If 270 
 
 .S67 
 ICopy 1 
 
Class. Vii:cA 
 
 Book___^S_^ 
 
pR. Ei^^RS. 
 
 iOURBON 
 
 The »llRGEINTHE 
 
 INES. 
 
 By PROF, YATES SNOWDEN, 
 
 OF SOUTH CAROLINA COLLEGE. 
 
 The Keowe« Courier Presses, 
 
 Walh»Ua» S. C. 
 
 1906 
 
HE 
 
 lOURBON 
 
 The MilRGEINTHE 
 
 INES. 
 
 By PROF. YATES SNOWDEN, 
 
 OF SOUTH CAROLINA COLLEGE. 
 
 The Keowee Courier Presses, 
 
 WalhalU, S. C. 
 
 1906 
 

 ''Lest Wc Forget. 
 
 ft 
 
 The ** Bourbon " was first published in the ** South- 
 ern Bivouac/' Nashville^ in September, 1886, and two 
 editions subsequently in Charleston, S» C» 
 
 The ^^ Dirge in the Pines'' first appeared in The 
 (Charleston) News and Courier in December, J 889, on 
 the occasion of the death of President Jefferson Davis, 
 the friend and political disciple of Honorable John C, 
 Calhoun, of South Carolina. 
 
 These earlier editions have been long out of print 
 and this more elaborate united publication is intended 
 to supply a renewed inquiry for copies. 
 
 Amicus. 
 Newry, S. C, 
 
 New Year's Day, 1906. 
 
The Carolina Bourbon* 
 
 W. M. R(18J2-19020 
 
 Ridiculous to some may seem 
 
 Thifi relic of the old regime, 
 
 So rudely wakened from his dream 
 
 Of high ambition, 
 A heart of nature^s noblest mould, 
 By honor tempered and controlled — 
 Oh ! look not in a soul so bold 
 
 For mock contrition ! 
 
 For, when the die of war was cast. 
 And through the land the bugle blast 
 Called to arms from first to last, 
 
 For Carolina, 
 Careless of what might be his fate. 
 He gave his all to save the State ; 
 He thought, thinks now (strange to relate). 
 
 No cause diviner. 
 
Of name and lineage proud, he bore 
 The character 'mongst rich and poor 
 Which marks now, as in days of yore, 
 
 The Huguenot. 
 Two hundred slaves were in his train, 
 Six thousand acres broad domain. 
 (His ancestors in fair Touraine 
 
 Had no such lot.) 
 
 He loved and wooed in early days ; 
 She died — and he her memory pays 
 The highest tribute — for, with ways 
 
 And views extreme, 
 He, 'gainst stern facts and common sense, 
 To the whole sex (to all intents). 
 Transferred the love and reverence 
 
 Of life's young dream. 
 
Perhaps too easy life he led — 
 Four hours afield, and ten abed, 
 His other time he talked and read, 
 
 Or else made merry 
 With many a planter friend to dine, 
 His health to drink in rare old wine — 
 Madeira, which thrice crossed the line. 
 
 And gold-leaf Sherry* 
 
 And here was mooted many a day, 
 The question on which each gourmet 
 Throughout the parish had his say : 
 
 ''Which is the best, 
 Santee or Cooper River bream ? " 
 Alas ! the evening star grew dim. 
 Ere any guest agreed with him. 
 
 Or he with guest* 
 
 * 
 
The war rolled on, and many a friend 
 And kinsman, whom he helped to send 
 Their homes and country to defend, 
 
 Home ne^er returned. 
 What harder lot could now befall ! 
 Threats could not bend nor woes appall ; 
 Unmoved, he saw his Fathers^ hall 
 
 To ashes burned. 
 
 And now to live within his means. 
 He dons his gray Kentucky jeans. 
 (His dress, in other times and scenes. 
 
 Was drap d^ete. 
 His hat is much the worse for wear ; 
 His shoes revamped from year to year. 
 For ** calfskin boots are all too dear,^* 
 
 We hear him say. 
 
So life drags on as in a trance, 
 No emigre of stricken France, 
 No Jacobite of old romance 
 
 Of sterner mould. 
 His fortune gone, his rights denied ; 
 For him the Federal Union died, 
 When o'er Virginia's line the tide 
 
 Of battle rolled. 
 
 ** Loyal je serai durant ma vie/' 
 So runs his motto. What cares he 
 For the flag that flies from sea to sea 
 
 And tops the world ? 
 Within the silence of his gates 
 Death's welcome shadow he awaits. 
 Still true to those Confederate States 
 
 Whose flag is furled. 
 
 — Yates Snowden. 
 
The Dirge in the Pines* 
 
 Mr, Daniel Ravenel, chairman of the committee of 
 twenty-five citizens^ who^ in Aprils 1850, brought the 
 body of Mr. Calhoun from Washington to Charleston, 
 in his eloquent report of the journey says : 
 
 '^To these more formal tributes were added other 
 testimoniak less imposing, but not less touching. At 
 several small places along the road the discharge of 
 cannon was the manifestation of respect. As we passed 
 a farm near Wilmington, N. C, the owner, an elderly 
 man, stood at the roadside uncovered, his right hand 
 resting on a small pine, hung with emblems of mourn- 
 ing, with his two servants standing behind him, also 
 uncovered. And a short time before this a distant bell 
 had sounded the modest tribute of a rural neighborhood, 
 where no assemblage was seen.'^ 
 
 The death of Mr. Davis, Mr. Calhoun^s ablest and 
 most ardent disciple, elicted many like touching tributes^ 
 not only in Virginia and North and South Carolina, 
 
10 
 
 bat throughout the Southein Stales. Perhaps the most 
 pathetic incident of the day in South Carolina was the 
 tolling of bells in the old Episcopal church of Pineville. 
 
 The tribute was rendered by one who believes the 
 Constitutional Union died when McDowell marched 
 on Richmond, and whose worldly hopes were crushed 
 when Lee surrendered at Appomattox. He has been 
 written of in verse as '*The Bourbon/^ and college 
 sophomores would speak of him as ultimus Romano- 
 rum; but his striking individuality, high character, 
 intelligence and patriotic ardor command the respect 
 and admiration of all who have the honor of his friend- 
 ship, or the privilege of his acquaintance. He lives in 
 what was formerly the ^'overseer's house" on his plan- 
 tation. His ancestrial home was put to the torch by 
 order of General Hartwell, while he, surrounded by 
 negro soldiery, with fixed bayonets, was compelled to 
 witness its destruction. 
 
 So much for the man ; his name matters not ; his 
 friends will recognize even as poor a pen picture as 
 this, for his family name has been ** the synonym for 
 honor and integrity in South Carolina since the Revo- 
 cation of the Edict of Nantes,'' and his own name has 
 not been absent from the Council Rolls of the State, 
 though it seldom appears in the ** personal " column of 
 a newspaper. 
 
n 
 
 He lives seven milec f t'om Plneville» once ** the Me- 
 tropolis of St, Stephens/^ and the summer home of 
 many of the rich planters of what was once the richest 
 parish of the State, outside of Charleston, The story 
 of the rise and fall of Pineville has been charmingly 
 told by the late Prof. F. A. Porcher, and is familiar to 
 many of the readers of The News and Courier. Three 
 or four dwellings, a church built by the planters early 
 in the century, and some chimneys, which mark the 
 sites of the old club house and the many private resi- 
 dences burned by Federal troops, arc all that remain of 
 the dead village. 
 
 Its very name Vv ill possibly pass away with the gen- 
 eration, for the United States Government has, with 
 unconscious sarcasm, changed the name of the post 
 office from Pineville to '^Crawl,^' as if to typify its slow 
 progress from Reconstruction to destruction. The 
 church has not been opened for many years, and it is 
 whispered that on the last occasion of divine service 
 within its walls, **The Bourbon'' read the prayers, and 
 the lady who composed the choir with one companion, 
 formed the congregation. 
 
 Three families, consisting cf the descendants of the 
 first rector of the church, a worthy Northern gentleman, 
 who has settled in the neighborhood since the war, 
 and a quintette of sterling young men of the name and 
 
i 
 
 12 
 
 blood of Marion, constitute the white inhabitants oi ihc 
 once populous Pineville. 
 
 Many negroes, more or less respectable, live in the 
 village, their shanties and ^'patches'^ covering the sites 
 of the dwellings of their former masters. The church 
 building is going to decay, and in a few years, if not 
 now, the traveller passing this old sanctuary to the 
 shattered tomb of Francis Marion, six miles further on, 
 will see 
 
 ^^The bat and owl repose 
 Where once the people knelt. 
 And the high Te Deum rose/* 
 
 It was upon such a scene and such a community 
 that, through the lofty pines, the sunshine of the Uth 
 of December burst all glorious. At mid-day, when the 
 funeral ceremonies of Jefferson Davis were in progress 
 in New Orleans, the bell of the little church tolled as it 
 never tolled before. A dead church in a dead village 
 has no sexton, and when the astonished villagers gath- 
 ered around the porch they found there ** The Bour- 
 bon,'' an old man of three score years and ten, ringing 
 the funeral knell, and paying thus the last tribute he 
 could offer to the loved leader of the Lost Cause. — 
 Yates Snowden. in The News and Courier. January 
 13th, 1890. 
 
 0* 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
 I lllli til nil iiiiiii"' "•'•"•'"'■"■' •■ 
 014 496 224 2 ^