails — a bitterness which it may be difficult at first sight to account for, or even to believe in, but the existence nevertheless of which dannot be ignored, but should rather, if possible, be removed and eradicated by us, if it lies in our power to do so, by the Americans, if it can be shown that they have judged us unfairly and condemned us without a hearing. Now in attempting this, the first step will naturally be to discover, if we can, the sources whence this feeling, or this misapprehension of each other springs ; and from an English point of view it would not I think, be unfair to say, that America is extremely jealous of the opinion and anxious for the approval of this country, and that she entered upon the war, believing herself to have every claim upon our sympathy, as well as good reason to expect a^ strong moral support from us, in a contest waged with the slave-holding interest of the South. She would have had us believe, in face of President Lincoln's assertion to the contrary, that the North was fighting to put down slavery. ' You have long taunted us,' she said, ' with the presence of this blot upon our escutcheon, and now that we are seeking to remove it you refuse us your countenance.' ' We looked across the ENGLISH SYMPATHY. 265 water,' said a Boston paper, commenting upon the surprise felt in England when made aware of the existence of this feeling, — ' We looked across the water while we were fighting for our national existence, and found our English brethren talking exactly like the traitors who were assaulting us, using, the same arguments, adopting the same misrepresentations, bandying the same sneers. What could we do but extend to them the same feeling that we had for our assailants ; we were thankful for their neutrality, but did not attri- bute it to a wish for our welfare, for we felt that if sides were to be taken, the South, and not the North, would have the benefit of their aid.' Now with regard to slavery I have already endeavoured to explain, that it was in reality of the essence and the issue of the war, although the North did not knowingly take up arms to put an end to it. Is it then fair for the North to take England to task for not being able to discern the true state of things, and for discrediting a feeling which had been so entirely repudiated by their own chief magistrate ? But that apart from the question of slavery, there undoubtedly was a great want of sympathy with the cause of the North amongst our educated classes at home, no candid Englishman will care to 266 THE SOUTH APTEE THE WAE. deny. The lower orders were sound, so Mr. Bright tells us, and the assertion is as easy to make as it is hard to disprove, and we must be content to let it rest. They certainly did not demand war to re-open the mills of Lancashire ; but the orderly behaviour, and the absence of agitation among the working classes, are the only facts from which their sympathy with the Federal cause can be said to be deduced, and these may have been due to other causes. And even if we make the admission, that the commencement of the war did find a considerable portion of the country in sympathy with the cause of Secession, is the lact one to surprise us, when we remember what human nature is ? or is it of a character to furnish the people of the North with a rightful cause of complaint against us ? Things happened pretty much in this manner. The news of the war came over here, and we re- ceived it with a provoking coolness, saying to our- selves, ' This is only the war of Independence over again, and the Americans, who were so ready to separate from us, and have always shown them- selves so eager to sanction the right of revolution and of resistance to constituted authority, are now feeling the effect of such a state of things them- selves. They succeeded in their rebellion against OLD SCORES. 267 US, and there is no reason why the same process should not be repeated by the South, who complain that they are ill-represented, misgoverned, and oppressed.' Then too, we could not help thinking that the United States had become too great and unwieldy — they talked too big. We were tired of hearing continually of the intended annexation of Canada, and of the kind sufferance by which we ourselves were permitted to exist. Nor did we find it easy to forget the sharp practice about the Ash- burton treaty ; the threatened revival of the dis- pute about the island of St. Juan, at a time when our hands were full ; and the sympathy openly shown to Eussia during the Crimean War. The praises too, which had been heaped so freely upon American institutions, to the very unfair dis- paragement of our own, had made their democratic government obnoxious in our eyes, and we could not help asking if Secession and Civil War were among the blessings we had been taught to look for in its train. There was no real feeling of ill-will towards America, but, on the contrary, a hearty sense at bottom of good fellowship with them, and a desire to see them great and prosperous. But we thought that they had been giving themselves airs, that a continued flow of success had made them some- 268 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. what over-bumptious, and in need of a little taking down — and so it was that we saw, almost with a feeling of relief, what seemed to be the collapse of the Great American Eepublic. * We shall be left in quiet now,' was the feeling, ' and shall no more be annoyed by continual outbursts of buncombe ; and even should they succeed in putting down Secession, they will at all events have gained the knowledge that Eebels are not always right* If however, as seems more likely, the result of the war be the formation upon the North American continent of two independent republics in the place of one, each will then act as a useful check upon the other, and a balance of power will be created which cannot but have a most tranquil- lising and beneficial effect upon our transatlantic relations.' Then there came in, I must confess, to some considerable degree, the question of our interests ; for the prospects of free trade and an open market in the South for our manufactures, was an inviting one, and almost tempted us to forget our abhor- rence of slavery and our allegiance to the cause of Emancipation. So matters stood when the first shot was fired and the contest began in earnest, while we stood watching, anxious — but to the best of our power THE WEAKER SIDE. 269 and belief — impaxtial spectators. "We had no desire to interfere, we would not recognise the Confederacy, and declined the overtures of France in that direction, but our sympathies could not fail to be increasingly enlisted by the gallant efforts of the South in her defence. We watched her un- flinching determination, her unwearied zeal in the unequal conflict, and we began to believe in her ultimate success. Mr. Grladstone but re-echoed the sentiment prevailing in the minds ,of the people, when he declared that ' the South had made itself a nation,' and heroism and devotion like theirs were felt to deserve a triumph. The mode too, of the conduct of the war by the North, tended also to alienate our sympathies from them. Their unlimited braggadocio — the continued assurance which persisted in treating the struggle as an affair of ' ninety days ' — the tardy surrender of the envoys taken from under the pro- tection of our flag — the alleged filling up of the entrance of the harbour at Charleston — the un- willingness of the people to pay taxes — the un- limited issue of paper money — their hatred of the conscription — the enormous expenditure and the disproportionate results, all tended to detach us more and more from the Union party and to enlist our sympathies on the weaker side. 270 THE SOtTTH AFTEE THE WAR. At last however, came the crash and the collapse when the South could struggle no longer, and the superior resources of the North had won the day ; and the only marvel was that the jSght had lasted so long, and that the few thousands of the Confederate army should have been able to keep at bay near a million of men. But the con- test was over, the cause of the Union was victorious, and we began to suspect that we had been some- what misled, and perhaps had judged hardly of the North ; and that, with all our boasted impartiality, our cool unconcern, we had, in the view we had taken of the war, been clearly and undoubtedly wrong: wrong, not however in according the tribute of our admiration to the gallant defence made by the people of the South, but in not looking beyond and over the deficiencies and merits of either side, to the broader issues and the mightier results which were involved in the event of this tremendous struggle; — wrong too, or per- haps barely just, in not giving to the people of the North the credit for the flame of pure and manly patriotism, for that love of the Union and the flag which burned so brightly in the honest and manly heart of Abraham Lincoln, and in those who like him were actuated by one idea, the wish, almost at any price, to preserve their darling country. PRESIDENT LINCOLN. 271 For this end — and herein lies their chiefest praise — these men were willing to make every possible concession, yet when concession was use- less, they still kept steadily the goal in view, and working onwards to the subjugation of the South, they advanced with certainty to a consummation scarcely less desired by them ; to the period, namely, when the national banner should no longer bear upon its folds the stain of slavery. It was not indeed, until the news of the death of the President reached us that we realised how great had been his worth ; how irreparable, as then seemed, his loss. But the American people may rest assured that the cry which arose throughout the length and breadth of this country — a cry of unmitigated abhorrence at the deed, and of sym- pathy with a bereaved people, was not the off- spring of fear or flattery, but sprang from the bottom of our deep hearts as the expression of the deepest feelings, and as a spontaneous recognition of the obligation of the ties of blood and kindred. But to return to our confession. These senti- ments of ours — sins, perhaps, of omission or com- mission — essentially natural as they were, could hardly be expected to have secured for us the good will of the North, or to be otherwise than resented by them, when they emerged victorious 272 THE SOXTTH AFTER THE WAR. from their day of trial, having disappointed our incessant predictions of their impending bank- ruptcy; our sneers at the fickleness of a demo- cracy; and at the impossibility if not of their conquering, at any rate of their holding the South. And so it happened that the accounts which came from the States soon after the close of the war, represented the bitter feeling against this country and the strong way in which her policy was denounced. The intensity however of that bitterness had, I fancy, been considerably modified at the time of our arrival in the country (August, 1865), and a calmer judgment had resumed its sway, as men who wished to be fair saw that there was much to say on our side of the question. ' I was right mad with you some time back,' said General Butler to us, or words to that effect, ' and swore a big oath that I would land before long a force of 40,000 men in Ireland ;* but I am willing to admit now that there is not the same cause for complaint that I fancied, and I do not see how your Government could have acted much other- wise.' Into the question of the ' Alabama ' I do not * The General could not or would not satisfy our inquiries as to the arrangements he had made for his return. THE ' ALABAMA.' 273 intend to enter, beyond simply adverting to it as a further most unhappy source of compli- cation and estrangement between the two nations. Eightly or wrongly the Americans complain that long before she actually sailed her career and intended destination were the common talk on all the steamboats on the Mersey, and that it was im- possible, therefore, that her escape can have taken place without the connivance of the Grovernment officials. The question, indeed, was being argued out between Lord Eussell and Mr. Seward during our stay, but was rather in abeyance as far as the public was concerned, until a short time before the meeting of Congress, when our refusal to pay the claims advanced or even to submit them to arbitration was made public. Then it was that the fury of the storm burst ; the press broke forth into passionate outcries against us, and in one notorious instance advocated the laying by of these claims for the present,- with the view of insisting upon a settlement of them at some future time when England should be in trouble, and when, having her hands full of other matters, she might at any price be glad to compound for quiet. These angry feelings were not, however, of long continuance, and more generous senti- ments began by degrees to prevail, more particur T 274 THE SOUTH AITER THE WAR. larly as tbe attention of the public was drawn off to Mexico, while the urgency of the affairs of their own internal policy helped to distract their thoughts, so that almost before the reading of the message it was evident that there was no real thought of war. Among the better informed, in short, it was evident that the old feeling of attachment, which, though often concealed and overlaid, lies nevertheless deeply rooted in the American breast, was to a great extent reviving, saddened only and tempered by the thought that the sympathy they had looked and hoped for in their fight with rebellion and slavery had not been accorded to them. ' England has disap- pointed our expectations' — such was the tone of the message — ' but she shall be treated, never- theless, with justice at our hands.' Coupled, however with this, was a strong desire for the resumption of the old relations of fellowship and brotherhood, and a conviction of the folly of any estrangement, or even coldness, between the two nations, foremost in the case of civilisation and Christianity. Only, they say, ' the first advance must be made on the part of England; this, at any rate, we have a right to expect.' As instances of this desire to resume friendly relations, I would give two expressions which fell MEETING HALF WAY. 275 entirely without concert froni the lips of two most eminent Americans engaged in the public service ; one of them occupying the position of President of the Senate, the other lately engaged in the diplomatic service. ' If you will but come forward,' said the former, 'and show your desire for our friendship, you may rely upon it we shall meet you more than half way.' ' Treat us but with kind- ness,' said the other, ' and we shall melt into tears.' Now there is no suflScient reason to attribute to the majority of the American people the pos- session of feelings warm as these. The applause that followed on the coarse invectives of Mr. Ban- croft's oration before Congress last spring, show that there are many who cherish no kindly sym- pathy towards England, The Irish population cannot be expected to be warm in our favour, or to applaud the mention of the tender feelings to which I have adverted, and which they might, with more reason, be expected to repudiate. But there can be no doubt that these views are held by a large, influential, and, let us hope, an increasing section in the country, which it were worse than folly in us not to endeavour to reciprocate and confirm ; while we are at the same time cautious and on our guard lest any concession should seem to be made to menace or insolence. 276 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. In what way this desirable end can be achieved is a problem of statesmanship that we are not here called upon to solve. It has been suggested that we should take advantage of these peaceful times to alter and amend our Foreign Enlistment Act, doing it not as a matter of bargain with other countries but as a simple act of right and justice. The proposition, however, has not met with general acceptance. Many are of the opi- nion that anything like a policy of concession would be fatal, which, while it would be taken as a confession of our weakness, would serve as an encouragement to further and unwarrantable de- mands. To a certain extent, undoubtedly, this might be the case, and when unjust demands are made or encroachments threatened they should be met by a prompt resistance. But the approaching of doubtful matters in a spirit of kindly consi- deration for others, with fairness and impartiality ; and a readiness to listen to arguments advanced on the side of our opponents, even to the extent of confessing ourselves, if need be, in the wrong, and of making proper reparation — ought to be the policy, as it will undoubtedly be the interest of a great and powerful empire. On the future relations of England with the United States will depend possibly, results, the ROOM FDR BOTH. 277 importance of wbich can scarcely be adequately estimated — results which may affect in no slight degree our national prosperity, perhaps even our national existence. We are united to the Ame- rican nation more closely than to any other by ties of blood, of language, and of religion. Each of us is necessary to the other. The vast extent of their fertile territory presents the natural outlet for our surplus population. Their stores ought to be the chief market for our manufactures, while we are scarcely less dependent upon them for cotton, sugar, rice, the natural products of their most fruitful soil. Sharing^ in the same hopes and fears, the same objects and interests, the world is large enough for us both, and our rivalry should not degenerate into jealousy. We have, doubtless, had much to endure in times gone by. Slights, insults, and encroachments, there have been to which we should hardly have submitted at the hands of any other people ; but which, in the case of the Americans, we have not resented because we attributed them to their true cause, and saw that they arose not so much from the wish to quarrel with us, as from the uneasy self-consciousness of a young people, who were feeling the want of an assured position, and were fearful of not meeting with the apprecia- 278 THE SOUTH AFTEK THE WAR. tion and respect wliich they deemed to be their due. The case is by no means an uncommon one. It may be seen again and again in every-day life, in the anxious susceptibility, the readiness to take offence, of persons whose status is still a little un- certain or undefined. The youth who fears lest he should be taken for a boy, the independent artizan who is nervously afraid of patronage, the nouveau riche at his entrance into society, are all of them instances of what I mean. But with America the case ought no longer so to stand. Her position is no longer a doubtful one. She has learnt during the late war what are her strength and her resources, no less than wherein lies the secret of her weakness. She has passed through the purifying ordeal of fire, of which she will herer after feel the beneficial results. There is no longer room for anxiety lest other nations should affect to depreciate or to ignore her position, or lest her motives for action should be misconstrued or mis- understood. And it is on this account now that she can so well afford to act with dignity and mo- deration, that we may with reason be hopeful in the interests of peace of the maintenance of a better understanding for the future. There is another circumstance which leads us SOUTHERN LEADERS. 279 to augur favourably of the future conduct of the foreign policy of the cabinet of Washington. To explain it, however, we must call to our recollection the fact, that the government in time past has been almost exclusively in the hands of ministers, who either came from the South, or were Northern men in league with the slave- holding interest and imbued with these principles. ' The Southern leaders,' it has been said, ' were always restless, and notwithstanding a proficiency in the mere craft of politics were also adventurers, because the institution, concern for which was the key to all their actions, was always insecure. They hated England, because England hated slavery, and they loved to annoy her as far as they could do so without actually provoking her to war.' Now this is a fact little remembered or im- derstood on this side of the water. The torrents of abuse poured upon us from time to time have rankled in our minds, while yet we have not been careful to discriminate from whom, for the most part, these indignities came, but have put them to the account of the government of the North, making them thereby answerable for the sins of their predecessors. As just would it be in this country, to visit upon a Parliamentary minority 280 THE SOUTH AFTEE THE WAE. themselves hopelessly excluded from office the laches and mistakes of a Cabinet, upon which they had exercised scarcely the shadow of an influence. It was indeed from the office of the Secretary of State at Washington that there issued these most insolent despatches — must, therefore, the Washington government, whatever may be its principles, of whomsoever it may be composed, henceforth be obnoxious to us ? Shall the odium which justly rests upon the authors of those state papers be transferred from Calhoun and his party to men who, whatever their faults, ought not to have visited upon them the sins of their bitterest political opponents ? Not that the present holders of power, or the members of the Eepublican party, are by any means entirely to be acquitted of blame on this score. But if the despatches of Mr. Seward have been some of them most offensive, it should be remembered that — owing perhaps rather to our misfortune rather than our fault — great cause for provocation has been given. The last four years have been times of great trial and excite- ment, and it may fairly be asked, that the disturb- ing influence of the circumstances under which the state papers had to be composed, should be taken into consideration, no less than the exacting LOOPHOLES FOB ESCAPE. 281 temper of the master for -whose approval the writer has had to look. The despatches of the Secretary of State are required to be such as will satisfy the amour propre of the American people, and must speak in the tone of self-assertion and importance which they imagine to be due to their position. And this is only what might naturally be ex- pected; for the more democratic a G-overnment becomes, the more is it necessary for those who aspire to lead the people, that they should hide their real meanings and purpose under a vague cloak of generalities, which, with the air of explicit declarations and manifestos, must always contain a convenient loophole for future retreat. The line taken by Andrew Johnson on his assumption of the office of President may be taken as a not unfair example of this kind of official morality. His violent denunciation of treason and rebellion, and the punishment he declared to be due to the authors, and the leaders of them, was agreeable at that time to the temper of the North- ern people ; but few have since complained of his not acting up to his professions, or have found fault with the liberal scale on which pardons have been granted. On the contrary, as counsels of tolerance and conciliation prevailed, the carry- ing out of harsh and vindictive measures of re- 282 THE SOUTH AFTEE THE WAE. pression would have jarred upon the better feelings of the North. The obstacles too, which such a course would have interposed to any scheme of reconstructing the Union, would have brought upon Andrew Johnson a storm of unpopularity. The populace is proverbially fickle, and those who aspire for any time to retain its favour, must be prepared to humour and follow its successive moods, whether of indignation, coolness, or in- action. This is a fact which should never be for- gotten in our dealings with America, and when we pass judgment upon a despatch or an oration, let us not feel ourselves called upon to take umbrage at violent expressions, or ill-advised threats, but be content to estimate the real feeling of the coun- try by her actions rather than her words. Let us trust that the plain good sense of her people will not allow them to go very far wrong, or continue to demand concessions that are unreasonable, and be ready on our part to wait till the exaggerated demeanour, assumed perhaps at first, shall be fol- lowed by calmer considerations and more peaceful counsels. Upon these grounds therefore, we venture to look forward with hope to the establishment of relations with the United States, upon a more com- fortable and satisfactory basis than that on which HOPE FOR THE FUTURE. 283 they have hitherto rested. On the one hand, be- cause the consciousness of the strength of their now assured position will enable the American people to act with dignity and forbearance ; and on the other, because the Southern faction, always restless and adventurous on account of the in- security of the institution upon which it depended, and hostile to England on account of her well- known views upon that subject, is not likely again to be paramount at Washington. And even should the old alliance of that party with the Democrats of the North be again cemented, and result in their return to ofl&ce and power, there will be little further cause for apprehension now that there is no longer between us the disturbing element of slavery. One thing yet remains to be said ; for it would be most unjust to leave this subject while the conduct of the American Government on a recent occasion calls for our especial notice, as affording no uncertain indication of the temper and the spirit in which for the future they are prepared to act towards us. With the close of the war there came to light that strange organisation of the Celtic race, calling itself Fenianism. The cg,binet at Washington, wisely determining that they would not by resistance fan its smouldering 284 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. embers into a flame, kept nevertheless a keen eye upon the movement, and at the right time inter- posed in a way calculated most effectually to put a stop to a nuisance, which, had they given it any encouragement, might have had the most disastrous consequences. Now this has not been done without the loss . of popularity. Many there are who have a lively remembrance of the raids organized in Canada during the war for the Union, and who would not now have been sorry to see the tables turned. The thousands of Irish who, on the first sus- picion of a success, swarmed from all parts of the States towards the Canadian frontier, will exercise an appreciable influence upon the next Presidential election, and there is little doubt that their votes will be cast against those who thwarted their hopes, just as they seemed to be upon the eve of fulfilment. To the credit however of the American Grovernment, considerations of selfishness or spite were not allowed for a moment to weigh against the obligation of their duty as neutrals ; and the spirit in which that duty was performed, has pro- duced an impression here that will not hastily be forgotten, and which we may hope will be pro- ductive of the best results. They have imagined ENTENTE COEDIALE. 285 themselves wronged by us ; but when the oppor- tunity ofifered they have not hesitated to act with justice, and in a manner hardly to be expected from the most friendly nation. It will be for us to show our appreciation of their conduct. Let it not, however, be supposed, because the prospect so far is undoubtedly reassuring, and be- cause we permit ourselves to hope for the establish- ment of a good mutual understanding between the two countries., and for a union held together by a firm bond of sympathy and concord — that, therefore, our entente cordiale ought to entangle us in too intimate an alliance with the people of the States. The too close proximity of kinsfolk in private life is considered undesirable, and so it may per- haps be fortunate that the mother country is separated from her former colonies by the ocean. Providence has happily assigned to each a sphere and a home of its own — a distinct part in the great drama of the world's history, in which the genius of each may find its full development. Surely we may hope that the means of communi- cation and facilities of intercourse, which are now being multiplied between these two kindred nations, may lead to a better knowledge and a warmer appreciation. 286 CHAPTEE XVII. WASHINGTON. CONGRESS ADJOURNS THE WHITE HOUSE INTER VIEWWITH THE PRESIDENT HIS POLICY OF RECONSTRUCTION VIEWS OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY THE TRIP TO CHICAGO THE SECRETARY OF STATE CONVERSATION WITH MR. SEWARD CHARACTER OF HIS DESPATCHES THE ATTACK UPON HIS LIFE — HOMEWARD BOUND DECK OF THE ' SCOTIA' ADIEUX THE VOYAGE CHRISTMAS EVE IN OLD ENGLAND. Nothing further of interest took place in Con- gress during the two days we spent at Washington, after the delivery of the message ; and, indeed, a day set apart for National Thanksgiving gave an excuse for a week's adjournment, and a number of the members took advantage of the opportunity to return home. Those, however, who came from the shores of the Pacific, and others from a dis- tance, had little temptation to move, and there was no perceptible diminution in the numbers who thronged the lobbies and the bar of Willard's. THE WHITE HOUSE. 287 The Presidential receptions do not commence until January, and we had made up our minds that we should have to leave Washington without a sight of Andrew Johnson, when Mr. Foster, the President of the Senate, offered to introduce us ; and under his guidance we found ourselves at ten o'clock next morning at the door of the White House. We were admitted by a man, half foot- man half orderly, and walked up without further introduction to a corridor on the first floor. Here already we found the callers beginning to assemble: some half-a-dozen were there before us, but during the short time that we had to wait the number increased very considerably. The furniture consisted of a well-worn carpet, a few chairs, and some spittoons, which a printed notice earnestly requested you might not overlook. The President, meanwhile, had not come upstairs from his private apartments. Poor man, what a life he must lead of it ! From ten in the morning till the same hour at night he can have no quiet, but must be content to admit all who choose to ask for an interview. The only time he can call his own is the early morning, or late night, when he must snatch the time so urgently demanded for the composition of messages, state papers, &c. Abraham Lincoln, indeed, had the courage once 288 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. to put up a notice shortly before the meeting of Congress, requesting that he might not be in- truded upon, as he was engaged in the prepar- ation of his message ; and the people, I believe, were good enough not to resent so unwarrantable an infringement of their undoubted rights. At last the door of the Presidential chamber opened — a few words passed between Mr. Foster and the official in charge, and we were the first to be admitted to the honour of an interview. Andrew Johnson was standing with his back to- wards us as we entered. Apparently he was writing at a high desk, but immediately came forward and gave us a most cordial reception. His manners were those of a perfect gentleman, and his appearance certainly prepossessed us in his favour. There was of course, no opportunity to do more than pass a few trivial remarks. The President begged that we would be seated; but the offer was one that we had not the option of accepting, as our conductor at once interposed, saying he was sure that the English gentlemen, knowing the demands upon the President's time, would not wish any longer to detain him. A word of congratulation upon the message followed, and Johnson said with a smile, ' I think there is not much in it to give us any trouble.' ' No,' EEPUBLICAN MANNERS. 289 answered Foster ; ' not much that they can grip hold of with their claws.' And so exeunt. Such was our interview with this remarkable man, in itself devoid of incident, and perhaps hardly worth a passing notice ; yet not altogether uninteresting, from the insight it afforded into republican manners, and from the idea we were enabled to form of a man, once a tailor of Ten- nessee, now raised to be chief magistrate of one of the first nations in the world. There was indeed much to give cause for amazement and reflection. It was marvellous that a man who only learnt to write after he was married, should now be able to control the destinies of so great a people : nor was it less to be wondered at that one, part of whose early life had been spent on a tailor's shopboard, should be able to receive us with the ease and the frankness of an English gentleman — a faculty which, I fancy, was never attained by his pre- decessor, honest Abe, whose uncouth presence and awkwardness were almost proverbial, though the warm heart and the gentle and kindly feeling within made men forget the ungainly exterior and the rolling gait. The Americans indeed are a wonderful people, and whatever the faults of their mode of govern- ment, than which it would be hard to conceive u 290 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. anything more unsuitable to a country like our own, we are at least bound to give their institu- tions the credit of having been able to produce in times of emergency a man so eminently adapted as was Lincoln to the occasion that called him forth; and — still more marvellous fact — that upon his death there should be an Andrew John- son ready to fill the vacant place. It is not very easy to divine what verdict will be pronounced by posterity upon the man who now occupies the Presidential chair. He is vio- lent no doubt, and it would be well if he had a better command of tongue and temper. The de- nunciation by name of his Eadical opponents, and his charging men of the highest character with murderous designs, was, to say the least, an egre- gious blunder : but he has had much to bear. In old times he nearly paid with his life for his de- votion to the Union, and now, in carrying out his scheme of reconstruction, he has been baited almost beyond endurance ; and one cannot wonder that he should sometimes have turned to bay. If the Union was ever to be restored in anything but name — if it was to be again enthroned in the hearts of the people, and not simply enforced by sword and bayonet — a policy of conciliation was the only one to be followed ; and that is the A TEUE SOUTHERNER. 291 character of the one undeviatingiy pursued by Johnson, since the speech he made in August, 1865, to a deputation of Southerners, when he told them that he was of the Southern people and that he loved them, and would do all in his power ' to restore them to that state of happiness and prosperity which they enjoyed before the madness of misguided men, in whom they had reposed their confidence, led them astray to their own undoing.' When the Conventions of the Southern States met last autumn, they learnt from the President what the conditions were which he required to be fulfilled, as a proof of their present loyalty and a guarantee against future mischief, before they could again be admitted to the exercise of their old rights. His demands were three in number : 1. That the Secession ordinance of each State should be declared null and void. 2. That they should ratify the amendment to the Constitution by which slavery was declared to be for ever abolished. 3. The repudiation of all debts incurred to carry on the war. These Andrew Johnson considered to be a sufficient security against the return of the South 292 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. to secession and slavery, and on their adoption he told the States that they were already restored. ' They had never been, they could never be out of the Union, and their right to the immediate possession and enjoyment of all their privileges in • the Union was perfect.' Congress, however, has refused as yet to admit within its doors the Southern members. ' We are not satisfied,' they say, ' with the guarantees demanded by the Pre- sident. What security have we as to the validity of the ordinances which have passed the Conven- tions ? But few voters took part in the election of the delegates of whom they were composed. No popular ratification has been accorded them. How can we be sure that the States will not turn round upon us and say that a constitution not ratified by the people is wholly without effect ? that they will not insist on the assumption by the Union of the obligations incurred by the Confederacy, or otherwise will force us to repudiate the payment of the debt we contracted for their S'ubjugation ? Wlmt is our security that slavery, though abo- lished in name, will not be restored in everything else ? What safeguard is to be relied upon to protect the national freedman, to secure the na- tional creditor ? ' The President, they would go on to say, is for THE WISEST COURSE. 293 sacrificing the negro, and would hand him over to the by no means tender mercies of his former master, who, now that his interest is no longer concerned in his protection, hates him as being the cause of all the trouble and suffering occasioned by the war. No one, indeed, can have visited the South since the conclusion of the struggle and have failed to observe the existence of this feeling, or not be aUve both to the danger arising out of it and to the duty imposed upon the North of seeing justice done to the coloured race. The obligation is one unhesitatingly acknowledged by the Presi- dent, but his idea is that it will be the best policy to endeavour to soften the asperity at present existing, and to be careful of exasperating the superior race by enforced legislation or unequal measures. He trusts, meanwhilp, that self-interest will oblige the planter to a kindly treatment of the negro, from the knowledge that an opposite line of conduct would drive away the only supply of labour that is likely for some time to be avail- able. The negro is in fact, he says, the master of the situation. He can move where he likes, and it will be his own fault if he chooses to remain stationary and put up with ill-treatment. Acting under this impression, the President has felt it his duty to veto the bills presented to him 294 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAE. oa this subject. These have been already dis- cussed, and it has been endeavoured to be shown that the Civil Eights Bill is nothing more than might fairly be demanded on behalf of the freed- man. The interest of the planter will doubtless be the greatest protection to the life and the limb of the labourer; but the Southern spirit is a fiery one, and passion but too often outweighs prudence. The Civil Eights Bill has now become law. What will be its effects time only will show, and we can but form surmises as to its probable operation, whether it will prove an apple of dis- cord between the two races, or ensure to the weaker the just ability to assert their rights. Such are the two programmes — the bills, we may say, presented for the acceptance of the American people. Such is the issue between the President and Congress, the one recommending a policy of confidence and trust, while the other would proceed more cautiously, feeling not un- reasonably some apprehension lest the fruits of their dear-bought victory should be filched from them, and lest the battle should have been fought in vain. There is much to be said on both sides. There are dangers to be avoided in either course. The question is still far from settled, and it is not THE SECRETARY OF STATE. 295 easy to see the solution of it. But the vast power of the executive, and the iron will of the man who now wields it, will go far towards securing the victory of the Presidential policy. But let this be remembered, whatever the solution of these and other problems which Andrew Johnson has been called upon to attempt — that he has dared to brave unpopularity, and to maintain his principles without flinching, in the face alike of the brutality of Southern mobs, and of the Violent abuse of a large portion of the Northern press.* In the evening of the day of our visit to the President we called to deliver a letter to Mr. F. "W. Seward, son of the well-known Secretary of State, whose signature (W. H. Seward) we have so often of late seen at the foot of despatches, many of them of no pleasant import. Father and son were both of them sitting upstairs, and both exhibited traces of the murderous assault made upon them by the assassin Payne eight * These lines are allowed to remain as they were written in June last. The recent exhibition, however, of intemperate violence into which Andrew Johnson has been led on his recent tour through the North, seems irretriev- ably to have damaged his own cause ; and leaves, I fear, but little room for even the most charitable interpretation that may be put upon his conduct. 296 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. months before. The wound at the side of the father's cheek was still unclosed, and the face unfortunately much disfigured. His articulation, always indistinct, is more so now than ever, but mentally he was in full vigour, and, as we discovered afterwards by comparison of dates, must have but just risen from the composition of one of his most offensive despatches to our Government, that concerning our refusal to detain the crew of the ' Shenandoah.' In our case, however, there was nothing to disturb his wonted urbanity ; he chatted freely about Ireland, Mexico, and the Southern question, and we discussed the mutual advantage of a good understanding be- tween England and America, and of a better knowledge and acquaintance with each other. ' But,' he added, ' people will never go from an old country to visit a new one. Thousands will go hence to Europe for one that comes here from the Old World. No single member of the present cabinets* of England or France has ever been in America. Had any of them paid us a visit a few years back, they would have understood us better, and things might have taken a very different course.' For himself, he said he had visited * This was spoken in November, 1865. FOREIGN TEAVEL. 297 every court in Europe before aspiring to conduct the foreign relations of his country. 'Pity he has turned his travels to so little account,' some one may say, who imagines him to be one of the bitterest enemies of England. This, however, is not the character given by those who have had opportunities of intimate intercourse with him. His despatches, they say, are written more for the reading of the American people than that of the court to which they are nominally addressed. On two occasions indeed he has spoken most offen- sively ; once at Quebec, where he prophesied our speedy departure from Canada, and again during the visit of the Prince of Wales, when he told the Duke of Newcastle that if ever he was in office he should have to pick a quarrel with England. We can afford however to disarm our resentment, and to cover the offence with the charitable allowance accorded to speeches made — as was the case with both of these — after dinner. He certainly has not taken steps towards the carrying out of his threats. In politics, Seward's old profession was that of a Free Soiler, but he is looked upon now as a very doubtful friend of the negro, and he is supposed further, never to have forgiven his party for their preference of Abraham Lincoln as their candidate for the Presidency at Chicago in 1860. 298 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. His son Frank Seward, too, is said to have great official capacity, and to be indeed his father's right-hand man, but since the attack made upon him he has hardly dared to apply his mind at all to work. They gave a curious account of the way in which the assault was made. Mr. Seward was lying ill in bed, in a room upon the second floor. The assassin Payne, by what knowledge no one can tell, made straight for the door of this room, which was one of four that opened on to a small landing. Here he meets F. W. Seward, cuts him down, and leaving him as dead goes on to make an end of the old man. His murderous purpose ac- complished, as he thought, he calmly walks down stairs, at the foot of which he is met by another son. Colonel Seward, who, taking him for some drunken idler who has lounged in by chance, kicks him down the steps, and off he goes. Frank Seward now wears, a small skull-cap: it was ne- cessary for the doctors to cut out a piece of the bone, and the pulsations of the brain were said to be plainly perceptible beneath ; but over it was forming now a gelatinous substance, and he is rapidly becoming himself again. We must not forget, in the hurry of de- parture, the kind hospitality we received at the GENERAL HOWARD. 299 hands of Sir Frederick Bruce, our Minister at Washington — a man who, happily for the pro- spects of a good understanding between the two countries, has already secured the good will and affection of the American people, in the inter- course he held with them in China, as well as by his performance of the duties belonging to the more important post that he now fills. A glimpse, too, we had of Greneral Howard, who commanded the right wing of Sherman's army, and who has before been adverted to as the Chief Commissioner of the Freedmen's Bureau. To him has been given the title of the Havelock of America ; for, like him, he has won by his con- sistent conduct and avowed adherence to the cause of religion, no less than by his generalship, the esteem and affection of the whole army. But Congress and Eeconstruction, Generals and Presidents, Niggers even -^ begin to lose their interest : we prefer the study of ' Appleton's Eailway Guide,' and the advertisements of the departure of the Cunard steamers; and begin to dwell upon the anticipations of the delights of an English Christmas, and of sports more to our taste than even a squirrel-hunt, or wait- iuCT for the canvas-backs among the inlets of the Chesapeake. Once more again we turn our 300 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. steps northward, and after two or three days of pleasant rest at Baltimore, a short experience of the genuine Yankeeism to be met with among the crowds who throng the saloons of the Astor House, and a few visits of farewell in New York, we find ourselves at noon on the 13th of De- cember on the wharf in Jersey city, alongside of which the ' Scotia ' is lying, with steam up, her two red funnels gleaming bright in the sun, while her deck is crowded with passengers and their friends, eager to have the last sight of the tra- vellers who will soon be on the other side of the Atlantic. Towards one o'clock the mails are on board, and the paddles began slowly to revolve, as stern-foremost we moved out of dock, amidst the waving of countless pocket-handkerchiefs, answer- ing to one another, on board and on shore. Soon we are steaming away in the clear atmosphere of an American December, leaving New York behind us glittering briglit in the sun, with the guns of the Battery on our left, and the houses and build- ings of Brooklyn rising white in the background ; and so, on past Staten Island dotted with its villas, through the passage of the Narrows, and exchanging salutations with the ' Java ' as she bore down upon us, fresh with news from the old HOMEWAED BOUND. 301 country ; till towards five o'clock we bid adieu to our pilot off Sandy Hook, and once more again we are fairly on the ocean. The voyage promised well for the first few days. The wind was fair, the good ship did its work right well ; as our coal diminished and we began to get lighter, the third day's reckoning showed a run of 325 miles in the twenty-four hours. Every one was in high spirits. It was going to be one of the Scotia's best trips, and stewards began to talk of her great feat accomplished just two years ago, when she landed all her passengers at Liverpool on the Friday, in time to eat their Christmas dinner. But, alas for the vanity of human wishes, soon after we came into the chill fogs that brood over the banks of Newfoundland, the wind veered round to the East, and it began to blow a gale. The log, which had been showing all along a speed of twelve to fourteen knots, now barely reached the tale of seven. The huge engines laboured and groaned in their herculean task, making scarce half their wonted number of revolutions. So day after day wore on, the wind was still dead ahead, and it was with jealous eyes that we looked on the ' Aus- tralasian,' outward bound and hurrying on under every stitch of canvas. ' How about Christmas ? ' 302 THE SOUTH AFTER THE WAR. people asked, and remembered that they had seen some wild turkeys put on board, and it began to be considered whether they might not be taken as fair and legitimate spoil under the circumstances. The officers of the ship began to look glum, only once before had their good ship failed to reach Liverpool on Saturday niglit, and it was evident that this was the earliest that we could hope for now. It is Friday at last, and the Irish coast ought to be near, but there had been no sun for several days to allow of an observation, and the Captain was very anxious. Night came on, and eyes were straining in vain for a gleam of the light of the Fastnet. Again and again were the en- gines stopped, and the lead was kept going, until the morning light showed land to the northward, and soon after mid-day we are at anchor, and transferring the mails to the tug alongside of us in Queenstown harbour — and early on the morning of Sunday we are outside the bar at Liverpool, and though the tide did its best to dis- oblige us, by four o'clock on Christmas Eve we are rejoiced after all our wanderings, in being again permitted once more to set foot on the soil of Old England. 303 APPENDIX A. HINTS FOE TRAVEL. What -will it cost? is naturally the first question that suggests itself if the plan is started of a trip across the water. And as it seems probable that, owing to 'the increased facilities of travel and the additional interest with which recent events have invested the United States, more of our countrymen will be led to pay a visit to their American cousins, it may not be unsuit- able to give an approximate idea of the cost of such a journey, and the best season for making it. Our tour was an extended one, occupying 128 days.* (We sailed from Liverpool on August 19th, and landed on our return on Christmas Eve.) It cost each of our party from 160Z. to 180?., which would give an average daily expenditure of 26s. or 26s., or, deducting the ocean fare, about 17s. or 18s. Some might think that this is too low a calculation. The sum named did not include wine nor unusual expenses, such as photographs, furs in Canada, and fans and Indian * The distance travelled was 13,733 miles. 304 APPENDIX. work at Niagara. We went to the best hotels and saw everything comfortably ; our numbers, probably, helped to lessen the expense. The want of wine, the only luxury from which we ordinarily abstained, was scarcely felt ; being, as it is, both dear and bad ; and scarcely ever taken during dinner at the hotels. Iced water is the universal beverage ; and in that thin, dry atmosphere, the stimulants which in England are in ordinary consumption, are felt to be unnecessary. The steamers of the Cunard line, which sail from Liverpool every Saturday, alternately to New York and Boston, are generally preferred for the Atlantic passage. If however it is wished to visit Canada first, the Allan line, which sails on Thursdays, goes to Quebec direct, at a saving of H. or 51. Some of our party landed from the Boston boat at Halifax, and, crossing Nova Scotia to St. John's in New Brunswick, reached Boston by the Bay of Fundy and Portland. They professed themselves highly gratified by the glimpse thus afforded them of the society and the. scenery of the Maritime Provinces. Life at Newport, the great watering-place on Ehode Island, ought not on any account to be missed. The season there ends practically by September the 1st, soon after which the great hotel, the Ocean House, is altogether closed. The cottage residents, however, stay on into November, forming a very pleasant society of a quieter kind. Travellers are sure to be pressed to spend a few days in the "White Mountains of New Hampshire. They may find in them a very pleasant retreat during the heats of July and August, but the scenery has nothing, I should fancy, of a sufficiently distinct APPENDIX. 305 character to make it wortli wliile to go out of the way to visit them. Lake George will well repay the detour of a day, on the way to or from Canada, by Lake Ohamplain ; and Trenton will probably be seen on the way to Niagara. Any length of time that can conveniently be spared wiU not be wasted at the Falls ; some stay should be made on both the American and Canadian sides. We spent a day or two at the Cataract House, (N.B. try the Torrent Baths), then crossed the lake on a short visit to Toronto, and returned to the Clifton House for a few days more ; which, I think, is as good a plan as can be followed. Our route thence lay westward to Chicago, but it may be more convenient to take the line via Milwaukee and La Crosse to St. Paul, which ought certainly to be visited, as the upper Mississippi has beauties unrivalled by any river scenery in the world. The return thence would naturally be to Chicago and St. Louis, and so direct to New York, unless the journey were extended to the South. Our Itinerary is subjoined : — Aug. ly. Sailed from Liverpool. 20. Off Queenstown. 28. Sighted Cape Eace. 29. Made Halifax. 31. Landed at Boston. Sept. 1-7. Newport. 7-14. Boston. 14. Albany. 306 APPENDIX. Sept. 15. Lake George. 16-20. Montreal and excursion. 20-23. Quebec. 23-27. Montreal. 28. Ottawa. 29 to Oct. 1. Kingston. 2-9. Toronto and Niagara. 10. London. 11—14. vid Chicago to Lane for shooting. 14-16. Chicago. 17-24. To St. Paul and return Chicago. 25. Bt. Louis. 26. LouisviUe. 27. Cave City. 28-30. Nashville. Nov. 1 & 2. Chattanooga. 3. Atlanta. 4-7. Augusta. 8. Savannah. 9-11. Charleston. 12-13. Wilmington. 14. Petersburg. 15-17. Eichmond. 18. Baltimore and New York. 19-30. New York. Des. 1-4. Philadelphia. 5-8. Washington. 8-12. Baltimore. 12. New York. 13. Sailed for Europe. 24. Landed in Liverpool. APPENDIX. 307 Shooting. — Tliose who are fond of shooting, and expect to be able to spare a week for the prairies, will do well to take a gun with them, although Abbey of Chicago, who furnished some friends of mine with guns and a dog, will probably be able again to do the same. One always, however, prefers one's own gun, and the trouble of the extra package is not very great. Sporting quarters are to be heard of in Chicago. The whole of the country westward is swarming with birds. Expeditions are made in the earlier part of the season with tents, &c., but most men will find it con- venient to put up at a village inn, or at a farm-house where accommodation can be secured. For large bags you must go perhaps into Iowa, but very good sport can be had without the need of a trip so far west. Shooting begins about the middle of August ; but the heat must be very trying at that time on the prairie, and the, birds are in far better condition a month later. Our party came too late, and found by the 12th of October all the grouse in packs, so that our bag never exceeded six or seven brace, except on one very fine day, when the birds lay well, and with three guns we lulled nineteen brace and a half. We were, however, very badly off for dogs, and had to walk up the stragglers of the pack. This was at Eochelle, or Lane, a station 70 miles from Chicago on the Dixon Air fine, where was a tolerable inn. Buck-shooting. — Our only experience of duck- shooting was at Lancaster on the St. Lawi'ence ; but it was a bad season, and owing to our h'aving no re- triever we lost more than half our birds; this was 308 APPENDIX. however, before the great flights which take place in October, when the birds come down from the great Northern lakes. Letters of IntrocLuction. — Too many good letters cannot be taken. They need not all be delivered, and if a few days only can be spared for a place, his letters will enable the traveller to gain at once an entree into society, and to give the people an opportunity of exer- cising the hospitaHty they are so ready and anxious to extend to Englishmen. 309 APPENDIX B. THE CHARITIES OP THE WAR. WoKK OP THE Christian Commission. (Extract.) Nashville. — ' If the scenes of the work in Nashville were written out, they alone would fill volumes. Here is the great Convalescent Camp, crowded vrith thousands of convalescents — men wounded in the great battle (Murfreesboro') three months before, but now partially recovered — men who had been trembling over the brink of the grave, now tremblingly rising back again into hfe — men just risen from days and weeks of pro- stration by fever and other diseases — men needing nicely prepared food — men needing the warm shirt, drawers, or blanket, to shield them from the chill air of night — men who had lost their Testaments in the fight — men who had not heard a sermon or a prayer since entering the service at the beginning of the war — men idle all the day long, with nothing to read and nothing to do, but the mischief always found by Satan for idle hands, playing cards until card -playing was not play but work, listening to oaths and obscenity until its novelty was 310 APPENDIX. gone, its \Yit stale — men above all who, in the long rest of hospital life, had reviewed the past with sorrow and regret, and who would fain make their peace with God before entering again upon the exciting scenes of active service, or taking the hazards of another battle. Every- where, at Nashville and Murfreesboro', in the hospitals and tented field, in barracks and in camps, an open door which no man could shut presented itself, and a wide field strangely, wonderfully inviting ; but who should enter it ? How was it to be supplied ? What were four delegates and seven boxes to the tens of thousands of famishing, perishing men there ? ' Now steam was for once found too slow, and the telegraph bore the repeated and urgent call northward for delegates, publications, and stores. Delegates volun- teered — a noble band — at the call with a magic promptitude. Stores also flowed in in wondrous pro- fusion. Permanent stations were established, manned, and supplied, at Nashville, Murfreesboro', &c. And now opens a work to gladden all hearts. The suffering are kindly cared for and comforted, warm clothing is put upon shivering limbs. The good-Samaritan work of every kind is gladly done and gratefully received. Thirty-five thousand testaments, thirty thousand soldiers' hymn and psalm-books, and a world of religious reading, are distributed. Daily prayer-meetings are held at the stations. Every station has its free writing-table, and thousands of letters are written home which never would have been written but for the facihties thus afforded the soldiers. The following is a description of one of the stations : — APPENDIX. 311 ' A store-room, twenty by sixty feet ; the front used as a reading-room, furnished with a free writing-table, the leading secular and religious papers on file, a circu- lating Hbrary of more than two thousand books, with the following card upon the table to be read by all comers : — ' The newspapers on the file are from your State and country. Sit down and read. The writing-table and stationery on the Idft are for your use. They want to hear from you at home. ' If out of stamps, drop your letter in the box, we will stamp and mail it. Those testaments, hymn-books, and religious newspapers, were sent to you — take one. ' That library has many interesting books ; find the one you like, have it recorded, and return it in five days. If you are in trouble, speak to any agent in the room ; you are the one he wants to see. At 3.30 p.m. every- body come to our prayer-meeting. ' The Saviour will be there. He says, " Come." ' Another report from Savannah, says, — ' We fitted up a room ' (allotted upon the capture of the city) ' with writing-desks for fifty men at a time, and from two to three hundred letters were written daily, and those which had no stamp we stamped at night and forwarded. For curiosity I counted a hundred letters taken at random one night, and found them directed, forty-two to Mr., thirty-five to Mrs., and twenty-three to Miss. It would be impossible to give any idea of the thankfulness with which the stores of reading, thread, needles, buttons, pens, ink, paper, &c., were received by the men. " There is something in Christianity after all,"' 312 APPENDIX. said a man, as he left our counter one day, and such a conviction was written legibly on the faces of many as they went away, who had come in carelessly, " Just to see what we had to sell." ' But one more extract. An account of a celebration of the Holy Communion in an army chapel, which few will be able to read unmoved, must bring this subject to a conclusion : — ' Pleasant Yalley — interesting Commmiion Ser- vice. — One of the most important stations in the De- partment, and I feel quite safe in saying, one of the most important ever occupied by our Commission, if success in religious work be made the standard, was at Pleasant Valley, east of Maryland Heights. During the winter, the camp was occupied by dismounted cavalry, usually numbering about ten thoiisand. In the midst of this encampment we first erected a chapel, thirty feet by forty. This proving entirely too small to receive all who desired to attend our daily and nightly meetings, it was extended to ninety feet in length, built in stockade fashion, and covered with canvas. In this rude temple hundreds of brave men every night bowed together around the altar. A Bible-class was organised, two or three sermons were preached every sabbath, besides preaching, or conference, and prayer every evening, and thus the fires were kept continually burning upon this altar. During the four months of the progress of this work, there were several hundred hopeful conversions. On one cold and stormy Sabbath, in the latter part of April, the Lord's Supper was dispensed to about five hundred communicants. The clergyman officiating, and APPENDIX. 313 many otliers, speak of this as one of the most interesting scenes ever witnessed. Brave men, from almost every loyal State in the Union, bronzed, weather-beaten, battle-scarred veterans of many bloody fields, crowded the chapel as the hour approached, till every seat was occupied. And then, in rapt silence, they listened to the simple story of the dying love of Jesus, and partook of the hallowed emblems of the Sacrifice that made men free. One of the officiating clergymen describes the scene in these words, — " The appointments of the table were of an humble description. The plates were of tin, the cups pewter, the bread came from the commissary, the table-cover was two religious newspapers, and over the bread were two small napkins, clean, but not ironed. Yet, though the circumstances were so novel, and had so much of discomfort, and the appointments of the table were so plain, the service in which we engaged was full of the most solemn interest and profit." Professor Stoever of Gettysburg, who was present, refers to this interesting scene in these words, — " It was one of the most impressive character, and reminded one very much of primitive apostolic times. Every one present seemed pervaded with the solemnity of the occasion. The chapel was filled with our veteran soldiers, and all, with two or three exceptions, participated in the ordinance. As the men received the consecrated emblems contained in the humble vessels, it seemed as if all felt that Jesus was present : and as the communicants gathered around the feast they realised the pre.cious influences of the Holy Spirit." ' I have dwelt upon this scene, because it is one of 314 APPENDIX. the brightest spots in the history of the war, and stands in the foreground of the picture — the love of Jesus sanctifying the war for liberty and truth.' Written after the battle of Gettysburg by a lady working on the Sanitary Commission : — Dear July, 1863. What we did at Gettysburg, for the three weeks we were there, you wiU want to know. ' We,' are Mrs. and I, who happening to be on hand at the right moment, gladly fell in with the proposition to do what we could at the Sanitary Commission Lodge after the battle. We stopped two miles from the town, to find that, as usual, just where the Government had left off, the Com- mission came in. There stood their temporary lodge and kitchen, and here, hobbling out of their tents, came the wounded men, who had made their way down from the corps-hospitals, expecting to leave at once in the cars. For the first few days the worst cases only capie down in ambulances from the hospitals ; hundreds of fellows hobbled along as best they could in heat and dust, and many hired farmers' waggons, as hard as the farmers' fists themselves, and were jolted down to the railroad at three or four dollars the man. Think of the disappointment of a soldier sick, body and heart, to find, at the end of this miserable journey, that his effort to get away, into which he had put all his remaining stock of strength, was useless, that ' the cars were gone,' or ' the cars were full,' that while he was com- ing others had stepped down before him, and that he must APPENDIX. 315 turn all the weary way back again, or sleep by the road- side till the next train, ' To-morrow.' Think -what this would have been, and you are ready to appreciate the relief and comfort that was. No men were turned back. You fed and you sheltered them just when no one else could have done so ; and out of the boxes and barrels of good and nourishing things, which you people at home had supplied, we took all that was needed. Some of you sent a stove (that is, money to get it), some of you the beefstock, some of you the milk and fresh bread ; and all- of you would have been thankful that you had done so, could you have seen the refreshment and com- fort received through these things. As soon as the men hobbled up to the tents good hot soup was given all round ; and that over, their wounds were dressed — for the gentlemen of the Commission are cooks or surgeons, as occasion demands ; and, finally, with their blankets spread over the straw, the men stretched themselves out, and were happy and contented tin morning, and the next train. Twice a-day the trains left for Baltimore, or Harris- burg ; and twice a-day we fed all the wounded who arrived for them. Things were systematized now, and the men came dovm in long ambulance trains to the cars ; baggage cars they were, filled with straw for the wounded to lie upon, and broken open at either end to let in the air. When the surgeons had the wounded all placed, mth as much comfort as seemed possible under the circum- stances on board the train, our detail of men would go from car to car, with soup made of beefstock or. fresh 316 APPENDIX. meat, full of potatoes, turnips, cabbage, and rice, with fresh bread and coffee ; and, when stimulants were needed, with ale, milk punch, or brandy. Water-pails were in great demand for use in the cars on the journey, and also empty bottles to take the place of canteens. I do not think that a man of the sixteen thousand, who were transported during our stay, went from Gettys- burg without a good meal. Eebels and Unionists to- gether, they all had it, and 'were pleased and satisfied. ' Have you any friends in the army, madam ? ' a Eebel soldier, lying on the floor of the car, said to me, as I gave him some milk. ' Yes, my brother is on 's staff.' 'I thought so, ma'am. You can always tell; when people are good to soldiers they are sure to have friends in the army.' ' We are rebels, you know, ma'am,' another said. ' Do you treat rebels so T It was strange to see the good brotherly feeling come over the soldiers, our own and tlie rebels, when side by side they lay in our tents. ' Hullo, boys I this is the pleasantest way to meet, isn't it ? We are better friends when we are as close as this, than a little farther off.' And then they would go over the battles together, — 'We were here, and you were there,' in the friendliest way. After the men's wounds were attended to we went round, giving them clean clothes ; had basins and soap, and towels, and followed these with socks, slippers, shirts, drawers, and those coveted dressing-gowns. Such pride as they felt in them ! comparing colours, and smiling all over as they lay in clean and comfortable rows, ready for supper — ' on dress parade,' they used to APPENDIX. 317 say. And then the milk, particularly if jt were boiled, and had a little whisky and sugar, and the bread with butter on it, and jelly on the butter ; how good it all was, and how lucky we felt ourselves in having the immense satisfaction of distributing these things, which all of you, hard at work in villages and cities, were getting ready, and sending off, in faith. Late one afternoon, too late for the cars, a train of ambulances arrived at our lodge with over a hundred wounded rebels, to be cared for during the night. Only one among them seemed too weak and faint to take anything. He was badly hurt, and failing. I went to him after his wound was dressed, and found him lying on his blanket stretched over the straw — a fair -haired, blue- eyed, young lieutenant, with a face innocent enough for one of our own New England boys. I could not think of him as a rebel, he was too near heaven for that. He wanted nothing — had not been willing to eat for days, his comrades said ; but I coaxed him to try a little milk gruel, made nicely with lemon and brandy ; and one of the satisfactions of our three weeks is the remembrance of the empty cup I took away afterwards, and his perfect enjoyment of that supper. ' It was so good, the best thing he had had since he was wounded ;' and he thanked me so much, and talked about his ' good supper ' for hours. Poor fellow, he had had no care, and it was a surprise and pleasure to find himself thought of; so, in a pleased, child -lilce way, he talked about it till midnight, the attendant told me, as long as he spoke of anything : for at midnight the change came, and from that time he only thought of the old 318 APPENDIX. days before lie was a soldier, when he sang hymns in his father's church. He sang them now again, in a clear, sweet voice, — ' Lord, have mercy upon me 1' and then songs without words — a sort of low intoning. His father was a Lutheran clergyman in South Carolina, one of the rehels told us in the morning, when we went into the tent, to find him sliding out of our care. All day long we watched him — sometimes fighting his battles over, often singing his Lutheran chants, till, in at the tent door, close to which he lay, looked a rebel soldier, just arrived with other prisoners. He started when he saw the lieutenant, and, quickly kneeling down by him, called ' Henry 1 Henry 1' But Henry was look- ing at some one a great way off, and could not hear him. ' Do you know this soldier '? ' we said. ' Oh, yes, ma'am ! and his brother is wounded, and a prisoner too, in the cars now.' Two or three men started after him, found him, and half carried him from the cars to our tent — Henry did not loiow him, though ; and he threw him- self down by his side on the straw, and for the rest of the day lay in a sort of apathy, without speaking, except to assure himself that he could stay with his brother without the risk of being separated from hia fellow- prisoners. And there the brothers lay, and there we strangers sat watching and listening to the strong, clear voice, singing, ' Lord, have mercy upon me 1 ' The Lord had mercy ; and at sunset I put my hand on the lieu- tenant's heart, to find it stiU. All night the brother lay close against the coffin, and in the morning went away with his comrades, leaving us to bury Henry, having ' confidence ;' hut first thanking us for what we APPENDIX. 319 had done, and giving us all that he had to show his gratitude — the palmetto ornament from his hrother's cap, and a button from his coat. Dr. W. read the Burial Service that morning at the grave, and wrote his name on the little head -board : ' Lieut. Eauch, 14th Regt., S. CaroHna Vol.' In the field where we buried him, a number of coloured freedmen, working for Government on the rail- road, had their camp : and every night they took their recreation, after the heavy work of the day was over, in prayer-meetings. Such an ' inferior race,' you know. We went over one night and listened for an hour while they sung, collected under the fly of a tent, a table in the middle where the leader sat, and benches all round the sides for the congregation — men only — all very black and very earnest. They prayed with all their souls, as only black men and slaves can ; for themselves, and for the dear white people who had come over to the meeting; and for ' Massa Lincoln,' for whom they seemed to have a reverential affection, some of them a sort of worship, which confused Father Abraham and Massa Abraham in one general cry for blessings. What- ever else they, asked for they must have strength and comfort and blessing for ' Massa Lincoln.' Very little care was taken of these poor men. Those who were ill durino- our stay were looked after by one of the officers of the Commission. They were grateful for every little ' thine. Mrs. went into the town and hunted up several dozen bright handkerchiefs, hemmed them, and sent them over to be distributed the next night after meeting. They were put on the table in the tent, and, 320 APPENDIX. one by one, the men came up to get them. Purple, and blue, and yellow, the handkerchiefs were, and the desire of every man's heart fastened itself on a yellow one ; they poUtely made way for each other, though — one man standing back to let another pass up first, although he ran the risk of seeing the particular pumpkin-colour that riveted his eyes taken from before them. When the dis- tribution was over, each man tied his head up in his handkerchief, and they sang one more hymn, keeping time all round, with blue and purple and yellow nods, and thanking and blessing the white people, ' in their basket and in their store,' as much as if their cotton -handker- chiefs had all been gold leaf. One man came over to our tent next day to say, ' Missus, was it you who sent me that present ? I never had anything so beautiful in all my life before ;' and he only had a blue one, too. We had on an average sixty of such men each night for three weeks under our care — sometimes one hundred, sometimes only thirty ; and with the delegation and the help of other gentlemen volunteers, who all worked devotedly for the men, the whole thing was a great success ; and you, and all of us, can't help being thankful that we had a share, however small, in making it so. Our work was over, our tents were struck, and we came away after a flourish of trumpets from two military bands, who filed down to our door, and gave us a farewell — ' Eed, white, and blue.' LONDON: yTKANQEWAYS AND Walden, Caslle St. Leicester Sq. j<:/.';'iti HirUi'innn: