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Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
 in 2010 with funding from 
 
 University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/rebelsdaughterstOOwoer 
 
THE 
 
 REBEL'S DAUGHTER 
 
 A STORY OF LOVE, POLITICS 
 AND WAR 
 
 B Y 
 
 J. G. WOERNER 
 
 Illustrated by E G Witter. 
 
 BOSTON, MASS.: 
 
 LITTLE, BROWN & CO. 
 
 PUBLISHERS. 
 
 1899. 
 
Copyright, 1899, 
 By J. G. WOERNER. 
 
 Press of 
 
 Nixon ■ JoHi's Printing Co., 
 
 St. Louis. 
 
To Mrs. Rust] Canqpbell Owen, of Springfield, Mis- 
 souri— wl^o sf^ares tf|e aiitfior's recollecttoris 
 of May Meadows - tf|is volUrr\e is 
 respectfully dedicated. 
 
 Sf. Loin's. Noremher, ISUU. 
 
 5;24199 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PART FIRST. 
 LOVE'S YOUNG DREAM. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. A Lesson in Woodcraft 1 
 
 II, One of the F. F. V. out West .... 17 
 
 III. A Western Town and its Rival Stores . . 36 
 
 IV". Bunkum: Mercantile and Literary ... 50 
 
 V. A Peep at the " Peculiar " Institution . . 66 
 
 VI. Literary Culture in the Backwoods ... 83 
 
 VII. A Candidate in a Quandary *J9 
 
 VIII. Barbecue and Spread Eagle 118 
 
 IX. Post-Prandial Plotting 140 
 
 X. Before the C4rand Inquest 156 
 
 XI. -Justice Seasoned with Politics 168 
 
 XII. The Genesis of Public Opinion . . , . 181 
 
 XIII. Sovereigns in Primordial Quale .... 193 
 
 XIV. A New Departure 212 
 
 XV. Awakening from Love's Young Dream . . 229 
 
 PART SECOND. 
 DEMOCRACY DIVIDED AGAINST ITSELF. 
 
 XVI. Gambrinus Under a Cloud 250 
 
 XVII. From our Washington Correspondent . . 267 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 XVIII. The Philosophy of Carving 276 
 
 XIX. The Ever New Old Story 21)4 
 
 XX. Shadows of Coming Events in a Sanctum . 314 
 
 XXI. How the Machine is Worked 323 
 
 XXII. Deniocracv in Convention 340 
 
 XX III. Too Late 357 
 
 XXIV. Private and Confidential 377 
 
 XXV. Storm-clouds in the Horizon 4H'.» 
 
 XXVI. Magnetism — Repellant and Attractional . 403 
 
 XXVII. Philosophers at Tea 420 
 
 XXVIII. " The Demos Krateo Principle " . . . 431 
 
 XXIX. The fiat of King Caucus 447 
 
 XXX. Cruel Conscience tricking Cupid .... 4fi7 
 
 PART THIRD. 
 
 DEMOCRACY RUN WILD. 
 
 XXXI. A Cataleptic Government 481 
 
 XXXII. The Torpor Broken 494 
 
 XXXIII. The War Fever in a Western Town . . . 513 
 
 XXXIV. After the Battle 530 
 
 XXXV. Friends and Foes 555 
 
 XXXVI. A Study in Black and White .... 5(;it 
 
 XXXVII. Confessions and Confidings 5H4 
 
 XXXVIII. Judge and Advocate 5!»7 
 
 XXXIX. Justice at the Drum-head •■'12 
 
 XL. A Wooer's Wile <i'^l 
 
 XLI. The Tester Tested . . .• <>41» 
 
 XLII. Cupid's Counter Coup *'*>'^ 
 
CONTENTS. vii 
 
 t'HAPTKH PA(iK 
 
 XLIII. Glimpses of War (ii»0 
 
 XLIV. A Rebel Doctor 710 
 
 XLV. Sisters and Brothers I'^tl 
 
 XLVI. Before the Dawn . . . . . . . ' . 74H 
 
 XLVII. After the War 757 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 Opposite Pagk 
 
 So he stepped boldly forward and seized the dainty fingers 14 
 
 There stood Victor with downcast eyes 74 
 
 " Yoii are a liar! " Victor hurled back 95 
 
 ' ' Apologize — to him ? To this greenhorn Dutchman ? " 113 
 
 " You think you can leave my pony behind? " . . . 124 
 
 The speech of the colonel created the wildest enthusiasm. 137 
 ' ' I trust that your Honor may excuse my unceremonious 
 
 intrusion here." 177 
 
 "Whither bound, gentlemen both? " 188 
 
 "Faithful fiddlesticks! " Leslie spoke up .... 244 
 " Do you know, Mr. May, that you are hardly a stranger 
 
 to me? " 257 
 
 Prof. Rauhenfels favored the company with a loquacious 
 
 dissertation on the art of carving 282 
 
 Leslie closely watching her, she placed the paper on the 
 
 rack, and began to sing 311 
 
 " There! " he said, holding out the paper to his visitor, 
 
 " What do you say to that ? " 344 
 
 He gazed into her face with unfeigned tenderness . . 367 
 
 " But what are we going to do with these bouquets? " . 41!> 
 
 The venerable senator bowed with courtly grace . . . 442 
 "Well, my young friend," said the colonel to Victor, 
 
 " you have not answered my question " . . . . 4(il 
 Nellie saw what for a moment filled her with superstitious 
 
 fear 548 
 
 And before the word ' ' fire ' ' was uttered she stood in front 
 
 of the muskets leveled at her brother 560 
 
 "Cressie! Is that the young lady's name? " . . . 576 
 Victor had addressed the last few remarks singly to Col. 
 
 Scheffel 630 
 
 Pauline, kneeling by the bedside, took one of his hands 
 
 in both her own 72i* 
 
 " Soul of my life, why grudge me the sweetness of the 
 
 admission? " 740 
 
THE 
 
 REBEL'S DAUGHTER 
 
 A Story of Love, Politics and War. 
 
 PART FIRST: 
 LOVE'S YOUNG DREAM. 
 
 J. 
 A LESSON IN WOODCRAFT. 
 
 IfN ante-belluui days a heavily-laden t'reight-wagon rolled 
 I along the great State-road api)roaching Brookfield from 
 
 ■ the East. The road over the mountains was rough in 
 mountainous parts, not without steep acclivities ; and in the 
 valleys, after rains, and during heavy thaws, the mud, both 
 deep and tenacious, at times offered serious impediment to 
 locomotion, requiring power in the draft animals and skill in 
 their handhng to avoid tedious delays. 
 
 On that bright summer day, however, the stately six horses 
 drew the wagon, heavily freighted as it was, with perfect ease 
 along the level stretch of road across Kickapoo Prairie, (xuided 
 by a cunning hand, the well-conditioned animals stepped 
 nimbly forward. Equipped with whip ;unl line, the driver 
 bestrode the saddle-horse, not without a boorish dignity : the 
 consciousness of sovereign sway over that powerful, thoroughly 
 trained team, obeying the slightest touch of the line, imparted 
 
 (1) 
 
2 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 to his otherwise' stolid ft'aturcs :i oleaiii of iiiti'llii;eiHH'. Nor 
 woiihl Ills weathiT-taiuicMl face and coinpact. WL'U-kiiit frame 
 compare unfavorably with the lank, gawky youth who sat 
 behind him on the waoon-board. havino- sought shelter there, 
 undei' the wa^'on cover, from the fervid rays of the sun. 
 
 The ])aleness of the latter's Itoyish face betrayed that little 
 of sunshine had hitherto fallen to his lot. llis forehead riv- 
 alled in whiteness the drillinii' witii which the wa^on was cov- 
 ered and which, bleached by the alternate rain and shine of 
 byoone years, encompassed him like an aureole. But — alas 
 for the I'oinancel — the picture could not in truth be calle(l a 
 charminu' one: to a supt-rlicial oi)server not even pathetic. 
 What it mulely |)roclaime(l of past privation and unsatislied 
 lonoing miyht be uottMltoa caicfiil ol)S('r\-ei' ol human nature; 
 not at all, lor instance, to Ihe uusophisticaled It'anisler on \]\v 
 saddle-horse. 
 
 Hut then he on the wayon-ltoard posed not for a picture. 
 He revelled in bliss, for the moment unalloyed. Care and 
 worry he had left behind in the city from which he had escaped. 
 In contrast with the weariness of mind and Ixxly lu'ousiiit on 
 by incessant toil, the sense of rest and peace to which he now 
 abandoned himself ))e<'ame douldy deliijhtfnl. . Sweet to him 
 was the fragrance of o-mss and the perfume of llowei's wafted 
 on the soft breeze that caressed his face. The profound soli- 
 tude was enhanced rather than disturbed by the drowsy creak- 
 ing of the wagon-longue ; the buzzing of insects, and the rustling 
 of grass : the scampering of a timid hare aci'Oss the road, or the 
 circling of a hawk in dizzy height overhead intensified rather 
 than disturbed the restful, silent solitude. 
 
 It was a lovely day. ( )ne of those perfect days of Spring or 
 early Summer, of which the climate of the Southwest, delight- 
 ing to rush from raw wintry blasts into enervating Slimmer 
 sultriness, is usually so sparing. Densely blue the sky above, 
 relieved here and there l)y fleecy clouds, soft and white, like 
 cotton bursting from its boll; bright the Kickapoo Prairie in 
 festi\(' garb below. The jiiicv green of grass and herbs liut 
 
 m 
 
A LESSON IN WOUDCBAFr. 3 
 
 brighteued the glow aud color of tlie wild Uoweis with which 
 the prairie was studded. A playful zephyr teases now the 
 laughiug blossoms, now the waving grass, until, thrilled with 
 iiis wanton caresses, the verdant blades and blushing blossoms 
 dance in merry glee. Swelling anon into mischievous mood, 
 he lashes them in turn, and they boAv their heads and toss 
 about coni2)lainingly, changing the smiling prairie into a surg- 
 ing ocean of verdure. And through it all winds the dusty 
 yellow road, not unlike a gigantic serpent lazily basking in the 
 sun, hiding here behind some tall bush or shrub, or slinking 
 away there out of sight in following a depression in the ground ; 
 but always emerging again into the sunshine until it finally 
 disappears in the distant forest that closes in the prairie. 
 
 But Yahkop, the autocrat of whip and line, is serenely indif- 
 ferent to tlie genial mood of the weather. Tlie charms that 
 deligiit ills young friend on the wagoH-))oar(I have a soporific 
 effect upon him only. 'Die landscape, so ciiarniiiig in its love- 
 liness to his young companion, is to liini of wearisome monot- 
 ony. The hununing of insects and the rustling of leaves and 
 grassblades become a lullaby, to which the measured pace of 
 the horses marks time. Unconsciously he nods in response to 
 the step of his saddle-horse, as if the two held mysterious con- 
 verse, betokening wonderful unanimity by continual nodding 
 of tlieir heads. 
 
 Now Victor, the young man in the wagon, thought highly of 
 the capabilities of his friend. To doubt this friend's infalli- 
 bility as an hostler would have seemed to him rank treason. 
 But the remarkable uniformity of the motion of the respective 
 heads of Yahko]) and tiie horse he was riding bi'ought a smile 
 to his lips ; for, as the former bowed lower and lower, and was 
 then suddenly jerked up, only to repeat the l)obbing. l)owing 
 and jerking, again aud again, he could not ignore the convic- 
 tion that the redoubtable teamster was dozing on his lofty 
 saddle-throne. But i)resently his smile of amusement gave 
 way to an expectant mien. Was not liere the opportunity to 
 uratifv his lonii-chci'ishcd anibilion to drive tliis o]oi-i<nis team 
 
4 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 of six all bv liiiiist'll'r He (k'tonniiu'd lo try liis luck: Yahkop 
 could })ut refuse or at the woi-st lecture liiui for his audacity. 
 So, summouing the reiiuisite couraue. he spoke up : 
 
 '' Yahkop I " {\\\ faultless Kuolish his name ought to have 
 tteeu Jacob or even .Tanu's ; but those who knew liim well pre- 
 ferred to call him, in deference to his (German nativity and 
 broad brogue, as he had been called in the fatherland.) 
 " Yahko]) ! (4et into the wagon nnd sleep! Come: let me 
 drive." 
 
 At the U'-st sound ot \'ictor"s \<tici'. Yahkop suddenly 
 assumed a bolt upright position and cracked his whij) with w 
 vehemence that started his horses into a lively trot. Then he 
 turned, with a lyriskness (juite unusual in him. toward his com- 
 panion, and laughed. His voice, ordinarily of baritone pitch, 
 on this occasion assumed a shrill tre))le calcidated to demon- 
 strate the a) (surdity of :tny suspicion that he might have l)een 
 caught napping. •• \'hat r "" he said. ■• yon vill drihfe? " 
 
 " Yes," the young man spoke uj) eagei'ly. •• You get into 
 the wagon and sleep. I will drive for yon." 
 
 A pause. The teamster pondered deeply the singular ])ropo- 
 sition of his young friend. Then. " Hut you don't ken drihfe," 
 he said. 
 
 " Oh, yes, 1 can," the youth replied, parading a confidence 
 which he did not feel. '' 1 have seen you at it so often, that it 
 would be funny if I could not do it too." 
 
 Another pause and a dubious shake of the head. " I dou't 
 b'lief you ken drihfe," he grumbled, rather to himself, how- 
 ever. Presently a cunning expression spread over his physi- 
 ognomy, as he turned t<i his comrade and asked: " Veil, how 
 you mek tshee ? ' ' 
 
 " Gee? " Victor repeated in blank astonishment. •• What 
 is gee ? ' ' 
 
 Yahkop enjoyed the success of his shrewd expedient im- 
 mensely. ''Ho hoi " he laughed, ''you vill drihfe, und 
 don't ken mek tshei' I " Then he continued his catechising : 
 " I'ud how you mek hah? 
 
A f.HSSO.V I\ WOOlJChWFT. ^ 
 
 But the youth was auaiii drivcu to coutess his io-norance. and 
 auain the cuiiiiiuii- ti'anister vojoicecl. After a brief pause he 
 inquired: •■ \'ell, how you mek de hosses go riji'ht? " 
 
 •■ I know I " was tlie eao-er rejily. -'You give two jerks 
 with the line, and tiie lead iiorsc will turn to the I'iiiht." 
 
 " Hni — yahs. ish sol "' saiil Yahkop. nodding oravely. 
 •• Uud how you mek de hosses o-o left? 
 
 •' This way.'" |)roni|)tly responded \'ietor. ilhistratiuii- the 
 motion with arm and hand. •• Yon pull the line steadily until 
 the leader has turned as far to the left as you want him.'" 
 
 "■ Hm, yahs," with much nodding. " You pull mit der 
 line, uud dat ish tshee : uud you tsherk mit der line, uud dat 
 ish hah." And the ignoranee of Victor as to so simple a 
 matter as gee and hah struck him as so funny, that he gave 
 vent to a renewed lit of laughter, emphasizing his own superior 
 knowledge by adding: " Und you vill drihfe uud don't ken 
 mek tshee und hah I I'nd yon l)een longer in dis kundree 
 OSS 1 ! " 
 
 '• But one does not learn such things in a city, at least not 
 in a bake shop." The answer came in tones of regret, as if 
 Victor wished to apologize for his lamentable ignorance. 
 
 '• Uud you don't ken learn it in der shcool. too." said Yah- 
 kop. mollified by Victor's apologetic voice. •• Ven you will 
 lern somedings, you must do it. Ven you lerus it in der 
 shcool, you don't ken do it." 
 
 '• But I have not been to school much, either," Victor 
 enlightened his friend. "Three or four years, hardly: and 
 in a public school, at that." 
 
 •• Plenty shcool fur der packwoots." was Yahkop's opinion, 
 emphatically expressed. •• Und more oss der packwoots 
 beeple got, vhat ve vill see." With this he vacated his saddle. 
 and said, beckoning the young man to mount. •■ now show how 
 you ken drihfe." 
 
 Victor complied with alacrity, leaping from his seat to the 
 tongue of the wagon, and climbing thence into the saddle. He 
 took whip and line in either hand, and prepared to show off. 
 
b THE UEUKL'S DAUL^UTEll. 
 
 Nothing could be easier ; tlie excellently trained animals 
 obeyed as readily, as if a more experienced hand had hold of 
 the line. He turned to the right, then to the left; he brought 
 the horses to a halt, and started them again — just as the 
 skeptical teamster demanded. The latter seemed well [)leased 
 with the result of the investigation, and prepared to retire 
 into the interior of the wagon, to seek Avhat comfort he might 
 upon the boxes and barrels composing the freight. 
 
 P^irst, however, he strictly charged the iieAvly installed driver 
 to be very careful in the handling of the horses. " 1 let you 
 drihfe, now," he said in a soleniu voice. " Und you teks 
 care — uudershtand ^ Und you don't mek no foolishness mit 
 der bosses — undershtand? You drihfes shteddy : und you 
 looks on der road, und you don't vi}) der bosses — under- 
 shtand r Und ven, in 'bout a' hour odder dree quarter, der 
 hill gums, odder veu somedings else gums, und you don't 
 undershtand, you shtops, und lioUcr nie — underslitand ? 
 Now, drihfe on I " 
 
 Of course, A'ictor readily |)n)niisc<l lull conipliauce witli all 
 that was (leuiandi'd of him. for he burned witli anxiety to as- 
 sume su|)reme conunand of the glorious team. All went well. 
 Proud as a king, — happier, perchance — he sat on his leather 
 throne, flourishing his whip for a scepter and ruling his ol)e- 
 dient subjects by means of the line with sovereign caprice. 
 Well might the sober leader be puzzled, why he was not per- 
 mitted to keep eitlier tlie right or the left, or yet the middle of 
 the road, but nuist descril)e a zigzag between the two sides: 
 he obeyed with stolid indifference each contradictory command 
 as conveyed to him by the magic line, and kept his peace, as 
 became a loyal subject. In like, manner the other horses 
 followed their leader; and even Uncas, the faithful watchdog, 
 trotted serenely alongside, with lolling tongue, not even a wag 
 of his tail betraying astonishment at the new ruler in the 
 saddle. 
 
 When the team had reached the conttnes of the prairie, the 
 road became narrower, and shorter curves appeared. This 
 
.1 ij'jssox /x W()()/)(/:.\Fr. / 
 
 gave \'ict()r new pli'iismr ; lor wliiU' he li.-id liitlicilo loiiud no 
 oecasion lo use citluT line or \vhi|), tlic lioi'scs now must 1h' 
 guided, to avoid bad pliuH's in the road, or liciv and tlu'ic a 
 stump projecting into it. iciidi-ring necessary the use not only 
 of the line. Imt nlso of tiu' bridle of tiie horse lu- \v:is liding. 
 Yahkop was still snoring lustily, when \'ictor peiceived what 
 appeared to him tolte si stee]) declivity of the road, and regret- 
 fully prepared to alxlicMte his l»rief authority. Hut he soon 
 discovered that the descent was not nearly so steej) as he had 
 at first imagined. He hesitnted : the road was in good con- 
 dition: the horses had hitherto promptly responded to every 
 indication given with the line — Avhat need was there to dis- 
 tnrl) his comrade's sAveet sluml)er? 
 
 While he was still hesitating, the horses had reached the 
 brow of the declivity, and stood suddenly still, of their OAvn 
 accord. What did this mean? ^'ictor was puzzled. He i"e- 
 memliered that Yahkop had sometimes permitted the horses to 
 rest at particularly I'ough places of the road: but that had 
 always l)een when traveling np hill, and the horses, just now- 
 seemed hardlv tired. Again he was nboiit to cnll on Yidikop. 
 and again he hesitated and timidly signalled the animals to 
 start. But he was more than ever surprised by the promjjf- 
 ness with which tlu'v olieved and the vigor with which they 
 pulled. The im[)etus they imparted to the wagon wns so for- 
 cible, that the rear horses were jnished into a brisk trot, and 
 the whole team accelerated their pace. The descent was gained 
 in a brief inoment, and \'ictor, really frighteneil now. called 
 frantically on the teamster for hel[). 
 
 When Yahkop. I'oused by the cries, scraml)le(l to the front 
 of the wagon, the whole team was rushing down hill with alarm- 
 ing speed. •• Lick der ol'f-hoss^an hart lick 1 "' he cried in a 
 voice of thnnder; for his ex])erienced eye detected dtinger in a 
 direction not visible to Victoi'. 
 
 So impressive and urgent weri' Yahkop's lone and manner. 
 that Victor was spurred into innnediate action. Unfortunately, 
 he had not the remotest idea which was the off-horse : but it was 
 
8 THE EEBKL'S DAI UHTEH. 
 
 evident lo him that lie wns expected to strike a blow, and so 
 lie sti'iiek at random, and il lell on the saddle-horse. 
 
 Tile effect was disastrous. N'ictor had used the wliip witli 
 vio-or, if not with judgment, and caused the horse wliich he 
 was riding to make a sndcU'n leap forward, which Yahko]) liad 
 intended the other horse to make, and thus precipitated the 
 catastrophe which the teamster had meant to avert. There 
 was a crash. The wagon-tongue was hurled to the right with 
 such violence as to dash both the rear horses to the ground, 
 and Victor was flung headlong out on the road. 
 
 Yahkop had leaped from the wagon with astonishing celerity 
 and assisted the fallen horses to regain their feet. They snorted 
 and tri'iiililed with fear: hut his (juick eye soon assured him 
 that they had sustained no serious injury. A few caresses and 
 soothing expressions sufficed to quiet them. The other horses 
 had stood still of their own accord, and neither they nor the 
 wagon showed any indication of damage. Having satisfied 
 himself in this respect, Yahkop found time to look around for 
 the unlucky youth, who stood there the picture of consterna- 
 tion and anxiety, his clothes covered with dust, surveying the 
 contusion produced Ity his imprudence. For him, the irate 
 teamsti'r had neither caresses nor sootiiing words. His eyes 
 l)lazed with wi'ath. He was angered l)eyond measure at the 
 thoughtlessness of the boy, and at the flagrant violation of the 
 l)eremptory orders he had given him : his wrath heightened not 
 a little by the consciousness of his own imprudence in com- 
 mitting the team to the inexperienced hands of the young lad. 
 He sought relief for his overcharged feelings in a Ihxxl of 
 invectives sucli as \'ictor had never listened to before. 
 
 '• Vy in Dunder you lick der sattle-hoss ven I tells you lick 
 der off-lioss. hey?" he burst out. •• You don't ken der off- 
 hoss, hey r und you don't ken der sattle-hoss? " 
 
 Victor was disarmed. He stood with downcast eyes, saying 
 not a word in defense or justification. 
 
 "• Und vy in Dunder you don't holler me ven der hill gums. 
 lie\- ? " he continued savagelv. •■ Don't I tell you, holler me 
 
A A/;.S'6'0.V IN WOUDLHAFr. 'J 
 
 veil (lev hill onms, hey? I'lid vy in DuikIcm- you don't shtop. 
 nnd holler ine ven der hill oiinis ? " 
 
 A olow of shame eolored Victor's cheeks. He felt the 
 rebuke to be just, and had nothincr to say. 
 
 •• I'nd vy in Dunder you drihfe down der hill niit a owick- 
 ness like you vill o() to der hell, hey? Mit six hosses und 
 tiftig huudert pound in der vaggen. hey? Und vy in Dunder 
 you drihfe down der hill und got no shoes on, hey? " 
 
 " Shoes? " Victor inquired in utter bewilderment, casting a 
 wondering glance at the covering of his feet, and then at his 
 interlocutor. 
 
 "• Yahs, shoes! " thundered the teamster. '' Vy you don't 
 put der shoes on ven you drihfe down der hill mit fiftig hundert 
 pound in der vaggen? " 
 
 " But I had my shoes on," said Victor, in meek astonish- 
 ment at this strange accusation. 
 
 '' Your shoes! " screamed Yahkop, a curious mingling of 
 anger, sarcasm and amusement working in his features. 
 •'Who talks 'liout yovr shoes! I don't talk 'bout yovr 
 shoes; I talk 'bout der vaggen shoes, der lock-shoes — desf 
 shoes! " And he pointed to the irons hanging on either side 
 of the wagon, attached to strong chains, and intended to serve 
 as drags in descending steep places, at the same time locking the 
 hind wheels and protecting the tires against ruinous friction. 
 
 A sudden gleam of light burst in upon the bcAvildered boy. 
 This, then, was the secret why the sagacious animals had 
 halted on the brow of the descent, —they had meant to give 
 him time t*) lock the wheels : and he had so stupidly failed to 
 understand them. This, too, explained their vigorous pull on 
 starting again ! He felt deeply humiliated. But he must not 
 permit Yahkop to believe that he had wantonly invited the 
 danger. " I did not believe the descent to be either steep or 
 long," he said meekly. •• And I forgot about locking the 
 wheels." 
 
 " Yahs! " growled the teamster, •• you tingks you drihfe a 
 babv-vaggen mit ooats f)n :i waxt floor I " 
 
10 THE llEHKi:^ DAUGIITEIL 
 
 Presently he continued in a nioie moderate voice, "' Now you 
 I'un der vag^en in der mire, now you j)ull 'iin out I " 
 
 Yahkop examined the .situation. The waaou had l)een run 
 against an oak of consideral)k' size, hy tliat unlucky lick given 
 to tlic wrong liorsc. and \\\v iiuestion Mas liow to get clear of 
 it. It was wedged in hi'twccii the right lore-wheel and tiie 
 tongue, and so violent liad lieen the collision, that the trace- 
 chains had snapped like glass. ■• \'liat ve go do now ? " he 
 asked witli a scowl. 
 
 \'ictoi- coidd give no ini'orniation. The striking I'esults of 
 his skill in driving had quite exhausted his scanty stock of 
 self-assurance. Nevertheless, since an answer was evidently 
 expected of him, he timidly suggested : *• Could we not hitch 
 the horses on Itehind and haul away tlie wagon? " 
 
 '"Vliatl Putt der vaggen liefore der hoss ? Ain't you 
 shmart I " said Vahko]), with profound contempt. But lie 
 nevei'theiess walked straightway to the rear, as if to ascertain 
 the feasil)ility of the plan suggested. An emphatic shaking of 
 the head soon sliowed liis companion that it found no favor in 
 Yahko|)'s eyes. ■• Der hosses don't ken ])ull l»ehind." he 
 announced, and walked round to the front again, wiiere the 
 pi'ospect was equally unpromising. 
 
 ^' Could we not unload the goods, and then draw away the 
 empty wagon? " Victor once more ventured to intimate. 
 
 The answer came i)romi)tly, and quite as Victor had expected. 
 " Yaiis," the teamster sneered, " mehliy ve trow out der goots. 
 I'nd who go trow 'em in again den? You go trow a hoxett in 
 der vago'en uiit half tousend pound? You eat moi'e ]iacon 
 und corn-bret fust, ven yon do dat." 
 
 " Some people may ])ass. wlio will he willing to help us," 
 ^'ictor suggested. 
 
 '•You shust vissle fur 'em 1 " Yahkoj) gi'owled. He had 
 not yet recovered his temper. 
 
 Victor ventiiretl no more suggestions. •■ If only that tree 
 were out of the way I " lie sighed, in hoj)eless dejection. 
 
 •• Dunderation I " cried Yahkop: ''dat ish der ting. Ven 
 
^1 LESSON IN WOODCRAFT. H 
 
 (ler vago\'ii (.loii't ou out dcr tree's vay. den der tice li'o oiil der 
 vaggen's vay. Ken aou cliop niit der axt ? 
 
 Yalikoj)".-; voiee had sounded so much less aerinionious. thai 
 \'ietor felt orcntly relievi-d. Adniittinu' that he had never done 
 any work in tliat line, he tliouiilil that he could easily do it. 
 and inquired eauvrly whether lu- was to chop down the tree. 
 
 A curious expression llitte<l across Yahkop's face. II was 
 not a "■enuine smile, nor even a i>rin. that found lodi>inent in 
 it : hut a sly. tliouoh not ill-natured suo-oestion of triumph 
 disj)laced the ano-ry scowl that had hitherto dwelt there. 
 •■ Yahs,"" he said. ■• <iit dev axt and choj) down der dree. I'nd 
 don't you oo do it too ywick." 
 
 Victor went to work Avith great alacrity. Ilioh he swuiio; 
 the ax. and weiuhty lilows he struck the doomed oak. Deep 
 in the trunk he Imried the *ilitterino- Idade, so that it cost him 
 quite an effort to dislodoe it after every hlow. But it required 
 many strokes l)efore he even chipped off a piece of l>ark : he- 
 cause he never struck twice at the same place. Pausino-. pres- 
 ently, to wipe the persj)iration from his face, he was dismaye<l 
 to lind what little in'ogress hi' had made. Yahkop watched him 
 complacently. Finally, a broad grin liohted up his face as he 
 said. •• (tuui. Fictor. let me try. You ken drihfe more better 
 OSS chop drees. You chop so o-wick, oss a new dree grows u[) 
 before dis dree falls down." 
 
 Ashamed of his lack of skill in even so rude an accomjilish- 
 ment as chopping trees. Victor yielded the ax as readily as he 
 had taken it uj), and his sturdy comrade went to work with a will. 
 He had better success; the chips tlew merrily in all directions. 
 But the oak against which he essayed his power was a stately 
 tree. More than a hundred snnnners had contributed to its 
 groAvth : the storms of more than a hnntlred winters had wrestled 
 with it, achieving no greater things against it, than to despoil 
 it of its annual cro[» of leaves and acorns. And very soon 
 Yahkop, too, ])ansed in his work, to breathe and wipe his fore- 
 head, and to look with dismay upon the insignilicance of the 
 work he had accomplished. 
 
12 THK REBEL'S DAVGHTKU. 
 
 Before he resumed, the rumlih^ of an approaching vehick' 
 was heard, which soon emerged from the woods and proved to 
 be a light and elegant, though strongly built traveling wagon, 
 drawn liy a span of line horses. The reins were in the hands 
 of a rather tall, somewhat sparely built man of middle age, 
 who occupied the front seat. Another ligure was discernible 
 in the interior of the wagon, but so deeply shaded by the 
 leather covering of the vehicle, that Victor could not plainly 
 make it out. Having reached the scene of Victor's late exploit, 
 the gentleman halted his horses and exclaimed : 
 
 '" Why halloo, friend Yahkop ! What in the world are you 
 doing here? You don't mean to camp so early in the day? " 
 
 •* No, Kernel May," said Yahkop laconically. '' Not ven 
 I not must." 
 
 ''Aha I " cried the stranger, whom Yahkop addressed as 
 Colonel May. •■ 1 see what is up. You have run against a 
 tree? " 
 
 " Y'ahs," the teamster admitted, with an indifferent attemjit 
 at a smile. '• Ind I vish it vas down." 
 
 '• A thing that will not happen very soon if you don't do 
 better work than this." the gentleman observed, the smile upon 
 his face giving it, as Victor thought, a very winning expression. 
 " But how, in the name of mischief, could such a thing happen 
 to you, who are known as the best driver between the city and 
 Brook field? " 
 
 " So: " said the teamster, his face aglow with pleasure over 
 the compliment to his skill; "I got a new drihfer, und he 
 found a new vay to Brooktield, und der new vay go across der 
 dree." A slight shrug of his shoulder in the direction of 
 Victor sei'ved to indicate who the new drivei- was. and a cun- 
 ning grin accompanied the joke. 
 
 Colonel May glanced at Victor, who blushed with pleasure. 
 The gentleman in the carriage possessed a strong fascination 
 for him. And the blush deepened when the stranger asked 
 Yahkop to introduce him to the young man. 
 
 " Dis ish my new drihfer," said Yahkop, winking slyly. 
 
A LE,SSOy m WOODCRAFT. 13 
 
 •• He go slitoi-ckipptT tiirold man N'aii HraakiMi : iiiid liis iiaiiic 
 i.sh Fictor mil liis t'l-ont name, mid W'aldhorst mil liis name 
 l)ehint.'" 
 
 " Well, youug man," saitl the straiioer. with a gi-acious 
 l»()\v and a smile that completely won Vietor'.s heart. " it seems 
 to nie that 1 have heard of you before. My friend, the Myn- 
 heer Van Braaken, informed me that he expects a young gen- 
 tleman from the city to assist him as salesman in his extensive 
 establishment. I trust that you may like our people when 
 you get to know them, and I bid you welcome as a new 
 neighbor." 
 
 The friendly greeting delighted Victor, but he was at a sad 
 loss to know what to do or say. While in the act of imitating 
 the bow he had seen Colonel May exe(nite. a lovely head 
 Imbbed out of the carriage and a maiden's silvery voice 
 resounded in merry laughter. 
 
 C'Olonel May regarded the young lady with a rebuking glance. 
 Luabashed, however, she cHmbed into the front seat by his 
 side, and said, as soon as her fit of laughter subsided, •• Oh. 
 l)apa, he is such a funny gentleman ! And it must be so droll 
 to hear him, and Yahkop, and Mr. Van Braaken talk gibberish 
 in the Dutch store I ' ' 
 
 " Do not mind the child's silly talk, Mr. Waldhorst," said 
 the Colonel. •' But let me introduce you to my daughter 
 Eleonora, whom we call Nellie for short. You have probably 
 heard our friend Yahkop call me May. Xellie. my child, this 
 is Mr. Waldhorst, who is to be our neighbor soon." 
 
 Victor had never lieen introduced to a lady audAvas painfully 
 conscious of his profound ignorance how to behave on the 
 occasion. To be sure. Miss Xellie was not a grown up lady : 
 l)ut then this consideration by no means lessened the embar- 
 rassment of the awkward boy, for the self-possession of the 
 damsel impressed him all the more, perhaps, on that account. 
 Blushing to the roots of his hair, he mechanically repeated the 
 motions through which he had gone in imitation of the Colonel's 
 bow, and did this in so original a manner, that the voung ladv 
 
14 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 found it difficult to resist a new outburst of merriment. Mind- 
 ful of paj^a's reproachful glance, however, she bravely con- 
 quered the temptation and extended her hand with so winning- 
 a smile, that \'ict<M' was charmed out of what little presence of 
 mind was left to him. There was no misunderstanding that 
 inviting gesture, however ; so he stepped boldly forward and 
 seized the dainty lingers, carrying them, on an unconscious 
 impulse of galhintry, to his lips. 
 
 The hand was (piickly withdrawn. IJut she said, in the 
 sweetest voice tliat ^'ictor thought he had ever lieard. •• I am 
 very glad, Mr. Waldhorst, to make your acipiaintauce, and 
 that we are to be neighliors. You must come and see us right 
 soon." 
 
 •' May I ? " he iiuiuired with an eagerness that left no doubt 
 as to the sincerity of his pleasure on receiving the invitation. 
 
 •• Why of course,"" slu- I'cpUcd. looking al liim as if wonder- 
 ing :it the ([uestion. and then ;id(le(I : ■• And you pardon my 
 rudeness, do you not ? 
 
 \'ietor was in a mood in which he would gladly have |i:ii'- 
 doned any crime the young lady could have connnitted, and 
 was on the point of telling her so. when it occurred to him, 
 that to grant a ])ardon presu])posed an offense, and he could 
 not couscientiously admit that he had been offended, (^nite 
 the contrary: he had never lieen so sweetly charmed, as when 
 he heard liis fidl name, coupled with the title •• iNIister '" pro- 
 nounced by her rosy lips. So he answered, with a diplomacy 
 quite foreign to his nature: •' If J had anything to forgive, I 
 would gladly do so for the pleasure of hearing you laugh as 
 you did a while ago." 
 
 Victor had innnediate reward for his gallantry : for she. 
 1hu-> encouraged, indulged herself in an unchecked peal of 
 nuisical merriment, before she exclaimed, ••Yon aic indeed a 
 droll young man, JMr. Waldhorst." 
 
 '• He has given you an example of courtesy worthy of imita- 
 tion," said the Colonel. Then seeing that Yahko]) had resumed 
 his laborious task, he tnriiecl to him, saying: •• Hut our friend 
 
c 
 
 :iQ 
 
A LESSON IN WOODCRAFT. 15 
 
 here needs a lesson in wood-em ft. This is an ar( upon which 
 we in the t)!U'k-woo(ls pride ourselves." ^^'ith these words he 
 threw the reins to his daughter and leaped to the ground. 
 Divesting himself of his coat, he took the ax from Yahkop's 
 hand. '* You are making sorry work of this," he said. •' if 
 you go on in this way, the tree, Avhen you get it down, will 
 (jbstruct the course of the wagon. IJesides, you must do bet- 
 ter than this with the ax." — pointing to the Jagged, irregular 
 opening that had been cut into the trunk of the tree — •• if 
 you don't want to be laughed at by our backwoodsmen." 
 
 ]ioth \'ictor and Yalikop were astonished to see with what 
 ease and dexterity he swung the ax ; the blows fell rajjidly and 
 with a precision which i)roduced a perfectly even, smooth sur- 
 face of ))otli edges of the triangular section he cut into the 
 trunk. Even the chips which his swift strokes dislodged, were 
 larger and more reguhir than those that Yahkop had ])rodiUK'd. 
 Presently hemotioniMl his daughter to drive a little further 
 down the hill, so as to l)e out of danger from the tailing tree, 
 ill case it should come down in an unforeseen direction, and 
 induced Yahko]) and Victor to remove the wagon horses also, 
 to make sure against an accident. 
 
 A few more weighty l)lows, and the tree swayed slowly from 
 side to side, as if making ready for the tumble ; then the crown 
 inclined majestically toward his brethren of the forest, main- 
 taining his dignity to the last. A loud crash now spoke his 
 angry protest against the violence done him : then accelerated 
 downward movement, renewed crashing, a hissing of the leaves 
 and twigs as they were forced through the air, and the giant 
 lay prostrate. It had fallen precisely as indicated by the 
 Colonel, and the road was clear for the wagon to pass on. 
 
 Yahkop approached the Colonel, who leant upon the ax and 
 complacently regarded the result of his Avork. They shook 
 hands, and Yahko[) was al)0ut to say something in acknowl- 
 edgment of the valual)le aid received from him, when the 
 Colonel interrupted : 
 
 "Spare your words, my friend. (Jim neighbor nuist always 
 
16 
 
 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEE. 
 
 be ready to assist another l)y any such trivial service as this. 
 Besides, you know, 1 am a candidate. If you want to do me 
 a particular favor, you may vote for me for Congress at the 
 next election, if it don't go against your conscience." 
 
 "I bet chew I " the teamster exclaimed, shaking the Colonel 
 vigorously by the hand. •' Und I licks all mine friends vhat 
 don't go wote fur you, ebery times." 
 
 Victor looked about for the carriage with the young lady : 
 it was gone. He ran out into the road, to see: there, some 
 distance down, where there was a curve in the road, he saw the 
 vehicle, the horses running with frantic speed. 
 
 "Colonel — your daughter I " he cried, turning deadly 
 pale. Then he ran, as he had never run before. 
 
II. 
 
 ONE OF THE F. F. V. OUT WEST. 
 
 IN the viilli'v iipprotu-luMl Ity the road ran a creek of eon- 
 siderable size, which, after the heavy rains sometimes 
 
 ■ experienced in this latitude, assumed the proportions of a 
 lively river, to cros^ which safely it was necessary to And some 
 place known as a reliable ford. 
 
 To reach such a ford, the road led asi(,U' from its direct 
 course up the creek for some distance, until the ford was 
 reacheil. and on the other side retracino- its course alonu' the 
 creek to a point almost opjjosite the ])lace where the detonr 
 beoan. Much of the l)cnd so descril)ed was visible from the 
 elevation where the travelers had met. 
 
 Colonel May, the moment his attention had l)een called to 
 the dauo-er of his dauo-hter, mounted that one of Yahkop's 
 horses which, after a swift glance at them all, he judged to be 
 the fleetest, and dashed down the road at the top of his speed. 
 Victor had dashed off in a different direction. Surmising that 
 the frightened horses would in their flight keep to the road, 
 he plunged through the woods down a steep descent, making a 
 bee-line for the nearest part of the road on the other side of 
 the creek, which he hoped to reach lief ore the horses, because 
 he thus cut off the great detour described by the road in 
 the shape of a horse-shoe. To l)e sure, the declivity Avas 
 very steep on the line in which he ran, and dense brush 
 and underwood often rendered his progress difflcult : but 
 he was swift of foot, and the ol»stacles in his way only 
 lired his zeal. On reaching tlu' valley, the road again be- 
 came visil)le and the sight of the runaway horses, having 
 l)y this time crossed the creek, and tearing down the road 
 with terrific speed, spurred him to renewecl cnergv. Hav- 
 
 (17) 
 
i'S THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 ing reachfd the creek, he plunged iu without a moment's 
 hesitation. The water was deeper than he had calculated: 
 after pressing forward a few steps, it reached to his armpits, 
 and the strong current carried him a considerable distance 
 down stream. But he did not lose his footing, and soon 
 gained the other shore. On dry land again, he rushed onward, 
 and reached the I'oad as he had hoped, before the runaways 
 had passed. He placed himself directly in their way. stretch- 
 ing out both arms to intercept them. Of course, he failed to 
 stop them ; but their endeavor to avoid him — one of them 
 pulling to the one, the other to the other side of him — lessened 
 their speed considerably. As they came within reach, Victor 
 seized the bridle of either horse, one in each hand, and hung 
 on with liis whole weight. He was quickly lifted from off his 
 feet by the rcai'ing animals, and dragged along by them ; but 
 as he held on with iron grip, lie })resently regained his foot- 
 hold. His efforts were seconded by a strong pull on the lines 
 from within the carriage : and it was not long before the ani- 
 mals were conquered, and stood, trembling and snorting with 
 fear, but reduced to obedience once more. 
 
 Victor likewise stood trembliDg and panting. The exertion 
 liad been well-nigh too much for him. His heart beat in violent 
 throbs. Ills lnvast heaved with a vehemence that seemed to 
 shake his body to pieces. But a triumphant smile lit up his 
 features, and became an eloquent substitute for the words 
 which his agitation prevented him from uttering, as he stepped 
 around to make his bow before the young lady. She sat 
 quietly, lier little hands still holding the reins firmly; her face 
 a shade paler than was natural to her. but otherwise cool and 
 self-possessed. If she had been really frightened or excited, 
 Victor could see no trace of it. 
 
 Great was his astonishment on beholding the unparalleled 
 courage and presence of mind of this remarkable little lady. 
 But his enthusiasm received a sudden check when a hearty peal 
 of laughter greeted him from those beautiful lips, before he 
 liad been able to sav a word. The voice was clear and silvery. 
 
ONE OF THE F. F. V. OUT WEST. 1!» 
 
 as it was wheu he bad tirst heard and found it so sweetly 
 melodious. But he did not now so much enjoy it. It occurred 
 to him tlial her hilarity was. under the circumstances, a trifle 
 out of place. He had expected to find her wild with excitement 
 and fear: yet there she sat, as unconcerned, apparently, as if, 
 since he had seen her before, a life bad not been in jeopardy, 
 to save which he had periled bis own — and laughed at him 
 for his pains. 
 
 •* Ob, Mr. Waldhorst! " she said, as soon as she recovered 
 her voice, '' if you knew bow you do look, — for all the world 
 just like the scare-crow papa put up in our wbeat-lield ! " 
 
 Victor cast a glance over his person, and became aware of 
 the cause of her merriment. She Avas right. A scare-crow 
 coi;ld not present a more comical sight than be did at this 
 moment. Both sleeves of his light coat bad been violenth' 
 torn and buug in great rags, leaving one of his arms quite bare, 
 and the other visible through a torn shirt sleeve. The coat- 
 tails bad gained in leugth what they bad lost in breadth and 
 symmetry, in consequence of great rents sustained by them, and 
 his pantaloons gave ocular demonstration that their fal)ric bad 
 l)een unequal to tlie strain upon them by the briars and brush 
 of the thickets through which he had forced bis way. Even 
 his shoes proved the worse for their rough usage in Victor's 
 encouuter with the horses, exposing through great gaps between 
 their soles and uppers bis toes, innocent of covering save by a 
 layer of dust. Dust profusely clung, also, to the remaining 
 portions of his garments, which the soaking they had received 
 in the creek rendered peculiarly adhesive. 
 
 She was right. This was not a plight to appear before any 
 one. least of all before the sharp eyes of the mirthful young 
 maiden who sat there so provokingly self-possessed. His bumili- 
 atiou was complete ; but with it was blended a keener pain, — a 
 sense of injury, of wrong — the source of which was as yet a 
 mystery to him. Perhaps, if be could have accounted to him- 
 self for the huii; to his feelings, he would have ascribed it to 
 the dimming of the bright image that h:id won for itself a place 
 
20 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEIi. 
 
 in his heart. He sought refuge behind the carriage, which 
 served him at once to hide his hidicrous phght, and to conceal 
 the chagrin and mortification tliat he could not at once repress, 
 from those keen, sparkling eyes. 
 
 He had not been in hiding long, however, when he heard a 
 soft, half coaxing, half reproachful vc^ice })ronounce his name : 
 
 " Mr. Waldhorst! " 
 
 The voice had great charm for Victor. (Still there was a 
 trace of the deep disappointment he felt audible in his answer : 
 
 " Yes, Ma'am? " 
 
 ' ' You are not going to run away ? ' ' 
 
 " Indeed, I should like to." 
 
 " And leave me to the mercy of these wild horses? " 
 
 " You do not seem to be the least bit afraid oi them." 
 
 "■ Oh, but you do not know what a terrible fi-ight I was in," 
 the sweet voice continued to pU'ad, •• when tlie liorses I'jin with 
 such terrilic speed down that long hill, and I luul great trouble 
 to keep them in the middle of the roatl, and I feared every 
 moment, that they might dash the wagon against a tree, or 
 upset it ! And then what courage it gave me to see you fly to 
 my rescue — yes, literally fly — for then I knew that you 
 would save me, and I was no longer afraid, not even when you 
 threw yourself right before the horses, like a hero of olden 
 time. If you leave me now, I shall just jump out, and let the 
 horses run away again." 
 
 How eagerly the proud boy drank in the delicious flattery! 
 What a glorious thing it would be, to accept the tempting 
 situation and play protector to the pretty child I WnX lie 
 remembered that she had shown greater skill and self-])Osses- 
 sion than lu'. in tlie management of the i-unaways : nor could 
 he forget the ringing laugh of a moment ago — nothing should 
 induce him to subject himself a seconil time to such [)ainful 
 humihation. 
 
 " Please excuse me," he said rather reluctantly, however. 
 " I really cannot show myself in the presence of a lady in the 
 lix I am in." 
 
ONE OF Till-: F. F. I'. OUT WFST. 21 
 
 " Pshaw I I ain iiut a lady at all," Nellie retorted, a little 
 impatiently. '' I am only a school girl and spoiled with too 
 much j)ettino;, papa says. I shouldn't think a brave hero like 
 you would mind the silliness of a little school girl. Do come 
 in and tiike the lines, until papa comes I " 
 
 \'ictor. who found it exceedingly diHlcult to resist the 
 maiden's entreaty, was saved the necessity of further strug- 
 gling against his own inclination Ity the appearance of Colonel 
 May, who came galloping up as fast as the borrowed horse 
 could carry him. •' Here comes your father," said Victor 
 with a sigh of relief. 
 
 Nellie, hearing her father mentioned, leaped from the car- 
 riage and ran to meet him with outstretched arms, while 
 Victor stepped to the front to hold the horses, and to conceal 
 his deranged toilet from the eyes of father and daughter. The 
 Colonel sprang from his horse and embraced the girl. 
 
 "Here I am. dear papal " she exclaimed, returning tlie 
 embrace with fervor. •• All safe and sound! " 
 
 •• Thank God I " he cried. " I hold you in my arms, unhurt 
 and safe I But what a fright yon have given me I " 
 
 " I was frightened too, papal " she said with a sweet smile. 
 •' But you see all is well. And for this we are indebted to the 
 mercy of God and the courage of Mr. Waldhorst." 
 
 "Tell me, how on earth did it nil hapjien? " the Colonel 
 inquired eagerly. 
 
 " The horses were frightened by the terrific crash of the 
 tree as it fell," Nellie related, as they walked leisurely toward 
 the caiTiage, the Colonel leading his horse by the bridle. '' At 
 first it was only Alec that shied ; but I never saw him so wildly 
 excited. For a little while Pompey was perfectly quiet and 
 tractable: but Alec dragged him along down the hill, and 
 pretty soon Pompey got wild also, and then both ran with all 
 their might. It was impossible to check them. When they 
 got to the creek, I was awfully afraid that they would upset 
 and. drown me ; but you see we got through all right. And 
 then I caught a glimpse of Mr. "Waldhorst tearing down 
 
22 THE BE BE US DAUGHTER. 
 
 throuoh the brush and briers : and 1 knew he was comiua; to 
 head off the runaways. I was perfectly sure that he would 
 master them. And oh, you just ought to have seen him — 
 how he dashed right into the horses while they were running at 
 2.40 speed, and caught them by the bridles, and how they just 
 lifted him up from his feet, and how he held on to them, like 
 /grim death, and made them stop! Oh, he was just like a 
 Roman hero I ' ' 
 
 "So Mr, Waldhorst proved a readier and more etticient 
 champion than 1 1 " said the Colonel, smiling fondly on the 
 enthusiastic girl. " But Avhere is the young hero, that T may 
 thank him for his chivalrous exploit? " 
 
 ''He is hiding on the other side of the wagon," Nellie 
 answered, with downcast eyes. Then, raising them to her 
 father's face with a look blending humble penitence with 
 roguish assurance, " Only think," she said, " how naughty I 
 have been ! But he looked too funny for anything ! In tear- 
 ing down the hill, you know, and rushing right through densest 
 brier-bushes and everything, and swimming through the creek, 
 and swooping down on the horses like a whirlwind, he muddied 
 and tore liis clothes, and looked sucli a perfect scarecrow, 
 that I could not, to save my life, help laughing at him." 
 
 They had by this time approached so near, that Victor could 
 not, "without silly affectation, avoid meeting them. Nellie 
 approached with beaming face and offered both her hands. 
 '' Let me thank you for your brave and noble deed, as I ought 
 to have done long ago! " she said, " instead of laughing at 
 you like an ungrateful goose." 
 
 " She is a child," said the Colonel, uoav also stepping for- 
 ward and shaking him heartily by the hand. " A very much 
 spoiled child, I am afraid. But don't stand there and blush, 
 as if you were ashamed of the heroic deed you have done. 
 Truly, I count it high honor to shake your hand, and hope 
 that you will permit me to regard you as my friend. That 
 naughty puss there, and I, we are both too deeply indebted to 
 you to square accounts by saying I thanlc you . ' ' 
 
ONE OF THE F. F. I'. OIT WEST. 28 
 
 •• ludeed. J do not deserve such kindness I " stannuered the 
 bashful boy. But notwithstanding his depi-ecatory words, he 
 revelled in an ocean of bliss. 
 
 " And may I now further trespass upon youi' good nature bv 
 askino- you to drive our wagon back to the place where we left 
 our friend Yalikop'r " said the Colonel. •• He must have his 
 horse back : and after her experience just now, I would not let 
 my hairbrained girl try another experiment with these horses." 
 
 '^ Oh. Mr. May." said Victor. i)leading with evident earnest- 
 ness. •' Miss Xellie would surely prefer that you should drive 
 instead of me : and I can return the horse to Yahkop so that 
 you need not be at the trouble to turn back."' 
 
 •• Well." said the Colonel, after a brief pause. •• if you insist 
 on it, yon may oblige us in this respect also. I only fear that. 
 wearied as you feel, you will find a ride witliout a saddle rather 
 trying." 
 
 '' Not in the least I " Victor asserted eagerly. ''I am 
 quite accustomed to riding bare-back." Saying this, he led 
 the horse to the other side of the wagon, and proved the truth 
 of his assertion by straightway climbing on his back. 
 
 He could not refrain from looking back before he had trotted 
 a hundred paces, and was surprised to see that the carriage 
 had not moved. When, on reaching a bend of the road which 
 would take them out of his sight, he ventured another back- 
 ward glance, he saw the carriage still in the road, but father 
 and daughter were no longer visible — they must have gotten 
 into the vehicle. 
 
 At the ford of the creek, he dismounted, and went through 
 a process of ablution, bestowing much more care upon this 
 operation than had been his wont. Before he had quite fin- 
 ished, he saw the freight-wagon approach from the other side 
 of the creek. Yahkop had driven down the hill with four 
 horses, the fifth tied on behind. As soon as Victor could get 
 at the wagon, while Yahkop was hitching up the third pair of 
 horses, he got out a bundle containing his Sunday clothes, and 
 hurried to put them on, in place of the rags he had brought 
 
24 Tllb: nEBEL'S DAUGIITEIL 
 
 ]»nck from his adventure. Of course the teamster plied him 
 with numerous (questions as to the outcome of the runaway, 
 and kept Mctor busy in satisfying his curiosity touching the 
 details. He was thoroughly laughed at on honestly mention- 
 ing the condition of his wardrobe at the termination of the 
 affair, and poutingly informed Yahkop that the young lady had 
 already performed that job in a very sufficient manner, though 
 he kept to himself what the damsel had said about a scare- 
 crow. 
 
 When he had got through with his toilet, Yahkop had also 
 completed the hitching of the horses, and Victor bestrode the 
 off-horse to continue his chat with the teamster. He was 
 Iniruing with curiosity to learn from the latter all he knew 
 about the gentleman who had so thoroughly aroused his 
 interest, hoping to gain, incidentally, some information touch- 
 ing the young lady. To his great disgust, Y^ahkop disposed 
 of the latter by calling her a forward little hussey, badly 
 spoiled by her parents and brother, because she was the pet of 
 the family. The Colonel, however, he described as the ricrhest 
 man in Vernal County, having many friends, and also many 
 enemies, and who expected to be elected to Congress at the 
 next election. He grew quite enthusiastic in dwelling on the 
 many excellent qualities of this remarkable gentleman, — the 
 best farmer in the County, he described him, " if he do come 
 from Ole Wirtshinny," where they generally know precious 
 little about farming, — a talker, that could out-talk any lawyer, 
 and not even tell a lie, — a friend of the poor, not too proud 
 to speak with a common chap. " Und how he ken blay mit 
 der axt, you seen yourselfes," he concluded. " I shust vish 
 1 ken blay mit der axt like he ! " 
 
 The team had meanwhile reached tlie bend in the road where 
 Victor had last seen the carriage, and he was surprised to see 
 it still standing there — a circumstance, to which he at once 
 called Y'^ahkop's attention. 
 
 " Shoor! " said Yahkop. " Y'ou dingks der Kernel ride to 
 Brookfield mitout der coat on 'is back? " 
 
ONE OF Till-: F. F. V. OUT WEST. 25 
 
 \'i('t()r I'omemberetl that the Colonel had pulled off his coat 
 before felliiijj- the tree, and eagerly inquired: " Did you bring 
 it along? " 
 
 '' Vhat you dingks?" Yahkoj) rejoined. " You dingks der 
 Kernel's coat ish too nuich fur four bosses to pull? " 
 
 The Colonel met them with a pleasant smile. As if in 
 response to Yahkop's statement, he said: '' You have brought 
 my coat, have you not? " 
 
 '' Shoor," the teamster replied, "der vaggeu got room 
 fur yer coat. Fictor, you git der Kernel's coat out der 
 vaggeu . ' ' 
 
 While Victor complied with alacrity, the Colonel expressed 
 his obligation. " But this is not all that I have waited for," 
 he went on. ^' If I can prevail on the young man there, I 
 wish to take him from you for the rest of the trip to Brook- 
 field. Can you spare him to us? " 
 
 " Y"ou likes to hire a new dribfer? " Yahkop inquired with 
 a sly grin. " Tek him. Und tek der axt too. Mebbe you 
 chop down some more oak drees." 
 
 But Victor protested. "I — I thank you," he said, color- 
 ing deeply at the prospect of a ride in the same vehicle with 
 the young lady who had such sharp eyes, and could laugh so 
 merrily and unmercifully. "I believe it would be improper 
 for me to leave the team. Mr. Van Braaken might be dis- 
 pleased." 
 
 " Leave that to me," said the Colonel, in a tone at once so 
 kind, and yet so authoritative, that Victor's resistance melted 
 away like snow in the sun. • " I propose to introduce you to 
 Mynheer Van Braaken myself. In two hours we will reach 
 Brookfield. You must be our guest for to-night, and to-mor- 
 row morning we will ]iay our respects to the Mynheer, before 
 Yahkop gets there." 
 
 '• We see, ven you git dere fust," growled Yahkop. " Ven 
 Fictor find some more drees, und you chops 'em down, den ve 
 see . ' ' 
 
 " I like you for this," said the young lad}', receiving Victor 
 
2fi THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 with a gracious smile, and making room for liim on her own 
 seat in the rear. " I would have been quite put out, if you 
 had refused papa's invitation." 
 
 The Colonel follow^ed, after a few parting words with Yahkop. 
 and started his horses at so lively a trot, that they quickly left 
 Yahkoii with his team far behind. Victor found riding in the 
 elegant spring wagon, seated on a soft cushion, quite a novel 
 luxury. And w'hen the Colonel, by a few well directed ques- 
 tions, had succeeded in putting him at his ease, he quickly 
 forgot all his shyness, and talked as confidentially with his new 
 friends, as if he had known them all his life. 
 
 One of the subjects of their conversation was Victor's knowl- 
 edge of the English language. It interested Nellie vastly to 
 learn, that he had hardly ever spoken English with any one 
 since leaving school, where he had been compelled to learn the 
 language, because no one there spoke his own. 
 
 " Have you learned French, too? " asked Nellie. 
 
 ' ' Oh, no ! " was his reph'. • ' I am very sorry to know, that I 
 have learned very little, indeed. One of the reasons Avhy I am 
 very glad to get the situation in Mr. Van Braaken's store, is 
 the promise he made me, that I shall have leisure to improve 
 myself by private study." 
 
 " What, for instance, would you like to learn? " the Colonel 
 made inquiry. 
 
 •'Oh, everything! " Victor said. "I should like to study 
 mathematics, and Latin, so that I might become acquainted 
 with the works of great men who explain to the world the 
 nature of things, and justice, and freedom." 
 
 The Colonel looked at Victor in some surprise. •' So am- 
 bitious? " he said smiling. "But you need not study Latin 
 in order to become acquainted with the works of the greatest 
 of men. Your own fatherland has produced a number of as 
 good and great men as ever lived, while the history of England 
 is replete with shining examples of wisdom, virtue and heroism. 
 Above all, however, let me recommend to you the teachings 
 of the founders of this glorious republic of ours. All of them 
 
ONE OF THE F. F. I'. ol'T WEST. 27 
 
 speak to you in our own tongue, of which you have sutlioieiit 
 knowledge for all purposes of study." 
 
 Victor listened with deep attention. *' But," he ventured 
 to suggest, ■' did not the governments of Greece and Rome 
 serve as models of our own. and is it not necessary to become 
 acquainted with the Avorks of their statesmen, in order to under- 
 stand ours ? ' ' 
 
 '' Hardly," said the Colonel with some complaisance. •■ The 
 form of government established for the republic of the United 
 States of America is without parallel or precedent, — so far 
 above the republics of Greece nnd Rome, as the Nineteenth 
 Century is above the middle ages in culture and civiliza- 
 tion." 
 
 Victor made no answer, pondering over what he had heard. 
 But Nellie soon interrupted his meditation. 
 
 " Tell me about the school you attended. Was it a large 
 one ? ' ' 
 
 " Rather a large one," Victor informed her. •' In the de- 
 partment of the boys there were about four hundred pupils ; 
 but only one teacher." 
 
 " Did you say four hundred boys, and only one schoolmas- 
 ter? " the Colonel inquired. "^ I have read of such schools, 
 conducted on what is called I believe, Joseph Lancaster's 
 System. Does the plan work well? " 
 
 " Quite well," said Victor; " at least I believe that it did 
 so in the school which I attended. The master conducted 
 the upper two or three classes in person, the pupils of which 
 took turns in instructing the children of the lower classes. 
 Monitors were appointed daily to note the names of all the 
 boys who, in any way, violated the rules. The offenders were 
 punished by the master in person, who inflicted chastisement 
 by means of a thin rattan, the number of cuts being determined 
 by the grade of the offense charged against the culprit. The 
 list of delinquents was called at a regular hour every day, 
 and it usually required from tea to fifteen minutes to get 
 through with this part of the discipline." 
 
28 THE REBEL'S DAUUllTEU. 
 
 Nellie found the school quite au amusing theme and asked 
 numerous questions, which Victor conscientiously answered. 
 
 But the Colonel, wishing to learn more of Victor's personal 
 history, directed his questions to that end, and soon drew from 
 him a simple narration of as much of his previous life, as 
 Victor thought worth mentioning. He informed his attentive 
 listeners, that he had come to this country with his parents, 
 when he was quite a young boy ; that his father invested the 
 greater part of his means in the purchase of a house and lot, 
 for which he paid cash, and did quite Avell for awhile, cai-rying 
 on a bakery, " until one day a stranger called at the house and 
 told father, that the house and lot belonged to him, demanding 
 payment for it. Father showed him the deed but the stranger 
 laughed at it, saying it was signed by his son, who had the 
 same name as he, but that the house did not belong to the son, 
 but to himself. At this father got angry, and told the man to 
 leave the house. After that he came back one day with another 
 man, who said he was a sheriff, and left a paper with father: 
 and three or four months after that, this sheriff drove us out 
 of the house, put our furniture in the street, and we had to 
 rent a house to live in. We were then quite poor, for father 
 had not much money left after paying for the house he had 
 bought." 
 
 " What scoundrels those men were I '" said Nellie, coloring 
 with indignation . 
 
 " But — did not your father employ a lawyer? " the Colonel 
 inquired with some astonishment. 
 
 "Yes," said Victor, " but not until after the sheriff had 
 taken possession of our house. It was then too late, the lawyer 
 said. But he also explained to us, that he could not have 
 helped us, even if father had employed him at once, for that 
 we had been defrauded by a i'ascal, and that we could not 
 recover anything from him by law, because he had no property 
 in his own name." 
 
 The Colonel remained silent ; but Nellie queried further : 
 
 ' ' What happened to you then ? ' ' 
 
ONE OF THE F. F. V. OUT WEST. 29 
 
 '' My I'atlRT," Victor coiiliinied, •• was vci-y iniicli ij;rievc(l 
 over our loss. His husiiu'ss did not prosper after that, and 
 we had sad times. Then caine the cholera, both parents took 
 it and died in the same week." 
 
 ••And then? " Nellie eaovrly pressed, as X'iclor ovei-come 
 by the sad memory pansed in his narration. 
 
 " And then," he went on. •• when our parents liad l)een 
 l)nried, and the sale of our household "(x^ds had produced 
 hardly enough to pay the doctor and undertaker, we had noth- 
 ino". 1 hired out as a Journeyman l)aker. an occupation which 
 I haye followed ever since, and my sister found a home in the 
 family of a distant relative of ours, back in the city.*' 
 
 '• Oh, then you have a sister? '" exclaimed Nellie witli anima- 
 tion. •• Tell us all about her I " 
 
 ••She is the dearest sister a brother I'ver iind I "' \'ictor 
 announced |)rou(lly. '* Not (piite so old as I am." lie added 
 in response to Nellie's eai>ei' (luestioning-, •• and her name is 
 Pauline." 
 
 "A pretty name. — I'auline ! " Nellie mused. ■• Is she a 
 beauty? Does she look like you? " 
 
 •• Like me? No indeed! " Victor protested, blushing vio- 
 lently. '• She is not so beautiful as some ladies," he con- 
 tinued, throwing a sidelong glance at his fair neighbor. •• but 
 I don't think you would laugh on seeing her for the lirst 
 time." 
 
 " Now, Mr. Waldhorst ! " the young lady p(nited, shaking 
 her forefinger at him, •• you ought to l)e ashamed of yourself 
 foi' reminding me of my silliness. Please, don't do that 
 again." 
 
 "Indeed, indeed. Miss Nellie, 1 meant no rt'proach I " |)ro- 
 tested Mctor, so earnestly, as to |)reclude any doubt of his 
 sincerity, •• I only meant lo say that my ^ister is not so — so 
 awkward, as I am." 
 
 •• I venture to say," tiu- C'olont'l interferetl, suspecting that 
 further words on the subject might increase the bashful young 
 man's eml)arrassment, •• that JNFiss Waldhorst is an accom- 
 
30 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 plished young lady, whom Nellie would be proud to beconu' 
 acquainted with . ' ' 
 
 "Of course I would," Nellie eagerly assented. " 1 know 
 I should love her if she is as good as Mr. Waldhorst says she 
 is. I have a brother, Mr. Waldhorst, but no sister. It must 
 be beautiful to have a sister." 
 
 ■' Is your brother older, or younger tlian yourself? " queried 
 the young man. 
 
 " Oh, he is much older than I am," Nellie went on. •• Why. 
 he is really a grown man. I think you will like him, Mr. 
 Waldhorst, when you get to know him. Everybody likes my 
 brother Leslie." 
 
 '• I Jim sure I shall like him. if — '" 
 
 Wlnitcver he was going to say remained unsaid ; for he cast 
 down his t'ves mid blushed, instead of finishing his remark. 
 
 ■• I know \vh:i1 you were going to say,"" proclaimed Nellie, 
 laughing lilitlicly. •• Yon were going to sny. if lie is like me. 
 Xow tluit would li;i\c' been :i pretty compliment. :uid you need 
 not be ashamed of it." 
 
 '' Does he live with you at Brookheldr " 
 
 " Yes, when we are at home: that is, we live at May Mead- 
 ows, which is the name of our place : it is quite close to Brook- 
 tield, but not just in it. I expect to meet brother Leslie, who 
 is home from Ilai-vnid iiy this time. And 1 will be so glad to 
 sec him. after being away from him for nearly a year. For I 
 iini myself just on my way home from the seminary at Columl)i{i 
 for the vacation."" 
 
 '' Ah I And bi'olher Leslie is also at home for the v;ic!i- 
 tion y " \'ictor incpiired. '• Where is Harvard? 
 
 " Why, don"t you know :d)out Harvjird L'niversity ? " said 
 the girl, evidently |)itying his ignorance. " It is a great 
 college, or something, away down East, among the Y'ankees, 
 in Cambridge, or Boston, or somewhere. My brother was very 
 proud, when papa sent him to Harvard." 
 
 ■' How I should like to go to college! " said Victor, evi- 
 dently envying the happy brother. 
 
ONE OF THE F. F. V. OUT WEST. 31 
 
 "' You liavo no cause fcr regret, 3'ouuo- man." said the 
 Colonel assuringly. '• The lessons which you have learned, 
 and are still learning, I trust, by being thrown on your own 
 resources, are worth more to you in the way of your education 
 and development, than a regular course in the best college in 
 the world could ever be, if, as I am sure is the case, you have 
 the stuff in ^-ou to make a man of." 
 
 In the course of the conversation Nellie had mentioned the 
 fact, that she had emigrated, with the rest of the family, from 
 Virginia, — emphasizing the name of her native State with a 
 degree of patent pride which made Victor wonder — while still 
 a child, but that she remembered their great plantation which 
 papa had sold ; and that they had brought all their negroes to 
 this State, because papa would not sell them to strangers. 
 
 •• The negroes? " Victor inquired, with a puzzled air. 
 
 •■ Why yes : the slaves, you know." 
 
 •■ Slaves? " Victor repeated, with still greater astonishment. 
 
 " Our 3'oung friend probably forgets, that ours is a slave 
 State," Colonel May remarked. " I fear that you consider us 
 behind the enlightenment of your native Germany, in this 
 respect, since they no longer tolerate slavery there." 
 
 '"They ncAcr had slaves in Germany! " Victor declared, 
 with great emphasis. 
 
 •• I would not insist on that so lirmly," the Colonel replied 
 with au indulgent smile. -It is not a thousand years ago, 
 that men there sold themselves and their children into slavery, 
 and the law tolerated this, and protected the masters in their 
 right over their slaves. 1 remember having read of one in- 
 stance, where a father, having gambled away all his posses- 
 sions, staked his own daughter, who was the most beautiful 
 maiden of the tribe, and she was delivered over to the winner 
 as his absolute property. — So you are not pleased with this 
 • peculiar institution ' of ours? " 
 
 "How can you ask me?" said Victor, who had listened 
 with astonishment to the Colonel's words, and was strongly 
 inclined to doubt the correctness of his information as to the 
 
32 THE REBEL'S DAUGIITEB. 
 
 existence of slaverv in (Teniiauv. • '• Can it \w right, oi' just, 
 or wise, to deprive a human Iteing of his freedom ? Why, to 
 me this seems a greater wrong than to take away his life." 
 
 " Let us not ]nirsne this topic," said the Colonel, quietly, 
 but authoritatively. •' We will hardly liave time to come to an 
 understanding on so important and vexed a question; for there 
 I see the grove Avhich shelters our dwelling. We will reach it 
 in a few minutes. But permit me to caution you against mak- 
 ing any but your most intimate friends the confidants of your 
 very positive views on this subject. You will hardly make 
 converts, and it might entangle you into unpleasant, even 
 dangerous, complications. ' ' 
 
 Victor remained silent. Colonel May had evidently spoken 
 with the kindliest intention. But why should it be necessary 
 for him to conceal his conviction on so important a sul)ject, 
 the right and the wrong of wliich were so palpal)ly evident? 
 Could this ))e a free country, if the exjjression of his opinion 
 could draw after it " unpleasant, even dangerous complica- 
 tions? " Wherein, then, consisted the freedom of speech and 
 conscience, which he had so often heard extolled and prized as 
 the proud privilege of the citizens of his adopted country? 
 
 The long summer day was meanwhile drawing to its close. 
 When the travelers arrived in front of the gate to the grounds 
 of the mansion bright lights were already shining through the 
 doors and windows. It was not so dark, however, but that 
 Victor could see, and greatly admire the tastefully laid out little 
 park, with its broad, gravelled walks, smoothly shaved grass- 
 plots and brightly blooming shrubs and flowers. The whole 
 was surrounded by a grove of stately old trees of original 
 forest growth, thinned out and cleared of underbrush to invite 
 the Itreezes of summer, without admitting the full rays of the 
 sun. L'[)on Mctor the Colonel's residence produced the im- 
 pression of comfort and elegance, which greatly enhanced his 
 appreciation of thi' honor involved in being invited to enjov 
 the owner's hospitality. 
 
 A number of dusky servants I'an to assist the travelers in 
 
<)NI<: OF THE F. F. V. OUT WFST. :i3 
 
 alighting. TIr'V <>l)c'iied Uu'galc and U)ok c-liargv ol' llic Ikji'sl'S 
 and carriage. The young guest watched the scene with curious 
 interest. He was surprised to find quite a different picture 
 from that which liis imagination liad created. Could these 
 faces, sliining witli contfutmcnt. many of tliem ))riglit with 
 evident i)leasure in welcoming their master, for each of whom 
 he had a word of cheer or encouragement, l)elong to the class 
 of abused victims of o})prcssion and tyranny? Here was sub- 
 jection, unquestioning obedience, indeed. l>ut where was the 
 look of abject terror, the eloquent though unspoken, protest of 
 a down-trodden race against the despoiliT of their human 
 rights, which the innnigrant boy connected in his imagination 
 with the condition of slavery Ir Nothing saw ^'ict()r of any 
 such : these slaves enjoyed their mastej''s jokes as keenly as if 
 they were his equals, and sometimes retaliated with ready wit. 
 
 At the gate stood a lady of i)Ieasant appearance, into whose 
 open arms Nellie sprang the instant her feet touched the 
 ground. "'My child I " and ••Mama I — dearest mama I " 
 Victor heard, as they eml)raced and kissed. A tall, handsome 
 young man, of intellectual features, so far as \'ictor could dis- 
 cern in the twilight, stepped out and cordially shook hands 
 with the Colonel. •• You are late, })apa I " he said. •• What 
 kept you so long? " 
 
 " Yes," the Colonel replied cheerfully, ■•' we had quite an 
 adventure. There will be something to talk about at the 
 supper table." 
 
 Nellie had hardly quitted the arms of her mother, when both 
 her hands were seized by a liright quadroon woman, who cov- 
 ered them with kisses, and then, holding out the girl at arm's 
 length from her, seemed to devour the lovely tigure with hungry 
 eyes. •• jNIy darling honey I " she addressed her, •• sweet balm 
 to my tired old eyes. I How it rests 'em to look at yer purty 
 doll-face 1 Ye're bringin' sunshine back wid ye, an' good luck 
 to de ole place. An' my, how you's growed ! An' what a 
 fine lady you got to lie I God bless you, my sweetest young 
 missis' I " 
 
 3 
 
31 THE UK BEL'S DAUGUTini. 
 
 " \\'(.'ll, C'U'o. are you g'oing to .U'ive me a chance after a 
 while, ())• (h) you mean to keep your young mistress all to 
 yourself? " the yctung man spoke up. as liis father saluted his 
 wife. 
 
 '•My dearest Leslie I " the girl exclaimed, Hying towards 
 her brother, who took her bodily up in his arms, and carried 
 her straightway into the house, in spilt' of her laughter, strug- 
 gles and protestations that siie was no longer a baby. 
 
 The Colonel and his wife now a|)proached Victor. " My 
 dear," she said, "1 have brought you an honored guest, to 
 whom we are deeply indebted. This is he, — Mr. Waldhorst. 
 Mr. Waldhorst, let me present you to Mrs. May I " 
 
 The lady bowed with much grace and dignity. '* I am 
 happy," she said, " to become acquainted with a friend of my 
 husband, and to welcome you to our home." 
 
 The great sitting room was lighted up brilliantly, and a 
 cheerful fire crackled in the spacious fire-jtlace. Male and 
 female servants, in all shades of cok)r, from the light yellow of 
 the quadroon to the honest black of the unmixed African, 
 flitted about. C)ne of them conducted Victor to a room, which 
 he was told to consider as his own during his stay. The 
 servant also informed him, that after he had arranged his toilet, 
 he AA'ould l)e called down to tea. 
 
 Before taking their seats at the table. Colonel May intro- 
 duced "\Mct(jr to his son Leslie May, and also to his overseer, 
 JNIr. Jeffreys^, who had been invited to take his meal with the 
 family on this occasion. At table the conversation soon turned 
 upon the adventure with the runaway horses and Victor's ex- 
 ploit in connection therewilh. The Colonel related what he 
 knew of the matter, Init Nellie frequently interrupted him with 
 droll remarks, taking care, however, always to turn the laugh 
 against herself, while she lauded Victor's prowess without 
 stint. The latter would gladly have escai)ed the lavish praise 
 liestowed on him, and endeavored to hide his l)lushes by keep- 
 ing his eyes upon his plate ; but he could not avoid noticing, 
 tliat Mr. .Jeffreys seemed nuich displeased with the favor shown 
 
ONE OF TJIK F. F. T. 06^7' WF.ST. 
 
 '6b 
 
 him hv all the members of the family, for even Leslie was pi'O- 
 fuse in showing his appreciation of what Victor had done for 
 his sister Nellie to whom he was tenderly attached . 
 
 When, late in the evening, Victor was condneted to his 
 chamber, he left his newly found friends with the conviction 
 that they constituted the noblest and happiest family he had 
 ever met. The promise of Colonel May to introduce him in 
 person to his new employer, led him to hope that he might 
 thereby gain in the merchant's esteem, and perhaps improve 
 his future prospects. But his happiest reflection when the 
 events of the bygone day passed in review before his mind, 
 was that he counted among his friends the noble, high-minded 
 Colonel May, his frank, good-natured son Leslie, and — by 
 no means least — the Ijright merry maiden, who could laugh 
 so cruelly, and so charmingly, and who was so proud of belong- 
 ino; to one of the First Families of Virmnia. 
 
III. 
 
 A WESTERN TOWN AND ITS RIVAL STORES. 
 
 BROOKFIELI), f>ituate near the edge of the forest which 
 ) had, in the coursie of time, encroached on the prairie, 
 once constituting a part of the great plains extending 
 from the Ozark to the Rocky mountains, was a small town, 
 owing its origin to the intersection of two important roads, one 
 of which traversed the State from east to west, the other from 
 north to south. To its locality on this intersection was due, 
 also, its dignity as the county seat of Vernal County, in virtue 
 of which it numbered a court house among its public buildings. 
 The court house w^as the only brick structure within a cir- 
 cumference of many miles. It stood on the jjrecise spot where 
 the two "roads crossed each other, in the center of a square 
 into which the roads led from the four cardinal points of the 
 compass. 
 
 This court house was no less conspicuous for its prominent 
 location, than for the important functions it served in the 
 affairs of the town. Its legitimate purpose was, of course, to 
 furnish the place for holding court, and the offices for the cir- 
 cuit clerk, the sheriff, and the State's attorney. But incident- 
 ally it served as a public hall, where the citizens were wont to 
 meet on occasions demanding a discussion of measures of pub- 
 lic concern. In it sat the conventions of both political parties 
 when laying their plans for the capture of lucrative offices. 
 On Sundays and holidays it served as the meeting house of the 
 Christian sects of Brooklield and its environments — Camp- 
 bellites using it in the morning. Baptists in the evening and 
 Methodists in the night ; or haply in the reverse order. Travel- 
 ing minstrels and itinerant lecturers disi)ensed amusement and 
 instruction in useful knowledge within the sacred Temple of 
 
^1 WESTERN TOWN AND ITS RIVAL STORES. 37 
 
 Justice to all who had a (luarter to spare, or could borrow one 
 for the occasion. 
 
 On the north side of the Square, where the Bo<Miville road 
 debouched into it, stood the hotel, with its l)road porch ex- 
 tending along the whole of its front, facing the court house, 
 next after which it was the largest building in town. Its chief 
 characteristic and ornament was a cupola in which there hung 
 a bell — a veritable bell, perhaps the only one in all the south- 
 western part of the State. Naturally, the Brookfielders were 
 proud of this bell, which constituted one of the chief features 
 of the town. Its primary office was to summon the guests of 
 the hotel, three times a day, to its dining room. But since 
 the fewest of the inhabitants sported the luxury of a watch of 
 their own, it performed the functions of a town clock, and 
 housewives learned to regulate their meal-times by its ringing. 
 It pleased mine host to hear it said, that the sun regulates his 
 rising and setting Ity the ringing of this bell. Then, too, it 
 did extra duty on Sundays, calling church-goers to their devo- 
 tions, evincing most liberal tolerance, in that it made no kind 
 of distinction between the sects in this respect. It was equally 
 impartial in sunnnoning wiiigs and democrats to their party 
 ])Ow-wows ; and when, on extra occasions, there were public 
 festivities, or if the mortal remains of a departed fellow-being 
 were to be conducted to their final resting place, it gave the 
 joyful signal, or sounded the funeral knell with serene equan- 
 imity. 
 
 The chief pride of Brooklield, however, was that it boasted 
 two stores, — one on the east side of the Square, and one on 
 the west side. It seemed almost providential, that the court 
 house stood between them : for such was the spirit of rivalry 
 possessing their resjx'ctive owners, that but for the iuter- 
 ])osition of that august structure, whidi served as a screen to 
 hide the doings of either from the keenly watching optics of 
 the other, serious consequences, affecting the peace of the 
 town might have been apprehended. The stores Avere inferior 
 in size to no olhcr l»uilding in town, save the court house, and 
 
38 THE REBEL'H DAUGHTER. 
 
 the iiotfl. Tliey vied with each otlier in showing the smoothest 
 weather-ljoarding, coated with tlie hriglitest of white lead, aud 
 the most intensely green window-ljliuds. But if their exterior 
 was gaudy enough to attract the eyes of the idlers, the untiring 
 efforts of the owners to lure customers originated a lavish 
 hospitality, which made them the favored resorts of all wh(^se 
 time hung heavily on their hands. To this rivalry Brookfield 
 chiefly owed its commercial importance : for the constant 
 endeavor of both merchants to capture each other's customers 
 by cutting down the prices of goods, and to give the greatest 
 ])ossible puldicity to their determination in this respect, secured 
 for the town the reputation, that goods were sold cheaper here, 
 and customers served more promptly, than at any other place 
 outside of the metropolis. Thus it came to pass, that buyers 
 from all parts of the Southwest ])oui-ed into the town to do 
 their trading, niaiiy of them ])assing by larger towns lacking 
 such fame. 
 
 Historical accuracy compels the admission, that Mr. Barnes, 
 the proprietor of the older establishment, situate on the east 
 side of the Square, was an unwilling jxirty to the fierce com- 
 petition. He was one of the original settlers of the town, aud 
 . took much credit to himself as having established, not only the 
 business i)resided over by himself, but that of the whole set- 
 tlement. It pleased him to consider himself one of the impor- 
 tant men of the country, a pioneer w^ho had introduced the bless- 
 ings of civilization into a remote wilderness, to whom the later 
 comers owed tlieir comforts, — even, to a great degree, their 
 pros])erity. For it was he, who. in tlie remote antiquity (some 
 live years or so ago) when the Kii'kai)oo Indians had just left 
 the neighboi'hood to settle upon their reservation in the Indian 
 Ti'rritory, liad lirought from tlie far off city a stock of coffee, 
 sugai', spun cotloii, unl)leaclu'(l muslin (known more popularly 
 as domestic) together with some Itoxes of iron, tin and earthern 
 ware, and offered them for sale in a primitive log house erected 
 near the cross roads, or to take in exchange for them the furs, 
 peltries, or wax froni \\\.v hives of wil(l Itees o-athered liv the 
 
.1 Wh'STEIi'N TOWN AND ITS IIIVAL STOUKS. '■">'-) 
 
 luintiTs. A hlucksiiiitli, mikI Uu'd :i wiuH'lwiiolit , soon (.'rcctcd 
 their shops in the iieighijorhood of the '' store," to wliicii. in 
 the eonrse of time, :i harness maker and a cobbler added their 
 loo- eabins. And when Mr. Barnes had sold out his goods, or 
 bartered them for the products of the chase, he sent the latter 
 to the city, where he disposed of them with handsome profit, 
 and " imported " a new stock of merchandise — a procedure, 
 which he repeated annually ever after with great regularity. 
 Notwithstanding the scarcity of cash in those times, — for the 
 new settlers rarely brought with them more than necessary to 
 [)ay for the land which they required to live on — his business 
 prospered and increased. It would have l)een his own fault if 
 he had not grown wealthy, since he tixed his own prices, as 
 well for the goods which he sold, as for those he took in 
 exchange, (^ame was still plenty ; and for a long time properly 
 ■prepared skins served as legitimate curi'ency, exchangeable in 
 the East for silver and gold. (Tovernment found it necessary, 
 after a time, to locate a land office and appoint a receiver of 
 public moneys at Brookfield, to accommodate the steadily 
 increasing stream of emigration from the South, North and 
 East; a post office, serving as a distributing office for quite an 
 extensive territory, followed, and the town prosj)ered. and 
 increased its population. 
 
 Mr. Barnes began to be looked upon, as he had long con- 
 sidered himself, a merchant prince. But the monopoly he 
 enjoyed became oppressive, I)ecause he could not be induced 
 to send for goods oftener than once a year. Prudent mer- 
 chant that he was, he always [)roportioned his orders to the 
 sales of the in'eceding year : and since the demand for goods 
 increased with the population, it frequently happened that the 
 supply gave out, and there was dissatisfaction and grumbling 
 among the disappointed customers. 
 
 One day, when the stock of goods hapi)ened to l)e at an el»b, 
 a rather heavily freighted two-horse wagon drove into the 
 town and stopped in front of the hotel. An elderly, but (piite 
 active little man with a weather-tanned face and one clear, oray 
 
40 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 eye, alighted from it and demanded aceommodation for himself 
 and beasts. The Brookhelders were on the look-out : for the 
 appearance of the wagon, i-eeoonized at once as belonging to a 
 peddler, had aroused their curiosity. The quaint, outlandish 
 look of the mercurial little man made him the object of unusual 
 interest : and it was not long before the spacious porch in 
 front of the hotel was lilled with inquisitive idlers of the town. 
 which seemed greatly to please the newcomer. He nodded 
 familiarly to all Avho approached, gleefully rubbed his hands, 
 and while with his sound eye he surveyed the crowd surround- 
 ing him, a spasmodic twitching of tlie lids of the one he had 
 lost produced so comit^al an effect upon the audience that a 
 titter of half suppressed merriment became audiV)le. When 
 the colored gi'oom had nnliitchcij and taken charge of his 
 horses, he took out of his wagon a box of considerable size, 
 set it down on the porch, and took off the li<l. 
 
 '' You wish to l)uy? " he addressed tlie by-standers in lluent 
 English but with so foivign an accent, that he greatly touched 
 the I'isibility of the onlookers. " I have in this wonderful box 
 cverytliing that heart may wisli for, exct'pt money, and that I 
 wish to get from you." lie tlien cast a swift, keen look over 
 his audience, and continued, taking out of the box one article 
 after the other, and showing it ai-ound. '* Suspenders! Every 
 man of you wears, 1 dare say, his own breeches, even if he is 
 married. Don't he? Therefore he wants suspenders. Or 
 ))reeches : Suspenders witliont breeches :ire of no use, exce{)t 
 up(jn a gallow ; and tiiere tliey use a rope instead. But if yon 
 are all supplied with breeches, you may need l)uttons. Here 
 theyai'cl Big and little, white and black — • manufactui-i'd 
 out of honest l)one, or horn, warranted to stick until torn off. 
 Or thread, to sew them on with, or have tiiem sewed on l»y a 
 prettv girl. Or needh's : Foi' without needles the sharpest 
 lassie will lie unable to piei'ce a button. Talking about lasses — 
 I know vdu like to hear ahout them — see. I have something 
 here for the dailings: scissors I They can nsi' them to cut 
 off the thread, as tliev cut off the thi-ead ol' a sweetheart when 
 
A WESTERN TOWN AND ITS IIIVAL STORES. 41 
 
 treiicliiiig on forbidden ground. See, most wondcrliil scissors I 
 Keen and sharp as a woman's tongue — bright and clear as a 
 maiden's eye — of adamantine hardness, like the heart of a 
 lassie when she gives you the mitten. Don't you all want :t 
 pair of such wonderful scissors? See, — the blades ;irc like 
 two lawyers trying u case ; they slash away at each other, but 
 cut only the jnirses'of the clients that come between them." 
 
 In such manner the peddler showed around his goods, 
 nnuising the crowil by tlroll c(jnceits, the effect of which was 
 heightened l»y the nervous manner in which he jerked out his 
 sentences, and his outlandish pronunciation. In the crowd 
 stood Mr. Barnes, the i)ioneer merchant. He volunteered the 
 opinion, delivered with a smile of derision, that this man might 
 make an excellent clown in a circus, Imt had not the stuff in 
 him for a decent i)eddler. "Has he succeeded in selling a 
 single article? " he impiired of Mr. Smith, standing beside 
 him. " He seems more desirous of parading his stale jokes, 
 than of selling his wares." 
 
 "You may be right, neighbor Barnes," said Mr. Smith, 
 who was none other tlian mine host of the hotel. •• If he 
 knew what he was about he might do a smashing business now, 
 for you've had nothing worth looking at in your store for a 
 young coon's age." 
 
 " I shall start for the city to replenish my stock next week," 
 Mr. Barnes replied a little testily : "• and then I will show you 
 goods, alongside of which this Iniffoon would not dare to let 
 his rubbish be seen. Everybody knows that I am to be relied 
 on, and you might have patience for a few days." 
 
 " You give us no otlu'r chance," Mr. Smith rei)lied. '• But 
 look: Old Jones is standing in front of his l)ox. Doesn't he 
 look exactly as if he meant to buy that watch he is picking up?" 
 
 "Indeed," cried JNIr. Barnes sneeringly. ••The peddler 
 really thinks he has found a customer. If he had a grain of 
 knowledge of human nature, he would know at once, that tlxd 
 fellow hasn't got a cent that lie (lon't need to color his nose 
 with." 
 
42 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 It really seemed iis if the [)e(Ullei' had set i)is heart on 
 securing a customer in Mr. Jones, — him of the copper-eohjred 
 nose; for he addressed himself to this individual with such a 
 Ci)mieal twilcii of his eyelid as to produce a shout of laughter. 
 '• J)o you need a watch, my friend ? " he jerked out. " Look: 
 here is one expressly imported for you from the city. It is 
 made of })ure metal, warranted not to cut in the eye. Its 
 works are a marvel to behold. It keeps time, twice a day, as 
 accurately as a chronometer for wliich you would have to pay 
 a hundred pounds. If you want it, I will sell it to you at 
 your own ])rice. Name your figure ! 
 
 Jones had by this tune succeeded in opening the case. 
 ''Why, I see no works in it at all I " he exclaimed, looking 
 nonplussed. 
 
 ''No?" queried the peddler, putting on a perfectly inno- 
 cent face, all spoiled, however, l)y that unfortunate twit(^hing 
 of his eyelid, which made him winking in a droll manner. 
 " Then I am sorry lor you, my friend. For that is a sad sign 
 of weak eyes. Weakened, perhai)s, l)y the red glare from 
 your nose. Try a i)air of my excellent specs. Cheap at half 
 the price ! " 
 
 The well known character of Jones as a lazy, drunken loafer, 
 gave point to the peddler's words, and turned the laugli against 
 him. 
 
 "That })eddler isn't (piite the fool you took him for," Mr. 
 Smith remarked to Mr. Barnes, smiling mischievously. " He 
 seems to hit .lones' character exactly." 
 
 "As if that meant anything!" said Mr. IJarnes suj)erciU- 
 ously. '• Any bal)y might read Jones' character in his besot- 
 ted face. That doesn't prove any business capacity in this 
 itinerant clown. He has not sold a thing yet." 
 
 " How can lie expect to make customers of men he insults 
 so shamefully? " asked a by-stander. " And 1 don't suppose 
 that people like to trade on the open street. He don't ap|)ear 
 to understand his liusiuess." 
 
 '•• You ari' riulil. neighbor Ibndcii." said l>ai-ncs. rejoiced to 
 
A \V/:^TEIiN TOWN AND ITS L'JVAL ,STOIiES. 43 
 
 liud lii.s viows sa[)|)t)i'ti'(l hy a IVUow lowiismau. " It is iiupai- 
 donablo in a nu'ivhant to tivat his pultlic with such downrisjht 
 insoli'iu'i'."" 
 
 Tilt' pc'(hlli'r. iioweviT, srciiird not ill ploast'd to havi.- tlu' 
 people laui>h. rather than buy, just yet. Haviny shown most 
 of the goods iu the box, he i*arefully replaced them and re- 
 turned the box to the Avagou. '■ There," he said, cheerfully, 
 " there are many such boxes in that stylish turn-out of mine. 
 Nobody has asked for the price of the goods, so I will volun- 
 teer the information, for the benefit of the public, that I can 
 afford to sell cheaper than any other honest man, and meau to 
 so do, because I l)iiy all my stock at auction for one (juarter 
 its value ; then when I get one half of what the things are 
 worth, I still make one hundred per cent ijrollt. You will l)e 
 astonished, when I call on you at your houses, how dog-cheap 
 the linest goods can be sold, and what tremendous l)argains 
 you are going to make." 
 
 Then, bowing to all around him, he retired into the hotel. 
 
 " That's about it, 1 guess," said Mr. Barnes, smiling trium- 
 phantly. " He has bought up a pile of rubbish that no one 
 else would have, at some auction, and now expects to ])alm them 
 off on us in the backwoods here, at prices for which the best 
 articles could be furnished." 
 
 The peddler counted on the notoriety which the oddity of 
 his course was likely to obtain for him, and he was not mis- 
 taken. When, after taking his meal, l»e called at the several 
 homes of the inhaliitants, he was looked for with lively curi- 
 osity by the fairer portion of the community, and his goods 
 found ready purchasers at very fair prices. His success was 
 so far above his most sanguine expectations, that he was in- 
 duced to inquire more minutely into the conditio)* of affairs. 
 As the result of his inquiries he determined to conqjete with the 
 merchant pioneer foi- the trade which Brookfield had to olfei-. 
 
 Thus it had come to pass that a new impulse was given to 
 the prosperity of Brookfield by the establishment of a second 
 store, Barnes soon found Mr. Van Braakcn. whose capacity' 
 
44 THE REBEL' h> DAUGHTER. 
 
 for busiiiejss he held in such utter contempt, an iiK-ouveiiieut 
 and formidable competitor. The first innovation he intro- 
 duced was the purchase of a stout freight wagon and the neces- 
 sary horses, which he kept almost continually on the road be- 
 tween the metropolis and Brooklield, thus enabling him to have 
 a fresh supply of goods always on hand. His success was 
 chiefly due, however, to the great i-eduction in prices which he 
 introduced from the start. The " Dutch Store " soon gained 
 the reputation of l)eing the place Avhere the best bargains were 
 to be made far and wide. 
 
 The nickname of " Dutch Store," which Barnes had given 
 to his rival's establishment, clung to it ineffaceal)ly. He had 
 counted on the i)rejudice of tlie liackwoodsmen against for- 
 eigners, and particularly against the " Dutch." — a term that 
 had become opprobrious in its application, not so nnicli to the 
 natives of Holland, luit rather to the Germans, who were 
 looked upon as descendants fi'oui those vile Hessians that liad 
 been sent o\er by the Britishei-s to crush out the spirit (jf 
 American ludependenci" — tiiinUing. \)\ fastening upon liim 
 this offensive epitliet, to di'aghim down to ignominious failure. 
 
 Mynheer \'an liraaken, liowever. who, as a native Hollander, 
 saw no disgrace in the word '• Dutch," was not slow to appre- 
 ciate and utilize for his own advantage this convenient cogno- 
 men, which, he at once saw, would most effectually bring his 
 business into i)ul)lic notice. The good natured naivete, with 
 which lie acu-epted the ttffensive byname, disarmed oi)position 
 and deprived the word of its sting. It was noticed with amaze- 
 ment, tliat the new merchant seemed to be as proud of the 
 distinction conl'erred upon him. as if llu- word •• Dutclnnan 
 weiv inten(le<l for a coinpliment. in I'ecognition of his merit in 
 coming ani(»iig tliem as :i stranger. He took special ])ains to 
 sprt'ad it as wicU-ly as possibh'. so tlial the fame of tlie-- Dutch 
 Store " soon extended to the southei'u and western limits of tiiv 
 State: and all along tlie great State roads: from the East and 
 from llie .North the ^' Dutch Merchant " was known. IJarnes 
 (lis<'overe(I too late, that he ha<l himself foriicd tiie mightiest 
 
A WESTEim TOWN AND ITS lUVAL STOlUJS. 45 
 
 weapon with wliicli liis rival was Uohting him. lie saw, and 
 bowed to, the necessity of employing other means of warfare 
 against his active competitor besides derisions and sneers ; he 
 was forced to content himself with smaller {)ronts, and to 
 replenish his stock of merchandise at shorter intervals, and 
 with greater circumspection. But he had suffered his rival to 
 gain too great a start, rendering exertion and sacrifices neces- 
 sary to enable him to hold his own. 
 
 Of course, there was no lack of secret envy and open oppo- 
 sition to be encountered by the adacious interloper. After the 
 lirst wave of his popularity had begun to subside, some of the 
 oldest inhaltitants of lirooklield thought it incumbent upon 
 them to espouse the cause of their ancient townsman against 
 tliis intruder, who was, besides, a foreigner. C)tliers. on the 
 contrary, thought him a valuable addition to the population, 
 whose business success meant prosperity and success for the 
 town. Thus two parties gradually formed, with Barnes and 
 ^^ln Braaken for leaders, which soon assumed the semblance 
 of organization. Not unlike two hostile armies in the held, 
 they had their outi)Osts, their scouts and spies. They met in 
 skirmishes, and even in severer encounters, tighting the Ijattle 
 between progress and conservatism, their watch words being 
 '' Dutch Store "" and '' Pioneer." 
 
 The commercial greatness of Brookfield could not but gain 
 by this rivalry. Even Mr. Barnes saw the validity of his 
 rival's motto, "Competition is the life of trade." Thougli 
 his gains were smaller than they had lieen under the enormous 
 protits of former years, he could not deny that twice tifty pre- 
 cisely equaled once one hundred ; and that many sales with 
 small profits might add as much to his gains, as greater protits 
 with fewer sales. 
 
 On the morning after Victor's arrival Colonel May accom- 
 panied him to Van Braaken 's store. As the Colonel had 
 predicted, Yahkop had not yet an-ived with the wagon. 
 Mynheer, as the Colonel persisted in calling the Dutch mer- 
 
46 THE HE BEL'S DAUUIITEU. 
 
 chant, was not a little astonished to see his new assistant 
 approach the store in Colonel May's company, and without 
 Yahkop. This at once aronsed his anxiety as to the safety of 
 his wares, and he inqnired eagerly, " Where is Yahko])? 
 Where is the wagon ? Has anything happened to the horses? " 
 The Colonel answered instead of the young man. '' l^on't 
 he alarmed, Mynheer, we left Yahkop with the team safe and 
 sound some twelve miles out, hist evening. If he hnrries 
 along, he will be here in an liour or two at the outside. Mr. 
 Waldhorst has put us — I mean my daughter and myself — 
 under very great obligation, and we did ourselves the honor to 
 bring him to our home, where we kept him for the night. I 
 now deliver him into your charge, as I had promised him before 
 he w(juld consent to come witli us. I hoi)e, Mynheer, that 
 you will pardon the liljerty that we allowed ourselves in mak- 
 ing Mr. Waldhorst our guest before he paid his respects to 
 yourself." 
 
 ' ' So you have already made his acquaintance ? ' ' spoke the 
 Mynheer, eyeing the Colonel somewhat suspiciously. " I like 
 that. And you are pleased with him? I like that. And 1 
 like it that he has come. When the wagon comes with the 
 goods we will have plenty of w'ork in the Dutch Store. Does 
 he know that our store is the Dutch Store ? ' ' 
 
 " I believe that my daughter has mentioned it to him," the 
 Colonel said, smiling, wlule Mynheer's eye-lid twitched re- 
 l)eatedly. 
 
 " Yes," the latter went on. " The Dutch Store. But step 
 in, Colonel. And you, Victor — that is your name, is it? — 
 look about on the scene of your future fame. Because you 
 belong to the Dutch Store, you will soon be much renowned." 
 
 "You will excuse me now," said the Colonel. -'• Having 
 redeemed my promise to introduce the young man to you, 1 
 must look about after other affairs. So bAe-bye." 
 
 ^' 1 guess you are in a hurry," said the merchant. *' You 
 have your hands full, as a candidate? But your election is 
 sure. 1 don't think vou ought to trouble yourself." 
 
.1 WESTEllN TOWN AND ITS ItlVAL ,ST<Jli'J:,s. 17 
 
 '' All, do yoii ivally think so? " the Colonel asked suavely. 
 •■ And may I count on your intlucnee'r " — 
 
 ••Xol" tlu' nieichant shouted, in eag-er deprecation. 
 •• Don'l count on inlluence from me I " Then he added 
 aixiloiietically : •• I am a man of business, and have no time 
 for politics. Besides, 1 have no vote. 1 never staid long 
 enough at any place to entitle me to my citizen papers. 
 And what inlluence I may have, 1 need for the Dutch 
 Store. But that will make no difference to you ; you will 
 he elected all the same. And I thank you for your kindness 
 to Victor here. 1 am sure he ought to be much obliged to 
 you . ' ' 
 
 " Tut I The obligation is all on my side, I assure you, " 
 the Colonel replied, cordially shaking hands with Mynheer. 
 •' And you, Mr. Waldhorst," he continued, turning to Victor, 
 " must not forget to be a frequent visitor at our house, where 
 you will always find a hearty welcome." 
 
 Victor followed his new chief into the interior of the store, 
 and was introduced to the head-clerk, Mr. Miller, as well as to 
 a youth of about his own age, whose name was Robert Roun- 
 tree, usually called Bob. The introduction over. Mynheer Van 
 Braaken addressed himself to the by-standers. ' ' Gentlemen, ' ' 
 he said, ''this is our new German clerk, who will hereafter 
 take pleasure in serving the patrons of the Dutch Store. He 
 will have little or no occasion to use his mother-tongue : for I 
 suppose that with the exception of my driver Yahkop, there 
 is not another German nearer than fifty miles of here. I 
 myself, you know," he continued, nodding with a condes- 
 cending air, '' am not a German, but a Dutchman, from whom 
 the Dutch Store gets its name." 
 
 Later, when Mynheer inquired into the particulars of the 
 journey from the city, N'ictor conscientiously related the cir- 
 cumstances which had led to the collision. A shadow of 
 decided displeasure settled on the merchant's face, as Victor 
 honestly related the mishap to the wagon. 
 
 " Yahkop did not right to let you drive that team," he said 
 
48 Till-: 11EBF.L\S DAlUniTKR. 
 
 rather severely. '• 1 employed liini to take eliarge of the 
 horses and wagon, and want you hi the store. Go on." 
 
 The recital of his exploit in trying to stop the runaway 
 horses seemed to please the merchant. " That was a smart 
 thing you did there," he said, nodding his head repeatedly. 
 " Acquiuntance with Colonel May will bring you advantage, 
 for he can't help patronizing you. He is a candidate and will 
 talk to many ])eople about himself, and will mention you, and 
 the Dutch Store."" 
 
 \'ictor found very little edilication in the words and manner 
 of his chief. He had expected a different leception of the 
 news he was communicating. What Mr. Van Braaken meant 
 by the advantage of l»eing talked about, was a mystery to him. 
 But he said nothing: only the words of his chief had jarred on 
 his ears, and he was at a loss to account for the de])ression 
 they produced. 
 
 The establishment into which A'ictor had l>een admitted as 
 youngest apprentice, was (illed with wares and merchandise of 
 all kinds. It was divided into compartments for the several 
 classes of goods kept for sale. One of them was devoted to 
 the exhibition of dry goods ; hardware was stored in another ; 
 in a third, groceries and provisions were kept, while a fourth 
 was used for the display of boots, shoes and hats. There were 
 separate divisions for books and stationery, and even medi- 
 cines, — among which quinine, Brandreth's pills and opedeldoc 
 ligured cons])ieuously, — had a i)articular corner assigned to 
 them. In a little back building or annex, furs, peltries, and 
 what other articles of l)arter the country afforded, were stored. 
 The extent of the business carried on by Mr. Van Braaken, 
 astonished Victor, and tilled him with pride at the thought of 
 identifying himself with an establishment of such magnitude. 
 He examined everything with minute attention, and would 
 have l)een pleased to enter on the discharge of his duties at 
 once ; but these consisted, for the present, in nothing more 
 than to learn the names of the articles, and to note the prices 
 and places where kept. 
 
J WKSTEUN TOWN ANI) ITS HIVAL STOllKS. !'.• 
 
 The arrival of the wagon with new goods from tiie metropo- 
 lis always ereated a considerable stir in the little town. Even 
 oil ordinary ocrasioiis it was a ti'eal for the idlers and loafers 
 ai)onl town to wateh the unloading of the wagon and the 
 ti'ansfer of the freight to the stores; and of all the wagoners 
 enijiloyed liy the mei'chants, none enjoyed greater popularity 
 than droll, simple Yahkoj). whose sententious sayings and 
 broken English afforded a rich source of fun and annisement. 
 To-day in [)articular, when he narrated Victcjr's ex[)loits in 
 driving the team against a tree, — not, of course, without 
 adding various emltellishments and exaggeratic^ns, — a great 
 crowd of townsmen surrounded the wagon, until the last box, 
 barrel and Ijale had been unloaded and transferred to the 
 interior of the store. The adventure itself, and Yahkop's 
 comical manner of relating it, caused great merriment among 
 the crowd, and the good-natured manner in which Victor 
 sometimes joined in the laugh against himself, jnade him quite 
 a favorite among them, so thatlMynheer Van liraaken felicitated 
 himself upon his valualde acquisition in his new a])prentice. 
 
 Victor assisted with a hearty good will in unloading, packing 
 and arranging the goods upon their shelves, showing such 
 aptitude and docility in all that he put his hands to, that he 
 gained the encouraging approbation of his chief, in this respect 
 also. 
 
IV. 
 
 BUNKUM: MERCANTILE AND LITERARY. 
 
 yjCTOK readily adapted himself to his new avocation. 
 He mastered the details of the business with ease and 
 ' rai)idity, and discharged his duties diligently and 
 cheerfully. Mr. Miller, his immediate superior, was a not 
 unamiable man, who patiently answered the numerous ques- 
 tions Victor had to ask about the rules of the establishment, 
 nor disdained to satisfy his curiosity concerning the town, the 
 country and the people, and other general topics. 
 
 In one respect, however, Victor found it exceedingly dilti- 
 cult to satisfy the expectations of his superiors. He could not 
 understand how^ it could possibly conduce to the advantage of 
 his employer, to deceive the customers as to the real quality or 
 value of the goods they wished to purchase. He betrayed his 
 lamentable ignorance — stupidity. Bob Rountree would have 
 said — in the rudimentary principles of trade, by suggesting 
 the silly and antiquated notion, that it was wrong to lie about 
 the wares one had for sale, and that the habit of doing so 
 nuist, in the long run, destroy one's business by frightening 
 off the customers. Mr. Miller, in particular, was put to much 
 trouble in the endeavor to correct Victor's heresies, and to 
 impress him with sounder, more business like views. 
 
 One day, after Victor had made some progress in learning 
 the names and prices of the various articles in stock, two 
 ladies entered the store, to wait upon whom the chief himself, 
 as well as every one of the employees showed great alacrity. 
 Mynheer Van Braaken received them at tlu' door and courte- 
 ously escorted them to the counter ; Mr. Miller made his 
 politest bow, and stood ready on the inside of the counter 
 to take tlieir orders; even Boli Rountree ostentatiously jiaraded 
 
 (50) 
 
BUNKUM: MERCANTILE AND LlTERAllY. 51 
 
 hiniself before them to ^illo\v his readiness to serve them, if he 
 shoiikl be wanted. Victor's lieart beat faster when his eyes 
 fell on tliese ladies : witli a tlirill of genuine pleasure he saw 
 them walk straight uj) to himself, and noted the kindly manner 
 in which they acknowledged his salutation. 
 
 They were his acquaintances, INIrs. May and her daughter 
 NeUie. 
 
 " Are you aware, sir, that you have been very naughty, Mr. 
 Waldhorst? " These were the first words that Nellie addressed 
 to him as soon as she had responded to his bow. '• How 
 many days have you been here, now, without once coming to 
 see us, and telling us how you are pleased with our ])eople. 
 and your place, and in(iuiring after our health? " 
 
 " You are most kind, Miss May," stammered Victor, blush- 
 ing with pleasure. '" I shall nnike carlv use of your invita- 
 tion." 
 
 '* So y.ou have said before," the girl replied. '' But now 
 that we are here to remind you of your promise, we may as 
 well get you to show us some of the fine things you have for 
 sale. I persuaded mamma to make our purchases in your store 
 this time, to give you a chance to show off as a salesman." 
 
 " Was it not to hear us talk Dutch in the Dutch Store? " 
 Victor inquired, with a bashful smile. "But Yahkop is not 
 here to-day." 
 
 '• You might talk Dutch with the Mynheer, as papa calls 
 your boss," Nellie retaliated saucily. •• But 1 regret to see 
 that 1 was mistaken in you. 1 took you for a model gentle- 
 man, and now you take delight in teasing me with the silly 
 words you heard nie say." 
 
 " What does the girl niean ? " Van Braaken asked Victor in 
 German. '' Answer in German. It will please her." 
 
 Victor complied and the result showed that the Mynheer 
 was right, for Nellie l>urst out in a merry peal of laughter. 
 " That sounds for all the world like the gabble of the Chicka- 
 saw Indians, that passed through here two years ago," she 
 exclaimed, on recoverino- her breath. 
 
52 THE llEBEI/S DAUGIlTEli. 
 
 " Nellie, you ought to be ashamed of yourself I " Mrs. May 
 said reproachfully. '' When will you learn to behave like a 
 Indy?" 
 
 *' IJut il sounds so funny, nianuna I " said tlie girl, endeav- 
 oring, with indifferent success, to compose her beaming fea- 
 tures. '' Well, then, Mr. Waldhorst, show me some of your 
 finest white hose." 
 
 "Hose?" ^'ictor repeated boklly. thougli he iiad not the 
 faintest idea of the meaning of the word. " For yourself? " 
 he added leisurely, to gain time. Then it Hashed into his mind 
 that he had seen a box labeled '■' Misses' White Silk Hose," 
 which he triumphantly produced, and submitted the contents 
 to her inspection. 
 
 Having selected a pair whose elasticity she was testing liy 
 stretching them out to their full length, she inquired: '' How 
 high do these come ? ' ' 
 
 Instead of answering, Victor V) hi shed scarlet. 
 
 " Well," said the young lady, looking up in surprise, 
 " can't you tell me the price? " 
 
 "Oh, the price! " came from Victor in a voice hardly 
 audible, the color deepening on his face. "The price is six 
 bits." He looked as if it would be a relief to him to be 
 engulfed by an earthquake, or to be carried off l)y some 
 friendly monster, out of range of those wide open, wondering 
 eyes. 
 
 A faint retlex of the color in his face and a hardly percept- 
 ible smile brightened the face of INfrs. May, as she promptly 
 came to Victor's rescue, by requesting him to show her some 
 stuffs suitable for a dress for Nellie. With a profoundly 
 grateful heart Victor piled up everything of line dress goods 
 the liouse contained before them on the counter. Tlie hidies 
 examined, admired, compared, — notliing just suited them. 
 At last Mrs. May requested him to show them a piece of silk, 
 of a delicate 1)lue color, which he had purposely not removed 
 from the shelf. Victor complied with jierceptible hesitation. 
 He had addressed himself exclusivelv to Mrs. Mav tvfter 
 
BUNKUM: MERCANTILE AND LITEBAEY. 53 
 
 st:itiii<>' tlu' \)v\vv of till' hose; l)ut lie now cast a I'lirtivi' li'lance 
 ill till' ilii'i'i'tioii wliei'o Ni'llie stood, — not, however at lier. 
 hut at Mr. Van J3raaken, standing iininediately hack of the 
 youiiii' lady. He took no notice of A'ictoi-'s ulance. JMrs. 
 JNIay seemed pleased Avith the article shown her. and inciuired 
 the price. Again Victor hesitated : cast an appealing look at 
 Mr. ^Miller, then another at his chief, and as neither of them 
 seemed to understand his signal of distress, he stammered out, 
 his voice gaining lirmness, however, as he went on : 
 
 '• We cannot recommend this article to you, Ma'am. It is 
 a poor quality of goods, and the color will fade in the sun." 
 
 The ladies looked at him in astonishment. They seemed 
 nettled. Mr. JNIiller promptly stepped forward and said, with 
 a most amiable smile, " The young man is mistaken, ladies. 
 Tins is a most excellent and exceedingly line quality of silk, 
 and if the color suits your taste, you need not hesitate t(j buy. 
 J assure you, that the sun will have no effect upon it." 
 
 •• 1 am not mistaken," answered Victor, turning pale before 
 the menacing frown he saw gathering on the brow of the chief, 
 but standing his ground bravely. " I have my information 
 from Mr. Van Braakeu, who said that we had been shamefully 
 cheated in this piece of goods, because neither the fabric nor 
 the color was genuine." 
 
 '• This is a strange misunderstanding on the part of our 
 young friend here," Mr. Miller rejoined, keeping up his 
 sweetest smile before the ladies. " I was never more deceived 
 in my life, if this is not as line a piece of goods as Avas ever 
 brought to Brooklield. Just feel this soft and delicate, yet 
 lirm and solid texture ; and the color is as true as gold. I 
 take some credit to myself as a competent judge of this kind 
 of goods. But here is Mr. Van Braaken, to Avhom the boy has 
 appealed. He, surely, can give us the best information." 
 
 Thus referred to Mr. Van Braaken could not avoid givino- 
 his judgment. He stepped up with a sober face, passed the 
 silk lightly through his lingers, and said, regarding the ladies 
 with a benignant look: " As usual, the young man is right. 
 
54 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 I am extremely sorrv, ladies, that I cannot, on this occasion, 
 acquiesce in the judoment of Mr. Miller, who is usually so 
 correct and relialile. That hoy is an extraordinary boy — 
 the smartest boy in Vernal County. You wouldn't take him 
 to be a Dutchman." 
 
 And Mr. Van IJraaken's eyelid twitched, and Nellie thought 
 he was winking at them, and it looked so funny, that she found 
 it exceedingly dillicult to restrain her merriment. Mr. Miller, 
 of course, was highly astonished. He deemed it scarcely pos- 
 sible that the beautiful, soft and even textile, which he again 
 examined with engrossing attention, should be a base imitation. 
 But Victor, in the joy of his heart, forgave his emi)loyer all 
 the humiliating ei)itliets Avith which he had so often wounded 
 him. Was not his integrity, — aye. his judgment, too, — 
 gloriously vindicated ])efore the ladies? Let Bob Kountree 
 sneer and grin, if it pleased him : Nellie had I)een a witness to 
 his triumi)h I 
 
 " Well, IMr. Waldhorst," said Mrs. May on recovering from 
 her astonishment, "■ since you insist on vetoing our own choice, 
 suppose you indicate to us what yours woidd lie. Show us the 
 goods that you would select for a dress for my daughter." 
 
 " Yes," Nellie chimed in, '• display your good taste by 
 picking out for me the loveliest dress you've got in the estab- 
 lishment." 
 
 " If you would do me the honor to be guided by my choice," 
 said Victor, modestly, but with the tone of conviction that 
 knows no doubt, "you Avill take this." And he displayed 
 before them a l)olt of nuislin de laine, which the ladies had laid 
 aside without bestowing a second look at it. " Is not this a 
 beautiful design? " 
 
 "Very pretty, indeed," said Mrs. May. ''But unfortun- 
 ately for your choice, Nellie already possesses a dress of this 
 same pattern . ' ' 
 
 "But not in wool, mama," Nellie suggested with some 
 eagerness. " See how nuich richer and brighter these colors 
 shoAV, and how much lovelier the pattern looks than on calico." 
 
BUNKUM: MEliCANTILE AND LITERARY. 55 
 
 "I never saw a lovelier dress on a lady, than this," said 
 Victor enthusiastically. " It becomes yon wonderfully." 
 
 "• What makes you so sure? " asked Nellie. 
 
 " I have seen you in one like it." 
 
 "When — that day in the woods, when tiie horses ran 
 away?" the girl asked in high glee, as if much pk-ascd. 
 '' Sure enough, mama, I wore that calico dress on my way 
 home from the seminary. Is it not strange, that Mr. Wald- 
 horst should have noticed it, and remember it so accurately? " 
 
 Mrs. May smiled graciously. " Well," said she, " if your 
 friend insists on it, I don't see how we can avoid buying it." 
 Then, turning to the merchant she said, " And you, Mr. Van 
 Braaken, I must congratulate on your disinterested sincerity. 
 I ho])e that you may prove the adage, that honesty is the best 
 l)olicy. For my part, I shall hereafter deal exclusively at 
 your establishment ; for it is quite a relief to be able to rely 
 implicitly on your word and judgment, as, from what I have 
 experienced here to-day, 1 feel confident I may do with entire 
 safety." 
 
 " Very much obliged for your good oi^inion, Madam." 
 said the merchant. "You are very right: Honesty is the 
 best policy. And you may rest assured, we in the Dutch 
 Store always speak the truth. One of the lirst [)rinciples 1 
 taught our young friend here was, to speak the truth to our 
 customers always. And you see, he is an apt scholar. He 
 will always, mindful of my teachings, sj^eak the truth, even if, 
 for the time being, it will lead to the loss of a bargain. Yes, 
 indeed, Honesty is the best policy ; and it is the motto of the 
 Dutch Store." 
 
 Victor hardly dared trust his ears. Had he so thoroughly 
 misunderstood his chief, in suspecting him of encouraging 
 unfair dealing with the customers? Why, what Mr. ^'an 
 Braaken had said to Mrs. May was exactly what he himself 
 thought right, and fair and wise. Of course, honesty is the 
 best policy ; and lo I tiiis was the motto of the establishment I 
 He must have [)ut a wrong construction on the previous con- 
 
56 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 duct and noi'ds of his su[)eriors in tlie store, and done his 
 employer orievous injustice. 
 
 But when tlie ladies had left the store, not without having 
 repeated I heir invitation to Victor to visit them at an early 
 daVi Van Uraaken informed him that lie had. on this occasion, 
 shown himself a fool. Mctor cohered with honest indiiination, 
 Init listened (piietly to what his chief had to s;iy to him. Only 
 when the latter repeatt'd with emphasis, that a competent sales- 
 man imist 1)1' able to pi'aise up and to sell a poor article as 
 \\v\\ as :i uood one he modestly suo-gested that Mr. ^'an 
 Braaken had himself (U'clared honesty and truth to be the 
 proper rule of action, which would insure success in business, 
 and was promptly told for answer, that this declaration was 
 meant for the customer, who must of course l)elieve in the 
 honesty of the dealer. But a merchant nuist not permit him- 
 self to l)e susi)ected of having been imposed upon ; and the 
 endeavor to convince a customer of the worthlessuess of the 
 goods his customer wishes to l)uy. was paving the way to 
 bankruptcy. 
 
 Victor listened with eyes and mouth wide open. He was 
 deeply impressed with the words of wisdom that fell from the 
 lips of his chief ; but the reflection was not edifying. He 
 began to suspect, that there was a radical defect in the training- 
 he had received ; that he lacked the essential elements for 
 success in mercantile business. Not even the consolatory 
 remarks with which his chief closed his harangue, restored his 
 equanimity. 
 
 "•But we have gained one great advantage to-day," said 
 Mr. \wn Braaken. "We have secured the custom of the 
 Mays, and all their inlluence. They will swear by the Dutch 
 
 Store hereafter." 
 
 * * * 
 
 The young man found solace in the leisui'e which his duties 
 left him. and which he utilized to pick' up such sci'aps of in- 
 formation, as the scanty means at his own command rendered 
 j)ossil»le. and which ])ut augmented his thirst for the knowledge 
 
BUNKUM: MERCANTILE AND LITERARY. 57 
 
 and cultuiv, the lack of which he felt so keenly. Among the 
 books kept for saU' in the store, he found Lindley Murray's 
 Grammar of the Ensilisii Language, and set diligently to work 
 in studying it. IJut lie found great dilllculties to surmount : 
 the text book liiat had fallen \nU) his hands was calcuhited for 
 the use of schools, presupposing the assistance of a teacher. 
 Nothing daunted, however, he plodded on. making what 
 progress he could. 
 
 One evening, on returning to the store after supper, he met 
 with Leslie ^Nlay. who was leisurely sauntering across the 
 Square. He shook liim cordially by the hand, and inquired 
 what he was doing. In the conversation that followed, Victor 
 confided to his friend the difficulties he found in the study of 
 grammar. 
 
 '' Cxrammar? " exclaimed Leslie, in some surprise. '• Are 
 you studying grammar? Then who is your teacher? " 
 
 '' That is the trouble," Victor replied. " I iiave no teacher. 
 And there are passages in my book which the closest attention 
 does not enable me to understand." 
 
 "• I should think so," said Leslie. '' What I " he continued, 
 with a smile of incredulity, " Studying grammar, and no 
 teacher? A>'hat. in all the world, possesses you to take up 
 this driest and most tedious of all subjects. — and without a 
 master, too? " 
 
 •* I am ashamed of my ignorance," said Mctor. •' J know 
 neither my own mother-tongue, nor the language of this 
 country. P2veryone ought at least t(^ understand his own 
 language . " 
 
 " Well! " re[)lied his young friend, with an inflection imply- 
 ing wonder, if not doubt. '' You have undertaken a job, sure 
 enough; and 1 am not surprised that you get stuck at times. 
 For though English grammar is sheer child's play alongside of 
 Latin, I wouldn't for the finest horse in Vernal County be put 
 through the drcai'y drill again. If you like it, you're a diyer 
 I)oke than 1 took you for, from what Nellie told me about you. 
 But talking; about a master — we've got one among us right 
 
58 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 now. Huveu't you heard that there is to l)e a lecture this 
 very evening on this same subject of grammar ? 
 
 '' A lecture on grammar? " exclaimed Victor, eagerly. 
 •' Where? By whom? " 
 
 '' Why, — haven't you heard about it? That is strange. I 
 thought you folks at the store got all the news lirsthand. It's 
 at the court house. Time: T.oO. Close at hand now. Ad- 
 mission, free. It's some scheme most likely, to humbug the 
 green ones out of • their money. For who would expect a 
 Yankee to do anything for anybody without i)ay, unless it were 
 bait to some trap ? ' ' 
 
 '' You know the lecturer, do you? " 
 
 " No. I have never seen him." 
 
 '' Then Ik^w do you know him to be a Yankee? " 
 
 '' Oh, no one but a Yankee Avould ever think of lecturing on 
 grammar. Besides, I have heard his name ; it is Caleb Amos. 
 Ca-leb A-mos ! Is that proof enough that he is a Yankee? " 
 
 "I would like above all things to hear him," said Victor. 
 '' Are you going? " 
 
 '• Well, yes, I believe I will," Leslie remarked leisurely, as 
 if the matter were not yet quite certain. ''Yes: I think 
 there are several reasons to induce me. Jn the first place, I 
 don't know what else to do with myself this evening. Next, 
 as the admission is free, I expect Brooklield to turn out 
 strong. The young ladies will be there to a man — " 
 
 '■'■ To a girl, you mean," Victor interrupted, with a smile. 
 
 " To see the man, let us say, then," Leslie continued good 
 naturedly. '' Or rather to be seen by the man. At least to 
 air their new bonnets, and i)atronize Art and Science. Thirdly 
 and lastly, 1 have really some curiosity to learn what a keen- 
 witted Yankee can find to say in a lecture on grammar." 
 
 ' ' May I go ^^ ith you ? ' ' 
 
 ■' Come, by all means," said Leslie cordially. " Let us go 
 now; the time lias almost come, and we must be early, so as 
 to get a place from where we can muster the ladies as they 
 enter." 
 
BUNKUM: MERCANTILE AND LITERARY. 59 
 
 The two vuiiiiii" iiu'ii tiinu'tl their steps tinvard tlie (^jiirt 
 house, wliere they foiuul ii few early comers ah-eady seated. 
 
 Darkness had not (luite set in yet in tlie open air; but the 
 oreat hall of the court house was g-looniy enough, though 
 ilhiiiiinated by two tallow candles, perched on the desk at 
 wliich the lecturer was to hold forth, serving rather to make 
 visible, than to dispel, the gloom. 
 
 •' Will Colonel ^Nlay be here? " asked Victor, as they entered. 
 
 •• My governor? Why. of course. He is.always in for any- 
 thing of this kind ; and just now, when he is a candidate, you 
 know, he must improve every opportunity to soft-soap the 
 monster, and wheedle them into voting for him." 
 
 Victor was puzzled to know what Leslie meant by soft-soap- 
 ing the monster, but felt bashful about inquiring. He sat 
 down by the side of his friend, near the door, where every one 
 that came in had to pass by them. Leslie had prophesied 
 truly ; more than half of the audience which l)egan to pour in 
 as soon as the l)ell in the cupola of the hotel had tolled out the 
 in\itation, consisted of ladies, old and young, and Victor was 
 proud to see how many of the fair comers had a smile and a 
 nod of recognition for his friend. After a while there was a 
 smile from a well-known face for him, too, and a maiden's 
 pleasant voice whispered: " Good evening, Mr. WaldhorstI " 
 
 It was Nellie's voice, as she entered by the side of her 
 mother. Passing by her brother, she said: "Why, what 
 brought //o*« here? This is the last place at which I would 
 haA'e expected to see you." 
 
 Leslie paid no attention to what his sister said, but whis- 
 pered into Victor's ear: " See, that is the lecturer I That 
 fellow% that's holding on to the governor." 
 
 '•' I thought you said you did not know him? " Victor asked. 
 
 *' Nor do I," replied Leslie. " But that long, narrow face, 
 the sandy hair and whiskers, those ferret-like, hypocritical eyes 
 and sharp nose can belong to no one 1»ut a Yankee. There, — 
 seel the governor steps on the platform with him. That is the 
 fellow!" 
 
60 THE EE BEL'S D AUGHT EB. 
 
 He was rio-ht. C(j1oik'1 May k'tl the straiiyer to tlie plat- 
 fovin with the courtesy and attention, which a Soutlieru uen- 
 tlenian bestows on an lionored i>nest. He ra})ped on the table 
 in riMiuest of silence, and said, .-iddressino; the audience: 
 
 "• Ladies and oentlemen I Friends and fellow citizens 1 To 
 nie has fallen the distinouished honor and pleasing duty to 
 introdut-e to you our illustrious oiiest. Personally, he is a 
 stranger among vis. But his fame as a man of learning, as an 
 indefatigal:)le worker in the realm of science, as one of the 
 great lexicographers of our age and c<juntrv, has gone ])efore 
 him and reached us, in the primitive backwoods. — on the 
 conlines, so to speak, of civilization, west of the mighty 
 JNIississippi. You will hear a mune. familiar to you all as a 
 household word, when 1 introduce to you the illustrious Pro- 
 fessor Caleb Amos, as the orator of the evening." 
 
 The gxMitleman thus introduced Ixjwed on all sides, and a 
 general stamping of feet was the welcome accorded him l)v the 
 audience. The Colonel, however, continued : 
 
 '• I net'd not, ladies and gentlemen, remind you of the honor 
 conferred upon us in the backwoods, here, upon Brookfield, 
 upon the whole Southwest of our glorious State, l)y the appear- 
 ance among us of the renowned Caleb Amos, who will thus 
 retlect u})ou us the splendor of his name and fame. And 
 you, — all oi you, — feel it to be, as I feel it to be, a sacred 
 obligation upon us, to sustain the reputation of our country 
 and people as patrons of the sciences, of enlightenment, and of 
 progress, — thus doing our^ share of the work of building the 
 Temi)le of Liberty, begun by our forefathers, so that (nii- 
 glorious Repulilic may truly become a Haven of Kefuge and 
 an Asylum for the oppressed of all Nations ! 
 
 " Now isn't that precious stuff ! " whispered Leslie into his 
 friend's ear, us soon as the storm of applause had subsided, 
 which the Colonel's patriotic speech had called forth. " It is 
 ])ei'fectly astonishing, what amount of nonsense my governor 
 can supply, when he tries I 
 
 Victor made no reply. It |)UzzU'(l him somewhat to under- 
 
lifWKUM: MKIK'ANTILK AND LI ll'.UAUY. *'> I 
 
 slnnd tlif ('ouncclioii liclwccii llu' niory ol' the Ivcpiililic iiiid :i 
 U'ctuiv on i>r:iiiiiiiMr ; Imt he vciituix'd no ciiticisin. 
 
 The U'ctuirr now took tlu' Colonel's jjIiu-c. lie had no 
 manuscript. Imt at once launclK-d out on the patriotic stream 
 of laudation, taking' his cui' I'rom his prcdet'essor. pronoiniccd 
 a loud, if nut clo(iuc'nt, pancjivric upon Liberty ; paid a ulow- 
 ino- tri])ute to the valoi' of the American peojjle in their struo-olc 
 against tyraimy and oppression : reminded his iiearers of the 
 necessity of eternal watchfulness as the price of liherty, and 
 demanded that every one of them stand to his post, restinoj, if 
 need lie, on their armour in the Held. Then he spoke of Intel- 
 lioence as the mighty weapon with wliicli alone the American 
 people could successfully resist the enemy from alu'oad, and 
 treason from within. " For intelligence," he pi'oclaimed, ''is 
 knowledge, and knowledge is power I To gain power, you 
 must possess knowledge, and to gain knowledge, you must l>e 
 master of your language. Language is the key to all knowl- 
 edge. Thus you see the vital importance of Language to your 
 lil)erty and to the welfare of the American i)eoi)le, and how 
 essential it is to supply the rising generation with the powerful 
 weapon Intelligence, for the struggle, the everlasting struggle, 
 against Oppression, Tyranny and Treason, from within and 
 without I " 
 
 The honest backwoodsmen applauded vigorously. Victor 
 listened with rapt attention, beginning- to see the point of the 
 orator's patriotism. But Leslie whispered, with a sneer, 
 ''Now watch, Victor. Directly you will see the Yankee 
 schoolmaster crop out, angling for pupils, with patriotism for 
 bait: " 
 
 •• For in a free country," the orator continued with unction. 
 •' Truth is mighty, and must prevail. But Truth is Thought, 
 and Thought is Spirit, and Spirit dwells in the Word — in tlu' 
 Word as written, or printed; chiefly as spoken. And who is 
 there among you, my fellow citizens, upon whom your country 
 may not, some day, call to stand ujj in the fight for Truth, for 
 Right, for Freedom? And how will vou obey the glorious 
 
B2 THE liEJJEL'S DA UGH TEL'. 
 
 summons without a thorough knowledge of your mother 
 tongue, — that glorious tongue whose destiny it is, in the not 
 far off future, to rule over the face of the civilized world? That 
 blessed tongue, whose mission it is to bear the torch of Free- 
 dom and Enlightenment to the Nations languishing in dark- 
 ness and ignorance ? ' ' 
 
 The speaker paused, to give the audience time for a new 
 round of apj^lause. " Can you tell me," again whispered. 
 Leslie, " who deserves the palm for stupidity, — the hypocriti- 
 cal Yankee with his bombastic nonsense, or that gaping crowd 
 so eagerly swallowing his clumsy bait? " 
 
 Professor Caleb Amos concluded his oration by a few ex- 
 planatory remarks on the nature of grammar, comparing the 
 aggregate of English words with the soldiers of a great army, 
 suggested that as these, by a systematic division into companies, 
 ))attalious and regiments were transformed from an unwieldy 
 mol) into a highly etticacious instrument in the hands of a 
 general, so the former, by the science of grammar, were ar- 
 ranged into easily distinguishable classes, groups and orders ; 
 and then announced that he was ready, by means of an entirely 
 new system, invented by himself, to teach the whole science of 
 grammar in ten days, for the insignificant fee of one dollar, 
 payable in advance, provided that a class of at least forty per- 
 sons, without reference to age or sex, participated ; the only 
 condition imposed being, that they coidd read and write in the 
 English language. 
 
 "There!" exclaimed Leslie triumphantly. "Do you see? 
 That's the barl) so bombastically baited. Forty dollars in ten 
 days! Not so bad for the Yankee, eh? Wonder if he will 
 tuid forty male and female fools in the settlement anxious to be 
 humbugged by him ? ' ' 
 
 Victor said nothing. He was nervously excited. The goal, 
 so distant, and of so laborious approach to him, was shown by 
 the lecturer to be within such easy reach. Only ten days ! 
 Only one dollar ! He trembled with eager hope that his em- 
 ployer might allow him to improve this grand ojjportunity, and 
 
BUNKUM: MKUVANTILE AND LITEKALT. G3 
 
 revolved in his mind tlie monientous question, wliether he 
 might venture tlie suggestion. 
 
 Just then INIr. Van Braaken, who had also attended the lec- 
 ture, approached, and elei^trified him with the proposition that 
 he should test his mettle in the grammar class. 
 
 '• I would be but too glad to do so ! " he replied eagerly. 
 
 " Then you shall try," said Van Braaken. " Come along. 
 1 see the new schoolmaster is ready to take subscriptions. 
 Step up I ' ' 
 
 They went up to the table where Mr. Caleb Amos was 
 explaining to a group of citizens his terms and conditions, and 
 inviting them to sign his list. Colonel May, Mr. Smith the 
 proprietor of the hotel, and Mr. Barnes the rival merchant, 
 were discussing the importance of the science of grammar, 
 agreeing that it was a good thing and ought to be encouraged. 
 
 " So I think," said Van Braaken, not without ostentation. 
 " And I mean to give my Dutch apprentice a chance. You 
 shall see that he will beat all the young men in the class, if he 
 is a Dutchman. Put your name on the list, Victor, and show 
 them that you are the smartest boy in the county. ' ' 
 
 Victor blushed over the bombastic boasting of his chief ; 
 but he was too haj^py to take offense. His name was the first 
 on tlie list. 
 
 " Here is his dollar," Mr. Van Braaken continued, taking a 
 Mexican dollar from his pocket and handing it to the Profes- 
 sor. " And if he needs books or anything else, he shall have 
 them. We are not stingy at the Dutch Store." 
 
 "Well done I " exclaimed Colonel May. "I know of no 
 young man that deserves encouragement more than my young- 
 friend Waldhorst." 
 
 Victor's eyes sparkled with pleasure at the Colonel's words, 
 and Yan Braaken walked away from the grouj) with a com- 
 plaisant smile and twitching eye-lid. 
 
 " We must give the townsi^eople a good example," the 
 Colonel went on. "My children are studying at the univer- 
 sity and seminary ; but it will do them no harm to brighten up 
 
64 THE BEBEI/S DAUGHTER. 
 
 i\ little (luriiiii- the vacation. Put your name down, Leslie, and 
 put down Nellie's, also."" 
 
 '•I ?"" incjuired Leslie, in very evident surprise and dis- 
 l)leusure. " Why should 1 attt-nd the class? J went Ihrouuh 
 English oj-;unniar some years ago." 
 
 '' Never mind," said the Colonel good huinoredly. •• It 
 won't hurt you to go over it again. .7nst ]>ut your name 
 down."" 
 
 "Oh yes, Leslie, do I " " whispered Nellie, who had ap- 
 proached with her mother. •• It will be so much nicer than at 
 school I All the girls are going, and we will have such fun I 
 
 "Are they really such geese ?" Leslie replied, also in a 
 ^vhisper. " Are they going, sure enough? Who, for 
 instance? " 
 
 •■ Why, Hettie Shannon, for one," lireathed Nellie, with an 
 arch smile and a meaning glance at her brother. " And then 
 Emily Matlack will be sure to come, of course." 
 
 Leslie hesitated no longer. " Well, Pa," he said, with a 
 droll smile of ivsignation, " it you insist on offering u\) your 
 own children on the altar of [Science and Patriotism, — why, 
 let the grim Moloch devour us. So here — Nel-lie and 
 Les-lie — May I " The two signatures followed Victoi's in a 
 bold, dashing hand. 
 
 It Avas an auspicious beginning for Caleb Amos. ]\L'. 
 Barnes found it prudent to follow suit. So did Mr. Smith, 
 and Mr. Jones, and after them many of the prominent citizens 
 of the town, who sul>scribed for their children of lioth sexes 
 and various ages. The re([uisite number of pupils was ol>- 
 tained before the meeting was over : Mr. Caleb Amos gleefully 
 rubl)ed his hands, and the audience began to leave the coui't- 
 house with the exalting consciousness of having saved the 
 honor of Brook/leld, and lighted a torcli whose splendor would 
 confound the Powers of Darkness. 
 
 lint no one was happier than Mctor, who indulged in delight- 
 ful anticipations of slaking his ardent thirst for knowledge and 
 culture. And when Colonel May requested his son to escort 
 
UUyKUM: M/Jh'CA.V'J'/Lh- AXD Llli:i;M!Y. 
 
 Go 
 
 tilt' ladies lioiiif. liccaiisc -.oiiif li'i\ial luisiiicss would detain 
 liiin yi't a wliili- in town, and Leslie invited liis younu' friend to 
 Join tlu'iii and conclude the evenino- with a walk in the l)enuti- 
 ful Hioonliiihl , hi' accepted without hesitation. And he aston- 
 ished Nellie liy l'or<>-ettin(i- his l)aslifulness in the picsence of 
 the vivacious younu' lady, and still increasiuii' hei' wonder by 
 tlu' readiness and spirit with which he met and parried her 
 sallies on their walk to May Meadows. 
 
 \'ictor loni>- reiiieinl)i'red that deliuhtful walk, and tlu- events 
 to which it o'ave rise. 
 
 
 
A PEEP AT THE "PECULIAR" INSTITUTION. 
 
 /liM FTER a deliglitful hour .spent iu the company of the 
 Jjiy^ ladies and Leslie, on the broad porch of the mansion 
 ' ^\^ at May Meadows, Victor took his departure, bravely 
 resisting the tempting invitation to stay all night. 
 
 It Avas not yet beyond the middle of June, and the weather 
 was delightful. A soft, refreshing breeze, peculiarly grateful 
 .•liter a hot June day, caressingly fanned his cheeks and fore- 
 head. The moon, in her crescent, sent down a dreamy light. 
 Her rays, percolating through the Uuttering foliage of the 
 grove that surrounded the May mansion, sketched grotesque 
 mosaics (jn tlie graveled walks, and cast romantic glamour 
 over the little village of huts just Iteyond, that served as 
 roosting places for the negroes. Profound peace reigned all 
 about; not a sound reached Victor's ears, save that of his 
 own foot-falls. The cabins lay there in the bright moon- 
 shine like huge grids fashioned into gigantic squirrel cages. 
 Victor had often seen these log cabins in the day-time, 
 without noticing them closely, except to smile at the primitive 
 architecture which constructed a habitation out of unhewn logs 
 piled over each other ; but now, in the serene calmness of the 
 moon-lit landscape, they made an impressive picture. His 
 imagination busily peopled the unpretentious hovels with men 
 and women whose destiny it Avas to sow, for others to reap ; 
 whose toil i)roduced the wealth iu wliicli their master reveled, 
 while they subsisted on cornbread and bacon, wore rags to 
 cover their nakedness, and were housed in these — picturesque 
 cabins. He drew aside from his direct path, almost involun- 
 tarily, in the direction of the negro quarters, and the desire 
 was strong upon him to witness the doings of the humble crea- 
 (66) 
 
A PEEP AT THE "PECUIAAir' INSTITUrfON. 07 
 
 tiires wlicn ainoiio- tluMiisolvc's. lie noticed, us he ap[)roaelieil 
 that most of the ciiltins were surrounded by vegetable Hardens 
 aiul melon patelies ; many I'ven were ornamented witli llower 
 beds and sliowy shrubs. In front of one or two of the cabins 
 he noticed dusky Ijoures stretched on the grass, but no other 
 sign ot lite. Every one seemed to have gone to sleep, for no 
 light was visible anywhere. Victor stood still to take in the 
 scene he gazed on. Presently he saw what appeared to him, 
 after all, to be a light, through the crevices between two logs of 
 a hut just ahead of him. His curiosity was aroused ; he ap- 
 proached stealthily to satisfy himself whether what he saw was 
 really the light of a candle. He noticed that the door was 
 closed, and that the window, composed of a single pane of 
 glass, was curtained within. But he saw plainly, now, that the 
 ray of light nuist come from a candle burning in that cabin, 
 (living way to the hnpulse of his curiosity, he peeped through 
 the interstice, and saw a powerful negro seated on a low stool, 
 a book upon his knees from which he seemed to be reading, 
 but in so l(jw a voice that Victor could not understand a word. 
 At his side knelt a young girl, one arm resting on the negro's 
 knee, the other holding the stump of a candle, by the light of 
 which he was reading. She was evidently listening with close 
 attention. Her face was turned from Victor, so that he could 
 not see it; but her form, full of grace and beautifully propor- 
 tioned, gave him the imi)ression of exquisite loveliness. On a 
 low bed, directly opposite, lay an old quadroon woman, whom 
 Mctor at once recognized as the one he had seen on the evening 
 of his first arrival at JNIay Meadows. This woman listened 
 as eagerly as did the girl. Unable to make out a word of what 
 the negro was reading, and curious to know what liook it could 
 be that interested them so much, Victor knocked for admission. 
 
 There was no answer. 
 
 Thinking that he had not l)een heard, he repeated the knock- 
 ing with more emphasis. 
 
 " Who dat knocken' at de doah' ? " came, iu a fretful voice, 
 from within. 
 
68 THE RE U EL'S DAUGIITEU. 
 
 "A stranger I " said \'ietor, surprised by the hesitation to 
 give him admission. •• May I eonie in r '" 
 
 Tlic door w:is now o[)ened. liiit \'ictor snw no light in the 
 room. EviTV thing was in dnri<nes.-,. Hut the moon shed 
 sufficient light lor liim to recognize tiie negro that had Ijeen 
 reading. He asked \'ictor what he wished. Although his 
 words were deferential, there was the same peevishness in his 
 voice, as of one who had been roused from slumber. 
 
 •• I thouglit you were reading just now," said Mctor, more 
 and more astonished at the strange things he saw. •• Did you 
 not have a light in the room? '" 
 
 " Light, Mars' ? Did yo' see light in dis yere cabin? " 
 asked the negro, the intlexion of his voice indicating the highest 
 degree of astonishment on his part. 
 
 Before Victor could answer he heard another voice, — evi- 
 dently that of the young girl he had seen — whispering con - 
 iidentially : •• It is ^Malist' Walders. riicle Xerxes. Let hiiu 
 come in ; there is no danger." 
 
 The negro meekly begged ^'ictor's pardon, and asked him 
 to come in. Not until Xerxes had carefully closed the door 
 again and l)olted it, did the girl relight the stumj) of the candle, 
 using for the jiurpose a friction match, which she ignited by 
 drawing it through a piece of doubled up sandpaper. 
 
 By the hght of the candle Victor now beheld a head of sur- 
 prising l)eanty. From a face of purest oval, surmounted hj a 
 luxuriant growth of wavy Itlack hair, a pair of large dark eyes 
 of liquid lustre met his gtize with an appealing, timid, yet 
 confiding look that strangely imi)ressed him. The lips were 
 full, but exquisitely formed, and of vermilion brightness : and 
 through the clear, transparent skin of her round cheeks, a 
 warm glow of rich carmine asserted itself, even by the dim 
 light of the tallow dip. 
 
 •' I am sorry to have disturbed you," said Mctor. •"• But I 
 saw yon reading, and have some curiosity- to know what book 
 it is that interests you so deeply." 
 
 The old quadroon on the bed and the nea'ro whom the o-irl 
 
A PEEP AT THE ''PECULIAR INSTITUTION. 69 
 
 hiid lueiitiuiied us Xerxes, looked at e:u'li other witli troulded 
 faces, but without sayintj; a word. 
 
 "Don't fear; Just tell him," he heartl thi' uirl say, in a 
 soft, tiute-like voice. " He has seen us any how, and IVIahst" 
 Walders will not V)etray us." 
 
 The oirl accompanied the last words with an aj)|)ealin^, 
 precatory look, which so impressed Victor that it haunted him 
 for many days. 
 
 •' Betray? " he said wonderingly. " What is there to 
 betray? " 
 
 ••You see," said the neoro man, •• dis yere Cressie — we 
 calls "er Cressie fur short, but 'er name's Loocreshy — she 
 larns me read'u' 'cause she lanit it from 'er missis, 'n' I — 
 I jiss ben read'n' to 'er." 
 
 ••And so you can read?" asked Victor, addressinu' the 
 ii'irl. •• And your mistress taught you herself? 
 
 ••Oh no! no, no! " protested Lucretia, with an earnestness 
 in tone and manner, as if she were defendino- her mistress 
 aoainst a grave accusation. •• I only looked on when she was 
 gettino- her lessons," she continued, with downcast eyes, as if 
 confessing to some serious offense, •• and I learned almost 
 without knowing how." 
 
 •'You learned all by yourself ? "" nuised Victor, who was 
 not rejoiced, somehow, to learn that it was not his young 
 friend Nellie that was responsil)k' for Cressie's education. He 
 regarded the graceful llgure and im})osing beauty of the 
 Octoroon girl with increasing admiration. •• And you are 
 really a — " 
 
 •• Slave," the girl said in completion of tlu' sentence, which 
 Victor, l)luslung, had left unllnished. '• Y\'s, I am Missis 
 Nellie's own slave. And she is the sweetest, kindest mistress 
 in the world. Mahst" May, he l)ought nie for her. because my 
 niaunny nursed her, and she always liked me." 
 
 •• 'n' der nevvah. nevvah was a bettah niarse 'n' Mars" May ; 
 nur a better missis in de wu'ld ! " Uncle Xerxes i)roclaimed 
 with solenniilv. 
 
70 THE llEBEVS DAUGUTEIt. 
 
 " I am very iilad to hear you say so," Victor remarked. 
 "•' Then 1 suppose you are all happy here at May Meadows, 
 although you are — slaves I " 
 
 *' Puftlckly happy. Mars' Wallers, eff on'y — " The 
 negro hesitated, and left the sentence unlinished. ButMctor's 
 curiosity prompted him to ask : 
 
 " Well — if only what?" 
 
 Instead of answering, the negro looked uneasily at the 
 others, and seemed to fear that he had already said too nuich. 
 Victor, seeing his embarrassment, i)ressed no further. " But 
 you have not yet shown me the book you were reading when 1 
 lirst saw you," he said, to change the subject. 
 
 " It's de book o' books," said Xerxes, with solemn rever- 
 ence. He drew away the stool upon which he had been sitting, 
 removed a piece of the flooring of the cabin, and produced 
 from the cavity beneath a well-worn l)ook. which he handed 
 to Victor. 
 
 "• The Bible! " exclaimed the latter in surprise. 
 
 " Yes, Mars' Wallers," said the negro reverentially. " It's 
 de preshus promise o' de Lo'd to 'is lowest crechahs." 
 
 '' Food to dem w'at's hungry : drink to dem w'at's thirsty ; 
 comfort to dem w'at lanngAvish," recited the quadroon from 
 her bed. 
 
 Victor was astonished at the profound earnestness of the 
 negroes. He l)egged them to read to him. Xerxes looked 
 inquiringly at the girl and on her nodding lightly, took the 
 book from Victor and, opening it at a i)lace marked with a 
 slender ribbon, commenced to read : 
 
 " Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, antl 
 I will give you rest. 
 
 ' • Take my yoke upon you and learn of me ; for I am meek 
 and lowly of heart: and you sliall lind rest unto your 
 souls." 
 
 Xerxes read with a slowness and dilliculty painful to wit- 
 ness ; but the solemn emphasis with which he pronounced each 
 word after he had s|)ell('(l it out. invested him with a dignity 
 
.1 PEEP AT THE ''PECULIAR'' INSTITUTION. 71 
 
 \vliifli relieved his effort from tedioiisness, and ^i-eatiy impressed 
 his audience, ^'ietor not excepted. 
 
 Lucretia now took tlie Bible and proceeded : 
 
 '' For my yoke is easy, and my burden is liiiht." 
 
 She read with tluenc^v, and a remarkably correct pronuncia- 
 tion. For a moment slie paused, as if to oive Victor the 
 opportiuiity ■ to speak, if he wished; l)ut he I'emained in his 
 listening attitude, and slie proceeded, turning to a passage in 
 the Old Testament : 
 
 ''He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, 
 and acquainted with grief ; and we hid, as it were, our faces 
 from him; he Avas despised, and we esteemed him not. 
 
 '• Surely he has borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows; 
 yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted; 
 
 '' But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised 
 for our iniquities ; the chastisement of our peace was upon him ; 
 and with his stripes we are healed." 
 
 The girl had long ceased, and given back the book t(j 
 Xerxes. Victor pondered on what he had heard. Was this 
 genuine piety; was it religious conviction that brought these 
 })eople together here? Did they find in the word of (4od com- 
 fort and strength to l)ear the bitter lot assigned them ? Did 
 the jn'omise of redemption reconcile them with the ignominy 
 and debasement to which the law of the land condemned them 
 without guilt of theirs? This powerful robust negro, in the 
 strength of health and youth, — this aged, decrepit woman, 
 near the close of a life of trouble and in-ivation, — this lieauti- 
 ful Octoroon, of voluptuous beauty and graceful presence — 
 Avas there for all of them but the one hope for liberation from 
 the yoke that rested on their necks, — beyond the grave? 
 
 A feeling of depression came over him as he remembered 
 the words which Colonel May had once spoken to him. that it 
 might prove dangerous to give expressi<in to iiis views on 
 slavery. 
 
 In the silence, into whicli all present Inul relapsed, the 
 thrice repeated plaintive nc^te of some bird of the night was 
 
72 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 distinctly Mudihle. It prodiici-d ;i stiaiiiic eliect on the occii- 
 |)ants of tlir cnliin : wiicii liic nit'hiuclioly soiunl wns first 
 iieai'd, tile slaws lookt-d at i'a(^li otlu-r in evident alarm. At 
 its re[)etiti()n Xerxes replaced the l>il»le in the eavily nnderthe 
 lloor. and hurriedly extinonished the candle. \'ict()r hardly 
 I'ealized what was lioino- on when he felt himself pushed s>eutlv 
 into a corner by the soft arm> of the Octoroon. "For 
 heaven's sake, Mahst'." she ra])idly whispered into his ear, 
 " don't betray us I Kee|) yourself hidden, let no one lind you 
 here I " At the same time >lie spread a dress, that huna- on 
 the wall above his lu'ad. in such manner over his person, as to 
 (juite conceal him. As she stealthily joined the (piadroon on 
 the bed. steps without wt-re heard ap[)roaclun*i' the cabin, and 
 l>efore \'ietor had time to rellect on the strange proceeding", 
 and the odd |)redicament in which he was placed, the rickety 
 dooi' was thrown wide open by a vigorous kick. 
 
 '' Whar's the light 'at's jist been burniu' yere? '" thundered 
 an angry voice, Avhich Victor recognized at once as that of 
 .Jeffreys', the ovei'seer. 
 
 There was no answer. 
 
 " Who's yere, anyhow r " the overseer sternly demanded. 
 
 " It'son'y me, INIars' Jeffreys," the negro airs wered meekly, 
 " an' Cassandra, 'n' C'ressie." 
 
 '• Light a candle," .Jeffreys commanded in a much moUilied 
 tone. 
 
 As soon as the light had l)een struck, which this time was 
 accomplished by nu-ans of a flint and steel, and a tinder-box, 
 .Jt'ffreys aj>proached the l)ed upon which Cassandra and the 
 Octoroon were now seated. 
 
 In doing so his foot stumbU>d ovt-r the piece of plank which 
 the negro had not accurately fitted into tlu' lloor. 
 
 " Hallo! \>'l.at's this? " lie cried, kicking aside the plank, 
 and peering into the hollow beneath, from which he soon 
 brought forth the liilile that had been hidden there. •• Hallo 1 " 
 he shouted in the triumphant tone of a lieadle having caught a 
 deliiHiuent in Ji(i(jniiit(' rlHirfo^ "is that what you're up to i' 
 
A VEEP AT THE 'TECULIAir' INSTITUTION. t'^ 
 
 llold'n' ;i piayiT iiicutin'. iirc ve'r .Vu" wliur's IIr' [):rs<)n ? 
 VVliich ()' yi'"s bi'cn do'iT tlu' iVMd'ii' ? " 
 
 No oiu' iimdo tinswci-. 
 
 "• 'riuinder an' blazes! " i-oari'd the irate overset'i'. •• Ye 
 don't mean to poke it down my throat 'at ye've been sitt'n' 
 yere doin" noth'n? Didn't I see the light shiueu' thronoh 
 the eraoivs o" yere mizzible shanty? Don't lie 'bont it, 
 now I 
 
 The neo'roes sat with heads Ijowed low: but none of them 
 made answer. 
 
 "If 'twas you, me beaut'." he said. a|)proa('hini>' the 
 Octoroon with an amorous g-fin, ''I'll let ye off easy. I'll 
 not tell yer master, nur Hog ye nieself, this time. fSay, was't 
 you ? ' ' 
 
 The Octoroon looked up. She saw the other two regarding 
 her with deep anxiety. This seemed to arouse her to a resolve. 
 Perhaps she eitnsidered, tliat tliey, at least, might be spared 
 the punishment. •• Do you promise, that none of us will be 
 l)unished. if I tell you? " she inquired of the overseer, lixing 
 her eyes upon him in a searching gaze. 
 
 " Xe'er a time I " sneered Jeffreys. •• That's not the bar- 
 gain. If 'twas you, I'll let jiok off, mind, if ye'll promise not 
 to be so cantankerously ugly to me, when I'm doiu' my level 
 best to please ye I ' ' 
 
 "It was me I " said Lucretia, witli proudly curled lips, 
 '' I've learned to read from my missis, and come down to read 
 the Bible to Uncle Xerxes and INIannnie Cassandra." 
 
 ''Now see, what lady-airs ye do [)Ut on I " said .Jeffreys. 
 " I knowed ye'd make a capital pa 'son. Well, I'll stick to 
 my word; no Hoggin' this time. See, how good I am to ye ; 
 now won't ye l)e friendly an' return the favor? " 
 
 '• You know that it is not for me to grant favors," said tiie 
 girl with haughty dignity. 
 
 Jeffreys cast an angry, threatening glance at her. ■• D'ye 
 mean to defy me? " he cried. '' Look out I Ye might rue it I 
 An" \()u." he turni'd to Cassandra and Xerxes with a nienaciui^ 
 
74 THE liEBEVS DAUGHTER. 
 
 frown. •■ let this be the hist time 'at I keteh ye witli liglit in 
 yer dirty sliauty, after nine o'clock, if this yere stuck up 
 wench he with ye or not. Ye know nie, an' I'll stand no 
 foolin' I " 
 
 Victor was in a most painful situation. He felt the hot 
 blood of shame rushing to his face at the thought of acting the 
 despicable part of an eavesdroj)per. Nothing but the fear of 
 compromising the poor slaves, and liringing further troul)le 
 upon their heads — which he instinctively felt would be the 
 case if he were discovered there now — prevented him from 
 stepping forth and making known his presence to the overseer. 
 
 " Git, now! " commanded the latter. "Off to yer quarters. 
 I'm goin' to go along — to see ye safe home I " 
 
 " I can go alone," Lucretia answered, preparing to leave 
 the cabin. '• Where is my shawl, Mammie? " 
 
 ''There it hangs, Honey! " the quadroon replied, pointing 
 to the corner where it covered the very dress which Lucretia 
 had drawn over Victor to conceal him from the eyes of the 
 overseer. Her eyes followed the direction indicated and 
 dropped instantly, saying, as if she had changed her mind, " I 
 believe I don't want it; its too warm, any how." And with 
 these words she started towards the door with an air of utmost 
 indifference. 
 
 " Stop! " shouted Jeffreys, who had noted the sudden drop- 
 ping of the girl's eyes, and whose distrustful mind at once 
 suspected a secret. " Wait a spell ; I'll jist git ye yere shawl. 
 Ye might take cold without." He had by this time removed 
 the dress together with the shawl from the nail on which it 
 hung. There stood Victor, with downcast eyes, shame and 
 confusion but too visible in his burning face. 
 
 "Mr. Wallerst I " exclaimed the overseer in genuine 
 astonishment. " An' what may yon be doin' yere? '" 
 
 Victor was about to answer, Init before he had said a word, 
 Jeffreys whose surprise quickly gave way to intense wrath, 
 continued : 
 
 " I s'pose this 'ere ])rayor meot'n' 's o' your gittin' u]), is 
 
A PEEP AT THE ''PECULIAR'' INSTITUTION. 75 
 
 it? 'Pears to lue ye're gittiu' 'long party durned fast with tlic 
 niggers, I do say, — 'l)nsin' yer friend's hospitality, gittin' u]) 
 onlawful midnight nu-etin's. 'n' havin' rendyvoos with 'is 
 nigger wenches I ' ' 
 
 "'There is no rendezvous, 1 assure you," said X'ietwr, rais- 
 ing his eyes, hut ([uickly dropping them again before the fierce 
 scowl on tlie overseer's face. " My presence here is quite by 
 accident." 
 
 " Oh, 3'aars, in course I " said Jeffreys with cutting sarcasm. 
 " At this time o' night — in yer friend's nigger cabin — all by 
 accident I " 
 
 " I meant no wrong," Victor stammered, deeply humiliated 
 by the consciousness of having been surprised in a dishonorable 
 situation. 
 
 " D'ye take me fur a darnation fool? " hissed the overseer, 
 whose wrath increased as he saw the dejection of the young 
 man. " Comin' yere in the deep o' the night, an' lockin' 
 yourself up with a yaller wench ! Blowin' out the light an' 
 creeping under 'er petticoat when ye hear a white man comin' ; 
 an' ye think a w'hite man '11 b'lieve ye, that ye meant uothin' ye 
 need be ashamed of ? " 
 
 " Ask the negroes — ask the girl herself," Victor begged 
 him. '^ She will tell you, that until a few minutes ago we 
 never interchanged a word in our lives." 
 
 " Ye don't say so ! Ye want me to ast the niggers, do ye? 
 The niggers, — ha, ha, ha I " laughed Jeffreys, grimly. " The 
 go-betweens — the pimps, d — n their black souls ! The cussed 
 yaller wench, 'at put 'er petticoat on top o' ye to hide ye — 
 the low-lived strumpet, 'at lets an outlandish Hessian Dutch- 
 man court 'er — " 
 
 "Stop, sir! What do you mean?" exclaimed Victor 
 with spirit. Shame and the consciousness of thoughtless folly, 
 as he now thought it to be, had disarmed him against wliat he 
 thought justitiable rebuke from a man who was responsible for 
 the conduct of the negroes. But the shameful insult conveyed 
 b\- the last words stunu- liini into resentment. " Do vou sus- 
 
76 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 pect nil' of anytliiuiJ' wroiiii; l)Osides enterinii' here without your 
 permission ? " 
 
 " Suspect r Oil, no, nu' line bird. Wliat J see, I needn't 
 suspect. I know it I " The overseer spoke tliese Avords witli 
 derisive triumph. He then turned suddenly on the Octoroon 
 and hissed out witli increasing wrath : '• As fur 30U. me liypo- 
 critical wench, ye sliall taste the lash on yer naked skin to cure 
 ye of yci' runnin' after a Hessian Dutchman." 
 
 lie had seized tlie girl by the arm, and pressed and pinclied 
 it with such violence as to extort from her a sharp cry of pain. 
 Victor sprang forward and tore her from him. "• Moderate 
 your passion, sir I " he ex(^laimed. " ^Vnd satisfy yourself, 
 that there is no cause for your shameful suspicion. What has 
 ha|)])ened here, is by my fault entirely, and I do not mean to 
 shirk my responsibility for it. These poor slaves are not to 
 blame. But what you say about a preconcerted meeting witli 
 this girl, is simply a lie." 
 
 Victor had spoken with warmth and emphasis. The revolt 
 of feeling caused ])y the overseer's tyiannical cruelty to the 
 defenseless slaves, lent to liis voice a vigor, and to his 
 manner an earnestness, which was not without effect on the 
 blustering tyrant. Nevertheless, he surveyed the slender 
 form of the young man before him with a menacing air, as if 
 he meant to chastise him on the spot. lie concluded other- 
 wise, however. " You call me a liar, sir? " he cried, with a 
 haughty swagger. '' Me, a free white man? 'I'iiat's an insult 
 to me, sir, 'at I'll thrash you fur, as soon as I'll git ready, 
 .list now, I consitler it me duty to the boss, to let 'im know 
 what's goin' on behind 'is l)ack. It's "is liizness to settle 
 with you fur meddlin' with 'is nigger wencli. an' stirrin' up 'is 
 slaves to sedition an' nnitiny. You'll follow me, sir, to the 
 nianshun. an' tliar" ye shall answer Colonel Mav fur \er doin's 
 yi're." 
 
 This prosjx'ct (illed poor Victor with dismay. What nuist 
 his generous friend think of him, if he should hear how 
 thoughtlessly and indiscreetly he had l»eiiaved? IIow painful 
 
A pi:i:r at the ''PKCULiAir' institution. " 
 
 the pr<)sj)t'ct of Imvinjj' to talk with hhn on this imtortuiiatc 
 happeiiino". Hut worse than this would it lie to put liiiusclf 
 in llic power of fliis euraux'd overseer liy Itetrayiu^' fear 
 or liesitation. lie would surely i>"ive a i2;arlile(l necount of 
 the matter, preseiitini>- the oecuvreuce not only in its worst 
 aspect, tiut in a false liaht. So he coneluded to l»e pi'esent 
 with Jeff leys when he made his aecusation, and promptly 
 notified bini that he was ready to visit the Colonel. 
 
 The Octoroon had already left the hut when Jeffreys, havinL>; 
 in vain looked for her, marched off with Victor for the man- 
 sion. 
 
 The Colonel had just returned from Brookfield, and seemed 
 to lie in excellent humor. He smilingly commented on the 
 honor done him l»y so late a visit from the two gentlemen. 
 Jeffreys apologized for disturhing him at so unreasonable an 
 hour; but the emergency, he said, was such as to call for 
 prompt action. He dwelt upon the demoralizing effect upon 
 the negroes by the presence of white people, or people that 
 thought themselves white, at surreptitious and unlawful mid- 
 night gatherings at the negro quarters, who encouraged them 
 in their seditious spirit, and outraged decency by shameful 
 behavior with lewd colored wenches. Urged by the Colonel to 
 speak more plainly, he related much of what he had seen at 
 the negro cabin, and more that he surmised, not omitting gross 
 exaggeration and mahcious insinuations. He concluded by 
 magnanimously submitting the nature of the punishment to be 
 inflicted upon the young foreigner to the Colonel's discretion, 
 but demanding for himself unlimited authority to deal with the 
 negroes, and particularly with the obstreperous Octoi'oon, 
 whose condign punishment was necessary as a warning example 
 for the upholding of discipline on the plantation. 
 
 Astonished beyond measure, Victor listened to the shameful 
 perversions of the overseer. It surprised him that the Colonel 
 permitted such passionate language in his presence, on the 
 part of an employee. It shocked him to perceive that the 
 Colonel listened to the cruel threat against defenseless slaves, 
 
78 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 who liad not, even on tlio overseof's own sliowinu', foniinilU'd 
 any offense, withont protest or fonmient. 
 
 As Victor was about to speak, a fonunaiuUng' gesture of 
 Colonel May denuiuded silence of him. At the very beginning 
 of the overseer's report his brows had contracted ; but he 
 listened patiently until the close ; put a few questions to 
 obtain a clear insight into all the facts, and then dismissed the 
 overseer with the injunction to take no stei)s in the matter 
 until he received further instructions, and then addressed 
 Victor: "To you, young man, I have a word to say; please 
 remain." 
 
 In leaving the room Jeffreys cast a malevolent look of 
 triumph at Victor, which forewarned him as to what he might 
 exi)ect at the hands of Colonel May. 
 
 The high esteem in which Victor held the Colonel, gave 
 double pungency to the harsh words. He had not for a 
 moment doubted that the Colonel would grant him a fair hear- 
 ing, and that a truthful statement of the occurrence, such as 
 he supposed the Colonel would give credence to in preference 
 to the malicious tissue of falsehoods on the part of the over- 
 seer, for whose wrath he found it impossible to account, would 
 disarm the worst displeasure of his friend. But the Colonel 
 had not permitted him even to speak in his own defense 1 
 
 When, after Jeffreys' departure, the Colonel desired him to 
 give his side of the story, Victor's predominant feeling was 
 one of indignation against the injustice threatened the poor 
 slaves. Hence he spoke rather to establish their perfect inno- 
 cence than exculpate himself, and the warmth with which he 
 espoused their cause aroused the Colonel not a little. 
 
 "Do you know," he interrupted him on one occasion, 
 " that the zeal with which you defend this Octoroon girl is a 
 very suspicious circumstance? " 
 
 Victor was startled. "What can you mean?" he asked 
 timidly. 
 
 "Why," replied the Colonel, a scarcely perceptible smile 
 illumining his face, " you are so enthusiastic in the description 
 
.1 I'KEP AT THE "PErULlAir' INSTITUTION. 79 
 
 ol ln'i' woiidcrrul In'autv tlial one iiiight well suppose you would 
 ahidly iiii[)i'o\\' :iii op[)oiliiiiilv to arrange a rendezvous with 
 her." 
 
 The young man's I'aee grew scarlet. " 1 give you my sacred 
 Avord of honor," he exclaimed, " that I never in my life saw 
 her, much less spoke to her, before! " 
 
 " Well, now, that is remarkable," the Colonel went on, with- 
 out changing a muscle of his face. " Then why does the minx 
 blow out her candle, as soon as you knock at the door? " 
 
 " I am sure I do not know%" said Victor, still deeply 
 embarrassed. 
 
 " And why did you hide under a woman's dress as soon as 
 you heard some one approach? " 
 
 " That was the girl's doing; and what in the world could 
 have been her motive for it, is a mystery to me." 
 
 The Colonel seemed to enjoy the young man's embarrass- 
 ment, but after a moment said, in a kind and confidential tone, 
 " I Avill give you the key to this great mystery, my young 
 friend. You do not know, I apprehend, that the blacks are 
 forbidden to have candle-light in their cabins after a certain 
 hour of the night ? ' ' 
 
 "No," said Victor, " I did not know that. It explains 
 their anxiety to prevent the light from being seen on the out- 
 side." 
 
 "Quite right! " said the other. "Perhaps, also, you are 
 not aware that it is a punishable offense for anyone to teach 
 them to read ! ' ' 
 
 "No, indeed! " exclaimed Victor, greatly shocked, and for- 
 getting, in his indignant surprise at so inhuman a law, as it 
 appeared to him, his own embarrassed predicament. " And it 
 is hard to believe, although I do not doubt your word. How- 
 ever harsh some masters may be in this resjoect, surely it is 
 strange that the hue should deprive a race of human beings of 
 the possibility of culture and improvement. You, Colonel 
 May, are not so cruel as to take from your slaves the comfort 
 they might derive from reading, for instance the Bible." 
 
80 THE HEBEI.'S DAUGIITEU. 
 
 " Tliuiik you tor the com])liiiient," said the Colonel, with 
 quiet humor. " For I take it that you mean it as such, though 
 in reality what you say implies, from your point of view, 
 oravc censure. Because I do not happen to think it cruel at 
 all to depiive the slaves of what you call culture." 
 
 \'ictor looked at the Colonel with amazement : he found it 
 dittieult to harmonize what he heard, with his estimate of his 
 nolile friend's character. 
 
 '' Judge for yourself." the latter continued, addressing the 
 young man in a gentle voice. l)ut with an earnestness that 
 thrilled him, " would it be a kindness to these j)eoi)le, Avhom 
 we deprive — whether justly or unjustly, let us leave undecided 
 just now — of their human I'ights, to teach them the magnitude 
 and value of that of which we rob them? " 
 
 '' True enough." Victor replied, after pondering a moment, 
 " they would feel all the more keenly their degradation and 
 wrong, the higher they rose in culture and refinement. IJut," 
 he added more eagerly, '^ is it permitted to brutalize a human 
 being just to keep from him the knowledge of the magnitude of 
 the crime connnitted against him? Is it not doubling the sin 
 to rob him not only of his liberty, but also of his dignity as a 
 human being? " 
 
 "'Let me suggest to you, young man," said the Colonel 
 Avith im])ressive emphasis, " that no one can be robbed of that 
 which is not his. A slave possesses neither human dignity, 
 nor freedom. No free man has ever been degraded into 
 slavery." 
 
 ^'i(•tor regarded the Colonel with a (piestioning look, indi- 
 cating that he did not take in the full force of the remark. 
 
 " But," the Colonel continued in a milder tone, *' although 
 J am sincere in my opinion, that the law. wliich deprives the 
 servile race of the means of ac(piiring education and culture, 
 accords with the dictates of gemiine humanity, and is there- 
 fore a blessing to themselves, yet I do not pretend that it was 
 enacted for their benefit. Its purpose is rather to serve as a 
 barrier against the intlammatorv literature, the libelous and 
 
A PKI:P at TUE 'TECULIAir' INSTITUTION. HI 
 
 seditious tr;u'1s nnd pniiipiiK'ts lii.-il .'ire lK'iii<i- scnitcicd Itiond- 
 cast over tiie hiiid by iiiischievoiis .-diolitionists, nml so, in h 
 cortaia sense, to protect our ■ property,' if that woi'd is not 
 offensive to your fastidious ears. Uut he tiiat as it may." the 
 Colonel added, reuardinu' the youn<J' man witii a smile, " so 
 the law is written, and you will do well to I'ememher it. 
 C'ressie knew tiiis, ;is well as the other slaves, and for that 
 reason endeavored to conceal the fact that tlie\ had leai'ued to 
 read . ' ' 
 
 The latter words had Iieen spoken with tlie smile on Colonel 
 May's face that was so fascinating to Victor. He was not 
 ready to assent to all that the Colonel had said; hut he was so 
 stronoly attracted by the mao-netisni of bis personality, that he 
 felt neither the desire nor the al)ility to attemi)t an answer. 
 '' Bnt I still cannot understand why the Octoroon was so 
 anxions to conceal ///// presence in the cahin ? " he said, after 
 a short pause. 
 
 "There are two reasons for that," the Colonel informed 
 him. ^" In the lirst i)lace, the girl most likely suspected that 
 your presence in the cabin together with her might l»e offensive 
 to the overseer — how true her instinct was you have yourself 
 seen — and then, in the next place, there is another law that 
 you violated. Neither negroes, nor negroes or whites, are 
 permitted to assemble in the negro (piarters after dark. So 
 you see, it was kind enough in the girl to trv to shield vou 
 against the consecpiences of your own indiscretion, or ignorance, 
 if you please." 
 
 " How thoughtless 1 Ikiw het'ii 1 " exclaimed \'ictor. '• And 
 how much I need your kind indulgence to obtain your forgive- 
 ness I May I hope," he added with precatory earnestness, 
 " that you will not permit the poor slaves to he made to 
 suffer for my folly r 
 
 A cloud again lowi'ied upon the face of the Colonel. ■• I 
 cannot promisi- pei'fect innuunity for them," he said. •• The 
 authority of the overseer nuist not be jeoi>arded. Although J 
 do not justify his over-severity in this matter, yet he must be 
 
 6 
 
82 
 
 THE REBEL'S UA UGH TEL'. 
 
 upheld ill the enforcement of discipline. But you must excuse 
 me now, young friend; 1 am weary after a busy day's work, 
 and it is late in the night. Stay with us until morning ; I will 
 have a room made ready for you in two seconds." 
 
 Victor declined the i)roferred hospitality for the second tim-e 
 this day. He feared to displease his employer by remaining 
 away from the store for the night. 
 
 •' Let your mind rest easy about the slaves," said the 
 Colonel on bidding him good night. *' I shall see to it, that 
 their punislunent be not excessive." 
 
VI. 
 
 LITERARY CULTURE IN THE BACKWOODS. 
 
 MON(4 the i)uhlic institutions of Brooklield, the i)riiitiiio' 
 ottice, second in importance only to tlie stores, tlis- 
 j(_ l)uted priority witii the post-ottice itself. Modest 
 enough in architectural pretension — unitinsj- in one room of 
 moderate size the editor's sanctum, the proprietor's business 
 ottice, and the printer's press and composino; room, with 
 space in one corner for the pallet of the jjrinter's devil. 
 Thence issued, in reoular weekly editions of more than one 
 hundred (copies, the (hark Argils, self-appointed (Guardian of 
 Freedom, keeping watch ovei' the interests of Vernal County 
 and the adjacent districts. A\'itli praisewoi-thy zeal and fidelity 
 he proclaimed the gospel of Freedom according to the dogma 
 of the Democratic party, and lashed, with inexorable severity, 
 the pernicious heresies of the Whigs. The Constitution of the 
 I'nited States, as interpreted by Thomas .Jefferson, constituted 
 his Holy Writ of statesmanshij). To doubt the infallibility of 
 (ieneral Jackson, was rank treason. He was the terror of 
 demagogues and delincpient otKce holders, of the wrong i)arty, 
 as well as the reliance and stronghold of political as[)irants of 
 the (nthodox faith. What wonder, then, that the Ozark 
 Arijat^ should be the pride of Hnjoklield and the oracle of its 
 ])oliticians of the Democratic stripe? 
 
 The enteri)rise and ])ublic-spirited activity of him of the 
 hundred eyes was not limited, however, to the lield of politics. 
 He announced on his title-j)age, in bold, ))lack type, that he 
 also proposed to be an ■• Organ of Art, Literature and 
 Science." This part of his self-imposed task he performed by 
 [)ublishing weekly cliapters of love-romances, or stories of 
 adventure with robbei-s or ghosts; also by disseminating use- 
 
 (S3) 
 
y4 THE liEBEL'S DAUGIITEE. 
 
 fill receipts for the prepai'ation of corn-salve, or some^iew way 
 of making- excellent pumpkin pie, and giving pulilicity to the 
 sublime effusions of love-sick village poets and poetesses. liy 
 this means he gained the goodwill of the fairer and frailer half 
 of the backwoods population in s(j far, that is to say, as these 
 were accessible to the printed form of thought. 
 
 But the peculiar element of his utility, and wherein he shone 
 a bright particular star, challenging tlie admiration of his con- 
 temporaries and of posterity as well, was referred to ))y tlie 
 modest phrase: "And Chronicle of the Southwest." lit' 
 sought and found his greatest pride in bringing to the knowl- 
 edge of his fello\v-(!itizens, and particularly of the citizenesses, 
 all cases of births, deaths, engagements and weddings, as well 
 as such other highly important items of news as serve to 
 enliven the hum-drum of everv-day-life. — who it was, for in- 
 stance, that escorted the beautiful and fascinating Miss Molly 
 Mumps, on last Sunday evening, from the meeting-house to 
 the residence of her father, our highly respected fellow-citizen, 
 Mopsey Mumps, Esq., and that the modest but aspiring young- 
 suitor had cast a timid, but signiiicant glance at the blushing- 
 maiden ; that Farmer Brown's exceedingly gifted housewife 
 had appeared at meeting in a highly tasteful linsey-woolsey 
 dress, spun from home-raised linen and wool, woven, dyed, 
 patterned, cut out, sewn and ornamented by her OAvn cunning 
 hands ; and what more there were of such curious and edifying- 
 topics. 
 
 That an event of such far-reaching importance to the citi- 
 zens of Brookfield, as the opening of a '' Course in the Science 
 of Grammar," under the auspices of Caleb Amos, Esq., the far 
 famed Professor of Lexicography, A. B., LL.I)., &c., should 
 escape the hundred eyes of the ^iri/ns, was of course out 
 of the questio-.i. If it had, l)y any accident, done so. there 
 was the patriotically inclined Caleb Amos to prevent so deplor- 
 able an omission of duty. For this deserving benefactor of 
 ignorant humanity, nnndful of the Savior's injunction, was not 
 dis])ose(l to hide his liglit under a bushel, but meant it to shine 
 
LITERARY CULTURE IN THE BACKWOODS. 85 
 
 ItriLihtlv ill tlic L'vos of in;uikiii(l. To this end he souolit out 
 the editor of the •• Ciii-oiiiele of tlie Soutlnvest," and imparted 
 to him the iilad tidinys of tlie blessin,<>-s in store for the l>e- 
 iii»>hted Itaekwoodsnien. And the •• ChronieU' " sounded its 
 trumpet, spreadiny- the news in bold disphty of type and 
 eml)ellislied with a profusion of exchimation points (at a low 
 lioure, and with a discount for cash) so that no reader of the 
 Ozark ^Injus need lie ignorant of tlie merit of the new system, 
 nor of the fame and liio-h sounding- titles of C'alel) Amos. Esq., 
 Professor. A. B.. LL.D.. &c. 
 
 Precisely at the appointed hour of the day llxed for the 
 momentous event, the ding-dong: of the bell in the cupola of 
 the hotel announced the beginning of the •' Course in the 
 Science of (Grammar." Thanks to the trumpet-tong-ued prom- 
 ulgations in the Ozarl: ^irc/vs, the i)articipants had increased 
 to such a numlier that no room in town was sulticient to con- 
 tain them, and the court house was put in requisition. To the 
 c(_)urt iiouse, then, at the lirst tap of the Ix'll, trooped the 
 embryo grammarians, among them sons and daughters of well- 
 to-do farmers of the vicinity ; boys and girls, misses in their 
 teens and virgins of riper years, as well as youths and young 
 men. Leslie May was there Avith his sister Nellie, and the 
 full complement of their male and female comrades. P^mily 
 Matlack eml traced her •■ sweet friend " Xellie with gush and 
 ostentation, while Hettie Shannon, a brown-eyed, dark-com- 
 plexioned lieauty of sixteen, gave her S(jft Itrown hand to the 
 brother, inquiring anxiously after his health, and after the 
 health of all the dear friends at May Meadows. Leslie squeezed 
 the little hand and made a motion as if to carry it to his lips. 
 whereat the little lady uttered a small scream, and Leslie moved 
 away to speak to other ladies. It appeared to ^'ictor, who 
 patiently w^aited at a distance for an opportunity to speak to 
 the brother and sister, as if Leslie were a decided favorite 
 among the fair ones. He noticed that he had a friendly word 
 for each, and now and tlien a Idushing cheek or a sparkle of 
 the eye gave token of the pleasure he conferred. As soon as 
 
86 THE llEBEVS DAUGHTER. 
 
 he cauo-ht sioht of \'ictor, hv stepped forward and seized him 
 l)y the arm. 
 
 "• Come, my l>ov." he said pleasantly, '* we are about to 
 embark for a voyaiie on the Ocean of Science, and it will l>e 
 well for yon to make the acquaintance of some of your felloAv- 
 voyaoers." Whereupon he introduced Victor to a number of 
 the l)ystanders with many a jocose remark. Victor ascribed 
 the politeness witli which he was received to the popularity 
 of his friend. 
 
 Nellie, too, was suiTounded hy a bevy of young- girls, so 
 that she was dillicult of a})[)roach. Jiut when Leslie had 
 released his arm, to speak to some young farmers that had just 
 entered, Victor ell)owed his way toward her, and Nellie came 
 to his assistance by calling out to him as sc^on as she saw him. 
 •' Why. how do you do, Mr. A\'aldhorst? Come right along: 
 1 have some news for you fiom May Meadows, which, J am 
 sure, will interest you." 
 
 But l)efore she had time to impart to him the '^ interesting 
 news " from May Meadows, the tinkling of a l)ell in the hands 
 of the teacher connnamled attention. The buzz of general 
 conversation ceased, and the pu])ils seated themselves on 
 benches and chairs, as they happened to find them. Caleb 
 Amos began his lecture. He sketched the plan u[)on which 
 he pro2)Osed to conduct the studies, and begged the pujiils to 
 give their undivided attention to the matter before them. 
 "Business V»efore pleasure."' he said. '■ This is a sound and 
 thoroughly American maxim, and we will scrupulously observe 
 it, and may then exj)ect a highly satisfactory result. For my 
 (jwn reminiseenci's of the rosy time of youth are not so far 
 faded, but that 1 can heartily sympathize with the innocent 
 pleasures of young people. And I see before me so much youth 
 and beauty, so nuu-h intelligeiu-e and manliness in the faces of 
 future citizens of our Repul)lic, that I |n'omisc myself many 
 pleasant hours in their company. Now. then, for business! " 
 
 Tt was (>vident that his words had produced a favorable 
 impression. •• Ilunibug! " Leslie whispered; but his loudly 
 
LlTEllAUY CULTURE IN THE BACKWOODS. 87 
 
 clappiiiij; hniuls uavc tlu' si<>;ii;il ior univcisnl iipphiusc, in 
 which the snuiUest hoys iiuidc the greatest uoisi', and even tlu- 
 hulies (lid not refuse to Join. 'I'his ])ro('ce(liiio- ustonisiied 
 Victor. It was (jnite dilTeri'iit from tiie prouram \\v h:id ex- 
 pected; but as he saw timt the ti-aciici' sch'uhmI [)ic;iscd with tiie 
 approbation ol' liis pupils, he, too, elai)|)ed his hands : tor 
 Caleb Amos had won his hearty goodwill. 
 
 The plan of tuition was based on '• Kirkhain's Lectures on 
 (4raiuniai-." (from which the teacher had also borrowed the 
 com])arison of the orannnatical classification of words with 
 military oriianization ) commencing with an essay on the j)hi- 
 losophy of language in general, and then proceeding to discuss 
 the system and peculiarities of the English language. Caleb 
 Amos had not a more attentive or more diligent pupil tiiaii 
 Victor Waldhorst. 
 
 IJnt, gratifying as was the |)rogress he made in his studies, 
 it gained him neither esteem nor goodwill among his class- 
 mates. The fewest of them were disposed to study with the 
 close application demanded l)y the teacher and liis system. 
 Many attended the class for the sole purpose of " having a 
 good time," as Nellie and Leslie had suggested, bv meeting, 
 under pretense of studying, with j(^lly peoj)le of their own and 
 the other sex. Of course, tlie deportment of these was in 
 contrast with that of Victor, which was felt by them as a silent 
 but irksome reproach. And when, one day, the teacher took 
 occasion to publicly praise him and hold him up to the class 
 as an example for imitation, it drew down upon him the ill-will 
 of them all. Even Nellie, whose existence he, in the fervor of 
 his zeal, had almost ignored since the opening of the class, 
 and who had waited in vain for him to demand of her the 
 interesting news from May ^Meadows which she had promised 
 him, felt provoked. It was a new experience to her to be 
 slighted and to see her advances i)assed by unnoticed. And 
 as she was conscious of having rather distinguished him bv 
 her favor, she felt his indifference, and the publich' expressed 
 praise of the tea<;her, almost as a personal gricAance. 
 
88 THE EKBEL\S DAUGHTER. 
 
 When, tlu'i'i'forc, Iut s(.';it-in'iglil)or, Miss Kiiiily Matlack, 
 poiitiuiily ivniavked, "How l)ig that a^awkv Diitclnnau must 
 think liiiuselfl " Nellie nodded vig-orously. and added: "The 
 scare-crow!" And as pooi- Mctor's lioiiri> occurred to her, 
 as he had presented himself hel'ore iier after her encounter with 
 the runaway lioises. she shook witli suppn-ssed merriment. 
 The consecpience was. tiiat siie had to ivlate tiie occurivnce to 
 iier intimate friend. nucU-r the injunction, of course, of tlie 
 strictest secrecy. Nellie possessed a lively imagination and 
 great talent in rehiting a story, and so iier intimate fi'iend was 
 vastly annised. Tlie audil)le titter and ciuickling of the latter 
 aroused tile curiosity (»f lu'r intimate fi'iend on her other side, 
 and as tlu' tiling was too good, under present circumstances, to 
 keep, slie related it to Ilettie Sliannon, of course under 
 injunction of strict secrecy. And as Ilettie had another 
 intimate friend, and so on. \'ictor"s adventure, listened to by 
 a lot of young and tlioiigiitless peo|)le, most of wliom liad, just 
 then, a feeling of resentment against him, had soon made tlie 
 round of tlie class, not without having gained, on the way, in 
 [)i(iuancy and orna.mentation, to add zest to it, according to 
 the taste of the individual chaiuiel through which it passed. 
 Neither Caleb Amos, nor the unsuspecting ^'ictor, could account 
 for the ri])ph's of merriment all around, the eager whisperings, 
 and halt siii)pressed laughter. But Nellie, if it really had 
 been her intention to humble her (lerman friend, had accom- 
 ])lished more than she had, bargained for in telling that little 
 story aljout the scare-crow. 
 
 On the very next day the teacher took occasion to congrat- 
 ulate the whole class upon tlii' progress made by each and all 
 of them ; he was proud of their acliievements, and expressed 
 what he termed a well-grounded li()])e, that each (Jiie would 
 become an excellent grammarian. IJut befort' entering on the 
 next division of the text-book, he |)roposed to recapitulate 
 what they had already gone over, so as to thoroughly jirepare 
 them for the lessons to follow. Ih' suggested that this could 
 be best accomplished by means of an examination ; and in 
 
UTKUAUY CULTUliE IN THE HACK WOODS. 89 
 
 order to cxcilc m spirit of ciiuihition. and also iiivi'sl the pro- 
 (•eedini>- witli a hiuiici' intcrol. lie ])roposcd to cnlivcii it l)y a 
 l)ar»siii*i' iiiMtcli. so tliat any nuv failinii" to answer ])roperly 
 should 1)0 •• turned down "' liy tlie next one who ii-ave a correct 
 answer. 
 
 The proposition was i-eceived witli apphiusc. 
 
 ••It remains now to detei'nn'ne.'" said the master. •• liow tlu' 
 hidies and gentlemen propose to ])e seated tor the start. It 
 wouUl he dillicuh. it not iini)ossible, to arrunoe you all accord- 
 ing to your proliciency. J have therefore concluded that you 
 should tortile l)ei>inning Ite seated by lot. To that end I have 
 l)repared a number ot ])aper slips which I will ])lace in a hat. 
 correspondiuii: to the number of pupils, each containino; a num- 
 l)er ; of these each of you will draw one, and take the seat 
 indicated by the number he or she has drawn. Let me request 
 you, ladies and gentlemen, n(.)t to open your papers until the 
 drawiuiJ- is concluded." 
 
 The teacher then called the names in the order in which they 
 were entered on the subscription list, hence ^'ictor took the 
 lirst i)aper, with which he withdrew without openino; it, mind- 
 ful of the teacher's request. Leslie was less scrupulous. The 
 triunq)h visilde in his features lietrayed that he had secured a 
 small numl)er. Nellie could not V)e expected to behave more 
 discreetly than her elder l)rother, and she also peei)ed into the 
 pai)er she had drawn. Hut what she saw there brouo-ht no 
 smile to her face. There was a very perceptilde pout, rather, 
 and A'ictor, whom she asked as she passed him, to show her 
 his number, thought he detected a tremor in her voice. 
 
 '' I have not looked at my luimber." he answered, •' l)ecause 
 the teacher did not wish us to." 
 
 " I did." said Nellie, showing him her number, which 
 proved to l»e one of the highest. "See what luck I had I " 
 she added. •• I dare say that you have l)een more fortunate." 
 A scowl darkened her lovely face, and a sinister expression, 
 as of envy, for a moment disfigured the mouth that \'ictor 
 thought so sweet wlien it smiled. It pained him to sch' her 
 
90 THE EEBEL'S DA UGH TEE. 
 
 so impatient. Acting upon a sudden inijjulse, he said, with 
 a sparkle in his dreamy eyes, '' Will you do me a great favor, 
 Miss May? " 
 
 '' What can 30U want of nic? "' she asked in return. 
 
 " I have not seen my luimber; it may be a higher one than 
 yours. But 1 would like to exchange with you." 
 
 '• Ydii want to swap with mp:* " she exclaimed in blaniv 
 astonishment. 
 
 " Yes, if you please." 
 
 Victor was electrilied by the briglit snule tliat suddenly 
 lighted up lier face. * " Here," she said, '■ take my a])omin- 
 able ticket. Yours caimot be worse." 
 
 She hastily opened the i)aper that Victor gave lier, and he 
 heard again that sweet voice in the silvery laughter that he 
 knew so well. '^ Xumlier one I " she proclaimed in high glee, 
 holding uj) the paper for inspection, and dancing with it from 
 friend to friend. " I've got the liead ])lace and I mean to 
 keej) it I " 
 
 Victor's pleasure, though not so demonstrative, was |)er- 
 haps fully as intense as Nellie's, in s])ite of the conviction, 
 ruefully entertained, that lie had now barred himself of the 
 chance of attaining a high rank in the parsing match. 
 
 When all the tickets had been drawn, the examination began. 
 At first there was much merriment Avhen anyone liad to give 
 up his place to a more fortunate comjjetitor ; l)ut the interest 
 excited l)y the rivalry soon became so intense as to exclude 
 every other consideration. Save a few of the most indolent ones, 
 all exerted their utmost al)ility to maintain their places, or turn 
 down some one al)Ove them. Victor, originally one of the last, 
 advanced rapidly, until he reached somewhere near the middle 
 of the class ; his progress then became more and nioi'e diffi- 
 cult, because those above him were more experienced scholars. 
 Among the latter were Nellie and Leslie. The brother had 
 advanced until lie occupied the seat next to liis sister, who on 
 her part bravely maintained the place of honor at the head of the 
 (rlass, having siiccessfidly answei'ed every (jiiestion pul lo her. 
 
LITERAL'Y CULTURE JX THE BACKWOODS. 91 
 
 Oiiee, when it was lier turn, the teacher asked, " How are 
 absti'aot nouns usually distinouislied from their adjectives? " 
 Simple as the (luestion seemed. Nellie was at fault. 
 
 " Well, Miss May."' the teacher said encouragiuii'ly, " surely 
 you can tell us that?" But he was mistaken : Nellie could 
 not ffive the information, and after the ominous '' ( )ik' — two — 
 three I " spoken, [)erhap.s, a shade more lingeringly than usual, 
 he added. •• Why, then, Miss INIay. you will have to tjive up 
 the place of honoi' ti> your brother." 
 
 lint Leslie could not. or would not, at least did not, deprive 
 his sister of iier preference. '• 1 don't know I '' he answered 
 curtly, when the question came to him. 
 
 '• Well, this is stranoe," said the teacher. " Next I " 
 
 But neither the next nor a number of those following, gave 
 the answer. 
 
 Miss Hettie Shannon, when the cpiestion was put to her, 
 answered timidly: •' By their meaning! 
 
 " Very good I " said the teacher. '' One knows a lady by 
 her — being a lady. But that does not answer the question. 
 Next: " 
 
 Victor watched the proceeding with eager interest. His 
 face colored with excitement. He thought he knew the an- 
 swer which the master expected, and was astonished that 
 no one el^e had thought of it. If it should coine his 
 turn — " 
 
 The next answer was wrong again. ]Mr. Caleb Amos grew 
 impatient. •• Miss Matlack, do you clear u[) the matter." he 
 said, as he came u\) to her. •' How — " 
 
 " By the form," answered the young lady. 
 
 " Well,"' exclaimed the teacher, •'•that is something. But 
 the goose has a form as well as the swallow ; and by the test 
 you have given us we would not be able to distinguish one 
 from the othei'. Next ! '" 
 
 Victor's heart beat violently in breathless suspense. \\'hen 
 the cpiestion reached his next neighbor, lie was almost sure 
 that the answer would come : for he had been told that this 
 
d2 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEIi. 
 
 young man had been a student at a colleg-e for some years. 
 But Kalpli Favton, instead of answering the question, seemed 
 disposed to (juarrel witli the teacher. 
 
 " A swallow is distinguished from the goose, among other 
 things, by its tail," he exclaimed, to the great amusement of 
 the class. " IJut I fail to see that either adjectives or nouns 
 have tails." 
 
 ''You do?" counter-(|Ucried the l^rofessor, opening wide 
 his eyi's, and betraying surprise l»y the inilection of his voice. 
 "' You must l)e exceedingly averse to ligurative language, or 
 jiossess a tame imagination. I see no impropriety in com})aring 
 sullixes of words with lails. \\\\-,\\ think you. ]\Ir. ^>'aldhorst ? 
 How— " 
 
 Victor. trenil)ling with excitement, fairly jumped from his 
 seat, and shouted before the question was linisju'd. •' liy the 
 end-syllable n-e-s-s I " 
 
 ■• You sec," the master spoke up. '• ^Ir. U'aldhorst has 
 saved the honor of the class. He has discoveri'd the tail of 
 abstract nouns, and so raised himself to the head <jf the class. 
 Take yoxxY seat at the right hand of Miss INIay." 
 
 Victor complied with palpitating heart and Hushing cheek. 
 His blazing eyes were bent to the (loor ; but he could not con- 
 ceal the exultant triumph that radiated from them. Both 
 Nellie and Leslie welcomed him with pleasant smiles and 
 encouraging nods, and when he sat down by the side of Nellie, 
 the young conqueror was reveling in unalloyed bliss. 
 
 But he was not long to enjoy his triumph. Energetic whis- 
 pers were heard all around the circle of i)Ui3ils, which soon 
 swelled into open expressions of discontent and anger. " It 
 is not right I " was plainly heard. " The teacher is partial — 
 He helped him — He always did favor the Dutchman — This 
 foreignt'r siia'nt make fools of us — \\v won't stand it ' — and 
 other like accusations and criminations were heard on all sides. 
 The temper of the pupils was wrought up to a |)itch threaten- 
 ing ojx'u revolt. Let the teacher connnand silence never so 
 authoi'itatively, — he succeeded in (pielling the uproar for brief 
 
HTHUAUY CULTURE IN THE BACKWOODS. do 
 
 moments only, and then it vvonid break out anew witli increased 
 violence. In vain he appealed to their self-respect and sense 
 ol' dignity : in vain to his antlunity as teaciier. •• You liave 
 abused your autliority 1 " Ralph l*ayton exclaimed in a loud 
 voice. '■ Uy your silly metaphor of the word tails you indi- 
 cated to your pet the answer you wanted, and heli)ed him to 
 an honor which is a shame and a disg-race to him and to you." 
 The speaker was uot a popular member of the class. A 
 show of haughty reserve, as Avell as a considerable degree of 
 self-conceit, which he took no pains to conceal, had madi' him 
 more opponents than friends. But in giving- vent to his spite 
 against the young " Dutchman " he had expressed the feeling 
 ni)perinost, just then, in the minds of most of the i)ui)ils, and 
 they heartily applauded him. 
 
 '^And besides," the young orator went on, emboldened by 
 the success that had attended his first speech, '• your question 
 and the answer to it were equfilly false and absurd. Abstract 
 nouns have no connnon ending. It was nonsense to say that 
 they ended in ' ness '. And the promotion of the Dutchman 
 for giving such an answer is a shame, and an insult to free and 
 independent Americans. ' ' 
 
 The -'free and indei)endent Americans" i)resent in the 
 class, including the fairer half of them, expressed their sym- 
 pathy with the sentiment uttered l)y the speaker, by vociferous 
 applause. Victor was at a loss to understand all this commo- 
 tion. The teacher lost the coolness and self-possession so 
 necessary for the control of an assemblage under excitement, 
 though it be but of school-lioys. He permitted himself to be 
 betrayed into an angry reply, undertaking to defend both the 
 (question and the answer as perfectly correct, and designated 
 the statement of the sjieaker as a pitiful attempt to cover his 
 own defeat. This added fuel to the liames of discontent; for 
 Ralph Payton's accusation gave a color of justice to the assault 
 upon Victor, without which the clamor against the latter might 
 seem to arise out of envious jealousy. Hence the attack on 
 Payton's position was equivalent to an attack on their own 
 
^4: THE HE BEL'S DAUGllTEE. 
 
 conduct. ••Payton is riorht I " resounded through the hall. 
 "We will not suffer him to he insulted I "' And a voice, 
 louder tluin the rest, shouted: " Jt is a disgrace to our class, 
 to have at its Iteatl a iniserMhle Dutch abolitionist and — scare- 
 crow I ' ' 
 
 Victor, notwithstanding tlie warning received from Colonel 
 May on the sul)ject of aliolitionism, was not aware of the full 
 extent of the insult intended. Jiut the word " scare-crow " 
 wounded him deeply. lie cast an invohuitary glance at his 
 neighbor, as if lookiug for explanation from her. She dro])ped 
 her eyes before his appealing glance, while a Hood of scarlet 
 suffused her face and neck. Hut (luickly looking n\) again, 
 her eyes met liis untlinchingly, and with her sweetest smile she 
 Avhispered: "Don't be angry I I have been silly and thought- 
 less, liut that fellow," she continued, throwing her eyes with 
 a withering glance in the direction of the last speaker, •• is 
 low and mean. I hope you will care as little for his cowardly 
 insult, as for my thoughtless folly." 
 
 In the earnestness of her request, she had placed the tips of 
 her lingers on his arm, and Victor felt a thrill of delight at the 
 soft pressure. He knew not what answer to make, nor was 
 there time to say anything; for Leslie, — who had jumped up 
 on hearing the word " abolitionist," and placed himself in 
 front of Victor, as if to shield him against harm, — now spoke 
 loudly, but without passion or excitement : 
 
 '' Boys, it is my opinion, that the greatest shame and disgrace 
 to our class is to forget what we owe ourselves and to our teacher. 
 In the presence of the ladies, tool Let us, before the gentler 
 sex, at least, behave like gentlemen, and not like silly school- 
 boys who are put out because somclxxly I'lsc has learned liis 
 lesson better." 
 
 Leslie's words met with favorable reception. The noise 
 subsided percei)tilily. liut l)efore the master could folloAV u]) 
 tiie advantage so gained, and restore order, Orlando .Tones, 
 who had spoken the offensive words, again arose, and said: 
 
 •■ Li'slie Mav. \«)u ouuht to be the last one to undertake the 
 
YoK lue u liiir ! " N'ictor iiuiiud buck. 
 
LITEUAliY iJVLTVllE IN THE nMJKW'OUDS. '-'o 
 
 defense of a sneaking spy, who stirs up your father's slaves to 
 disobedience and revolt, — who in his own person, teaches 
 tlieni to read and to write, — an outlandish rudlan, who don't 
 know anythinii- about propriety and decency, and who lias 
 shamefully insulted your own sister." 
 
 This was more than ^'ict()r could stand. lie was stunned 
 at the audacious perversion of the affair in the negro cabin, 
 shocked at being called a s[)y and a rultian ; but to be accused 
 of indecency, and more than all, of having insulted Miss 
 iMay, — here in the ])resence of the young lady herself, befoi'e 
 the whole class — this could not ])e tolerated. Forgetting all 
 else in his intense indignation, he leaped to his feet and 
 shouted, his eyes Hashing with wrath, his voice trembling with 
 passion: — •' This is an infamous lii- 1 And he who says it, is 
 an infamous liar I " 
 
 Orlando .bnies, as the backwoods code of honor i)rescril)ed, 
 nuist chastise the offender on the spot. He {)romptly stepjjed 
 forward with clenched hsts and threatening gestures, 
 
 "Who do you call a liar I " he yelled hercely. "Take 
 l)ack that word or I'll knock your teeth down your insolent 
 tlu'oat !" 
 
 ^ Yon are a liar I " Victor hurled l)ack. •• You and auy- 
 Ijody who says that 1 intentionally insulted Miss May." 
 
 Young Jones drew back his arm for a blow at Victor. But 
 Victor, whose blood was boiling, anticipated him. He was not 
 an adept in the noble art of boxing; had never been engaged 
 in a list-light in all liis life. 13ut he was in a furious passion, 
 and sprang blindly at his antagonist, dealing him a ))low in 
 the face that felled him to the floor. At this moment Halpli 
 Payton rushed up. evidt'utlv to the rescue of his fallen [)ar- 
 tisan. 
 
 " Back I " was heard the loud, but still unim[)assioned, and 
 therefore all the more authoritative voice of Leslie. '• Fair 
 play I Let these two light out their quarrel, Ralph Payton : 
 and if your list itches for a light, try it on me I 
 
 ••Let him come I " shouted Victor. "He wh(j lies is a 
 
9G THE nSBEVS DAUGHTEU. 
 
 coward, and I am not uirnid of all the liars in the ela«s. if they 
 are as bio-, every one of them, as the oiant CJoliathI 
 
 Victor could not have adopted more ellicient means to secnre 
 the respect of his fellow-pupils, than this display of }>ersonat 
 intrepidity. Many of the old settlers remembered the time 
 when prudence and v:\lor were indispensable re([uisites for the 
 })rotection of life and i)ro])erty aoainst treacherous and cruel 
 enenues, and courage was still looked on as the chief manly 
 virtue. \'ictor knew notliiu<>- of this, nor that lie was brave or 
 couraoeous. Jiut Hal[)h I'ayton knew it, and saw to his cha- 
 grin that so far the assault on the foreiofner had resulted to his 
 decided advautao-e. And Orlando Jones knew it, and felt the 
 disgrace of defeat all the more keenly. 
 
 Threatening dire vengeance he arose from the lloor. He 
 permitted himself, with feigned resistance, to V)e led away, 
 rej)eating when beyond the reach of Victor's long arms, his 
 slanderous charges, counting on the popular intolerance against 
 abolitionism, and emphazing \'ictor's low instincts. " You 
 have all seen," he cried when at a safe distance, '' how this 
 rowdy attacked me like an assassin. That proves the truth of 
 what I say, that he is a dangerous abolitionist, who will bring 
 bloodshetl and servile insurrection into the land. I tell you he 
 is ripe for the penitentiary. For a monster wIkj will assassi- 
 nate a defenseless num uuawares, and disgi-ace a harmless 
 girl, is capal)le of any crime." 
 
 Again Mctor's passion carried him Iteyond control. He 
 tore away from those surrounding him and rushed upon his 
 adversary, striking at him in blind fury. Jones scarcely re- 
 sisted, seeking only to i)rotect his face and head against the 
 weighty blows that Victor's arm indicted. 
 
 " Enough I " Jones presently shouted, thus proclaiming his 
 defeat. Victor ought now to have desisted ; but he was 
 lamentably ignorant of the code nmong tlie backwoodsmen, 
 and kei)t pounding his adversaiy in di'liaiice of code and 
 etiquette. 
 
 " Ahl " and •• Oh I " came from the lips of some of the 
 
LITKUABY CULTURE IN TIIK BACKWOODS. 97 
 
 timid fair ones; •' shame I " and •• mercN I '" fi'oiu othei's. 
 The teacher, in tiuinder tones, eonnnanded order: but \'i('tor 
 heard liini not. Ralph Payton au^aiu spranu' ti> the rescue oJ' iiis 
 l)arty friend, and a<>ain Leslie interposed, di'niandinii- fair play. 
 
 " Do you eall that fair phiy when the up])er man heats the 
 one that is down, afti'r he has aeknowledfivd his defeat ? " 
 
 Leslie saw that Payton was riuht. " Jt is enouo'h now, 
 Vietorl " he saicL l>ut \'ietor still heard not. lie was liter- 
 ally beside himself with furious passion. 
 
 Nellie had witneissed the contest with sparkling eyes and in 
 l)reathless suspense. Her sympathy was evidently with Victor ; 
 but when she saw that he continued to beat his opponent after 
 he had said •• enough I " her l)rows contracte(L and she shook 
 her head in decided disaj)proval. Then she sprang forward, 
 laid her hand on Victor's arm, and said: " That will do, Mr. 
 ^yaldhol•st. You must not strike a man after he says 
 ' enough.' " 
 
 The touch of that little hand at once paralyzed Victor's arm. 
 He stood speechless and motionless while Orlando .Tones made 
 good his retreat, and gazed at the intrepid gii'l. 
 
 The whole affair had lasted probably not longer than a 
 minute or two ; but to Victor it seemed an age since he had 
 conquered the place at the head of the class, and the privilege 
 to sit by the side of Nellie. And now she stood there, looking 
 at him so reproachfully. With the return of his self-possession 
 came the bitter self-accusation, that by giving way to his pas- 
 sion he had forfeited the esteem of his friends — that he 
 proved himself guilty of the ruffianism with which Ralph Payton 
 and Orlando Jones had charged him. 
 
 " Par-don me I " he stammered, manfully fighting back the 
 tears that would force themselves into his eyes, as if taking 
 advantage of the weakness and depression that followed the 
 tension of his nerves during his late excitement. " I — I — 
 meant not to insult you I " 
 
 "Of course not I " spoke Nellie, in her clear, bell-like 
 voice, so as to attract general attention. " I know von, Mr. 
 
98 THE BEBEL\S DAUGllTKB. 
 
 Waldliorst, for a thorouo-h o-entlonian and a brave hero, who 
 saved my life at the peril of his own."" And ha vino- thus 
 made ample re})aratioii for the unintentional injury she had 
 done him, she held out her hand to him and said ?' cornel " 
 
 He followed her, not able to thank her in words. Before 
 they reached their seats he heard Leslie say, also addressino; 
 the whole class : 
 
 " I deem it my duty to add a word in justiiication of my 
 friend. It has been [)ulili(tly charged here that he is an abo- 
 litionist, and carries on illicit intercourse with my father's 
 negroes. I can give a shrewd guess at the source whence this 
 infamous slander emanates. The originator of it is a dastardly 
 liar, whoever he is. The disseminator is a no less dastardly 
 slanderer. One such has to-day received well-deserved chas- 
 tisement at the hands of my friend, and the like treatment 
 awaits all that may follow the slanderer's example. 1 wish to 
 add, that whoever doubts my word in this matter, may say so, 
 and I am ready to settle with him at any time or ])lace, as soon 
 as the class will be dismissed." 
 
 In speaking the latter words, Leslie cast a look of deliance 
 at Ralph Pay ton, of which that gentleman chose to take no 
 notice. 
 
 "And now, fellow students," concluded Leslie, " let us, 
 with the j)ermission of our highly honored teacher, give a hur- 
 rah to the young man who by his natural capability and indef- 
 atigable diligence, has won the lirst place in our class, and 
 by his personal courage and prowess has won our respect and 
 esteem. Hip — hip — hurrah ! Hurrah ! Hnrrah ! ! ! " 
 
 The class — at least the great majority of them — heartily 
 responded. The ladies were not tardy in their demonstra- 
 tions. Miss Emily Matlack and Miss Ilettie Shannon waving 
 their handkerchiefs almost as enthusiastically as did Nellie 
 May; even the teacher smiled approliation. When the noise 
 had subsided, the latter declared the class dismissed for the 
 day, and admonished the {Hipils to return jjromptly in the 
 morniuii' for the renewal of their studies. 
 
VII. 
 
 A CANDIDATE IN A QUANDARY. 
 
 bt; IC'TOK left the court house iu :i state of bewiklennent 
 \w// brought on by eonllieting emotions. Elation over his 
 ' signal success in the class ; shame and poignant dis- 
 tress at thought of the spectacle he had made of himself Ijy 
 giving way to his passion ; exultant delight over the decided 
 partiality shown him by Nellie and Leslie, — all these con- 
 tended for the mastery in his bosom. And above it all the 
 puzzling experience, that he had been most applauded for that 
 of which he was most ashamed, — the disgraceful broil witli 
 Orlando Jones. Not even the teacher had reprimanded him 
 for his unseemly violence I Jiut he felt keenly the humiliation 
 that lay in Nellie's gentle rebuke. What must she have 
 thought of his temper, and of his manuers, to lind it necessary 
 to remind him of his cowardice toward a helpless adversary I 
 
 The l)rotlier and sister had cordialh' invited him to accom- 
 l)any them to May Meadows. It needed very little coaxing 
 to induce him to accept the tempting invitation. He felt that 
 nothing would so effectually restore his mental equililirium, as 
 the delightful companionship of his young friends. 
 
 "Tell me, Victor," said Leslie with a jocular smile, when 
 all three were on their way to the Colonel's residence, " were 
 you born with a caul, and did some benevolent fairy stand god- 
 mother at you baptism? That was a happy inspiration, this 
 morning, that prompted you to the one only course to stop the 
 mischievous gadding of those rowdies in the class. I confess, 
 that I was always afraid that your excessive modest}', the like 
 of which no maiden in Vernal County is blessed with, would 
 ruin your prospects in life, at least before the public. But 
 
 (99) 
 
100 THE BEBEVS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 to-dav you luive convinced mc, that yon liavc tlic stuff in you 
 for a politician who Avill lind \'ernal County too narrow, some 
 day, for his a.niV)ition.'" 
 
 This swct'ijino- anuounccniciil startled and puzzled Mctor. 
 He was afraid his friend Avas (piizziny- him. " What is a pol- 
 itician? " he incpiired. 
 
 '■ Wliat a question I " exclaimed Leslie. " ^^liy, politician 
 comes from politics. A politician is a man who engages in 
 politics." 
 
 "• Papa is a politician, is he not? " suggested Nellie. 
 
 " I should think so ! " the young man asserted. "And 
 what a politician I He has made most wonderful progress 
 in the line art of humbugging since this campaign began." 
 
 " Is humbugging the height of a politician's art? " Victor 
 inquired naively. 
 
 "■ Why, of course! " Leslie answered promptly, regarding 
 his companion with an amused smile. " A politician goes in 
 to win; and to win, he must stand in with the people. If he 
 wants an office, he must make the honest voters believe that 
 he accepts it from motives of sheer patriotism, at great per- 
 sonal sacrifice to himself ; and he Avheedles them into voting 
 for him by promising all sorts of impossible things, — that the 
 millennium will come, if they only will elect him, — and such — 
 humbug." 
 
 " Then your father is not a politician I " Victor proclaimed, 
 with an air of conviction that precluded doubt. 
 
 " Well, and why not? " 
 
 " Because INIr. May is too thoroughly a gentleman to do so 
 dishonorable a thing! " Victor responded with enthusiasm. 
 
 Nellie gave him a proud and grateful look, while Leslie, 
 looking a little ashamed, cordially shook him by the hand, 
 saying " I think you are right, \'ictor. In that view of the 
 case, the governor is not, perhaps, a politician. But we are 
 so in the habit of using the word to describe a man who makes 
 a business of politics ; who hangs out the show-bill of patriot- 
 ism, and makes of patriotic party platforms so many cloaks 
 
A CANDIDATE IN A qUANDAllY. 101 
 
 for liis ainhitious, or ('(n'l'toiis. Inil alwnys sc'llisU (.'uds. Is not 
 that luunhug':' " 
 
 '' And why do you think that 1 will bi' a successful politi- 
 cian? " ^'ictor asked. 
 
 " You prove it just now by dealing nie this poser^" said 
 Leslie, laughing-. '' It would be diiticult, indeed, to imagine 
 you as dealing in hypocrisy or humbug, or believe you capable 
 of deceiving even a babe. But I am right, for all that. 
 Wrong perhaps in applying the Avord in this sense, to the 
 governor. And yet, has he not produced an infiuite amount 
 of humbug and nonsense during this campaign? Let me re- 
 mind you of the precious stuff he got off on the occasion of 
 his introducing Professor Caleb Amos to the people of Brook- 
 lield. But, my friend," he added, turning with smiling face 
 to Victor, "there are politicians, also, in a nobler sense. 
 .Statesmen, if you please, who devote themselves to the science 
 of political economy ; who organize parties on political princi- 
 l)les, and w'ho are as innocent of ottice-hunting, in the vulgar 
 sense, as you or the governor. You would not object to being 
 a politician in this sense, would you? " 
 
 " Still, I cannot imagine how you connect my behavior to- 
 day with this subject," Victor remarked. 
 
 '• I will tell you," the other rejoined. " You were in a most 
 critical predicament to-day. How near you came to being a 
 victim to the base slanders of your jealous detractors, you 
 probably never suspected, nor realize even now. People stand 
 no tom-foolery in this part of the country from abolitionists, 
 nor allow the negroes to be encouraged in their discontent and 
 wild notions of bettering their condition. And that is just 
 what they represented you as being and doing. That is why 
 it pleased me so well to see you nip the foul conspiracy in the 
 bud l)y an emphatic word and a stinging t^low, which at once 
 made you the master of the situation." 
 
 '' 1 can't imagine how that helped me I " said Victor, shaking 
 his head dubiously. 
 
 •• lint I can see! " Nellie exclaimed eagerlv. " It was a 
 
102 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 mean thing of Orlando Jones to state publicly what I had 
 meant for a harmless joke, to an intimate friend, and then to 
 pervert it so shamefully, and make a public accusation of it. 
 And so everybody was glad that you thrashed him for it." 
 
 " Let it be a lesson to you, my giddy-headed little sister, to 
 keep that unruly tongue of yours under better control! " 
 moralized the liig brother. 
 
 "I know I You needn't preach me a sermon alxjut it," 
 said Nellie, trying honestly but with indifferent success, to 
 put a sober expression on her face. 
 
 " liut that wasn't the main thing," said Leslie. "That 
 was only a private affair between you and Nellie — " 
 
 " But it Avas an infamous lie I " Victor shouted, with return- 
 ing indignation. 
 
 " Of course it was I " Leslie assented. "• And your tower- 
 ing i>assion and the energy with which you hurled the lie at 
 him, showed uj) not only this infamy, but also — and that was 
 of greater importance — the utter groundlessness of the cock- 
 and-bull story about the negroes. And this is what 1 meant, 
 when 1 said that you had the stuff in you for a thorough poli- 
 tician, who knows how to do the right thing at the right time." 
 
 " Ah," said Victor, with an admiring glance at the little 
 lady and her brother, and blushing with pleasure, " it was not 
 my doing that rescued me from disgrace, but yours. Miss May, 
 and yours, Leslie. You both stood by me so bravely, and 
 everybody admires and loves you so nuich, that for your sake 
 they finally pnt up with me also. Plow immensely popular you 
 are I " 
 
 " I hope you are right I '" said I^eslie, laughing. •• A little 
 popularity just now would not come amiss to the governor. 
 The cam])aigu is getting hot, and there is no telling what the 
 end will ]»e. It would be a deuced nuisance, if that sneaking- 
 whig \\'a(l(lie were to beat him." 
 
 "Your father?" (In a tone of incredulity.) "Why. 
 surely, that cannot be. Kveryltody, I should think, is going 
 to vote for Colonel Mnv." 
 
A CANDIDATE IN A QUANDARY. 103 
 
 " ^V f(insuiiim:ili()ii dcvoiitlN to hi- wislied I "' (.'xcl:iiiiic(l the 
 son. •• But I would unicli [)i'efer certainty to the liopi-. 'I'linl 
 business about -lelTrevs is uo;ly. If only the oovernor were 
 free to deal with him as he ought to be dealt with for his 
 insolence I " 
 
 '' With .Jeffreys, your overseer? " asked Victor, eaoerly. 
 
 '•Why, yes," Nellie spoke up. •' Did I not tell you ;i 
 week ago, that I had news to tell you from May JNIeadows tliat 
 Avould interest you ? lint you never once came near me, so 
 that I could tell." 
 
 '* How stupid of me 1 " he replied, and then added eagerly: 
 ■ • Please tell me now . ' ' 
 
 " It concerns you somewhat, also," Leslie answered for his 
 sister. " Jeffreys insists on it that you were stirring up the 
 negroes, were teaching them to read and write, and such 
 nonsense, — well, about the same thing that rowdy Jones said 
 in the class. Now the governor did not want to believe every- 
 thing he said, and they quarreled. There were not many words, 
 but pretty sharp ones. Jeffreys will have it that there must 
 l)e exemplary punishment of the negroes. Among the rest, 
 he wants Cressie publicly Hogged. He says that she is one of 
 the worst ringleaders, and openly defied his authority. But 
 Cressie belongs to sister Nellie, and she has taken it int(j her 
 head, that Cressie shall not be whipped, and the governor takes 
 Nellie's view of the matter." 
 
 " Don't you think it would be cruel and wrong to punish 
 Cressie, just because the overseer is mad at something? " 
 Nellie spoke these words with an inquiring look at Victor, as 
 if she hoped, but was not quite sure, that he would agree 
 with her. 
 
 •' It would be the heiglit of tyrannic injustice! " the hitter 
 exclaimed warmly. " But is not Colonel May tlie master? 
 And if he will not permit this wrong to be done, does not that 
 settle the matter? " 
 
 " Under ordinary circumstances it would, of course," 
 Leslie explained. " But Jeffreys is headstrong and vindictive. 
 
104 THE UEBEL\S DAUGllTEU. 
 
 :uul thivatoiis to leave the place if he does not yet his way. 
 If he makes o-ood his threat, of coiirse there will he a big row 
 about it and all sorts of talk ainoiio- the peoj)le. Jeffreys will 
 certainly put the matter in the worst ])ossil)le light, that is too 
 plain U) be doubted. The whigs would make tremendous 
 capital out of it, and defeat the governor almost to a certainty." 
 
 '' How in the world can this thing injure your father? " 
 (pieried Victor, in anxious surprise. " It is not wrong for a 
 master to discharge a servant who will not obey, is it? And 
 whose business is this, but his own? "' 
 
 " 80 I say! " Nellie j)ut in. •• Papa must know Ijest what 
 to do al)out his own affairs, and if he lets Mr. Jeffreys go, 
 because they cannot l)otli be boss, nobody can object." 
 
 '' No one," replied Leslie, speaking more soberly than was 
 his custom, " who knows the facts of the case. On the con- 
 trary, every one that will take the trouble to examine the facts 
 at all, will say that he is right. But the (piestion is not so 
 much whether he is right or wrong, but how to avoid a scand.-d 
 that will certainly prove disastrous on the eve of the election." 
 
 It troubled \'ictor to notice tlie seriousness of his friend 
 Leslie, and he listened \\'ith a solicitude arising from a guilty 
 feeling that his own im[)rudence had brought on all this trouble. 
 
 Leslie continued: "You see, if Jeffreys is discharged, the 
 whigs will take up his side of the story and magnify it so as 
 to make it a hundred times worse than even Jeffreys now puts 
 it. The governor will l)e held up as a renegade on the slavery 
 (question, Avhich just now causes so much excitement all over 
 the South. They will make him out a hypocrite, who secretly 
 does that which he publicly i-ondenuis ; a traitor to the cause 
 of the South, by permitting sedition and insurrection to be 
 taught to the negroes of his own household, 'i'he discharged 
 overseei' will pose as a martyr, who would rather sacrilice a 
 })rolitable position than l)ecome a tool in the hands of a traitor 
 to his country I Orlando Jones has shown you this very day. 
 how t'asy it is to spivad lies, and how readily they are Itelieved." 
 
 " Hut you have also shown how easy it was to put down Ihe 
 
.4 CANDIDATE IN A QUANDAHV. 105 
 
 lies!" Victor oxclaiined exultantly. •• A word Iroiii Miss 
 Nellie, a simple statement l»y you, were sulHcient to sweep away 
 their wel) of lies." 
 
 " You lia[)[)en to he mistaken, young man," said Leslie. 
 '' Your thundering • liar I ' and your ready list did that. But, 
 you see," he continued, relapsing into the sober tone in which 
 he had been speaking, '• we cannot lock up the whole body of 
 voters in a schoolroom : nor can the governor demonstrate 
 to them all with his list, that his enemies are lying. No 
 harm can come to him from any one whom he can meet face 
 to face ; danger threatens only from the lie that sneaks in the 
 dark, like the snake in the grass that shuns the open light of 
 day." 
 
 They walked on in silence for a while, pondering the situa- 
 tion. Presently Victor inquired, '" What has your father con- 
 cluded to do in the matter? " 
 
 '' Nothing as yet," answered Leslie. " liut 1 fear that he 
 will yield to Jeffreys." 
 
 "Yield! " Victor repeated, emphasizing the word so as to 
 almost make Leslie blush. 
 
 " AVill Jidre to yield," the latter added quickly. •• Would 
 you have him throw away his chance for the election, just to 
 shield a slave from a Hogging which she, ])erhaps, after all, 
 deserves ? ' ' 
 
 The young German shook his head dubiously, but made no 
 reply. 
 
 They had now reached the grounds of May Meadows. In 
 passing the place from which the negro quarters could be seen, 
 Victor looked eagerly in that direction. He seemed to regard 
 with his eyes the hut in which he had surprised the negroes 
 reading the Bible. 
 
 •* Cressie is not there," said Nellie, who liad followed the 
 direction of his look, with a smile. " I ordered her to remain 
 in the house until this matter is settled." 
 
 "That will do C'ressie no good," Leslie remarked. "Jef- 
 freys will not be tlnvarte<l in iiis [)urj)ose ])\ your opposition." 
 
106 THE BEBEVS DAUGHTER. 
 
 "We shall see I " said Nellie, proudly lioldiiiiJ- up lier 
 shapely head. 
 
 Dinner was just about to be served at the mansion when 
 they arrived there. Victor was kindly received, particularly 
 by the Colonel, who had not long before returned from an 
 electioneering; tour, and was in high spirits. He expressed his 
 pleasure at seeing the young man as a guest at his table, and 
 inquired about the progress he was making in his grammatical 
 studies. Of course, Nellie at once launched into a narration 
 of the important events that had transpired at the class. Her 
 vivacious description, spiced with droll imitations, put the 
 com}mny at the table in the pleasantest humor, and so engaged 
 their attention, that none of them noticed how the entrance of 
 Lucretia, who was waiting at table, affected the guest. He 
 found the girl still more beautiful, if possible, in the full light 
 of day, than when he had seen her by the flicker of the tallow- 
 candle. She was of the same age as Nellie, but taller and 
 more fully deVeloi)ed. The plainness of the garb she wore did 
 not altogether hide the soft outlines of her voluptuous, Junonic 
 form. Her whole appearance contrasted strongly with that of 
 her sjjrightly, vivacious young mistress ; yet it seemed to 
 Victor that the charms of each were heightened by the com- 
 parison. Especially remarkable did he lind the features of the 
 two maidens, when Lucretia stoo])ed by the side of her mis- 
 tress to pass her some dish from the table, and brought the 
 two faces into close juxtaposition, enabling him to note the 
 hapi)y, child-like, yet piquant and highly intellectual look 
 beaming from Nellie's clear grey eyes, in contrast with the soft, 
 dreamy, almost plaintive expression characterizing the liquid, 
 dark, yet lustrous eyes of the Octoroon. 
 
 But it was not the ap})earance of the two girls that en- 
 gaged Victor's busy thoughts. He pondered over the political 
 necessity which subjected the faithful servant to the cruel 
 caprice of a brutal hireling, uotwithstandiug the desire of a 
 kind mistress to protect her. and the conviction of her master 
 that she wns inuoccnt — Ix'caiisc the soveiTJon voters uiiuht 
 
.1 CANDIDATE IN A QU AND AMY. 107 
 
 choost' to look oil her inipuiuty as a proof of u tiv:isoiial)l(' 
 heresy in the master, from wliom they must withhold their 
 suffrages. 
 
 " Now seel " exclaimed the Colonel, with a pleasant lautih, 
 as Nellie related the triumph achieved by Victor, in giving" tiie 
 correct answer to the ([uestion that battled the rest of the 
 class, '* What an honor for us to entertain the Corypheus of 
 grammatical science at our table I " 
 
 "Yes, indeed," Nellie continued; "and that was the 
 smallest of his victories." And she went on to relate the 
 remainder of the morning's experiences, interrupted now and 
 then by a correction or explanation on the part of Leslie. 
 The Colonel listened with attention, his interest in the narrative 
 increasing when the slanderous charges against Victor were 
 mentioned. His face took on a sober expression. When 
 Leslie, who had assumed this part of the narration, mentioned 
 the intrepidity with which Victor had met the charges and 
 hurled the lie at the accusers, he threw^ an approving glance at 
 the young man which brought a blush to his cheek. After 
 listening with evident satisfaction to the further development 
 of the fracas, he whispered a fcAv words into his wife's ear, 
 whereupon the latter sent Lucretia on an errand resulting in 
 her protracted absence. 
 
 " It is high time," said the Colonel, after Lucretia had left 
 the room, without lietraying h\ look or gesture, how much she 
 would have liked to remain — •' it is high time that I should 
 come to an understanding with -Jeffreys about that unpleasant 
 dispute between us. I infer from what you related of the 
 occurrence in the class, that he has already, partially at least, 
 made good his threats. What those silly boys tattled out in 
 the grammar school is l)ut the beginning of the attack on me. 
 .Jeffreys has evidently spread the matter and colored it to suit 
 his purposes. His plnu is to corner me by prejudicing the 
 public opinion. It is a l)ad business 1 " There was a pause 
 during which the Colonel thoughtfully paced the room. •• If 
 only llie chM'tion were a little further off I " he ])res('ntly cim- 
 
108 THE HE BEL'S DAUOHTER. 
 
 tinned. " 1 haw but a single day to spare for Broolviield ; all 
 the remainder of the time Ijetore the first Monday in Angnst 
 is cnt ont for bnsiness elsewhere. And if this talk gets ont, 
 my presence here will ]>e indispeusal)le."' 
 
 " It is aggravating to think that this insolent Jeffreys is to 
 have his own way, after all! " said Leslie. 
 
 "I jnst hate him I " Nellie chimed in; and the cloud 
 gathering upon her forehead looked even more portentous than 
 that on her Ijrother's face. '' And I hoi)e that you will show 
 him who is master here." 
 
 " What do jioii think of this?" asked the Colonel, turning 
 round toward Victor. 
 
 '' I? " stammered the young man, disconcerted by the 
 sudden (juestion. •• I cannot presume to express an opinion. 
 1 cannot judge what your situation demands." 
 
 '' But you liafp an opinion':' " 
 
 " It is Avorth nothing to you." 
 
 " Speak, nevertheless. I wish to know your opinion." 
 
 •* I have spoken. You know Avhat I think," Victor said in 
 a low voice, and with downcast eyes. 
 
 " And do you persist in your view, after all I tolil you the 
 other night about })ublic opinion in this country? " 
 
 " I nuist repeat, that I cannot judge as to your })ersonal in- 
 terests," said Victor, in almost a whisper, and under evidently 
 Ijainful eml)arrassment. 
 
 '' tSui)i)()sing that it will cost me my election if I discharge 
 this Jeffreys? " 
 
 " If the Octoroon girl is to be punished for learning to 
 read," said Victor, with a rapid glance at Leslie and Nellie, 
 who were both listening attentively, " or because she went in 
 the night time to her uncle and mother, to read tlie J5ible to 
 them, it is very cruel, but may be just, under your law. JJut 
 if— " 
 
 " Don't be so pathetic about the uncle and mother," the 
 Colonel interrui)ted him with a smile. '' Xerxes is neither the 
 uncle, nor Cassandra the mollier ol' Cressie. Tliat is a wa\' 
 
A CANDIDATE IiV A QUANDAEY. 109 
 
 (larUic^ liuvc ol' tMlkiiiji' siboiit ciicii otlii'i'. (';iss:iii(lr:i was tin- 
 nurse of Ci'ossic, as she was of Xcllie. I>ut — \\\va\ were 
 you u'oiuii to say ? 
 
 \'i('tor cast a basliful look al Nellie and eoiitiuued wilh 
 downcast eyes: '^ IJut if the auger of JMr. Jeffreys is due to 
 another cause, that is an honor to her, then lier jjunishnient 
 would be a cruel and tyrannical mockery of justice'. And," 
 he added, suddenly raising up his head and looking the 
 Colonel full in tiie face, '' in such case you will not 
 permit it." 
 
 '•'■ Not even if I were to lose my election in consequence? " 
 the Colonel asked him, with a look that puzzled Victor. 
 
 '' Not even then I " he promptly exclaimed, his eyes spark- 
 ling with eager enthusiasm. " But I do not understand how a 
 simple act of justice should endanger your election." 
 
 ''Victor is right I " shouted Nellie, leaping to her feet. 
 '' Papa is not afraid of Mr. Jeffreys, 1 know. Cressie has 
 learned to read long ago, and no one has ever found fault with 
 her for it; and papa is not going to have her flogged, just 
 because Mr. Jeffreys wishes it." 
 
 Colonel May looked at his children with a peculiar smile. 
 " 1 think we will hear what Jeffreys has to say for himself," 
 he remarked. '■ And you will oblige me by remaining," he 
 added, as Victor rose to leave the room. '• What is about to 
 transpire here, will hardly remain a secret. And then, you 
 know, you are, in a measure, personally interested in the 
 matter." 
 
 Jeffreys appeared. When he learned for what purpose he 
 had been calletl, he cast a sinister glance at all present. His 
 face assumed a sullen, almost defiant, expression when his eye 
 fell on Victor. " Are all these to stay yere while we do our 
 talkin' ? " he moodily inquired. 
 
 "Mr. Waldhorst has done me the iionor to consent, at my 
 request, to be present at our interview," said the Colonel, 
 quietly. '* Your respective statements do not harmonize on 
 all the facts of the case." 
 
110 THE BEBEVS DAUGHTEIL 
 
 " D^xi.' moan me to defend me words aoin tliis — Hessian? " 
 asked the overseer, in a tone iK'traying- irritation. 
 
 " Mr. Jeffreys, pray do not forget that Mr. A>'aldhorst is a 
 guest at iny house, and a gentleman," said the Colonel, some- 
 what severely. 
 
 ''Time was, when a sneakin' abolitioner wa'n't allowed to 
 count fur a gentleman," said Jeffreys, with increased ill humor, 
 " An' as to Ms bein' yur guest, 'e shamefully 'bused yer hos- 
 pitality fur dirty doin's — " 
 
 Victor sprang to his feet. He was about to utter his indig- 
 nant protest, when the Coloiu'l interruj^ted liim and, with a 
 peremptory gesture, demanded his silence. Then, turning to 
 the overseer with the dignity of a Southern gentleman vindicat- 
 ing the honor of his house, he sternly said: "Not another 
 word, Mr. Jeffreys, of this kind. Remember that you are 
 addressing me. and that there are ladies present." 
 
 The connnanding attitude assumed l>y Colonel May, and the 
 dignified emphasis of his voice, failed not of their effect. The 
 overseer made an effort to moderate his inanner. ■' I'm real 
 sorry," he said lowering his eyes before the keen glance of his 
 master, " 'at nur me actions nur me words are to the likin' o' 
 the ladies. I aint got the gift 'o tiatterin' speech : 'n' 1 like 
 to name things be thar right names." 
 
 " I learn from Mr. Waldhorst," the Colonel continued, 
 "that on the evening in question, his curiosity led him to 
 Xerxes' cal)in, where he found the negroes reading the 
 Bil,le — " 
 
 Jeffreys interrni)ted him with a scornful laugh, and the 
 question " Is that what made "im blow out the* light r " 
 
 " No interruptions, sir I " the Colonel exclaimed severely. 
 '' You are aware, are you not, that the light was blown out by 
 the negroes, because they feared to be discovered l)y you? 
 Now, it is against orders for them to have a light in their 
 cabin ; and it was w^'ong in Lucretia to go there without first 
 obtaining permission from you. But the offense is not so 
 orave a (jue as to call for the infliction of the lash — " 
 
A CANDIDATE IN A QUANDARY. HI 
 
 "Oil," .Ic'l't'rcys ao'iiiii iiilcMrii])tO(l with :i iiKilicioiis siicoi', 
 " 'twas all right fur that 'ere sassy wench 'ii tin' Hessian 
 thar — " 
 
 "Silence, sir! " exclainiecl the Colonel in a voice so stern 
 as to awe the overseer into compliance. Upon a significant 
 gesture from her husband, Mrs. May left the room, taking 
 Xellie with her. " 1 had hoped," he then continued, " that 
 the presence of the ladies would lie a sutiicient restraint upon 
 your rudeness of speech: 1 was mistaken. You have made it 
 l)lain enough what foul purj)ose you impute to Mr. Waldhorst's 
 presence there, and with the mention of which you were about 
 to insult the ladies. 1 now repeat to you, that your surmises 
 are utterly without foundation. From this you may infer, that 
 I do not deem the whole affair worthy of further notice. Let 
 it drop right here." 
 
 The overseer regarded his chief with unconcealed rage. 
 " D'ye mean this fur yer List word? " he linally hissed out. 
 
 " 1 have nothing to add to' it." 
 
 " But me inllooence over the niggers '11 not be wuth shucks, 
 if ye balk me in this way! " he cried with increasing wrath. 
 " If 1 can't be 'lowed to have me own Avay, I can't be 
 responsible fur the niggers — " 
 
 " I will assume the responsibility," said the Colonel. 
 
 " Then take the work too I " A look of tierce defiance, not 
 unmixed with lurking triumph, accompanied these words of the 
 overseer, which contained an open declaration of war ; for he 
 deemed it impossible, under the circumstances, that his services 
 would be dispensed with. 
 
 " Yon mean — " 
 
 " I mean," interrupted Jeffreys, giving full sway to his 
 violent rage, " 'at I'm not goin' to stay at a place, whar the 
 master takes sides 'ith the niggers agin' the overseer, 'n' whar 
 the whim of a bal\v counts more nur the discipline of the 
 slaves; 'n' whar' an outlandish 'venturer 's openly 'lowed to 
 'pint randyvous with lewd nigger wenches — " 
 
 " Enough! " the Colonel exclaimed. His brows contracted, 
 
11^2 ' rilE BE BEL'S DAUGUTEli. 
 
 and liis eyes Hashed Ihivatciiiiiiilv. " Your iulauious suspicion 
 proclaims unmistakably the source of your jealous rage. Jt is 
 well, Mr. Jeffreys, that you are minded to (juit my service. It 
 saA'es me the necessity of dischargina" you." 
 
 •Jeffreys liad not t-ounti'd on being discharged. •' Are ye 
 thinkin' o' the crops 'at hain't been put l»y yet? " he asked in 
 a moderated tone. " 'N' 'at this is 'bout the bizziest season 
 o' the year? " 
 
 •'The negroes will luiA'e to get along without your superin- 
 tendence," the master promptly replied. 
 
 " 'N' now, with yer 'lection on hand, ye hain't got time to 
 be lookin' after the niggers," the overseer suggested meekly. 
 
 " Permit me to manage my own affairs," the Colonel re- 
 plied. 
 
 .Teffreys saAV that he had gone too far. lie had deemed the 
 threat of leaving sufUcient to compel compliance with his de- 
 mand and was not i)repared for the contingency of its accept- 
 ance. To Victor's unbounded astonishment, and immensely 
 to his relief, the overseer changed his tone of defiance to one 
 of almost cringing meekness, as he replied: "But lue time's 
 uot up. J'm not goin' to leave ye Jest when ye need me 
 uiost." 
 
 " I have already indicated,'" the Colonel said quietly, '' that 
 I deem myself capable of managing my own Vtusiness. You 
 iteed not remain on my account." 
 
 " But me contract binds me, 'n' gives me the right to stay 
 vere till the crops are in in the fall. 1 shan't break me con- 
 tract, nur 'low you ter break it." 
 
 " Does that mean," asked the Colonel, " that you take back, 
 without reserve, the threat to leave? " 
 
 " Well, yes, if you want me to say so." 
 
 " And you will obey my orders without gainsay? " 
 
 " About the niggers? Well, yes, then. Say no more about 
 'em. But ye'll have to take the consequences on yer own 
 head." 
 
 Victor had followed the conversation with intense interest. 
 
" Apologize — to him? To this greenhorn of ti Dutehniani:' " 
 
A CANDIDATE IN A (QUANDARY. 113 
 
 Hetwccii his indignation over tlic tliiciitcncd crui-lty 1o llic 
 slaves, tlie etliical baseness of Avliieh lie felt all the more keenly 
 l»y reason of the liioh esteem in whieh he held Colonel May 
 and all his family, and the disastrous eonse(inenees to l)e ap- 
 [)rehended from the vindietive .lelfreys if he should earry oul 
 his threat, his feelinos were wrouoht up to a painful tension. 
 lie felt profoundly relieved, therefore, when the interview be- 
 tween the two men, that had beoiin so stormily, took this pacilie 
 turn. He east a look of triumphant joy at his friend Leslie. 
 This young man smiled misehievously, and whispered: " Just 
 wait ; the fun is not over yet. The governor is not the man to 
 be played with so easily." 
 
 " Let me understand, then," said the Colonel, " that the 
 matter is settled on this basis. There is not to lie another 
 word about it ; neither to Xerxes, nor to Cassandra, nor to 
 any living soul. And now, just one thing more. You have 
 deeply insulted my friend, Mr. Waldhorst, and I deem it due 
 to him, and to my honoi', to demand that you should apologize 
 to him. When you have done so, I expeet from his courtesy 
 to me, that he, too, will make no further mention of this dis- 
 agreeable matter." 
 
 •'What I To him? To this greenhorn of a Dutchman ? " 
 fairly yelled the overseer in newly kindled wrath. '' Apolo- 
 gize — to him? Not by a d d sight I Why, I'd ruther 
 
 beg pard'n o' the luggers 'emselves, uur o' this d d Dutch 
 
 abolitioner ! " 
 
 " But you will do jt, if we are to remain friends I " said the 
 Colonel with that air of (juiet determination, which brooked no 
 resistance. 
 
 Jeffreys gnashed his teeth, and regarded the young man with 
 a look of intense hatred. 
 
 ''Please, Colonel, omit thisl" begged \'ictor, wiio felt 
 exceedingly uncomfortable, in a beseeching tone. •• I wish no 
 apology from ]\h'. Jeffreys." 
 
 '" It nuist be I " the Colonel answered, unmoved by Vict(n''s 
 recpiest and by Jeffreys' rage. " Mr. Jeffreys himself under- 
 
 S 
 
Ill rui'j nh:i;i:us daughter. 
 
 stands, that an insnlt to a gut'st in my honse is an insult to nij 
 lionor, which I cannot permit without dcmandino; reparation." 
 
 " ] shan't do it 1 " roared Jeffreys. 
 
 " You mean then, to carry out your throat? " 
 
 •' Me contract don't bind me to no sich conditions," fumed 
 the overseer. 
 
 ''You forget, JMr. Jeffreys, tliat you, not I, canceled the 
 contract," said Colonel May with emphasis. "• You will either 
 give me the satisfaction which I demand, or the contract be- 
 tween us is at an end. 1 do not permit terms to be dictated 
 to me by my — servant." 
 
 The scarcely perceptible emphasis upon the last word seemed 
 to sting dee])ly. " T^on't forget," roared the overseer in a fit 
 of ])assion in wiiicli he disregarded every consideration of pru- 
 (h'nce and pi-o]>riety, '' 'at the ' sarvant ' is a free American 
 citizen 1 You'll lind out, on 'lection day, what it is to insult 
 a free voter I This country isn't sunk so low, yet, as to 'leet 
 a sneak, 'n' a traitor, 'n' a hy])ocrit I I'll see to it, 'at the 
 people iintls out who 'tis 'at's whinin' fur thar' votes I I'll 
 show 'em the wolf in sheep skin I A mau't pretends to be a 
 Demicrat, 'n' cringes to an outlandish abolitioner I Think o' 
 me, Kuruel May, when 'lection day comes! " 
 
 The Colonel regarded his adversary with ])rou(l contempt. 
 The scornful smile that curled his lips, proclaimed more sting- 
 ingly than the keenest words could have done, how utterly he 
 des[)ised his now openly avowed enemy. '' You wish to show 
 the people a wolf in sheep's clothing, do you? A traitor? A 
 tyrant? A hyimcrite? You will not fail to accomplish your 
 purpose. To be sure, I have never enjoyed the ojjportunity to 
 admire your eloquence, except when you stood, lash in hand, 
 before a trembling slave; but to show the ])eople a low 
 sneaking wolf, whose I'apacity is visible even through his 
 sheepish physiognomy, yon need no other eloquence than your 
 own appearance. l>ut yon will no doubt understand, Mr. 
 Jeffreys, that it is high time for you to begin your patriotic 
 mission. The sooner you begin it," he added, pointing with 
 
A CANDIDATE IN A QUANDAL'Y. 115 
 
 iiiipcM-ious o-cstiirc to tlu' door. •• the li(>t1('r it will \)v for your 
 Itodily \vi'lt';in'.'" 
 
 Leslie riihlu'd iiis IkukIs in liioli <r\vv. \'ielor was clmriued 
 l)y the (lionity and loftiness of the Colonel's bearing", bvit 
 exceedingly a|)|)i-eluMisive of the consequences that he might 
 have lirought down upon himself. Jeffreys had been lashed 
 in.to fury. — less by the cutting words, than by the intense 
 scorn and contempt of the tone and manner in which they had 
 been uttered. He stood with gnashing teeth and clenched list. 
 For a while it seemed as though he meant to rush n])on his 
 eni'my and fell him to the ground : but the Colonel stood linn, 
 not moving a muscle, and the steady look that met the over- 
 seer, out of the Colonel's clear, grey eyes, cowed him. He 
 slowly retreated toward the door. Not until he had gained it 
 did he say a word : but then he raised his list menacingly, and 
 shouted : " Ye'U hear from me on 'lection day I 
 
 When he had gone. Colonel May turned with smiling face to 
 A'ictor and said: •' Did I right, my young friend? "" 
 
 "Indeed you did I "' exclaimed Victor with unfeigned 
 admiration. '' Nothing could surpass the dignity and nobility 
 of yonr bearing. But," he added, as the Hush of admiration 
 passed from his cheeks, " was it politic to challenge his wrath 
 to the utmost ir Have you not made of him an implacable 
 enemy ? ' ' 
 
 " What?" cried the Colonel, in a tone of mock surprise, 
 " do I hear aright? Does my (Tcrman friend inquire, whether 
 I acted prudently? Has your keen sense of rectitude already 
 suffered demoralization in this land of politics? " 
 
 Victor made no answer. But Leslie shook his father's hand, 
 and exclaimed : " You hit the nail squarely on the head this 
 thne. Pal The pronounced enmity of this scoundrel is far 
 less to l)e feared, than his underhanded machinations in the 
 dark, while still in your service." 
 
 " Of course," said the Colonel. " Half-way measures 
 would have accomplished nothing here. Besides, his stay at 
 May Meadows was impossi))le for the further reason, that his 
 
110 THE RE BEL'S 1) AUG H TEH. 
 
 I'uiming after the Octoroon girl would have given rise to 
 scandal and offense. It is clear from your statement of the 
 affair at the grammar class, that he has talked about it to 
 others ; and though he did this simply out of jealousy of our 
 young friend here, I could not permit it to go on. Yes, yes," 
 he continued, with a mischievous smile toward Victor, "you 
 have made him fiercely jealous by your meeting with Lucretia. 
 Quite .without reason," he made haste to add, as Victor, 1)lush- 
 ing deeply, gave him a beseeching look ; "it is only his guilly 
 conscience that has conjured up the preposterous idea." 
 
 " But will not Mr. Jeffreys do everything in his power to 
 defeat you at the election? " asked Victor, to cover his con- 
 fusion. " I fear, that my silly conduct has greatly endangered 
 your success." 
 
 " Have no fear, young man," said the Colonel, with an air 
 of such confident assurance, as tended greatly to relieve Vic- 
 tor's anxiety. " J even expect to make some capital out of 
 the affair. It is fortunate, that in this case the public good 
 is identified with my personal interest. I am much mistaken 
 in the temper of my fellow citizens, if I do not succeed in 
 furthering my own prospects by exposing this villain." 
 
 " You see," Avhispered Leslie, " therein the governor shows 
 his greatness as a politician." 
 
 " I see nothing wrong in it I " Victor replied, cheerfully. 
 
 " But now we must reassure the ladies, who have been 
 driven away by this ruttian," the Colonel remarked. "I 
 apj)rehend that they are anxious to learn the upshot of our 
 doings here. And I must take measures to supply the place 
 of Jeffreys in directing the work of the negroes." 
 
 When Mctor, on his way home, again passed the neighbor- 
 hood of the negro huts, he suddenly saw the Herculean frame 
 of Xerxes before him. He approached meekly, holding in his 
 hand a tattered rag that served him for a hat. 
 
 " Mars' Wallers," the negro addressed him in a low, 
 mysterious whisper, "am it true — is Mars' Jeffreys gone — 
 f ui" good ? " 
 
A CANDIDATE IN A qUxiNDARl'. 117 
 
 Victor assured him tliat Jeffreys would return no nic^re. 
 
 Tlie negro reverently folded his hands, raising his eyes to 
 the sky and spoke, in a voii-e whose solemnity and deep 
 earnestness profoundly impressed Victor: " De Lawd hah 
 heard de pra'er ob his unwutliy sa'vent. (Tlory be to Gawd 
 on high I Amen I " Then he added with a signilicant look at 
 Victor, *• now JMay JMeadows am a ])ai'adise. an' de sarpent's 
 gone." 
 
 While Xerxes was yet speaking, two cither ligures appeared, 
 \'ictor knew not Avhence. Cassandra, led by the Octoroon 
 girl, seized his hand and spoke reverently: " De Lawd hab 
 sent his angel fur our salvation. (Jlory to (^awd fur ebber 
 and el)l)er I " 
 
 When she had dropped his hand, the Octoroon knelt before 
 him, seized the hem of his coat and pressed it to her lips. 
 •' JMiss Nellie has told me," she said in a feverish wdiisper. 
 •• And it was grand and noble. God bless you! And (nrod 
 bless Miss Nellie: (;od bless you both! " 
 
 Before \'ict(jr had fully realized what had taken place, the 
 girl had arisen and disappeared with the others. 
 
VIII. 
 
 BARBECUE AND SPREAD EAGLE. 
 
 W/HE oraininar school class met uext day, as usual; but 
 ^- Kalpli Payton and Orlando Jones knew it no more 
 ^"^ forever. Victor remained at its head to the end. 
 This procured for him tlie I'eputation, wliether rightfully 
 or otherwise has never l)een authoritatively decided — of 
 being the best grammarian in Vernal County, — a distinction 
 of which no one boasted more loudly than Mynheer Van 
 Braakeu. He was really grateful to his apjjrentice for having 
 redeemed liis vaunt of having the smartest boy in the county 
 in his store. His speculation had proved a prolital)le one; 
 for ^'ictor was much talked about, autl when his name was 
 mentioned, the ■• Dutch St(U-e " was mostly alluded to also. 
 Motor, in turn, was grateful to his chief, to whose lil)erality 
 he owed the advantage gained by his connection Avith the 
 grannnar class. He applied himself diligently to his duties at 
 the store, where he likewise made good progress, excejjt in the 
 one particular in which he was so lamentaldy remiss, — the 
 ability to deceive customers as to the quality and value of the 
 goods kept for sale. The involuntary faltering of his voice 
 and the tell-tale blush upon his cheeks, just when bold-faced 
 effrontery or insinuating cajolery was wanted for the l)usiness 
 in hand, rendered all his efforts at improvement in this direc- 
 tion fruitless. Not even the example of his colleague. Bolt 
 Rountree, availed him, although he soon convinced himself 
 that most customers greatly preferred to deal with Bolt, because 
 they were assured that they got their goods from him at less 
 than their cost to the merchant himself, by the simple process 
 of permitting himself to l)e •• beat down "' from a prici- jjlaced 
 ))Ui'posely high at first to admit of this pi'ocess witlioiit loss. 
 
 (118) 
 
BARBECUE AND SPREAD EAGLE. 119 
 
 JJiil soon niter the closiiiti- of tlie chiss ;i coiiiiiiu' event of 
 even liiulier interest to the pnlilic ;it laroc niono|)oli/.e(I the 
 town-talk aniono- the gossips of Brooi^lield. 'I'lie Fourth ot 
 .Inly was approacliinii- 1 And tiie politicians had dftei-inined 
 to make it the oeeasion of a threat festival tor tiie inhaliilants 
 not only of IJrooklield and vicinity, l)ut of ail Vernal C'ountv, 
 whereat the natal day of American Jnde[)endence was to he 
 honored l)y patriotic speeches and the roasting- whole and eat- 
 ing' of oxen. \'ictoi-'s expectation was raised to tlie top notch 
 by the excitement which stirred the Brooklleldeis in respect of 
 the magnillcence of tlie coming demonstration, whicii was to 
 eclipse anything of the kind that had ever heen seen west of 
 the Mississipi)i River. It was to he a feast tit for the gods, 
 not only in a culinary point of view l»ut also as an intellectual 
 treat, steeping back-woods Americans in the ])liss of self-con- 
 scious patriotism. Hob Kountree indulged in i)old prophesies 
 of the grand surprise in store for the friends of his friend, 
 Ralph Payton : regretting, however, that he was not permitted 
 to go into i)articulars. These vague hints Mctor was disposed 
 to attribute to a touch of envy on the part of his young col- 
 league, which had been noticeable, now and- then, particularly 
 since the grammar class had made him a rather prominent sub- 
 ject of gossip. But even the prosaic head-clerk, Mr. Miller, 
 grew- enthusiastic over the prospective event, and ventured the 
 remark, that Victor would see something to cherish in memory 
 for the remainder of his life. 
 
 Leslie had nuich to say about the fun ahead. •• You will 
 get to see a wIk^Ic menagerie of all the species of the (/(-ims 
 //o//;o," he said to Victor, '' who will stand around open- 
 mouthed, eagerly swallowing the i)atriotic clap-trap and worn- 
 out phrases used in tickling the ears of independent American 
 citizens. On the galleries you will l)ehold the fairer half of 
 Vernal County in all the colors of the rainbow, gaudy with o-av 
 ribbons and the latest monstrosities usui'ping the name of bon- 
 nets. Look out for fun I " 
 
 Nellie had conlided to him that she had an invitation from 
 
120 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Ralph Paytou. — •' that liatclul IVllow in the chiss, you 
 know," as slie ackU'd, to Victor's orcat satisfaction, — to 
 accept him as her t'scort to the l)ar))ecue on In(U^i)en(lence 
 Day ; and slie adtU'c], to his even o-reater disgnst, that she knew 
 of no plausible excuse to decline the proffered honor. This 
 last piece of information had an unaccountabh' dei)ressino; 
 effect on A'ictor. It was suliicient to tone down his anticii)ated 
 enjoyment of the jjlorious I^'onrth. 
 
 In the store too, and in the business (.lone there, the exi-ite- 
 ment was apparent. Customers made [)urchases with reference 
 to the festival ; u;ossii)s criticised the merits of the speakers in 
 advance; even the negroes of both sexes whispered and tittered 
 among one another how they meant to enjoy Indi'pendence 
 Day, and resni-rected their hoai'ih'd up (pmrtt'rs and dimes for 
 the accpiisition of fineries :uid gee-gaws to l»e displayed on the 
 festive occasion. 
 
 - Mynheei'A'an lii'aaken, whose absorption by and devotion to 
 the cares of his business i-endere<^l him callous to the sentiment 
 of patriotism, was drawn into the vortex of pul)lic excitement 
 on his own level. When the connnittee appointed to solicit, 
 donations for the celebration called on lum, Victor was api)re- 
 hensive that the chief might refuse to respond and thereby 
 incur the displeasure and invite the criticism of the public. 
 But therein he greatly underrated the business abilities of his 
 chief. For no sooner had he — wary merchant that he Avas — 
 discovered that his rival on the other side of the scpiare had 
 distinguished himself by the donation of *' one whole ox," 
 than he subscribed his name to the list, and set opposite 
 thereto: One sack Java coffee (scarce 'in those days, in Ver- 
 nal County, and dear) ; One barrel sugar; One barrel line rye 
 whisky; live ])oxes Princijje cigars. " Yes, yes," he said, as 
 the connnittee, speechless with astonishment at this unparalleled 
 liberality, received l)ack the paper, " they shall not say that 
 the Dutchman is niggardly. Mr. liaiiies need not brag about 
 his ' wlK)le ox ! ' " 
 
 Such munilicence was witiiout |)recedeiit in \'ernal County. 
 
UAUBECUK AND SPBEAD EAGLE. 121 
 
 Till' two li'ciillciiicii coiiiposiiiu- the (•oiiiiiiittt'c ('X|>r('ssc(l llicir 
 tlitmks ill l»i'li;ill' n\ tlic ariiti'lul ('(»ii)imiiiity and in tlic iiame 
 of tlic "(ioddi'ss of Liberty," liopiiijj' tliilt so si<>ii;il a proof 
 of whole-souled liberality of the generous donor would be duly 
 ap[)reeiated. S(), too. iioped Mynheer \i\\\ IJraakeu ; and the 
 secpiel j)roved that he had reekoned well. For though the 
 IJarnes ])arty hinted at pompous lioasting and a transparent 
 attempt to bias public opinion, yet the citizens l(^oked with 
 great favor on the generous offering, and the party of the 
 Dutcli Store scored several points in their favor. 
 
 lk'f(^re sunrise of the eventful day \'ictor appeared at May 
 ^Meadows ; for he and Leslie had agreed to make the trip to 
 the s[)ot where the festival was to come off, on horsel)ack. 
 Notwithstanding the early hour of the morning, he found everv 
 one on the place uj) and stirring. The negroes were unusually 
 alert, and busily engaged in the various preparations for 
 starting. Leslie had two tine horses under saddle, which 
 stood pawing impatiently in front of the dwelling house. For 
 Nellie, a pretty pony st(Jod ready to be mounted l»y his young 
 mistri'ss. The Colonel issued what orders he deemed neces- 
 sary for the c(Miduct of the darkies at the barl)ecue, and then 
 joined Mrs. May in the traveling carriage, where Lucretia and 
 Cassandra had already been placed, and started for the scene 
 of the day's festivities. 
 
 After the departure of the family carriage the good humor 
 of the negroes seemed, if possible, to increase. They teased 
 each other in merry mood, i)aying but little heed to the pres- 
 ence of the young master in preparing to get away ; while he, 
 on liis part, excited boisterous laughter, by many a rough jest. 
 Some of the negroes were oljliged to travel to the grand rendez- 
 vous on foot. They left in groups of two and three, chatter- 
 ing freely as they went their way. Others made free use of 
 the remaining draught-animals and vehicles of the most varied 
 description, to save the lalior of walking. One whole family 
 foiiiKl accommodation on an ox-cai't : quite a number of voung 
 and old of t)otli sexes climbed upon a hav-wauon. di'awii bv a 
 
122 THE BEBEVS DAUGHTEE. 
 
 yoke' ol' oxen and a snperannuatod nuile. Some, also, ntilized 
 old plongli-liorses to ride, single ov donble, as the temper of 
 the animals ])ermitted, oi' the riders eould agree, to the place 
 of great attraction. 
 
 Victor was interested in and naich anuised by the stirring 
 and pictnresciue scene developing l)efore him. 
 
 Presently Nellie ai)peared. She wore the dress which Victor 
 had selected for her. and he thonght he had never seen her so 
 beantifnl. 
 
 '■How charming yon look in yonr new dress!" he ex- 
 claimed, almost involuntarily, Init witli such I'vident and sin- 
 cere admiration, that the young Uuly blushed with ])leasure. 
 
 •' Why, iNIr. Waldhorst, you have actually i)aid me a com- 
 pliment I " she said, with a gracious smile. "I have never 
 heard you make so gallant a speech before. You have learned 
 that from brother Leslie, I su})pose. J5ut let me caution you 
 not to contract his outrageous habit of flattering young girls. 
 lie is incorrigible in this respect." 
 
 " You shall iKjt say that I am dishonest with you. at least," 
 the brother retorted, while scanning her ligure from head to 
 foot. '■ It is painfully evident to me, that your glass and your 
 maid have l»oth played you false to-day. You look as dowdy- 
 ish as an unkempt owl in daylight." 
 
 ■'You unmannerly slanderer! " pouted Nellie. " Why 
 can't you l_)e as nice to your sister as you are to other young- 
 ladies? " 
 
 ■• because my sister wants me to be honest," sand Leslie, 
 regarding her with a mock-serious mien. 
 
 " Jf you were honest," said ^'ictor warmly, "you would not 
 have found fault with Miss Nellie's toilet. It is not more 
 honest to censure unjustly, than to praise without cause." 
 
 " Now you hear the words of wisdom! " Nellie exclaimed 
 triumphantly, and botli she and Leslie indulged in merry 
 laughter, keenly enjoying Victor's sober earnestness. " Let 
 me advise ifon to learn from Mr. Waldhorst iiow to appreciate 
 your sister's excpiisite taste. And I am sure tiiat "Slv. Payton 
 
BARBECUE AND SPREAD EAGLE. 123 
 
 will a<ii*'i' with him ; Ik- will tell you so to 3'oiir face wIrmi he 
 comes." 
 
 •' Tf']w eoiiu's, you mean ! " teased Leslie. •' You may have 
 to wait a loiiii' time for //////. He has his grand oration to pre- 
 pare tor the barbecue. With his head full of so big a j)roject, 
 it will not be surprising if he forgets the little school-girl he 
 has promised to escort on the way." 
 
 ''• Is it true? " Nellie inquired, showing such evident interest 
 in the subject as caused Victor to wonder. •• Will Mr. Payton 
 sjjcak to-day ? ' ' 
 
 ••Of course I " the l)rother answered. -'He is down as 
 the lirst orator on the program. Immediately after the Decla- 
 ration of Independence, he will see justice done to the sjjread 
 eagle, and demonstrate that without it there could be no liberty, 
 nor equality, nor independence. I'nder such (arcumstances you 
 must excuse him if, until the supreme moment has come, when 
 the eyes of Vernal County literally, and those of the whole 
 unbounded continent iiguratively, hang upon his lips, he shall 
 l)rove a little tacitui'n and distracted, or, what is more likely 
 to happen, if he shall forget all about the existence of the 
 patient young girl so anxiously awaiting his coming." 
 
 The news imparted by Leslie had a strangely depressing- 
 effect on Motor ; but Mr. Payton's appearance at that moment 
 precluded further discussion concerning him. Nellie returned 
 his greeting very graciously, and announced herself ready t(j 
 start. As she stepped toward her pony, Ralph sprang from 
 his horse to assist her to mount. Victor thought he had 
 never seen a more graceful act of gallantry in his life. Ralph, 
 whose powerful frame at this moment seemed to him the 
 embodiment of manly vigor and beauty, seized the bridle of 
 the pony with his left hand, and held out his right, so as to 
 form a convenient purchase for Nelhe's foot, from wdiich. with 
 an agile spring, she leaped into the saddle, thanking him, as 
 she adjusted herself, with a bright smile and gracious nod, for 
 his knightly service. Victor was enchanted by the elegance 
 and grace of the lovely maiden on horsel)ack. When Ralph 
 
124 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 joined licr, slie tunit'd to him a face beaiuiiig in youtlifiil 
 vivacity ; and as Victor Avatched thein cantering away, eno^aged 
 in spirited conversation, he wished in liis lieart to l)e in Pay- 
 ton's ])lace. 
 
 "Well, don't yon think we had better follow them ?" the 
 voice of Leslie broke in u])on him, as he gazed in perfect for- 
 getfnlness after the eqnestrians. '' The snn is rising, and we 
 Avill have a piece of shar]) riding to do, if we mean to be off 
 tlie road ])efore the heat of the day sets in." 
 
 Victor, thus aroused from his reverie, mounted his horse, 
 and the two set out on their journey. 
 
 Their I'oad at lirst traversed the open [)rairie. and the 
 riders urged their horses to a lively pace. They overtook 
 other travelers on foot and in all manner of vehicles. To 
 Victor it seemed as if the i)opulation of all Vernal County had 
 turned out upon a pilgrimage. The charm of novelty-, the 
 refreshing inUuence of the balmy morning breeze, and Leslie's 
 sparkling conversation, turning every occurring incident into 
 a droll joke, soon elevated Victor's s^jirits ; and by the time 
 they had overtaken the other coujjle he heartily enjoyed the 
 drolleries of his friend. 
 
 " Come ! " exclaimed Leslie, spurring his horse into a gallop, 
 as they passed Pay ton and Nellie, the latter listening, as it 
 seemed, to a narration from her escort; " let us not disturl) 
 mighty genius in its bold flight. It is evidently big with a 
 grand idea, and if we interrupt it in its la])or. it might bring 
 forth a frightened little — mcjuse I ' ' 
 
 They dashed past the two in a sweeping gallop, \'ictor to the 
 right, Leslie t(^ the left. If Payton really engaged the atten- 
 tion of his fair companion Avith a rehearsal of the si)eech he 
 intended for the grand occasi(jn, the exercises Avere abruptly 
 closed, for XeUie, as soon as the tAvo horsemen came alongside, 
 touched her pony with the riding Avhip, and in a very fcAv 
 seconds she was riding betAveen her brother and Victor. 
 
 " You Ihink you can leave my pony behind? " she said to 
 \'ictoi'. in :i tone clearlv showing tliat she meant to challenge 
 

 '' You think you can leave my pony behind? " she 
 said to Victor. 
 
BARBECUE AND SPBEAD EAGLE. 125 
 
 him t(» a trial of tiu' speed of tiieir respective horses. ^ '■ If you 
 do, you are mistaken. I eau beat you thi'ce leu<i;ths at least 
 in reacliing' that yrove ahead of us." 
 
 Again the Avhip tell smartly on the pony's hide, and sent 
 him forward at the toj) of his sj)eed. Of course, there was 
 nothino- for Victor to do but accept the challenuv. So he like- 
 wise ur<>ed his horse to his utmost, and for a while maintained 
 his j)lace at her side. But it soon became apparent that it was 
 not the pony's speed that was to decide the victory, but rather 
 the skill of the rider. Xellie dexterously avoided the passen- 
 "•ers and vehicles on the road without in the least interferin<)- 
 with the pony's gait, while Victor, less skilled in the handling 
 of his horse, seriously impeded his speed by awkward at- 
 tempts to turn out, fearing danger to those whom he passed, 
 or to himself, so that Nellie easily came off winner in the race. 
 
 " iSii", your gallantry is getting the better of your honesty I 
 Nellie exclaimed, with uplifted finger and a rej)i'oachful smile. 
 '' You are not just to the horse you are riding." 
 
 '' What do you mean? " queried Victor. 
 
 -'I know that my pony is swift of foot, and that there are 
 not many horses in this part of the country that can show him 
 their heels in a race, particularly when I ride him myself. 
 But Grace Darling, — that is the mare papa had saddled for 
 you — can give him several lengths in a quarter and always 
 beat him. You have lost the race on purpose to please me." 
 
 '" Upon my word, I did not I " said ^'ictor, deeply morti- 
 lied. '' I did my best; but poor Grace Darling was not swift 
 enough to make up for your superior skill in horsemanship. — 
 But what a pretty name — Grace Darling I She must be a 
 great favorite of yours." 
 
 " She is," said Nellie, as they trotted along, without wait- 
 ing for Leslie and Ralph Payton to catch up Avith them. '^ 1 
 selected the name myself. She is papa's favorite saddle-horse. 
 We raised her on the plantation, and papa allowed me to name 
 her. I am proud to know that you approve of the choice I 
 made." 
 
12G THE HE BEL'S DAUGHTEIi. 
 
 Tlie remainder of the road took them through a rather dense 
 piece of wood, and Motor maintained his plaee at Nellie's side, 
 even after tiie otliers had come uj). until they arrived at their 
 destination. 
 
 The i)lace selected for tlie day's enjoyment was a grove of 
 considerable size, quite free from undergrowth, dotted sulfi- 
 ciently with nuvjestic forest trees to afford protection against 
 the sun, without excluding the grateful l)reezes of the hot sum- 
 mer day nor seriously obstructing the outlook. The grassy 
 sward was smooth as a carpet, sloping gently toward the east, 
 where a brook of clear water meandered gracefully along the 
 vale, offering its liquid treasures to the tliirsty and panting 
 animals. For the delectation of the human kind numerous 
 gourds had l)een jirepared as drinking vessels, and hung up 
 near a sj)ring, inviting the nuiltitnde t<^ quencli their thirst 
 with its pure, clear water. 
 
 A murmuring of many voices, sounding in tl>e distance like 
 the buzzing of a swarm of bees, arose from the place. Along 
 the lirook, and all around the spot selected for the day's exer- 
 cises, inclosing it on all sides like a corral, stood the wagons 
 and other vehicles of those who had arrived before them, dis- 
 phiying in motley array the Avealth of the county in vehicles of 
 every imaginable kind, size and construction — everything, in 
 fact, that the county had on wheels. Within the inclosure thus 
 formed there was a scene of lively commotion, — men and 
 women moving to and fro, grown people and children, black 
 and white, all preparing for the coining frolic. And still they 
 kept coming, — whole families on horseback, in wagons and 
 cari'iages, and on foot: well dressed men and women, and men 
 and women in gaudy llnerv : stalwart farmers in suits of liut- 
 ter-nnt jeans, and portly farmer's wives in neat, home-spun 
 linsey-woolsey dresses ; sturdy youths and l)nxom nu\idens. 
 ruddy and rosy mostly, yet among them faces paled and 
 pinched by rcfieated attacks of fever-and-ague. Slaves, too, 
 in all colors and shades, from the honest jet-black of the wool- 
 capped African, to the yellow of tlie nudntto and the counter- 
 
r.AUr.ECUE AND SPllEAD EAGLE. 1^7 
 
 feit pallor of the ([uadroou and octoroon, — some but scantily 
 clad, others decked with kerchiefs, ribbons and feathers of the 
 brightest hues. 
 
 Victor oazed in wonderment at the kaleidoscopic panorama. 
 
 Nellie had joined some girl friends whom she met there, and 
 Ralph Pavtou disappeared as soon as the horses had l)een 
 given in charge of the darkies. Leslie took Victor with him, 
 to show him the preparations for the barbecue. 
 
 •• What is this scaffolding for? " Victor inipiired, pointing 
 to a doul»le row of boards nailed on i)Osts set in the ground, 
 and inclosing a large sc^uare on three of its sides. 
 
 ''That is the gallery for the ladies," Leslie informed him. 
 •■ One should think that here were space enough for the whole 
 po|)ulation of Vernal County ; but not a male soul will lind room 
 when the exercises begin. Pro Ikk^c rice, as the lawyers say, 
 we men will assume an upright standing, and look down upon 
 woman-kind with the proud consciouness of our superiority." 
 
 " And that little house there, hung all round with oak 
 leaves and garlands, and a ladder leading uj) to it. — what 
 does that mean? " 
 
 " Why, that is the platform ! " Leslie explained, with some 
 liveliness of manner. " A literal, dcnvnright platform, made 
 of honest planks from FulUiright's saw-mill. It doesn't look 
 overly strong ; but I dare say that the governor will feel more 
 at home upon it than u[)on the rickety concern which his party 
 has constructed and calls the platform of its candidates. — Up 
 yonder," Leslie continued, " the speakers will hold forth. 
 From thence, the gospel of Liberty is to be proclaimed ; up 
 there our friend Pay ton will cull his laurels, — or put up with 
 oak leaves instead. — By the bye, he confessed to me, after 
 you and Nellie had galloped away from us in that wild goose 
 race, that he had gathered his inspiration for his maiden speech 
 from you." 
 
 " From me! " exclaimed Victor, in great surprise. 
 
 "From you! "Leslie repeated laconically. "But ask no 
 questions; you will soon lind out how." 
 
128 THE HE BE us DAUGHTEli. 
 
 Tliey walked on miuI soon (.'aiiR' to the eating- lahlcs. — tliat 
 is to say, to a long row of un])laned boards i)laeed upon 
 slender stakes stuck in the ground. Here there was great display 
 of activity. Huge baskets were brought forth from' various 
 of the wagons, yielding lil)eral supplies of delph, cutlery and 
 other eating utensils, picturesque in their variety, if not re- 
 niarkal)le for elegance. Not far off there were numerous lires, 
 utilized by cohered cooks for the roasting and cooking of 
 coffee. IJusy darkies ran hither and thither, fetching fuel, and 
 water, and executing other orders of their masters or mis- 
 tresses, to Avhom the superintendence of this department had 
 been conlided. Down by the brook experienced huntsmen 
 were engaged in the i)reparation of the barl)ecue proper, — 
 the roasting of poultry, game, mutton, pork, and ))eef — each 
 animal being carefully cleaned and split in halves left hanging 
 together by the back lione, and in this condition roasted 
 whole, — from tip to tail — '' htirh>'-((-<jiieii«^ " — on live coals. 
 To this end trenches were dug in the ground and lilled. to the 
 depth of a foot or more, with the glowing coals of hickory or 
 pecan wood. Poles were laid across the trenches, and u})on 
 these the meat was spread, as upon a gigantic gridiron. None 
 but experienced campers were intrusted with the responsible 
 oliice of directing the barbecuing process, and greatly im- 
 pressed were they with the dignity of their position. (Travely, 
 like generals marshaling their troops in a charge on the enemy, 
 did they order about the busy darkies : directing a fresh supply 
 of live coals where the lire burned low ; now ordering a piece 
 done to the precise shade of brown desired, to be taken from 
 the lire, or to be turned over, or to ))e replaced 1)V another ; 
 then, after critical inspection, causing hot gravy to be poured 
 over it, and the projier quantity of salt to be api)lied ; keeping, 
 all the while the willing darkies Hying busily from ]ilace to 
 |)lace. 
 
 In order to furnish a sullicieiit supply of live coals, great 
 lires of hickory and pecan wood were kei)t uj) at different 
 places. It was a novel and interesting sight to Victor, to be- 
 
BxiUBECUE AND ^rUEAD EAGLE. \'1[) 
 
 hold tlie briiihtly ^ilowiiiti- (^);ils (illt'd into colossul kettles and. 
 suspi'iuU'd on lon^- poles, cari'ied about l)y powerful negroes 
 from place to place as wanted. And tlien the lono- lines of 
 lieiy ditciies upon whicli tlie hui>e inasst's of meat lay siz- 
 zliuii' and seudiiio- ont an appetizinu' odor, — the u'rave, 
 critical fetitures of the diiinilii'il cooks, — tlie merry <>amhols 
 of the tleliuhted nciiroes. — the picturesque ""roups and couples 
 of chatterinii' and lauiihiuu' humanity, — Victor would not soon 
 foro'et the strikiiiu' and fascinatino- pan(jrama. 
 
 Toward eleven o'clock in the morniuii' a lono--dra\vn, shrill 
 blast on a conch announced the l)eo'inning of the festivities. 
 The crowd poured in from all sides toward the u'alleries, which, 
 as Leslie had foreseen, were monopolized by the female [lortion 
 of the audience. "• Come," said Leslie, taking his friend by 
 the arm, '^ let us pick out a [ilace where we can nuister the 
 lieauties on exhibition here. Jt will lie a h^ng- time before you 
 will again see such an agtrregation of feminine loveliness, and 
 lind so inviting an oppoi'tuiiity of witnessing how sweetly the 
 dear creatures blend envious jealousy and haughty [iride with 
 dove-like meekness and cocpiettish innocence. See, how 
 charmingly patriotism sits u])on the faces of our country 
 daisies I ' ' 
 
 Victor followed without gainsay. They ap[)roached the 
 platform, on which the most i)rominent citizens of the county 
 were now taking seats. C)ne of the foremost of them was 
 Kalph Payton, who climbed up the ladder with an air of 
 conscious superiority. 
 
 *• See," whispered Leslie, " does he not ape a Roman sena- 
 tor to perfection? It needs but the toga now, to make him 
 forget that he is — a silly youngster I " 
 
 Colonel May, too, was among those who ascended the lad- 
 der : likewise, to Mctor's wonderment. Mynheer Van Braaken. 
 (Gratitude for his lil)eral donation had procurt'd for him tliis 
 distinction. Of c(jurse, a like honor was due to Mr. Barnes, 
 as the pioneer merchant of Brookiield. Among the prominent 
 (Mtizens, were, also, ]\rr. Rountree, the father of Bob Kountree, 
 
 y 
 
130 THE llEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 sheriff of the county. '• Yes," said Leslie, as Victor called 
 his attention to the presence of the sheriff, ''and yonder is 
 liol) hinisell' — see liim?^ — talking to our discharged overseer. 
 These two are up to some niiscliief, you may depend upon it ; 
 and let me advise you, Vietor, to be on your guard against 
 that precious eoUeague of yours. Birds of a feather you 
 know." It was very evident that the suV)ject of conversation 
 between them was of absorbing interest to both and the scowl 
 on the overseer's face i)ortended no good. Victor turned to his 
 (U)mpanion, as if for explanation ; but the latter found no time 
 to enlighten him, if, indeed, he possessed the requisite infor- 
 mation ; for just then they Avere l)rought in contact with two 
 young ladies, — the Misses Emily Matlack and Hettie kShan- 
 non — both of Avhom claimed the attention of Leslie, for a few 
 words of friendly chat, at least. While they were yet talking, 
 Mrs. May came toAvard them leading Nellie by the arm. and 
 beckoned her son to her side the moment she saw hhn. 
 
 •' You nuist accompany us," she said to him. " Mr. Pay- 
 ton, Avho Avas to escort Nellie, is wanted on the platform Avhere 
 the speakers are assembling." 
 
 " Ah, yes," said Leslie, offering his arm Avith ready acqui- 
 escence, " the American Eagle needs his sustaining eloquence. 
 I told you," he added AAith a mischievous glance at his sister, 
 '' that your lieau Avould forsake you. But you needn't get 
 jealous; the American P^agle will drop him soon enough, and 
 then you can go and comfort him."' 
 
 Nellie had disengaged herself from her mother's arm. l>ecause 
 they found it impossible to Avalk three abreast in the dense 
 throng, and conlidingly took that of Vietor, Avhereat the young 
 man l>lushed with pleasure. 
 
 The seats, Avhich Leslie skillfully captured for the ladies, 
 eommanded s. luie vicAv over the whole gallery, and were near 
 enough to the platform to enable every word spoken there to 
 be easily heard. The male portion of the audience formed a 
 dense circle on the outside of the gallery, in Avhich Victor and 
 Leslie stood in the iciir of their ladies. It Avas indeed a mot- 
 
liAllBECUE AND Sl'liEAD EAGLE. 131 
 
 ley yet imposing siglit tliat met Victor's gaze, and he listened 
 with but half an ear to Leslie's droll comments on the various 
 people and their doings. 
 
 Another loud blast on the couch, sounded by one of the 
 men on the platform, had the effect of silencing the immense 
 crowd. 
 
 " I move that the Honorable Thomas Shannon be elected 
 president of this grand assemblage of the people I " proclaimed 
 a stentorian voice. " All favoring this motiou say, aye I " 
 
 A thousand voices assented ; whereupon the same voice an- 
 nounced the unanimous election of the Honorable Thomas 
 Shannon, requesting him to step forward and take his seat as 
 president of the meeting. To execute an awkward bow, and 
 comply with the request to take his seat, seemed to exhaust 
 the sphere of the president's duties ; for not a word did the 
 portly old gentleman, thus distinguished, say, and not another 
 thing did Victor see him do after taking his seat. 
 
 " Is this gentleman a })roniinent citizen:' " Victor whispered 
 into Leslie's ear. 
 
 '' You see," said the latter, •' that he is a man of consider- 
 able weight. He is Justice of the Peace of Clear SiJring town- 
 ship, and possesses the merit of being Miss Hettie Shannon's 
 father." 
 
 After the applause, with which the weighty president had 
 been recognized, had subsided, the voice moved the further 
 election of a numlier of vice-presidents, one for each of the 
 thirteen original States, all of whom, as Victor wonderingly 
 ol)served, happened to be present on the platform, and all of 
 them were unanimously elected. As the name of Mynheer 
 Van Braaken was put to the vote. Victor betrayed some un- 
 easiness as to the result. '' Don't be afraid," Leslie whis- 
 pered. " On an occasion of this kind everybody votes aye. 
 To make sure of unanimity, the nays are not taken. The 
 otlicers are all selected lieforehand : the whole program is cut 
 and dried." 
 
 With the election of the thirteen vice-presidents, the organ- 
 
132 THE EEllEL^S DAUGllTElL 
 
 izatiou of the "grand assemblage of people " was complete, 
 and the oftieial celebration ])egan. Reverend Joel Hayden 
 stepped to the front of the platform, and read the Declaration 
 of Inde})endenc'e in a clear, sonorous voice. IJiit few of those 
 present had never read, or heard read, this ever memorable 
 document, by which a nation had announced its right to i)oliti- 
 cal autonomy ; yet every one of them listened with proud self- 
 consciousness and profound attention to the eloquent logic of 
 the words, in which Thomas Jefferson had given expression to 
 a people's demand of their right. Upon Victor the simple, 
 yet convincing language of the alleged founder of the DeuKi- 
 cratic party wrought a powerful effect. Long after the julti- 
 lant applause, which had rewarded the eloquent reader, had 
 died away, the closing words rang in his ears: " And for the 
 support of this declaration, with a (inn reliance upon the protec- 
 tion of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other 
 our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor." 
 
 The appearance of Ralph Payton tit the front of the plat- 
 form, announced as the first of the speakers, aroused him from 
 his revery. The applause, with which the young man was 
 greeted, involuntarily increased Victor's respect forliim. JJut 
 when he saw Nellie wave her handkerchief and regard the 
 young orator with sparkling eyes and an indescribal)ly sweet 
 smile, a keen pang shot through his heart, and he would have 
 given worlds to be in his place, — to stand thus before a con- 
 course of peo])le, reveling in the incense of their applause, 
 and gathering inspiration from the smiles of a lovely maiden. 
 
 Ralph, however, enjoyed his happiness for but a brief 
 moment. As the applause died away, so faded the color from 
 his face. Leslie lient down t() liis sister and whispered into 
 her ear: " We nuist conu' to the rescue of your Demosthenes ; 
 his knees are shaking I "" and without heeding lier reproving 
 '' be ashamed of yourself I " lie started a new roinul of vigor- 
 ous cheering. 
 
 "My fellow-citizens I " came in a faint voice from the lips 
 of the orator. 
 
BAllBEGUE AND SFUKAD EAGLE. 133 
 
 " Louder I Louder 1 " was shouted ou all sides. 
 
 ''Ladies and (4eutlenien I " Kalph continued. His voice 
 still trembled; but the exertion to make himself heard served, 
 in a measure, to break his staoe-frioht. " This is a free 
 country I Yes, my fellow-citizens, it is a free and a great 
 country I It is free, because Americans made it free, and 
 have enriched it with their heart's blood I " 
 
 This announcement was a bold one, and was innuediately 
 rewarded by a round of vociferous cheering. " Good I " whis- 
 pered Leslie, loud enough, however, to be heard by Nellie and 
 A'ictor, '' Heart's blood of free Americans makes excellent 
 manure I 
 
 '• And this is an independent country I " the orator went on. 
 •' An independent country of all the world ! It is independ- 
 ent, liecause the noble American Eagle, the proud American 
 bird, striking his talons in the Alleghany Mountains on the 
 one hand, and grasping the Rockies with the other, dipping 
 his beak here into the Atlantic and thei'e into the Pacific 
 Ocean, and laving his breast in the mighty Huron, while his 
 tail sweeps the boundless plains — ." 
 
 The sketch of the American bird was too magnilicent not 
 to arouse the enthusiasm of the backwoodsmen. A loud and 
 prolonged round of hurrahing and cheering interrupted the 
 speaker before he had placed the wings. Ralph had by this 
 time fairly overcome the nervousness attending his opening- 
 words, and wiped the perspiration from his forehead. Leslie 
 Avas one of the loudest in his demonstrations of ai)proval, and 
 exclaimed: " r4ood ! Now engage the Eagle in a set-to with 
 the British Lion, so as to give him something to do with his 
 wings I " 
 
 " Fellow-citizens! " Ralph spoke on, "• this is an independ- 
 ent country. ])ecause the valiant American Eagle has rescued 
 it from the claws of the IJritish Lion. (Renewed cheering.) 
 And not only from the British Lion, Init also from the Hessian 
 hirelings, who helped him. And we conquered them all. And 
 therefore this is n free :uid independent country." 
 
134: rilE HE BEL'S DAUGHTEU. 
 
 The speaker piui.sed and again drew the luindkercliief over 
 his face, then continued with unction: 
 
 " But, fellow-citizens, ^thc price of liberty is eternal watch- 
 fulness. Therefore let us be watchful against the British Lion, 
 and also against the Hessian hirelings. America belongs to the 
 Americans; therefore let us suffer no Hessians among us! " 
 
 " That is meant for you, ^'i(•tor," said Leslie. '" The milk 
 in the cocoanut is, that he is appealing from the school-master 
 in the class to the prejudice of the masses here asseml)led. 
 He thinks he has got you at a disadvantage here, and that he 
 can get his revenge for your turning liim down. But in that 
 he is mistaken, unless 1 am."" 
 
 Strange to say, the pause which the orator here made, was 
 not lilled up by the applause of the audience. He therefore 
 concluded to bring his big guns to bear: "What says the 
 Father of his Country? "' he asked. " What says Washing- 
 ton, — he that was iirst in war, lirst in peace and first in the 
 hearts of his countrymen? (Enthusiastic cheering.) He says. 
 ' History and experience prove that foreign intluence is one of 
 the most baneful foes of Republican government.' And 
 again, he says, ' Against the insiduous wiles of foreign 
 intluence (I conjure you, fellow-citizens, to believe me) the 
 jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake.' So 
 spoke Washington, the first in war, the iirst in peace, and the 
 lirst in the hearts of his countrymen. (Renewed cheers for 
 Washington.) Therefore, fellow-citizens, like Washington 1 
 say to you, let us suffer no foreigners among us I I make this 
 appeal to you to-day, on the auspicious birthday of American 
 Independence, and on the natal day of American liberty I I 
 say, let us lirmly resolve to stand manfully by America, for 
 American Jndependence ! I^et us thrust forth from us the 
 foreigners, — be they Bi-itishers, or be they Hessians — lest 
 their baneful inlluence rob us of our l)irthi'iglit as Amei'icans ! 
 This is the parting advice given to the American people, by 
 the greatest of men, Washington, that was lirst in war, lirst 
 in ponce, and first in the hearts of his countrymen." 
 
liAHIiKCUl-: AND SPlil'JAD NAGLh'. loO 
 
 Sly Ralph luul couiitcMl on the assistance oi the lalhci-ol his 
 country foi' an clTcctivc peroration to his speech. IJnt Toi- 
 some reason incomprehensible to him, the charm tailed to \v(,ik. 
 Probably the ehxpient quotation had been repeated once too 
 often, so as to wear off the spice of novelty. Even after he 
 had made his bow to the audience, to indicate that he would 
 quote Washiuiiton no more to them on that day, there was but 
 a faint nuirnuir of applause, the lukewarmness of which divw 
 from Leslie the stale reproach of the ino-ratitude of re|)ublics, 
 seeino- that Ralph Payton had oenevously given uj) the lloor to 
 other speakers. 
 
 C)f these there were quite a number. The star-spangled 
 t)anner, the land of the free and the home of the Itrave, and 
 otlier patriotic themes obtained due recognition after the 
 spread eagle. At last, Colonel May was announced as the 
 "Orator of the Day." The simple mention of his name had 
 the effect to stay the demoi-alizing tendency of the audii'iice 
 to scatter. After some pleasant introductory remarks and an 
 anecdote or two, to put his hearers in good humor, he con- 
 tinued : 
 
 "The lirst of the talented speakers who addressed you on 
 this auspicious occasicni, observed, that this is the land of 
 freedom. That was a liappy thought, my friends. — a great, 
 a noble thought I Yes, this is indeed the land of freedom, — 
 the land of free thought, of free speech, of a free press! We 
 are free to worship Almighty (xod according to the dictates of 
 our own conscience, and to act as we think riaiit, so lono- as 
 we infringe not the rights of others. Ilei'e indeed, divine 
 Lil>erty has reared her tiMn|)le, and l)eck()ns to the {)ersecuted 
 and opi)ressed of all nations, holding out to them the promise 
 of their ])irthright, that Godlike quality of man, — freedom, 
 given of (-rod to freemen only I " 
 
 Victor listened with closest attention. It escaped his 
 notice, that Ralph Payton had approached Nellie, and was 
 probably claiming his reward for the morning's brilliant per- 
 formance ; nor did he perceive the gii-Ps curt manner, refusins," 
 
136 THE llEBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 to have Ikt attention diverted from her father's address. 
 Victor's eyes were riveted npon the speaker, his ears closed to 
 everythino- Imt the oM'rpowerino' words issuinu' from those 
 eloquent h'ps. The orutor depicted in glowing' words, yet 
 simple and diieet, the dionity and sacredness of freedom. 
 The conviction Itegan to dawn in ^'i(•tor's mind, that freedom 
 is the one essential attribute of man. 
 
 From this introduction the speaker passed on U) a panegvi'ic 
 on the work accomplished by tiie revolutionary fathers in 
 erecting that magnilicent temple, in which Lil)erty is now 
 enthroned, — the central piUar and keystone of which is the 
 Constitution of {\\v I iiited States. In crisp and pointed words 
 he sketched the fundanuMital principh's of tlie government, as 
 embodied in that instrument : autonomy of domestic interests, 
 unity in national functions and foreign relations. As the 
 State is a unit, though compost'd of individuals possessing 
 inaliena])le rights, so is the Nation a unit, though composed of 
 States which, under that constitution possess rights that ma\- 
 not l)e disregarded. 
 
 "• One dissonant element,'" lie then continued, '■ has tempted 
 internal demagogues and foreign enemies of free government to 
 assail that sacivd instrument : its implied sanction of slavery. 
 As if slavi'ry had beiMi created by that instrument I As if it 
 had not been forced upon the colonies by tiie mercenary policy 
 of the mother country, and was uot a deeply rooted institution 
 with which the framers of the constitution were confronted I 
 As if the glorious boon of freedom could ever have been 
 secured to this blessed land upDU any other condition than the 
 perfect autonomy of the States I 
 
 This part of tlie Colonel's oration impressed \Mctor deeply. 
 It seemed to him, sometimes. — and the hot blood rushed to 
 his face at the tiiought — that the speaker's argument was 
 aimed at him pi-rsonally even as the speaker's eye most often 
 sought out his. 
 
 Elaborating the impossibility of the formation of the Inion 
 witiiout a recognition of the existeuci' of slaverv, and dwelliuii' 
 
f ," ti 
 
BAHBECUE AND SPREAD EAGLE. 137 
 
 upon the (lisaslmus coiisi'ijiu'iici's to tlic cDuft'di'i'iitioii timt must 
 have attended its jihandonnieut, he once more indulged in a 
 o-lowino- eulooy upon tiu' pros[)erity and lil)erty that had been 
 secured thereliy, and then asked: '' Wiiat would have been 
 your choice, iny friends, if you had had the constitution to 
 frame. — a I'nion, such as we have it, leaving- tlu; questi(jn of 
 slavery to l)e decided by the States themselves, with the right 
 to abolisli it. if they deemed it right, or wise, to do so? Or 
 would you have sacriliced the I'nion to the barren assertion of 
 an abstract principle, which would, in all human probability, 
 have resulted in the sulijugation of the States l)y some foreign 
 power, remembering that Inited we Stand, Divided we Fall? "' 
 
 The jubilant applause, in which even Victor joined, left wo 
 doubt as to the views of the audience on this point. Then 
 followed the argument, which Victor had already heard from 
 the Colonel's lips in private c(jnversation, against the party of 
 fanatics and hypocrites who made it their mission to cast the 
 firebrand of insurrection and civil commotion among the people, 
 accusing the slave-holders of the l:)lackest of crimes for simply 
 claiming their inherited rights, guaranteed l)y the laws of God 
 and num. — whiHjranded that sacred constitution as a cove- 
 nant witii hell, and sought to paralyze the power of the South 
 and West by means of iniquitous tariff laws, and making war 
 upon its thne-honored institutions. Ju a scathing diatribe, the 
 speaker depicted the hyi)ocrisy of the Croesuses of the North 
 and P2ast, who grew fat ujuju the Ijlood and marrow of the 
 operatives in their mills and factories, extorting from them the 
 labor of their l)est years for scanty wages, and leaving them iu 
 their old age. with their heli)less wives and children, to starva- 
 tion and misery, while they turned up their sanctimonious 
 eyes in make-believe horror at the sins committed in the South 
 against their black lirctlircn. 
 
 The speecli of the Colonel, whatever may have been its de- 
 merits, created the wildest enthusiasm of his audience. They 
 questioned neither the truth of his statements, nor the logic of 
 his reasoning, but abandoned themselves to the i)ower of liis 
 
138 THE BE BEL'S DAUGllTEB. 
 
 eloquence, which so triunii)hautly demonstrated to them the 
 truth of what they wished to be convinced of. But A'ictor 
 listened as to the annunciation of a new gospel — a revelation 
 of the orandeur of the laud of his adoption. In his exultation 
 lie then and tliere vowed to liiniself to love and cherish this 
 i^lorious land, and to defend and serve it to tlie utmost of his 
 humble ability, lint the sentiment upi)ermost in liis heart was 
 that of admiration and reverence, amounting ahnost to adora- 
 tion, for the man whose words were so grand and eiuiobliug, 
 whose elocinence was so overpowering. 
 
 The Colonel was too experienced a sj)eaker to conclude 
 without a striking climax. Pointing to some of the slaves 
 skipping blithely about the grounds, and beckoning to some 
 of his own servants to approach, he exclaimed: "Look there 
 my fellow-citizens! Oliserve the jolly, shining faces, l)eaming 
 with contentment and good cheer; imagine, alongside of them, 
 the [)inched physiognomies of Northern factory operatives, 
 their scantily fed children, care-worn wives and emaciated old 
 men, and tell me, which class of slaves ajjpeals most to the 
 sympathy of good men? '' 
 
 When the thousand-voiced cheers elicited by this t-ompa- 
 rison had subsided, the Colonel ])egged permission to add a 
 word in defense of himself, and alluded to the slanderous re- 
 ports industriously circulated against him. as he had heard. 
 l)y his enemies. Without mentioning names, he proceeded to 
 narrate trutlifully the occurrences already detailed between 
 Victor, the negroes and the overseer, ^'ictor blushed deeply 
 as he listened ; Nellie regarded him witli smiling face, and 
 Leslie whispered into his ear: " This is the milk in the cocoa- 
 nut! His whole speech was but tlie introduction to this 
 llagellation of that miserable .Jeffreys. Do you believe, now, 
 that the governor understands his Inisiness as a ])olitician? " 
 
 The llippanl words of Leslie gratecl hai'slily on \'ictor's car. 
 How could his own son speak so irreverently of the man whom 
 he himself worshiped in his inmost heart? 
 
 The Colonel closed witli an appeal to those ])resent. all of 
 
BARBECUE AND SI'L'EAD EAGLE. 
 
 131) 
 
 Avliom luid known him long and well, for a just and inipaitiul 
 judgment between him and his tiaducers, and left the phitforni 
 amid the deafening cheers of the applauding nudtitnde. 
 
 This eoneluded the ■• intelleetual part of the program." as 
 Leslie descril)ed it, and a third blast on the eoneh announced 
 the beginning of the more lively exercises at the tables. Tiiat 
 the excited crowd rushed forward to the tables set in the shadv 
 grove in picturestpie confusion, and devoured the tempting 
 viands, prejiared according to the most approved rules of the 
 l»arbecue, with ravenous ai)petites, — that the crowd of 
 human ])eings, so long condemned to silence, now sought to 
 indemnify themselves liy lioisterous chatting and laughter, — 
 that Colonel May was shaken by the hand and congratulated 
 on all sides, goes without saying. 
 
 As Nellie succeeded in getting at him, she threw her arms 
 about him and kissed him in view of all the people. 
 
 Victor regarded him in silent admiration. The Colonel 
 took him by the hand and said, with his winning smile, " Well, 
 my friend, how did you like my speech?" Whereat Victor 
 made no answer in words, but reverently kissed the hand that 
 had been offered him. 
 
 " Some of my arguments were meant for your especial 
 consideration," said the Colonel, and led Mrs. May to the 
 table. 
 
IX. 
 
 POST-PRANDIAL PLOTTING. 
 
 ^^ffl'HE profound imiu'esssion made upon Victor by the speech 
 [[[ of Colonel May unlitted him for the enjoyment of the 
 " scenes which grew livelier and more boisterous as the 
 day wore on. He felt the need of solitude to dig'est and 
 assimilate the mio-hty thoughts that he had heard expounded. 
 In his exalted mood he felt the clamoi'ous applause accorded to 
 the rude jokes of s(^me rural Demosthenes as a jarring dis- 
 cord. His soul was not attuned to the hilarious mood of those 
 around him. Thus it happened that he paid but little heed to 
 the lionizing attentions received by Ralph Payton as the just 
 tril)uti' to his genius; that even lovely Nellie's lavish smiles 
 upon the petted orator, and the complaisance Avith which she 
 permitted him to entertain her, failed to arouse ^'ictor's 
 uneasiness. Nor did it attract his notice that one of the post- 
 prandial orators, when the whiskey donated by his chief was 
 being tapped and distributed to tiie thirsty revelers, gave, as a 
 toast in honor of JNIynheer ^'an Hraaken, the sentiment : " To 
 the liberal Dutch ^Merchant I " and heard but as in a dream, 
 that liis fi'ieiid Li'slic undertook to answer (wlu-n INIynheer 
 failed to respond, except by vigorcMisly nodding his head and 
 winking with his twitching eye). It may as well l)e men- 
 tioned iiere, that, although \'ictor lost the full benelit of his 
 friend's lemarks, Leslie was lavish in his praise of '' the 
 liberal-minded and generous (h)nor,'" and " took this festive 
 occasion '" luilhei'inore. to exjU'ess tht' gratitude of the com- 
 nnmity to this ■• distinguished and highly honorable foreigner " 
 for the impetus given Ijy him to the pr()si)erity and commercial 
 progress of Hrookliejd, and of all the Southwi'stern part of the 
 State. Of course, Victor failed, also, to notice, that Leslie, 
 (14U) 
 
POST-PliAXDIAL PLOTTING. 141 
 
 under guise of extravaguut encomiums upon Kalpli Payton's 
 maiden speech, dealt tliis gentleman some ugly left-handed com- 
 pliments and that ho aroused the adherents of ISrynheer to wild 
 enthusiasm, to whicli the Barnes party could not even make oi)[)<)- 
 sitioii. Nor, of course, did he see how Kalpli Payton changed 
 color when Leslie alluded to his oration, and al)rui)tly de{)arted 
 from Nellie's. presence without so much as taking leave of her, 
 although this demure maiden, barring a sparkle in her eye, 
 seemed imiocence itself. As soon as opportunity offered, 
 \'ictor left the scenes of gayety and sought the solitude of the 
 woods to connnune with his thoughts. 
 
 Ralph Payton, for his part, was not disposed to seek soli- 
 tude. He moved about among the excited crowd until his 
 eyes fell upon a small group engaged in earnest, though low- 
 voiced, conversation, toward which he straightway directed his 
 steps. It was a singular coincidence, that he himself and the 
 rough handling he and his speech had just received at Leslie's 
 hands, constituted the theme of discussion. .But the balm for 
 his wounded self-esteem, if such he was in search of, came in 
 an undesirabU' form ; for Gregory Jeffreys, the foremost of the 
 group he had joined, accosted him with a derisive grin, and 
 said : 
 
 ■' AVell, Ral[)h Payton, be ye sat'stied now, o' the rakin' 
 down ye'r been gittin' from that puppy Leslie ? Sarves ye right 
 'nough. 'Cause I been warnin' ye agin the silly notion o' 
 makin' a speech agin tliese d — d fur'ners. But ye knowed 
 better, an' now ye got it." 
 
 Ralph turned red in the face. " \yhat do you want, Jef- 
 reys?" he retaliated, almost liercely. '"I made that speech 
 with the best intention. I thought that you all wanted these 
 upstart foreigners to be put down a peg oi' two. How can 1 
 help it, that Colonel IMay takes so much stock in then;? Or 
 that his son Leslie seems to find a pleasure in insulting me for 
 their benefit r ' ' 
 
 " That thar' old Dutchman 's leadin' public 'pinion by the 
 nose with 'is braggin' 'bout cheap goods, an' competition, an' 
 
14-> THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEli. 
 
 all that, an' giy'u' away a bar'l o' rot-gut whiskey," Jeffreys 
 retorted. " An' the young gawk 's got in fash'n, 'cause 'e's 
 a d — d little sneak 'at worms into the lik'n' o' silly wiinen- 
 folks. It was a d — d piece of foolishness to 'tack 'em in 
 public, an' give that blatherskit'n' Kurnel May the chance to 
 put it in politics." 
 
 " How else can you assail them? " Ralph broke in. " In 
 this way only, by arousing and turning against them th(^ 
 patriotic indignation of the public, can you safely get at them." 
 
 " Payton is right," said Orlando Jones, another of the 
 disputants. " We must show up the danger these foreigners 
 bring to our country. I hate them like poison." 
 
 " And no wonder," the last of the trio chimed in, who was 
 no other than Bo)) Rountree, Victor's colleague in the Dutch 
 Store. '' It was a perfect shame, the way old \m\ treated 
 your father, without cause or provocation." 
 
 " Hold your tongue, youngster, until your o[)ini(Mi is 
 wanted," exclaimed Orlando, highly incensed by the allusion 
 to the practical joke played on old Jones by the peddler. 
 
 " And Victor is insufferably proud and conceited," Bob 
 continued, emphasizing his words by a vigorous shake of the 
 head. ''And it will be doing him a real service to let him 
 know his proper place among white folks. That is Mr. 
 Jeffreys' opinion, and it is mine." 
 
 " Sart'nly," Jeffreys assented. " What 'ud the outlandish 
 gawk ])e 'thout the partiality o' the Kurnel 'n' 'is kith 'n' kin? 
 An' how kin you, Raljjh Payton, stomach the 'ristocratic airs 
 o' that conceited i)up 'at gave ye sich a kickin' t'other day at 
 the grammar scliool, an' now agin here, to-day? An' the 
 little hussey 'at carries her head so high 's no better — " 
 
 "Not a word al)out the lady I " Ralph exclaimed with em- 
 pliasis. " I sliare your antipathy against the Dutchman, and 
 grant you that Leslie has treated me shamefully. But all that 
 is no reason for mixing up Miss May in the matter. 1 will 
 not suffer it, as I want you, once for all, to understand." 
 
 "More tool vou I " sneered Jeffreys. "She's lead'n' ve 
 
I'OST-l'UANDlAL I'LOITING. 143 
 
 b_v the nose. She tliiiiks a heap more o' that outlandish 
 greenhorn 'n she docs o" yon, 'n' yon an honest 'nierican. 
 I'd just like to know, how the ngly scarecrow turns the heads 
 o' the silly winien-folks ; lir 'e's cock in the roost with the 
 missis an" the maid." That 'ere Octoroon gal 's crazy 's a 
 loon after 'im." 
 
 '' Come, now, Jeffreys," said Orlando Jones, '• 'taint as bad 
 as that, is it? " 
 
 " Oh, they say that the overseer is sort of jealous of that 
 Octoroon girl and my partner, the 3'oung Dutchman," said 
 Bob Rountree, with a teasing smile that exasperated Jeffreys. 
 
 " Is that the reason why he hates the young foreigner so 
 cordially? " Ralph Payton asked. '' Xo wonder, then, that 
 he owes him no good will. I am with him there. But," he 
 added, turning to Jeffreys, '• I don't want Miss ]May, or any 
 of her family, disturbed. Mind that." 
 
 " Young man," the overseer exclaimed in great irritation, 
 " I've been deadly insulted 1 Both on 'em insulted me, — that 
 d — d Hessian, an' ek'ly that slick-tongued Kuruel. An' 
 I'm not a dog, to lick the hand 'at's dealt me a blow. If 
 sich is j^ore sentiment, we won't hitch hosses. I'm in fur 
 payin' back an insult with int'rest. My 'pinion is 'at Kurnel 
 May 's got to be ])ut down I We kin do it easy, by provin' 
 in a court o' law what a dirty comp'uy 'e keeps, an' showin' 
 np 'is dirty doin's, 'at give the lie to 'is speeches an' palaver 
 in public. Let's show 'im uj) fur the white-livered abolitioner 
 'at 'e is, protectin' that 'are d — d Dutch upstart, an' sid'n' 
 with niggers agin white folks. Ye needn't bring charges 
 ag'n' the Kurnel at all, lest ye'r amind to. It'll all come out 
 loud 'nongh, if ye on'y git that d — d young fur'ner in 
 court." 
 
 •'Them's my sentiments to a Tl " Orlando Jones pro- 
 claimed. " He assailed me from behind, like a coward and 
 an assassin ; he insulted me before the whole class. That is 
 against the law, and he must be punished. We have laws in 
 this country-, and we should appeal to them to get justice." 
 
144 THE REBEL'S DAlJGllTEU. 
 
 " Nonsense I '" excltiinied Kalph Paytou. ''You bring an 
 action aoainst liini for assault and battery, and if you convict 
 liini, lie will ))e sentenced to pay a line of one dollar, niayl)e : 
 and like as not, somebody else will pay that for him. No. 
 sirree! That's not ///// opinion.'" 
 
 " Nor yet mine I " Jeffreys announced, assuming an air of 
 special im[)ortance. " If you bring the action, Orlando .Jones, 
 ye'll have the costs to pay, like 'nough, into the bargain. 
 'Cause I hear'n say ye made the fust assault yerself, an' they 
 might prove it on ye. But thar's a law ag'in' sociatin' with 
 niggers, au' stirrin' up niggers to sedition an' revolt. An' 
 'e must l)e indicted by the grand jury, whar' there'll be no 
 risk for the informer; an' it's felony, an" it'll be penitentiary 
 if they fetch 'im in guilty." 
 
 "Yes I And if they don't, there is Judge Lynch to ride 
 him on a rail, with a coat of tar and feathers on ! " suggested 
 Bob Kountree, rubbing his hands in high glee. 
 
 "•At least, which would be better, he would ))e banished 
 from the country," said Ralph Pay ton. 
 
 •• Then we are agreed to this? " Jeffreys inquired. " If we 
 are, let us consider, how we'll git 'im indicted. Fur if 'e's 
 got friends on the grand Jury they'll never indict 'im." 
 
 "How so?" asked Kali)li Paytou. "Are they not sworn 
 to lind according to law, without fear, favor or affection? You 
 must have proof and they must find according to the evidence," 
 
 •• Of course! " Jeffreys explained to the others, contracting 
 one of his eyebrows so as to indicate his superior crafti- 
 ness. " We know all 'l)out the impartiality o' grand juries. 
 But the case is this: If 'e has friends on the grand jury, 
 they'll not lind the evidence sutlicient an' ther'll be no 
 indictment." 
 
 " But if the grand jurors are his enemies, — leastwise not 
 his friends — • then justice will get her own I " Bob Rountree 
 remarked excitedly. " My daddy is sheriff, and I am his 
 son ! ' ' 
 
 " Now, if Jones, Orlando's old man. 'ud be on the jury," 
 
POST-l'UANDIAL PLOTTING. 115 
 
 Ji'l'fl'cys hinted, willi :i sly uliiiicc :il Uoli. •• "I'M see ':il the 
 hiws ()" the l;iii(l "ud Ix- ohi'ved. There'd lie no t rnit "rous 
 s_viii|):ithiziir with I'lir'n spies tn cloud'n 'is Judo'ineiit. iiiirto 
 liiiuler' 'iiu I'roiii doin" 'is (Utoty." 
 
 '• He woiihl iXMiieiiiher foreiii'ii peddk'is and hate Diilcli in- 
 terl()i)ers," put in IJolf Koiintree. onee moiv i'iil)hino- his hands 
 in excited luuuor. 
 
 " F<ireio:n iuUiience is one of the most banelul toes of re- 
 puMiean uovermnent I " quoted Kalpli Payton from his speech. 
 
 " And I think ]\[r. Jeffreys ought to be on the grand jury," 
 said Orhindo .Jones. '^ He knows more al)()ut tlie evidence 
 than anybody else, and owes a duty to the community." 
 
 " Mebbe ye're riglit," the overseer generously admitted. 
 
 " And Mr. Barnes I " added liol) ; " and all of Mr. Barnes' 
 friends. There are enough of true men left in this country 
 who are not afraid to do their duty against these upstart for- 
 eigners. And my daddy slian't know a thing about the whole 
 matter. ' ' 
 
 " Bob's a smart young man, now, ain't 'e? " said Jeffreys, 
 patting the apprentice on the shouhler witii a patronizing 
 smile. •' It mightn't bi- nice to see tlie old man an' the 
 Kurnel at loggerheads, as miglit liap[)en if anything leaked 
 out. An' it 'ud be foolish to let the enemy look into our 
 liands. An' that reminds me." he added, casting a searching 
 glance at the surroundings, •• that we musn't stand vert' 
 whispering any more. I seen that 'ere Leslie's eyes on us onc't 
 or twic't. an' 'e's the veiy devil to put this an' that together." 
 
 '' All right." said the a[)prentice. exchanging a look of 
 tacit understanding with Jeffreys. ^' I've got mv cue. 
 Neither my boss, the Dutchman, nor my daddy, are to smell 
 a rat. But if the next grand jury should indict my dear 
 friend We for high treason, — you know wIks's sheriff, and 
 who's his son." 
 
 '• I guess we'd better scatter easy, like, so's not to draw 
 attention," said Jeffreys; and Orlando Jones, acting upon the 
 suggestion, moved away. 
 
 10 
 
He TllE li'E BEL'S DAUGllTEU. 
 
 " And I shall devote myself to the pleasure of the fair sex,'* 
 said Bob Rountree. " Some of them have, no doid)t, sadly 
 missed me." 
 
 And the group dispersed. '' For all the woild," thought 
 Paytou, not without a touch of misoiving, " like a l)and of 
 conspirators." 
 
 The promising young apprentice was in a highly exhilarated 
 UK^od. The fair Emily Matlack was pleasantly surprised by 
 his animated (tonversatiou, and the self-possessed smile that 
 illumined his face. She was ready to make the most of his 
 amiable attentions, notwithstanding — or perhaps because of — 
 the slight Avhich she fancier} to have received from Leslie May. 
 She was determined to prove to that young gentleman, that she 
 could amuse herself quite agreeably without his compan}- , and 
 that there was no lack of admirers who sought her favor. He 
 should be made to understand, that it was a matter of supreme 
 indifference to her, whether he bestowed his favors here or 
 elsewhere. In this spirit of laudable independence, she 
 entered enthusiastically into the vivacious mood of her newly 
 captured admirer. She found his attempts at witticism irre- 
 sistibly funny, and rewarded his most trivial remarks with 
 gracious smiles and appreciative laughter. This hitherto 
 unexperienced success fired the young man to renewed exer- 
 tions and ever l)older attempts to excite his fair companion's 
 risibility, so that the merry young couple were thoroughly 
 successful in attracting public attention. 
 
 But notwithstanding all this, Miss Emily seemed not alto- 
 gether happy. A closer observer than Bob Rountree was at 
 this moment, Avould have suspected the searching glances cast 
 by the young maiden in every direction. But Bob saw in the 
 excessive hilarity of his companion only the effect of his per- 
 sonal amiability, and it escaped his notice entirely that some- 
 times a shadow of keen disapj^ointment passed over her face, 
 when Ttter wandering glances failed, evidently, to reveal the 
 object of their diligent search. It was somewhat of a surprise 
 to the voung man therefore, to hear her suddenlv exclaim '• I 
 
I'OST-I'llANDlAL PLOTTING. 117 
 
 thoiiohl so! " just when he was o-ivino- her llic ln'iu'lit ol' a 
 lively (leseriptiou of some startling adventure. 
 
 'I'lie inniiediate cause ol' this exclamation was the discovery, 
 on the part of Miss Emily, of Leslie, whom her sharp optics 
 descried, in a distant part of the gTounds, leisurely escortinu- 
 her intimate friend Ilettie Shannon toward the adjacent wood. 
 IJolt, looking up into his fair companion's face, followed the 
 direction of her intent gaze ; hut he saw neither Leslie nor the 
 young lady he was escorting: his eyes, instead, fell on a group 
 on the furthermost limits of the grounds, composed of Colonel 
 May, his wife and daughter, and Ralph Payton. Naturally 
 enough, he attributed her exclamation to her discovery of this 
 group and more particularly to the fact of her noticing the 
 attention paid to Miss Nellie by Kalph Payton. 'Now Bol) 
 possessed considerable acuteness of intellect, and a lively 
 imagination. He at once concluded that Miss Emily was an 
 imi)lacable opponent of Victor Waldhorst, having heard from 
 young Jones that it was she who had divulged the piquant 
 anecdote of the scarecrow ; and that she was agreeably sur- 
 [)rise(l to notice that Ralph Payton still enjoyed Miss Nellie's 
 good will, notwithstanding what had passed between them 
 in the grammar class, giving expression to her delight by the 
 remark he had heard. His surmises in this direction were 
 confirmed by the very evident haste with which the young 
 lady pressed forward in the direction of tiie group men- 
 tioned. 
 
 " I am quite sure," said he, with the laudable desire to say 
 something pleasant to his fair young friend, " that my poor 
 colleague has nothing to hope for in that quai'ter. Ralph 
 Payton has cut him clean out there." 
 
 "Ralph Payton?" the young lady inquired iiuiocently. 
 without, however, looking at her escort. " Where? " 
 
 '' Why, there, where we are going; with Miss Nellie May," 
 said Bob, wondering at Miss Matlack's obtuseness. 
 
 " Ah, with Nellie May I " replied Emily rather absently. 
 " Oh, ves 1 Why there she is sure enough. Let us not dis- 
 
148 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 turl) tlR'in. NN'ouldn't you like to tiike a wjilk with me in the 
 cool shade of the wood? It is very warm to-day." 
 
 Bol), of course, gladly asseuted. He was tleliiilited with 
 the evident progress he was making in the young lady's favor, 
 and stepped along so ])roudly l)y her side, that he failed to 
 perceive her preoccupation, and the intentness with which she 
 peered into tiie wood, which tliey were now rapidly approach- 
 ing, lie made up for her taciturnity by eagerly pursuing the 
 topic of conversation, — Ralph and Mctor — a theme whicii 
 aroused his deepest interest, and upon which he had marvelous 
 things to say. It was a pity, therefore, that his comi)auion 
 listened with but half an ear, else she might have learned that 
 Bob Rountree was a warm admirer of Ralph Payton, but had 
 little love for Victor Waldhorst. 
 
 In the cool and quiet solitude which they had now reached, 
 iier sharp eyes soon discovered, visible between the foliage of 
 the shrubs and bushes, the bright straw-colored dress of her 
 friend Hettie. " I thought so! " was the ejaculation that for 
 a second time almost escaped her, but which on this occasion 
 she succeeded in suj)pressing. Slowly the two walked on, the 
 diret^tion cliosen l)y lu'r enabling her to keep in sight the 
 straw-colored caru-o dress, by the side of which the blue-jeans 
 coat worn by Leslie May became visible. Bob's animated 
 conversation must have reached the ears of those ahead, for 
 the bine-jeans coat, as well as the yellow calico dress, came to 
 a sudden standstill. Elmily took her [)artner a step or two 
 farther, and then, declaring that she was too tired to proceed 
 on the walk, proposed to rest a while. 
 
 Meanwhile Leslie May, having reached this j)art of the wood 
 in his i)romenade with the charming Hettie Shannon, was not 
 a little surprised to hear the voice of the merchant's apprentice 
 in lively conversation with Emily Matlack. Hettie, turning- 
 round, beheld in Boll's companion her friend Emily, and put 
 her linger to her lips, thns signaling Leslie to remain silent. 
 Tlie latter raised his forelinger in mock remonstrance, and 
 whispered a few words into lier ear which made her ))lush ; l»ut 
 
roSr-PHANDIAL rLOTTING. 149 
 
 both iviikuiumI pc'i'fi'ctly sili'Ul. IJol) luid i>;ill;iiil l\' ^jircml liis 
 silk li;iii(lki'icliicl' on tlic iiroiiiKl ior Miss Kiiiily ((j sil on. 
 while Ir" hiiiisi'lf took :i ivcuinl)t'ut position l)y lu'i' sidr. con- 
 tiiining to entertain her with praiseworthy /.eal. 
 
 Leslie ^Nlay. wlio iiad remained silent, at first in delcMvuce to 
 his lady's whim, soon listened with keen interest on his own 
 aeeount to Bob's lively talk, and in tnrn sionaled his compan- 
 ion to keep silenee wlu'n he saw lier start to approach the otlier 
 couple. So communicative had liob become toward his fair 
 listener, that he was presayino- all sorts of dark things for 
 Victor, among them the |)ossibility of a trial for a great crime, 
 and so many hints of trouble for the Dutch Store, that it was 
 not difficult for Leslie to guess what was going on. He did 
 not dream, however, of Jiolt Kountree's own jjart in the pro- 
 gram, but imagined the whole plan an electioneering trick 
 against his father. The importance of the interests at stake 
 seemed to him to justify the part he was acting as eavesdrop- 
 per. Besides, he had entered on the rolo originally only to 
 please a charming young lady, whose curiosity had gotten the 
 better of her discretion. 
 
 But the attention of both was claimed in a new direction bv 
 sounds as of one approaching. There was rustling of the 
 leaves of the hazel bushes close by. and presently a hand 
 became visible in the act of separating them to make room for 
 the head that followed, and which Leslie recognized as that of 
 young Victor. 
 
 " Xow seel " he exclaimed, as unconcernedly as if the two 
 liad met alone in the wood. '• Luihih in F((liiiUi ! " 
 
 ^liss Emily had also heard the approach of the footsteps, 
 but paid no attention to them. Not so Bob Rountree. He 
 was too busily engaged talking to his lady to notice the slight 
 noise. Leslie's remark, therefore, startled him. He quicklv 
 jumped up. and was disagreeably surprised to see Victor, as 
 well as Leslie with his companion. The young lady also rose, 
 but more leisurely, and lioth a])proached the others. Bob with 
 a guilty look, but Emily as serenely and Avith a smile of such 
 
150 THE BEBEV8 DAUGHTEB. 
 
 glad surprise, as if she had just tlien beconu' aware of the 
 l)resence of Leslie and her dear friend Hettie. 
 
 " Where on earth have you been all the afternoon? " asked 
 Leslie of Victor. " One would almost suppose that you are 
 afraid of the sovereigns on this birtliday of Iheir national 
 independence." 
 
 "Don't pretend! " said Miss Emily, with a sweet, though 
 somewhat ironically intended smile. " I hope Mr. Waldhorst 
 has as good a right to liide himself in the solitude of the 
 woods as — certain other people I " These last words were 
 accompanied by a look of superb contempt at Miss Hettie 
 Shannon. 
 
 " Oh, certainly I " the latter retorted, returning the sneer of 
 her virtuous friend with an angry flash of her eyes, "• cer- 
 tainly I Just as good a right, at least, as a certain young lady 
 has to appoint a meeting with her ardent admirer in the forest, 
 and — to wallow in the grass with him. all alone in the 
 wood I 
 
 '■'■ Honi .soit 'jid /lull !i piniae!^' exclaimed Leslie, stepping 
 between the angry maidens. " Nobody to blame ! 1 declare 
 to you upon my honor, Miss Matlack, that it Avas only at my 
 urgent request, that Miss Shannon accompanied me on a voyage 
 of discovery after my missing friend Victor. That our way 
 led into the woods, was certainly not her fault. But you. 
 ]\liss Shannon," he continued, tui'ning to his lady, •• are in 
 danger of doing great injustice to your amiable friend, if you 
 deem her capable of braving the dangers of the forest, even 
 under the protection of the redoubtable Mr. Eountree. if she 
 had not knoAvn that she would find you here also." 
 
 The ladies listened, not altogether sure of Leslie's sincerity. 
 But this young gentleman, evidently sincere enough in his 
 endeavors to reconcile the belligerent beauties, took one hand 
 of each and laid it in that of the other. " I see," he said 
 with a winning smile, " how greatly pleased you both are to 
 meet each other here. Now give vent to your joy, pour out 
 vour hearts lo each other, and afford ns ])oor youngsters the 
 
rOSTPRAXDIAL rLOTTIXG. lol 
 
 happiness of witnossiuij; the sisterly coiicord of so iiiiich 
 feminine loveliness and l)eaut_v 1 
 
 What remained for tlie pooi- o-irls to do, l)iit to (dasp ciu'li 
 other's liands, and make at least an outward show ol that 
 cordiality for which Leslie commended them ? Suspecting, in 
 their secret hearts, that the saucy young- man was, in some 
 way, fooling, or at least teasing, them, yet neither had the 
 courage to resist his coaxing request, and both did us he hade 
 t hem . 
 
 Leslie himself then turned to ^'ictor. who stood there as 
 perplexed and ignorant of the meaning of what was going on 
 as was Bob Rountree, and whispered into his ear: " You must 
 help me out of this scrape. Take that smiling Miss Hettie off 
 my hands, or I shall incur the deadly enmity of the amiable 
 Miss Emily." 
 
 "Of Miss P^mily? " Victor asked, in surprise. "Why, 
 she is friendliness itself. She fairly worships you." 
 
 " That's just why," Leslie whispered energetically. "If 
 you don't help me, the lovely- maidens will scratch out each 
 other's beautiful eyes. I must take Miss E^mily back to the 
 grounds, or there will be a hair-bristling catastrophe." 
 
 '* But Miss P^mily has an escort," Victor protested. " Did 
 she not come wdth Mr. Rountree'::' " 
 
 " Never mind that youngster; I'll get rid of him easily 
 enough," urged Leslie. " But I must have Hettie (jff my 
 hands too, or I can't make up with Emily. And if I poke 
 her off on Bob, she'll get her back up and the trouble will be 
 equally great in the other quarter." 
 
 Victor was about to object that he foresaw the same conse- 
 quence in the case of Miss Shannon, if she were '■ poked off " 
 on hiin, but Leslie had already left him. and was coaxing 
 Bob Rountree " as a great favor" to himself, to hurry off 
 and inform Mr. and Mrs. May and his sister Nellie, that it 
 was high time to prepare for the return home, and that he, 
 Leslie, would be with them in a very few moments. 
 
 The young mtvn was, as he had expected, willing enough to 
 
152 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 ()l)lig'c Leslie, :ni(l iiliidly embrueed tlu- (ipportuiiity to oet well 
 out of the coiiii):iiiy in wliicli. since ^M(•tol■ had Joine(l them, lie 
 felt ill Mt ensc. 
 
 '' Now. wln'ii 1 \v:ili\ up with the two jj'irls," Leslie, return- 
 iu<i', whispered in N'ictor's ear, '' you sidle uj) to llettie, and 
 tell her somethinii- llatterino'. If it o'oes auainst your grain to 
 rail her a heauty, or any sueh nice thing, say something com- 
 plimentary of her father; that will do aliuost as well. Then 
 \-ou walk on ahead witii her, or stay beiiind, whichever comes 
 most natural. Slii'Ml not let go of you after that." 
 
 'I'he voinig ladies graciously accepted his kindly offer to 
 escort them hack to the grounds, and \'ictor, mindful of 
 Leslie's ri'tpiest, walked Ity Ilettie's side, and ventured a few 
 l)ashful remarks. Uul Ilettie's answers were so natural and 
 amiable, that \'ictor began to hope that he might coin the c(jni- 
 pliment which was expected of him, for the young lady her- 
 self. \n pondering what to say, he happened to remember the 
 imposing ligure and dignilied bearing of the gray-haired old 
 man, who had ])resided over the great assemblage in the morn- 
 ing, and completely won the heart of the filial daughter by the 
 vivid descri[)tion of the impression made on him, so that fur- 
 ther compliment became unnecessary. llettie, attaching her- 
 self to Victor, and turning toward him with an eager face, the 
 better to listeu to his remarks, loitered in her steps, so that the 
 two couples Avere far enough apart to be out of ear-shot of 
 private conversation. Thus it came about, that what Leslie 
 said to conciliate the irritated Emily, remained a secret be- 
 tween them. Hut it must have been perfectly satisfactory to 
 the fair one, for ^"ictor noticed that she took his arm in a very 
 cordial manner, and that the two chatted with each other, in 
 livelv, but i)erfectly harmonious style. The example thus 
 o-iveu was readily followed by Mctor, who thought it a |)art of 
 the role he had assumed to offer his arm to his fair partner ; 
 and when Hettie conlidingly put her plump little hand uj)on it, 
 he magnanimously forgave his friend for •' poking off " this 
 lovclv li'irl upon him. 
 
PO.sr.PLWNDIAL PLOTTIXG. 153 
 
 In tliis \v;iy tlu'V successively renclied llie ui'duikIs. Leslie 
 led his cimr<>(' str:iiuiit\v;iv to her |i:ii('iils ; liiit \' ictor wiis SO 
 pleasantly entertained by his c(iin|)ani(in. tiiat he lortjot all 
 about i>;<)in<»- houie. Nor did he [nkv note of tlu' circumstance 
 that, wliile many of the participants iind already taken their 
 departure home, those that remaincMl were so c()ns])icuously 
 hilarious, as to point unmistakalily to the freely donated 
 whiskey of ^Mynheer as the source of their inspiration. 
 
 ])Ut presently the silvery voici' of Nellie broke in upon the 
 pleasant chat Itetween \'ictor and Miss Shannon. After a 
 friendly word to the latter, she turned to Victor, and said, 
 shakino- hei- uplifted linuer at him. in a serio-comic, chiding- 
 voice: "• 1 am afraid, Mr. Waldhorst. that niy brother has 
 already corrupted your exemplary manners. Jf any one had 
 told me. I would not have believed, what I now see with my 
 own eyes ; that you dared walk arm in arm with a young ladv, 
 in broad daylight, at a public festival I And to })ass l»y 
 your most intimate friends without even a nod of recog- 
 nition ! 
 
 Victor, with a vivid l)lush of conscious guilt, cowardly 
 dropped the arm of the young lady he was escorting, and 
 lowered his eyes before the mischievous smile of the wayward 
 c'hild. " You forget," he stannnered in great enil)arrassment, 
 •• that you yourself have done me the honor, to-day — " 
 
 '• Oh, that was a mere make-shift," Nellie interrupted him. 
 " I c-ould not squeeze through that crowd without an escort, 
 could 1? But it seems to me, that you and Hettie came from 
 a place where there was no crowd at all. Come, confess, sir, 
 that l)rother Leslie has had you in training! " 
 
 There is no certainty as to what \Mctor would have con- 
 fessed, because just at that moment Ralph Payton came along 
 and interru]>ted the conversation. For once the appearance of 
 this young gentleman was welcome to Victor. He announced, 
 that the pony had been saddled, and that every thing was 
 ready for tlu' homewai'd ride. As Nellie turned toward IJalph 
 Payton to accom])any him back, siie gave \'ictoi' a parting 
 
154 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 injunction. '' I chartre you," she said, in playful banter, " to 
 follow soon, else (xrace Darling will tax the skill of her rider 
 severely, if you want to catch up with us before reaching May 
 Meadows. You have seen how swift of foot my ])ony is, and I 
 surmise," — this Avith an arch look at Ralph — "that Mr. 
 Payton's bosom has been relieved of an immense Aveight since 
 morning, so that his horse, too, will travel smartly." 
 
 She left Victor standing abashed, as she departed with her 
 cavalier, gazing after her Avith the vague longing Avhich he had 
 felt on seeing those tAvo dei)art from May Meadows in the 
 morning. 
 
 Suddenly he l)ethought himself of the young lady Avhose arm 
 he had so ignomiuiously forsaken, and turned Avith the inten- 
 tion of thanking her for the pleasure she had conferred upon 
 him. But she was nowhere to be seen. He looked around in 
 peri)lexitv, and as he failed to discover the least trace of 
 her, he concluded that the young ladv had joined her folks, 
 and, extremely anxious to obey Nellie's parting injunction to 
 be on the road as soon as i)Ossible, hurried on to lind Leslie. 
 From one of the blacks he learned that Leslie had just been 
 seen Avith a lady in a straAV-colored dress. -'In a straAv- 
 colored dress!" mused Victor. " Why, that must l)e Miss 
 Shannon. Where on earth did he meet her, and what can he 
 want of her noAv ? " Shaking his head OA'er the incalculaljle 
 moods of his friend, he quickly traversed the grounds. 
 
 The turmoil increased, although great numbers were con- 
 stantly leaving for home. Many of those Avhom he encov;ntered 
 Avere evidently intoxicated. He felt ill at ease : and as he saw 
 nothing of Leslie, he considered the propriety of ordering his 
 horse and starting off alone. It Avould not be difficult, he rea- 
 soned, to OA'ertake Nellie and Payton ; perhaps it inight i)lease 
 the little lady to have two escorts in place of one. 
 
 But before he could carry out his intention, some one seized 
 his arm, and he felt wonderfully relieved to recognize his 
 friend Leslie. 
 
 >' Comi', my boy." said llic latter in liis cheery voice, " it is 
 
rOST-riiANDIAL PLOTTING. 155 
 
 not safe to remain here mnch longer. Unless I am much mis- 
 taken, there will Ije striking- illustrations before long, of the 
 manly independence of the sovereigns. The Avhiskey of old Van 
 Braaken is getting in its work." 
 
 " Where have you been? " said Victor, taking Leslie's arm 
 and keeping pace with hiin on the way to where the horses 
 awaited them. " I have looked for you everywhere — " 
 
 " And found me nowhere, certainly," said Leslie, in l)anter- 
 ing tone. '* Now, are you not a pretty specimen of a cavalier, 
 to stand there and permit the lady intrusted to your care to 
 be whisked from your side, without your ever knowing it? " 
 
 ' ' Did you — ' ' 
 
 ' ' Of course ; I took Hettie to the bosom of her anxious 
 family, for I saw that you would never succeed in accom- 
 plishing that task yourself. Besides, we had a little account 
 to settle between ourselves that required no witnesses." 
 
 '' What do you mean? " asked Victor innocently. 
 
 " Why, she owed me a fee for having made me the partici- 
 l)ant of a great secret — . But there I I almost forgot that I 
 must spare your sensitive ear. You might deem the reward I 
 claimed almost as immoral as the conspiracy I traced by the 
 aid of the fair one." 
 
 "' Your words are all riddles to me I " said Victor. 
 
 "You will solve them when the time comes." Leslie 
 answered. "But now tell me, what do you think of a back- 
 woods barbecue? " 
 
 Victor complied. His naive remarks, as he related the 
 experiences of the day, and the impressions they made upon 
 his mind, elicited many a subdued chuckle of amusement from 
 Leslie. But the enthusiasm which caused his eyes to sparkle 
 as he described the powerful effect produced by his father's 
 speech, and the adoration of the man, expressed more elo- 
 quentlr by his rapt tone and transfigured features than liy his 
 words, in turn impressed the son. 
 
 To Victor's unspoken, but deep regret. Nellie and Payton 
 were not overtaken bv them before reachino- home. 
 
X. 
 
 BEFORE THE GRAND INQUEST. 
 
 I UK IJrodklicUU'i-s liahitually looked forward to the opon- 
 **- iiiii' of court (on tho second Monday of July and 
 .huiuarv each year) as an event fraught with great 
 interest to them. Jt was a rare treat to the idlers and gossij)s. 
 Not that there was pageantry, or i)i-illiant display, or inii)res- 
 sive ceremonial of any kind. The judge wore neither ermine 
 nor wig, nor was the sheriff armed with either sword or tij)- 
 8taff. Yet there was much to see and hear. It was some- 
 thing, for instance, to hear the sheriff's proclamation in 
 opening court, perverting, to the disgust of judge and lawyers, 
 the ancient foruuda of the Norman-French tongue " Oyez 1 
 Oyez ! Oyez I " into the commonplace English •' O yes ! O yes ! 
 O yes! " And then there were s[)eeches of the lawyers, 
 belligerent and vehement, in the manner of lighting cocks ; and 
 the torturing of witnesses on the rack of cross-examination ; 
 and many a nugget of highly spiced scandal, furnishing wel- 
 come topics for gossip at the stores and the veranda of the 
 hotel for weeks to come. Jt was something, too, to see the 
 new faces which court day brought; tirst of all the circuit 
 attorney, and the rest of the lawyers wIk^ followed the judge 
 itinerant from county seat to county seat, all over the circuit, 
 like the tail of a comet; harvesting rich crops of fees, since 
 even the Imc^kwoodsmen were aware how much a fat fee stimu- 
 lates the alertr.ess and eloipieiice of a lawyer; wherefore 
 anxious clients, on the eve of impending trials, came down more 
 freely with their carefully hoarded •' dust." Then the liti- 
 gating parties from far and near; the twice twelve citizens 
 suiiuikhumI t() serve as traverse jiiroi's ; and linally. the grand 
 (loC) 
 
UEFOUE TIIK (4nAND rNQUKST. lo7 
 
 iiuiuisitoi's, twenty in iimnhi'i', ciivt-lojx'd in tlic mystic niinhiis 
 of secrecy. 
 
 Mr. Rcjiaitree, the slieriff, was a coiiscientions ollici-r. IJe 
 was deeply impressed with the o'rave res[)()nsil)ility restiny- 
 npon him in dcsiiJiuitinu- tiie men who were to wield tiie power 
 of calling' their fellow-men to account for crimes and misde- 
 meanors connnitted. or alleged to have been committed. For 
 this reason iVIi'. Rountree usually felt some anxiety on the 
 api)roach of court terms. But on the occasion in question 
 he had found this most trying of his olficial duties so easy, 
 that he congratulated himself on his unex[)ected success, 
 ascribing it to the routine acquired by practice. The list of 
 names had occurred to him as if by intuition, on the very next 
 day after the i)arl)ecue, and while engaged in an unusually 
 pleasant chat with his son Bol). If in accounting to jiimself 
 tor his extraordinary success he took undue credit to himself, 
 ignoring entirely the merits of his son in this connection, let 
 him not l»e judged harshly : for Bob was nuich too filially 
 minded to i)ermit his father to even dream, that the happy 
 composition of the grand in(iuisition was not due entirely to 
 his own ability. 
 
 More deeply, perhaps, than even the sheriff, was mine host 
 of the Brookfield hotel interested in the advent of court days, 
 in a pecuniary point of view at least. And no less the pro- 
 prietors of the two stores whose respective establishments were 
 crowded, on these occasions, with customers. 
 
 It was a rather costly honor to Mr. Barnes, to oltlciate as 
 grand juror at a time when his presence in the store was so 
 imperatively demanded. The proud consciousness, however, 
 of outranking his rival of the Dutch Store as an officer of court, 
 outweighed his business scruples. It was a soothing balm to 
 his vanity to reflect upon the distinction involved in this sac- 
 rifice, which his country demanded of him. He saw in this 
 mark of confidence on the part of his fellow-citizens a well- 
 merited compliment in compensation for the unjust i)artiality 
 shown to his rival on the occasion of the barbecue. And how 
 
ir>8 rilE n F.BEL'S DAUGIITEU. 
 
 tlatterinsi" was the deference sliown him by his eolleauues I 
 How assuring the ciruunistanoe, that not a single iueinl)er of 
 the grand jury l)elonged to the partisans of the Dutch Store! 
 True, he had never suspected what a dangerous, wicked indi- 
 vidual his rival harbored in his store, in the person of his young 
 apprentice, and wiiat a treasonalile intluenoe emanated from 
 tliese foreigners. Mr. Jeffreys, his colleague on the grantl 
 jury, opened his eyes in this respect, and Mr. Jones effec- 
 tually seconded his efforts to warn the country of the dan- 
 ger threatening the peace and welfare of the law-abiding 
 population from this source; and before the grand jury had 
 l)een closeted one hour, they had instructed the Circuit 
 Attorney to prepare an indictment against Victor Waldhorst, 
 charging him with felony : which, when it had been read to 
 and sanctioned l)y the grand jurors, was signed by Mr. Barnes 
 as foreman and returned into court as a true bill. 
 
 Mynheer Van Braaken, meanwhile, was reaping a rich har- 
 vest. Shoulder to shoulder stood the eager customers in his 
 store. Mr. Miller, the head clerk, Mr. Van liraaken himself, 
 as well as both apprentices, had their hands full to attend to 
 the business. Victor, in happy unconsciousness of the por- 
 tentous thunder-cloud gathering over his devoted head, forgot 
 for once, in his zeal of activity, what was expected of him in 
 the way of lauding the excellence of the goods ; and though 
 he caught the eye of his young colleague resting upon him 
 several times, with an unaccountable expression, in which both 
 shyness and malice seemed blended, he was in no wise dis- 
 concerted thereby. For he felt that to-day prompt attention 
 to the wants of the customers, close watchfulness in the 
 exchange of goods and money, and a careful scrutiny of liank- 
 notes and coin was all that was expected or demanded of him. 
 And in these respects he felt himself fully the equal of Bob 
 Rountree. 
 
 Neither of the apprentices, however, was completely 
 wrapped up in the l)usiness of the store. Victor's curiosity 
 had been aroused bv the information he had gathered from 
 
Uh'FOIiE Tin-: (lUANl) INi^UEST. lo'J 
 
 Leslie's coiiversntion nhout the powers and l'uiu-ti<)ii> «il' the 
 Judge, jiirv and allonieys, ami aliout the several olllees ju-r- 
 fornied by tlie onuid and petty juries, in the adniinistra- 
 tiou of Justiee. The same sul)ject engaged the thoughts of 
 Bob Kountree ; Avith tiiis difference, however, that in liis 
 ease they assumed a more concrete shape, — the interest 
 that he felt l>eing a direet and personal one. His thoughts 
 engrossed him to such an extent, that his behavior excited the 
 notice of his chief, as well as of Mr. Miller, and drew from 
 them warning glances of disapproval. 
 
 While Victor's sense of duty vvas sufficient to insure his 
 undiminished attention to business, it did not exclude the 
 lively desire to see, with his own eyes, an American court of 
 Justice in all the majesty and panoply of its power. The 
 " Grand Inquest," as Leslie had described it to him, more 
 particularly piqued his curiosity. The imposing name sug- 
 gested to him continually the stern austerity of the Spanish 
 Inquisition, investing the subject with a degree of romantic 
 interest contrasting strongly with the sober reality about him. 
 Leslie May had in words not entirely devoid of pompous ex- 
 aggeration, represented this institution as the grand bulwark 
 of liberty, which the English people had, after many struggles, 
 extorted from their rulers and incorporated in the Great Char- 
 ter of English Liberties ; from which it had come down, as a 
 precious inheritance from the mother country, to the American 
 Colonies, and now constituted an essential part of the Bill of 
 Rights of every American State. No wonder, then, that Vic- 
 tor's lively imagination reverted, now and then, to the mys- 
 terious doings that nuist be going on over at the court house, 
 and that he regretted the impossibility of being an eye-witness 
 to them. 
 
 No wonder, either, that the summons of his employer, call- 
 ing on him to accompany Leslie May to the court house, greatly 
 astonished him, for though the crowd of customers had by this 
 time perceptibly decreased, he had not noticed the entrance of 
 Leslie, nor that this voung gentleman had been for some time 
 
HrO THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 ('nJ4'iil>('(l ill ;in cjinu'st Ihouuli wiiispcrcd (■onvcrsutioii witli his 
 cbief. He n-adiiy ioUowed his Iriciid, t(H'liii<i- iiratelul to him 
 for his supposed [lurposc of iuakin<»' him acciuainted witli tlie 
 jjractical workings of the court. Nor did. he note the 1o(j1< of 
 open-mouthed exj)ectatiou witli whicli l>ol) I\ouiitree reu'arded 
 the two as tliey left the store. 
 
 Havinii" step})ed into tlie open air, Leslie eordially took 
 Victor's arm. " Victor," he said lightly, " they are goiiiii- to 
 phiy a joke on you. They want to vex and frighten you. Now 
 promise mo, that you won't be ano-ry, or at least, that you will 
 not let them see your ano'er ; and we will turn the joke against 
 them so that all Vernal County shall shake with laughter at the 
 stuj)id faces they will make on their disccjiniiture. Will you 
 })romise ine? " 
 
 " What do you mean? " said ^'ictol■. with a puzzled look. 
 
 " Imagine," Leslie continued, not noticing his friend's 
 question, "• that you were about to join the secret order of 
 free masons. You know, don't you, that they try to frighten 
 the candidates for the mysteries Avith all sorts of hocus-pocus 
 and absurd monkey shines, to try their mettle? And you 
 know, too, that not one of them was ever hurt so much as by 
 crooking a hair of his head? So here: You will come out of 
 it all without a scratch or a bruise. They shall not even rutHe 
 your temper, if you only have faith in what I tell you." 
 
 '' lint 1 don't understand you," said \'ictor. whose astonish- 
 ment liegan to change to alarm at the strange words of liis 
 companion. •• What do you want me to do? " 
 
 " Nothing, but to be true to yourself, and to exhibit the 
 courage of your true nature I " Leslie exclaimed, witii an 
 encouraging look. '' Above all things, to believe me. when I 
 tell you that you are in no real danger whatever." 
 
 " liut I dream of no danger I " N'ictor replied, with a look 
 of alarm that belied his words. •• 1 can't im:igiiie where there 
 should be danger to me." 
 
 " Well," said Leslie with a smile, the light irony of which 
 did more to (piiet Victor's apprehensions than his reascming. 
 
■ BEFOHI-: THE aUASD IXqUEST. 161 
 
 " the fact is, tliat yon aiv attout to he conlTontcd witli the 
 majesty of that bulwark of American IJherty tiiat J liave been 
 tellina; you about. The grand jury has perpetrated the 
 practical joke of finding a true bill against you, — that is, they 
 have indicted you for treasonable conspiracy. " 
 
 " Me? What for? AVhat have I done? " cried ^'ictor, 
 turning pale now Avith real alarm. 
 
 "Nothing l)ut ^vhat you thought right and just," replied 
 Leslie, in a calm, assuring tone. " You see, the whole thing 
 is intended for a cowardly attack on my governor. They 
 know \ory Avell, that they cannot hurt him, or you either, by 
 this proceeding in court ; but they mean to get up an excite- 
 ment against the governor, so as to injure him in his election. 
 At the same time they intend to frighten you, to revenge them- 
 selves on you for the insult they imagine you ])ut on some 
 of the silly fools. But if you will only keep a stiff upper lip, 
 and laugh at them instead of giving them a chance to make 
 merry over you, we shall turn the tables upon them in a way 
 to make them laugh at the wrong corner of the mouth. vShow 
 them the stuff you are made of I Prove that my sister is right 
 when she calls you the proudest, and admires you as the 
 bravest, boy in Vernal County! Will you promise? " 
 
 Victor actually l>lushed with pleasure on hearing Nellie's 
 opinion of him, notwithstanding the alarming nature of Les- 
 lie's statement. But he made no reply, for they had by this 
 time crossed the Square and reached the court house. They 
 stood on the threshold of the temple of justice, which Victor 
 entered with a feeling of suspense and awe never )>efore 
 experienced. 
 
 Just as they stepped in, the Mystic Twenty, constituting for 
 the time being, the bulwark of American Liberty for the 
 County of Vernal, stood up to receive from his Honor, the 
 judge, further instructions touching their duties, and then 
 marched by, in Indian file, on their way to the room assigned 
 them for their deliberations, where they moved and carried an 
 adjournment for the day. 
 
 11 
 
162 THE BEBEL'JS DAUGHTER. 
 
 "Mark their faces! " Leslie whispered. "You know a 
 sufficient number of them to be able to understand, now, how 
 they came to accuse you of treasonable practices." 
 
 "Why, there is Jeffreys! And Jones! And Matlack I " 
 whisjx'red Victor eagerly. Are llic^c the men that constitute 
 the Grand Inquest? "" 
 
 " And Barnes and all his supporters," Leslie went on. 
 '• Not one of them has any love for the Dutch Store. And 
 Mr. Rountree is sheriff, and Bob is his son. Do you begin to 
 see method in this madness? " 
 
 " You don't mean to say that Bob — " 
 
 " Y'es, I do, though! " Leslie interrupted him with an air 
 of triumph that puzzled Victor still more. " Bob Rountree 
 lias undertaken to personate, for once, the Genius of Liberty, 
 and to have a hand in the construction of its bulwark. He 
 has carried Ralph Payton's political maxim into practice, and 
 here is his first blow at the baneful effect of foreign influence. 
 Now for the first counter-stroke ! It will never do to give 
 them the satisfaction of seeing you taken to jail, or even 
 letting the sheriff lay hands on you." 
 
 -Jail! Sheriff! " The words fell with terrific effect on 
 poor Victor's ear. He began to understand, that there was no 
 child's play going on, and that courage was, indeed, needed. 
 
 But Leslie gave him no time to indulge in gloomy forebod- 
 ings. " I have already engaged a lawyer to conduct your 
 defense," he said. " There he is.. The first thing to be 
 attended to is, I suppose, to get you off on bail, that has also 
 l^een provided . ' ' 
 
 The gentleman pointed out as Victor's defender approached 
 as soon as he saw Leslie, who introduced him to Victor as Mr. 
 Bedford. 
 
 "You are just in time to avoid the necessity of a bench 
 warrant," he said, in a cheerful voice, to Victor. " The judge 
 was al)out to issue one. You may now Avaive arraignment and 
 the reading of the indictment. I will cause your ])lea of not 
 guiltv to be entered of record, then we will give bail for you. and 
 
hEFOUK THK GRAM) INQUEST. 163 
 
 that will finish the busiui'ss for to-day. To-morrow, tlieu, the 
 trial may begin, if I can get the State's attorney to consent." 
 
 "But how can 1 plead not guilty, when I have not heard 
 the accusation, and do not know with what offense I am 
 charged? " Victor objected, with a seriousness which caused 
 both the attorney and Leslie to smile. 
 
 '• Oh. that is a mere form, my friend," said the lawyer. 
 '' It is self-evident that you must plead not guilty, else there 
 could not be a trial at all. And then I happen to know the 
 content of the indictment; I looked over it just now, to see 
 whether I could find a loop-hole in it, for which I might move 
 to quash, or at least wear out the patience of the prosecution 
 by dilatory motions. But brother Yancey is a sly old fox ; you 
 might as well attempt to drill a hole through a cast steel bar 
 with a rotten lead pencil, as to pick a flaw in one of his 
 indictments."' 
 
 With these words, Mr. Bedford stepped forward to the plat- 
 form, upon w^hich the judge sat behind his desk, thus cutting 
 off Victor's eager questions as to the nature of the charge 
 against him. 
 
 " May it please 3'our Honor," Mr. Bedford spoke, " we are 
 leady to Avaive the reading of the indictment in the case of 
 The State vs. Victor Waldhorst. We plead not guilty, and 
 praj' your Honor to fix the amount of bail to be given." 
 
 The judge demanded the document for inspection and asked 
 the State's attorney for liis opinion. "It is an unusual 
 charge," said the judge apologeticallv. "I do not remember 
 to have ever seen an indictment framed under this section 
 of the statute." 
 
 Victor listened attentively to the statements of the judge and 
 the lawyers, hoping to gain some notion of the particulars of 
 the charge against him: but he listened in vain. Neither the 
 judge, nor any of the lawyers, ever mentioned the offense, the 
 gravity of which they discussed with so much volubility. The 
 only thing that Victor understood from the learned debate was, 
 that bail was demanded in the sum of one thousand dollars, 
 
164 THE BEBEUS DAUGIITEB. 
 
 which his lawyer declared (but so as not to be heard by the 
 judge) to be an outrageously high amount, and a plain viola- 
 tion <^f the constituti(jnal inhibition against excessive l)ail. 
 Leslie announced, that the amount was a matter of indiffer- 
 ence, and nodded to a man evidently on hand for this purpose, 
 who stepped forward, and declared himself indebted to the 
 State in the sum of one thousand dollars, lawful money of the 
 United States, to be well and truly paid, on condition however, 
 that Whereas, &c. 
 
 The judge then inquired of the counsel whether they had 
 agreed on the day for Avhioh the trial was to be set. The 
 prosecuting attorney answered that they had not been able to 
 agree, and demanded sufficient time to consult with the wit- 
 nesses, as well as to examine authorities and precedents, in 
 order to be able to present the case properly ])efore the court 
 and jury. But Victor's lawyer opposed delay. He was evi- 
 dently acting in the interest of his employer, for he never even 
 consulted the wishes of the real defendant in the case. Victor 
 noted that his lawyer Avas possessed of an exceedingly ready 
 tongue, and that he urged immediate action with a loquacious- 
 ness which seemed to carry everything before it, until Mr. 
 Yancey, the State's attorney, exposed the futility of his argu- 
 ments in a few, in Victor's opinion, convincing words. If the 
 latter had been free to choose his defender between the two 
 lawyers, he would, without a moment's hesitation, have chosen 
 Mr. Yancey. This gentleman was of tall, imposing stature ; a 
 frank, kindly expression about the mouth redeemed the face 
 from what would otherwise have stamped it as forbiddingly 
 severe. His clear grey eyes had for a moment rested on 
 ^'ietor, and from this glance the boy caught the impression 
 tliat the State's attorney Avas a reliable, whole-souled man. He 
 spoke calmly and to the point ; his voice was both clear and 
 melodious ; Victor felt instinctively that it would possess 
 powerful influence over judge and jury. For the present, how- 
 ever, his own lawyer scored a victory over his opponent ; for 
 the judge, after listening patiently and with patent impartiality 
 
BEFOBE THE GRAND INQUEST. 165 
 
 to the argument on both sides, cut off further deljatc l)y lixing 
 the next morning for the beginning of the trial. "Justice 
 delayed," he exi)lained sententiously, " is justice denied. 
 The defendant has a constitutional right to a speedy trial." 
 
 "Ah, ha! " Mr. Bedford exclaimed, turning with triumphant 
 mien to Leslie, and rubbing his hands in high glee, " you see, 
 we are one too many for the sly old fox. We have easily 
 beaten off his first assault and I flatter myself that our coun- 
 ter move has somewhat discomlited the enemy. It is quite 
 an advantage gained over the old fellow to comi^el him to go 
 into the light without preparation. Now, my young friends," 
 he continued with a slight nod toward Victor, to indicate that 
 he also was included, " let us discuss our plan of battle." 
 
 Leslie proposed that they should all three repair to the May 
 Mansion to talk over the matter. " It is possible," he said, 
 " that my father, who is absent on an electioneering tour, may 
 return at any moment ; and it seems to me to be important to 
 have his views as to the course to be pursued in the defense." 
 
 " Of course it would," Mr. Bedford promptly responded. 
 " Indeed, it would be highly desirable that he should be pres- 
 ent at the trial, so as to afford a sort of moral support to the 
 defendant. Such things have a powerful effect on our honest 
 yeoman sitting in the jury box." 
 
 "Particularly, as the whole plot is but a poorly masked 
 attack on himself, to defeat his election," added Leslie. 
 
 " See, see! " Mr. Bedford remarked, seeming to be highly 
 amused at this piece of news. "So you think that General 
 AVaddle has his linger in this pie? A little bold, — don't you 
 think ? — but sly, I grant you, prodigiously sly ! The idea of 
 manipulating the grand jury in furthering his electioneering 
 schemes! And you really think, that old Waddle invented 
 this clever trick ? ' ' 
 
 " No, I don't believe anything. of the kind," Leslie repUed. 
 " I have no reason to impute particular intellectual ability to 
 my father's opponent in this election ; nor do I think him a 
 paragon of generosity. I think him quite capalde of acting 
 
]66 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 upou the maxim, that in an electioneering canvass, as in love 
 and war, everything is fair that promises success. But I do 
 not think him such a knave, and certainly not such a fo(jl, as 
 to attempt to bribe or influence the grand jury. No! This 
 brilliant idea grew in another head ; and the motive was not 
 love for General Waddle, but hatred for Colonel May." 
 
 " You don't say! " exclaimed Mr. Bedford, casting an ad- 
 miring glance at the young man. " You seem to be well 
 informed. Where did you get your information? " 
 
 " That is my secret! " said Leslie, laughing. '"But there 
 is no magic about it. I only put this and that together." 
 
 Victor listened with eager ears to the discussion that fol- 
 lowed, in which Leslie explained to the lawyer the particulars 
 of the case, so far as he knew them, but from which Motor 
 could not learn more than that the charge against him was in 
 some way connected with his visit to the negro quarters. Then 
 it occurred to him, that Colonel May had warned him of the 
 unlawfulness of meeting with negroes after dark, in their own 
 quarters, without the consent of the owner or overseer. But 
 the magnitude of the offense with Avhich he stood charged, as 
 well as the extent of the penalty thereby incurred, still re- 
 mained the subject of painful anxiety to him. As soon, there- 
 fore, as he could succeed in putting in a Avord, he timidly 
 inquired: "Is this matter so very serious? If I am found 
 guilty, is there any danger of my going to the penitentiary? " 
 
 " You are right, my young friend," the lawyer answered, with 
 a coolness and unconcern that shocked poor Victor. •• In our 
 slave states it is no joking matter to be accused of tampering 
 with the negroes. It is almost equal to the crime of high treason, 
 only that you may l)e found guilty on circumstantial evidence, 
 while the constitution prohibits conviction for treason without 
 the concurring testimony of two witnesses to the overt act." 
 
 " Don't let this lawyer frighten you! " said Leslie, whose 
 calmness and assuring smile did much to allay Victor's fears. 
 " He is trying to exaggerate his case in order to quiet his con- 
 science for ohargino- an exorV)itant fee. The long and short of 
 
UKFOliK THE (4UAXD IXCJCEST. 107 
 
 the luattei- is. tlial you aii' cliarged with iiieitiiiu- my fatliei"s 
 •slaves to insufroction. Do you understand, now, how utterly 
 ridiculous the whole thing- is? " 
 
 '• Less ridiculous than perilous." Mv. Bedford insisted. 
 •• ^^'e u)ust i)roceed with the utmost caution in selecting our 
 traverse Jury. For a mistake in that direction would surely 
 prove fatal. Let one or two fire-eaters be among them, and 
 they will so fanaticise the whole twelve, that you could no 
 more prevent a verdict of guilty, than you could stop a runaway 
 horse by holding on to its tail." 
 
 •• Let it be my care to assist you in making your [)eremp- 
 tory challenges," Leslie replied coniidently. ■• I am jiretty 
 thoroughly acquainted with the citizens of the vicinage ; and 
 while the grand jury seerns to have been picked out with con- 
 sunnnate skill, I have no idea that the petty jurors have been 
 tampered with. Depend on me and on the governor, if he 
 should return befoi-e the trial begins." 
 
 The conviction began to impress itself upon \'ictor's mind, 
 that Leslie was not sincere in treating the matter so lightly, 
 concealing his apprehensions only to spare his friend's feel- 
 ings. His thoughts reverted to the intense hatred of Jeffreys, 
 who had preferred to quit the service of Colonel May, rather 
 than make friends with the despised foreigner. The Avarning 
 uttered by Colonel May, during that memorable ride with him 
 and Nellie, recurred to him with appalling meaning, — to con- 
 fide his positive views on slavery to no one but his most inti- 
 mate friends, lest disagreeable consequences arise. And he 
 remembered, how seriously Leslie himself had viewed the 
 situation before there had l)een an indictment. It was not 
 surprising, then, that a keen sense of peril deeply moved 
 Victor, and that he sought and improved the first opportunity 
 to Avithdraw from a discussion which was growing painful to 
 him. In the solitude of his own little chamber he endeavored 
 to prepare himself for the coming ordeal, and gather what 
 composure he might, so as not to disgrace his friends with 
 cowardly ]iusi]lanimitv. 
 
XI. 
 
 JUSTICE SEASONED WITH POLITICS. 
 
 ^AKLY next moniing the partisans of the rival stores 
 repaired in great numbers to tlieir resj)ective head- 
 (piarters. On the Square numerous groups of men 
 engaged in earnest conversation : the lawyers at the liotel, 
 who after the morning menl resorted t(j the s|)acious porch to 
 air their heels and pick their teeth, were joined l)y such of 
 their lay ])rethren as l)raved the danger of incurring liability 
 for a fee, in search of information which they were thought 
 best able to impart, concerning the stirring news that agitated 
 the tijwii. For not only there, but far around the country the 
 rumor had quickly s]n'ead, that the '' young Dutchman " had 
 been indicted l)y the grand jury for felonious misdeeds. 
 
 Mighty consequential men. to-day, were tlie Mystic Twenty, 
 stalking about with solenni faces, hjoking down upon their 
 fellow-citizens with the proud consciousness of stern duty Avell 
 performed. Many an admiring glance followed them as they 
 strode on toward the court house, and great was the curiosity 
 to learn tiie particulars of the horrible misdeeds, to avenge 
 wliicli tliey had invoked the strong arm of the law. But 
 neither l)r()ad hints nor suggestive insinuations, nor yet direct 
 questioning, elicited more from the temporary Pillars of Justice 
 than a })ortentous shaking of the head, or shrugging of the 
 shoulders. 
 
 The disciples of lUackstoue [)roved, on this occasion, less 
 close than the grand jurors. Tiiey freely vented their views 
 as to tlie importance of the trial, and its probable issue. IJoth 
 the friends and the opponents of the alleged culprit found 
 their extremest o^jinions represented. 
 
 Tlio liveliest interest in tliis (|ueslion was taken of course, 
 (1G8) 
 
JUHTIGE SEASONED WITH POLITICS. 169 
 
 by the respective adherents of the two iiiercaiitile estuhlish- 
 ments. In the Dutch Store the view was openly expressed, 
 that the indictment was a slianieful subversio'n of justice; for 
 was it not pkiin that Mr. Barnes liad abused his official posi- 
 tion, as a member of the grand jury, to strike a blow against 
 his hated, because more successful, rival in business? Van 
 Braaken himself said nothing ; but the vehemence with which 
 he nodded and blinked assent to this opinion left no doubt as 
 to his conviction on this point. In the conservative camp, on 
 the contrary, there was congratulation and rejoicing, that so 
 heinous a crime, threatening the peace and safety of the com- 
 munity, was being dealt with in a lawful manner, thus avoiding 
 the excesses of a self-constituted court of Judge Lynch. 
 
 The croAvd of peo})le in and about the courthouse increased. 
 Pale with suspense, but i)utting on a bold face, Victor ap- 
 peared with his friend Leslie and his counsel Mr. Bedford. 
 The latter, fully aware of his importance on the present occa- 
 sion, elbowed a passage through the crowd for himself and his 
 companions. He indulged himself in the blissful foretaste of 
 the fame which he expected to achieve ; he imagined himself as 
 the conqueror in this contest with the iState's attorney — as the 
 successful champion of the standard bearer of the Democratic 
 party, — as the gracious recipient of the homage of an admir- 
 ing po[)ulace. For he had construed Leslie's statements as an 
 indication that the political aspect of the case was of the lirst 
 importance, to which the interest of the real defendant was but 
 secondary. 
 
 At nine o'clock the judge ascended the platform, and after 
 the transaction of some routine business the case of the State 
 vs. Victor Waldhorst was called for trial. There was, at first, 
 considerable skirmishing between the two lawyers, in which 
 Mr. Bedford showed himself a skillful tactician, who gave his 
 adversary great trouble, contesting every inch of debatable 
 ground. Voluble of tongue though he was, and prolilic of 
 shrewd quibbles and technicalities, Victor's confidence in his 
 defender was not such as to <>-ive him comfoi't or assurance. 
 
170 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 In vain he listened lor some emphatic avowal ol his innocence, 
 some unequivocal expression ol confidence in the cause ol his 
 client from the lip's ol his counsel : he heard but words and 
 phrases devoid ol meaning to him. C^uite diHerent Avas Mr. 
 Yancey's style. When the preliminaries had at last been set- 
 tled, the jury selected and sworn, "and a true verdict to 
 render, according to the law and evidence," the State's attor- 
 ney rose to explain the nature ol the charge against the 
 delendant. and the issue they were called on to try. 
 
 He concluded his opening address to the jury by reminding 
 them ol the solemn obligation resting upon them, cautioning 
 them to let neither compassion lor the youth and inexperience 
 ol the prisoner at the bar, nor bias or prejudice ol any kind 
 against him, interlere with the conscientious discharge of their 
 duty. 
 
 Whatever ellect his words might have produced on the judge 
 or jury, they fell with crushing power on the prisoner, whose 
 eyes were riveted, as if by a magic charm, on the eloquent lips 
 that spoke his doom. For the first time, now, did he compre- 
 hend the full import of the crime that he had committed. 
 With fatal perspicuity the prosecuting officer pointed out fact 
 after fact and circumstance after circumstance, until poor 
 Victor doubted his innocence. It ceased to be a question, 
 to his apprehension, of acquittal or conviction ; the extent and 
 nature of the punishment was now alone the subject of deep 
 anxiety to him. His feelings were wrought up to a {)itch dis- 
 abling him from forming a clear judgment of what was going 
 on about him. 
 
 Ralph Payton was the first witness produced by the prose- 
 cution. His testimony was successfully warded off by Mr. 
 Bedford, depending, as it did, almost entirely on hearsay. 
 When the State's attorney, in very evident disgust, dismissed 
 him, without his having testified to a single relevant fact, the 
 counsel for the defendant cheerfully rubbed his hands and put 
 a variety of questions concerning matters as to which Mr. 
 Pavton was compelled to answer that he knew nothing. An 
 
JUSTICE SEASONED WITH POLITICS. 171 
 
 audible titter rewarded the attorney's poor joke, as he dis- 
 missed the witness, about •' a fine specimen of an American 
 Know-Nothing. ' ' 
 
 The next witness, Orlando Jones, profited by the discom- 
 fiture of his predecessor, and confined his statements to what 
 was within his own personal knowledge. But since this knowl- 
 edge was confined to what had transpired in tlie grammar 
 class, he added but little to the strength of the case for the 
 prosecution . 
 
 After him, Bol) Kountree was called on the stand. The 
 trouble with the preceding witnesses had been their swiftness 
 in making damaging statements against the defendant : Bob 
 Rountree, on the contrary, made it extremely difficult for the 
 prosecution to get him to make any statement at all. He pro- 
 tested with great zeal and vehemence, that the defendant was 
 his comrade and friend, and that he knew nothing whatever to 
 his discredit. Not until he had been sorely pressed, and in 
 answer to leading questions permitted by the judge on account 
 of his very evident unwillingness, did he confess with osten- 
 tatious hesitation, that his friend Victor, had, on one occasion, 
 •' in the goodness of his heart," admitted to him, that in a 
 free country there ought to be no slaves. And after further 
 coaxing and pressing he added, that he also had said, that it 
 was the duty of ever}" patriot to assist the slaves in — he had 
 forgotten now, whether in their Jiberation, or, perhaps it was 
 only that, — protecting them in their rights. And he was sure, 
 quite sure, that his friend Victor had meant no harm by that. 
 In vain did the State's attorney press upon him the importance 
 of remembering the exact words ; in vain did he remind him 
 of his solemn duty to permit neither the bonds of friendship, 
 nor the sentiment of affection, to prevent him from speaking 
 the whole truth as a sworn witness. Bob Eountree stuck to it, 
 that he knew nothing more. Only when the disgusted State's 
 attorney was about to desist fijom further effort he remem- 
 bered and admitted, in a voice trembling with repressed feeling, 
 that Victor had once. — onh' once — told him that he had 
 
172 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 made it hot for the overseer, aud that the negroes would be no 
 longer tyrannized by him. After this confession, extorted 
 from him palpably against his will, Bob Rountree hung his 
 head, and made no further revelation. The State's attorney 
 passed him over to Mr. Bedford for cross-examination. 
 
 To this gentleman's surprise and unfeigned disgust, Leslie 
 bade him, in an energetic whisper, to abstain from putting a 
 single question to Bob Rountree. " What," he replied, " let 
 this insolent little hypocrite off without a scathing raking over 
 the coals? Why, his testimony has prepared the jury io 
 believe Muything that may be said against the defendant to his 
 damage. We would be completely at the mercy of the jury." 
 Leslie insisted on his view. After much protesting and 
 shaking of his head, Mr. Bedford rmally consented to adopt 
 the course demanded l)y him, on condition that he should 
 justify this course to his father, while he washed his hands of 
 the consequences. " We ought to expose the double-faced 
 hypocrisy of the little villian," he said, in conclusion ; ''he 
 has done us more injury, than if he had sworn to the most 
 criminating acts." 
 
 "Of course," Leslie assented. "But that is no reason 
 Avhy w^e should give him the opportunity to intensify the effect 
 of his evidence, as he will surely do if you let him. Spare 
 your ammunition for the next witness." 
 
 This was, as Leslie had surmised, the overseer Jeffreys. He 
 proved, as was also foreseen , the most formidable witness against 
 Victor, his testimony telling with fatal force l>y reason of the 
 mistrust which the statements of Victor's colleague were cal- 
 culated to arouse in the minds of the jurors. Jeffreys prefaced 
 his testimony by sketching the condition of things at May 
 Meadows before Victor's coming there. Xerxes he described 
 as a sullen, reoelliously inclined, discontented negro, who 
 could be kept in subjection by the utmost severity only. The 
 Octoroon Lucretia, he said, was a docile, oljedient wench, 
 much attached to her master's family, until the Dutchman 
 ap])e:in'd on the scene, when she completely changed, became 
 
JUSTICE SEASONED WITH POLITICS. 173 
 
 insolent and unmanageable, and openly defied his, the over- 
 seer's, authority. After this introduction his testimony as to 
 what he had Avitnessed in the negro quarters, in the night time, 
 told witli powerful effect against tlie accused. It hardly 
 needed the expression by the spiteful witness, — so vehe- 
 mently objected to by Mr. Bedford and so promptly ruled out 
 by the judge — of his inference, that there must have existed, 
 and still exist, a conspiracy between the negroes and the 
 Dutchman, which must demoralize the slave population, and 
 prove dangerous to the peace and safety of the whole com- 
 munity. 
 
 Victor was not surprised by the perversions and exaggera- 
 tions of his revengeful enemy. He had expected nothing else. 
 Mr. Bedford shot angry glances at the audacious witness ; 
 even Leslie May was horrified by the boldness and persistence 
 with Avhich the discharged overseer pursued his scheme for 
 vengeance. The judge, jury and audience listened Avith 
 breathless interest to the criminating revelations. Even a 
 more experienced judge of human nature than Victor, might 
 have been awed by the expressions visilde upon the faces of 
 those about him — compassion, sympathy, apprehension, 
 gratified malice — all according to the good or ill-will borne 
 for the young prisoner. Leslie alone regarded the witness 
 with a calm smile portending him no good. 
 
 But the scheme of this witness included a purpose beyond 
 the conviction of the hated foreigner. In the full fiush of his 
 triumph over the latter, he now pushed on in pursuit of higher 
 game. He must strike a blow at his equally hated former 
 master. With this view he related how Colonel May had 
 openly sided with the sneaking aljolitionist, and thus destroj-ed 
 all discipline among the slaves ; it was in vain that Payton and 
 Jones shook their heads in disapproval ; in vain that Mr. 
 Yancey contracted his brows into a threatening scowl, — the 
 spiteful .Jeffreys was not to be moved from his purpose of an- 
 nihilating the democratic candidate for Congress. He pro- 
 ceeded to show up his heretical stand on the slavery question, 
 
174 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEli. 
 
 when the State's attorney, who had waited in vain for Mr. 
 Bedford to interpose objection to the irrelevant testimony 
 given by the witness, himself commanded him to desist. " We 
 do not propose to listen to the private grievances between 
 Colonel May and this man ; they have nothing whatever to do 
 with the case on trial, and — ." 
 
 He was interrupted by Jeffreys, who did not mean to be 
 balked of his revenge. "But it's part o' me testimony I'm 
 givin,' " he exclaimed. " I can't give in me testimony, 'thout 
 I say what b'longs to't — ." 
 
 Jeffreys was in his turn interrupted by the judge, who, with 
 a threatening frown, commanded him to be silent. The ob- 
 jection of the State's attorney was sustained ; and as he had 
 no further questions to ask of the Avitness, the latter was turned 
 over to the defendant's counsel for cross-examination. 
 
 Now the moment had arrived when Mr. Bedfoixl saw himself 
 called on to sustain, — if possible, to eclipse, — his reputation. 
 It was necessary to destroy the evidence given by this man, in 
 order to save, — not so much the defendant on trial, as the 
 democratic candidate for Congress fi'om ignominious defeat. 
 A cowardly assault had been made on him behind his back by 
 an assassin that struck in the dark ; he must be vindicated in 
 so thorough a manner, as to cover his enemies with confusion. 
 And Mr. Bedford was the man to justify the confidence re- 
 posed in him. He covered himself with glory, as his col- 
 leagues at the bar subsequently assured him, in the memo- 
 rable examination that now followed. 
 
 Before entering on the main issues of the case, he led the 
 witness through an exhaustive biography of himself, putting 
 his questions with an air of such easy good nature as to com- 
 pletely disarm the witness of any suspicion that there was an 
 attempt to discredit him. Mr. Jeffre3^s became quite com- 
 municative and confiding, congratulating himself that he had 
 so impressed the defendant's counsel as to secure at his 
 hands more considerate treatment than either Jones or Payton 
 had received. Without intending, or indeed knowing, he 
 
.Ill STICK SEASONED WITH POLITJCS. 1 7o 
 
 drew a pleasant picture of the life at May Meadows, described 
 the field hands as industrious and contented, the domestic 
 servants as happy and devoted to the family. When, how- 
 ever, he came to speak of Victor's visits to the place and of 
 the orders given by Colonel May in reference to the affair at 
 the negro cabin, he relapsed into his former bitterness of tone. 
 It was then that the lawyer began to show his skill. First he 
 encouraged and cajoled ; then sneered and vexed the witness 
 with insinuations and irritating suggestions, and finally 
 goading him with exasperating taunts into furious wrath, in 
 which he gave vent to a torrent of invectives against the 
 defendant and Colonel May, betraying his intense hatred and 
 passion . 
 
 From this point on there were frequent consultations 
 l)etween Leslie and the counsel. The witness took alarm. 
 His answers were given with greater deliberation, and he 
 sometimes hesitated before replying to a question put to him. 
 Some of these questions Avere, indeed, startling and utterly 
 unlooked for; but the cross-examination went relentlessly on. 
 The lawyer knew nor pity nor mercy, but with determined 
 pertinacity pursued his inquiries, coercing answers to the 
 strangest, most unexpected questions. One by one the real 
 facts began to appear from his unwilling replies : His bootless 
 advances to the pretty Octoroon girl, — his intense jealousy of 
 the young foreigner, — the quarrel between him and Colonel 
 May, because the latter would not permit the flogging of the 
 young girl, — finally his ignominious dismissal from the Col- 
 onel's service. — all came out with utmost minuteness of 
 detail. Even the conversation of the conspirators at the bar- 
 becue was dragged to light. Neither obstinate lying, nor 
 cunning evasion, neither prevarication nor subterfuges availed 
 the cornered Avitness. With inexorable persistence, assailing 
 him from all directions of approach, came the questions, taking 
 him often by utter surprise. There was something awful in 
 the" power exerted by the relentless law-yer. The tenor of his 
 questions proved him to be so thoroughly familiar with matters 
 
176 THE BEBEUS DAUGIITEB. 
 
 which could be knoAvn to no one but the witness' confederates, 
 that for a moment the suspicion ilashed across his mind that 
 he had been l)etrayed. Great ))eads of perspiration gatliered 
 upon his forehead ; he hardly dared wipe them off, for fear of 
 calling attention to his agitation. His eyes wandered uneasily 
 al)out the room, until he finally fixed them, with fierce anger, 
 upon Leslie who regarded him with a calm smile of triumphant 
 superiority. It was he, then, that had " put this an' that 
 together," — from what indicia was of course a mystery to 
 him — and was posting the lawyer to put those terrible ques- 
 tions ! But apprehension for his own safety soon gained the 
 ascendency in his mind over every other consideration. The 
 scowling faces about him boded him no good. He was in 
 mortal dread that he might have made statements bringing 
 himself in confiict with the criminal laws. 
 
 This moment, in Avhich impotent rage and abject terror dis- 
 torted the face of the principal witness for the State, Leslie 
 deemed the proper one to impress upon the judge and jun', 
 by refraining from further questioning. He had some diffi- 
 culty in prevailing on Mr. Bedford to desist from the ])ractice 
 he so keenly enjoyed ; he finally yielded to Leslie's urgent 
 demand, only because he conceived Leslie to be his real client 
 and ilid not wish to antagonize him. The prosecuting attorney 
 hesitated ; he was undecided whether to put further questions 
 or not, as it seemed a hopeless task to attempt to bolster up 
 his badly damaged witness. Before he came to a conclusion, 
 there was a commotion at the door, and some one Avas seen, 
 presently, to elbow his way through the densely crowded 
 court-room. It was Colonel May, who passed forward untd 
 he had reached the counsel table. The perfect silence prevail- 
 ing at this moment throughout the room was evidence of the 
 eager curiosity with which the public watched the movements 
 of this man, evidently exjiecting some startling development 
 to follow his appearance. Victor, for his part, looked upon 
 him as his guardian angel. His face brightened into an ex- 
 pression of hope and renewed confidence : whatever might 
 
JUSTICE SEASONED WITH rOLITIVS. 177 
 
 happen now, — of this he was sure, that he would not suffer 
 injustice. 
 
 " I trust that your Honor may excuse my unceremonious 
 intrusion here," the Colonel said, addressino- the judge in a 
 respectful manner; ''hut I deemed it my duty to offer my 
 testimony in the interest of truth and justice. I ]>ray your 
 Honor, therefore, if it be not too late, to permit me to appear 
 as a witness in the case of my friend, Mr. Waldhorst." 
 
 " It is by no means too late," spoke the judge, in his most 
 amiable manner, '• whether you wish to testify for or against 
 the accused, for the prosecution has not yet rested. But 
 if I am not mistaken in supposing your testimony to be in- 
 tended for his benefit," he added smiling significantly, " and 
 if I understand the meaning of the black clond which I dis- 
 cerned a moment ago on the usually placid countenance of 
 Brother Yancey, there seems to be no necessity for testimony 
 in that direction. At any rate, you will confer with the 
 lawyers upon the subject." 
 
 The State's attorney shook hands with the Colonel, and 
 after exchanging a few words in whispers, he addressed the 
 court. "Your Honor has interpreted the expression of my 
 face correctly," he said. " It was my intention, even before 
 the appearance of Colonel May, to ask permission of your 
 Honor to enter my nolh prosequi in this case — " 
 
 Before he could add another word, Mr. Bedford sprang to 
 his feet, protesting in a lond voice against such a disposition. 
 "We are entitled, if your Honor please," he urged strenu- 
 ously, "to a verdict from the jury. It is a sacred right 
 under the constitution, that no man shall be put twice in jeop- 
 ardy — " 
 
 "Spare your breath," Mr. Yancey interrupted him, and 
 then continued, without taking further note of Mr. Bedford's 
 protest, " I cannot close ray eyes to the palpable proof devel- 
 oped in this case, that a most shocking crime has been 
 committed here in the sacred name of justice. One of our 
 time-honored institutions, the very fountain of justice and 
 
 1-2 
 
178 THE BEBEUS DAUGIlTEIx. 
 
 palUuliuui of our civil rights, lias been prostituted to the 
 miserable purposes of political trickery and private malice. I 
 l)eg to remind the grand jurors themselves, to remember, that 
 their oaths bind them to present a true bill against all_ persons 
 known, or with reasonable cause suspected, to have violated 
 the law, though the culprit be one of their own number. In 
 the cause of triith, however, and for the purpose of completely 
 vindicating the victim of this foul conspiracy, I suggest that 
 the testimony of one witness, at least, be heard for the de- 
 fense. I allude to that of our illustrious fellow-citizen. 
 Colonel May." 
 
 The lustre of Victor's eyes, more eloquently than any other 
 of his features, gave token of the revulsion of feeling expe- 
 rienced by him. He felt like kneeling down and worshiping 
 the man whose dignified words were grateful alike to his ears 
 and heart. For they restored to liberty and honor, — his 
 faith in truth and justice, — adding new proof of the greatness 
 and glory of the land of his adoption. Yes ! No grander 
 State existed ; no people could be freer ; nowhere was justice 
 more lirmly enthroned, more proudly triumphant, than in this 
 glorious land of ])erfect equality before the supreme arbiter of 
 Jill — the law ! 
 
 Neither .Jeffreys nor Bol) Kouutree remained to hear the 
 testimony of Colonel May. At its conclusion there was 
 tumultuous applause, which the combined efforts of the judge 
 and sheriff were unavailing to suppress. The jurors unani- 
 mously acquitted Victor without leaving their seats, and Victor 
 was literally carried away on the hands of the excited multi- 
 tude. Colonel May, too, achieved a great triumph. After 
 the adjournment of court, there were enthusiastic hurrahs for 
 the democratic candidate for Congress, and loud and repeated 
 shouts demanded from him a speech. That he complied with 
 the request, successfully haranguing the crowd from the judge's 
 platform; that INIr, Bedford, the triumphant counsel for the 
 defendant, as well as Mr. Yancey, the circuit attorney ; that 
 judge and jury remained to participate in the meeting, now 
 
JUSTICE SEASONED WITH POLITICS. 179 
 
 turned into a political gathering-, was as much a mystery to 
 Victor, as the fact that LesUe exhibited neither exultation 
 nor delight at the satisfactory termination of the trial. But 
 when the latter, professing to be tired of the pohtical humbug, 
 left the court house, Victor readily followed. 
 
 Out in the Square he pressed Victor's hand. " We did well, 
 you and I, did we not? " he said. " Do you see, now, that I 
 was right in telling you, that there was not the least danger 
 for you ? Bah ! I counted on the stupidity of these sneaking 
 villains, and you see now how correctly I judged them." 
 
 " Leslie May," said Victor, retaining Leslie's hands in both 
 his own, " I know- not, howl deserve this exceeding kindness 
 at your hands ; but forget it — I shall never — never ! ' ' 
 
 "Bah!" Leslie exclaimed. " I was in for fun, and it was 
 a grand success." And his merry laughter rang over the 
 Square. 
 
 " You, and your father," Victor continued. " 1 shall never 
 be able to repay the debt of gratitude which I owe to both of 
 you." 
 
 " Why, Avhat else could we do, but fight for our chance in 
 the election?" Leslie exclaimed, still laughing. "Don't for 
 a moment imagine, that either I or the governor acted from 
 motives of the good Samaritan sort in this matter. Did it not 
 occur to you, that we were all the while fighting our own 
 battle? And do you not see, how the governor is scoring 
 several tricks in his game against General Waddle? " 
 
 Victor dropped his eyes. " Yes," he said in a low voice, 
 as if ashamed of the confession he was making, " I did at 
 one time fear, that you and the lawyer — well, that you did 
 not consider my case as of the greatest importance. But I 
 see, to my shame, how unjust my fears were in that respect." 
 
 " Do not misunderstand me," exclaimed Leslie. " You 
 were never in any real danger yourself ; or do you think it 
 possible, that either the governor or myself would have sacri- 
 ficed you? To be sure, when hour after hour passed, without 
 the governor putting in an appearance, I did feel a littl^ 
 
180 
 
 THE liEBEL'S DAUGIITEU. 
 
 squeamish ; and when Bob Rountree lied so masterfully, I was 
 for a while nonplussed. But you saw, did you not? — that we 
 would have come out all right, even if the governor had not 
 appeared in the nick of time? " 
 
 "Certainly I " Victor exclaimed with a touch of genuine 
 emotion. " The State's attorney is a noble man, who Avould 
 not permit injustice to be })erpetrated in the name of the law." 
 
 " Not, at least," observed Leslie, with a playful smile, " if 
 therel)y tlu' democratic candidate for Congress should come to 
 o-rief." 
 
 
XII. 
 
 THE GENESIS OF PUBLIC OPINION. 
 
 YNHEER VAN BRAAKEX had. with what oraee he 
 succeeded in assuiniug, })eriiiitted liis head clerk, Mr. 
 Miller, to attend the trial at the court house ; and 
 since both of his apprentices were present there without refer- 
 ence to his consent, it had fallen to his lot to serve the cus- 
 tomers of the Dutch Store in person. These were not many ; 
 for the fewest of the visitors to Brooklield on that day kei)t 
 away from the court house during that memorable trial. But 
 next morning he demanded from Victor a minute account (^f 
 the whole affair. Again and again he ruljbed his hands in 
 high glee, and regarded his fortunate apprentice who had so 
 signally succeeded in attracting public attention to himself, 
 and incidentally to the Dutch Store, with evident satisfaction 
 and spasmodic twitching of his eye-lid. Now and then Mr. 
 Miller threw in a word, when Victor's modesty betrayed him 
 into the omission of a particularly interesting feature of the 
 proceedings, and thereby increased the good humor of the 
 chief. In the course of Victor's narration a number of idlers 
 found their way into the store, and stood listening. Of these, 
 each had a word to say himself, for every one of them was 
 proud of having been an eye-witness to the famous trial ; and 
 it was a remarkable circumstance, that every one, to the last 
 man of them, had foreseen and predicted the triumphant 
 acquittal of the young man. The most enthusiastic of these 
 ex post facto prophets was Bob Rountree. With ostentatious 
 boastfulness he pointed out his own signal victory over the 
 State's attorney, and bitterly complained of the persistent 
 attempts made to entrap him int(^ the statement of something 
 that might be construed to his friend's disadvantage. Em- 
 
 (181) 
 
182 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 pliatic was his assertion of ViL-tor's innocence of any of tlie 
 groundless charges against him. He was out of all patience 
 with the perjured villain, Jeffreys, who was alone at the 
 bottom of the whole infamous prosecution — probably because 
 he wanted to revenge himself for having lost a good situation. 
 As if Victor could have possibly had anything to do with tli(d ! 
 
 In connection with the name of Jeffreys several opinions 
 were suggested touching the prol)ability of an indictment 
 against him for perjury and misdemeanor in the office of grand 
 juror. That the State's att(jrney had openly demanded this, 
 was deemed by some a sure indication that it would speedily 
 transpire. Others doubted whether tlie grand jury would find 
 a bill against one of their own number. " A crow won't 
 scratch out another crow's eyes! " suggested one. 
 
 "Yes, crows! " Mynheer repeated, with a look at Bob 
 Rountree, which, whether intended or accidental, sent the hot 
 blood into the apprentice's cheeks. " And how do crows get 
 on the grand jury? The flinging of this stone was meant to 
 kill more than one bird. It was a stab at the Dutch Store. 
 Is not Mr. Barnes the foreman of the grand jury? " 
 
 "He is no longer! " exclaimed a bystander, who had just 
 arrived from the court house. '' I myself heard the judge 
 excuse him from further service." 
 
 "Aha! " cried the Dutch merchant, energetically rubbing 
 his hands. "The crow! Indeed, a crow won't scratch out 
 another crow's eyes! ',' 
 
 " But that is no reason why he should withdraw from the 
 grand jury," Mr. Miller remarked. " I rather guess, that he 
 is ashamed of the company he linds himself in. Jeffreys is 
 smart enough not to be In the way of the sheriff, if that officer 
 should have a writ for him." 
 
 "You may be right," the Mynheer responded, his eyes 
 twitching nervously. " Mr. Barnes has cause to be asliamed 
 of himself. And we have a rule in our countr}^, which prob- 
 ably holds good in America, never to liang a man before you 
 (^at(^h him. — So, you think, tlie shive-driver is out of the way ? ' ' 
 
THE GENESIS OF rUBLIC OPIXION. 183 
 
 "Quite certain," Bob Rountree asserted, eoiilidi'iitially. 
 '' Jeffreys is the man to save his hide, if there's danger al)()ut ; 
 and I reckon that he is perfectly well aware that the climate 
 of Brookfield, just now. is rather unliealthy for him. The 
 perjured villain I " 
 
 '' Now, what mought be //o/v- objection ag'in Jeffreys, 
 young man?" asked one of the bystanders, regarding Bob 
 with a show of simple curiositv. 
 
 "Has he not sworn a false oath?" retaliated Bol>, with 
 superb indignation. " Has he not sworn that my father, the 
 sheriff, — and I should like to know who is the man that for a 
 moment doubts the integrity of my father! — took a brilje to 
 pack the grand jury with friends of his — " 
 
 "And with enemies of the Dutch Store," the Mynheer 
 interjected. 
 
 "And with enemies of the Dutch Store," Bol) accepted 
 the suggestion, blushing but evincing not the smallest embar- 
 rassment, " and intimated, that I had helj)ed hiin — // " 
 
 It was remarkable, that the * zeal with which the fdially 
 minded son espoused the cause of his absent father, did not 
 meet with enthusiastic applause on the part of the honest 
 backwoodsmen. Probably the presence of the Dutch mer- 
 chant, Avho had not yet expressed his views, prevented an 
 unrestrained demonstration of apjn'oval of the youngster's 
 chivalrous conduct. At any rate, there was significant silence, 
 broken, linally, by the same voice that had been heard before. 
 
 " Ya-as," he assented, " he did intimate that purty strong. 
 'Pears to me, howsomever, 'at 'e testified to tliat 'ere p'int 
 ag'in 'is will, 'e wriggled an' squirmed like as if 'e'd been 
 stretched on a rack. That 'ere lawyer Bedford 's a boss hand 
 to put the thumbscrews on a contrary witness, an' make 'im 
 confess »///// irilly." 
 
 " But 't warn't Bedford 'at made 'im scpit-al,"" remarked 
 another. "Fact is, 'at all the hard ipiestions 'at made 'im 
 sweat was put in the lawyer's head l)y that 'ere voung 
 May." 
 
184 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 '■' From which 1 reckon," observed tlie former speaker, " 'at 
 Leslie May knows more 'n' tlie lawyer does 'bout that 'ere 
 scrape. An' I kind'er guess, 'at 'e knows more'n's comfort- 
 able fur tliem 'at 's had their linger in the pie. Au' I shouldn't 
 l)e a mite astonished, if there's bills found ag'in more "n one 
 on 'em, 'fore this 'ere scrape 's seen to the end." 
 
 More than one pair of eyes rested on tlie son who had so 
 valiantly defended his father's integrity, and the latter felt 
 called on to make answer to the last remark, as if addressed to 
 him personally. " ^^'llat do I know about it! " he exclaimed, 
 with great show of indignation. " 1 only know, that Jeffreys 
 lied about everything he said. He lied about Victor ; and he 
 lied about me." 
 
 Bob seemed to feel that the one sound ey(^ of his chief 
 rested upon him, for he cast his eyes down, and thereafter 
 participated very sparingly in the further conversation. But 
 the theme was too inviting to the gossip loving idlers congre- 
 gated in the store, and Bob's ingenuity in parrying the curi- 
 osity of eager interlocutors -Nvas put to a severe test. Victor 
 had become silent. His thoughts were busy over the painful 
 riddle, what it was that could have induced his young col- 
 league to join hands with Jeffreys in the attempt to ruin him. 
 Could it be that his employer Avas right, — that this animosity 
 arose from sheer hatred of foreigners and ill-will against un- 
 welcome competition ? 
 
 The entrance into the store of young May himself produced 
 a lull in the conversation. But lief ore a minute had passed, 
 some one asked him point blank, what he thought of yester- 
 day's trial. This was but the precursor to a torrent of ques- 
 tions. With admirable tact the young man replied so as not 
 to offend the sovereign voters, and yet without disclosing a 
 single fact not already known to them, or giving the slightest 
 clue to the source of his knowledge. 
 
 " I come to you with a request," he said to Mynheer, as 
 soon as he had gracefully shaken off his inquisitive interlocu- 
 tors, " which, 1 hope you will not refuse me. 1 wish you to 
 
TIJE GENESIS OF PUBLIC OriNION. 185 
 
 spare me oiii- young friend, the lion of the day, for an hour's 
 Avallv, as I have some matters that 1 would like to talk over 
 Avitli him." And without waiting for a reply, he addressed 
 Victor: '■ You are ready to come with me, are you not? " 
 
 Of course, Victor gladly put on his straw hat, and after a 
 gracious nod of assent from his I'mployer, took the arm of his 
 friend and left the store with him, to the very evident disap- 
 pointment of the gossips, and eliciting a scowl from the re- 
 maining apprentice. 
 
 •' First of all, let me heartily thank you, in the name of my 
 father, for the signal service you have done him," said 
 Leslie, as soon as they had gained the open air and were 
 be^'ond ear-shot of tlie loungers in the store. '' I dare say 
 that you are hanlly aware of the extent to which you have 
 helped liim in the election, and how much his prospects have 
 improved since yesterday's affair at the court house. Why, 
 it was a perfect ovation to liim that resulted from your ac- 
 quittal I The unmasking of that villain, Jeffreys, set the 
 public wild, and gained their favor naturally, as if the gov- 
 ernor, and not you, had l)een the hero. Although you and I 
 know better, yet he will get all the credit for, and the profit 
 of, this thing. You do not grudge him the laurels he is stealing 
 from 3'ou, do you? " 
 
 Victor threw a glance of such radiant admiration and deep 
 gratitude at his companion, that it proclaimed more eloquently 
 than words what black ingratitude he Avould deem such a 
 thought. " drudge him, I? " he stammered. " What have / 
 done in this matter, that a'ou should for a moment think of 
 me in connection with your father's triumph? To _?/o*r, Les- 
 lie, to you alone, does he owe his success, if you call that 
 success, which is but the spontaneous recognition on the part 
 of the people of his rectitude." 
 
 His voice trembled as he spoke. "'But tell me, Leslie," 
 he continued, after a short pause, "how was it possible for 
 you to detect and tear t(^ pieces the tissue of lies sworn to l)y 
 Jeffreys? What did you know of the conspirac}" — for it must 
 
186 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 have been a regular coiis[)iracy between them — and why did 
 you never say anything to nie about it? " 
 
 " Well, you see, my boy," said Leslie, very complacently, 
 " the fiat has gone forth from the family powers that be, that I 
 am to be a lawyer, to gain renown and shed luster upon the 
 family, at the bar. You, though unknown to yourself, hap- 
 pened to be my first client. I could not wish for a more grate- 
 ful one. That Payton and Jones have not much love for you, 
 you may have surmised from your experience Avith them at the 
 grammar school ; and I know it, perhajDS, better than you do. 
 Nor is it a secret to you, that Bob Rountree is in danger of 
 succuml)ing to jaundice, out of sheer envy of your popularity. 
 What a row there has been between that scoundrel Jeffreys 
 and the governor, you know equally well. So, you under- 
 stand, it required no superhuman brilliance of intellect, but 
 only a moderate share of very conunon sense to guess what the 
 bond of sympathy was that l)rought these four worthies to- 
 gether. And when they got into a corner at a public festival, 
 and whispered among themselves in secret, — when one of 
 them, whose father is sheriff, and selects the grand jury, un- 
 dertakes to predict what indictments may be expected from 
 them, even before they have been summoned — then, you see, 
 I would be a poor stick for a lawyer indeed, if I failed to 
 smell so big a rat. Don't you think so? " 
 
 " I can only admire your keen sagacity ! " Victor exclaimed. 
 
 " So you think I need not be ashamed of my lirst attempt 
 at playing lawyer? " 
 
 " How can you ask such a question ! Do you not think that 
 I know, how far superior you are to Mr. Bedford as a lawyer? 
 If it had not been for your prompting, he would never have 
 gotten the better of Jeffreys — ' ' 
 
 " No, by Jove! " Leslie interrupted. " And do you know, 
 that I take greater credit to myself for having spoilt your 
 precious colleague's cunning scheme of ruining you by his 
 hypocritical [jrofessions of sympathy for you ? If Bedford had 
 given him the chance, by undertaking to cross-examine him. 
 
THE GENESIS OF PUBLIC OPINION. 187 
 
 the littlo scoundivl would have given the most incriminating 
 evidence, doubly damaging because he would liave given it the 
 appearance of being extorted from liim liy the counsel fov the 
 defense." 
 
 " I don't believe that Mr. Yancey himself, or any lawyer in 
 the State, will equal your fame, when once you Ijegin the 
 practice in earnest. Ah, Avhat a grand and noble thing it is, 
 to vindicate the hiw, to tear off the mask of treacherous vil- 
 lainy, to punish the guilty and protect the innocent, — to be- 
 come the valiant champion of Truth and Justice ! How I 
 envy you this glory, l)ut wish you success, all the same, from 
 the bottom of my heart I ' ' 
 
 Leslie regarded his companion in wondering surprise at the 
 enthusiasm displayed. '' AVhy," lie said, after a brief pause, 
 "you talk as if you thought tlie profession of the law to be 
 one of the grandest avocations of man. If that were my con- 
 viction, 1 would, in your place, drop the counter-hopper at 
 once, and become a disciple of Blackstone." 
 
 "Oh, if that were possible!" Victor exclaimed eagerly. 
 " It would be the happiness of my life ; but," he added with 
 a sad smile of resignation, " where should the means come 
 from to enable me to study law? And how could I dare enter 
 on a course of study presupposing a liberal education, such as 
 I never enjoyed? " 
 
 " You have an exaggerated notion of the learning necessary 
 to a lawyer," said Leslie. " A little Latin, of course, would 
 come handy. It is by no means indispensable, though. With 
 your patience, and your love for the driest kind of studies — 
 for did you not undertake to study grammar without a mas- 
 ter? — you will acquire a -better knoAvledge of law in a year or 
 two, than I have now, with all my University education. If 
 you are really in earnest about it, you will catch up with and 
 beat me in a very short time." 
 
 Leslie's words profoundly impressed Victor. The two young- 
 men walked on for a while in silence. They had taken the 
 road leading to May Meadows, and had now reac^hed a pleasant 
 
188 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 grove of trees affording grateful shelter against the scorching 
 sun, when Victor was startled from his reverv l)y a voice 
 breaking abruptly upon his ear. 
 
 " AVhither l)Ound, gentlemen both? " 
 
 Looking u}), he saw before him the gaunt, lean ligure of ]Mr. 
 Iluffanl, tlie editor and ])roprietor of the fharlx Anjiis, — a 
 gentleman, for whom Victor entertained the greatest respect, 
 as ]»eing the leader and mouthi)iece of public opinion and the 
 oracle of the Democratic i)arty of Vernal County. ]Mr. 
 Iluffard was not a beautiful Adonis ; but from his rather long, 
 sallow face, framed in by bushy brown whiskers and sporting 
 a large, thin-liiiped mouth surmounted 1)V a iirominent nose, a 
 l)air of clear brown eyes beamed forth the utmost good nature, 
 their merry twinkle often heightening the effect of facetious 
 drolleries that he loved to utter with gravest mien. 
 
 " If May Meadows be your destination," he continued, 
 afb'r amiably shaking hands with both the young men, " I beg 
 to make one of your company, — that is, of course, if I don't 
 make a crowd thereby. 1 have some business with Colonel 
 May, touching his campaign ; but this fortunate falling in with 
 you, young gentlemen, may enable me to kill two birds witli 
 one stone. For I need some details and particulars to com- 
 plete my report of the phenomenal trial of yesterday. The 
 Ozar'k Aiyjus^'' he continued, addressing himself specially to 
 Victor, "will claim the merit of first heralding to the world 
 this highly important event. Yes, sirree ! A highly impor- 
 tant event! I venture to predict, that this remarkable trial 
 will open the eyes of our brethren in Yankeeland to the true 
 status of public opinion in the South. , For our State is reck- 
 oned among the Southern States, although, geographically 
 considered, we belong to the great West, — and our Eastern 
 brethren are systematically stirred up against us on that 
 account. Our slaves, though better off than the white slaves 
 of the Eastern factories, are held up to the world as the vic- 
 tims of cruelty and tyranny. We art> ac(nised, 1)y tlu> hypo- 
 
Whither bound, gcutk'iueu Ixjth? " 
 
THE GENESIS OF PUBLIC OriNION. 180 
 
 critical abolitionists, as savages, suppressing free speech and 
 nianufacturiug public opinion in the interest of our slave- 
 holders. We are branded as barliarians, clogging the onward 
 march of civilization, and constituting a foul spot on the fair 
 escutcheon of Liberty. Now the outcome of your trial will 
 prove to every fair-minded person, that the reverse of all this 
 is true of our State. It will throw a flood of light on the 
 tolerant views of our population. It Avill incontestably dem- 
 onstrate the incorruptible sense of justice prevailing in our 
 courts, and controlling our public men ; and it will show the 
 humanity and mildness with which we treat our slaves." 
 
 Victor listened, not without interest, to the rhapsodies of 
 the garrulous editor, while Leslie smiled at the rehearsal of 
 what he evidently meant for a leader in his next issue of the 
 Ozark Ar(jas. 
 
 The editor, after exhausting the political aspect of the case, 
 then connnented on the persons engaged in it, and now devel- 
 oped a most astonishing curiosity touching the past history of 
 Victor, his plans and prospects ; and particularly inquired 
 about his opinions and views concerning American politics. 
 Led on by a few suggestive remarks l)y Leslie, Victor gave a 
 comprehensive statement of the prominent events of his life, 
 and soon found himself defending, to his own astonishment, 
 the political, social and civil institutions of the laud of his 
 adoption, including the legal status of the slaves, which, a 
 short time ago, he looked on as a foul blot on the country. 
 Mr. Huffard liked his genuinely democratic principles, and 
 Leslie jocosely prophesied for hhn a successful career as a 
 democratic jjolitician, who was born for greater things than 
 to figure as an insignificant counter-hopper. 
 
 While engaged in such conversation, they reached May 
 
 ■ Meadows, where they were pleasantly received by the lady 
 
 of the house, I)ut learned to Victor's keen regret, that Colonel 
 
 May had departed from home a short time before their arrival. 
 
 The edit(n' received this information with equanimity, although 
 
190 THE REBEL\S DAUGHTER. 
 
 he had thus been disappointed of the chief purpose of his 
 ostensible errand. Not so Victor. He not only regretted the 
 absence of the Colonel, but the restlessness with which he 
 looked about him, and the wistful glances he directed toward 
 the open door and window, plainly betrayed that he missed the 
 presence of some one else also. To add to his disappointment, 
 the editor promptly declined the invitation extended to both of 
 them to remain for dinner ; and since neither Mrs. May nor 
 Leslie extended a special invitation to himself, he was compelled 
 to comply, — reluctantly enough — with the urgent request of 
 the loquacious editor, to accompany him back to town. His 
 friend Leslie contented himself, somewhat to Victor's surprise, 
 with a polite expression of regret at the departure of both the 
 gentlemen ; and so he found liimself , a few minutes after his 
 arrival, exchanging the pleasant, cool atmosphere of the 
 elegant May mansion for tlie oppressive glare of the July sun 
 without. 
 
 He was a poor listener, and but slow in his responses to the 
 numerous questions propounded by his talkative companion, 
 and suddenly ceased to answer altogether, when a musical 
 voice resounded through the garden. That was Nellie's room 
 whence the voice was heard, and he promptly stopped to listen. 
 There, at the window of Nellie's room, he saw a graceful female 
 figure. But the eyes that beamed upon him from a face of 
 wondrous beauty, and slowly sank before his eager gaze, were 
 not the clear, gray, mirthful eyes he loved so well, but of 
 gazelle-like softness in their dreamy expression. The sudden 
 flush of his cheeks died out, and he bethought himself of the 
 necessity of disarming any suspicion that his abstraction 
 might have aroused on the part of Mr. Huffard, liy a closer 
 attention to his questions. 
 
 The next issue of the Ozark Argns, which appeared on the 
 Saturday following, gave Victor the key to Leslie's purpose in 
 taking him out for that walk, as well as to the meaning of that 
 
THE GENESIS OF PUBLIC OPINION. 191 
 
 accidental meeting; with the inquisitive editor. The political 
 side of the " Organ for Art, Science and Literature " shone 
 now in the zenith of its power and glory. As the Democratic 
 party proclaimed the gospel of Liberty, so its self-appointed 
 Avatchmau on the battlement of the party had all its hundred 
 eyes wide open to what was going on, and bravely sounded 
 the tocsin calling the warriors to their tents, and marshaling 
 them in battle against political heresies and traitors. The 
 burden of its latest trumpet-blasts was Victor's famous trial. 
 At the head of the paper appeared a double-headed leader, 
 introduced by sensational head-lines in glaring capitals, in 
 which Mr. Huffard undertook to give voice to public senti- 
 ment on this important event. As an introduction to the facts 
 developed in the trial, there was a biographical sketch of 
 Victor Waldhorst's previous life, with special emphasis on his 
 exploit in saving the life of the daughter of the democratic 
 candidate for Congress. That this gentleman, moved by the 
 generous and noble sentiment of gratitude, exerted himself to 
 rescue the young man from the peril of becoming the victim of 
 a diabolical conspii'acy on the part of his political opponents, 
 discovered in the nick of time by the watchful energy of the 
 young lady's brother — the talented sou of Colonel May — 
 that by the combined exertions of father and son a most das- 
 tardly scheme was successfully bafHed, was, the editor ob- 
 served, but natural, and no more than was to be expected 
 from the highly honorable and capable gentleman, who, in vin- 
 dicating the cause of innocence and justice, demonstrated, 
 also, that Honesty, Fairness and Love of Liberty were Demo- 
 cratic Virtues, leaving low trickery and vile treachery to be 
 sought for among the opponents of this glorious party. Then 
 followed, in equally pompous phrases, an exposition of the 
 national-political bearing of the affair, much as Mr. Huffard 
 had foreshadowed in his conversation with Victor. 
 
 It was, perhaps, not strange, that the young man permitted 
 himself, in the flush of his triumph and the exultation induced 
 
192 
 
 THE BEDEL'S DAUGlITEll 
 
 by the lionizing tliat fell to his lot, to lie all too easily con- 
 vinced of the groundlessness and injustice of his prejudice 
 against a community that tolerated slavery as one of its cher- 
 ished institutions, and to conceive an exalted opinion of the 
 magnanimity and liberality of its people. The utterance of 
 public opinion was so emphatically ou his side, — the side of 
 Right and Justice, as Victor proudly thought — that it was 
 dhtlcult to doubt the honesty of its expression. 
 
XIII. 
 
 SOVEREIGNS IN PRIMORDIAL QUALE. 
 
 HE Democratic party might safely count on a decided 
 majority in Vernal County. In the town of Brook- 
 ^'^ field, however, and that part of the adjacent country 
 which was included in its electoral precinct, the political parties 
 were very evenly balanced ; the natui'al consequence of which 
 was, that discussions of the principles dividing them, as well 
 as concerning the prospects for success of their respective 
 candidates, were both numerous and animated, growing in 
 vehemence as the election day drew nearer, Victor took a 
 lively interest in these discussions, a due share of which were 
 carried on in the Dutch Store, and soon learned enough of the 
 current phrases employed by the disputants to enable him to 
 participate in the debates. He felt himself drawn into the 
 vortex of political strife with irresistible force ; for to the 
 purely personal motive inspiring him with the desire to see 
 that party victorious that had selected as their standard-bearer 
 his patron. Colonel May, was superadded tlie firm conviction, 
 that upon the triumph of democratic principles depended 
 the welfare of the nation. Inflamed by the eloquence of 
 Colonel May's speeches, he eagerly drank in the doctrines 
 asserted weekly by the Ozark Argus, and more logically main- 
 tained in the political pamphlets with which his democratic 
 friends freely supplied him. He was still in that happ}^ period 
 of life, when faith in the attainability of a cherished ideal is 
 yet undimmed by the skepticism, which is but too often the 
 bitter fruit of experience ; he entertained the fond conviction, 
 that the dogmata of the Democratic party contained the catholic 
 basis of Freedom indispensable to the liberty and prosperity 
 
 13 (193) 
 
194 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 of the couutry. What wonder, then, that he looked upon the 
 adversaries of this glorious party as enemies of true liberty, — 
 that he deemed the conscious leaders of the whigs to be traitors 
 to the cause of the people, and firmly believed it to be the duty 
 of every patriot to contribute his best efforts to open the eyes 
 of their deluded followers ? 
 
 Earnestly did Victor devote himself to the faithful perform- 
 ance of this sacred duty, — so earnestly, that he came to be 
 looked on as a staunch champion of their cause by his party 
 friends, and that the opposition considered him a youthful 
 enthusiast, who would one day when his judgment matured, 
 learn better ; — so earnestly that his zeal, sometimes, to the 
 disgust of his employer, carried him away to the extent of 
 neg-lecting his duties to the customers at the store. 
 
 On the first Monday of the month of August the two parties 
 arrayed themselves, throughout the State, for the decisive 
 battle. And in Brookfield the rival mercantile establishments 
 prepared for an arduous day's work. At an early hour, the 
 doors and windows were opened for ventilation during the pro- 
 cess of dusting and sweeping, so as to be ready to serve the 
 multitude of customers expected. For it was the custom of 
 voters, who came to town on election day for the exercise of 
 their sovereign prerogative, to improve the occasion to barter 
 for and purchase what store-goods were wanted at home. Even 
 in the liquor shop (styled grocery by its frequenters, — prob- 
 ably as a euphonism for groggery) down by the Boonville 
 Road, a fresh supply of whiskey had been laid in, for there, 
 too, an increased demand was anticipated, based upon the 
 experience of former years, when patriotic candidates exercised 
 a generous hospitality in regaling their friends, and the whip- 
 pers-in of both parties repaired thither to encourage their ad- 
 herents, infuse new spirit into the llagging and luke-warm, 
 and gain new converts by lavish shaking of hands, cajoling 
 speech and free drinks all round. 
 
 The court house, however, formed the center of attraction 
 on election daj'. Hither streamed the sovereigns from all 
 
SOVEREIGNS IN PRIMOIiDIAL QUALE. 195 
 
 points of^the compass to make known their sovereign pleasure 
 at the polls. Before the sun had gilded the horizon, the 
 judges of election appeared with their clerks, each of whom 
 carried a gigantic poll-book with columns for the candidates 
 and lines ruled for the names of the voters. These books 
 were deposited upon a table standing directly in front of one of 
 the windows, through which the process of voting was effected. 
 No one was admitted into this room but the judges and clerks ; 
 but on the outside, opposite to the window, stood candidates 
 and their friends, to Ivcep watchful eye on what was going on. 
 As soon as the first rays of the sun became visible, au officer 
 appeared to swear in the judges and clerks, and then the 
 sheriff made proclamation that the election for (naming the 
 offices that were to be filled) had been legally inaugurated. 
 
 During the early morning hours the throng of customers in 
 the stores was not so great as was expected to be the case later 
 in the day, and Victor readily obtained permission to satisfy 
 his curiosity by witnessing the proceedings at the ballot-box. 
 The word ballot-box, it should be remembered, being used in a 
 figurative sense ; for in these early days men were supposed to 
 be willing to have it known for whom they voted, so that it 
 was the fashion of the voters to call out the names of the men 
 of their choice viva voce., and there were no literal ballots, nor 
 ballot-boxes. Victor was very glad to meet his friend Leslie 
 in front of the court house, and at once asked him to exj^lain 
 the process by which elections were accomplished. 
 
 "Nothing more simple! " said Leslie. "But wait a mo- 
 ment. I see your particular friend Ralph Fayton trotting 
 toward this place. He has recently reached his majority and 
 is about to cast his maiden vote. We will have a practical 
 illustration of the whole thing directly." 
 
 Young Payton seemed deeply impressed with the responsi- 
 bility resting on his shoulders as a citizen of the Rei^ublic, 
 about to decide its political future. He tied his horse to one 
 of the many hitching posts provided for such occasions, and 
 stepped pompously toward the group of men assembled in 
 
196 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 front of the window, acknowledging Leslie's and Victor's 
 salutation with a hearty nod. 
 
 "You see," whispered Leslie to his friend, " he is almost 
 as proud in giving his first vote, as he was on the memorable 
 occasion of his maiden speech at the barbecue. I wonder 
 whether he will carry his spite against us to the extent of 
 voting for the opposition man ; he and his whole family have 
 always claimed to be democrats." 
 
 " I have no fear as to that," said his friend. " It is only 
 I whom he hates." 
 
 As if to confirm these words Payton now stepped forward 
 and expressed his hope to Leslie — completely ignoring the 
 presence of Victor — that Colonel May would be elected by a 
 sweeping majority. " I am most happy," he added with 
 pomposity, " that it is my privilege to cast my first vote for 
 so eminent a gentleman, and one so entirely worthy of the 
 honor." 
 
 " I thank you, Ralph Payton," said Leslie, cordially shaking 
 hands with Payton. " And I am sure that my father is proud 
 of the high honor you confer upon him." Then, casting a 
 rapid glance at Victor, he continued with a smile: "Mr. 
 Waldhorst here is anxious to be initiated into the mystery by 
 which American freemen make known their will. I am sure 
 that he will be thankful to you, if you will permit him to 
 witness the recording of your vote. Will you gratify his 
 desire? " 
 
 " Since the act of voting is a public one," said Ralph Pay- 
 ton, not deigning to cast even a look at Victor, " I cannot 
 hinder him from looking on." With these words he stepped 
 in front of the window and spoke his name in a loud voice. 
 
 "Ralph Payton! " one of the judges repeated, and the 
 clerks entered the name on the poll books. " Your age? " 
 
 " One-and-twenty years and over!" was the reply. 
 
 ' ' Residence ? ' ' 
 
 " Clear Spring Township ; Vernal County." 
 
 " Citizen? " 
 
SOVEREIGNS IN FlilMOIWIAL QUALE. 197 
 
 " Natural born citizeu of the Uuited States, and also citizen 
 of this State." 
 
 " Then, Ralph Pay ton, for whom do you vote as your rep- 
 resentative in the Congress of the United States ? ' ' 
 
 " I vote for Leonard May! " the young citizen proclaimed 
 with a proud consciousness that Victor envied him. 
 
 The judge repeated the question in respect of every office 
 that was to be voted for, and when Pay ton had answered the 
 last of these questions, he stepped aside to make room for 
 other voters. 
 
 Victor had watched the proceedings with great interest. 
 " How simple ! " he exclaimed, when it was all over. 
 
 " Our young friend has discovered a profound truth," spoke 
 Mr. Huffard, who had just approached, extending one hand 
 toward Leslie, the other to Pay ton, while his eyes rested on 
 Victor. " The grandest and most beautiful things are the 
 most simple. And what can be grander or more beautiful, 
 than the power of an American citizen, exercising his 
 sovereignty in so simple and efficient a manner? — But 
 how goes the election?" he continued, turning to Leslie; 
 " and why is not your father here to watch and protect his 
 interest ? ' ' 
 
 "He left last night for Bolivar, where his presence is 
 deemed to be of greater importance than here," Leslie replied. 
 " He is foolish enough to believe, that I am sufficiently able to 
 keep things right side up at home." Then, noting that Payton 
 had sauntered off to join a group of men engaged in lively 
 discussion, he continued in a subdued voice, " Between our- 
 selves, I really believe the governor is right. From the cir- 
 cumstance that even Payton voted for him, I infer, that he 
 will poll the full party vote here in Brookfield, with a fair 
 share of support from the wliigs. Old Waddle looks savage 
 enough, which augurs well for our side." 
 
 " Your father knew what he was about when he confided his 
 interest to your keeping," said the editor, slapping the young 
 man's shoulders with an admiring smile. " You dealt a stun- 
 
198 THE BE BE US DAUGHTER. 
 
 niiig blow against the old fox by getting that trial over before 
 the election. That piece of engineering does you credit, 
 whether as a politician, or as a lawyer. But I never doubted 
 Ralph Payton's loyalty to the party. The Pay tons are de- 
 scended from an old Virginia family, with whom desertion of 
 party was always looked on as treacherous. To be sure, he 
 strayed wildly in his absurd speech about foreigners and 
 foreign influence, on the Fourth of July ; it puzzles me to 
 account for his vagaries on that occasion. He is a young 
 man, however, and has time before him to learn a great deal." 
 
 " You may be right, Mr. Huffard," said Leslie, " as well in 
 regard to his pai'ty fealty, as also in surmising that he may have 
 nuich to learn. As to his hatred of foreigners, I suspect that 
 it does not extend very far. It is purely personal, and springs 
 from an experience he passed through at the grammar class — . 
 But look! There is old Jones and his hopeful cub of a son. 
 Doesn't the old man look as if he had already done a good 
 day's work over at Burden's doggery? They are coming to 
 vote, it seems. Now, I'll stake a five-dollar bill of the State 
 Bank against a picayune, that they — or is Orlando too young 
 to have a vote? — that the old man, at least, will vote against 
 my father." 
 
 LesUe's surmise was correct. If his offer of a wager had 
 been accepted, he would have been a richer man by the 
 picayune, for the two Joneses passed them with sullen faces, 
 and the father voted, with great ostentation, for the whig 
 Waddle, while the rest of the candidates were selected by him 
 from the democratic ticket. Orlando, who had meanwhile 
 carried on a lively conversation with Ralph Pay ton, in low 
 voice, but accompanied by animated gesticulation, then stepped 
 up to the window and gave his name. When the usual ques- 
 tion as to age was put, Leslie regarded him with an eye of 
 keen scrutiny. The answer came hesitatingly, and in a low 
 voice. "Twenty-one — " 
 
 " Hold! " exclaimed Leslie, noticing the blush that mounted 
 to Orlando's face. He approached young Jones with the 
 
SOVEREIGNS IN miMOBDIAL QUALE. 199 
 
 obvious intention of interfering with his vote. But before he 
 reached him, the old man stepped between them. 
 
 " Stand off, Leslie May! " he exclaimed in a loud threat- 
 ening voice. " Me boy's jist as good a right yere, as you,' or 
 any o' yer kith and kin, if ye do think yer got the vote o' 
 Brookfield in yer pocket. Me boy, as did 'is father before 
 'im, 's goin' to throw the weight o' 'is influence ag'in a purse- 
 proud dimigogue, an' a renigade 'at's sold 'imself body an' 
 soul to a trucklin' furr'ner. Go ahead, Orlando." 
 
 "I don't believe the young man is of age," said Leslie 
 quietly. 
 
 " But I know 'e is ! " Jones shouted with great vehemence. 
 " An' I guess I ought ter know, bein's I'm 'is father! " 
 
 " I would believe your son in preference to yourself," Leslie 
 replied, " even after the specimen I saw of his caliber in testi- 
 fying, a few days ago. If he thinks that he has a right to 
 vote, let him swear to it." 
 
 Instead of replying to Leslie, Jones now turned to the 
 judges of election. "Do we live in a free country, or don't 
 we? " he exclaimed with pomjjous declamation. " Does the 
 law protect a free American citizen, or don't it? Has a voter 
 any rights, or not? Or are we vassals an' slaves o' this 'ere 
 furr'n influence 'at wants to dictate to a free American who 
 sh'll be 'lowed to vote an' who shan't? I demand the protec- 
 tion o' the law, an' I demand it o' you, an' I sh'll hold you 
 responsible." 
 
 "The law is to be administered without fear, favor or 
 affection! " said the officiating judge. " Who is it that chal- 
 lenges this man's right to vote? " 
 
 "I!" answered Leslie, "I doubt that he is twenty -one 
 years old." 
 
 " In such case the law provides, that the challenged party 
 shall prove his right by an oath on the Holy Bible," the judge 
 announced. "Are you ready to swear to your age young 
 man? " 
 
 Orlando changed color, and threw a precatory glance in the 
 
200 THE BEBEU8 DA UGH TEE. 
 
 direction of his father. Meeting with no sympathy in this 
 quarter, the young man assumed an air of injured innocence 
 and spoke up, in a voice of defiant swagger, " I am not going 
 to f?tand it, to be treated like a lying scoundrel ! If they won't 
 let me vote without swearing, I'm not going to vote at all." 
 
 His loud voice attracted attention among the by-standers. 
 A little crowd gathered, among whom Mr. Waddle, the whig 
 candidate for Congress, stood conspicuous. Jones the elder 
 at once addressed him in excited tones. 
 
 " Mr. Waddle, things be a-comin' to a purty pass, when an 
 American citizen can't be 'lowed to vote, if 'e means to vote 
 fur you ! " 
 
 " Oh, it is not as bad as that, is it? " Mr. Waddle said, 
 looking encouragingly at Mr. Jones. " I know the judges to 
 be honest, worthy men ; surely, they will allow no one to be 
 deprived of his constitutional rights. Tell me, what has 
 happened? " 
 
 " You are perfectly right, Mr. Waddle," Leslie May put in, 
 before Jones had an opportunity to reply. " Our friend Jones 
 is excited, because I have challenged his son's right to vote. 
 I will leave it to you, Mr. Waddle : Is it the duty of the judges 
 to take the oath of a man whose vote is challenged? " 
 
 Mr. Waddle, a rather tall, though somewhat slender man, 
 with gray hair and whiskers and smoothly shaven chin, seized 
 the hand of Leslie, frankly extended to him, and gave it a 
 hearty shake. " Ah," he said, smiling significantly, " the 
 son of my opponent seems to be pretty sure of his case, since 
 he leaves it to myself to decide. I might well decline the 
 proffered honor, on the score of being directly interested in 
 the question to be decided ; but you are a sly fox : you put me 
 on my honor to decide, if at all possible, in favor of my highly 
 esteemed rival. And so you doubt the majority of the young 
 man? May I inquire, upon what you base your doubt? " 
 
 " Look at him a little more closely; perhaps the reason will 
 occur to you as readily as it does to me," Leslie smilingly 
 I'eplied. 
 
SOVEREIGNS IN rBIMOIWIAL QUALE. 201 
 
 Orlando Jones was evidently ill at ease. He still stood in 
 front of the window, with sullen mien and downcast eyes, 
 when Waddle turned toward him. 
 
 " Well," he said, " I see a very good-looking young man 
 before me ; and I am proud to learn that he intends to cast his 
 vote for me ; 1 really do not see why he should not be twenty- 
 one years old. What do you say yourself, my young friend? 
 You surely ought to know your own age? " 
 
 " I say, that I am not going to have my word doubted in 
 this infamous way I " Orlando exclaimed in a tone of bravado 
 and defiance. "I have already said, that if they won't let 
 me vote without swearing, I am not going to vote at all." 
 
 " I can well understand how you feel about this matter, 
 young man," said Waddle, in a voice of fatherly admonition. 
 ' ' But you are not altogether in the right. The electoral fran- 
 chise is not only the glorious privilege of a freeman, but also a 
 sacred duty. A true American knows his rights ; and knowing 
 dare maintain them." 
 
 The crowd of by-standers had been considerably augmented 
 by this time ; the curiosity of the sovereigns was aroused to a 
 high pitch, to learn the outcome of the interesting dispute. 
 No one listened more earnestly than Victor, into whose ear 
 Leslie whispered : ' ' The sly old coon is going to draw it a 
 little too fine, this time. He means to impress the crowd with 
 .a notion of his high sense of honor and impartiality, without 
 losing Orlando's vote. But you will see him sit down between 
 two chairs directly." 
 
 " Come, young man, don't let the rest of the voters wait 
 all day for their turn," the judge now urged. "Tell us, 
 whether you are going to swear or not, and make room for 
 others." 
 
 " Then why don't you take 'is vote? " old Jones exclaimed. 
 " He stands there all the while fur ye to take 'is vote." 
 
 " Exactly! " Waddle said. "If no one proves him to be 
 under age, it is his privilege — I may say his duty — to cast 
 his vote." 
 
202 THE REBEL'S D AUGHT EB. 
 
 The judge of election looked at the candidate in evident sur- 
 prise. "I don't so understand the law," he said, hesitat- 
 ingly, — embarrassed, evidently, by differing from such high 
 authority as the whig candidate for Congress. " As I take it, 
 it's for the voter whose right is challenged to prove it by his 
 oath on the Bible, I don't pretend to be learned in the law, as 
 you are. General; but I'm bound. to act on my understanding 
 of it." 
 
 While the judge consulted with his colleagues on the point, 
 the dispute was taken up by the crowd outside. Some agreed 
 with the judge that had spoken, others asserted that it was the 
 young man's right to vote without being sworn. There was 
 perceptible unanimity of opinion among the democrats against, 
 and among the whigs in favor of the young man's right. The 
 judges themselves divided on the question; and since there 
 were two democrats and but one whig amongst them, the view 
 of the presiding judge prevailed, and Orlando was ruled to 
 either take the oath or leave the polls. To the disgust of his 
 father and the chagrin of General Waddle, the young man 
 chose the latter alternative, stepping aside with downcast eyes 
 and a sullen face. This ended the dispute officially ; but only 
 one-half of the sovereigns outside were convinced of the jus- 
 tice of the decision — the democrats lauding the wisdom of 
 the majority of the judges, while the whigs sympathized with 
 the elder Jones, who wrathfully prophesied the early downfall 
 of the Republic, and railed against the cowardly truckling to 
 foreign influence. 
 
 Victor was highly excited by what he had seen and heard. 
 He was so absorbed in the contemplation of the novel and 
 interesting scenes about him that he forgot all else, — forgot 
 about the densely crowded store, forgot how necessary Avas his 
 presence there on this day above all others. As the sun 
 mounted toward the zenith, the Square, particularly about the 
 court house, tilled with ever-increasing flocks of people, many 
 of whom gave evidence by their lively gesticulation and hilari- 
 ous conversation, of having already performed the pilgrimage 
 
SOVEREIGNS IN PBIMOBDIAL QUALE. 203 
 
 to the Mecca on the Boonville Road. The sober dignity that 
 had characterized the opening of the election day and produced 
 so solemn an effect on Victor, was gradually changing into 
 boisterousness, strongly reminding Victor of the closing scenes 
 at the barbecue after Van Braaken's whiskey had begun to do 
 its work. Leslie had left him, to look after his father's hiter- 
 ests at the groggery, and Mr. Waddle improved the oppor- 
 tunity of his absence from the polls to rally his own forces, 
 and impress upon them the necessity of united and determined 
 effort to avert defeat to the Whig party. He was soon sur- 
 rounded by a number of devoted followers. Victor was 
 shocked and mortified by their boasting assertions of perfect 
 success of their party generally, but especially of the moral 
 certainty of the election of their candidate for Congress. 
 
 " Ef it hadn't been fur that consarned ass of an overseer," 
 he heard one of them say, "we'd 'a' swept the county 
 clean ! ' ' 
 
 " Why, didn't he just show up the rottenness o' the demo- 
 crats? " was demanded by another. 
 
 "You're foolin' yeself thar' ! " was the emphatic reply. 
 " 'e jist showed up 'is own rottenness. Colonel May's made 
 more out'n that d — d trial 'n the best dozen o' stump speeches 
 'e ever made. Why, didn't I hear old Burden say, — 'n' 'e's 
 as stiff a whig as ever trod sole leather — 'at 'e was goin' to 
 vote fur 'im ? The d — d old dish-rag ! ' ' 
 
 " Ya-as," exclaimed another, " 'n Boyd! Didn't Squire 
 Boyd say, sez 'e, 'at 'e wasn't goin' to vote the whig ticket 
 any more, not 'thout the whigs was goin' to indict the grand 
 jury? " 
 
 ' ' Nonsense ! ' ' exclaimed Qeneral Waddle in a tone of con- 
 lident assurance; "don't you see, that for every whig that 
 votes for Colonel May on account of that fuss with his over- 
 seer, two democrats vaW vote against him ? There are two sides 
 to this thing. Some people mav think that the grand jury 
 overshot the mark by indicting a foolish boy ; but there are 
 more who heartily approve their watchfulness, and feel it to 
 
204 THE BEBEL\S DAUGHTER. 
 
 be their duty to come to the defense of this tiiue-houored in- 
 stitution. This is the feeling of all substantial, well-disposed 
 citizens. Be assured, my friends, that the honest majority of 
 the people will not stand by a man who resents the attempt 
 of his own servant to defend our firesides against servile insur- 
 rection by ignominous dismissal from his service." 
 
 ''Do you know, General, why the Colonel discharged his 
 overseer? " inquired Mr. Huffard, wlio had meanwhile ap- 
 proached the speaker. " It seems that you have not read the 
 report of the trial published in the ^irgns." 
 
 "You must excuse me, Mr. Huffard," the General retali- 
 ated, " if I find better employment for my time than to study 
 your, no doubt highly interesting paper. I get my views from 
 more reliable sources." 
 
 " Probably from the immaculate Jeff reys himself! " sneered 
 the editor. " What a pity, that your ' reliable ' witness left 
 the countiy for his country's good." 
 
 " There be other witness," Jones the elder now spoke up. 
 " We're not 'bleeged to put up with your say-so." 
 
 "Exactly," Mr. Huffard assented. " There, for instance, 
 is the young man himself, who was tried. Or," he added 
 with a significant glance at General Waddle, " who furnished 
 the pretext for a trial. Shall we hear what he has to say about 
 the case? " 
 
 " I don't see why I should take the testimony of a lad who, 
 so far as I know, is not old enough to vote, and whose testi- 
 mony was not admissible even at the trial." 
 
 "An' who's an outlandisli furr'ner! " added Jones, " 'at 
 understands 'bout as much of our institootions as a jackass 
 does of algebray ! ' ' 
 
 " Stick to the point," said the editor, without noticing 
 Jones' remark. " We are not in court just now, and here the 
 testimony of Mr. Waldhorst weighs as heavy as that of any 
 of the witnesses who were examined at that remarkable trial. 
 And there," he added, pointing to a group of men a|)proach- 
 ing tlie court house from the direction of the Boonville road. 
 
SOVEEEIGNS IN PRIMORDIAL QUALE. 205 
 
 " comes one whose comi)cteiu'y and veracity even you, General 
 Waddle, Avill not think of questioning." 
 
 In the midst of the group pointed out, Victor observed 
 Leslie in the company of Yahkop, the teamster, who was clad 
 in his Sunday best and strutted along with the air of a puffed 
 up turkey gobbler. Victor smiled, as he recalled Yahkop's 
 boast, that he would not only vote for Colonel May, but also 
 " lick " every one of his friends who would not do so likewise. 
 Yahkop seemed fully determined to redeem his promise. 
 
 The editor requested Leslie to correct the erroneous impres- 
 sions that might exist in respect of the affair with the overseer. 
 But the young politician adopted a different line of tactics. 
 
 " Oh, let us hear no more about that," he said, with a 
 smile and a significant glance at his father's opponent. 
 " We've had enough of it in court and on the stump. Let 
 us rather attend to the business of the day. I have brought 
 some citizens with me, who wish to do their duty to the coun- 
 try. Make way at the w^indow, there! " 
 
 Yahkop had probably been instructed as to what was ex- 
 pected of him at the polls ; for he stepped proudly forward 
 and gave his name as " Tshakop Fershter, mit a tshay in der 
 front." 
 
 The announcement caused some merriment among the by- 
 standers ; Mr. Jones, still wrothy over the discomfiture of his 
 son, and whose pugnacity had been fortified by frequent visits 
 that morning at the rum shop on the Boonville road, alone 
 saw cause for offense in the pompous swagger put on by the 
 clownish teamster. "What!" he cried excitedly, "D'ye 
 mean to let this lout have a vote, when you refused it to my 
 son — a native born American — 'at's been twice as long in the 
 country as this 'ere Hessian ! " 
 
 These words kindled the wrath of the teamster. " Tat Ish 
 an high lie!" he exclaimed. " I gums from Bahden — you 
 know vere ish Bahden ? Und I be a burger from Amerikah — 
 undershtand? Und I wotes fur mine frined, der Kurnel 
 May — undershtand you ? — ebery times ! ' ' 
 
206 THE BE BE US DAUGHTEB. 
 
 It is hardly probable that the irate teamster was aware of 
 the peculiar significance attached to the word Hessian in 
 America, and particularly among the backwoodsmen. But 
 this term, usually coupled wdth the predicate " blind," served 
 in his native laud as a contemptuous jeer and nickname, and 
 in this sense, in which Yahkop necessarily understood it, it 
 conveyed a galling insult to him, and his pugnacity was 
 heightened, no doubt, by the generous potations of whiskey, in 
 which he had indulged in honor of the day, until Leslie suc- 
 ceeded in coaxing him away from the rum shop. But while 
 the spirits imbibed had effectually overcome the habitual 
 phlegma of his nature, they in no wise added to his vocabulary 
 of English, nor aided the perspicuity of his delivery. The 
 jargon that resulted, accentuated by violent, if not expressive, 
 gesticulation, touched the risibility of all who heard or saw 
 him, and gave rise to cheering and laughter. 
 
 ' ' You an American citizen ? ' ' Jones asked with a sneer of 
 such withering contempt as ought to have abashed a more 
 sensitive person than the one he was addressing. " Why, you 
 can't even talk American! Any baby can see 'at you're 
 nothin' but a d — d Hessian." 
 
 Yahkop, upon whom the word " Hessian " produced the 
 same effect as a red rag upon an enraged bull, turned upon 
 his adversary with obviously hostile intent ; but Leslie and 
 Mr. Huffard both held on to him with strong arms, and finally 
 succeeded in persuading him, that it was his first duty to se- 
 cure his vote for Colonel May, according to his promise. To 
 the question put to him by the judge of election, whether he 
 was a citizen, he gave an angry, most emphatic affirmation. 
 But before the voting proceeded, Mr, Jones again interfered, 
 this time by a peremptory challenge of his vote. 
 
 "What is the ground of your challenge?" the judge in- 
 quired. 
 
 "Why, he's a furr'ner!" cried Jones, triumphantly. 
 " Anybody 'at's hear'in 'im jabber can know 'at 'e's no 
 American citizen." 
 
SOVEREIGNS IN PRIMORDIAL QUALE. 207 
 
 " Equality before the law is at the root of justice! " pro- 
 flaiuied the judge seuteiitiously. '' It has already been decided 
 that a voter, whose right is challeuged, must qualify himself by 
 an oath on the Holy Bible. Are you ready to prove your citi- 
 zenship by an oath on the Holy Bible ? ' ' 
 
 " Ebery times! " growled Yahkop, with a withering glance 
 of defiance and hatred at Jones. " Git your Bibles ! " 
 
 The judge was about to admininister the oath. Huffard 
 and Leslie looked smiling. The crowd was highly amused by 
 Yahkop 's grimaces and droll speech, and there was lively 
 cheering and laughter. Waddle saw with chagrin, that things 
 looked unfavorable for his cause ; something must be done to 
 turn the tide of public sentiment. He resolved to take a bold 
 step. 
 
 " Hold! " he said, in a peremptory voice. " You are mis- 
 taken, Judge. The law demands the best proof always. 
 Now, in this case, the best proof of this gentleman's right to 
 vote is not his oath, but a certified copy of his naturalization 
 decree. You have heard him say, that he was born in Baden, 
 which is, of course, a foreign country. He cannot, therefore, be 
 allowed to vote, unless he produces his naturalization papers." 
 
 "Aha! " crowed Jones. "D'ye hear that? A Hessian 
 hireling can't swear 'imself into the right to vote ! America 
 belongs to the Americans yet." 
 
 The already deep scarlet of Yahkop 's weather-tanned face 
 took on a deeper shade. But he was determined to let nothing 
 interfere with the fulfillment of his promise to vote for Colonel 
 May, and bravely choked down his passion. 
 
 The judge was embarrassed. To be compelled to overrule, 
 for the second time to-day, so eminent a lawyer as General 
 Waddle was known to be, staggered him. Yet he had done 
 his best ; he had even felt relief in being able to show his im- 
 partiality by ruling, this second time, in favor, as he thought, 
 of Waddle's side. He turned to Huffard and Leslie with 
 the question, " What do you think, gentlemen, about this 
 matter? " 
 
208 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " I think as you do," the editor answered. " What is sauce 
 for the goose ought to be sauce for the gander. What do you 
 say, Leslie May? " 
 
 "It is my opinion," said Leslie, " that our friend Yahkop 
 don't care the snap of his finger for these legal quibbles. I 
 dare say, that he will not object to relieve the tender con- 
 science of the whig candidate for Congress, and take a load off 
 the mind of our patriotic friend Jones, by showing the judge 
 his naturalization papers. Am I right, Yahkop? " 
 
 " Ebery times ! " growled the teamster, diving with his right 
 hand into the spacious breast pocket of his Sunday coat, and 
 producing thence a carefully wrapped up paper, which he 
 handed to the judge, with the question " Shwear I now? " 
 
 General Waddle had taken the paper from the judge's hands 
 and examined it. He now answered, instead of the judge, 
 "it is not necessary. These papers conclusively prove your 
 right to vote." 
 
 This unforeseen result of Jones' challenge was hailed by 
 boisterous laughter and cheering by the populace. " Hurrah 
 for the Dutchman ! " " Bully for the Hessian ! " was shouted, 
 while the judge proceeded to take Yahkop 's vote. He roared 
 out the name of Colonel May with such hearty good will, that 
 it was heard above the noise of the crowd, and increased 
 their good humor. 
 
 But now, having redeemed his promise, Yahkop felt no 
 further interest in the fate of either of the political parties, 
 but turned square round in search of his adversary, bent on 
 wiping out the stigma put on his fair name by that foul epithet 
 " Hessian." Just as the judge asked him to name his choice 
 for the State senate, he caught sight of Jones, as he was 
 edging his way out of the crowd in the direction of the 
 Boonville road, and shouted: " Mishter Tshones ! Mishter 
 Tshones ! " at the top of his stentorian voice. This was by 
 most of the by-standers misunderstood as the name of the 
 candidate to be voted for, and caused new merriment over the 
 Dutchman's funny mistake. But Yahkop was minded to 
 
SOVEREIGNS IN PBIMORDIAL QUALE. 209 
 
 honor " Mishter Tshones " in a different fashion. "You 
 we'ht an little und gum und she'hk hands mit der Hess! " he 
 shouted, breaking away from Leslie and Huffard, who both 
 I'ndeavored to hold him back, and forced his way through the 
 thickest of the crowd toward his adversary. 
 
 Before Jones, taken entirely unawares by the prompt action 
 of the infuriated teamster, could ward it off, he had received 
 a weighty blow from Yahkop's powerful fist. But he was not 
 slow to return it. In the twinkling of an eye the crowd had 
 formed a ring around the pugilists, and all were eager to wit- 
 ness the sport and to see fair play. 
 
 For a while it seemed as if the undisciplined strength of 
 the burly German's arms would be more than neutralized by 
 the superior skill of the American champion , who was a boxer 
 of no mean experience. He easily parried the blows aimed at 
 him in blind rage, with one arm, while the fist of the other did 
 fearful execution on Yahkop's unprotected physiognomy. The 
 onlookers took eager interest in the combat; even the judges 
 of election and their clerks stretched their necks and poked 
 their heads out of the window to lose none of the exciting 
 sport. For a long time both of the combatants held their 
 own: skill, routine on the one side, fairly balanced by sheer 
 power of muscle and weather-hardened toughness on the other. 
 Opinions differed as to what the final outcome would be ; 
 wagers were offered and accepted, and the backers of each 
 cheered lustily over the slightest advantage gained by either. 
 Victor looked on with^the liveliest interest ; he noticed with a 
 sense of exultation that he could not quite suppress, that 
 Y'ahkop's iron muscle and superior strength were beginning 
 to tell on his opponent, who was naturally a weaker man, and 
 whose constitution had been undermined by excessive alcoholic 
 indulgence. Y'ahkop finally succeeded in throwing him to 
 the ground ; and then it was not long before Jones cried 
 " 'nough! " and a deafening shout proclaimed the Dutchman 
 victor. 
 
 The word " 'nough" vividly recalled to Victor's mind the 
 
 14 
 
210 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 scene iu the class-room, when it had required the gentle touch 
 of Nellie's hand to stay his arm. As though he still felt that 
 electric thrill, a hot blush mounted to his face as he saw 
 Yahkop continue to pound his vanquished, now helpless ad- 
 versary. Rushing up to his friend, he earnestly called on 
 him to desist. Some of the by-standers, ignorant of the 
 import of the words which Victor had spoken in German, and 
 misinterpreting the purpose of his movement, seized him 
 rudely by the arm ; and when he struggled to free himself 
 from their grasp, one of them exclaimed, " For shame! To 
 rush upon a man that's down, two to one! " at the same 
 time dealing him a blow in the face that knocked Victor 
 senseless. 
 
 Leslie and the editor picked him up, while others pulled the 
 infuriated teamster away from his enemy, now thoroughly de- 
 moralized. When Victor recovered consciousness, he was 
 being led away from the crowd by his two friends. His nose 
 bled profusely ; one of his eyes was swollen so as to almost 
 close it. Some men were leading Yahkop toward Van Braak- 
 en's store, and the two groups reached it almost simulta- 
 neously. Victor was appalled by the frightful appearance of 
 his friend's face. He was bleeding from mouth and nose. 
 The blood had saturated his garments. His features had been 
 bruised into an unrecognizable mass. He himself had re- 
 ceived but a single blow ; but he felt that it had been sufficient 
 to disligure him. They found the store nearly empty of cus- 
 tomers, for most of them had rushed out to witness the fight 
 and were now following Yahkop and Victor l)ack again — these 
 two constituting just now the center of attraction. 
 
 Mynheer Van Braaken stood behind the counter at his post, 
 surveying- his apprentice with a look that sent dismay to his 
 heart ; for he saw in it less of anger, than of contempt, and 
 Victor's conscience told him how richly he deserved it. 
 
 " We bring the wounded from the field of battle," said the 
 editor, jocosely. "They deserve well of their country, for 
 which they have fought and bled." 
 
SOVEREIGNS IN PRIMORDIAL QUALE. 211 
 
 " And fallen," added Leslie. " The dust on their gar- 
 ments bears witness. The country owes them a debt of 
 gratitude." 
 
 " Then let the country pay its debts," retorted Mynheer, 
 the lid of his left eye twitching spasmodically. "For this 
 young man may need it. I guess he tliinks more of his 
 country anyhow than is good for him, or me. I guess he 
 will make a better politician than a storekeeper. I guess he 
 has learned too much for a storekeeper." 
 
 " Fictohr ish all right! " Yahkop proclaimed dogmatically. 
 " Und he learn blenty for der packwoots. Und ven he git vip, 
 I don't ken know; und ven an tam fool say ' Hess,' und 
 he lick him, Fictohr ish all right, ebery times." 
 
 "That Avill do, Yahkop," said Van Braaken. " You can 
 go ; and if your condition allows, tend to your horses. We 
 will have a talk later. And Victor may go with you, or 
 wherever he likes. We have no use for such a looking chap 
 in a decent place, as the Dutch Store is. Even a politician 
 might be ashamed to show himself in his plight." 
 
 Victor hung his head in deej) dejection. He Avas not pained 
 so much by the harsh, ungracious words of his chief, as by 
 the depressing consciousness that his anger was just and 
 natural. 
 
 But Yahkop had not lost faith in him. " Hang not der 
 headt ! " he said in his rough way, as the two left the store 
 together. " Ven he say ' Hess,' you lick 'im, ebery times. 
 Und der old man lick 'im too, ven he say ' Hess,' und git 'is 
 odder eye knockt out." 
 
 There was no comfort for Victor in this consoling prospect. 
 Yahkop continued his tirade in mixed English and German 
 against the rascally " Tshones " in vain. 
 
 They had not proceeded far, when Leslie and Mr. Huffard 
 overtook them and respectively invited Victor to May Meadows 
 and the printing office to arrange his toilet. He gratefully 
 accepted the latter offer, for he shuddered at the thought of 
 being seen at May Meadows in his present condition. 
 
XIV. 
 
 A NEW DEPARTURE. 
 
 ICTOR, when they reached the iji'inting office, was glad 
 Jw// to fhid it deserted by its inmates. The working force 
 of the Ozark Argns consisting for the time being of a 
 pressman, who also did duty as a compositor, foreman and 
 proof-reader, and a small boy, who personated the printer's 
 devil and had gone off to assist at the election. Mr. Huffard, 
 after filling the w^ash-basin with water and placing a towel and 
 comb at his disposition, bid him make himself at home and 
 take his own time in performing his ablutions. To put him 
 entirely at his ease, the discreet editor then left the office, say- 
 ing that he must see how things were going on at the polls. 
 Victor felt thankful for the considerate kindness of his friend in 
 leaving him alone. He set about removing, so far as he could, 
 the traces of his misadventure from face and garments, 
 troubled, meanwhile, by thoughts of his future ; for if Myn- 
 heer Van Braaken were to discharge him from his service, 
 what would become of him ? He felt that his employer would 
 be fully justified in having nothing more to do with him. 
 
 Out on the Square the noise made by the populace, now 
 numbering not a few intoxicated men among them, continued. 
 Victor wondered, sometimes, when he heard their lusty cheer- 
 ing for some favored candidate, whether there could really be any 
 doubt of the triumph of Truth — by which he meant the success 
 of the Democratic party — and the election, by an overwhelm- 
 ing majorit}'^, of his friend. Colonel May, to the Congress of the 
 United States. Then his thoughts wandered off to the events 
 which had brought him in contact with this man of wonderful 
 magnetism, — with Leslie, and with — Nellie May. He won- 
 dered, whether, if he lost his place in Van Braaken's store, 
 (212) 
 
A NEW DEPARTURE. 213 
 
 these friends would disappear from his horizon? A deep 
 longing came over him, the earnest aspiration to prove himself 
 worthy of their friendship, to do some grand and noble deed 
 compelling the admiration of men. How, or what, he knew 
 not ; so much only he began to suspect, that there was but 
 little hope for him to achieve distinction as a country store- 
 keeper. 
 
 On looking about in the printing office, his eyes fell upon 
 the imposing stone in the middle of the room, on which lay the 
 dead form of the last number of the Ozark Argus ready for the 
 distribution of its types into the printer's cases. He whiled 
 away the time by spelling out the words presented inversely in 
 the metal. Noticing a composing stick on one of the cases, 
 partly filled with type, and on the upper case in front of it a 
 printed paper, with, a guide on one of its articles marked with 
 a red pencil, it interested him to find that the words in the 
 composing stick corresponded with those of the article to which 
 the guide pointed. Here was a discovery ! The veil that had 
 shrouded the mystic art of printing was rent asunder ; the secret 
 of the compositor's stick lay open to his gaze — by putting the 
 types into that stick, he could make them spell the words of 
 the copy before him, or anything he pleased. 
 
 He could not, of course, resist the temptation to put his 
 discovery to the practical test. But simple as the matter 
 looked, he found it a tedious task to pick out the proper letters, 
 each one of which he found it necessary to examine before 
 placing it. He wondered why no one had thought to label the 
 compartments into which the types were sorted, so as to save 
 the loss of time consumed in finding the particular types 
 wanted. In the course of time, however, he remembered the 
 places where to find letters most in use, and began to make 
 better headway in his play at composing. So interested did 
 he become in his novel amusement, that he forgot all else 
 about him, and was astonished when Mr. Huffard returned, 
 to find that the day was almost spent. 
 
 " Well, well! " said the editor, smiling pleasantly. '' What 
 
214 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEIi. 
 
 mischief are jou up to noAv? I fear that you have been making 
 sad havoc among the types." 
 
 Victor proudly showed the result of his work. A broad 
 grin spread over the editor's face as he inspected the achieve- 
 ment of the amateur printer. " Why, you are a genius! " he 
 exclaimed. " This is very creditable showing off for a tyro. 
 When once you have learned to distinguish a q from a b, and 
 a p from a d, and how to place the types right side up, you 
 may begin to pose for a printer's devil." 
 
 Victor blushed vividly. But he eagerly inquired of his 
 friend, whether he thought it possible that he should ever 
 become a good printer. 
 
 "Of course you could! " the editor responded promptly. 
 He looked at the lad for a second or two, and then added: 
 " You possess every qualification for an excellent printer, and 
 I have no doubt that you will achieve great success if you take 
 to the business. But why do you ask the question? Are you 
 afraid, that old Van will give you your walking papers? Are 
 you looking for a new situation? " 
 
 Victor thus suddenly confronted with the thought which he 
 had hardly formulated in his own mind, was half frightened 
 by it. He answered evasively. But a few questions put by 
 the shrewd editor elicited the whole truth. Not only that 
 Victor actually feared to be discharged for his shameful con- 
 duct, but also, that he secretly hoped so, and that the boy's 
 mind was intent upon becoming a printer. The prospect of 
 having the young man in his own office was not displeasing to 
 him. He was sure that he could utilize him in more ways than 
 by his simple work as a printer. But he was really a kind 
 man, and believed that Victor's capacities would find a wider 
 scope to assert themselves in than the avocation of a merchant. 
 Besides, he had no idea that Van Braaken would willingly 
 part with the young man. He therefore rather discouraged 
 Victor's notion of becoming a printer, advising him to think 
 well over the nialter before taking a decisive step. 
 
 The setting of the sun marked the close of the election. 
 
A NEW DEPABTUEE. 215 
 
 Victor, on stepping out into the Square, was met by Leslie, 
 wlio informed him that the judges of election and the clerks 
 would soon begin to count the votes, and invited him to 
 be present with himself to witness the operation. Although 
 most of the voters that had come from a distance had already 
 left for home, there was still quite a crowd surrounding the 
 court house, impatiently^ awaiting the return of the officers, 
 who had locked up the poll books and gone to partake of re- 
 freshments after the fatiguing labors of the day. It was not 
 long before the sheriff, followed by the judges and clerks, 
 appeared and proceeded to unlock the door of the room in 
 which the counting was to take place. The candidates that 
 happened to be on hand, as well as a number of the most 
 prominent citizens — not less than ten of each of the political 
 parties, as the law prescribed — entered also. Leslie May, 
 representing his father, was of course one of them. Victor 
 found no difficulty in gaining admission with him. 
 
 His eagerness to learn the verdict of the people on the pai'ty 
 issues, and particularly as to the fate of his patron — in re- 
 spect to whom his anxiety exceeded, is possible, that of 
 Leslie himself — made the leisurely preparations for the work 
 to follow a sore trial of his patience. At last the clerks were 
 seated, each with one of the books before him in which the 
 voters' names had been recorded, the judges at another table, 
 also with books before them, in which to enter the number of 
 votes cast for each candidate ; and everything was ready. To 
 make sure of a correct count, each vote was called out by one 
 of the clerks and verified by the other; the judges repeated 
 the names of the candidates voted for, and entered them each in 
 his own book. Victor was deeply impressed with the precau- 
 tions taken to secure a faithful record of the will of the people. 
 
 The vote for the congressional candidates was counted first. 
 Leslie jotted down the votes, as called out, on a slip of paper; 
 Victor kept an accurate tally without the aid of a written 
 memorandum. His face visibly brightened as the clerks 
 announced, and the judges repeated, in monotonous, but to 
 
216 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 Victor highly musical iteration: "For Congress, Leonard 
 May! " scarcely relieved, now and then, by a run of two or 
 three votes for the opposing candidate. Victor's exultant 
 enthusiasm made it impossible for him to remain quiet ; he 
 rushed up to Leslie, even before the judges had cast up the 
 total vote, and impulsively embraced him. It was an unusual 
 thing for Victor to do ; for however enthusiastic his nature, he 
 was by no means demonstrative. " Colonel May is the wisest, 
 best and noblest of men," he exclaimed, " and the voters know 
 it! How could they help electing him? They honored 
 themselves in honoring him." 
 
 ' How could Leslie remain cold in view of the unprecedented 
 popularity of his father, evidenced by the heavy majority 
 polled for him by the voters of his own precinct? But he 
 only said : " The governor's head is level ; he played his cards 
 for all they were worth ! ' ' 
 
 The official announcement by the judges was: " For Con- 
 gress, Colonel Leonard May, 193 ; General John Waddle, 37." 
 
 After a deafening round of cheers at this proclamation, in 
 which Victor joined with all his heart, the count proceeded. 
 Mr. Huffard had made his way into the room, and Victor 
 noticed that he and Leslie engaged in earnest conversation. 
 His interest in the counting had now much abated. Still, he 
 was somewhat curious to compare the Colonel's vote with that 
 of the other candidates on his ticket. He hardly knew 
 whether, as a patriotic democrat, to regret that the others fell 
 far behind their leader, or, as an ardent admirer of Colonel 
 May, to rejoice over this result. There was, on the average, 
 a small majority for the democrats. 
 
 Victor was about to leave the room, as most of the others 
 were now doing, when Leslie hastily approached him " to shake 
 hands once moie, before parting for the night," he said. " And 
 I want you," he added, " to promise to call at May Meadows, 
 to-morrow morning, before going to the store. I hope the 
 governor will have some news for us that it will please you to 
 hear." Victor was but too happy to promise. 
 
A NEW DEPARTURE. 217 
 
 He found the family assembled at breakfast when he reached 
 May Meadows next morning. He brought a heavy heart with 
 him ; the pleasant walk and lovely summer morning had not 
 dispelled the gloom produced on his mind by reflecting on his 
 conduct of the day before. His gloomy thoughts, however, 
 vanished before the genial, cheerful welcome accorded him at 
 the Colonel's mansion. There must indeed have been pleasant 
 news ; for an atmosphere of bright sunshine pervaded the room 
 when he entered. P^very countenance was illumined by a 
 pleasant smile ; even the pathetic face of Lucretia, who waited 
 at table, wore an unusually contented expression, and bright- 
 ened up when she beheld the early visitor. Nellie, first to 
 address him, jumped up from her chair, and, seizing his hands 
 with both of hers, exclaimed, " Here is Victor, — the victor! 
 I am so glad to see you, Mr. Waldhorst, for papa says you 
 helped him win the election." 
 
 " Good morning, my young friend! " said the Colonel, also 
 rising to shake hands with Victor. " Nellie is right. 1 did 
 say — aud I mean it — that if I am elected, no small share of 
 the responsibility for the result will fall on your shoulders. 
 I am very glad to see you here this morning, so that I may 
 shake hands with you on the probability of my success. 
 According to the information which I have been able to pick 
 up on my way home last night, the chances are very promis- 
 ing." 
 
 Mrs. May, too, was unusually friendly in her welcome, 
 insisting that the guest should join them at table, notwith- 
 standing his protestations of having already breakfasted. At 
 a nod from her mistress, Lucretia laid a plate and placed a 
 chair for him, and he gladly accepted the cordial hospitality. 
 Conversation became lively and general ; each one had some- 
 thing to say about the canvass through which the Colonel had 
 just passed, and the changes in their mode of life which his 
 election would involve. Nellie clamored for the removal of 
 the whole family to Washington City when her father went 
 there to take his seat in Congress — a proposition which the 
 
218 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Colonel declared to be ridiculous. But Victor noticed, — not 
 without dismay at the thought of the separation which Nellie's 
 scheme would involve for him, that not only Leslie, but also 
 Mrs. May, seemed to look on it with favor. 
 
 Of course, the mishaps to both himself and his friend, the 
 teamster Yahkop, at the polls, did not escape discussion. 
 Leslie gave a lively account of the droll speeches of the irate 
 voter, and of his ungovernable wrath on being called a Hessian, 
 so that even Victor could not help joining Nellie's merriment 
 over the recital. But he grew sober when the recollection of 
 his own situation in consequenee of yesterday's events again 
 confronted him with the problem of his immediate future. 
 The Colonel, noticing his sudden depression, said, with his 
 pleasant smile and in his kind voice, " Are you thinking 
 of Mynheer's blunt speech of yesterday? Leslie tells me, 
 that he handled you rather roughly, and perhaps undeservedly 
 so." 
 
 " Not undeservedly," was Victor's honest reply. " It will 
 be but justice, if he dismiss me at once." 
 
 " You need fear nothing of the kind," the Colonel assured 
 him. " He will readily pardon your zeal in m}^ cause. Be- 
 sides, I happen to know, that he would on no account spare 
 you willingly from his business. He thinks too highly of the 
 value of your services." 
 
 "As to the value of my services," Victor replied, "he 
 has told me repeatedly that I lack very much of being fitted 
 for a merchant." 
 
 Leslie and Nellie looked at each other with a significant 
 smile, but said nothing. 
 
 " And what is your own opinion in this respect? " the 
 Colonel queried. 
 
 " I think he is right," said Victor. 
 
 A smile now played about the lips of Colonel May also, but 
 he quickly suppressed it, and continued: "Now, Mr. Wald- 
 horst, I want you to understand, that the little unpleasantness 
 which 30U believe to exist between Mynheer Van Braaken and 
 
A NEW DEPARTUEE. 219 
 
 yourself, ueed not trouble you. Not another word will be 
 said to you on the subject. But how would it suit you to take 
 up another vocation? How would you like to engage in the 
 printing business ? ' ' 
 
 Victor gave a furtive glance at Leslie, whose face, however, 
 remained perfectly impassive. " I think I would like it very 
 much," he answered eagerly. 
 
 " Mr. Huffard, as Leslie tells me," the Colonel continued, 
 " is convinced that you will make an excellent printer. And 
 I am sure that you will make your mark as an editor. Your 
 thirst for knowledge, your eagerness for politics, your enthu- 
 siastic championship of what you deem right and just, will lind 
 a much wider field for development in a printing office, than 
 behind the counter of a country store." 
 
 "I? An editor? " the young man gasped. But he could 
 not conceal his delight at the Colonel's words. 
 
 "You need not assume the chief editorship of a leading 
 journal just yet," said the Colonel. " There will be much for 
 you to learn ; and some things, no doubt you will have to 
 unlearn. But don't let that deter 3'ou, if 3'ou feel that you 
 would rather be a printer than a merchant." 
 
 " Indeed, I should like very much to become a printer! " 
 was Victor's almost involuntary reply. 
 
 " Then we will consider it settled that you are to join the 
 working staff of the Ozark Argus. Mr. Huffard says that he 
 will be glad to receive you. Some day perhaps you will be 
 called on to serve in a different capacity : for a large propor- 
 tion of our public men have risen from the ranks of the printers. 
 I am convinced, that in one way or another you will distinguish 
 yourself." 
 
 ' ' But I thought that you had set your heart on becoming a 
 lawyer! " said Leslie, smiling curiously, and interrupting Vic- 
 tor's stammering efforts to express his thanks. "Have you 
 thought better of that ? ' ' 
 
 "Oh, you know that is out of the question! " Victor 
 replied, " and you know the reason why." 
 
220 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 "He is afraid," said Leslie, addressing his father, "that 
 he has not learned enough Latin. As if one who mastered 
 the English grammar in a course of ten days could not just as 
 easy pick up Latin enough to understand Story's pedantic 
 quotations from the civil law, and the maxims scattered through 
 the text books and judges' opinions, chiefly to create the 
 impression that there is something in the law known to them, 
 which common people should not know ! I had a talk with 
 Yancey last night, and he says, that the time spent in our 
 colleges in the study of Latin could be much more profitably 
 employed in the study of approved text writers. Yancey 
 thinks that Victor could study in his office, and is willing to 
 give him the use of his books." 
 
 This was great news for Victor. He looked from one of the 
 gentlemen to the other with eager, questioning eyes, hardly 
 daring to believe in the reality of the good fortune that prom- 
 ised to put him in the way of gratifying his secret, most 
 cherished ambition. 
 
 The Colonel regarded him with a quizzical smile. " Do you 
 believe yourself competent," he said, " to devote an hour or 
 two every day to the acquisition of a smattering of Latin, and 
 in the course of time to the devouring of ponderous law 
 books, in addition to the tasks that will be imi)osed on you as 
 a jirinter's devil? " 
 
 " I'would surely try," was the answer, given in a low voice, 
 while a crimson glow spread over his eager features. 
 
 " Then, I know, you will surely succeed," the Colonel went 
 on. " You know that ' where there's a will there's a way,' or, 
 as the Latin maxim has it, ' Labor omnia vincit.' If you are 
 really in earnest, as I have no doubt that you are, your chance 
 is fully as good, indeed better, than Leslie's, with^all his 
 university training, to become a successful, if not distinguished, 
 lawyer. And in your political aspirations, if you have any, 
 the profession of the law, again, will prove a highly useful 
 stepping stone." 
 
 " Why, just think," Nellie spoke up, " what fun it would 
 
A NEW DEPARTURE. 221 
 
 be to have Mr. Waldhorst iu partnership with Leslie I "What 
 an odd team they would make ! ' ' 
 
 Mrs. May seemed not to take so kindly to the idea of a bus- 
 iness connection between her son and Victor. " But do you 
 think," she said, " that our young friend possesses sufficient — 
 what shall 1 call it — assurance or boldness — ' ' 
 
 " Call it cheek, mama, or brass, if that's what you mean," 
 suggested Leslie. 
 
 — "to become a successful lawyer? " she continued, not 
 heeding Leslie's interruption. " Mr. Waldhorst is so — gen- 
 tle, so — " 
 
 " So diffident and bashful! " Leslie again put iu. "Yes, 
 he will have to get over that amiable foible of his, if he ever 
 expects to rescue a horse-thief from the clutches of a backwoods 
 jury." 
 
 " Yes," Mrs. May continued, smiling graciously, " I may 
 say it without wishing to disparage the merits of our friend, 
 that in my opinion his modesty will sadly interfere w'ith his 
 success as an advocate." 
 
 " Truly, he that bloweth not his own horn, his horn shall 
 not be blown ! ' ' said Leslie with a mischievous twinkle of the 
 eye. 
 
 " Never fear as to that ! " said roguish Nellie. " If brother 
 Leslie is in the firm, there will be brass and cheek enough for 
 both, and to spare. Mr. Waldhorst will do the work, and 
 Leslie the tooting ; and it will be just splendid ! " 
 
 "And if we should lack for business," the brother retal- 
 iated, " Sissy will help us out with that tell-tale tongue of 
 hers. She has already helped us to one pretty extensive law- 
 suit by stirring up her silly admirers against each other ; with 
 a little practice she will soon be able to furnish more business 
 than we can attend to. I suppose, Nell, that we will have to 
 give you an interest in the firm." 
 
 " That will do, children! " said the Colonel, putting an end 
 to their good-humored banter. 
 
 When he, true to his promise, accompanied Victor to the 
 
222 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 store, Victor was agreeably surprised to notice the utter ab- 
 sence of anything like displeasure or ill-feeling on the part of 
 the merchant, who seemed to regard Victor's plans for the 
 future, involving his withdrawal from the Dutch Store, as 
 quite a matter of course. They talked the subject over in the 
 most amicable mood, Victor himself saying but little. When 
 they had discussed the whole matter as to Victor's immediate 
 plans, the Colonel said something about his studying law, 
 whereat the merchant grew unusually lively. " Yes, yes," he 
 said, nodding vigorously, and with a nervous twitching of his 
 weak eye-lid. "I always knew there was something in the 
 boy. He is going to make a man some day. But he has 
 much to learn, yet," winking slyly at the Colonel, with a 
 grimace that was meant for a smile — "he has a great lesson 
 to learn. He is smart enough to be a lawyer, and he knows 
 enough to be a politician. But it will be bad for his clients if 
 he tells the jury all he knows about them. And he will never 
 be elected when he runs for office if he tells the voters what he 
 thinks of them. And he is going to do all that, if he don't 
 learn how not to tell the truth sometimes." 
 * * * 
 
 Victor applied himself diligently to the discharge of his 
 duties in the new sphere of his activity. Simple enough they 
 w^ere, at first, though irksome, at times, requiring the per- 
 formance of the merest drudgery. He acquitted himself to 
 the perfect satisfaction of Mr. Huffard, who congratulated 
 himself on the acquisition of so apt an apprentice. Plenty of 
 leisure was at bis disposal, which he conscientiously utilized 
 by earnestly devoting himself to the mastering of the Latin 
 grammar, an old copy of which Leslie had placed at his dis- 
 posal. This gentleman even conquered his aversion to the dry 
 details of the study, from which he himself had but recently 
 been absolved, so far as to help his young friend over its initial 
 difficulties. But this assistance ceased when, early in the 
 month following, Leslie returned to Harvard University. 
 Nellie, too, was taken back to Columbia, the Colonel himself 
 
A NEW DEPARTUBE. 223 
 
 escorting her thither, to continue her course at the Young 
 Ladies' Seminary. A lonely time ensued for Victor, upon 
 whom the absence of his young friends weighed heavily. His 
 visits to May Meadows that had been to him bright gleams of 
 sunshine in the somber monotony of life, uovv ceased almost 
 entirely save that the Colonel, after his return from Columbia, 
 now and then insisted on taking him home for a Sunday din- 
 ner, or an afternoon drive. These occasions served only to 
 emphasize the absence of the young people ; — he sadly missed 
 the vivacious sallies of Nellie, and Leslie's good-natured 
 sai'casms. 
 
 The conversation of the Colonel was not without its charm, 
 however, and Victor soon learned to listen with a new and 
 quite different interest. For the congressman-elect often dis- 
 cussed before him the political program he was chalking out 
 for himself and the party he I'epresented ; and the young man, 
 proud of the confidence thus reposed in him, eagerly absorbed 
 the views of his patron and promised to become an enthusiastic 
 champion of whatever policy was thus unfolded before him. 
 Utterly unconscious of himself, Victor in this way became a 
 stout adherent to the States-right-school of the Democratic 
 party. It never occurred to him that his own crude, unsophis- 
 ticated view^s of right and justice were of any value to his 
 friend. He accepted the favors shown him by the Colonel, 
 with a grateful heart, and adopted his political principles with- 
 out question or doubt, — having neither the disposition, nor, 
 indeed, the mental ripeness, to detect their truth or error. 
 
 During the first few mouths after Leslie's return to college 
 Victor found great solace in a voluminous correspondence with 
 his absent friend. For a while the collegian answered 
 promptly, and Victor was led to believe that his gushing 
 effusions gave as much satisfaction to Leslie as the replies did 
 to himself. But soon the answers grew shorter and less 
 regular, and although Leslie excused his want of promptness 
 on the score of absorbing studies, rendering necessary the 
 most assiduous application to insure a diploma at the end of 
 
224 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 the year, when he proposed to orraduate, yet Victor reluctantly 
 admitted to himself that Leslie's increasing taciturnity must 
 be due rather to his want of inclination to write, than to the 
 lack of opportunity. 
 
 In the course of time, Victor was promoted from his devil- 
 ship in the printing office to the dignity of compositor and 
 pressman. He had made such rapid progress in both branches 
 of the business, that Mr. Huffard found it profitable to take 
 another apprentice in his place and let him do the work of a 
 journeyman. But this advancement was not half so encour- 
 aging to him as the acceptance by the editor of an essay writ- 
 ten by him on the political issues then before the country. It 
 was a proud day for him when he first saw his own thoughts 
 confront him from the printed sheet of the Ozark Argus. A 
 part of his inmost self gone forth from him, beyond his reach, 
 forever, to influence others. For good? He hoped so, — aye, 
 he was sure of it : for truth needs but manifest itself to be 
 triumphant. And was he not adding his testimony to the 
 cause of truth ? No doubt of it ; for the editor of the Demo- 
 cratic organ of the Southwest had agreed with his views, and 
 the congressman-elect had approved of them. Even Leslie, to 
 whom he had, in the first flush of his joy, sent a copy of the 
 paper containing his article, marked with a red pencil, had 
 written to congratulate him, saying no one but his gifted, 
 aspiring, honest young friend could be the author of so noble a 
 defense of Democracy. His success inspired him to further 
 efforts, and it was not long before Mr. Huffard left him to 
 manage a considerable share of the editorial work on the 
 Argus, to his own liking. The young recruit to the editorial 
 staff displayed quite an aptitude in getting up interesting 
 items of news, and penning them in pleasing style, as well as 
 in the writing of political leading articles. He seemed in a 
 fair way to realize Colonel May's prediction that he would 
 make an excellent editor. 
 
 About this time the formation of a new political party, 
 having for its object the disfranchising of Catholics and natu- 
 
A NEW DEPASTURE. 225 
 
 ralized citizens, strongly enlisted Victor's opposition. Being 
 himself a '' foreigner," it was but natural that be should 
 keenly feel the narrowness of the maxim, tliat " America 
 belongs to the Americans ; " and the stand taken by the great 
 majority of the democrats against the new doctrine served to 
 increase, if possible, his veneration for the party, whose tenets 
 demanded equality of rights for all American citizens, of what- 
 ever religious creed, or nativity. The little town of Brook- 
 field, to be sure, afforded but small vantage ground for the 
 American party. Besides Orlando Jones and his father, whose 
 personal experience inclined them to side with the new doc- 
 trine, and Mr. Barnes and a few of his friends, who had not 
 forgotten the inconvenient competition of the Dutch merchant, 
 there were hardly any converts. Even Ralph Pay ton, not- 
 withstanding the eloquent protest he had launched against the 
 foreigners in his maiden speech at the barbecue, was not ready 
 to join a party, whose leading object was plainly to disorganize 
 the Democracy. 
 
 Nor was there much promise of success for the American 
 party in any part of the State, save in one or two of its larger 
 cities ; or, indeed, in any of the Western States. But in the 
 exchange papers, to peruse which was now a part of Victor's 
 duty, he found enthusiastic accounts of its rapid spread in the 
 East, and particularly in the Middle States. He was troubled 
 to perceive that the tidal wave assumed such mighty propor- 
 tions as to threaten at no distant day to engulf the entire 
 nation. True, the Democracy everywhere stood firmly by 
 their colors ; but the new party was drawing to its support the 
 discontented elements of all other political organizations. The 
 whigs, who had hitherto presented an unbroken line of bat- 
 tle against the democrats, were evidently demoralized by 
 their signal defeat at the last election, and their party was 
 plainly in the process of disintegration. Great numbers of 
 them, not willing to ally themselves with the other new 
 party, whose opposition to Democracv sprang from their ab- 
 horrence of slavery, acted in concert with the Know-Nothings, 
 
 15 
 
226 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 and secured for them victory in many State elections. It was 
 but natural, therefore, that Victor looked forward to the final 
 issue of the struggle, involving his own rights as a citizen, 
 with apprehensive anxietj^, and that he put forward his best 
 arguments in defense of Democra,cy, in the articles which 
 appeared from his pen in the Ozark Argus. 
 
 In writing these articles he soon made the discovery, which 
 greatly startled him, that his strongest motive in their compo- 
 sition was a personal one. He asked himself, what would be 
 his attitude toward the party, if he were a native born Ameri- 
 can? The answer, which he could not conceal from himself, 
 gave him much trouble and perplexit3^ It was but right and 
 wise, that Americans should rule America. It was but just 
 and proper that the American nation should resist all foreign 
 influence, naturally directed against our republican institu- 
 tions, in all lawful ways. And what duty could be more 
 sacred and binding, than that of preserving and upholding the 
 Union and constitution of the United States? 
 
 Meanwhile time passed and Victor diligently discharged his 
 duties in the printing office, and studied Latin. On one occa- 
 sion he asked the assistance of Mr. Yancey to unravel for him 
 a knotty point. The lawyer met him with much kindness, and 
 after giving him the desired information, entered into a gen- 
 eral conversation which drifted into politics, involving the 
 prospects of the American party. Victor soon betrayed his 
 perplexity in respect of the principles which he thought so 
 true, that they could not be conscientiously opposed. 
 
 " Let me understand to what principles you refer," said 
 Mr. Yancey quietly. 
 
 " Loyalty to the Union ; jealousy against foreign influence ; 
 preservation of republican institutions," answered Victor. 
 
 ' ' Does any one propose to annul any of these ? ' ' queried 
 Mr. Yancey further. 
 
 "Not directly, perhaps," said Victor, after pondering 
 awhile. "But then, you know, the abolitionists think slavery 
 a greater evil than the disruption of the Union. And some 
 
A NEW DEPAUTUBE. 227 
 
 of^them ^have actuallj^ denounced the constitution as wicked 
 and an abomination. And then — are not some of the foreign- 
 ers too ignorant to be intrusted with the privilege of the 
 ballot?" 
 
 ""Why, yes," the lawyer replied, a scarcely perceptible 
 smile lighting up his features. " Some of the fanatics have 
 gone the length of denouncing the constitution as a compact 
 with the devil, and the Union a league with hell, or something 
 of that sort. I quote from memory. But have you not 
 noticed that many of the recruits to the Know-Nothing party 
 come from these same abolitionists? Such is, at least, a fair 
 inference from the fact, that their first successes were 
 achieved in the States most strongly infested by them. And 
 does it occur to you, that their ' jealousy of foreign influence ' 
 is due chiefly to the circumstance that the great majority of 
 German and Irish emigrants persistently vote the Democratic 
 ticket?" 
 
 " Is not that," suggested Victor, though hesitatingly, " a 
 corroboration of the assertion, that they are too ignorant to 
 have an opinion of their own, and therefore become pliant 
 tools in the hands of designing demagogues? " 
 
 " It proves, at any rate," said the other, " that they have 
 faith in Democratic principles, which the opponents of the 
 Democratic party have not. There is greater significance in 
 this than is apparent on the surface. If it be true, as you 
 and I are certainly convinced, that the Democratic party 
 represent the true theory of our government, then this so-called 
 American party is not only un-democratic, but emphatically 
 un-American. Universal freedom is the caixlinal principle of 
 the American government, as it is the cardinal tenet of the 
 Democratic party. Hence the emigrant, seeking refuge from 
 oppression, — whether industrial, social, or political — in this 
 land of promise, naturally identifies himself with the party 
 which has inscribed the promise of this freedom on its banner. 
 But what is the principle — if it be not an abuse of the word 
 to apply it to this organization, whose sole cohesive force con- 
 
228 
 
 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 sists of its opposition to Democracy — by which they propose 
 to rule Amei'ica? How are tliey going to 'resist foreign in- 
 fluence,' and ' protect and uphold the constitution and the 
 Union ? ' On their own showing they mean to abolish free- 
 dom of religion, the equality of man before the law, the elect- 
 ive franchise for freemen. Catholics are to be denied the 
 rights of citizenship, emigrants to be branded as political out- 
 casts, the right of suffrage to be exercised according to the 
 flat of a secret association. What would be the value of a 
 Union 'preserved,' of a constitution 'protected' in such 
 fashion? " 
 
 How easy it was to convince Victor of what he was so eager 
 to believe ! Mr. Yancey's words impressed themselves deeply 
 on his mind and memory. The light in which Mr. Yancey 
 had put the argument against Know-Nothingism relieved him 
 entirely of the scruples with which his tender conscience had 
 oppressed him. His articles in the Ozark Argus henceforth 
 were noticeably bolder and more incisive, and he had the sat- 
 isfaction to see most of them coi^ied and strongly commended 
 by the exchange papers that came to his hands. 
 
XV. 
 
 AWAKENING FROM LOVE'S YOUNG DREAM. 
 
 'HROUGHOUT all the long winter that followed, — a 
 winter unequaled in duration and severity by any 
 within the memory of the oldest inhabitant — Victor 
 had looked forward with yearning heart. Not that time passed 
 heavily with him. What with his duties at the case and press ; 
 with now and then an hour or two devoted to the penning of 
 local items for the " Chronicle of the Southwest," and the 
 pursuit of his studies under the guidance of Mr. Yancey, he 
 was kept busy enough. Nor was it alone the coming of 
 Spring, — that season so full of promise and delight to the 
 young and hopeful — that he so eagerly awaited. Life seemed 
 pleasant enough to the aspiring young man, who had con- 
 vinced himself that he was preparing for a life of usefulness 
 and activity, — not void, either, of a lurking hope, that 
 success, perhaps, was in store for him. How hapj^y it would 
 make him, if he should justify the good opinion of his friends — 
 of Colonel May, of Leslie — , Might not Nellie, then, forget 
 that he was of graceless and ungainly person? It was this 
 hope, which had taken hold of him far more iirmly than he 
 was aware, that occupied his thoughts and wove pleasant 
 fancies into his waking dreams. The inclemency of the season 
 had no terror for him. However fiercely the tempest howled 
 without, the dingy little office, from which the Ozark Argus 
 took its weekly flights into the surrounding country, afforded 
 cosy shelter to the young man who was busy with himself — 
 and looked forward. 
 
 Spring came at last, as Spring will always come, when 
 winter is over, — tardily, this time, but all the more joyfully 
 welcomed by old and young ; for all had grown weary of 
 
 (229) 
 
230 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 winter's protracted tyranny. Springtime and May — delight- 
 ful to Victor as to every one ; still he looked forward. 
 
 For Spring would be followed by Summer, and Summer — 
 early, in the season — would bring Leslie home from the uni- 
 versity, laden with honors, no doubt; for had not Leslie 
 written to him that he meant to achieve snmma cum kmde, and 
 was there anything that Leslie could not achieve, if he wished 
 to? And — well, yes! he thought of that, too — the early 
 Summer would end Nellie's term at the Young Ladies Seminary 
 at Columbia. So he looked forward. 
 
 But hope's fruition rarely equals the joy of anticipation. 
 Nor was Victor's case an exception, when the time came to 
 which he had looked forward. For when, in the bright and 
 sunny month of June, with its fresh green foliage and delight- 
 ful breezes, Leslie returned, he brought with him, among 
 other trophies culled during his Harvard campaign, a mus- 
 tache, — not heavy, nor bristling, nor yet of jetty hue; but 
 visible to Victor's naked eye and palpable to the touch — at 
 least Victor so inferred from the frequency with which his 
 friend's thumb and forefinger fondled it. 
 
 Now there was nothing startling in the fact of his friend's 
 sporting a mustache, except, perhaps, that mustaches and 
 beards were not in fashion in those days, in the backwoods. 
 But the young student had, together with the mustache, 
 assumed an expression of face that did not fully correspond to 
 the image that Victor treasured in his memory, and so the joy 
 experienced on his friend's return was dimmed by a shadow, — 
 a vague disappointment ; almost, as if a beloved friend, from 
 whom he had parted nearly a year before, had not really come 
 back, but was about to go away from him forever. 
 
 Nellie, too, returned soon after. She, to be sure, wore 
 no mustache, however greatly she admired that of her 
 brother, and thereby set an example to the young ladies of 
 Brookfield, who thenceforth unanimously found the tuft of 
 hair on Leslie's upper lip just too charming for anything. 
 But she had become taller in stature, and her figure had gained 
 
AWAKENING FROM LOVE'S YOUNG DEE AM. 2:31 
 
 wonderfully in grace of outline. She, too, presented a con- 
 trast, though a most delightful one, to the image which he 
 had been cherishing in his inmost heart. 
 
 But her smile was as sweet as ever, and the cordiality with 
 which she greeted him on his first visit to May Meadows after 
 her return, made it easy for him to make friends with the fas- 
 cinating young lady that had come back in place of the 
 sprightly young school-girl of last Summer. It was through 
 the influence of Nellie, who had in reality changed more than 
 Leslie, that Victor soon regained his old footing with both. 
 And yet there was a drop of bitterness in the sweet draught of 
 bliss, — a keen pang of genuine pain that disturbed, now and 
 then, the delight which he found in the intercourse with the 
 inmates of May Meadows. As coming events cast their 
 shadows before, so the dread of the Colonel's departure for 
 Washington threw a shadow on Victor's sunny path. Nellie 
 had succeeded in persuading her parents to adopt her scheme 
 of removing with the whole family to the Capitol, for one 
 season at least. The plan was frequently discussed in his 
 presence, for the young people took great delight in dwelling 
 upon the pleasure anticipated from their admission to Washing- 
 ton society, and Victor vaguely felt that the separation from 
 his young friends would prove more thorough than a tempo- 
 rary cessation of personal intercourse. 
 
 But his dread of what the future had in store for him was 
 not the only, nor indeed his most formidable trouble. It was 
 clearly wrong and unreasonable in him to regard it as a trouble 
 at all, that the young men in and around Brookfield should 
 share his admiration of Nellie May and heavily tax the hospi- 
 tality of May Meadows by the assiduity of their attentions 
 to her. No one knew better than Victor, how ungenerous it 
 was to the young lady, to grudge her the triumphs which she 
 enjoyed, evidently enough, with great relish. He was ashamed 
 of the feeling, too ; yet he could not conquer it, and it made 
 him downright miserable to notice the frequency of Ralph 
 Payton's visits, and the very evident pleasure he took in 
 
232 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 Nellie's society. Nellie herself was equall}- frieudl}' to all her 
 callers ; she treated even Orlando Jones, whose father had 
 taken so decided a part against her own father at the election, 
 with friendly courtesy. 
 
 As the time approached, when preparations had to be made 
 for the departure of the May family, it was determined that a 
 great party should be given in honor of the occasion. It was 
 to take place in the mansion of the congressman-elect. The 
 wealthiest and most influential inhabitants of Brookfield were 
 to be there as guests, not excluding, however, the humbler, 
 and even humblest, classes. Expectation was on tip-toe ; the 
 gathering was talked of long beforehand as an event in the 
 history of the town, second only — if second at all — to the 
 great barbecue of last year. Of course, the Chronicle of the 
 Southwest could not afford to ignore this stirring topic of 
 news, and Victor received orders from Mr. Huffard to try him- 
 self at writing a " stunning puff " for the member of Congress 
 in connection with the " grand soiree," — which the editor-in- 
 chief directed his assistant to spell ' ' swaree " — to be given 
 his constituents on the eve of his departure for Washington. 
 
 The getting up of the " puff " was easy enough for the enthu- 
 siastic admirer of Colonel May; the only danger was, indeed, 
 that it would assume proportions entirelj' too " stunning " to 
 go into print. But the backwoodsmen were not fastidious in 
 their taste, as Mr. Huffard knew, and so he allowed his assist- 
 ant's enthusiasm full sway. The " swaree," however, proved a 
 difficult matter for him to handle. He had no clear notion of 
 the meaning of the word, nor had he ever been present at any 
 of the social gatherings at which young people of both sexes 
 amuse themselves after a da}' spent in helping the host shuck 
 corn, raise a log cabin quilt coverlet, or do some such work 
 requiring many hands, and offering opportunity, under specious 
 pretense, for social intercourse in the evening. A broad grin 
 overspread the editor's face as Victor confessed his perplexity ; 
 but he relieved his assistant's doubts by dashing off a few 
 lines himself, descriptive of the frolic to be expected, and 
 
AWAKENING FROM LOVE'S YOUNG DEE AM. 233 
 
 appended it to Victor's glowing panegyric. Tlius it happened, 
 that the party to be given at May Meadows was heralded to 
 the world with a bombast hardly inferior to that which, a year 
 or so before, had ushered in the great barbecue. 
 
 To Nellie the event promised illimitable enjoyment — " fun " 
 was her expression for it. She meant to have all the fun there 
 was in it. She meant to show what could be done in the way 
 of giving a party by one of the first families of Virginia. 
 Leslie, too, looked with some expectation for the frolic to come 
 off. His mustache had grown somewhat during the Summer, 
 and assumed a tinge distinctly contrasting with his fine com- 
 plexion. So he coveted the opportunity of trying its effect on 
 the susceptible rural belles, before pursuing more difficult 
 game at Washington. Victor was of course among the in- 
 vited. He would have greatly preferred a quiet evening with 
 Nellie and Leslie to the finest party in the world, and abso- 
 lutely cast about for an excuse to remain away. It might 
 have been better for his subsequent peace of mind if he had 
 succeeded in finding a pretext for absence from the dreaded 
 ordeal ; but his conscience forbade a direct untruth, and he 
 found no plausible pretext for a refusal to come. 
 
 It was a beautiful evening tow-ard the end of October, when 
 Victor accompanied by his chief set oufupou the well-known 
 path leading to May Meadows. Mr. Huffard was in one of 
 his talkative moods, entertaining, or thinking that he enter- 
 tained, Victor — (for this young man was nervously thinking 
 of the party) — with reminiscences of similar affairs through 
 which he had gone in his youth. But his anecdotes failed to 
 enliven Victor's spirits ; they rather depressed him, for in 
 every one of them the hero turned out superior to his sur- 
 roundings, achieving his triumphs by dint of ready wit, or 
 wonderful presence of mind — qualities, in which Victor felt 
 his inferiority but too keenly. The story of the scarecrow 
 haunted his memory like a nightmare. 
 
 Both he and the editor were received kindly enough, how- 
 ever. The Colonel, as he shook hands in courtlv, vet cordial 
 
234 THE BEBEUS DAUQHTEB. 
 
 manner, expressed the great pleasure it gave him to see the 
 " gentlemen of the press," in whose pleasure it lay " to make 
 or mar " the reputations of public men. Nellie was all smiles 
 and whispered to the young man her hope, that he would 
 amuse himself well enough to insert a favorable notice of the 
 party in the Argus. Both Colonel and Mrs. May showed their 
 Southern blood by the quiet tact displayed as host and hostess, 
 in putting their guests at ease. A considerable number of 
 these had already arrived. Among them Ralph Payton and 
 other members of the last year's grammar class. The rival 
 merchants of Brookfleld were there — Mynheer Van Braaken 
 deeming it wise to come, in the interest of the Dutch Store, 
 while Mr, Barnes was anxious to jDropitiate the member of 
 Congress for the district, although he had not voted for him. 
 
 As yet the sexes seemed afraid of each other ; the young 
 men held themselves strictly aloof from the ladies, — talking 
 in little groups among themselves, and showing, by the readi- 
 ness with which they laughed, loud and boisterously, over 
 each puny attempt at witticism, how thoroughly self-possessed 
 they were, and how immensely they enjoyed themselves. Not 
 to be behind them in the display of sociability, the girls on 
 their part giggled among themselves. 
 
 Leslie, noticing the constraint that kept the young people 
 apart, determined to break the ice for them. An old-fash- 
 ioned " play-song " he knew to be as efficient to bring to- 
 gether a room full of people anxious to be sociable, as the 
 Polonaise in opening a ball. He beckoned to Ralph Payton, 
 requesting him to choose a partner and lead off. Nothing loth, 
 the young man stepped up to Miss May and begged her, with 
 a graceful bow, to honor him, while Leslie did the same with 
 Miss Matlack. The quartette promenaded through the room 
 singing, to a popular melod}^, words, which Victor understood 
 about as follows : 
 
 " We are marching on to Baltimore, 
 Two behind, and two before; 
 Let our band be never parted. 
 
AWAKENING FE03I LOVE'S YOUNG DEE AM. 235 
 
 But when you see a soldier true, 
 And a faithful lassie too, 
 
 Then open the ring 
 
 And let another in 
 That you think will prove true-hearted." 
 
 The i)romenaders were just passing Victor when they sang 
 the last w^ords, and he was puzzled on receiving a curtsy from 
 Miss Matlack ; Miss Shannon, who had received a similar 
 compliment from Leslie, approached from the other side of the 
 room and took Victor by the hand. Then he understood that 
 he was the " soldier true " of whom they had been singing, 
 and that Miss Shannon must be the lassie allotted to be faithful 
 to him. So he bravely marched along in the procession with his 
 fair partner, swelling the chorus of voices that were now again 
 
 " — marching on to Baltimore," 
 
 until they had ' ' taken another in ; " after which the singing 
 and marching continued, until as many as wished to participate 
 had taken up the march to Baltimore. 
 
 Victor having never seen anything of the kind before, was 
 for a while quite interested. It amused him to see how 
 anxious some of the outsiders seemed, to be elected into the 
 patriotic band. But as the procession grew in numbers, and 
 the same words Avere repeated without variation, the interest 
 slackened, and he wondered how long the thing was going to 
 last in this way. A question to this effect brought from his 
 fair partner an exultant smile. " Oh — don't you know? " she 
 whispered eagerly, " why, all the fun is going to come in the 
 wind-up. You will see." 
 
 And he did see. Upon a signal from Pay ton the procession 
 came to a halt, the song ceased, and he led Miss May into the 
 middle of the room, the others joining hands and forming a 
 circle around the couple in the center. Leslie then led off 
 with a new song to a different air, somewhat in this fashion : 
 
 " King William was King James's son, 
 Upon a royal race the}' run ; 
 
236 THE REBEL' 8 DAUGHTEli. 
 
 Upon his breast he wore a star 
 That shone near and that shone far. 
 Down on the carpet you must kneel 
 As sure as grass grows on the field — ' ' 
 
 Ralph Pay ton gracefully complied with this injunction, and 
 it gave Victor a genuine pang of distress to notice the charm- 
 ing tableau presented by the couple in this attitude — Nellie 
 standing erect, radiant in her loveliness, looking down upon 
 her gallant adorer with a roguish smile ; Ralph in elegant 
 pose, holding tlie tips of her fingers in his right hand, gazing 
 with rapt admiration into her beautiful face. The song 
 continued : 
 
 ' ' Salute your bride and kiss her sweet — ' ' 
 
 Suiting the action to the words Ralph leaped up, encircled the 
 lovely maiden with his arm, and culled from her tempting lips 
 the reward for his chivalry. 
 
 This filled Victor's cup of misery. It cost him a powerful 
 effort to conceal his emotion, and it was absolutely impossible 
 for him to answer in words the tittering remark of his partner, 
 " Didn't they do it nicely? " His heart beat in almost audi- 
 ble throbs as she said, " I wonder who is going to be her real 
 choice? " 
 
 The song went on : — 
 
 " Now you may rise upon your feet — " 
 
 whereupon Ralph, with courtly bow, answered by an equally 
 graceful curtsy from her, left the circle. Still the song went 
 on; Nellie, meanwhile, mustering the faces of those com^wsing 
 the ring : 
 
 " If he's not here to take your part, 
 Go choose another with all your heart ; 
 Go choose in the East, go choose in the West, 
 Go choose the one that you love best ! ' ' 
 
 Victor was intensely excited. She was now to " choose the 
 one that she loves best." Whom ivill she choose? Nellie's 
 
AWAKENING FROM LOVE'S YOUNG DUE AM. 237 
 
 eyes, in sweeping over tlie circle, caught the intensely eager 
 gaze of Victor, and a bright smile illumined her face. But 
 only for a moment. Then her eyes turned from him, searching 
 for some one else. As the words were reached : 
 
 " Go choose the one that you love best " 
 
 she nodded, smiled sweetly, — not on Victor. He was petri- 
 fied with dismay to see Orlando Jones step into the ring, kneel 
 to her, and be kissed by her ! Orlando Jones — his bitter 
 enemy from the grammar class, — his traducer, he, whom 
 Nellie, a little more than a year ago, had called a low, mean 
 fellow, and now, to Jiiss him! He never forgot the bitterness 
 of that moment. But for the soreness of his heart his wounded 
 vanity might have been soothed by the malice of Miss Shan- 
 non's remark, "isn't it just too ridiculous to see Mr. Jones 
 stand up with Nellie May, after Ralph Pay ton? " Even Nel- 
 lie's encouraging smile and the assurance whispered into his 
 ear as she passed out of the circle to resume her duties as 
 hostess, that his time to choose and be chosen would soon 
 come, failed to lighten the burden at his heart. What cared 
 he to be chosen by any but the one maiden in all the world , or 
 to choose, when she was not to be chosen? 
 
 The song went on as if nothing had happened to blot out the 
 sunshine of his life. One by one the youths and lasses were 
 invited into the coveted ch'cle, and dismissed from it, until his 
 own turn came ; he went through the motions as he had seen 
 others do, chosen by whom he cared not ; choosing, he hardly 
 knew whom; kissing with an indifference hardly just to his 
 fair partners. 
 
 The introductory play-song and its winding up had occupied 
 a considerable portion of the evening, and Leslie had fully 
 accomplished his purpose. The conversation was general and 
 very lively long before its completion. The older guests had 
 grouped themselves according to their inclinations and talked 
 about politics, crops, the marvelous development of Brook- 
 field, and whatever other topics that lay nearest their interests, 
 
238 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 while the younger ones discussed affairs most interesting to 
 them, much as young people do everywhere, finding ever new 
 fascination in the old, old story. Nellie flitted about among 
 her guests like a lovely butterfly, laughing and chatting now 
 with one group, now with another, always merry, always 
 graceful, the favorite of young and old, having won the aj}- 
 proval of even the young lady guests by her tact in choosing 
 the least popular young swains to be favored with her kiss, 
 whereby she had so deeply wounded poor Victor. But she 
 had determined with equal tact on compensating him in her 
 own way, later in the evening. Refreshments Avere not want- 
 ing: Lemonade for the ladies ; for the men, — patronized not 
 exclusively by the elder ones — the staple beverage of the 
 country, whiskey. For those who liked it, the Colonel had 
 provided wine, relished, however, by but few. What with the 
 exhilarating effects of the whiskey, the wine, and the cheering 
 influence of pleasant and social intercourse, the assemblage 
 was soon in the best possible spirits. 
 
 Games of various kinds were introduced and participated in 
 with enthusiastic enjoyment. In one of them it fell to the lot 
 of Leslie to name the penance by which a forfeit was to be 
 redeemed. Although his eyes were bandaged, he correctly 
 surmised the pawn to belong to Victor, and, having noticed 
 the young man's depression, determined to give him an oppor- 
 tunity to show off in his own line, and put himself in a better 
 light before the company. So he decreed that the ow^ner of 
 the pawn must instantly pronounce a funeral sermon on the 
 demise of the Whig party. Victor was greatly embarrassed. 
 But he must not show the white feather. Summoning all his 
 courage, he stepped forward and claimed the pawn. " I will 
 give you a few words of lament instead of the sermon," he 
 said, when the applause had subsided, with which the company 
 had received the announcement of the sentence against the 
 owner of the forfeit ; ' ' such as a patriotic whig might be 
 supposed to indulge in after the defeat of his party. I shall 
 call it 
 
AWAKENING FBOM LOVE'S YOUNQ DEE AM. 239 
 
 THE LAY OF A GOXE COON. 
 
 Old Tip is dead 
 
 And the coons are fled 
 To a country all unknown, Sir! 
 
 Our cider's spilt 
 
 And the cabins we built 
 Are up to the moon all blown, Sir ! 
 
 And Tyler, too, 
 
 Has proved untrue 
 Since the coons away did go. Sir! 
 
 And so we moan 
 
 Forlorn and lone 
 Like a widow without a beau , Sir ! 
 
 Here's Harry, who 
 
 Oft tried to woo 
 The people in his way. Sir ! 
 
 But his ways don't take. 
 
 And 'tis a mistake 
 To trust this kind of Clay, Sir! 
 
 Even God-like Dan 
 
 Is not the man 
 That can us now avail. Sir ! 
 
 So we must weep 
 
 Our misery deep 
 And up Salt Eiver sail, Sir! " 
 
 The beginning of the declamation, spoken in a low, uncer- 
 tain voice, amid the buzz of conversation carried on outside 
 of the circle of those participating in the game, was lost to 
 most of the company; but before he had concluded, the 
 utmost silence prevailed, and when he was through there was 
 a general clamor for a repetition, in which General Waddle 
 the defeated whig candidate for Congress, joined. So Victor, 
 although he had honestly redeemed his forfeit, was by general 
 acclamation sentenced to pay the i^enalty a second time. 
 
240 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Restored to a degree of confldeuce by the flattering request, 
 he succeeded in reciting the little lampoon in a steadier voice 
 emphasizing the tone of dejection and philosophical resigna- 
 tion he meant to express, and thus greatly heightening the 
 effect upon the company. The applause was spontaneous and 
 cordial; more so from the older than from the younger folks, 
 for every line contained some illusion to the well-remembered 
 " hard cider and log cabin " campaign, in which the " coons," 
 as the whigs were derisively called, had gained so brilliant a 
 victory, and been so bitterly disappointed of its fruits in con- 
 sequence of the death of the president and defection of the 
 vice-president. 
 
 " A very creditable performance," was the verdict of Gen- 
 eral Waddle. " If the situation depicted were only true, I 
 would call it a most excellent performance. As it is, we must 
 give our Democratic young friend credit for a lively imagina- 
 tion, and a marvelous proficiency in improvisation." 
 
 Victor blushed with pleasure, and his eyes sought out 
 Nellie, who beamed upon him an approval that he prized more 
 highly than even the encomiums from her father, and all the 
 rest of the company together. But his honesty would not per- 
 mit him to api^ropriate laurels not strictly his due. " It is 
 not an improvisation," he said. "I had thought it out 
 before." 
 
 "What! " exclaimed Mr. Huffard, his brows contracting 
 with comical indignation, " and kept it treacherously to your- 
 self? Don't you know, that your brain, and all its political 
 and poetical i)roductions belong to the Argus? To think that 
 it should have been despoiled of its legitimate dues in this sur- 
 reptitious manner! You'll bear watching, young man! " 
 
 " We will have it in the Argus in proper time," cried 
 Leslie, well pleased by his success in bringing Victor out of 
 his dumps. "But just now we will make a song of it. It 
 will go excellently well to the tune of " Sitting on a Rail." 
 So let us have the words once more, Victor, and the whole 
 company, whigs and all, will join in the chorus." 
 
AWAKENING FliOM LOVE'S YOUNG DREAM. 241 
 
 The song was a social success. Every person present was 
 familiar with the tune to which " The Lay of a Gone Coon," 
 was sung with a hearty good will. 
 
 But the grand feature of the May Meadows party was still 
 in petto of Nellie and Leslie. It was nothing less than a mock- 
 marriage, with all the pomp and circumstance of a real one, — 
 a bride, bridesmaids, groom, groomsmen, parson, ceremony, 
 reception, festive wedding supper, and dancing for those whose 
 conscience did not forbid the delightful pastime. The idea 
 had originated with Nellie, who would of course personate the 
 bride, and she had extensively provided herself with the neces- 
 sary ornaments and trappings appropriate to the occasion — 
 bridal robe, veil, wreath, rings and all. Although Leslie had, 
 at first, been reluctant to enter into the scheme, he, when his 
 impetuous sister had coaxed him into it, seconded her plans 
 with energy, and had undertaken to acquaint the company at 
 the proper time with the proposed entertainment, as well as to 
 attend to such other matters of detail as would more properly 
 be attended to by him. It fell to his lot to select the ladies 
 and gentlemen who were to act as bridesmaids and groomsmen, 
 and also to inform the groom himself of the high distinction 
 that was to be conferred upon him. The brother and sister 
 had kept the whole thing a profound secret until the time for 
 action came, — partly because it would enhance the enjoyment 
 of the affair if sprung upon the company as a surprise, and 
 partly because the}' wished to avoid the gossip that might busy 
 itself with the relations between Nellie and the gentleman chosen 
 as groom. 
 
 During a somewhat protracted absence of Nellie from the 
 room, the cause of which Victor sought in vain to imagine, 
 Leslie surprised him by a whispered invitation to follow him 
 into a side room, where he completely took away his breath by 
 the inquiry, how he would like it to become Nellie's husband? 
 A crimson flood suffused the 3'oung man's cheeks and fore- 
 head, followed swiftly by a deathly pallor. 
 
 "Nellie's husband!" he stammered, stunned by the bare 
 
 16 
 
242 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 mention of that as a possibility, which he had in his inmost 
 lieart, in rare moments only, dared to picture to himself as 
 supreme, but utterly unattainable, bliss. "What — what do 
 you mean? " 
 
 - " Just what I say," Leslie, replied, smiling mischievously. 
 " Nellie wants to get married to-night, and has hit upon you 
 for a partner. Have you any objection? " 
 
 " I? Marry 3Iiss Nellie? " Victor slowly repeated, gazing 
 into her brother's face in helpless bewilderment. " You do 
 not — you cannot — .mean it ? " 
 
 " Why not? " replied Leslie, with a tantalizing smile, keenly 
 enjoying Victor's dazed astonishment. Then, as if taking 
 pity ou his painful perplexity, he added: " Not for good, you 
 know, but just in fun. We wish to entertain our guests with 
 the sijectacle of a wedding, and Nellie believes it will give you 
 pleasure to stand up with her for the mock ceremony. It is 
 all play, you know : but I dare say that many of the l)oys will 
 envy you the fun you will have." 
 
 "Oh! " sighed Victor, catching his breath, as if relieved 
 from a heavy burden. "Just for fun! " Then he added, 
 the color coming back into his face more deeply than before, 
 " Miss Nellie wishes 'to marry — me — in fun! " 
 
 "Yes," Leslie rejoined, "I am sure it will be capital 
 sport to you and Nellie, — and to the whole company — to go 
 through the whole rigmarole of a marriage ceremony, — the 
 parson standing before you, joining your hands and preaching 
 to you about the duties of married life, and all that. By the 
 by, I mean to have Huffard act the parson. Won't he put all 
 the • mock gravity and sanctimonious unction required for the 
 solemnity of the occasion into his part? I think I hear him 
 enjoin you to ' love, honor and obey ' sister Nellie! Beware, 
 Victor, how you promise, or she will make you her abject 
 slave for the rest of your life." 
 
 Again the color faded from Victor's face, — hardly, how- 
 ever, because he feai'ed the doom of slavery at Nellie's hands — 
 for he said, with an imploring look into Leslie's eyes, genuine 
 
AWAKENING FROM LOVE'S YOUNG DUE AM. 243 
 
 agony audible even in liis whis^jered words : "I am sorry, Mr. 
 May, that Miss May wishes to marry — in fan." 
 
 ' ' Sorry , Victor ? Why ? " 
 
 Victor made no answer to this question, but continued, after 
 a brief pause, during which his eyes had slowly dropped, as if 
 unable to Ijear .the astonished gaze of his friend: •' I thank 
 you, and I thank your sister, from the bottom of my heart, for 
 your very great kindness. It was, indeed, very kind of you — 
 of both of you — to think of me in — in this way. But I — I 
 cannot stand up with Miss May — in fun ! ' ' 
 
 " What do you mean? What on earth can be your objec- 
 tion?" Leslie exclaimed, his astonishment fast turning into 
 anger. " You have always professed such chivalrous devo- 
 tion to my sister, that we thought that this thing would be a 
 gratification to you. And now you say that you can't do it? 
 Nellie will be even more surprised than I am ! " 
 
 " Oh, do not be angry, Mr. May! " implored Victor. " It 
 would make me but too happy to do anything for you and Miss 
 May — anything compatible with honor and duty — " 
 
 " Compatible with honor and duty! " Leslie repeated in a 
 tone of withering sarcasm, his brows contracting to a sinister 
 scowl that absolutely frightened Victor, who had never seen 
 his friend in such a mood. "And pray, Mr. Waldhorst, do 
 you consider it incompatible with honor and duty to stand up 
 with Miss May ? ' ' 
 
 " To make sport of so sacred a thing! " said Victor, in a 
 whisper hai'dly audible. " It would be committing sacrilege, 
 to repeat, before a whole room full of people, who would 
 giggle and laugh, words of the most sacred import, in wanton 
 mockerj^" 
 
 He had hardly finished these words when the door opened 
 and Nellie, wreathed in smiles, and in Victor's eyes unspeak- 
 ably beautiful in the bridal robe of snowy whiteness, entered 
 and, walking straight up to Leslie, asked him whether he had 
 gotten through with all the arrangements ; but w^ithout waiting 
 for an answer, she turned to Victor, who stood spellbound in 
 
244 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 the presence of such ravishing beauty, and asked him with a 
 gracious smile: "How do you like your bride, Mr. Wald- 
 horst?" 
 
 Victor made no answer. The beads of perspiration gathering 
 on his forehead gave token of the anguish that racked his soul. 
 
 Nellie sobered up. " Why, what is the matter, Mr. Wald- 
 horst? " she asked. " I expected a different welcome to 
 this, from my devoted cavalier, when he is about to receive 
 his reward for his faithful constancy." 
 
 "Faithful fiddlesticks!" Leslie spoke up. "Behold a 
 sanctimonious Puritan, who finds it ' incompatible with honor 
 and duty ' to marry my sister, even in fun ! He evidently 
 thinks you a forward minx, to ask him to marry j^ou, and 
 sternly gives you the mitten. Serves us right, though, for our 
 folly in not taking into account the fastidious taste of your — 
 outlandish beau." 
 
 The girl turned as white as her bridal robe. " Is this so, 
 Mr. Waldhorst? " she inquired in low accents, regarding 
 Victor with pathetic appeal for contradiction. But as Victor 
 hung his head without replying in words, the blood rushed 
 back in a mighty flood, dying her neck, cheeks and forehead 
 with lovely crimson ; and she flashed upon him such a look of 
 angry indignation and fierce scorn, as might have caused a 
 bolder man than Victor to quail. Turning to her brother, she 
 bade him at once summon Mr. Payton, adding that he, at 
 least, would not disgrace her by a shameful repulse. 
 
 When Leslie had left the room, after assuring his sister that 
 everything would be ready in a minute or two, Victor essayed 
 to beg forgiveness of the haughty beauty. His voice sounded 
 hollow, even to his own ear; but he managed, by a mighty 
 effort, to stammer out a few words. Instead of answering 
 him, she said, in a voice that froze the young man's blood, 
 " I have a great favor to ask of you. If you possess a spark 
 of manhood, you will not refuse it. I beg of you, that you 
 will not boast of the triumph you have gained over me this 
 night." 
 
^v/v^... . 
 
 '' Faithful McUesticks 1 " Leslie spoke up. 
 
AWAKENING FBOM LOVE'S YOUNG DUE AM. 245 
 
 " You wrong ine, Miss Nellie ! Oh, how you misunderstand 
 me! " The words were wrung from Victor in very torture, 
 and Avere his only reply to Nellie's cruel speech. 
 
 " My name is Eleonora ; and strangers call me by the name 
 mj' father bears," she said, haughtil}'. 
 
 The entrance of Ralph Payton, at this moment, smiling in 
 eager expectation, relieved Victor from the necessity of reply- 
 ing, and made it impossible to seek to explain himself more 
 fully. He felt himself dismissed. 
 
 In leaving the room he caught what appeared to him a glance 
 of malicious triumph from Payton, and noticed the unusual 
 paleness of Nellie's face, as she smiled upon the latter. He 
 noticed also that she had not quite relaxed her haughty 
 bearing. 
 
 * * * 
 
 It is not important to dwell upon the further events transpir- 
 ing at the party. So much may be recorded, that the mock 
 marriage was gone through with, almost literally in accordance 
 with the program laid down by the brother and sister, save 
 that Nellie was led to the improvised altar with a grace and 
 elegance that Victor could not have displayed. The reception 
 after the ceremony, at which the bride was kissed by all the 
 gentlemen present, as was the fashion at real weddings, — the 
 sumptuous supper, served in a style befitting the hospitality of 
 the May family — the dance, to the music of two negro fid- 
 dlers, at which the bridal couple led off in a waltz, and had 
 all the floor to themselves, round dances being comparatively 
 unknown at Brookfield, — all came off to the great edification 
 of the assemblage, who voted the May party a grand success 
 and noted the feature of the mock-marriage for imitation on 
 future occasions. 
 
 When the guests had departed, Nellie sat weai'ily upon a 
 lounge, reflecting, with a far-off look in her eyes, on the 
 occurrences of the night. Leslie broke in upon her revery 
 with the question: " Well, Sissy, and what do you think of 
 our part}'? I rather flatter myself that it was comme il faat. 
 
246 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 The palm of success is unquestionably due to you, for I fancy 
 that that mock-marriage astonished the natives and will become 
 an institution at all their frolics hereafter." 
 
 Nellie was wrapped in deep thought. Without looking at 
 her brother she said: "I wish, that we had not set the 
 example." 
 
 " What? " exclaimed Leslie, regarding his sister with un- 
 feigned astonishment. " Wh}', I almost believe that that 
 silly boy has infected you with his Puritanical squeamish- 
 ness. He deserves a cowhiding for his shameful insult to 
 you." 
 
 "Victor is a romantic dunce," said the girl, deliberately, 
 " and he has thoroughly spoilt for me the enjoyment of the 
 evening, to which I had looked forward so eagerly. But his 
 punishment has been far more severe than his offense. I dare 
 say that he will not soon forget the cut I gave him." 
 
 " And serve him right ! " Leslie interrupted her. " It makes 
 my blood boil even now to think of his insolence and ingrati- 
 tude, after the petting he has received in this house. Don't 
 let the thought of him disturb your enjoyment of the triumph 
 in the success of our — let me say your — stroke of genius." 
 
 " Was it quite the thing, Leslie, for me to make a spectacle 
 of myself, for the amusement and gratification of vulgar 
 loobies? " Nellie asked, her manner indicating that her Avords 
 implied an assertion rather than a question. 
 
 " For mercy's sake, Nellie, don't become a sentimental fool, 
 like this German dreamer ! You will make yourself the laugh- 
 ing stock of the whole town. Talking about loobies, — think 
 what a painful experience you escaped in not having to go 
 through the ceremony with him." 
 
 " Yes, Leslie. And it was Victor that saved me from that 
 ordeal. Don't you think that he showed himself more of a 
 gentleman — ' ' 
 
 " Than? " demanded Leslie, as Nellie hesitated. 
 
 "Than I showed myself a lady?" said Nellie, smiling 
 dubiously. 
 
AWAKENING FROM LOVE'S YOUNG DREAM. 247 
 
 "Bosh! Get off to bed ! " said Leslie. "You are worn 
 out and sleepy. To-morrow you will be yourself again, and 
 be proud of the triumj)hs you have scored to-night." 
 
 " I hope I will," was Nellie's response, as she languidly 
 bid her brother good-night. 
 
 Whatever effect the party at May Meadows may have had 
 on the young people having attended it, it certainly proved 
 a turning point in the life of the printer's apprentice. The 
 May family departed for Washington a few days afterwards, 
 and so Victor was deprived of the melancholy pleasure of 
 bidding farewell to his young friends. For it occurred to him 
 that under the circumstances it would be for him a humil- 
 iation to visit May Meadows. So he saw nothing more of 
 either Leslie or Nellie. Colonel May himself was as cordial 
 as ever when, on the morning of the departure, he came to 
 the printing office to say good-bye to Huffard and Victor, 
 playfully requesting the latter to remember him kindly, 
 and leniently criticise his official conduct in Congress. It 
 w^as, of course, out of the question, he knew, for the young- 
 lady to call on him ; but he had secretly hoped that Leslie 
 would shake hands with him before leaving, and perhaps say 
 that Nellie wished him good-bye. It stung him to the quick, 
 therefore, to see the carriages start for the metropolis, where 
 the family were to take boat for Pittsburg, without his having 
 received so much as a word or a glance from either. 
 
 Perhaps it was well for Victor that things took this turn. 
 For even his infatuation did not prevent him from seeing, — 
 though so thoroughly biased in their favor — the cruel injustice 
 of their conduct. His mettle was, for once, aroused. Pride 
 came to his aid in battling with his feeling of bitter disappoint- 
 ment. He had acted rightly. They were in the wrong. But 
 however soothing to his dignity, the spirit of resentment and 
 retaliation engendered by the contemplation of their injustice, 
 was not so potent as to heal the ache in the innermost recesses 
 of his heart. Deep down, there was woe more bitter than the 
 wounds caused by the harsh treatment he ha(,l received, — an 
 
248 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 agony all the more poignant because he was hardly aware of 
 its true cause. Nellie herself had dimmed the lustre of the 
 halo created about her person by his poetic imagination. She 
 had, with cruel hand, sullied his divinely beautiful ideal of 
 womanhood, — most cruel, because none other than her own 
 hand could besmirch his worshiped idol. 
 
 But the rude awakening from his romantic dreams, so far 
 from crushing out his ambitious aspirations, served as a new 
 impetus to school himself for a life of usefulness in the service 
 of humanity — of freedom, as ideally embodied in the princi- 
 ples underljang the American government, — of Democracy, 
 as the party whose goal was the realization of his ideal. 
 Firm in this conviction, he devoted himself to the task of 
 becoming a true democrat, and threw himself with all his 
 might upon the discharge of the duties immediately before 
 him. 
 
 During the next few years he thoroughly mastered the de- 
 tails of the printing business, so far as the limited resources 
 of a country office permitted. Nor did he neglect the diligent 
 study of the law under the guidance of Mr. Yancey, making 
 such progress therein as elicited admiration and sincere com- 
 mendation from this gentleman. He took occasion, indeed, to 
 suggest to Victor to seek a wider field for the display of his 
 talent than Brookfleld afforded, — a piece of advice that im- 
 pressed the young man, because it so perfectly accorded with 
 nis own inclination. 
 
 Colonel May had ])een twice re-elected to Congress, owing 
 much of his success, at home at least, to the loyal, vigorous 
 support received fixDm the Ozark Argus, the leading articles of 
 which emanated mostly from Victor's pen. He spent several 
 months during the recess of Congress, at home ; but the family 
 had not returned. They spent the most of the time when 
 Congress was not in session in traveling, both in Europe and 
 in the United States, accompanied, sometimes, by Leslie, who, 
 as Victor had learned from the Colonel, was now about to 
 settle in the metropolis for the practice of the law. The attach- 
 
AWAKENING FROM LOVE'S YOUNG DREAM. 249 
 
 ment of the youug man for his early patron suffered no 
 diminution ; indeed, their intercourse was, considering the dif- 
 ference in their ages and position in life, remarkably intimate, 
 arid the interchange of letters between them livel}^ But while 
 Victor preserved the most ardent sentiments of gratitude and 
 admiration for his benefactor, their communications related 
 mostly to political affairs, and the magnet that had once drawn 
 him so powerfully to May Meadows, was no longer there. 
 Nellie and Leslie gone, what was there to attract Victor? 
 
 Letters about this time received from his sister, breathing a 
 love and affection very grateful to his hungry heart, awakened 
 a feeling akin to homesickness which, in connection with advice 
 received from Mr. Yancey, ripened in his mind the resolution, 
 to turn his back upon the town of Brookfield, and to seek in 
 the great city, a iield of activity at once more congenial to his 
 tastes and more promising to his ambition. 
 
 He left the town, one lovely day of Spring, in company of 
 his old companion, Yahkop, regretted by none so much as by 
 Mr. Huffard, who, however, joined his former chief, Mynheer 
 Van Braaken, in prophesying for him a bright future, in a 
 sphere af^jrding scope for his ambition. 
 
PART SECOND: 
 DEMOCRACY DIVIDED AGAINST ITSELF. 
 
 XVI. 
 
 GAMBRINUS UNDER A CLOUD. 
 
 HS^ politics of the country, as viewed by politicians of 
 the ordinary calibre, were in a muddle. Self-consti- 
 tuted rulers of primaries and ward-meeting orators 
 had lost their reckoning. For the straws that indicated the 
 public mind were blown, by fitful gusts of political winds, in 
 unexpected and incalculable directions. Fickleness was a 
 mild term to apply to the mood in which the political weather- 
 vane boxed the compass in erratic jumps. Croakers there 
 were, who saw portentous clouds arise in the political hori- 
 zon, auguring foul weather to follow. But they shared the 
 fate of curse-stricken Cassandra, whose prophesies of evil 
 fell upon listless ears. Hopeful, easy going patriots of the 
 stay-at-home class dreamed not of danger ; for had not many 
 clouds come and gone in the horizon, leaving the ship of State 
 serenely sailing its wonted course, favored by the fairest 
 weather? Sore-heads there always had been; misunderstood, 
 unappreciated statesmen, disappointed demagogues, purse- 
 poor patriots with unappeased hunger for office, — who of 
 course must presage utter ruin to a misguided, unappreciative 
 country. For what good is in a commonwealth that is deaf to 
 their wisdom, unresponsive to their appeals, inexcusably blind 
 to their claims for office ? They have croaked before ; they 
 will go on croaking, unless their mouths are stopped Avith 
 official pap. Still, even hopefully inclined politicians were 
 (250) 
 
GAMBRINUS UNDER A CLOUD. 251 
 
 puzzled to make out their course, or to predict the direction 
 into which the political wind would eventually settle. 
 
 One of the symptoms of the time, unaccountable to many, 
 was the meteor-like brilliancy with which the new light of 
 Know-Nothingism dazzled the people. Some, to be sure, saw 
 in it the legitimate fruition of the disorganizing effect pro- 
 duced by the final collapse of the Whig party. Triumphant 
 Democracy, no longer held together by pressure from without, 
 gave signs of falling to pieces of its own weight. The active 
 principles of its vitality, no longer directed against the veteran 
 enemy with whom it had measured swords so often, began to 
 attack its own vitals. It had outgrown the proportions of a 
 party, being no longer a part only of the Avhole ; and must 
 now disintegrate into new parties. Then had come the tempt- 
 ing opportunity for crafty politicians to foist off upon the 
 community their counterfeit patriotism. Ardent love for the 
 constitution and devotion to the Union, paraded along with an 
 array of cabalistic catch-words, shrouded in mysterious sym- 
 bolism, dazzled and dazed the voters, who believed that the 
 purity of the ballot can be preserved by the use of secret signs 
 and passwords, and rascals kept out of a patriotic party by 
 arming its honest followers with a Shibboleth and a secret grip. 
 Thus reasoned they who thought to ascribe the phenomenal 
 success of the Know-Nothing party to the ordinary law of cause 
 and effect ; and marveled not thereat. 
 
 There was another factor, too, to be reckoned with in sum- 
 ming up the political situation. Among those who were not 
 caught by the hocus-pocus of Know-Nothingism, and who 
 could not sanction its proscriptive policy, were many who had 
 identified themselves with that band of persistent enthusiasts, 
 whose earnest zeal in the cause of freedom had won for them 
 the nick-name of " Freedom Shriekers," because they 
 marched, just then, to the battle-cry of " Free-Soil, Free 
 Speech, Free Labor, Free Men!" Their opponents, who 
 agreed in nothing so well as in making common cause against 
 these enthusiasts, conducted the warfare against them largely 
 
252 THE BEBEL'8 DAUGHTER. 
 
 with the weapons of mockery and ridicule. But neither sport- 
 ive raillery, nor keen satire, nor venomous shafts of sarcasm, 
 deterred the zealots from their jjurpose. They seemed to 
 thrive under this system of opposition, which they chose to 
 point out as persecution and denial of sacred right. However 
 ridiculous might be their pretensions, it behooved wise poli- 
 ticians to take them into account in figuring on the probabili- 
 ties of future elections. Let triumphant Democracy, in par- 
 ticular, summon Israel to its tents ; for the battle is not 
 always to the strong, nor the race to the swift. 
 
 Victor Waldhorst had returned to the metropolis. He 
 found, that there the party that he had so faithfully combatted 
 in the columns of the Ozark Avijiis, had it all their own way. 
 The city had yielded at almost the first onslaught, surrendering 
 unconditionally to the victorious Know-No things. They had 
 captured the office of the chief executive, a decisive majority 
 in both branches of its legislative councils, as well as the 
 judiciary (in the shape of the police judge, then styled 
 Recorder). New brooms proverbially sweep clean, and so 
 there was, of course, a decidedly clean sweep from office of 
 the petty placemen, who held appointments more or less fat, 
 as compensation for the services rendered as partisans of the 
 now dethroned party potentates. Loud were the wails that 
 went up from the victims of the municipal new broom, and 
 bitter the imprecations heaped upon the heads of the new 
 administration, amid impotent gnashing of teeth. But after 
 the usual storm of indignation and Cassandra prophesies of 
 turned out office-holders things went on very much as before. 
 There was plenty of remunerative work for those unfortunates 
 that had to be weaned from the official fleshpots, if they de- 
 sired to earn the bread they ate, even though they belonged to 
 the class of Dutch, Irish or Catholics proscribed by the party 
 of patriots in power. And even those who possessed the pass- 
 words and grips of the Mystic Order, — at least such of them 
 as had not been admitted to the Holy of Holies, — had no 
 bread to eat not spiced l)y the sweat of their brow. Rum 
 
QAMBRINUS UNDER A CLOUD. 253 
 
 shops ami beer houses still did a thriving business, tliough 
 now begiiiuing to arrogate to themselves the more euphonious 
 appellation of " saloons." On Sundays, the spacious beer 
 gardens, located mostly in the suburbs, though not scarce in 
 the city proper, were well patronized by socially disposed 
 citizens of Teutonic descent, seeking there, with their wives 
 and children, recreation in the open air, and enjoying the 
 national beverage with pretzels and Limburg cheese, listening 
 the while to soothing or inspiring strains of music discoursed 
 by well trained bands. 
 
 Ah, those beer gardens ! That desecration of the Holy 
 Sabbath Day by music from brass and stringed instruments ! 
 What a flagrant violation of the law of the land ! For was 
 there not an ordinance of the city prohibiting the keeping open 
 of any place for the sale of intoxicating drinks on the first 
 day of the week, commonly called Sunday? Did not the 
 statute of the State declare such to be a misdemeanor, indict- 
 able by the grand jury and punishable by fine not exceeding 
 fifty dollars? Surely, this was a signal instance of the law- 
 lessness of the foreign population, and of the rottenness of the 
 old parties that had winked at and connived with the evil 
 doers, thus encouraging open defiance of law and order. 
 
 Here, then, was a task worthy of the municipal broom. The 
 law must be vindicated. The American party must weed out 
 these heathenish customs and protect the country against dan- 
 gerous foreign influence. And the American party shrank not 
 from its self-imposed task: it was equal to the emergency, — 
 the fiat went forth : The beer garden must go ! 
 
 A glorious time ensued for the lawyers. Sheriff, marshal, 
 clerks of the criminal courts and prosecuting officers grew fat, 
 metaphorically speaking, on the plentiful harvest of fees inuring 
 to them out of the crusade against beer gardens. True bills 
 for the violation of the Sunday law monopolized the attention 
 of the grand jury ; their trials engaged the time of the criminal 
 courts to the extent of crowding cases against murderers, 
 thieves and other common malefactors. 
 
254 THE EEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 The jimior member of one of the law firms retahied to de- 
 fend the proprietor of an extensive beer garden under indict- 
 ment, was a young man who had recently settled in the Qiiy 
 for the practice of the law. An old practitioner entered into 
 partnership with him in the hope of an advantageous increase 
 of business. The case in hand fell to the management of the 
 junior partner. It involved not a single question of law that 
 had not already been decided by the Supreme Court adversely 
 to their client, so that the only possibility of a favorable issue 
 lay in the highly Improbable chance of breaking down the 
 testimony of the prosecution. The client had been fairly 
 informed of the hopelessness of his chances, and the implicit 
 confidence placed by him in the integrity of his lawyers put 
 them on their mettle. The young man determined to bring 
 his utmost ability to bear in the achievement of an acquittal of 
 his client if within the reach of human exertion. With the view 
 of posting himself on the details involved in the trial, and to 
 familiarize himself with the manner in which business was 
 conducted in these places, he determined to visit the establish- 
 ment of his client, and study the character and habits of its 
 patrons. 
 
 Leslie May — for such was the name of the junior i3artner 
 of the firm of Simms & May, — reached the pleasant grounds 
 known as Vaux Hall Park on a bright, sunny Sunday after- 
 noon in the month of July. It was accessible not only to 
 pedestrians, but Avas, on line Sundays, equally the resort of 
 pleasure seekers who came on horseback, in buggies, ba- 
 rouches and carriages of higher pretensions ; and most of all 
 in those omnibuses of illimitable capacity, in which there is 
 always room for one more passenger. Mr. May found the cool 
 shade and green foliage of the pax'k exceedingly refreshing 
 after his hot walk in the scorching July sun, and sat down to 
 one of the many tables provided for the accommodation of the 
 guests, wiping the perspiration from his streaming forehead. 
 He ordered the waiter, who promptly approached, in shirt- 
 sleeves and apron of immaculate white, to bring him a glass of 
 
GAMBBINUS UNDER A CLOUD. 255 
 
 the "ice-cold lemonade," of which guests were reniinded by 
 little signs hung up ou the ti'unks of the trees. " Don't forget 
 to put plenty of ice in it! " he called out in a loud voice, as 
 the waiter hurried away. 
 
 The young lawyer looked around. The spacious grounds 
 were not yet half filled with guests, although a continuous 
 stream of perspiring humanity poured in from the dusty roads 
 outside, through gates at opposite sides. Leslie noticed that 
 there were almost as many ladies and children among the 
 comers as men, and they came mostly in groups, or at least in 
 couples. They seated themselves at a convenient distance 
 from the music stand, where an orchestra of twelve musicians 
 were already tuning their instruments. The table next his 
 own was but a few feet off, and Leslie noticed that the single 
 occupant of the bench before it was regarding him with 
 evident interest. 
 
 " It is a warm day," said the stranger, as soon as their 
 eyes met. 
 
 "I have found it to be so in reaching this place," Leslie 
 answered. 
 
 " You did come by foot, sir? " the other continued. 
 
 " Exactly so," said Leslie, amused by the curiosity of his 
 interlocutor. " And I found it quite a hot walk." 
 
 " Pardo?; / " said the neighbor, pronouncing the last sylla- 
 ble with a strong emphasis. " I see you are very much 
 warmed. And I did hear you command cold lemonade. With 
 plenty ice in it. You wish to drink ice-cold lemonade, when 
 you are very much warmed ? ' ' 
 
 " Why, yes," said Leslie May, smiling. " That is just 
 what I crave. I want cooling off, and a glass of iced lemon- 
 ade is, I think, about the thing." 
 
 " Psivdon ! " the stranger repeated, rolling the r sufficiently 
 to betray that he was not speaking in his mother tongue. 
 ' ' Have you already 'owned a horse ? Yes ? And when you 
 drive him fast on a warm day, like it is this day, and when he 
 is very much warmed, like you are warmed, just now, gave 
 
256 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEE. 
 
 you him cold water to drink, first? No? Tlieii, why will 
 you be more considerate with your horse, as you will be with 
 yourself? " 
 
 The earnestness of the stranger's manner precluded the idea 
 of officious meddling, and highly amused the young lawyer. 
 Before he made answer the waiter appeared, bearing on a tray 
 a large glass with a straw in it. As Leslie was parang the 
 waiter, the stranger continued : 
 
 "You must not drink that stuff, so warm as you are! If 
 you will honor me, drink with me a glass beer. It is excel- 
 lent to-day. It is of Uhrig's choice brew. Or drink with me 
 a glass wine, if you like better. Then if you are cooled, I 
 will drink with you lemonade, and it will not make you sick. 
 If you drink that stuff now, it will be, for you, poison." 
 
 " Do you think that drinking wine will cool me off? " Leslie 
 inquired with a smile. 
 
 " It will warm for you the stomach," the other replietl 
 gravely, " and make the blood to circulate, and cold water will 
 afterward not hurt you. Shall I order a bottle wine, or prefer 
 you beer ? ' ' 
 
 "I will leave that entirely to your choice, since you take 
 such interest in my health," Leslie replied. " But may I in- 
 quire, what induces you to favor me with your, no doubt 
 excellent, advice? " 
 
 " Right, young man! " the old gentleman spoke up, apolo- 
 getically. "My name is Auf dem Busoh ; and I am a mer- 
 chant. — Waiter ! A bottle Riidesheimer ! — I have no motive, 
 but wish not to see a young man to ruin his constitution, when 
 he is heated, like you are." 
 
 "My name is Leslie May! " the lawyer explained. " I 
 am very thankful to you for your kindness ; though I must 
 say, that I have never experienced any injurious effects from 
 drinking lemonade, while I have seen bad results from the use 
 of more ardent drinks." 
 
 Mr. Auf dem Busch shook hands with Leslie on learning his 
 name, and proceeded to enlighten the latter on the evils of in- 
 

 -^<?^l^ 
 
 " Do yoLi know. Mi-. May, that you are hardly 
 a stranger to me ' " 
 
CrAMBIilNUS UNDER A CLOUD. ^bl 
 
 teniporaiK'c, in {iiiy shape, — even in the drinking of vo\(\ 
 lemonade. A lively conversation ensued between the two as 
 they quaffed their wine, which Leslie found to l)e of excellent 
 (luality. lie readily fell in with the humor of his newly found 
 friend ; and adroitly turned the conversation on the subject of 
 the enforcement of the Sunday-law, with the view of picking 
 up any information that he might utilize in the coming trial. 
 
 The interchange of opinions l)etween them was so interesting 
 to both that they paid but little attention to the really excellent 
 music discoursed by the band, nor heeded the arrival of the 
 numerous guests that began to collect at the tables around 
 them. Not even a party of ladies and gentlemen, until these 
 had approached quite near, and Leslie heard his name called 
 out by a voice betraying joyful surprise. On looking up, 
 V^ictor Waldhorst stood before him, offering both hands in 
 cordial welcome. Leslie himself was both pleased and sur- 
 prised to meet his Brookfield crony so unexpectedly ; but the 
 delight of the latter was unbounded. After heartily shaking 
 hands, — finding it difRcult to repress a strong impulse to 
 embrace his friend Leslie then and there — he turned with 
 beaming face to the old gentleman with whom Leslie had been 
 conversing and said: " Uncle Auf dem Busch, permit me to 
 introduce to you ray dearest friend, Leslie May, who, as well 
 as his excellent father, has been a real benefactor to me." 
 Then, turning to a lady of rather stout build and comely 
 appearance, he added, " and this, Leslie, is my aunt, Mrs. 
 Auf dem Busch ; and this " — turning to a young lady, who 
 blushed on being referred to — "is my sister Pauline." 
 
 Leslie had courteously bowed to Mrs. Auf dem Busch ; but 
 when Miss Pauline was introduced to him, he rose with easy 
 grace, and offered his hand, which was cordially clasped by 
 the young lady. " Do you know, Mr. May," she said, smilino- 
 pleasantly, "that you are hardly a stranger to me? M}^ 
 brother has spoken so often of you, and is so enthusiastic in 
 your praise, that I feel as if I had known you for a long time." 
 
 ' ' I fear that the fond partiality of your brother has endowed 
 
 17 
 
258 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 me with virtues and hero-like qualities whose absence you will, 
 on nearer acquaintance, but too speedily discover," said the 
 young man, looking well pleased, nevertheless, and scarcely 
 betraying the modesty he professed. "I only hope that in 
 your kindness you will look leniently on the great disparity 
 between your brother's idealized hero and ray commonplace 
 self." 
 
 The company, in taking seats, distributed themselves so as 
 to occupy both tables, and Leslie adroitly placed himself 
 beside Victor's sister. There was another gentleman in the 
 party, whom Victor introduced as his cousin, Woldemar Auf 
 dem Busch, and who, in consequence of Leslie's maneuvering, 
 found himself at the same table with his father and mother, 
 leaving the young lady seated between her brother and the 
 young lawyer, — an arrangement, Avhich was not, apparently, 
 to the taste of the young man last introduced ; for an unmis- 
 takable frown darkened his face, — unnoticed by the others, 
 but acknowledged by Leslie with a scarcely perceptible smile. 
 Whether this frown excited Leslie's mischievous propensity to 
 tease, or whether he was prompted by an amiable desire to 
 please the sister of his friend, who had received him so 
 graciously, certain it is that he brought his conversational 
 powers into full play, and succeeded in charming not only the 
 young lady, who proved an attentive listener, but also, and 
 particularly, the old gentleman. Victor, who was eager to 
 hear about Nellie, inquired after the family of Colonel May ; 
 but Leslie put him off with the promise to satisfy his curiosity 
 to the fullest extent as soon as occasion offered for a talk 
 between themselves, proceeding meanwhile to entertain his 
 hearers with a sprightly account of his experiences of Wash- 
 ington life, as well as of his travels. The close attention 
 which was paid to everything he said must have gratified his 
 vanity ; and the few questions addressed to him by the elder 
 Auf dem Busch enabled him to divine and dwell upon the 
 topics most interesting to his auditors. Several more bottles 
 of Kiidesheimer were disposed of by the company, and it is to 
 
OAMBBINUS UNDER A CLOUD. 259 
 
 be feared that the young lawyer sadly forgot the main {)uri)Ose 
 of his visit to Vaux Hall Park, whatever progress he made in 
 gaining the good will of his new acquaintances. 
 
 The sun was declining in the west, and a cool breeze fanned 
 the heated faces of the guests at the Park, now glowing, 
 mostly, with a fervor not due to tlie external temperature 
 alone. The band had left the platform on which they had 
 performed during the afternoon, and were now striking up 
 dance melodies in a large pavilon devoted to the worshipers 
 of Terpsichore. Many of the guests were leaving, and Mrs. 
 Auf dem Busch reminded her husband that it was time to think 
 of going home. The young lady promptly arose on hearing 
 the suggestion, and Leslie, following her example, expressed 
 his regret that the extremely pleasant time he was enjoying 
 should end so soon. " Surely, Miss Waldhorst," looking 
 coaxingly into the fair, fresh face of the young girl, — " you 
 may stay just long enough to honor me with your hand for a 
 turn in that exquisite waltz they are playing ? Listen — It is 
 Strauss' 'Beautiful Blue Danube! ' Can you resist the 
 allurement of those inspiring strains? " 
 
 Pauline looked at him for a second in mild wonderment. 
 The slightest touch of a smile brightened her rosy lips and 
 found reflection in her brown eyes, as she threw a glance 
 toward the gentleman at the other table, meeting a frown of 
 pronounced disapproval on the face of the younger Auf dem 
 Busch, not unnoticed by Leslie; " You must excuse me, Mr. 
 May," she said, " do you think it would be quite the proper 
 thing to do? " 
 
 " Why not? " Leshe rejoined eagerly. " See how all those 
 young people are enjoying themselves ! You are not averse to 
 dancing, are you ? " 
 
 " On the contrary, I am very fond of it! " said Pauline, her 
 sparkling eyes giving emphasis to her words. ' ' But — it is too 
 late. We must be going home." 
 
 " I am sure that Mrs. Auf dem Busch, and you, Mr. Auf 
 dem Busch," said Leslie, turning to the elder members of the 
 
260 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 party with the most winning smile of entreaty, " will gladly 
 postpone your departure for a few moments to give me the 
 pleasure of a dance with Miss Waldhorst, if she does not 
 object." 
 
 "But she does object!" exclaimed the old gentleman 
 bluntly. " Said she not, it is not proper? She has right. 
 Mark you the dancers on the dance-floor. See you any there 
 besides servant-maids and work-folks? Dancing on Sunday, 
 in a public park, is for them right. They shall enjoy so much 
 as they can on Sunday ; because they have only one Sunday 
 in the week. If you will dance, or if Pauline will dance, you 
 shall dance every day in the week, on a day more fitting as 
 Sunday, and in a place for you more fit as a park." 
 
 Leslie yielded gracefully, although it puzzled him to account 
 for his discomfiture. Did the young lady really consider it 
 bad taste to dance on Sunday? Now he thought of it, her 
 behavior had been jjerfectly consistent with such refinement. 
 The recollection of Victor's conduct toward Nellie on the occa- 
 sion of that last party at Brookfield flashed through his mind. 
 But the old gentleman — did /;e consider his family too good 
 to mix with "servant-maids" and " work -folks ? " Then 
 why were they in the park at all ? Or had the frown on young 
 Auf dem Busch's face anything to do with the girl's refusal? 
 Perhaps so. At least his suspicions in that direction gained 
 consistency when she, as he was about to escort her to the 
 gate, where the carriage was waiting for the party, somewhat 
 hastily accepted her cousin's arm, who officiously helped her to 
 her seat and thus cut off further opportunity for conversation. 
 
 " I will take your place in the carriage," the old gentleman 
 said to Victor ; ' ' for you will like it to have more conversation 
 with your friend. And forget not," he added, as he climbed 
 into the carriage, " Professor Rauhenfels comes after-to-mor- 
 row. Miss not to come." 
 
 Victor was but too glad to see them leave, and Leslie, 
 whether glad or not, bowed his adieux as they drove off, and 
 took Victor's arm. 
 
GAMBBINUS UNDEB A CLOUD. 261 
 
 " Let us go back to the garden," he said; " we can talk 
 there as well as anywhere else, and I have taken a fancy to 
 that ' Riidesheimer ' your uncle introduced us to. And now, 
 before you ply me with the thousand and one questions that 
 are on the tip of your tongue, let me put you through your 
 catechism. Tell me, first of all, how you got away from 
 Brookfield, and what you are doing here." 
 
 Victor felt the old fascination in Leslie's company. The 
 last harsh speech he had spoken before their parting was for- 
 given, if not forgotten. However great the change which the 
 experience of years had wrought in both young men, — change 
 never more pronounced than in the period of adolescence 
 through which they had both passed — it had not diminished 
 the glowing, devoted friendship between them, at least on 
 Victor's part. As of old, the slightest wish of his friend was 
 to him as a peremptory command. And so, though his heart 
 fairly ached to hear about the other members of the May 
 family, he willingly complied with the request to speak of him- 
 self first. 
 
 There was not so much to tell. He modestly alluded to the 
 desolation he felt after the departure of the Mays from Brook- 
 field ; of the progress he made in learning his trade, and of his 
 studies ; of his conviction, that there was so much more to learn 
 than could be taught him at Brookfield ; and wound up by 
 stating that he had finally concluded to return to the metrop- 
 olis, where he had found congenial employment as editor of 
 a German newspaper. " And now tell me, Leslie," he 
 begged, when he had finishsd his little narration, " where 
 have you been during all the time I have not seen you ? — I 
 learned from your father that you had traveled much of the 
 time, and was delighted with the account you gave us this 
 afternoon of some of your interesting experiences. But I want 
 to hear about yourself and about your mother, and — " 
 
 " About Nellie," Leslie interrupted him, " yes, I know. 
 I am going to tell you all about all of them presently. But 
 you have not told me half 1 want to know about yourself. Who 
 
262 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 is this uncle of yours ; and how do you stand with him ? Do 
 you live at his house? " 
 
 " No," was the answer. " Nor is he my uncle. Our re- 
 lationship is very distant. But he was a friend of my father, 
 and after the death of my parents took care of my sister Pauline. 
 He was very kind to her, treating her in every respect as if she 
 were his own daughter, although he has a number of children of 
 his own." 
 
 " Of whom this cousin of 3'ours, this Woldemar, is one? " 
 
 " Exactly. He is the oldest of them, and both Mrs. and 
 Mr. Auf dem Busch are very proud of him — " 
 
 " I should think so," said Leslie, not waiting for the finish- 
 ing of the sentence. " But tell me, Victor, are >/on proud of 
 him, too? " 
 
 "I? Why should / be proud of him? I have no proprie- 
 torship in him ; and our relationship is so distant, that neither 
 of us lays stress upon it, though Uncle Auf dem Busch wishes 
 us to call one another cousin." 
 
 " I see," said Leslie musing. Then he continued : "But 
 do you like him ? ' ' 
 
 " Of course I like him ! " Victor answered promptly. " He 
 is a manly fellow ; a little proud, which I think he has a right 
 to be—" 
 
 " And not a little imperious ! " Leslie again interrupted. 
 
 " Why, yes, he is rather imperious," Victor smilingly ad- 
 mitted. " But what makes you think so? I believe he has 
 hardly spoken a dozen words in your hearing." 
 
 " And a little jealous? " 
 
 " Jealous ! What do you mean? Jealous of what? " 
 
 "Of your sister's admirers, for instance. She has many, 
 has she not? " 
 
 "I have never seen anything like jealousy on his part," 
 said Victor. "But — " 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " 1 think he is kind to my sister; yes, I am sure, he is very 
 kind to her." 
 
GAMBRINUa UNDER A CLOUD. 263 
 
 " Oh, no doubt of that," said Leslie, not without a slight 
 sneer. " And that is not wliat you started to say. But never 
 mind. Tell me about the paper you are editing. AVhat is its 
 political creed? " 
 
 •'How can you ask me that!"' the young man exclaimed, 
 almost reproachfully. " You know my politics as well as I do, 
 seeing that I am but your father's disciple." 
 
 "Yes, certainly. But I did not ask you about '/oi'u- poli- 
 tics, but about the creed of the paper you are editing." 
 
 " Do you believe me capable of advocating anything but my 
 convictions ? ' ' 
 
 " No I " Leslie admitted frankly. "And I might have 
 known better than, to ask the question. I have heard say, that 
 an editor trims his sails, sometimes, so as to please not only 
 the proprietor, but also his readers." 
 
 " Such an editor is to be despised. 1 could not, if I would, 
 take charge of a paper on such conditions." 
 
 "And would not, if you could!" Leslie exclaimed cor- 
 dially. " Forgive me, if my question suggested a doubt, 
 which I did not entertain. — I suppose that you take a 
 decided stand against this warfare on Sunday beer gardens? " 
 
 A deep blush spread over Victor's face. "I — I must 
 confess," he said, somewhat dejected, " that in this particular 
 the articles in my paper do not exactly reflect my conviction. 
 I cannot conceal to myself, that it is wrong to openly defy 
 the law, even if the law is an obnoxious one — " 
 
 "Therein you differ from some of your countrymen," 
 Leslie interrupted. " I heard one of them argue, — no less 
 a person, than the proprietor of this establishment, who is a 
 client of mine — that it is a sacred duty to combat wrong in 
 whatever shape we meet it, though it assume the shape of a 
 law — ' ' 
 
 " Yes, I know; " Victor broke in. " That is the higher 
 law doctrine, which neither you nor I believe in. But it is 
 not in good taste, for one class of citizens to array themselves 
 against another class — presumably the majority, else it would 
 
264 THE ItEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 not be the law — as my German speaking fellow-citizens are 
 doing in this matter of the Sunday laws." 
 
 ' ' Do not forget the Irish ! ' ' put in the young lawyer. ' ' They 
 are in full accord with you Germans on this question." 
 
 " Nor am I sure that the law is not in the main a wise one," 
 Victor continued, looking intently at the glass before him, half 
 tilled with the golden juice from the Rhein. " Is there not a 
 fascination aV)out this delicious beverage Avhich some people 
 find it impossible to resist — entii'ely too many, as you may 
 satisfy yourself by looking around you — and who abandon 
 themselves to its influence to an extent depriving them 
 temporarily of the full use of reason? " 
 
 " Bah ! " rejoined Leslie contemptuously, " I dare say, that 
 hardly one in twenty of the guests here rise above the level of 
 their beloved lager beer — ' Uiirig's choice brew,' as your 
 uncle named it — and those that do are surely none the worse 
 for the inspii'ation and quicl^ening of their wits imbibed with 
 this glorious nectar! " Then, emptying his glass with great 
 gusto, he added: '' Ah! There is a drink truly fit for the 
 gods ! Your uncle is an excellent judge of wine, A'ictor ; there 
 is no denying that." 
 
 " So he is," said Victor, " and of beer, too. Perhaps these 
 men around us get as nuich enjoyment out of their beer, as 
 you or I do out of this excellent wine. And I fear that the 
 consequences, when nature exacts the penalty for the violation 
 of her immutable laws, will be much the same in either case." 
 " Katzenjammer? " suggested Leslie, with such a droll 
 smile, and so grotesque a pronunciation, that Victor could not 
 suppress a burst of laughter. 
 
 " Where did you pick up that word, and what do you know 
 about it? " he asked. 
 
 " When I was at Heidelberg," Leslie explained, " I was 
 naturally curious to see the sights of the great university, 
 making use of my sheepskin from Harvard to get an intro- 
 duction. Well, I succeeded to the length of obtaining an 
 invitation to one of their drinking bouts in honor of Alma 
 
GAMBEINUS UNDER A CLOUD. 265 
 
 Mater, which they call Comraers, and where they ' rubbed the 
 Salamander,' avowedly in honor of their distinguished Amer- 
 ican visitor, with such hearty good will, that a plentiful crop 
 of ' Katzenjaranier ' was the result next morning. An old 
 professor of philology, whose acquaintance I had made at one 
 of the ' Kneipen ' resorted to by students, and who helped me 
 get away with many a Schoppen of their excellent Neckar 
 wine, cheerfully expounded to me the mysterious misery of 
 this significant word, involving the explanation that it in no 
 wise referred to cats, as an ignorant foreigner might be led to 
 suppose, but really meant something far less itsthetic, — 
 exactly expressive, however, of the humor of the stomach 
 after attending a Commers." 
 
 "But that is the smallest part of the evil brought on by 
 excessive indulgence — " 
 
 "Do spare me! " Leslie interrupted the moralizing editor. 
 " I've had a sermon on temperance from your uncle already, 
 and I wish you would tell me about the professor that you are 
 to meet ' after-to-morrow ' at your uncle's. Who and what is 
 he? " 
 
 " I know very little about him, except that uncle picked 
 him up somewhere in the interior of the State, while he was on 
 a hunting excursion. Uncle says that he is the most learned 
 man he has ever met with, and that his book learning has not 
 spoilt his common sense, for he is an excellent shot and a 
 remarkably successful huntsman, knowing all about the haunts 
 and habits of game. I think he lives alone in a log cabin in the 
 woods, dividing his time between study and shooting game, 
 on which he manages to live. Just at present he is teaching 
 philosophy to a class of students of Hegel, and uncle wishes 
 me to become acquainted with him. He thinks that I will 
 greatly profit by the intercourse." 
 
 "So, so! A philosopher! " said Leslie, with a quizzical 
 look at Victor. "I should like to see him. Couldn't you 
 manage to introduce me? " 
 
 " Nothing easier! " Victor replied eagerly. " Come along 
 
266 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 with me to uncle's to meet him. I shall be very glad to have 
 you with me, for, to tell the truth, I expect to be dreadfully 
 bored by him, especially if he gives us some tough hunting 
 yarns, as uncle does, sometimes, or quizzes me on philosophy. 
 Do come with me, if your time permits. I am sure uncle will 
 be very much pleased to have you come. He has evidently 
 taken a great liking to you." 
 
 " Consider it settled that I come," said Leslie, rather 
 patronizingly, yet evidently much pleased. " And now I will 
 treat you to a thrilling account of The Adventures of the May 
 Family Abroad." 
 
 Victor listened eagerly, as Leslie, in his vivacious way, 
 recounted the experiences of their Washington life, and of 
 their travels to the mountains, the seashore and to Europe. 
 Victor judged from Leslie's account that Nellie must have 
 been a reigning belle in Washington, as well as wherever else 
 she graced society with her presence. " She is now at Sara- 
 toga with mama," Leslie concluded, " where they expect to 
 remain until the season is over, when the governor will join 
 them and escort them back to the city." 
 
 " And so you were not in Washington, last winter, at all? " 
 asked Victor. 
 
 " No," Leslie replied. " I w^as at Cambridge, taking a 
 post-graduate course in the law-school, to brush up for 
 practice, which I have now begun in downright earnest. That 
 reminds me," he added, " that I have a letter from Nellie in 
 my room, which you may like to read. It was written to me 
 from Washington just before I left Boston, and is full of her 
 notion of things, political and otherwise, that hap|)ened there 
 last winter." 
 
 It was late when the friends parted that night, and Victor 
 accompanied the young lawyer to his room, eager to get Nellie's 
 letter. His impatience to peruse it did not permit him to 
 accept Leslie's pressing invitation to stay longer. But he 
 promised him that he would call to take him along to his 
 uncle's house, where they were to meet Professor Rauhenfels. 
 
I 
 
 XVII. 
 FROM OUR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT. 
 
 Jr WONDER whether you will believe me, dear brother 
 [ mine, when I tell you that I am honestly — what you 
 
 ■ lawyers would call bonajide — glad that Lent has come? 
 Truly, it is even so. For although stern Society wield her 
 scepter never more tyrannically, exacting unabated assiduity 
 (Heavens ! what a string of dictionary words ! ) in attending 
 parties, suppers (which they mostly call dinners here), not to 
 mention at homes, soirees, conversazioni, and what not, all to 
 be gone through with e?t grande toilette; yet balls are over for 
 the season, hops are under a ban, and the german is inter- 
 dicted during Lent. From which it follows, that Society's 
 muchly tried votaries enjoy a qualified respite from daily 
 toil-e^ — relief and rest, if only by way of change in the pro- 
 gram, as one finds rest in that delightful new trick of revers- 
 ing in the waltz — and now and then — just think of the 
 glorious boon! — an evening to be spent at one's own sweet 
 will. 
 
 And so, vwit cher frere, you will rejoice with me at the 
 advent of Lent. For behold ! one of the delightful free 
 evenings has come to me that are so grudgingl}^ doled out by 
 stern Society aforesaid, and I am going to devote it to a big 
 brother at Boston, for whose edification I propose to compose 
 a charmingly nonsensical letter, full of delightful gossip. Oh, 
 you may turn up that nose of youj's, like a solemn bird of 
 Minerva, as becomes a denizen of the Hub of the Universe, — 
 but don't I know how dearly that wise brother of mine loves 
 gossip, especiall}' if there be no sense in it? And I am not 
 in the mood to restrict myself to the tedious rules of ele- 
 gant diction and timid propriety, nor even to conform to the 
 
 (267) 
 
268 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 canons of syntax that Professor Caleb Amos tried so hard to 
 rub into us at that famous grammar class. So look out for a 
 cosy chat, with plenty of nonsense, and don't be shocked at 
 a bit of slang, now and then, to hit off what I could not say 
 so well in regulation language. 
 
 I have given strict orders to Cressie, (who, let me tell you, 
 has developed into an accomplished lady's maid under the 
 influence of Washington Society) that I am not at home to 
 any one this evening ; least of all to the empty-pated gentle- 
 men in glossy broadcloth and immaculate kids, who essay to 
 curry favor with pa by paying court to his lovely daughter. 
 Cressie is very loyal to me. I can trust her, not only as to 
 her honesty, but, what is of more importance, sometimes, her 
 discretion. This, you will understand, is very high praise of 
 a domestic in Washington. So I anticipate a delightfully 
 quiet time ; immunity, for once, from the stereotype phrases of 
 polite company, so pleasantly suggestive, once, to the un- 
 sophisticated maiden ; grown, now, oh ! so stale and wearying in 
 their ever recurring iteration and unmeaningness ! 
 
 — Apro2)os of admirers, can you guess who called on me last 
 week ? Let me draw the picture for you : A young man — 
 mark you, a max, — by which I mean, in this instance, some- 
 thing more than the current term gentleman imports — of say 
 twenty-five ; a little disguised in a faultless evening costume, 
 not omitting the white cravat and stovepipe of intensest 
 gloss; rather tall, with a round, honest face, haughty eyes, 
 and a saucy mustache of russet hue. Do you recognize him? 
 Of course you do. Let me add that he brought with him the 
 aroma of Western Prairies, and that he addressed me in 
 the dear familiar dialect of Virginians emigrated to the West- 
 ern backwoods, that reminded me so vividly of bygone days 
 in our delightful Western home. Of course he was none other 
 than my sturdy rural beau, whose attentions to me were so sore 
 a trial to poor, bashful Victor Waldhorst. Yes, it was Ralph 
 Payton. You cannot imagine how glad I was to see him. 
 He presented so agreeable a contrast to the regulation society 
 
FBOM OUR WASHINGTON COIiBESPONDENT. 2G9 
 
 ligures at Washington. Not Init that he wonld hold his own 
 on the score of etiquette in any company ; for he is neither 
 ignorant of the forms of good breeding demanded by Society, 
 nor backward in tlie use of the stereot\'])e phrases she pre- 
 scribes. But these phrases, when they are uttered by him, 
 sound, somehow, as if they meant something. When he 
 expressed his pleasure at seeing me, I believed him, and the 
 pleasure was mutual and genuine. I was happy in the i-emi- 
 niscenees of olden times, and eagerly abandoned myself to 
 their influence. But he soon dashed cold water over my 
 idyllic mood, and spoiled my pleasure by a silly joke. I hap- 
 pened to ask him what business had brought him to Washing- 
 ton, and he answered that the most important part of his 
 business here was — to see his bride ! The remark was 
 accompanied by so significant a smile, that it would have been 
 silly in me to ignore its meaning: so I had to smile also, or 
 appear rude. It must have been a sickly attempt for I felt 
 myself blushing violently. His remark was not in good taste, 
 was it, Leslie? I am sure that that silly boy, Victor, who 
 dared even under the influence of his painful bashfulness, to 
 question the propriety of my conduct on the occasion of that 
 mock-marriage, would have jDossessed more delicacy than to 
 allude to it, under the circumstances. Victor offended me 
 deeply in that affair; but has it ever occurred to you, that 
 his conduct on the occasion was that of a true gentleman, and 
 that he displayed a courage and heroism of which the bolder 
 man was incapable ? 
 
 Payton's unfortunate allusion thoroughly spoiled the rest 
 of his visit for me. Luckily, there had been no other person 
 near enough to hear or at least to understand the remark, 
 and I showed him so plainly that the subject was distasteful to 
 me, that he will not, probably, allude to it again. Still I did 
 not venture to repeat my question as to his business here, and 
 he did not volunteer the information. Nor has he repeated 
 his visit. I learn from papa that he is still in the city, and 
 has called on him several times. Can he be seeking for office, 
 
270 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 do you think, and wants papa's influence with the govern- 
 ment ? 
 
 — In speaking of stereotype Society figures at Washington, 
 I do not mean to be understood as seeing no difference in 
 them. I am aware, of course, that no city in the world 
 boasts such a variety of types and specimens of humanity, 
 probably, as the cajjital of our nation. One hears the state- 
 ment so often in conversation, and meets with it so often in print 
 that it has become trite. What I mean is, that Society pol- 
 ishes down those whom it admits within its jealously guarded 
 precincts, freezing out all sharp edges and acute angles of 
 personal characteristics by the uniformity of dress, deportment, 
 even of conversation, which she decrees, and will not permit 
 to be departed from. Now this uniform fits some better than 
 others, and some not at all. Consequently one m-ay discern 
 cliaracter and individuality by the way the uniform fits the 
 wearer; and it is a source of amusement to some of us, to 
 guess whether a gentleman introduced to us is a member of Con- 
 gress, a government officer, or a lobbyist with a big or a little 
 ax to grind, by the way he uses his napkin or eats his soup. 
 I have made some pretty sharp guesses in this way. But one 
 is picked up, sometimes, in forming the estimate of a man's 
 character or standing by the way he conducts himself in 
 Society. A rather annoying, — I may admit to you, svJt rosa, 
 humiliating — thing happened to me the other night in this 
 direction, which I don't mind telling you — minding that the 
 miles between Washington and Boston protect me equally 
 against your mischievous smiles and your polite sarcasms. 
 
 We had all been invited to a conversazione at the hotel of 
 the Secretary of War, whose daughter, you remember is an inti- 
 mate friend of mine. Jennie had often invited me to tea ; and 
 as papa was not certain whether he would have time to escort 
 us in the evening, I persuaded mama to go there with me in 
 the afternoon and remain, feeling sure that Mrs. Secretary 
 Would be glad enough to have us assist in receiving the guests. 
 
 I made in this way a number of new acquaintances. Sena- 
 
FROM OUR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT. 271 
 
 tors, Members, Judges, Lawyers and people of all sorts were 
 iutroduced. I could not possibly remember all the names. 
 Among them were two who had come together, and who hardly 
 separated from each other during the whole evening. I could 
 not help noticing them, for they presented a striking contrast : 
 the one being a small, rotund, dumpy little gentleman, while 
 the other was tall, lean, gawky, — overtopping his companion 
 by a head and a shoulder, — a goodly sized shoulder at that. I 
 had not caught their names, when they were introduced to the 
 hostess ; but somehow I had the impression that the tall one 
 was a Methodist preacher. Perhaps it was because he had a 
 long, sallow face, closely shaven ; dark eyes, and a great 
 mouth, which gave him a pious look. The length of his arms 
 was wonderful. It seemed to trouble him greatly to know just 
 what to do with them. While I was noticing these things, a 
 gentleman passed in front of us, bearing refreshments upon a 
 tray to a group of ladies, and I could not help imagining what 
 a funny figure our tall visitor would make, steering through 
 the room with such a waiter poised upon his elongated arms. 
 Jennie laughed as I whispered something of the kind into her 
 ear, and left me with the remark — ' Let us have the picture 
 by all means.' 
 
 Before I was fairly aware of her intention, she had crossed 
 over to where the two gentlemen were conversing with Mrs. 
 Secretary and mama. I could not hear what she said to them ; 
 but i^reseutly the tall one threw a glance in the direction where 
 I stood, then bowed to Jennie and started off toward the 
 buffet. When he returned, he walked slowly, his eyes riveted 
 on the tray he was bearing, holding it out at arm's length, and 
 grasping it firmly with both hands. He seemed to be painfully 
 apprehensive that the two glasses of water freighting it might 
 slip off and spill their contents on the carpet. Jennie, as well 
 as the short-statured friend, looked on with evident amusement, 
 and many eyes were turned on him, including my own, taking 
 in the fun of the situation. I am afraid that he may have 
 read something of the kind in my face ; for when, having 
 
272 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 bowed, not ungracefully, to both Jennie and myself, as we 
 each took one of the glasses, he looked at me, his bright eyes 
 twinkling with fun, and a good-natured smile made his big 
 mouth really handsome. 
 
 " I am happy," he said, " in liaving been permitted to 
 render a slight service to ladies so fair. But I fear it would 
 go hard with me to make my living as a waiter in Washington 
 City. Carrying this load has been rather harder work to me 
 than splitting rails. But," he added, a flash of irresistible 
 drollery lighting up his face, "waiters rarely receive such 
 precious wages as I am getting." 
 
 I thanked him, as courteously as if he had been the most 
 accomplished cavalier, for the trouble he had put himself to on 
 our account and asked him what he meant by wages. 
 
 " Don't you know? " he asked in return. " Why, that re- 
 minds me of a story — no, I mean of a ballad I once read. 
 Are you acquainted with the poems of Schiller? " 
 
 I regretted my ignorance. 
 
 " Then there is a treat in store for you," he went on. 
 " Schiller felt, and in his poems knew how to describe in 
 burning colors, the exquisite bliss, as well as the keen torture 
 of human passion. He was, if not a keen observer of, cer- 
 tainly in genuine sympathy with, the virtues and frailties of 
 men and Avomen. You will be delighted and imj) roved by 
 reading the excellent translation by Bulwer. — Unless, in- 
 deed," he added with a questioning bow, "the original is 
 accessible to you ? — And when you come across the ballad of 
 The Glove, you will know what I mean by wages. Mean- 
 while ladies, I have been very happy to make your acquaint- 
 ance." 
 
 Saying which, he bowed himself away, and joined his com- 
 panion, with whom he had a jolly laugh. And, oh Leslie, 
 they must have laughed at me ! For when Jennie asked me 
 how I liked my Methodist preacher as a cavalier, she laughed 
 too ; and when I pressed her to tell me the names of the two 
 gentlemen, I was petrified to learn that the short one was the 
 
FE03I OUR WaSIIINOTON CORRESPONDENT. 273 
 
 Senator from Illinois, anil the tall one was his late competitor, 
 and the long and short of it is, that they are the two most 
 famous men in the United States just now on account of their 
 brilliant joint debate, a year ago last fall, on the slavery 
 question. It was a shabby trick of Jennie to get me into such 
 a scrape, was it not? I was awfully mad at her, and did not 
 fail to let her know ; but that did not mend matters any. 
 And I don't like the Illinois Senator any the better for drag- 
 ging his rail-splitting opponent into our conversazione getting 
 me into a scrape. And oh, Leslie, tell me, what did he mean 
 by that ballad of The Glove? 
 
 * * * 
 
 — It is several days since I began this tediously long letter 
 to you. I got to thinking about the ballad of The Glove, and 
 whether that gawky rail-splitter meant to deal me as severe a 
 blow as he did his opponent in that joint debate : for reallj-, 
 he had the best of the argument, did he not? Because I 
 remember hearing papa say that he had given the Squatter 
 Sovereignty doctrine a settler for good and all. But I am 
 glad that he was not elected senator. Papa is glad too, I be- 
 lieve. And in thinking over these things, I got sleepy, and 
 put off finishing this letter. The next time I got time, I 
 didn't have time : for hardly had I sat down to read the stuff 
 that I had written, preparatory to a continuation, when 
 Cressie announced a visitor, and brought me the card of Ralph 
 Payton. Of course, I was at home to him; so the letter to 
 you flew unceremoniously into my desk, and Ralph Payton 
 presented himself, gotten up in prime style by barber and 
 hairdresser, and showing good taste in the selection of his 
 tailor. Conversation between us was brisk enough this time. 
 And what do 3'ou think it was that brought him to Washington 
 City? He told me of his own accord. He wants to bring 
 out papa as a candidate for the United States Senate ! 
 And he came to offer his services in the canvass. Think 
 how I wronged him in supposing that he wanted papa's 
 influence for himself! He is perfectly sure that papa will 
 
 18 
 
274 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 succeed witli ease. So am 1, if papa will consent to make the 
 race. And the thouoht of seeing; him in the Senate chamber, 
 mama and I looking down ni)on him from the gallery reserved 
 for the families of Senators, listening to his stirring appeals 
 for the rights of the South — it almost lills the measure of my 
 ambition. I was so glad over the news, that I believe I 
 danced, and laughed, and scpieezed his hands, and made a 
 fool of myself generally. I think it was just grand in him to 
 come all the way to Washington to offer his help to papa to 
 make him a United States Senator. Don't you? 
 
 * * * 
 
 There was another interruption, of course, to prevent me 
 from finishing this epistle to yon. I am hurrying on to the 
 end now, else I fear you may never get it. Well, as soon as 
 Mr. Payton left that evening, I ran up to mama's room to talk 
 over the great news with her. She took it very coolly, I 
 thought. Perhaps papa has already talked it over with her. 
 Pretty soon papa himself came home, and I of course tackled 
 him upon the subject uppermost in my mind. It is all true, 
 Leslie! At hrst he was rather ba(?kward in owning up, talk- 
 ing about the dirticulty of making a canvass all over the State ; 
 but finally it all came out, and he admitted that he had fully 
 made up his mind to make the run. And you know, as well 
 as I do, that if papa tries, the thing is as good as settled. In 
 my joy I mentioned to him what Ralph had told me about 
 helping him; whereat he smiled, saying that Mr. Payton evi- 
 dently knew on which side his liread was buttei'ed, for that his 
 own election to the House of Representatives was dependent 
 on papa's election to the Senate. Just think of it, Leslie ! 
 Papa in the Senate, and Ralph Payton in the House, and both 
 from the little town of Brookfield! Won't Brookfleld feel 
 
 proud ? 
 
 * * * 
 
 .lust one thing more, before 1 send off this interminable 
 letter. The senatorial election, so I heard i)apa say, does not 
 come off until next winter. l>nl I do l)elieve that he is already 
 
FROM OVIt WASHINGTON COItRESPONDENT. 275 
 
 preparing for the race. He made a great s{)eecli this evening 
 in Congress, in wliich lie just demolished the Know-Nothiugs, 
 sailed into the black republicans, and regretted that the only 
 honest enemies the democrats ever had, the whigs, were now 
 fighting under false colors and helping the common enemy of 
 whigs and democrats undermine the constitution. The con- 
 stitution, he said, must be our watchword; its strict inter- 
 pretation our creed; its preservation our slieet-anchor of hope, 
 and its principles — Freedom and Equality before the Law — 
 the highest aim and motive of political charity. What do you 
 think of such a speech for a campaign document? Of course, 
 every one that has talked to me or in my presence about it, is 
 extravagant in its praise ; but then you know, we can't take 
 nmch stock in what people say to our faces. Papa is going to 
 have ever so many thousand copies of it printed and scattered 
 all over the State. That looks like business, does it not? I 
 wish we were at home, for I do believe I could help papa in 
 some wa_^ in this matter. Won't you try and persuade mama 
 to make a visit, at least, to Brookfteld, before the election for 
 senator comes off next winter? Papa will have to come any 
 how, I suppose, and 1 feel like doing some electioneering for 
 him. 
 
 We are all well. B^ven Cressie, who wishes she were away 
 from this wicked place. Mama sends her love. Papa hopes 
 you will settle down to the practice of law soon. And nobody 
 is going to be prouder of your success at the bar than 
 
 Your loving sister 
 
 Nellie. 
 
xvm. 
 
 THE PHILOSOPHY OF CARVING. 
 
 HE firm of Auf dem Buseh and Son was well known on 
 Main street. Its senior member, not without shrewd 
 business tact, had made for himself a reputation for 
 honesty, punctuality and strictly upright dealing, which had 
 gone far to secure success. His gains had accumulated 
 slowly, for he was cautious and shy of hazardous speculations ; 
 steadily, because he was waiy and watchful in taking advan- 
 tage of turns in the market. And so, when his eldest son had 
 returned from Europe, whither he had been sent to receive a 
 thorough mercantile training, the new firm entei'ed on its 
 career under favorable auspices. 
 
 The old gentleman was proud of his son. His joy, how- 
 ever, was not without its drop of bitterness. There was 
 a lack of enthusiasm in the son's nature. He did not seem to 
 appreciate the signal advantages that had fallen to his 
 lot. This first puzzled, then pained the fond father. In the 
 fullness of his joy he had tendered the young man an interest 
 in the firm, — the highest mark of confidence and approbation 
 in his power to bestow ; — it had been received with cool 
 politeness, as if the young man thought that in accepting the 
 partnership he was conferring a benefit on his father rather 
 than receiving one. It nettled the old gentleman also, that 
 Woldemar exhibited no slightest emotion on being welcomed, 
 on his return, in a charming new residence, which the mer- 
 chant had acquired during his absence, and of which no men- 
 tion had been made in the letters to him, on purpose to give 
 him an agreeable surprise. So, too, he had quietly accepted 
 the addition to the family circle of a grown up young lady, 
 without comment or question. And yet the father was very 
 (276) 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF CARVING. 277 
 
 proud, of both the new villa in the suburbs, and of the young 
 lady cousin, whom he had adopted into the family, and whom 
 he thought a paragon of beauty and excellence. 
 
 Probably the old gentleman was unreasonable in expectino- 
 Woldemar to take as much interest in these things as he did 
 himself ; at least Woldemar thought so. For Woldemar had 
 been to Europe. He had seen great cities, whose architectural 
 displays would put to blush the modest pretensions of his 
 father's villa. How could one be proud of anything this 
 Western world afforded, after seeing the great palaces, the 
 imposing, artistic structures, the " frozen harmony " as he 
 had heard it called, of cathedrals and domes in the old 
 country ? 
 
 And as to the young lady — why, he had been smiled upon 
 and made much of by those who were infinitely above Pauline 
 in point of beauty, familj^ and wealth, not to mention refine- 
 ment and culture. How could he be expected to go into 
 ecstacies over a simple maid like Pauline ? Plainly his father 
 did not take into account the superior educational advantages 
 he had enjoyed, nor the polish acquired by social intercourse 
 with people of high culture. 
 
 Still, he found Pauline not so bad in her way. True, she 
 had not so many compliments for him as some of the Fraulein 
 in the old country had lavished upon him ; and seemed scarcely 
 impressed with the high value of his good opinion. But then 
 she had a pleasant way of looking straight at him out of her 
 clear round eyes when she spoke to him ; her mouth was reallv 
 pretty when she smiled, as she did on small jDro vocation. 
 And one day, when there was company in the parlor, he was 
 quite astonished to find that she could entertain the visitors, 
 in the absence of Mrs. Auf dem Busch, with perfect self-pos- 
 session, and that they listened to her sprighly conversation 
 with as much jileasure, — almost, — as to his own interestino- 
 accounts of foreign experiences. 
 
 Pauline herself seemed well pleased with him. Her 
 " Cousin " Woldemar had, before his return from Germany, 
 
278 THE REBEL'S D AUGHT EB. 
 
 been freely talked over in the family. His brilliant future 
 was a theme upon which her " Uncle " Auf dem Busch had 
 loved to dAvell. So she had come to look upon her " cousin " 
 as a paragon of excellence, to win whose approbation might be 
 as high a boon as Fortune had in store for any young lady. 
 She was heart-free, knowing of love just what she had learned 
 from books, and as yet her ideal hero had not assumed a clearly 
 defined shape. Bound by the deepest sentiment of gratitude 
 to the family that had received her with open arms when she 
 was cast upon the world a homeless orphan, treated by Uncle 
 Auf dem Busch with all the tenderness and protecting care of 
 a father, she repaid the Ivindness and love of those in Avhose 
 midst she had found a happy home with fervent affection. 
 What more natural, then, than that she should deem the evi- 
 dent wish of her benefactor in respect of her relations to 
 Woldemar a new proof of his kindness ? Yes ; it was an easy 
 and not at all unpleasant task to try and win the love of the 
 excellent young man, if she could ; and to marr^^ him, if he 
 wanted her. 
 
 Thus there was a tacit understanding in the family, that at 
 some future time tliere might be a more binding tie between 
 Woldemar and Pauline, than that of the distant relationsliip 
 now existing. Not expressed in words, however, even by the 
 merchant himself ; least of all by the young man. He would 
 not displease his father liy showing opposition ; but it was 
 surely not necessary to entangle himself by any avowal of 
 intention which might be considered binding. And things 
 went on in this way, pleasantly enough, until the Sunday 
 afternoon, when the appearance of Leslie May in Vaux Hall 
 Garden had aroused Woldemar's displeasure. Pauline, for 
 her part, was not. at all displeased. She was rather gratified 
 to meet the idolized friend of her brother, and was at a loss to 
 account for the very evident aversion displayed by Woldemar. 
 But she asked no questions, and, indeed, soon dismissed the 
 subject from her mind. 
 
 Victor had informed his uncle of his intention to bring Mr. 
 
THE riiiLosoniY of cauvinu. 279 
 
 May with liiiu to meet Professor Raubenfels ; and on the day 
 appointed for the visit preparations were going on at Bnsch 
 Bluff — so the merchant had named his pretty villa — for the 
 reception of the guests. Pauline was busy, flitting from 
 parlor to kitchen and dining room, when Woldemarcame home, 
 rather earlier than was his wont, announcing that Mr. Auf dem 
 Busch would soon follow with the visitors. The busj' young 
 girl welcomed him with her usual smile and pleasant greeting, 
 and he could not help noticing that she looked more than 
 usually charming. His acknowledgment, however, was not 
 more friendly than usual, but rather less so, showing, indeed, 
 an ostentatious disapproval of the cheerfulness with which she 
 tidied the parlor and superintended the cooking. He made it 
 evident that he not only disliked the expected visitors, but 
 also that he felt it to be a personal grievance that Pauline 
 declined to share his aversion. To be sure, she showed no 
 particular interest in that conceited bear, Professor Rauhen- 
 fels, who in some unaccountable way fascinated his father ; 
 but then, Victor meant to bring, also, that insolent young 
 Southerner, who had so importunately persecuted the young 
 lady with his attentions. What business had he in this house? 
 And what business had she to expect the coming of the guests 
 with such evident eagerness? Surely, she must know, that it 
 was unlady-like to receive the unsolicited attentions of a silly 
 3'oung coxcomb, who was a perfect stranger to her, without 
 protest! The correct young gentleman, who had been to 
 Europe, would not stand it. He must tell her so. 
 
 But, whether for weal or ill, the young gentleman was pre- 
 vented from carrying out his well-meant resolution. Before 
 he had settled on the proper words to say, and on the manner 
 of saying them, he heard the deep bass of Professor Kauhen- 
 fels, which he hated, and saw his father approach through the 
 grounds, engaged in lively conversation with the guests he 
 was bringing, Woldemar went to the door and received the 
 company with elaborate politeness, contrasting perceptibly 
 with the cordial h')spitality of the owner of the mansion, and 
 
280 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 the bright welcome extended to them by the young lady, who 
 had also gone to the door to meet them. They were soon 
 seated in the parlor, where Professor Rauhenfels continued 
 the narration of a marvelous hunting story. Leslie May was 
 seated opposite to him and found, for the first time since his 
 introduction in Mr. Auf dem Busch's store, an oj^portunity 
 to notice his personal appearance. Paying no attention to 
 the story he was telling, which he supposed to be on a par 
 with the yarns usually spun by amateur sportsmen, he 
 leisurely took a mental inventory of the Professor's prominent 
 traits . 
 
 A man, he found him, of rather tall stature, well propor- 
 tioned, broad shouldered ; clad in sovereign contempt of fickle 
 fashion and arbitrary rules of etiquette, almost to the defiance 
 of conventional propriety. His feet were encased in a pair of 
 low shoes, not always closely laced ; and as the extremities of 
 his nether garments did not quite reach the top of his shoes, a 
 considerable expanse of sock was visible, now and then, which, 
 in default of garters, sat loosely, in picturesque, if not grace- 
 ful, undulations. The weather being of the kind to which the 
 denizens of the Western metropolis were accustomed in high 
 summer, a waistcoat was clearly a superfluous luxury: the 
 lio-ht jacket of brown holland that he wore, affording sufficient 
 covering. The only portion of his wardrobe making any pre- 
 tension to amplitude was his shirt collar. Not a sham imitation 
 in paper, — he hated shams in any shape — nor even of snowy 
 linen ; but a genuine part of the garment itself, turned over a 
 ribbon doing service as a neck-tie, somewhat in the fashion 
 which painters love to give to the collars of Schiller and 
 Byron, and which, in connection with his jetty hair, worn 
 long, might remind one who had known him of the romancist 
 Ned Buntline. Leslie took in the peculiarities of his dress at a 
 glance. But the expression of his features, — bold and 
 striking though they were — was not so easily read. 
 
 A broad, high, somewhat retreating forehead, suggestive of 
 poetic power and force of imagination ; a prominent aquiline 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF CARVING. 281 
 
 nose, indicative of strong will ; square jaws and high cheek- 
 bones, giving him, especially when seen in profile, a command- 
 ing, eagle-like mien, in no wise softened by the sparkle of his 
 keen, brown-black eyes set far apart. His rather large, 
 mobile mouth might have betokened sensuality, but for 
 the slight downward curve of the corners, which readily 
 assumed the proportions of a sneer, and was capable of im- 
 parting to his features the expression of intense scorn, or, 
 when under excitement, of impassioned enthusiasm. 
 
 One of the peculiarities about him was the rich, deep bass 
 of his voice, which commanded attention even in ordinary con- 
 versation, such as he was engaged in while Leslie observed 
 him. But when the ladies appeared to summon the guests to 
 table, it put the observer to a severe test to maintain his 
 gravity; for as he rose to greet Mrs. Auf dem Busch, his 
 inquiry after her health was couched in falsetto, an octave or 
 two above the usual pitch of his voice, and with an inflection 
 of the tenderest solicitude. 
 
 It was also a surjjrise to Leslie, to see the host motioning 
 the professor to the head of the table. " You shall be sur- 
 prised," he explained to the other guests, " to see and admire 
 our friend's wonderful skillfulness, which he has in the art of 
 carving. If it be a turkey, or if it be a goose ; and much 
 more, if it be a matter of carving a smaller bird. It is not 
 now the time for turkeys ; but one of the consignors to our 
 firm has honored me with a prairie chicken or two, and it shall 
 taste to us better, when our friend has so skillfully carved it 
 like he can do." 
 
 Leslie, who had promjjtly offered his arm to Miss Wald- 
 horst, was less amused by this speech than he would probably 
 have been, if his attention had not been attracted by the scowl 
 on young Auf dem Busch's face, as he, Leslie, took his seat 
 by the side of that which Mrs. Auf dem Busch assigned to 
 Pauline, quietly ignoring the evident intention of that lady 
 that her son Woldemar should occupy it. Mrs. Auf dem 
 Busch, whose plans were thus crossed, had not the presence of 
 
282 THE EEBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 mind to call her guest's attention to the mistake he had made, 
 and the old gentleman failed to notice it. 
 
 Nevertheless, conversation in no wise flagged. Professor 
 Rauheufels, deprecating the merchant's compliments to his 
 skill, favored the company with a loquacious dissertation on 
 the art of carving, demonstrating that the chief requisite of a 
 successful carver consisted in the accurate knowledge of the 
 anatomy of the bird. 
 
 " Oh, ho! " the A'ounger merchant exclaimed ; " give me a 
 fat bird and a sharp knife, and I will guarantee you that I get 
 away with the meat, if I were at all hungry, with or without 
 knowing anatom3^" 
 
 " Yes," observed Leslie, " or even with a dull knife, or none 
 at all. But then the professor might say, that that was 
 carving with Alexander's sword, which was simply cutting 
 through the knot instead of unraveling it." 
 
 " Just so," the professor assented. " The kind of carving 
 the wolf does, when he munches the lamb he has stolen. But 
 mark you, the wolf is not so ignorant of the lamb's anatomy 
 as our young friend here assumes in his hypothesis — " 
 
 "When he is through with his meal," Leslie interrupted, "he 
 has probably devoured the whole subject, anatomy and all." 
 
 " But the professor will say, that is munching, and not carv- 
 ing, " said Victor. 
 
 "Exactly;" Rauheufels replied, somewhat emphatically. 
 " Do you not see that the bird and the knife, as well as the 
 hand that holds it, are but tools, that obey the carver's will? " 
 
 " Granted ! " Woldemar threw in. " So the wolf also works 
 his will on the lamb. What difference, then, between the 
 two?" 
 
 " Only this," said the professor, " the carver — presumably 
 a rational being — exercises his free will, while the wolf 
 blindly obeys his appetite. The one is a master ruling, the 
 other a servant ruled by nature." 
 
 " Are we masters, ruling nature? " Victor inquired in 
 surprise. 
 

 O ?o 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF CARVING. 283 
 
 "Oh, no," sneered Woldeniar. "You misunderstand. It 
 is only the adept at carving that rises to that dignity." 
 
 "Just so," said the professor looking sharply at the last 
 speaker for a second, but then addressing himself to Victor. 
 "Nature has given us eyes to see; that much she has done 
 for the wolf also. But she has given us^ what she has not 
 given the wolf, reason — that divine attribute in virtue of 
 which man rules the world." 
 
 " Rules the world ?" Victor repeated with eagerly questioning 
 eyes. " How can that be, when so many human beings 
 annually perish for the want of simple means of subsistence, 
 or fall victims in other wa3's to the inexorable laws of nature, 
 which man is utterly impotent to abrogate, or even modify? " 
 
 " Right, my friend," the professor answered, complacently. 
 "The laws of nature are eternal and immutable. What an 
 insigniiicant accident man would be, were it otherwise! 
 Imagine, if you can, what must follow an instant's cessation 
 of the law of gravity. Chaos ? Not *so much as that : for in 
 chaos, in so far as we can conceive it at all, is relation and 
 coherence. But utter nothingness : for the single substantial 
 quality of all matter is gravitation." 
 
 Leslie, witli a good-natured smile of incredulity, addressed 
 this question, rather to his fair neighbor: " What then does 
 man's supreme rule of tlie world amount to, in view of the 
 supremacy of the law, for instance, of gravitation? " 
 
 " Man cannot, of course, ignore the law of nature in any 
 direction," the professor answered, " any more than he could 
 create it. But he can subordinate it to his purposes. He 
 commands this gigantic monster, gravitation, to do his bid- 
 ding, and it yields unquestioning obedience. It grinds for 
 him his corn, it holds together his habitations, carries him and 
 his wares across continents, over oceans, and through the air; 
 it points out to him the paths of the heavenly bodies, and 
 measures for him time and space. Which, think you, is the 
 master, and which the servant? " 
 
 " I should tiiink, that they took turns about in having things 
 
284 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 their own way," Leslie suggested. " Wlien tliis monster plays 
 snow-balling with mighty avalanches, or shakes down houses 
 and cities during an earthquake, his obedience shines con- 
 spicuously by absence. Where, under such circumstances, is 
 man's mastery? " 
 
 "Asleep!" Rauhenfels almost shouted, "Don't blame 
 man's stupidity on the faithful servant who simply does what 
 he is bid to do. Let me help you to a fine piece of tlie breast 
 of this bird. See, — I lay it on your plate, and this monster, 
 gravitation, holds it there for you, like the obedient servant he 
 is. Now you know that he would dash it to the floor with 
 equal readiness, if you ordered him to do so by the way you 
 hold your plate. Would it not, then, be ridiculously unjust to 
 hold him responsible for your awkwardness if you should 
 drop the meat from your plate? And just so if a man puts 
 himself in the pathway of the falling avalanche, or builds top- 
 heavy houses in the regions of earthquakes." 
 
 " Then," interposed Leslie, " to guard against avalanches, 
 you expect man to level the mountain, so as to keep the snow- 
 ball out of the monster's power? " 
 
 " An easier way would be for him to keep away from the 
 mountains during snowstorms," said Rauhenfels. " But 
 supposing that the occasional recurrence of avalanches were 
 known to threaten extermination of the human race, then were 
 it not willful self-destruction if it failed to level the moun- 
 tains, — that being the only means of avoiding avalanches? 
 So, you see," he continued, again turning to Victor, " that 
 the question of mastery between man and the forces, or laws, 
 as we have called them, of nature, is quite easil}^ settled. 
 Remembering that man is free — that is to say, that his will 
 is first cause, or self-cause, his superiority over that which is 
 unfree, or cause only as it is effect, is patent." 
 
 Victor had listened with deep attention. " Do you then 
 mean to say," he now inquired eagerly, " that man is above 
 the law? Why, that would clothe him with the attributes of 
 divinity ! ' ' 
 
THE riJILOSOniY OF CAEVING. 285 
 
 " Well," the professor replied, his voice assuming its bass 
 pitch, and his eyes beginning to sparkle, " and is not freedom 
 divine ? Is not God freedom ? And do 3^011 not claim that 
 God-like atti'ibute for yourself ? Understand, — I do not mean 
 the potentiality to do or not to do which is all that some people 
 see in will, or liberty. That is will in its capricious, arbitrary 
 form, which man possesses in common with the mule and 
 which is the highest law to the wolf when he devours the lamb. 
 Man possesses a goodly share of this kind of will, or freedom. 
 Vast numbers of men and women never rise higher in the 
 realm of existence. There are slaves, — aye, and more of 
 them than are now held in bondage in this free land of ours — 
 who prove, by their very condition as slaves, their incapacity 
 for freedom, — for free men cannot be made slaves. So there 
 are tyrants, despots, whose claim to the divine attribute stands 
 upon no higher ground. And you are right, my young 
 friend, in doubting the attributes of divinity of either extreme." 
 
 " Then, I understand, after all, that man is not above the 
 law? " said Victor interrogatively. 
 
 " But man may antagonize the laws of nature against each 
 other," exclaimed the professor with some animation, "and 
 thus make them his servants. He commands Gravitation to 
 float his ships, and Boreas to waft them over the ocean ; or, if 
 he desires a more relialjle agent, he harnesses Phcebus himself 
 to his chariots, compelling him to propel them with the swift- 
 ness of the fleetest bird whither he listeth ; he has wrested the 
 thunderbolt from Jupiter's hand, and sends his messenger 
 more swiftly over the earth, than Hermes served Jove of old. 
 Is not man greater than the mythological gods? " 
 
 " Mythological gods, yes," Woldemar spoke up. " But 
 they, like the laws Victor spoke of, are of man's making. 
 Not much divinity about them, I should think." 
 
 The professor fixed a keen glance upon the new speaker, the 
 curves of his mouth assuming a contemptuous expression. 
 " You seem to think," said he, " that man can make laws, as 
 well as o-ods ? ' ' 
 
286 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 " Of course," was Woldemar's prompt auswer. " In 
 monarchies, rulers, ' by the grace of God ' fashion the laws 
 to their liking ; in republics, they are made by the people 
 themselves. You do not question so much, I hope? " 
 
 " And will you please inform me, what you understand by 
 law? " the professor asked with a show of innocent curiosity. 
 
 "Why, law, in the sense I spoke of it, is the will of the 
 people, expressed in some form recognized as binding," Victor 
 answered, instead of Woldemar. 
 
 " An act of the legislature, whether it exjiresses the will of 
 the people or not," suggested Leslie, who, though really 
 anxious to draw the ladies into participation, had shown him- 
 self an attentive listener. 
 
 " Why not say plainly, the pretended will of the sovereignty, 
 if that is what you are driving at? " said tlie professor, suavely- 
 enough. But suddenly assuming a severity of tone and a 
 lierceness of manner that startled Victor, he added: "But 
 tliat is a miserable makeshift. You can find half a dozen 
 sucli delinitious in the ordinary dictionaries. Why, even 
 Blackstone knew that much, only it took him a great many 
 more words to say it. And every jackanapes of a lawyer that 
 has bought him a sheep-skin from some diploma-mill chatters 
 it after him ever since. That, to be sure, is the kind of 
 law that the British Parliament, the American Congress, and 
 every puny State legislature grinds out daily by the cart-load. 
 You can get it made to order, cheap for cash. The capricious 
 whimsicalities of unlimited monarchs are on a par with the 
 trash given us by constitutional governments, — for, — mark 
 you, Blackstone is not sure but that anything Parliament sa3's, 
 no matter how absurdly ridiculous, is law. And I suppose I 
 need not tell you, gentlemen, that whoever has an axe to 
 grind, or even a small hatchet, is a welcome guest in the halls 
 of your legislatures, not to mention the smaller fry of city 
 coinicils and other law-making corporosities, provided he 
 furnish the sugar to sweeten their tempers. Lcmo^ indeed ! 
 If this sort of law did not, fortunately, possess the knack of 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF CARVING. 287 
 
 the Kilkenny cats, which, you know, ate each other up until 
 nothing was left of them but the tails, it would long ago have 
 inundated the world, like a second Deluge." 
 
 When Rauhenfels made mention of " jackanapes " of law- 
 yers, Leslie had winked at Victor so droll a grimace as to 
 start the young Auf dem Buschs into an audible smile, 
 severely testing the self-control of the ladies to avoid following 
 their example. He now improved the opportunity afforded 
 by the pause, to demurely inquire, what, in the professor's 
 opinion, became of the tails left by all the Kilkenny cats? 
 
 " Tails, is it? " snorted the professor, flashing a keen glance 
 of defiance at the demure speaker. " Pray sir, will you tell 
 me, what it is, that your statute books contain, but just cats' 
 tails? From cover to cover, from A to Izzard, what Init cats' 
 tails? Not even assorted, but just thrown together, pell-mell, 
 relying on the charitable presumption that judges and lawyers 
 know their A-B-C-, the scientific jirineiple upon which indexes 
 are constructed, by means of which to put their hands on tail 
 A or tail Izzard, as occasion may require! Why, my young 
 friend, eliminate from your Statutes at Large, your Common 
 Law, your Omnium-gatherum of Chancery Rules, stolen from 
 the Civil Law, — eliminate from them the few ingots of 
 rational thought that have come down to us from such ven- 
 erable seers as composed the decalogue and like codes, and 
 you will have a vast and imposing mass of cats' tails for your 
 trouble. Put them into your pipe and smoke them ! " 
 
 " You would not impose so cruel a task on me, now would 
 you ? ' ' said Leslie, with pleading voice. ' ' Even if I deserved it, 
 it would be unmerciful to the ladies, who, I submit, are not to 
 be blamed for the cats' tails in our statute books. I trust, 
 rather, that you will condescend to enlighten us as to liow we 
 are to obtain a better quality of law. For if neither monarchs 
 nor legislative assemblies are to be relied on, I can think of but 
 one other source from which law could emanate, — the people 
 themselves, in their original sovereign capacity. But the only 
 instance I can remember in historv or fiction, in which that 
 
288 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 plan received a trial, was a signal failure. Even our Pilgrim 
 Fathers, who for a time undertook to personate legislatures, 
 judges and executioners in their aggregate capacity, soon 
 found, that a pure Democracy would not, to use a phrase of 
 Carlyle, march." 
 
 " I should think not," sneered the professor, the down- 
 ward curves of his mouth deepening perceptibly. " And sup- 
 posing it did march, think you that the quality of the law 
 would thereby improve? I may grant you, that the people 
 have a marvelous proficiency in picking out knaves and fools 
 as their representatives ; but they are representatives ; and 
 since the stream can rise no higher than its source, they reflect 
 truly the calibre of their constituents. No, my young friend! 
 The chances are, that a hundred thousand fools will quite equal, 
 in their aggregate stupidity, the folly of any smaller number 
 of them, just as the tyranny of majorities is as destructive of 
 liberty, as that of a single-headed despot. Oh, no, do not 
 understand me as joining in the popular cry, in this sense, of 
 Vox Populi vox Dei ! " 
 
 " But you have not vouchsafed the information we crave," 
 Leslie insisted. " You have, instead, only cut off one more 
 source of possible legislative authority, and I am at my wits' 
 end to imagine how the evil you so graphically describe might 
 be remedied." 
 
 " Don't you see," said Woldemar, who could not resist the 
 temptation to pour what he deemed a broadside into the 
 enemy's unprotected front, although it went sorely against his 
 grain that in doing so he was siding with the Southern 
 lawyer, — " don't you see what the gentleman is driving at? 
 He has distinctly disavowed all authority. Except metaphy- 
 sics. Ask him, and if he confesses his real view, he will tell 
 you, that not only the State, but the whole Universe, is gov- 
 erned by speculative philosophy, whose high priest is Hegel, 
 the inventor of a mystical system of Trinity, whose corner- 
 stone is the doctrine that Being and Naught are identical, and 
 that the identitj' of the two constitutes the World. No won- 
 
THE PIIILOSOniY OF CARVING. 289 
 
 der, then, thut he spurns all laws emanating from a source that 
 recognizes common sense. For he who enters the realm of 
 Hegelian Speculative Mysticism must leave understanding 
 behind." 
 
 Rauhenfels turned to the new speaker with a sarcastic smile. 
 " I congratulate you," he said, '• on the good use you seem to 
 have made of your time while in Germany. No doubt, you 
 made a profound study of Hegel and his philosophy ; or, if 
 not of Hegel, at least of those of his adversaries, who prove 
 in learned disquisitions how much of a mystery Hegel has 
 remained to them. You quote Diihring almost verbatim. 
 Yes, sir! The world /x governed, — not by speculative phi- 
 losophy, but by reason, which it is the ottioe of speculative 
 philosophy — speculative .^ mark, not in the sense in which your 
 highly respectable firm deals in sugar and coffee, or a land 
 shark in acres and town-lots, but as searching after Truth — 
 to discover, and of the legislature, or other law-announcing 
 authority to announce. Yes, sir! This same Hegel, and 
 every thinker who has searched after and discovered Truth, 
 are the real law-makers. For whatever is, is by virtue of the 
 reason for its being. Discover that, and you have its law ; 
 and he who announces it, is the legislator. Who, think you, 
 was the true legislator, — Galileo, the humble Italian astrono- 
 mer, or Urban VIII, backed by the wisdom and power of the 
 inquisition? Surely, the Pope was in authority, wielding the 
 power of the Christian Church. He haughtily commanded the 
 Sun to dance attendance upon our Earth, the Earth to stand 
 as the lixed center of the Universe. Y'et do we not all agree, 
 that the philosopher's whispered '■ E pur se muoce!' was the 
 more potent decree ? ' ' 
 
 " But this is a mere fable I " Woldemar announced, oracu- 
 larly. "It is now admitted l>y those best informed on his- 
 tory, that Galileo did not utter these famous words at all, nor 
 ever retracted his recantation." 
 
 " Well, is not Fable more true than History? " demanded 
 the professor, with some animation. 
 
 I'J 
 
290 THE BEBEU8 DAUGHTER. 
 
 " Of course," put in Victor, eagerly. " It is the judgment 
 of the world, that this was the proper thing for Galileo to say 
 under the circumstances ; and whether he spoke the words or 
 not, they are perfectly true." With some hesitation he then 
 added: "But it seems to me, that Mr. May's question has 
 not yet been answered. If the acts of Congress, or the State 
 legislature, are not the law, what are they? " 
 
 " Exactly so," said Auf dem Busch Senior. "It is neces- 
 sary that we have law, and the law shall be reasonable, as the 
 professor has well spoken. Now I like some upclearing, who 
 shall say, if the law be reasonable? Shall I myself say so? 
 Then all say that is law, what they like. We have a Sunday 
 law ; and some people say it is reasonable. I think it is 
 tyranny. Now who has right? " 
 
 " Ah, that is a very different thing," said the professor, 
 with great deference. " Right — that is, the law of God, — 
 is eternal and immutable, as God himself is. But since it ex- 
 ists in our consciousness only, constituting our conscience., 
 every man carries in his own breast the criterion for right and 
 wrong. And you, Mr. Auf dem Busch, have forcibly pointed 
 out the necessity of some external criterion, to decide authori- 
 tatively between individuals who differ, whether honestly or 
 wickedly, in their assertions of right. It was this necessity, 
 that gave us the decalogue on tables of stone. It was this 
 necessity, too, that brought us Christ, who established a 
 religion of Mercy instead of the rigid rule of jealous Jehovah. 
 It is this necessity, in fine, that gives us parliaments and 
 congresses, and legislative bodies of all sorts. Yes, you have 
 pithily put it: There must be authoritative statement of what 
 is right and wrong. Whether this be by an autocrat or a par- 
 liament, a king or a popular assembly, matters really very 
 little. The essential thing is that it be recognized as authori- 
 tative, and that it be obeyed as such. As the Church demands 
 faith in its dogmata, on pain of excommunication, so the State 
 coerces obedience to its commands, though it cost the prop- 
 erty, the life, or even the liberty of its defier — " 
 
TEE [PHILOSOPHY OF CARVING. 291 
 
 " How far, then," Leslie inteiTupted, " does your definition 
 of liiw differ from tliat given by Mr. Waldhorst, or Mr, Auf 
 deni Buscli, or even myself':' " 
 
 ' ' As the true does from the false ! ' ' the professor exclaimed 
 promptly. "The dogma of the Church is infallible, because 
 to the faith of the believer it is divine revelation. But how 
 about the unbeliever? Can it be law to him? So with the 
 citizen : Possessing in his own breast the highest criterion for 
 right and wrong, he necessarily measures the law by that 
 standard. If he find it true and just, he will abide by it, and 
 that law is iDrobably a divine revelation to him. But if it be 
 of the Kilkenny Cat kind, made to-day, to be repealed to- 
 morrow, or changed, modified, or amended — what shall be 
 said of it? Or if it be a gigantic steal from the many to 
 enrich a favored few? Or if it be an infamous piece of 
 barbarism — ' ' 
 
 " For instance? " Leslie inquired. 
 
 " You want an instance? " the professor exclaimed, his eyes 
 rtashing, his mouth curving downward, his voice trembling 
 with excitement. " Let me mention only the statutes of half 
 the States of this Union, which in all seriousness proclaim 
 l^roperty in man ! Think of the monstrous contradiction — 
 man, whose essential quality is freedom, to be declared by the 
 laic to be property! And, not enough that the slave States 
 enact such damnable heresy against human dignity, but the 
 federal government itself, — representing slave and free 
 States — by a statute to which it proposes to exact obedience, 
 degrades every freeman in the land to the level of a Jack- 
 Ketch, condemning him, at the beck of the vilest dealer in 
 human flesh, to help hunt down, like a bloodhound, his run- 
 awaj' ' chattel,' and deliver back into slavery a manor woman, 
 to be scourged by an enraged mastei- for the crime of having 
 aspired to their God-given freedom ! Is this instance enough 
 to justify a freeman in protesting that such cannot be law? " 
 
 The words of the professor, spoken with impressive pathos, 
 produced a different result upon his several hearers. Wolde- 
 
292 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 mar Auf dem Busch had iiiil)it)t'd, during his absence in 
 Europe, the positive views prevalent among the Germans on 
 the sul)ject of slavery ; and it was natural that the closing 
 words of his antagonist should command his assent. But it 
 was equally natural that he should dislike to applaud a man so 
 utterly unsympathetic to him ; so he remained silent, 
 
 Leslie had a smile for the professor's earnestness. He 
 looked at the young lady by his side to note the effect pro- 
 duced upon her, and neither he nor Woldemar was pleased bj^ 
 the eager assent to be read in her sparkling eyes and from her 
 eager, half -parted lips. 
 
 Victor was the one most deeply interested in the views ex- 
 pressed by the professor. There was a dazed look upon his 
 features that betrayed the difficulty he found in weighing the 
 argument. Absurd, had the professor said, were the laws of 
 slavery? Surely, he must be ignorant of the true condition of 
 things in the slave States. And yet, — he was so positive ! 
 And of his sincerity there could be no doubt. And — he was 
 certainly no fool ! For however paradoxical had been liis talk 
 about law, he could not, at bottom, deny any of those striking- 
 statements. 
 
 Victor again experienced the doubts and trouldes that Col- 
 onel May had awakened in talking on this subject ; only now 
 the shock was greater, and it came in the opposite direction. 
 It pained him to hear the institution of slavery so savagely 
 assailed. 
 
 Auf dem Busch Senior, alone expressed his thorougii ap- 
 proval of the professor's words. " It has been as I thought," 
 he said, with an air of unmistakable relief, " that we have 
 been misunderstanding the professor. He has well spoken 
 the truth. In this matter, like in all other matters when he 
 speaks in earnest. He denies not that we must obey the law ; 
 but he is in wrath about foolisli law, like Sunday law, and 
 slave law. But we will be vexatious no more to-day with 
 slavery. It is not yet dark ; 1 will enjoy a smoke in the open 
 air. So I ask the gentlemen to join me, if it shall be pleasing 
 
THE nilLOSOPUY OF CARVING. 293 
 
 to them. You are a judge of a line cigar, Mr. May? Our 
 frieud Raulienfels is also a judge, and when he has not his 
 cob-pipe and country tobacco, he is not afraid of my brand. 
 You Avill like it, I make no doubt. You are not to mind the 
 ladies. We have seasoned them. What, Pauline? " 
 
 " Indeed, you may say so," the maiden responded ; " and 
 the drawing-room as well. You can have no idea, Mr. 
 May," she continued, turning to this gentleman as she arose 
 with the others, " what German gentlemen can do in the 
 smoking line. When uncle puts his Meerschaum into requi- 
 sition, and Cousin Woldemar joins him with a favorite El Sol 
 Regalia, and Professor Rauhenfels puffs away at his cob, the 
 fragrance is sometimes overpowering, even to me, who am 
 partial to the aroma of tobacco smoke ; and the atmosphere 
 around them is as foggy as the philosophy they discuss." 
 
 " There," said the uncle, shaking his forefinger at the girl, 
 " make us not so black a picture before Mr. May." 
 
 " No blacker than the color of aunt's curtains in the morn- 
 ing after one of your revels," the girl retorted. " But don't 
 let us spoil your enjoyment, gentlemen. I am sorry not to be 
 able to inhale the fragrance of your cigars, in the open air, 
 with you, but some domestic duties claim my attention for a 
 while. Presently I will be happy to join you, if you have no 
 objection to my com.pany ; and I expect to find you all in ex- 
 cellent spirits, 3'our tempers mellowed by the soothing influence 
 of a fine Havana." 
 
 It annoyed Leslie to hear of the girl's detention in the 
 house, for politeness forbade his remaining. All the greater 
 was his gratitude to the old gentleman, when he heard him de- 
 cree that the domestic duties must give way, for once, to the 
 more immediate duties to their guests. " I want, that you 
 show^ Mr. May what we have in the garden," he said; and 
 then to Leslie: " You will admire the skill that she has as a 
 gardener. " 
 
XIX. 
 
 THE EVER NEW OLD STORY. 
 
 ^USCH BLUFF was a pretty villa, Avhich had not yet 
 lost the charm of novelty, in the eyes of its owner at 
 least. Perched on the summit of a graceful knoll on 
 the range of bluffs from which it took its name, environed of 
 all sides except that toward the river by a grove of thrifty 
 forest trees, it commanded an extensive view of the river, as 
 well as of the bottom lands and bluffs far up and down on the 
 other side. A mile or two to the southward the swift current 
 of the turbid stream slackened its speed, seeming to linger 
 fondly near the town of Pennyville, where it had washed out 
 for itself a deep, broad basin in the angle formed by veering a 
 point or two to the left. On the north the Arsenal Island, — 
 named so because located opposite the national armory, more 
 popularly known as the Arsenal — divided the rushing Avaters 
 into two channels. It was covered with a dense growth of 
 young willows and sycamores ; uninhabited, save that a few 
 rugged fishermen had erected there a rude hut or two to shel- 
 ter them against the rain or storm while plying their vocation. 
 Further up, on the other side of the river, the log cabins and 
 board shanties of PapstoAvn dotted the shore, Avhile below in 
 a southeasterly direction, the distant hamlet of Cahokia nestled 
 among the majestic trees produced by the rich alluvial soil of 
 the American Bottom, just visible from the most elevated point 
 of the grounds around the villa. Its owner, w'ith exultant 
 sense of proprietorship, not unpardonable under the circum- 
 stances nor always successfully concealed, pointed out to his 
 new friend, the young lawj^er, the salient traits of the land- 
 scape, adding to his explanation of the scenery, such items of 
 historical, legendary and scientific information as he had stored 
 (294) 
 
THE EVER NEW OLD STORY. 295 
 
 in his mind, chiefly gleaned from conversations with his friend, 
 the professor. For the latter gentleman prided himself upon 
 his artistic tastes, and his powers of accurate observation, and 
 the merchant delighted to repeat some of the high sounding 
 phrases in which the professor indulged, now and then. Thus, 
 in commenting upon the peculiar vegetation of Arsenal Island, 
 he informed his politely listening young companion, that the 
 perennial youth of the trees was due to the ambulatory nature 
 of the island. 
 
 " Yes, sir," he said, " ambulatory is how the professor calls 
 it. You see, it is so : The water dashes with great might 
 against the upper point and all the time carries away some 
 earth. This makes the trees to fall into the river, and they 
 sometimes make snags, so dangerous, you know, to steam- 
 boats. But on the back part the earth sticks fast, and when 
 the water is low, and the sun shines on the new earth, it 
 makes willow trees to grow, and maybe sycamores, or some 
 other trees which like to grow in moist earth. And so, you 
 see, the island melts in front, and grows behind, and travels 
 down stream all the time and the trees are always young." 
 
 They had now reached the spot from which the aspiring 
 church steeple of Cahokia, topped with the Roman cross, came 
 into sight, as well as a few of the lowlier habitations, cluster- 
 ing about the church, with their moss covered roofs. The sun 
 was low in the horizon ; the western shore of the river along 
 the bluffs facing the east, somber with the descending shad- 
 ows of approaching twilight. But the slanting rays of the 
 crimson luminary nearing his couch in the Avest, bathed the 
 bluffs on the opposite side in a flood of mellow light, bringing 
 them into bold relief against the intervening miles of heavily 
 timbered bottom-lands, checkered, here and there, with patches 
 of luxurious corn fields in the vicinity of Cahokia. Here, 
 again, the didactic instinct of the merchant asserted itself, and 
 he proceeded to enlighten his young friend on the history and 
 peculiarities of this venerable town. 
 
 " More ancient," he explained, '• than our own proud city. 
 
^•'6 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 It is inhabited chiefly by descendants of French-American and 
 Spanish- American Creoles, who have great pride and squalor; 
 also great poverty and independence. Their pride and inde- 
 pendence makes them to hate civilization ; and their poverty 
 makes them proud. They are much skilled in lish-catching. 
 For our river has tine Cat and Buffalo, if you know how to 
 catch them. They cultivate some corn in the fat l)ottom-land, 
 more than a hundred bushels on the acre. And they smoke 
 tobacco which they plant themselves. AVhen a young Creole 
 Avants to buy a ribbon for his sweetheart, or maybe coffee or 
 something for his old folks, he choj^s down a pecan tree, or an 
 ash or hickory, like they have some splendid trees all over the 
 l)ottom-lands, and hauls it to our city in an ox-cart, and sells 
 it for six bits a load, and is for a while rich." 
 
 Leslie seemed to listen with profound interest ; but his eyes 
 rested not on the distant view of the svm-bathed church spire, 
 nor even on the majestic steamer soaring into sight on the river 
 below, moving with swan-like grace on the bosom of the placid 
 waters opposite rennyville. And it is to be feared that he did 
 not reap the full benefit of the merchant's sage teachings ; for 
 on sighting the approaching steamer, the latter launched out 
 into an instructive discourse on the vastness of the carrying 
 trade and interstate commerce of our Western metroi)olis. A 
 l)icture closer by riveted Leslie's gaze, — one more beautiful 
 than which no painter in happiest mood ever conceived. For 
 there, a little in advance of them, stood Pauline, more tall and 
 erect, seemingly, than Leslie had deemed her, — her finely 
 shaped figure in bright summer robe gracefully outlined 
 against the darker foliage of the shrubbery. One of her hands 
 was raised on high in the act of drawing down toward her the 
 branch of a tall oleander, while with the other she bent its 
 cluster of flowers toward her companion, as if to invite him to 
 inhale its fragrance. It was Woldemar that stood there beside 
 her, erect also, and much taller than she, so that her shapely 
 head was turned upward to meet his eye. An eager look was 
 in her own eyes, — a pleading, expectant look, and a winning 
 
THE EVER NEW OLD STORY. 297 
 
 smile slightly parted her rosy lips. Was tlie young lawyer 
 much to blame tliat he forgot Cahokia, Arsenal Island and 
 steamboat, in gazing upon those expressive brown eyes and 
 distractingly tempting lips ? Or that he was deaf to the in- 
 structive discourse of the sage merchant, straining his ears, 
 instead, to catch, if possible, the import of the conversation 
 carried on by those two ? 
 
 What he heard, when he did hear, was commonplace enough. 
 It was Woldemar that spoke: "Yes; it reminds me of the 
 fragrant almond." Not much surely; and when he had said 
 these words, Pauline geiith' released the slender twig, casting 
 upon the shrul) a last loving glance as it swung into position. 
 When she turned her face in the direction where Leslie was 
 standing, she saw the gaze of intense admiration with which 
 he regarded her. She blushed. It was a weakness of hers to 
 blush. Her words to Woldemar could not have been of much 
 imi)ortance to elicit the reply he had heard ; but commonplace 
 as was that reply, it had startled him. For Woldemar had 
 accompanied his words with an expression of tenderness that 
 Avas an entirely new feature to the eyes of Leslie, and which, 
 together with the smile that brightened his countenance as he 
 looked at his fair companion, gave it a dangerous charm. At 
 least Leslie thought so ; and he acted promptly on the spur of 
 this thought., 
 
 " Pardon me. Miss Waldhorst," he said, loud enough to 
 compel the lady's attention; "is this shrub, on which you 
 lavish such tender regard, one of the triumphs of your genius 
 for gardening, of which 3'Our uncle is so proud? " And quit- 
 ting the side of his host with an apologetic bow, he joined the 
 young lady. 
 
 "This shrub, sir," she said in playful banter, "is the 
 triumph of no one's genius, unless it be the waterfng pot. It 
 is the result of Uncle Auf dem Busch's liberality in allowing 
 me to order an unlimited suppl}^ of these useful exotics, with- 
 out which I don't know what we should have done the first 
 year or two with our patch of a garden. This rose-tree is a 
 
298 THE BEBEL'S DAUGIITEB. 
 
 gem, repaying the small attention it requires with a profusion 
 of beautiful and delightfully fragrant blossoms ; its graceful, 
 tree-like shape, with its showy leaves, at the same time, 
 furnishing valuable material for the arrangement of ornamental 
 bosquets." 
 
 At the first words addressed by the young lady to Leslie, 
 Woldemar bowed and left them, joining his father; and the 
 young lawyer had the satisfaction of witnessing, once more, 
 the scowl on Woldemar's face, which Leslie had come to 
 regard as habitual to it. 
 
 " Rose-tree, did you say? " the rejoicing young man in- 
 quired with a deferential show of curiosity. " I thought it 
 was an oleander." 
 
 "So it is," Miss Waldhorst responded. " But I like pet 
 names, — suggestive ones, you know. And having heard the 
 professor one day explain that oleander is a name corrupted 
 from two words of some dead language, meaning rose and 
 tree — coming to think of it, now, he said bay — I pre- 
 ferred the name rose-tree, as being prettier, and very 
 appropriate. Do you think so? " 
 
 "Beautifully aj^propriate, indeed!" Leslie replied with 
 warmth. Then, turning his hungry eyes reluctantly from the 
 bright face before him to the oleander, and thence toward the 
 flower beds and bosquets surrounding them, he added : " The 
 same unerring taste inspired this pet name — so suggestive of 
 beauty and strength — that created this delightful little para- 
 dise. I thoroughly agree with Mr. Auf dera Busch in his 
 appreciation of your talent — genius, I ought to say — for 
 landscape gardening. This, indeed, is Art in high perfection." 
 
 Miss Waldhorst flushed. Not, as Leslie for a moment im- 
 agined, with pleasure. The smile faded from her lips as she 
 answered: "Please, Mr. May, spare me the humiliation of 
 such remarks. I am happy to think that uncle takes pleasure 
 in n\y way of arranging his flower beds and grouping the 
 shrubbery. I make no pretension to art, or landscaping." 
 
 " Forgive me, Miss Waldhorst," spoke Leslie, in deferential 
 
THE EVE It NEW OLD STOBY. 299 
 
 earnestness. " Not for what I said, which should not offend 
 you, but for having — unintentionally, you will believe me, I 
 hope, — seemed to flatter you, and thus to wound your sen- 
 sitiveness. I plead the absolute sincerity of my words in 
 extenuation of my fault." 
 
 " Surely, sir," said the young lady, " your remark becomes 
 offensive by repetition, in pushing me to disclaim modesty." 
 
 "Ah, how can you help disclaiming modesty! " Leslie ex- 
 claimed, in a tone of sincerity and earnestness not usual to 
 him. "True modesty cannot possibh^ be conscious of itsdf. 
 I am a poor hand to quote poetry ; but I remember a line, 
 written by a gentleman whose acquaintance I made in Venice, 
 expressing so exactly and forcibly what I mean, that you will 
 pardon me for quoting : 
 
 " Never can modesty, e'en in a dream, proclaim her own 
 nature ; 
 With but the word she is lost, fled at the sound of her 
 voice." 
 
 Just as Leslie was reciting the lines, Professor Rauheufels 
 approached with Victor, and both stopped to listen. Victor 
 seemed pleased l)ut the professor with a smile of conscious 
 superiority, remarked: "It seems to me as if I had heard 
 these lines before. Where did you get them? " 
 
 Leslie hardly deigned to conceal his chagrin at the interrup- 
 tion, and it imparted some asj^erity to his voice, as he promptly 
 responded, placing himself squarely in front of the professor 
 in doing so: "From the author himself, as I have just 
 informed Miss Waldhorst I ' ' 
 
 " I know the author well," the other continued, serenely 
 ignoring Leslie's impatience. "He is a pupil of mine in the 
 philosophy class, and a man of considerable ability. He 
 would surely make his mark in the world, if he could rid him- 
 self of his unfortunate hallucination of being a poet." 
 
 " Well, I think I should share this hallucination, if it be 
 one," observed Victor, who was evidently impressed with the 
 
300 THE REBEL' fi DAUGIITEB. 
 
 beauty of tlie epigram recited by Leslie. "To me the senti- 
 ment expressed seems wonderfully true, and the language terse 
 and apt." 
 
 "Perhaps so," Rauhenfels assented. "But that does not 
 make it poetical. Why, he himself expresses the same thought 
 in a much more poetical form. Something like this: 
 
 " ' Modesty's speech is always a silence that tells she is 
 modest ; 
 Never declaring her own, has she the sweetest of praise.' 
 
 But, not content to let the distich remain in this rather neat 
 shape, he must needs inform us, that 
 
 " ' Modesty, sweetest of maidens, is not aware she is modest; 
 When she kuoweth herself, then she is never herself.' 
 
 Observe, he still has an image — the maiden — to symbolize 
 modesty. But then, afraid, apparently, Ihat even in this form 
 his wisdom may not sufficiently impress itself upon his reader, 
 he proceeds to give the utterly a]>stract statement to which 
 Miss Waldhorst has just been treated." 
 
 Had Leslie's desire to be alone with Miss Waldhorst Iteen 
 less urgent, the announcement, that the author was a member 
 of the professor's class, might have elicited further inquiries. 
 But just now the one thought uppermost in his mind was 
 Pauline Waldhorst. It was to his infinite satisfaction, there- 
 fore, that Victor, evidently bent on learning more of the poet, 
 drew the professor away with him to prosecute his ques- 
 tioning. 
 
 As soon as the others were fairly beyond ear-shot, he eagerly 
 turned to the young lady, saying " You have not yet given me 
 the assurance of your forgiveness, Miss Waldhorst." 
 
 " For what? " she asked. 
 
 " For the awkwardness, with which I seem to have offended 
 you . ' ' 
 
 " Are you quite sure, Mr, May, that I have nothing to for- 
 give but awkwardness? " The words were spoken with such 
 
THE EVER NEW OLD STOllY. 301 
 
 demure simijlicity, that Leslie was really at a loss to under- 
 standTier drift. 
 
 But, "Indeed, if you will believe me, nothing else! " he 
 answered without hesitation. " And surely you will not 
 punish me for what was really not a fault, but truly my 
 misfortune." 
 
 " Punish you ? " 
 
 " Cruelly, by not forgiving." 
 
 " Sir," she said, a faint smile working its way to her lips, 
 '■ I fear that what you call your misfortune is really a grave 
 fault, — the sad disposition to tease. But I must not shame 
 your poet-friend by assuming a modesty which would prove 
 me immodest. Let me assure you, that I have nothing to for- 
 give on the score of awkwardness. And it will l)e my turn to 
 sue for forgiveness, if — " 
 
 " If? " 
 
 The smile on the young lady's face brightened and took on 
 such arch roguishness in the fresh young face, as to set the 
 beholder wild with delight. " If you can establish your sin- 
 cerity," she continued. " Are you willing to submit yourself 
 to an unerring test ? " 
 
 "Nothing M'ould make me more happy! " he replied with 
 fervor. 
 
 "Then tell me: Have you ever seen the plant commonly 
 called Touch-me-not? " 
 
 "Only in the shape of a prudish old maid," he replied 
 readily. 
 
 " Or a Mimosa? " 
 
 " The name I have heard ; but I cannot associate it with a 
 plant." 
 
 " Itis well. Follow me." 
 
 She led the way to a secluded part of the garden, anil 
 stopped in front of some potted plants resembling, Leslie 
 thought, tiny Acacia or Locust trees, carefully protected 
 against rough northerly winds. " Now sir," she said, speak- 
 ing in a solemn whisper, and endeavoring to compose her 
 
302 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 features into owl-like gravity, in exquisite contrast with her 
 mirth-beaming eyes, " you are in the presence of the never- 
 erring oracle Mimosa Sensitiva. Kneel to it, as if you meant 
 to worship. You may spread your handkerchief to protect 
 your knees against the dust. Place your right hand over your 
 breast where you are supposed to have a heart. Then, look- 
 ing me full in the face, repeat the words you wish me to 
 believe ; and in token of your sincerity, bow to the oracle and 
 press its topmost twig with your left hand to your lips. If 
 you prevaricate, it will droop in shame and sorrow on your 
 I^olluting touch." 
 
 Leslie did as he was bidden. It was clear enough that she 
 was playing a trick on him that would, in the end, result in 
 his being laughed at ; but was it not a delightful thing to kneel 
 there, almost as if he were kneeling to herself, and to obey 
 literally her injunction to look her full in the face? This lat- 
 ter part of the program he protracted to a shameful extent ; 
 twice had he spoken the words ; and still his eyes were fixed 
 in eager gaze upon the lovely priestess of the oracle, until, 
 with imperious gesture, neck and face suffused with crimson 
 visible even in the darkening twilight, she exclaimed with 
 solemn voice: "The oracle, sir, demands your homage! 
 Remember your promise ! ' ' 
 
 Then, conscious of the rudeness of further delay, he boldly 
 grasped the topmost branch of the little plant and pressed it to 
 his lips. His curiosity was on tip- toe to see what would 
 come. The effect startled him. Although expecting some 
 such issue, he was surprised to see the little plant close up its 
 leaves pair by pair, with deliberate regularitj^ then bend down 
 its twigs and shrivel up and die, apparently, within a few 
 seconds. 
 
 The maiden evidently enjoyed his perplexity and indulged in 
 a peal of triumphant, though musical laughter. " How now, 
 Sir Knight! " she cried. " What am I to think of your 
 protestations of sincerity? " 
 
 " I suppose I ought to shrivel up and sink into the ground, 
 
THE EVER NEW OLD STORY. 303 
 
 as that idiotic thing is trying to do," he rephed, leaping to 
 his feet, and joining in the laugh as loudly, if not as merrily, 
 as Pauline. "But tell me," he asked her, " must this poor 
 Mimosa die in consequence of my iniquities? Is the stab 
 which its oracular sentence has inflicted on my reputation, like 
 the sting of a vengeful bee, to cost its life? " 
 
 "Oh, no, Mr. May," said the lady, in soft, reassuring 
 tones, delightfully sympathetic in Leslie's ears, notwithstand- 
 ing the tinge of irony audible in the voice, "it is to be hoped 
 that the touch of your lips is not quite so venomous as that. I 
 venture to prophesy that in a few minutes it will unfold its pretty 
 leaves, straighten out its drooping limbs and, w^holly resusci- 
 tated, rejoice with me that you have so bravely passed through 
 the ordeal." 
 
 "Passed through the ordeal! " the astonished young man 
 repeated. " It has disgraced me. It has tarnished my honor. 
 Surely, Miss Waldhorst, you do not rejoice over the foul spot 
 your oracle has cast over my fair name ? ' ' 
 
 " Why, Mr. May! " the young girl exclaimed, astonished 
 in her turn, but smiling pleasantly. " Do you not see the 
 point? The Mimosa would have been as sensitive to my touch 
 as to yours. Its oracular virtue consists in testing your cour- 
 age, so long as you are unacquainted with its peculiar charac- 
 teristic. If you had not been honest, you would not have 
 dared to touch the plant. So you see that the oracle has hon- 
 orably acquitted you, and it now becomes me to ask j^our 
 pardon. Are you generous enough to grant it? " 
 
 He snatched up the hand and carried it to his lips. "I 
 thank you for the delightful lesson you have given me, most 
 wise and beautiful priestess! " he said, and would have re- 
 tained the dainty fingers that sent thrills of ecstacy to his 
 heart, but that the heavy footfalls of Mr. Auf dem Busch 
 Senior announced his approach. 
 
 "It is already late to be in the open air," he said. " We 
 will go in. The others are already in the parlor. We will 
 have some music, if Mr. May likes." 
 
304 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Leslie was about to answer in the stereotype phrases used 
 on such occasions, but the old gentleman continued : 
 
 " I heard laughing. Has Pauline played her Touch-me-not 
 trick?" 
 
 The question elicited no audible answer. Pauline, who had, 
 indeed, often amused herself by showing off the peculiar 
 quality of the Sensitive plant, was, for the first time in her 
 experience, anxiously considering what effect the experiment 
 might have produced upon her visitor. He had called her a 
 ?c/.sp, as well as a beautiful, priestess. Was he mocking her? 
 
 Leslie, on his part, was puzzled to decide, whether he was 
 pleased or otherwise to learn, from the old gentleman's ques- 
 tion, that she had played this trick before. The exultant 
 consciousness of success, which she took no pains to conceal, 
 might have assisted him in finding an answer to his doubt. 
 
 The i)arlor by lamplight (gas had not yet been introduced 
 to this part of tlie suburbs) presented quite a cheerful appear- 
 ance. Its furniture had evidently been selected with an eye 
 to comfort and ease rather than elegance. The chairs and 
 sofas liad a look almut them as if they would enjoy being sat 
 upon. The table in the center was large and solid enougli to 
 hold books, writing materials, or papers for the temporary 
 accommodation of those inclined to so use it. One article of 
 ecpupment alone bore evidence of a disregard of cost in the 
 lifting up of the room : An elegant, very line piano (a Chick- 
 ering Grand, the dealer liad called it). This liad been })ur- 
 chased by the merchant on the suggestion of Pauline's nuisic 
 teacher, that her [)rogrcss in the art warranted a l)etter instru- 
 ment than tlie one that had been used in the Auf dem liusch 
 family from time innnemorial. 
 
 When they entered, Pauline, whispering a few words into the 
 ear of Mrs. Auf dem Busch, immediately disappeared into 
 another room, to tlie visible displeasure of Auf dem Busch, 
 Senior. Leslie, with a newly formed determination to make 
 his peace with Auf dem Busch Junior, appropriated the vacant 
 chair at his side and opened conversation. "I take it for 
 
THE EVE 11 NEW OLD STOItY. 305 
 
 granted," he said, " that you have seen, during your sojourn 
 in Europe, nuuiy line residences and beautiful private parks, 
 so that naturally your judgment is more critical than that of 
 us simple Americans. But is not this villa of your father's a 
 bright gem in its way ? Particularly when viewed in contrast 
 with the showy, but sometimes utterly tasteless houses and 
 yards affected by our men of — money? " 
 
 "Professor Rauhenfels has told father many times, that 
 ours is a very line place," Woldemar made answer, with cool 
 politeness. 
 
 " Oh, the professor I " exclaimed Leslie, the slightest touch 
 of a sneer in his voice. " I don't take much stock in his 
 opinions. Except," he added with a low laugh, " on cats' 
 tails. Ah, what a center shot 3^ou gave him at the table about 
 his Hegelian philosophy." 
 
 The professor and Victor were engaged in an animated dis- 
 cussion sufficiently far off from Woldemar and Leslie, to be 
 out of ordinary hearing distance. Woldemar, casting a look 
 in their direction, replied: " He deserved it. I wish I could 
 tell him what 1 think of him openly ; but father has taken such 
 a liking to him that he would be deeply offended if I did not 
 keep on good terms with him. And see there; even Victor, 
 who up to this time has shared my antipathy to this man, is 
 now charmed by him, like a helpless bird by a snake ! I gave 
 Victor credit for better taste and sterner self-respect." 
 
 " n you knew Victor as well as I do," Leslie replied in a 
 confidential whisper, "you would not be surprised to see 
 him take up with any man who has a positive opinion on any 
 matter, and is not backward in asserting himself. And our 
 friend Rauhenfels is not overly bashful, — do you think? " 
 
 Leslie had touched Woldemar in the right place, if he was 
 really in earnest about propitiating his young host. " I should 
 think not I " he replied, whispering also, but with some em- 
 phasis. " He is as crammed full of conceit as a two bushel 
 sack with three bushels of chaff in it." 
 
 Having said these words, he seemed to regret them, or to 
 
 20 
 
306 THE BEBEU8 DAUGHTEB. 
 
 resent, perhaps, the familiarity in which the young lawyer had 
 indulged towards him. For he relapsed at once into uncon- 
 genial silence. But Leslie was not to be put off so easily. He 
 continued the conversation with that winning candor and frank- 
 ness that had so enslaved Victor, and against which not even 
 Woldemar was proof, now that it suited Leslie's purpose to 
 conciliate his rival. (For Leslie had never for a moment 
 (loul)ted that Woldemar sustained the relation, in very dicta- 
 torial manner, of lover to Miss Waldhorst.) He succeeded in 
 melting away the icy reserve of the young merchant, and was 
 making brave headway in gaining his good will, when the old 
 gentleman, frowning at the protracted absence of Pauline, 
 called upon his son to entertain the company with music, thus 
 putting an end to the conversation with Leslie. 
 
 " If ladies find not the time to do honor to honored guests, 
 we will teach them a lesson in what is polite," said the old 
 merchant. " Woldemar, play you something for Mr. May 
 and the professor, what they will like." 
 
 "What irill the gentlemen like?" said Woldemar, with a 
 smile. Without waiting for an answer, however, he continued : 
 " Perhaps Mr. May would like a real German Folk-song? " 
 
 Of course, Leslie would be very much pleased with a Ger- 
 man Folk-song, and the professor said that no music could be 
 better. So Woldemar sat down to the piano, and sang, in a 
 resonant, pleasing voice, the song of " Heiden Roslein," 
 accompanying himself on the piano. Before he had concluded 
 the first line, Mrs. Auf dem Busch joined her son, singing the 
 melody in a clear soprano ; then the husband followed with his 
 deep bass, and Victor completed the quartette. When the 
 refrain was reached, several of the younger members of the 
 Auf dem Busch family, who had been granted the privilege of 
 the parlor on this occasion, joined in the chorus, and all the 
 singers united, with evident enjoyment and heart}^ good will, 
 in swelling the melodious harmony of the chorus refrain 
 
 " Koslein, Koslein, Koslein roth, 
 Roslein auf der Heiden ! ' ' 
 
TUB EVER NEW OLD STORY. 307 
 
 During- the singing of the second verse Leslie's enjoyment 
 was heightened b}- the re-entrance of Miss Waldhorst, who 
 joined in the soprano with her own bell-like voice, thus 
 enabling Woldemar to reinforce the bass, adding percei^tibly 
 to the musical effect. 
 
 " Would you not explain to me the burden of the song? " 
 Leslie asked the young lady when the singing ceased. " Every 
 one seems to enjoy so thoroughly the meaning of the words, 
 that I am sure it would add to my own enjoyment of the 
 glorious music, if I understood the import of the words." 
 
 " It is all about a little wild rose," Pauline explained blush- 
 ing without conscious cause. " I have a translation of the 
 song somewhere, which I will show you if you wish." 
 
 ," And sing it to me? " he added eagerly. " I am sure it 
 will be a rare treat to me to hear you sing this song in 
 English." 
 
 " Certainly, if it will please you," she assented, selecting 
 one of the books on the music stand, and placing it open on 
 the rack of the piano. " Woldemar, will you ha^e the kind- 
 ness to accompany me ? ' ' 
 
 For answer the young merchant at once intonated the pre- 
 lude, its softness contrasting, though not unpleasantly, with 
 the more powerful chords of his previous rendition. Perfect 
 silence pervaded the room as she sang. She had a sweet, 
 clear voice, of volume sufficient to fill the parlor. No one 
 joined in the chorus of the refrain. Even the youngsters, 
 eager enough to take part in musical performance, instinctively 
 restrained themselves, and thus avoided marring the effect of 
 Pauline's pure voice, as it swelled into a ringing fortissimo 
 just before the conclusion. 
 
 Leslie was deeplv impressed. " How touchingly beauti- 
 ful! " he exclaimed, as he caught his breath, after the 
 singing had ceased. '' What exquisite tenderness in the 
 sentiment ! ' ' 
 
 "Exquisite fiddlesticks!" the professor exclaimed, ap- 
 proaching the piano, and taking from it the book from which 
 
308 THE BEBEVS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 Pauline had sung. " Miss Waldhorst has enchanted us all 
 with the wonderful sweetness of her singing. But try to read 
 the words without the insinuating charm of her voice, and you 
 will liud love-sick sentimentality instead of sentiment — un- 
 meaning, flat twaddle, instead of the spirited, sparkling little 
 gem of Gothe, so touching in its sim[)licity, so genuine in its 
 metaphor. This translation sounds like the lackadaisical 
 gushing of a sentimental school-girl over a valentine, with a 
 vignette of two hearts transpierced b}' Cupid's arrow." 
 
 " What is the matter with this i)oetry':' " inquired Victor, 
 who had been rudely shocked by the professor's discordant 
 remarks. " You cannot demand in a translation the force 
 and beauty of the original. And I look upon this poem as a 
 very creditable imitation in Englisli of the poet's idea. A 
 literal rendering of the w^ords would necessarily have destroyed 
 the rhythm and rhyme, without improving the mere content." 
 
 " Decidedly not! " sneered the professor. 
 
 Leslie was incensed at wliat he deemed a wanton piece of 
 effrontery to the whole company. " I learn with astonish- 
 ment," he said, speaking in a tone of such withering contempt 
 as Victor had never — save on one unforgotten occasion — 
 heard his friend use, " that the gentleman is as much at home 
 on the subject of poetry, as on that of metaphysics, or carving 
 grouse. Perhaps he possesses the ' divine afflatus ' in a higher 
 degree than my unfortunate Venetian friend, or the author of 
 the P^nglish version of the ' Wild Rose.' In which case it would 
 be uncharitable to suppose that his remarks are dictated rather 
 by envy, than strict regard for poetical truth," 
 
 The professor's eyes flashed, and the corners of his mouth 
 assumed a decided downward tendency. But the torrent of 
 invective, anticipated by those who knew him well, was stayed 
 yet a while by the remarks of Woldemar, who, deeming him- 
 self an ardent admirer of Gothe, could not permit this oppor- 
 tunity to pass by without breaking a lance in defense of his 
 favorite poet, and at the same time assist in the discomfiture of 
 Professor Rauhenfels. 
 
THE EVER NEW OLD STORY. 309 
 
 "The professor is right in one respect," he said; "the 
 lines of Gothe are certainly more spirited, — more spicy, if I 
 may use that expression, than this translation. How could it 
 be otherwise ? I agree with Cousin Victor, that no transla- 
 tion can ever equal an original poem, unless, as I believe I 
 heard the professor say, the translator surpass the author in 
 power." 
 
 " As Shakespear and (4othe himself did in reproducing the 
 works of those whom they glorilied ! " the professor mter- 
 jected. 
 
 " Then Mr. Rauheufels has it in his power to vindicate 
 Gothe's Heidenroslein," young Auf dem Busch continued, 
 " and to prove himself the peer of Shakespear, by reproducing 
 "The Heideu Roslein " in English, in a version not so flat 
 and wishy-washy as he characterizes the one we have heard." 
 
 " Gentlemen," the professor said, pouring out his words 
 with iierce defiance, " do you mean to deny a freeman the 
 right to speak his conviction? You flare up at my remarks, 
 as if they were in disparagement of your own merits. Apply 
 them so, if you feel the smart of the lash. As to the diflfl- 
 culty of translating a poem from one language into another, 
 that is a remark that has been made before, and the wisdom 
 of the company here assembled will hardly mark an epoch in 
 the history of literature. Nor is there any terror for me in 
 your sneering challenge. No one is more sincere in his admi- 
 ration of Gothe than myself ; and let me say, with deference to 
 the present company, that the men who rise to an adequate 
 appreciation of his greatness, are exceedingly rare. I do not 
 claim to be a poet ; but if I could not do better in the transla- 
 tion of a poem than this author has done, I would not offer to 
 let other people get sight of my productions." 
 
 Auf dem Busch listened to the quarrel with amusement at 
 first; but when the professor's vehement speech threatened 
 unpleasant consequences, he essayed to pour oil on the troubled 
 waters. Having unbounded confidence in the ability of his 
 friend to make good any of his assertions, he interrupted the 
 
310 THE EEBEUS D AUG II TEE. 
 
 speaker with a proposition. " 1 have heard say, that Ameri- 
 cans try pudding by eating it. Suppose now, you eat the 
 pudding, and tell us in English, what Gothe says in the Heiden 
 Rosleiu." 
 
 Without another word, the professor drew forth a scrap of 
 paper and a pencil, and sat down, staring at the ceiling, as if 
 the poem he was to translate was written there. 
 
 Meanwhile Leslie turned to Miss Waldhorst and asked her 
 opinion on the professor's judgment, volunteering the infor- 
 mation that he, for his part, deemed the poem he had heard 
 her sing with such exquisite pathos, to be very line. 
 
 "I — I must say," the maiden answered with some hesita- 
 tion, "that I like the German much better. The tenor is, 
 that a wanton boy saw a rose, — a little rose, you know, a 
 diminutive for which sounds well in German, but it would 
 be absurd to say ' roselet ' in a poem — and, boy-like, he 
 wanted to break it for himself, — pluck it I mean. There is a 
 line, wiiich I am sure that even the professor cannot put into 
 P^nglish with the beautiful effect of the original — 
 
 ' War so jung, so morgenschon ! ' 
 
 — you cannot say that in ILnglish. And it is so touching 
 when the little rose defends herself with her thorns, and the 
 wild boy, — not minding them at all — plucks her from her 
 parent stem, and the rose can do nothing but suffer it. And I 
 cannot describe to you the pathos and tenderness of the 
 refrain, simple as the words are — 
 
 ' Eoslein, Koslein, Kosleiu Roth, 
 Rosleiu auf der Heiden ! ' 
 
 But see : the professor seems to have finished his task. I am 
 eager to know what he has made of it." 
 
 The professor read over wdiat he had written, and, turning 
 to Miss Waldhorst, said, loud enough to be heard by all pres- 
 ent: "• Here is, in such crude form as my limited time enabled 
 me to employ, mij version of the Heidenrosleiu in English 
 
bfj 
 
 be 
 a 
 
THE EVER NEW OLD STORY. 311 
 
 words. Will you honor iiie, Miss Walclhorst, by singing it to 
 the company with tliat grace and pathos, whicli Avill nialvc it 
 tolerable to them ? ' ' 
 
 " Let us hear the words tirst! " cried Victor, " that we may 
 have them clearly before us. The professor himself said that 
 music bribes the ear." 
 
 " You shall be fair," proclaimed the host. " If the pro- 
 fessor likes first to have the singing, Pauline shall first 
 sing." 
 
 This decree was not demurred to, and the young lady took 
 the paper handed to her. But the professor's chirography 
 was not as legible as print, and she had to call the writer to 
 her assistance to decipher it. A flush of pleasurable excite- 
 ment was visible in her face, as, Leslie closely watching her, 
 she placed the paper on the rack, and sat down to sing, play- 
 ing the accompaniment this time herself. Everyone, of 
 course, listened with silent attention. 
 
 "■ Youth espied a rosebud rare, 
 
 Kosebud on the heather ; 
 Dew-gemmed in the morning air, — 
 And he yearned the rose so fair 
 
 From its stalk to gather. 
 Rosebud, rosebud, rosebud red. 
 
 Rosebud on the heather. 
 
 He would pluck the rosebud rare. 
 
 Rosebud on the heather ! 
 Rosebud cried : My thorns bewai'e I 
 I will prick thee, if thou dare 
 
 From my stalk me gather. 
 Rosebud, rosebud, rosebud red. 
 
 Rosebud on the heather. 
 
 Wantonly he seized his prize, 
 Rosebud on the heather ! 
 Vain was struggling, vain were sighs, — 
 
312 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 Boldly plucked lie, spite all cries, 
 
 Rose and thorns together. 
 Rosebud, rosebud, rosebud red, 
 
 Rosebud on the heather ! " 
 
 ' ' Bravo ! ' ' exclaimed the old gentleman , when the song was 
 iiuished. " And I will say ' brava I ' too, because I know not 
 if the writing is liner or the singing of Pauline. Ah, the pro- 
 fessor was wise, when he wished Pauline to first sing his song. 
 But now. Professor, you will read it? Victor and Mr. May 
 shall now judge, if it be good poetry." 
 
 "I know one thing already," said Victor; "and that is, 
 that the music sounds better with these words than with the 
 others. That may be, because the professor gives us the 
 same image which we get from the original." 
 
 The professor seemed much pleased with Victor's remark. 
 But a recognition that he might have prized more highly came 
 from the young lady, Avho extended to him her hand and said, 
 her face beaming with delight, " I thank you, Professor 
 Rauhenfels, for having made Gothe speak to me in English. 
 This is the ' Heidenroslein ' as he pictured her, — to me, at 
 least. Will you believe me, when I tell you, that your rendi- 
 tion has put the pathos into the refrain, which makes it so 
 touching in the original, and which I entirely missed in the 
 other translation, although the words are very much alike? It 
 suggests admiration, tender solicitude, and finally sympathetic 
 regret for the fate of the poor rose." 
 
 " And yet," was the professor's answer, "it is the fate of 
 roses to be plucked." 
 
 " Therein seems to lie the touching power of this poem," 
 said Pauline. " We feel, that the rare rose is destined to be 
 appropriated by the hand that is not afraid of her thorns. 
 And there is no escape from destiny- ! ' ' 
 
 " Yours is a genuinely poetic instinct, Miss Waldhorst," 
 the professor exclaimed, in undisguised admiration. "You 
 have caught the poet at his trick. How is it that Gothe him- 
 
THE EVER NEW OLD STORY. 313 
 
 self pats it ? — He ' calls the particular to its universal con- 
 secration ! ' And Heine, less philosophically, but more 
 popularly, perhaps, suggests, that 
 
 "' It is an old, old story. 
 And yet forever new ; 
 And he, to whom' it happens. 
 His heart doth break in two.' " 
 
 There was more music after this, and animated conversation, 
 to which they all contributed their due share. Miss Waldhorst's 
 vivacity was a surprise to both Woldemar and Leslie, with 
 very different effect on each. When the guests had taken their 
 departure, at a late hour in the night, the one was overjoyed, 
 the other dismayed, by the cordial and pressing invitation 
 extended by the host to the young lawyer to repeat his visit 
 at an early day, with the evidently sincere assurance, that he 
 would be always welcome. 
 
 Perhaps the dismay would have been deeper, if Woldemar 
 had caught the look of eager expectation with which Pauline 
 regarded the guest until his answer came, or the vivid flush 
 that suffused her face wlien she shook hands with him on 
 saying good-night. 
 
 
XX. 
 
 SHADOWS OF COMING EVENTS IN A SANCTUM. 
 
 .OLDEMAR AUF DEM BUSCH'S statement that 
 Victor was, like a helpless bird, under the charm of 
 Professor Rauhenfels, was not without an element of 
 truth, though in a manner and for a reason better compre- 
 hended by Leslie. Not attracted toward the stranger himself, 
 he naturally ascribed the influence he had gained over his 
 uncle to successful wiles of sycophantic blandiloquence. The 
 antipathy thus experienced grew into positive dislike by 
 reason of the stranger's offensive habit of announcing his 
 opinions, often unasked, on any and all subjects that hap- 
 pened to be under discussion in his presence, — announced, 
 too, with an exasperating air of infallibility, and many times 
 in direct contradiction of Victor's sincerely cherished convic- 
 tions. 
 
 The consequence w^as that Victor shunned him whenever he 
 could do so without offending his uncle. But Victor was a 
 sincere searcher after truth, and battled against error when- 
 ever he recognized it as such, though at the cost of the merci- 
 less demolition of fondly hugged illusions. Permitting himself, 
 one day, to be betrayed into a fierce wrangle with the profes- 
 sor on a topic upon which he entertained very positive views 
 in direct opposition to those of the professor, the latter 
 scattered Victor's arguments like empty chaff before the 
 wind. Victor felt deeply humiliated ; but however hotly he 
 resented his discomfiture, he could not but admit the force of 
 his adversary's logic, and bow, with what grace he might, to 
 the power of a superior intellect. After this, again and again, 
 he engaged in fierce debate with the professor, on such topics 
 (314) 
 
SHADOWS OF COMING EVENTS IN A SANCTUM. 315 
 
 of science, religion, and particularly politics, on which he had 
 formed decided opinions, suffering defeat after defeat. Al- 
 though many of his jDet theories were cruelly shaken to pieces 
 in the hot contentions, his impressible nature, ever ready to 
 accept what he recognized to be true, just or real, was gradu- 
 ally drawn towards his opponent, his distrust melted away, 
 and his antipathy changed to wonderment and awe before the 
 towering intellect of this marvelous man. 
 
 Such was the magic spell that fascinated Victor's mind. Its 
 influence became so great, that Victor ceased to feel humilia- 
 tion when the professor made light of convictions that had 
 been sacred to the young man, as the embodiment of truth to 
 him. He instinctively felt that the mind of Professor Rauhen- 
 fels condescended from its own loftier level to cope with a 
 weaker intellect, and took comfort in the belief, that he was 
 himself thereby elevated to a higher plane. His opponent, 
 in some way impressed him with the thought, that aspiration 
 after truth was the truly divine afflatus, — that quality of 
 human nature, implanted by the Creator, through Avhich re- 
 demption from error and sin is accomplished — the possession 
 of which he felt to be a common trait between the professor 
 and himself. 
 
 His editorial duties left him little leisure to devote to the 
 study of poets, or the laborious task of wrestling with the 
 abstruse reasoning of Hegel. He was nominally the assistant, 
 in fact however the principal, editor of the Beobachter im 
 Thai, a daily newspaper published in the German language. 
 It were, perhaps, nearer the truth to say that he was its only 
 editor. For Mr. Becker, whose name figured at the head of 
 the paper as " Proprietor and Editor in Chief," was a gentle- 
 man of Pennsj'lvanian ancestry, whose acquaintance with the 
 German language and literature extended no further than to 
 the ixitois known as " Pennsylvanisch Deutseh," which he 
 spoke with the liberal admixture of Americanisms idiomatic 
 to the " Pfjilzer " settlers in Pennsylvania. Victor might well, 
 therefore, be held responsible for the political and literary 
 
316 THE BE BE US DAUGHTER. 
 
 coloring of the paijer edited by bini, though only as " assist- 
 ant." 
 
 To infer, from this condition of things, that Motor was 
 sovereign ruler in the sanctum, would be pardonable, but 
 ncA^ertheless gross error. P'or Mr. Becker, whatever was his 
 proficiency in the other two "R's," had certainly mastered 
 the elements of his " 'rithmetic." He knew how to put two 
 and two together for a purpose. Now his purpose, besides 
 enjoying his glass of beer (or several glasses of beer) and 
 game of Solo in the company of boon companions, was the 
 accumulation of dollars. He reasoned that his hoard of dol- 
 lars would increase with the pojnilarity of his i^aper. And to 
 secure popularity, the paper must advocate the views held by 
 the public, so he argued. Now the views of the public came 
 to him through the medium of his friends of the saloons ; and 
 these were not always in accord with the views entertained by 
 Victor. There was, in consequence, many a dispute between 
 the d(illar loving proprietor, and his, in this respect, at least, 
 impractical editor. On the question of the enforcement of the 
 Sunday law, for instance, there were heated discussions in the 
 sanctum. And so with regard to the kindred subjects of 
 Temperance, or Total Abstinence Societies, on which their 
 views differed rather widely. Finally, a peace was patched 
 uji l)etween them which, although its terms satisfied neither 
 party, yet enal)led them to get along without hostility. But 
 then came another topic that began to agitate public opinion, 
 especially in the circles in which the Beobarhter had its 
 readers and subscribers, and which threatened to become more 
 troublesome than any of their previous differences, because 
 Victor stood firm and was intractable on all questions involv- 
 ing his conviction. 
 
 Leslie Ma^^ was a frequent and always welcome visitor at 
 the sanctum about this time. Welcome not only to Victor. 
 For Mr. Becker legarded the young lawyer as a man of rising 
 importance, to be reckoned among whose friends was an honor, 
 and might prove of advantage to the Beohar/iter. Mr. Becker's 
 
SHADOWS OF COMING EVENTS IN A SANCTUM. 317 
 
 friends looked ii[)oii the youug man as tlie champion of per- 
 sonal liberty and of the freedom of conscience, — that Inightest 
 oem in the escutcheon of the laud of their adoption — who 
 had vindicated the law by turning it against itself. This arose 
 out of the fact, that Leslie had succeeded in breaking down 
 the prosecution of the Sunday cases to the surprise and envy of 
 his brother lawyers ; to the admiration and gratitude of most 
 citizens of Teutonic origin, who hailed his success as the 
 Triumph of Truth and Freedom ; and to the no small chagrin 
 of politicians of the Know-Nothing stripe. To Victor, the 
 result had been no surprise ; but his joy was none the less ex- 
 ultant when Leslie, in the first flush of his triumph, himself 
 informed him of his success. A romantic incident connected 
 Vv'ith the trial not only added greatly to the young lawyer's 
 personal interest therein, but led Victor, when, on a subse- 
 quent occasion he learned the particulars, to see in it the hand 
 of Providence, dealing out retribution and poetic justice. 
 
 For the prosecuting witness, on whose testimony the prose- 
 (tuting attorney relied to prove the facts of the case, was none 
 other than Victor's old enemy, the whilom overseer Jeffreys, 
 to demolish whose credibility as a witness had been an easy 
 and most delightful task to the young lawyer. Of course, 
 neither Mr. Becker nor his friends knew of this circumstance, 
 and all the more admired the astute man of law, in tearing off 
 the mask of sanctimonious hypocrisy from the informer. 
 Victor had not become acquainted with this feature of the 
 trial until afterward ; but the success of his friend was in itself 
 so joyful an event, that in the exuberance of his spirits he 
 was not content to talk the matter over in his sanctum, but 
 3'earued to impart the great news to sympathizing friends, and 
 in this mood proposed a visit to the villa. The readiness of 
 his friend in accepting the invitation pleased him much, and he 
 found it quite natural that Leslie should, on this occasion, be 
 the lion of the evening, and monopolize the lion's share of con- 
 versation at Busch Bluff. The cordial words of praise that 
 fell from his uncle's lips, the profuse and somewhat exagger- 
 
318 THE BEBEVS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 ated compliments paid liim by Cousin Woldemar and even the 
 elegant homage that lay in his sister's eager attention and 
 sparkling eyes were so entirely in accordance with his own 
 feelings, that he saw nothing in them but the well merited 
 tribute due to superior ability. 
 
 The renewed intimacy between the two young men, however 
 welcome to both, was not wholly conducive to harmony in the 
 sanctum. Unconsciously to the editor, not unnoticed by 
 others, the Beohachter grew more em[)hatic in its advocacy of 
 the particular shade of Democratic doctrine that had been 
 instilled in liis mind by the teachings of Colonel May. These 
 doctrines were advocated by Leslie with a fervor which aston- 
 ished Victor, Avho had never noticed enthusiasm as a trait in 
 his friend's character; just now, however, he was certainly 
 enthusiastic on the subject of State Sovereignty, going to an 
 extreme in this direction to which Victor could not follow. 
 But his own views became more jDOsitive, his editorials more 
 decided, in suj)port of the constitution. He saw in the strict 
 construction of its provisions, by which the sovereignty of the 
 nation was divided between the several States on the one hand 
 and the Federal government on the other, the safeguard to ward 
 off the danger that, in the minds of many, threatened to shake 
 the government to pieces. Loyalty to the constitution for- 
 bade warfare against slavery by the general government, be- 
 cause it vested all power over slavery in the States. But the 
 majority of the readers of the Beohachter were not disposed to 
 draw this distinction, and Mr. Becker insisted on more vigor- 
 ous articles against slavery. Victor responded by a zealous 
 advocacy of the Emancipation Societies then springing up in 
 various of the slave States. This course satisfied some of the 
 city subscribers ; but as the Beohachter circulated quite 
 extensively in the surrounding fi'ee States, at least in its weekly 
 edition, and as the P'ugitive Slave law was beginning, under the 
 interpretation it had received by the Federal courts, to arouse 
 serious opposition in these States, Mr. Becker was not satisfied, 
 but demanded outspoken radical anti-slavery editorials. 
 
SHADOWS OF COMING EVENTS IN A SANCTUM. 319 
 
 The proi)rietor of the paper was not equal to the editor in 
 carrying on a dispute on the basis of legitimate argument, to 
 be decided by common sense or reason. Victor had not 
 hitherto found it difficult to avoid a direct surrender of his 
 own convictions in conducting the paper. Even the compro- 
 mise on the subject of Sunday laws and temperance agitation 
 could not be claimed as a victory by the proprietor. And as 
 Mr. Becker's political views accommodated themselves rather 
 easily to the demands of temporary expediency, Victor might 
 have come off triumphantly in the hot disi^utes that followed 
 on the slavery question, but for the impenetrable shield with 
 which his opponent's utter inaccessibility to argument armed 
 him, when it was his pohcy not to be convinced. The fear of 
 losing subscribers was to him an argument more potent than 
 any that Victor could bring to bear. It was during one of 
 the violent contentions between them, in which the proprie- 
 tor's ultimatum followed by a peremptory refusal on the part 
 of the editor, was about to produce an immediate rupture be- 
 tween the belligerents, that the entrance of Leslie May into 
 the sanctum caused, for the moment at least, a suspension of 
 hostilities. The excitement of both the disputants was too 
 great to be concealed from the visitor, and Mr. Becker him- 
 self, to Victor's relief, stated the cause of their quarrel, ap- 
 pealing to the young lawyer for aid in bringing the editor to 
 his senses. 
 
 Leslie had at that time attained to a popularity, in conse- 
 quence of his success in defeating the Sunday-law-cases, — a 
 popularity greatest among the very people with whom Mr. 
 Becker associated — which commanded the respect of the pro- 
 prietor of the BeobacJiter. He also possessed, as Victor so 
 well knew, the gift of seductive persuasion which made him 
 almost irresistible in carrying his point, when he was in ear- 
 nest. And just now he seemed, for a reason not quite appar- 
 ent to Victor, to have set his heart on keeping the present 
 editor of the Beobachter at his post. But it was no easy task 
 even for the diplomatic skill of Leslie May, to pour oil on the 
 
320 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 troubled waters : for Victor was inflexible iu what lie deemed 
 a matter of duty, and Mr. Becker stultborn in his zeal to 
 please his subscribers. All the efforts of tlie mediator seemed 
 in vain, until, in the very nick of time, he advanced a propo- 
 sition that set ]K)th the disputants to tliinking. He suggested 
 the candidacy of the young editor for the legislature, — a 
 proposition that dazed Victor. He saw a hitherto secretly 
 clierished am)>ition thrust forth from the innermost recesses of 
 his heart into the glaring light of day, and rudely pushing 
 him to action liefore the time had come tor which he was wait- 
 ing. Yes : It was a dream in which he had fondly indulged. 
 He had thirsted for the 'opportunity of distinguishing himself 
 as a pu))lic man. Having served as a mem))er of the General 
 Asseml)ly might put him in the way of an election to Congress 
 and — to meet Nellie May on lier own level. Nellie May! 
 The proud lieauty, the worshii)ed idol of his heart, whose 
 image liad been newly enthroned therein by the reading of that 
 letter intrusted to him by Leslie, and wliich he had not re- 
 turned, but — how he blushed, even now, to think of it! — 
 appropriated as a priceless treasure! Once again, it seemed, 
 fate was hurrying hi)n on to the realization of a plan that lie 
 had relegated to the far-off future. Leslie's suggestion must 
 be considered, — must, indeed, be answered. 
 
 Was it feasible ? 
 
 The same (question was in the mind of Mr. Becker. The 
 prospect of the editor of his paper being a member of the 
 legislature was an alluring one to him. It would be a great 
 card for the Beobachter. And what was even of greater im- 
 j)ortance, it would put his paper in the way of patronage. 
 Advertisements, at good, round prices, payable out of the 
 government funds, would pour in, at the mere nod of the edi- 
 tor, if he possessed any influence at all, — and he knew Mr. 
 ^N'aldhorst well enough to be easy on that score. He would, he 
 was sure, make his mark. Posted, as he was, on the political 
 questions of the time, it was not at all improbable that he 
 would rise to a position of a leader in the House, or at least 
 
SlfADOWS OF COMING EVENTS IN A SANCTUM. 321 
 
 of his pMily ill tho House. Not quite so sure was lie, whethei-, 
 supposing him to have attained inUuence, he would Avield it in 
 dispensing patronage to the paper. But then he was perfectly 
 sure that he could rely on his editor's loyalty, and trusted to 
 his own diplomatic skill in manipulating the legislature, if 
 need be, under cover of Victor's popularity. By all means, 
 then, let Mr. AValdhorst be elected to the legislature as a 
 representative German, from the editorial staff of the Beo- 
 hdi-Iitt^r I in TJxiI .' And ^Ir. Becker, too, pondered the question, 
 Was it feasil)le ? 
 
 So conlldeut did ^Nlr. May profess to l)e on this j)oint 
 that all doul)t vanished from the mind of the proprietor, 
 and even Victor found it easier to stifle the misgivings of his 
 natural dilfidencc. ^' You see," he explained to the hopeful 
 proprietor, '• I am mvself more deeply interested in the matter 
 than even you or my friend, Mr. Waldhorst ; for my father is 
 a candidate for the United States Senate. It is very impor- 
 tant for us to have so staunch a supporter of his party as well 
 as so firm a personal friend as 1 know Mr. Waldhorst to be, 
 as a member of the General Assembly when the election comes 
 on." 
 
 Of course I 
 
 Nellie's words in connection with this scheme were graven 
 on Victor's memory, and the vivid recollection of her enthusi- 
 astic gratitude for the assistance volunteered by Ralph Payton 
 fired him with zeal, before which his party loyalty, even his 
 profound sense of duty to the country, paled into insignifi- 
 cance. His mind, if he had known it, had been made up on 
 the first instant, to accept Leslie's suggestion. The prospect 
 of being able to contribute by his vote as well as the whole of 
 any influence he could bring to bear — whatever that might 
 amount to — to the elevation of his friend and benefactor to 
 the United States Senate, appealing to his profound sense of 
 obligation and gratitude, constituted an overpowering motive, 
 sufficient in itself to put to shame all possible doubts and ob- 
 jections. And above all these considerations, and at the 
 
 21 
 
322 
 
 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 bottom of all his thoughts in connection therewith, there was 
 the distant vision of a radiantly beautiful face, irresistibly 
 luring him on with its entrancing smile. 
 
 And so Leslie's plan met with cordial approval by the 
 powers of the sanctum, and, for the present at least, peace and 
 harmony reigned supreme there once more. It was settled 
 that neither Mr. Becker nor Victor should put themselves, just 
 yet, to any trouble at all, but leave the matter to the manage- 
 ment of the young lawyer, Avho promised to secure Victor's 
 nomination by the county convention, if he would only 
 consent. 
 
XXI. 
 HOW THE MACHINE IS WORKED. 
 
 ^VENTS soon proved that Leslie had not j^romised more 
 
 ,j, than he was a])le to perform. 
 
 It was a trying time to Democracy. Victor exerted 
 his utmost abiUty to vindicate its doctrines in their pristine 
 purity. But while he combated political heresies in the columns 
 of his paper, Leslie, in a more quiet and unostentatious way, did 
 far more effective practical work. It was his creed that politi- 
 cal principles are best vindicated by the success of the party 
 advocating them : hence he looked upon victory in the elec- 
 tions as of greater importance than the discussion of abstract 
 principles. To him it was of far less moment that the demo- 
 crats should be convinced of the truth and justice of their 
 cause, than that democrats should win. He wanted his father 
 elected to the United States Senate ; and that could be accom- 
 plished only by having a Democratic majority in the General 
 Assembly. He therefore bent his energies to swell the num- 
 bers of Democratic voters. Nor could his father be elected 
 unless he was the choice of a majority of the democrats in the 
 legislature ; hence he labored to procure the election of as 
 many adherents to the cause re^jresented by his father as jjos- 
 sible. That Victor should be one of these, he had, as we have 
 seen, early determined ; and as he was perfectly sure of Vic- 
 tor's loyalty to whatever cause he espoused, he took more than 
 ordinary pains to commit him to the policy advocated by his 
 father. It may be inferred from the stand taken by Victor 
 against his principal, to what extent he had been successful in 
 this resi^ect. Yet he deemed it of great importance to guard, 
 as far as possible, against the danger of adverse influence, the 
 gi'eatest of which he reckoned Victor's extreme conscien- 
 tiousness. 
 
 (323) 
 
324 THE BE BE US DAUGHTEB. 
 
 The Democratic County Coiiveutiou liad been called for an 
 unusually late day. The leaders of the party, burdened with 
 self-imposed resi^onsibility for the welfare of the State, had 
 held back with the promulgation of the policy according to 
 which the country was to l^e saved from the misrule and cor- 
 ruption under which it had suffered at the hands of Know- 
 Nothingism without subjecting it to the mercy of the republi- 
 cans, who were to be even more feared on account of their 
 avowed purpose of subverting the constitution. It had be- 
 come obvious that there would l:)e at least three parties opposed 
 to one another in the impending contest ; and the Democratic 
 leaders had determined to wait until the last possible moment 
 before giving out th-e watchword under which Democracy was 
 to do battle. The know-nothings made a gallant stand, in- 
 scribing upon their banner the magic words that led them to 
 victory before. " The Constitution " and " America for 
 Americans " was their war cry. The republicans followed, 
 calling upon Freemen to vindicate Freedom. Both of these 
 parties had nominated tickets for the State and county officers, 
 and the construction of a Democratic platform and nomination 
 of Democratic candidates could be put off no longer. 
 
 So, finally, the convention was called, and primary meetings 
 appointed for the wards of the city and the townships of the 
 county, to select delegates. Then came a busy time for central 
 committeemen, members of the Democratic clubs, and wire- 
 pullers and ward politicians generally. The Democratic news- 
 papers were full of stirring appeals to the Democratic voters to 
 be on hand in the primary meetings for the purpose of electing 
 representatives to the party convention. 
 
 Victor, who had always conscientiously performed a voter's 
 duty in this respect, was sincere and earnest in his editorial 
 exhortations. He emphasized strongly the great importance 
 of primary meetings, as constituting the foundation upon which 
 the party organization was built up, the fountain so to speak 
 from which all its authority flowed, and in whose hands lay 
 the determination of the principles for which the party con- 
 
now THE MACHINE IS WORKED. 325 
 
 tended. He demonstrated that in a government l)used upon 
 the will of the majority of the people, the omission to express 
 this will in the only authentic and efficient manner in which it 
 can be done, is a treasonable dereliction of duty. 
 
 But Victor, on this occasion, did not confine his activity to 
 the writing of editorials in his newspaper. His patriotism 
 and loyalty to the Democratic party had been perceptibly 
 quickened by the prospect of being a candidate himself. He 
 called on as many of his personal friends as his time would 
 allow, reminding them of their duty to the country. At Busch 
 Bluff, the way to Avhich had not been so long as to deter him 
 from making a visit there, he was received with significant 
 smiles by his uncle and cousin, and the voluntary promise of 
 the former that he would not forget to vote for him. It was 
 evident that Leslie had forestalled him there, and that the old 
 gentleman had received his cue from the young lawyer. 
 Pauline, also, mentioned to him, as she attended him to the gate 
 on his departure, that Mr. May had told her the grand news 
 of her brother's going to the legislature. " And he says," 
 she added with an eager, triumphant look into his eyes, " that 
 you are going to make a United States senator of his father." 
 
 On the evening appointed for the meeting in his ward Victor 
 was on hand at the precise hour of the call. He was sur- 
 prised and much pleased to find the hall respectably filled at 
 this early hour. But his surprise was still greater on hearing 
 a well-known member of the central committee, almost as soon 
 as he had entered the hall, call the meeting to order, and propose 
 Mr. Victor Waldhorst for chairman. Victor protested ; but his 
 feeble stammering was drowned by the voice of the committee- 
 man, who demanded that all democrats favoring his motion 
 should say aye ! and then, that all opposing should say no ! 
 whereupon lie proclaimed that the motion had been carried, and 
 called on Victor to take his seat on the platform. 
 
 Victor was really and truly unprepared for the honor thus 
 thrust upon him. But as there was no time for deliberation, 
 and principally because he lacked the presence of mind to so 
 
326 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 word a refusal as not to give offense to the uieetiug, he bash- 
 fully permitted himself to be conducted to the chair. 
 
 The smiling face of Mr. Becker was the first he encountered 
 on looking around, and his love for this gentleman was by no 
 means stimulated by the thought that flashed upon him, that 
 he owed his present uneasy position to the ambitious scheming 
 of the newspaper proprietor. He was confirmed in this 
 suspicion by the next move of the committeeman, who thus 
 addressed him : 
 
 " I now move you, Mr. Chairman, that that active and 
 prominent democrat Nehemia Becker, Esq., be elected secre- 
 tary of this meeting." 
 
 The motion having been duly seconded, was mechanically 
 put to a vote by the chairman. 
 
 A voice from another part of the hall then moved the ap- 
 pointment by the chair of a committee of five, to select and 
 present to the meeting the names of five reliable democrats, to 
 lie voted for as delegates to the county convention to be held 
 at Hamilton Hall on Monday next. 
 
 The motion had hardly been put and carried, when a paper 
 was slipped into his hand, containing the names of five per- 
 sons, of whom Victor was personally acquainted with but one, 
 and that was his employer, Mr. Becker. The chairman's em- 
 barrassment was great. It was not in accordance with his 
 views that matters should be precipitated at this rate. The 
 selection of delegates to the county convention was a duty of 
 such momentous importance as to demand careful delibera- 
 tion. Nor was he at all satisfied that Mr. Becker was a proper 
 person to be intrusted with any discretion in connection there- 
 with. But what was he to do ? The meeting was waiting for 
 his action. He personally knew but few of the persons pres- 
 ent. So he reluctantly announced the gentlemen named on the 
 paper before him, which he had fortunately recognized as being 
 in the handwriting of Leslie May, to constitute the committee 
 of five. The persons designated rose, and left the hall for 
 consultation. 
 
TfOW THE MACHINE IS WORKED. 327 
 
 It was then, before the door had been closed upon the retir- 
 ing committee, that a new surprise awaited the astonished 
 chairman. A voice from a distant part of the room cried out: 
 " Mr. Chairman ! " Victor was not acquainted with the voice, 
 nor with the gentleman standing up and evidently claiming the 
 floor. At this crisis, to his great relief, some one close by 
 whispered into his ear: "Dr. Moorman! " So he recog- 
 nized Dr. Moorman as being entitled to the floor. Dr. Moor- 
 man wished to offer a Preamble and Resolutions, for the 
 consideration of the democrats present at the meeting, and 
 sent them up to the secretary's desk to have them read. As 
 Mr. Becker, the secretary, had left the room on committee 
 duty, the task to read fell on the chairman. The paper was as 
 follows : — 
 
 " Whereas, we claim it to be the right, as it is the sacred 
 duty, of democrats in primary meeting assembled, to make 
 known their views, and speak out their sentiments, touching 
 the affairs of the nation ; and 
 
 Whereas, we deem it of essential importance, that our 
 representatives in the General Assembly be informed of our 
 views and convictions touching the election of the representa- 
 tive of our glorious State in the Senate of the United States ; 
 and 
 
 Whereas, we have witnessed with profound satisfaction the 
 congressional career of that staunch and reliable democrat, 
 the Honorable Leonard May, who has so ably and successfully 
 represented the interests of our State in the Congress of the 
 United States for three consecutive congressional terms ; there- 
 fore be it 
 
 Resolved, by the democrats of the Fourth Ward in primary 
 meeting assembled, that the delegates to the couuty conven- 
 tion to be elected by this meeting be, and they hereby are, 
 instructed to A'ote for such candidates for election to the Gen- 
 eral Assembly, as may be known to be favorable to the election 
 of our distinguished fellow citizen, the Honorable Leonard 
 May, to the Senate of the United States. 
 
328 THE BEBEL'S DAUGIITEB. 
 
 Eesolced, moreover, that we request the count}' oonventiou 
 to instruct the candidates to be nominated by said convention, 
 and who may be elected to the General Assembly, to cast their 
 votes in favor of the said Leonahd May at the election of a 
 United States senator." 
 
 The reading of the paper was followed by the clapping of 
 hands, the stamping of feet, the clatter of canes and shrill 
 shouts of hurrah ! usual on such occasions. The resolutions 
 seemed to express the unanimous opinion of the people, for 
 not a dissentient voice was raised. Victor, who was inclined, 
 but for the verbosity employed, to hold his friend Leslie re- 
 sponsible for the authorship of the paper, was so thoroughly 
 in accord with its purpose, tliat he spoke for the first time 
 during the evening, in a loud, ringing voice as he put the 
 (juestion, and when he announced the unanimous adojition of 
 the preamble and resolutions. 
 
 But not even yet had the end of surprises for the chairman 
 of the meeting been reached. At the precise moment when lie 
 had announced the vote as having been carried, the Committee 
 on Nominations re-entered the hall, and Mr. Becker, as its 
 chairman, submitted a list of names, including his own, as 
 well as that of Victor, together with three well-known friends 
 of Mr. Becker, whom Mctor had never susj^ected of higher 
 pretensions of statesmanship than noisy declamation in bar- 
 rooms, emphasized by calling all present to join him in a 
 drink. He felt ill at gase. But the report must be put to 
 a vote ; and when it had been unanimously adopted, nothing- 
 remained for him to do but to announce the gentlemen therein 
 named as the choice of the Democracy of the Fourth Ward as 
 delegates to the county convention. As soon as this had 
 been done, some one moved that the meeting do now adjourn, 
 and in less than fifteen minutes after it had been called to 
 order by the committeeman all was over, and the democrats 
 of the Fourth Ward had spoken, so far as the election of the 
 members for the county coijvention for that year was coq- 
 cerned , 
 
//Oir THE MACHINE IS WORKED. 329 
 
 Victor was not at all pleased with the result of the evening's 
 work ; least of all with his own share in it. He felt, as if the 
 participants in the meeting had been used as puppets, bobbing 
 up and down at the pleasure of some one behind the scenes 
 pulling the wires. He was perfectly sure of this, so far as 
 himself was concerned. Was this the way in which freemen 
 exercised their sacred right of determining the pohcy of a 
 [)arty, as he had so glowingly set forth in his editorials? As 
 it was still early in the evening, Victor proposed to Mr. Becker 
 that each of them should visit some other ward meeting, with 
 the view of obtaining fuller particulars for the Beobachter 
 than would likely be furnished by the professional reporters. 
 He for his own part immediately set out for the First Ward. 
 
 The meeting for this ward was held in a market house, which 
 Victor I'eached in a few minutes. His suspicion that Leslie 
 had obtained great influence with the Democratic Central Com- 
 mittee, and was manipulating the ward meetings in the interest 
 of Colonel May, was strongly confirmed by the unexpected 
 fact, that he found his own uncle, Auf dem Busch, Senior, 
 occupying the chair. The further fact, that a set of resolu- 
 tions similar to those that had been adopted in the Fourth 
 Ward were offered here, did not so much surprise him, after 
 the experiences of the evening. But there was here no such 
 unanimity as had characterized the Fourth Ward meeting. 
 After the reading of the resolutions there was applause, but 
 thei'e was also dissent. A loud voice demanded to know : 
 " Who is this Mr. May? " Whereupon the mover of the 
 resolutions answered sharply, that such a question could only 
 proceed from ignorance or from gross prejudice ; for that Mr. 
 May had been for many years an illustrious leader of the 
 Democratic party of the State, and its veteran champion in the 
 National House of Representatives. " Then let him stay in 
 the House of Reijresentatives," the first speaker replied 
 vehemently, "and let us keep our long tried senator at his 
 post in the Senate. I move you, Mr, Chairman, to lay these 
 resolutions ou the table," 
 
330 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Victor saw that one of the men on the platform approached 
 the chairman and whispered into his ear, whereupon the latter 
 brought down his hammer with great energy, and succeeded 
 presently in quieting the storm of applause and hisses that 
 followed the words 6f the last speaker. " It is a motion," he 
 said with quiet dignity, " and it is a second, that we shall put 
 the resolutions, which we have heard, on the table. And I 
 have heard that if it is a motion to put on the table, it shall 
 not be debatable. Also, I decide, that it shall not be 
 debatable." 
 
 Victor blushed at the thought that his uncle might, from 
 ignorance or in his bewilderment, omit to put the question ; 
 but a renewed storm of applause from the one, and of hisses 
 and groans from the other side of the disputants, rendering 
 the further use of the gavel necessary by the chairman, 
 relieved him for the moment of his anxiety. Loud exclama- 
 tions of " Shame! " " No gagging here! " and of "Ques- 
 tion! " " Take the vote on tabling! " resounded through the 
 hall. Mr. Auf dem Busch was in no wise disconcerted. He 
 soon restored order and continued, after again lending ear to 
 the busy whisperer, "I put now the question, if we put 
 the resolutions on the table. If you wish it, say aye! " The 
 ayes were loud and numerous. Then the chairman demanded : 
 " If you not wish it, say no! " And the noes, to Victor's 
 anxious ears, were not so boisterous, but rather more 
 numerous. 
 
 Before the chairman had time to give his opinion as to the 
 result of the vote, there were many clamorous demands for a 
 division. This time the chairman spontaneously bent his head 
 toward the man who did the whispering, and then proclaimed, 
 " I do appoint tellers to count the hands. I appoint my son, 
 Woldemar Auf dem Busch, and my nephew, Victor Waldhorst, 
 to be tellers. If you wish to lay on the table, raise up your 
 hands ! ' ' 
 
 It is probable that Mr. Auf dem Busch could not have 
 selected two more conscientious tellers in the audience ; but 
 
now THE JI A CHINE IS WOBKED. 331 
 
 the sovereigus present were not going to put up with such 
 barefaced and shameful nepotism on the part of the chairman ; 
 and they were not slow in letting him know this. Besides, it 
 soon leaked out that Victor was not a resident of the First 
 Ward at all, and had no right, therefore, to participate in the 
 meeting. So the chairman was compelled to select other tel- 
 lers. He did so with as much coolness and dignity as if the 
 faux pas made in the first selection were due to some one else's 
 blunderiug. As soon as, by dint of vigorous hammering with 
 the gavel, he had quieted the laughter and yells of the crowd, 
 he directed the tellers to count the uplifted hands (" only 
 the right hands! " he enjoined on them), and announced after 
 the count, that the motion to table was lost. The resolutions 
 were finally passed by a small majority. 
 
 Victor had every reason to be proud of the success of the 
 cause he advocated. In the Fifth Ward also, delegates had 
 been chosen who favored the election of Colonel May, and of 
 the May candidates to the legislature. Yet he left the hall in 
 anything but a triumphant mood. But what most deeply 
 pained him. was the wound that his self-respect received by the 
 conviction, which he could no longer ignore, that some one 
 had prepared the program which had been so accurately car- 
 ried out in both the wards at which he had attended ; and that 
 the same thing had been done, or at least attempted, in the 
 other wards was too plain to admit of doubt. That this per- 
 son was Leslie May, was equally apparent. It was humiliat- 
 ing to think that not only himself, but also his uncle and cousin 
 had been used as involuntary, even unconscious tools in 
 accomplishing another's purpose. That this purpose was, so 
 far as he could see, proper and meritorious, — that his friend 
 Leslie had accomplished, far more efficiently and successfully 
 than he Wmself could have di'eamed of doing, his own purpose 
 and aim, — did not blind his eyes to the danger that threat- 
 ened, bv practices of this kind, to undermine the liberties of 
 the people. Leslie May was a wise, generous, well-meaning 
 man — second in generosity and whole-souled patriotism to no 
 
332 THE BEBEUS DAUOHTEB. 
 
 man, save, perhaps, Colonel May himself; — but what of that? 
 What if a designing demagogue pursued a similar course in 
 furtherance of wicked, selfish ends? What if a motive ulterior 
 to the welfare of the State inspired the hand that fixed the 
 wires and moved the puppets ? 
 
 And he had, but that day, lauded in glowiug words, the 
 primaries as the palladium that shielded the liberties of American 
 P'reemeu ! 
 
 He reached the otlice in a dubious mood. Dubious, because 
 it was agreeable, after all, to know that a man of adroitness 
 and skill was managing his election. He could not help 
 rejoicing over the prospect of success, so greatly enhanced by 
 Leslie's interest therein. His prospect of success! And 
 what it meant to him, if he had the mettle to improve it — 
 to compel the respect, if not more, of Eleouora May! For he 
 had not forgotten the cruel emphasis with which she had insisted 
 on her full title, the last time she had spoken to him, now so 
 many years ago. 
 
 Yes, Miss Eleonora j\Iay, yon shall yet learn to respect your 
 " outlandish beau I " 
 
 He had hardly conunenced to reduce the reports of the 
 evening's work at the primaries into shape for a leading article 
 in the morning's paj^er, when Mr. Becker entered, his face 
 Hushed with excitement and exultation. " Mr. W^aldhorst! " 
 he exclaimed, " congratulate yourself! The day is ours! If 
 I were only as sure of being elected State Printer as you are 
 of going to the legislature, I would consider my fortune made. 
 But that lawyer friend of yours is a trump, and no mistake ! 
 Why, he had the whole thing fixed beforehand, everything cut 
 and dried. If his father is half the man that his son is, he 
 will go to the Senate in spite of anything the democrats, re- 
 publicans and know-nothings can do, or all of them put 
 together ! ' " 
 
 The exuberance of Mr. Becker infected Victor to some ex- 
 tent. " Yes," he said, " I know that Mr. May is a keen, 
 shrewd and wise politician, And the most wonderful thing 
 
now THE MACHINE IS WOUKED. 333 
 
 about him is, that lie makes peojile do what he wants wliether 
 they consent or not. e)r even whether they know it or not! " 
 he added, his cheeks Hushing with shame at the recollection of 
 the parts that he and his uncle had been made to play that 
 evening in Leslie's program of the primary meetings. " And 
 he is a warm and faithful friend! " 
 
 '• Particularly in getting you into the legislature to vote for 
 his father," the proprietor added, somewhat more soberly. 
 " But he plays his cards well. I shall try to be on good terms 
 with him." 
 
 Just then Leslie himself entered the office, bringing Pro- 
 fessor Rauhenfels with him. Of course, Victor was eager to 
 learn the result of the meetings in the other wards, and plied 
 both Leslie and the professor with questions. Leslie was in 
 an extremely pleasant mood ; but his quiet subdued behavior 
 contrasted strongly Avith the excitement of the professor, 
 whose nervous boisterousness and exuberant hilarity greatly 
 astonished Victor, who had never seen him under such excite- 
 ment. 
 
 " Sir! " he exclaimed, in answer to one of Victor's ques- 
 tions, " we are going to astonish the Old Fogies that have 
 been running this town. We will capture the enemy, horse, 
 foot and dragoons ! We'll show the know-nothings, that they 
 were never so wise as in choosing their name. We'll teach 
 the abolitionists that they can't abolish the constitution, just 
 yet. My friend, — Mr. May — and I, we will for once put 
 the electioneering machine on its proper basis, and show the 
 world, what a little brains and tact can do! " 
 
 ''Call it audacity, Professor! " said Leslie, with a quiet 
 smile, " or cheek. For our success, so far, is due to nothing 
 so much as to the boldness and audacity with which we specu- 
 lated on the good nature of our friends, the metropolitan poli- 
 ticians, and of those of our friends that ought to be politicians. 
 Our friend Victor, for instance," he added, turning his smiling 
 face toward the editor, " must have been astonished this even- 
 ing, when called on to preside over a ward meeting. Tell me : 
 
334 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 How did you get along? It was so much easier tliau you 
 thought, was it not? Of the result of the voting I have been 
 informed, as also of the result in the First Ward, where your 
 excellent uncle did good execution with the gavel, I am told. 
 There must be an unruly set down there," 
 
 " But uncle got along with them sj)leudidly ! " said Victor, 
 rather jjroudly, '' I could not have done half so well I " 
 
 " Oh, yes, you could! " was Leslie's reply. " The fact is 
 that you don't know what you can do until you try. But I 
 wish you had some of your uncle's pugnacity, I suspect that 
 he rather enjoys a spirited encounter now and then, aud I 
 would not like to be his opponent when he knows that he is in 
 the right," 
 
 " But why did you not let me know what you were going to 
 do? " asked Victor, with an undertone of reproach in his voice, 
 " I was terribly embarrassed when the chairmanship was 
 sprung on me without a moment's warning. And don't you 
 believe that it was taking an unfair advantage of the voters to 
 pack the meeting the way j'ou did ? — why, you must have had 
 twenty-five or fifty men in each of the meetings — and to have 
 everything prepared beforehand, cut and dried, so as to leave 
 nothing for the real voters to do, but to say aye ! This is 
 Democracy with a vengeance, I should think! " 
 
 " Ho ho! " the jorofessor spoke up in the place of Leslie, 
 " So you wanted your friend to let you know beforehand what 
 was going to be done at the meeting? You wanted to be in 
 the ring, did you? It would have been Simon Pure Democ- 
 racy, if you had had a hand in doing the cutting and drying ! " 
 Then he turned to Leslie and continued: "It is well that we 
 know this, Mr, May, Hereafter we shall have to take our 
 young friend into the conspiracy, to hoodwink aud betray the 
 real voters into saying aye to our treasonable plots," 
 
 Victor was dumfounded. He had a vague notion that he 
 had said something foolish, without clearly knowiug what. 
 While he pondered over the professor's words, Leslie said, 
 quietly: "That is just what the professor proj^osed to do. 
 
now THE MACHINE IS WOBKED. 335 
 
 He suggested that we should talk the matter over with you, so 
 that you might be prepared to act when the time came. But I 
 told him that I knew you better," he added, looking signifi- 
 cantly at Victor. " I told him that I was pretty sure that you 
 would have nothing to do with the whole matter, if you got it 
 into your head that it was putting up a job. And you seem to 
 take that view of it ; don't you? " 
 
 " Of course we were putting up a job," the professor broke 
 in ; " and a good sized one at that. Nothing less than regen- 
 erating sleepy old Democracy : waking her up to the work that 
 is on hand for her ; securing a convention that may be able to 
 cope with the know-nothings, and trip up the fanatical republi- 
 cans in their treasonable attempt to undermine the constitution ! 
 I reckon that you are proud that you had nothing to do with 
 putting up a job like that ! " 
 
 "But," said Victor, hesitating, and much abashed by the 
 professor's sarcasms, "the best end cannot justify improper 
 means. Packing a meeting seems to me a great wrong com- 
 mitted against the majesty of the people. I do not see the 
 difference between it and cheating, or lying, or committing 
 forgery. For it is intended to be, and has the effect of, a 
 falsification of the real sentiment entertained by them, — 
 making them responsible for what they themselves have neither 
 done, said, or intended." 
 
 " I think you are putting it in rather strong terms, Victor," 
 said Leslie, more seriously than usual. " In the first place, I 
 wish to disabuse your mind of the idea, that we sent either 
 twenty-five or fifty men to any meeting. In the Fourth Ward, 
 for instance, there were only three men with whom either the 
 professor or I spoke a word before the meeting took place. 
 One of these was the committeeman whose business it was to 
 see to the organization of the meeting ; a second one was the 
 mover of the resolution you passed, and the third was our 
 friend here, Mr. Becker, whom I requested to furnish us with 
 the names of some friends upon whom we could rely as being 
 in harmony with our views, to serve on the committee to make 
 
336 THE ItEBEL\S DAUGHTER. 
 
 iioniiuatious. Of t'uur.se, the central eoiniiiittee always has 
 some man at every meeting to prompt the chairman, in case 
 he should need assistance. 80 in the First Ward : I believe 
 that I saw no one that attended that meeting but your uncle 
 and your cousin — " 
 
 " Yes," Victor indignantly interrupted, " and my cousin 
 did not vote for your resolutions, either I " 
 
 " Well, it seems that they were passed without his vote," said 
 Leslie with a smile. " Don't be too hard on him. The mover 
 of the resolution in that ward professes to be a Avarm friend of 
 father, and of course I asked him to be on hand. So in all 
 the other wards; you Avill believe me when I tell you that be- 
 sides seeing that some one should offer, and if need ])e defend, 
 the resolutions, and that trustworthy persons should l)e selected 
 to nominate friendly delegates to the convention, I did abso- 
 lutely nothing to intluence the result. And in this matter I 
 received valualile assistance from the professor. ♦ This is about 
 the size of the ' packing ' that either or both of us did." 
 
 " I should not wonder if our young friend did a great deal 
 more in the packing line," said the professor. " I should 
 wonder, though, if he did not do his level best in the columns 
 of his paper during the last few days, to get his friends to at- 
 tend the meeting. He may have gone to the length of asking 
 some of them jx^rsonalh/ to come ; but of course, if he did, he 
 begged them to use all their influence against his nomination, 
 and against any measure tViat he might favor." The peal of 
 laughter with which the professor pointed his irony was ex- 
 ceedingly distasteful to Victor. 
 
 "In the next place," Leslie continued, " I would like to 
 know of you, w'hether anything Avas done at the meetings of 
 which you have any information, that was not perfectly square, 
 open and aboAe lioard r Do you not fully and freely concur 
 in all that was done, including the resolutions instructing for 
 the Colonel? " 
 
 "Most certainly I do!" was Victor's hearty response. 
 " And the resolutions in particular speak my inmost convic- 
 
now THE MACIIlNh: LS WOUKPW. 337 
 
 tion. 1 do not object to irjnit was cloiic, l)iit only to the ineaiis 
 employed in doing it." 
 
 " I will tell you wiiat it is that trouVjles our young friend," 
 the professor reniarlved sententiously. " He suspects that we 
 have, in preparing the resolutions, in looking out for proper 
 men to i)ropose as chairmen, and, in general, to keep the 
 meetings to their proi)er work, meddled with — usurped, if 
 you please, — the legitimate functions of sovereign demo- 
 crats — " 
 
 " And is it not so? " Victor interrupted. 
 
 "Oh, to be sure, we are not sovereign democrats, you 
 know 1 " continued the professor, addressing his words, with 
 smiling irony, to Leslie and Mr. Becker. " He confounds a 
 primary meeting with a jury box ; the voter must have no 
 more knowledge of the man he is called on to vote for, or of 
 his political principles, than the juror should know of the man 
 or of the case he is called on to try, — so that he may cast his 
 vote with the utmost ignorance obtainable under the circum- 
 stances. He is afraid to vote for a personal friend, lest it be 
 selfish partiality on his part ; or to advocate a policy which 
 might 1)y possibility result in benefiting himself, or a personal 
 friend, because these are the practices resorted to by dema- 
 gogues — ." 
 
 Leslie slyly winked at Mr. Becker, who nodded eagerly. 
 But the professor continued to speak in the high key ha1)itual 
 to him when in sarcastic mood, and concluded with the remark : 
 " You see, Mr. Waldhorst will have no bias, no preconceived 
 opinion of what may be best for the true interest of the 
 country — in short, he would have no partisanship in his 
 party." 
 
 "You willfully misrepresent and wrong me I " cried Victor, 
 in great indignation. " I have said or done nothing to justify 
 you in accusing me of such gross absurdities. What I said, 
 or intended to say, is, that for a set of men to combine to- 
 gether to carry this or that man for this or that committee at a 
 proposed meeting, to determine in advance on a set of resolu- 
 
338 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 tions to be passed, and agreeing on the delegates to be sent to 
 the convention," is to rehearse a farce, to the performance 
 of which you graciously invite the public as spectators. Or, 
 to put it in your own words, to do yourselves the work which 
 the voters ought to do. It is worse — it is tampering with the 
 highest safeguards of lil^erty. Granting that your work has 
 accomplished what is right ; aye, that you have done much 
 better than the voters, uninfluenced by your plotting, could 
 have done : — what is to hinder unscrupulous men to follow 
 your example with less pure motives ? The toleration of such 
 practices would make of the government by the jjeople a de- 
 lusion and a snare. Nothing could prevent unprincipled 
 demagogues from controlling the elections, the legislature, the 
 whole government ! It would bring us tyranny in the most 
 oppressive shape that you yourself have so eloquently de- 
 nounced — the misrule by secret and irresponsible con- 
 spirators ! ' ' 
 
 Victor's blood was up, and he had not weighed niceh' the 
 words he employed. The professor smiled, as he replied : " I 
 am glad that you see the absurdity of some of your statements. 
 For note : It is not / that accuse : I have but drawn the logical 
 result of your own words. And I dare say, that you will be 
 equally astonished when you come to see, as you will on a 
 Httle reflection — the contradiction involved in your explana- 
 tion. Does it not strike you, for instance, that the audience 
 you mention in connection with the farce did as much, if not 
 more, of the acting than those whom you call the conspirators? 
 Admitting that they were, what by their being at the meeting 
 they held themselves out to be — democrats — was not their 
 authority in every particular precisely equal to that of the so- 
 called actors ? The vote of each counted one : the majority 
 spoke for aV . The binding authority of a primary meeting 
 depends, and can depend, only on the theory, that, as every 
 member of the party is invited to be present and participate in 
 the proceedings, so the whole party is — must be — deemed to 
 have been present and to have spoken its will. This theory 
 
JIOW THE MACHINE IS WOE K ED. 339 
 
 applies more forcibl}- still, of course, to all who were present 
 at the meeting. Presumably they did what they came there 
 to do, — voted their conviction. If so, they are bound by the 
 majority. But if they aV)stained from voting, what better 
 right have they to complain than if they stayed at home ? Or 
 is it censurable that .some — those whom you called the actors — 
 came [jrepared to do their work, having thought over and con- 
 sulted about the questions to be decided :ind the men to be 
 elected ? You are pleased to designate this the rehearsal of a 
 farce : don't you think it would have been much moi'c of a farce, 
 if nobody had come prei)ared to work? " 
 
 Victor made no answer. The professor's M^ords sounded 
 very much like some of the arguments he had himself urged 
 upon the voters in drumming them up to attend the primaries. 
 Again he |)ondered. But Mr. Becker seemed highly pleased 
 and was not at all backward in letting the professor know that 
 he approved of his sentiments. " You have spoken like a 
 book," he said, as he approached the professor to shake hands 
 with him. " I hope that Mr. Waldhorst will profit by your wis- 
 dom. The young man, in my opinion, carries his squeamish- 
 ness entirely too far. I have often told him so. If, for 
 instance, it came in his way, as a member of the legislature, 
 to benefit his own paper, and advance his own interest, by 
 shoving a printing job at his friend, for which the State pays 
 a fair price, would there be anything wrong in his doing so? 
 And ought he not strain a point to enable him to serve his 
 party, himself and an old friend at the same time? " 
 
 "■ There is practical sense for you I " exclaimed Leslie, with 
 a loud laugh and a sly wink at the professor. 
 
 But the latter cast a searching glance at the printer, and 
 said: " Well, Mr. Becker, that is a matter about which we 
 may talk hereafter. Let us not dispose of our chickens before 
 thev are hatched." 
 
XXII. 
 
 DEMOCRACY IN CONVENTION. 
 
 Sundays were red-letter days in Victor's caleiulav. He 
 ^^\) looked forward to them with j^leasant ex])ec'tation. He 
 reckoned events with reference to their proximity to 
 Sunday. Of all the Aveek-days he liked Saturday l»est, be- 
 cause it would l)e followed by Sunday. He loved to hear the 
 (thimes ring Ave Maria on Saturday evening, because their 
 stirring concord (distinguished from the single bell of other 
 days), gave joyful promise of the golden morrow. Sweet to 
 him was the peal of the bells on Sunday morning, attuning his 
 mind to loftier aspirations ; sweet the rolling music of organ 
 and choir, so suggestive of high and ennobling thoughts. He 
 felt as if Clod were nearer to him on this day : that the Sab- 
 bath day is truly a divine institution. And he blessed in his 
 heart the Hel)rew law-giver tor the rigor with which he exacted 
 its observance l)y the Chosen People. 
 
 One of the features distinguishing the German from the 
 Anglo-American newspapers of the ])eriod was, that the latter 
 omitted Sunday from their regular publication days, l>ut 
 included Mondays ; requiring, in order to furnish the latest 
 news, editors, reporters, compositors and printers to devote at 
 least a part of their Sundays to their regular vocation. Victor 
 thought the plan adopted by the German papers, of issuing a 
 Sunday and omitting the issue of a Monday paper, much more 
 rational. The custom of publishing Sunday papers was in 
 course of time adopted by the Anglo-American press, without, 
 however, omitting the Monday paper, so that for their em- 
 ployees there is now no Sunday at all. Under the combined 
 influence of lieree competition, each paper striving to excel all 
 others in the variety and amount of reading matter furnished 
 (340) 
 
DEMOCRACY IN CONVENTION. 341 
 
 to their readers ou Sunday, and the liberal patronage of adver- 
 tisers, who soon discovered the peculiar value of Sunday 
 papers for their purposes, they were increased in size to such 
 enormous proportions, as to put it out of the question for 
 ordinary mortals to wade through them, and to embitter the 
 life of editors whose duty compelled them to make a mental 
 inventory, at least, of the contents of the several contem- 
 poraries . 
 
 Things had not reached this pass, however, in ante-bellum 
 days. It was still a pleasure to Victor to scan the Sunday 
 papers while sipping his coffee and lingering over his Sunday 
 breakfast. First, of course, his own Beobachter. For he had 
 not yet lost the zest of taking in the full effect of his articles 
 in their liuished, printed form, and took considerable pride — 
 none the less gratifying because coyly concealed — in the tact 
 and judgment evidenced by a more than usually successful or 
 interesting number, satisfying his own critical standard. Then 
 he would skim over the other German papers, making note of 
 any item of news or article of interest that might be utilized 
 for his paper. But on the morning after the primary meetings 
 he took up the opposition paper before his own, not, perhaps, 
 because his own candidacy had stimulated his interest in 
 political polemics, but in sympathy with the general excitement 
 prevalent on the subject. At any rate he was eager to learn 
 the attitude assumed by his competitor toward the convention 
 to be held next day, and what, if anything, he had to say 
 touching the resolutions instructing for a United States Senator 
 in the person of Colonel May. His curiosity was satisfied to 
 the fullest extent. He had credited his rival, with whom he 
 was carrying on a bitter warfare on political grounds, all the 
 more intense because both papers belonged to the same polit- 
 ical party, with such sovereign contempt for truth and decency, 
 that he honestly believed that no statement of his would ever 
 sur])rise him. But on this Sunday morning he discovered that 
 he had been mistaken in this belief. He was not only sur- 
 l)rised, but absolutely stunned by the unparalleled feats of 
 
342 THE EEBEU8 DAUGHTER. 
 
 perversion aud distortion accomplished by the rival editor. 
 His eye was first caught by one of the brief paragraphs in the 
 editorial column, which may be given in English about as 
 follows : 
 
 '•' Kick Them Oit I We are cnedibly informed, that at the 
 meetings last night a disreputable set of rowdies succeeded in 
 terrorizing the legitimate voters, and foisted in their bogus 
 material as delegates to the convention. Let this body strictly 
 investigate, and purify itself of the impostors! " 
 
 Victor at once surmised that this was a blow aimed, if not 
 personally against himself, then at least against the paper he 
 edited. On i-eading further, he found his surmise but too 
 fully corroborated. His cheeks blanched, though he was all 
 alone in the room, as he read : 
 
 *' A I)is(UiA('EFUL Row last night brought shame on the 
 First Ward. A lot of hirelings, evidently in the pay of some 
 corrupt political aspirant, or of a striker obeying higher orders, 
 poured in on the ])rimni'y meeting there, and overpowered the 
 peaceful citizens. They seated a pliant tool as chairman, who 
 ruled all points of order in their favor, and he had the insolence 
 to ajjpoint his own son and his own nephew as tellers to count 
 the votes. In this way they succeeded in falsifying the views 
 of the people of the First Ward, aud declaring a set of 
 dplegates elected who are said to favor an obscure individual 
 from the backwoods to replace our long tried Nestor in the 
 United States Senate. Let the convention redeem the fair 
 name of our city, and save the First Ward from humiliation 
 and shame ! ' ' 
 
 A little further on, this paragraph stared him in the face: 
 
 '' CoM.^iEXT UxxECESSAKT. It givcs US siucere pain to learn 
 that our highly esteemed colleague of the Beobachter, Mr. 
 Victor Waldhorst, has seriously stultified himself by taking 
 part in the shameful proceedings in the First Ward last night ; 
 and that, too, after he had participated in a high-hnnded piece of 
 defraudation in the P'ourth Ward. By a trick unworthy of his 
 hitherto unsullied reputation he, with a few of the personal 
 
DEMOCRACY IN CONVENTION. 343 
 
 friends of the backwoods aspirant for the United States sena- 
 torship, organized a meetini>- in tlie Fourth Ward before the 
 time for which it had been called, and with resolutions cut and 
 dried in his pocket, and a list of delegates agreed on before- 
 hand, went through the motions of voting, and adjourned the 
 meeting within live minutes after the regular time for which the 
 voters had been notilied to be there." 
 
 Victor's first impulse on reading the insulting charges was, 
 to hunt up the rival editor and compel him to retract, or in- 
 flict upon him such personal chastisement as might warn the 
 miscreant to have some slight regard for truth and common 
 decency. He leaped up from his chair and paced the room in 
 rapid strides, lashing his anger into furious wrath, until it 
 reached a pitch at which it must boil over, or find vent in some 
 deed of violence. Yes; he must horsewhip the audacious, 
 lying scoundrel, — would do it to-day, — now I What though 
 it ivas Sunday ! Not a day, not an hour must be lost in delay- 
 ing the vindication of his personal honor. 
 
 The resolution so formed seemed to relieve the violence of 
 his passion. He sat down again to his nntasted coffee and read 
 over the scurrilous paragraphs with closer attention. The 
 second reading did not mend matters much. There were the 
 infamous chai*ges, the stinging insults that could not be tamely 
 submitted to. There was the dastardly lie against his uncle, 
 so entirely cut out of whole cloth ; for a more sincere, well- 
 meaning man than his uncle never lived. There was the 
 assassin's blow, at his revered friend, Colonel May. No! such 
 cowardly calumny must be signally refuted. The only proper 
 answer, in case he refused complete and unconditional 
 retraction, was to administer a horse-whipping to the lying 
 scouudi'el. 
 
 But soup is rarely eaten so hot as it is served. Victor re- 
 flected that there should be a witness to the execution of the 
 summary punishment. Not, indeed, for his own assistance, — 
 for he never once contemplated the possibility of taking, in- 
 stead of giving a whipping, — but only to witness the fact. 
 
344 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Of course, this witness must be Leslie. Indeed, coming to 
 think of it, Leslie was almost as deeply interested in this mat- 
 ter as himself, and would certainly take an active part in de- 
 feuding his father. But he should only stand by ; Victor owed 
 it to himself, to his uncle, and certainly to the Colonel, to keep 
 the control of the matter in his own hands. 
 
 A rap at the door disturbed his busy tlioughts, and simul- 
 taneously with his aln'upt "come! " Professor Rauhenfels 
 entered, accosting him with a cheerful "Good Morning I " 
 He waited for no salutation from Victor, but plunged headlong 
 into conversation, speaking cheerfully and in a tone of assur- 
 ance and confidence that failed not of its effect on the editor. 
 "The gods are propitious!" he said. "Apollo himself 
 could not have favored us w'ith finer weather for the work we 
 have in liand. This raw, chilling, blustering atmosphere is 
 just the thing to drive to cover the game we are pursuing. 
 We shall find the new-fledged delegates squatting snugly in the 
 back door bar-room attachment to some family grocery store, 
 ready to dicker with the highest bidder for their votes, guzzling 
 beer or tippling whiskey. Let us put in a good day's work 
 before the l)attle opens, and we will have smooth sailing in the 
 convention to-morrow. ' ' 
 
 Victor's face had brightened on seeing the professor. Pos- 
 sessing unbounded confidence in the wisdom and keen intelli- 
 gence of his friend, he was eager to hear his opinion on the 
 subject uppermost in his mind. The professor's remarks 
 puzzled him, and he was not sure of apprehending their full 
 import ; but the matter in hand was too pressing to talk about 
 anything else. " There! " he said, holding out the paper to 
 his visitor, pointing with his thumb to the offensive items. 
 " What do you say to that? " 
 
 The profess'or took the paper and leisurely read the para- 
 graphs pointed out. Victor keenly watched the play of his 
 features. There was at first a slight contraction of the eye- 
 brows ; but after a while a broad grin spread over his face, 
 giving it a sardonic exi>ression of triumph. "(rJood!" he 
 
he s;u(1. lioldiiiy out the \n\\)ev to his visitor, 
 ' ' AN'hat do j-oii say to tlitit r ' ' 
 
DEMOCBACY IN CONVENTION. 345 
 
 exclaimed, dashiuij; the paper away. '' So they are sf|uealing 
 already, are tliey ? They'll squeal Avorse than that before we 
 are throiio-h with them. Kick them out, indeed I If any 
 kicking is to be done, we intend to have a hand in it, — or a 
 foot, rather — hey, Victor?" He concluded his remark with 
 a ringing laugh, puzzling Victor whether to ascribe it to the 
 intended pun, or to the imaginary discomtiture of the ad- 
 versaries. 
 
 "Do you think, as I do, that I ought to cowhide this 
 villainous liar? Does he not deserve a thrashing? ■" 
 
 '• For his good will, yes," the professor replied sol)erly. 
 "If a person low enough to administer it could be found. 
 But it is out of the question for you to dirty your hands with 
 such a job. And why should you or I, or any one on our 
 side of the question, think of punishing even an enemy for 
 working into our hands in such glorious style? " 
 
 " Working into our hands?" Victor repeated in unfeigned 
 astonishment. " What can you mean? " 
 
 ''Just what I say. This editor friend of yours, — quite 
 innocent of any intention to do so, I am sure — has done more 
 f(^r y(ju and for the cause you advocate in your paper, than 
 you could possibly have done without his gratuitous assist- 
 ance. It is to be hoped that this scurvy sheet has been ex- 
 tensivel}^ circulated this morning ; for it will serve better to 
 introduce you to the members of the convention than a score 
 of articles in your paper, or a column of extravagant eulogy 
 and softsoap in that of your opponent. Just come out and 
 see how eager they will all be to speak to you, and if you 
 don't turn the talk to your own advantage, it will be your own 
 fault. Besides, your adversary has laid himself so terrifically 
 open to attack from you, that you must be a poor scribe 
 indeed if you don't make him sick of his dirty tricks." 
 
 " But the convention will sit to-morrow, and no paper will 
 appear until the day after," Victor, rather taken aback by the 
 professor's way of looking at things, suggested. 
 
 '•'■ We have all day before us to work for the nomination," 
 
346 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 was the answer, " and a good two Aveeks after that for the 
 election. With the start you have got, thanks to your invol- 
 untary helper, you may consider the question of your nomina- 
 tion as settled ; and if you can only goad him into a few more 
 specimens of such patriotic effusions as these, made, if pos- 
 sible, a little more personal to yourself, you may likewise 
 count on your election, whatever may be the fate of the ticket 
 on which you run. — But come! It is time to begin our 
 day's work. If you must put yourself on a level with this 
 blackguard, or prove that he is wrong by administering to him 
 a well-deserved thrashing — or taking one, whether deserved 
 or not — put off the cowhiding to some other day. TJiis is 
 the Lord's Day ; let us serve the Lord by serving our coun- 
 try." 
 
 Loth as Victor was to sacrifice his precious Sunday leisure 
 to any ordinary business matters, the stirring interests involved 
 in the election left no room for hesitation or doubt as to wliat 
 he must do. Nor was he unwilling to postpone the chastisement 
 of the editor to some future time. " But where is Mr. May? " 
 he queried, as he was getting ready to accompany the profes- 
 sor. " I thought we would go together." 
 
 " He has gone down to Busch Bluff," the professor answered 
 casting a meaning smile at Victor. " He told me that he 
 wished to consult the old gentleman on some electioneering- 
 business. We are to meet him at the Vaux Hall Saloon." 
 
 Victor pocketed the paper containing the offensive articles, 
 as well as that morning's Beohacliter, the latter containing a 
 list of the delegates elected the night before, which might serve 
 them as a guide to the places to be visited during the day. 
 As they were about leaving the professor remarked : 
 
 '"I supjDOse you have not forgotten lago's advice to 
 Roderigo? " 
 
 " What was that? " Victor innocently inquired. 
 
 " Put money in thy purse! " 
 
 Victor returned to his lodging that night, or it may be nearer 
 the truth to say next morning, with a stock of newly gathered 
 
DEMOCEACY /iV CONVENTION. 347 
 
 experience and heaclache, purchased, — perhaps not too 
 dearly — at the cost of the ready cash with which he had set 
 out. Besides that, lie had become indebted to his friend for 
 a small loan, and a perceptible cooling off of his desire to 
 cowhide his rascally colleague. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Monday was ushered in by a bright, crisp October morning, 
 all too early to give Victor an opportunity to witness its glori- 
 ous sunrise. Hamilton Hall had the advantage of him in this 
 respect. Its hospitable doors, as well as its windows, had 
 been flung wide open long before Aurora was ready to gild its 
 walls, or to illumine the clouds of dust sent forth by busy bar- 
 keepers and porters with brush and broom. For Hamilton 
 Hall constituted the second story of a building known as Ham- 
 ilton Retreat, a well-known popular resort, much frequented, 
 even on Sundays, the know-nothing crusade against Sunday 
 saloons and beerhouses notwithstanding, b}^ politicians of 
 ward renown and petty statesmen generally. Yesterday had 
 been a day of bustle and activity at Hamilton Hall. Many 
 barrels had been emptied of their contents, much dirt and litter 
 scattered on the floors and a general cleaning up on Monday 
 morning w^as excusable, in view of the rush that was to be 
 expected on the assembling of the democratic convention. 
 Thus, while yet the silence of the streets was scarcely inter- 
 rupted by the rumbling, now and then, of a solitary milk or 
 baker's wagon or the footsteps of an early wanderer echoed 
 from across the way, there was within the Hall the din and 
 bustling of dusting and sweeping, of scrubbing and scouring, 
 of polishing decanters and replenishing them with the contents 
 of round-bellied jugs, — of tables, chaii's and benches moved 
 from place to place, and of kegs and barrels rolled into place 
 for use. When the sun had risen, and sent its first slanting 
 rays through the freshly cleaned windows, the stir within sub- 
 sided, and the city without began to rub its eyes and to put on 
 its working-day garb. The streets grew livelier as mechanics 
 and laborers trouped their way toward the treadmills, and 
 
348 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 drays and carts rattled noisily over the. rough macadam. The 
 sky was beautifully blue ; the atmosphere clear and bracing ; 
 the bright October morning altogether lovely ; yet few of the 
 passers-by lingered to enjoy its glorious charm. Even the 
 rosy -nosed bummer, who would rival Croesus in wealth if 
 time were money, as is sometimes asserted, wended his way 
 to the bar-room in search of a tonic more potent than the 
 freshness of the morning afforded. Shrill- voiced newsboys 
 lustily shouted the names of their papers : " 'ere's yer Herald ! 
 'ere's yer 'Publican! " adding by way of whetting the ap- 
 petite of sensation-loving readers, " All 'bout the 'lopement in 
 high life! "or: " All 'bout the murder in Happy Hollow I " 
 or all about whatever tidbit of scandal or horror they had to 
 offer. 
 
 As the inorning drew on apace, more customers found their 
 way into the bar-room of the Hamilton Retreat, — the politicians 
 of the small-fry sort, mostly, Avho had gone through a lively 
 time yesterday, and were again on hand for to-day to feast, 
 like a swarm of hungry mosquitoes, on the blood of tender- 
 skinned candidates. Some of these worthies, fortunate in the 
 possession of a stray picayune, anticipated the arrival of their 
 victims by investing in a drink of whiskey, invariably demand- 
 ing a Meelee cigar (retailed at the price of ten for a picayune) 
 free into the bargain. But this extravagant outlay of money 
 ceased as soon as the candidates, with now and then a stray 
 delegate or two. began to drop in. The latter were promptly 
 pounced on and buttonholed by those of the candidates that 
 l)elieved, or made believe, that their claims for past services 
 demanded recognition by the party : others, less experienced in 
 the practice of office-seeking, and therefore more diffident, 
 gladly availed themselves of the offers of the patriotic bum- 
 mers to introduce them to their friends — all of them men of 
 great influence, these friends of the bummers — who would 
 determine by their vote in convention the vote of the whole 
 delegation from their respective ward. Corroboration of the 
 great influenee of the deleaate thus introduced would follow 
 
DEMOCRACY IN CONVENTION. 349 
 
 on the part of soiue brother liuiaiiier wlio hai)i)eiie(l, l)y tlie 
 merest chauee, to be standing near ; and if (juite sure to what 
 office the eandidate aspired, he, or some comrade, would 
 inform the delegate, in a stage whisper, that there was not a 
 more popular man mentioned in connection with such office, 
 than the gentleman just introduced. The invitation to the 
 drinks naturally followed, as the most convenient inducement 
 to conversation with the delegate. 
 
 Quite a difference now developed in the tastes of the gentle- 
 men invited: the whiskey straight, ordered before ou pecuniary 
 grounds, was now abandoned for brandy smashes, mint juleps, 
 sherry cobblers, or such cocktails and toddies as a veteran 
 toper might indulge in regardless of expense. In the matter of 
 cigars, too, the plebeian Meelee was flung aAvay with contempt, 
 and even the Half-Spanish, and the Principe, ordinarily re- 
 garded as a luxury too costly, were now, when a candidate 
 stood treat, slighted for the royal Regalia or Plantation Havana, 
 furnished at the liar at a picayune apiece. 
 
 Toward the hour of ten in the forenoon the bar-room was 
 crowded to an uncomfortable degree. The bartender, rein- 
 forced now by an assistant and the boss himself, was kept busy 
 enough ; yet many, indeed most of the men, Avere there tor 
 pu]-pos(,'s other than drinking. Much talk was going on, — 
 here in whispers, there in loud declamation ; among groups of 
 two or three or more ; in front of the bar, where argument was 
 emphasized, sometimes, by bringing list or tumbler violently 
 in contact with the counter ; or in the comparative privacy of 
 some nook or corner ; soliciting votes or influence, denouncing 
 rival candidates, promises to and by delegates, and to and by 
 candidates and their friends — dickering, bargaining, plotting. 
 Little knots of men gathering in the hallway and under the 
 stairs leading to the hall above, obviously intent upon keeping 
 secret whatever negotiations they were carrying on. When the 
 hands of the bar-room clock indicated the hour of ten, a grad- 
 ual exodus to the hall above began to thin out the crowd below, 
 leaving the saloon in the possession of idlers, and of such of 
 
350 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 the active politicians — committeemen and agents of rings and 
 bosses — as were still busily engaged in planning and plotting 
 for the nominations to be made upstairs. 
 
 The hall in which the convention was to sit began to fill up. 
 A number of benches, sulliciently long to seat, each, a full 
 delegation, were arranged on the floor, not unlike the pews hi 
 a church ; a little banner suspended at the head of each in- 
 dicated the number of the ward or the name of the township to 
 which the bench was assigned. At one end of the room a 
 platform was raised a foot or two above the level of the floor, 
 just large enough to accommodate the officers of the conven- 
 tion. Besides the chairs and tables on the platform, and the 
 row of benches lining the walls, intended for the accoinmoda- 
 tion of that most indispensable adjunct to representative bodies 
 in the United States — the lobby — there was no furniture in 
 the hall. 
 
 Victor was the first member of the Fourth Ward delegation 
 that took his seat in the bench assigned to them, long before 
 the secretary of the central committee called the convention to 
 order. He looked about him, noticing with considerable inter- 
 est the buzz and commotion of the men swarming into the hall, 
 gathering, mostly, in little knots and groups, whispering ex- 
 citedly, or making wise faces at each other. Professor Rau- 
 henfels was there, walking about with the air of a very busy 
 man, now among the delegates, shaking hands and grinning 
 pleasantly, as if much delighted in doing so, anon accosting 
 someone in the lobby gesticulating wildly, as if in demonstra- 
 tion of some hotly contested proposition. There was Uncle 
 Auf dem Busch, also, sitting among the delegates from the 
 First Ward, serenely contemplating his surroundings, evidently 
 ready to act with becoming dignity in whatever character his 
 services might be demanded. Leslie May, cool and jjerfectly 
 at ease as ever, leisurely paced the jjlatfonn, exchanging nods 
 and whispered remarks with the gentleinen there ; and Mr. 
 Becker, delegate from the same ward with Victor, was on hand, 
 but as yet too busy to take his seat. Indeed every one, — so 
 
DEMOCRACY IN CONVENTION. 351 
 
 it seemed to Victor — was actively engaged in furthering some 
 definite scheme, in which he was particularly, if not personally 
 interested. It occurred to Victor that many of the delegates 
 had. in political slang, " an axe to grind " in the convention, 
 and that he was not alone in the awkward predicament of being 
 a candidate before the same body of which he was a member. 
 
 When the convention was called to order, considerably after 
 the time for which its opening had been announced, its organi- 
 zation was speedily effected by the election of a temporary 
 chairman, a sergeant-at-arms and two secretaries. Victor took 
 alarm as he noticed that not a single dissentient voice was 
 raised against the chairman nominated by the central commit- 
 teeman, whom he knew to be an ardent supporter of the com- 
 petitor of Colonel May for the United States Senate. Every- 
 thing moved smoothly, until the motion was put for the 
 appointment, by the chair, of a committee on credentials, 
 when a motion to amend by substituting a committee of one 
 from each ward and township gave rise to a heated discussion, 
 turning chiefly upon the impropriety involved in the amendment 
 of putting men on the committee of credentials whose seats were 
 contested. Victor felt greatly embarrassed how to vote on this 
 question, as he feared that the right of the whole Fourth Ward 
 delegation to their seats might be challenged. During the de- 
 bate Mr. Becker appeared in his seat and added to his anxiety 
 by the whisi^ered remark, that Mr. May considered the fate of 
 his father's candidacy to depend on the issue of the vote on 
 this amendment. Yet he deemed it wi'ong that one, whose 
 right is in question, should be made the judge of such right. 
 Must he oppose the amendment, as decency and justice seemed 
 to him to require, and thus jeopard, as far as his vote would 
 go, the cause of his friend and benefactor, and with it the 
 cause of Democracy and truth, as he understood them? 
 
 Before he came to a conclusion satisfying his judgment, the 
 roll of the delegates was called on the amendment, and Mr. 
 Becker promptly responded for the Fourth Ward: "Five in 
 the affirmative I ' ' 
 
352 THE liEBEUS DAUGHTEIi. 
 
 Now A'iftor looked upon this act of his chief as an unwar- 
 rantable usurpation, for neither had Mr. Becker been appointed 
 spokesman for the delegation, nor had A'ictor been consulted 
 as to his vote. But the Fifth Ward had ))een called on to vote 
 before he made up his mind whether it was his duty to disturb 
 the proceedings by a protest ; and after that it would have 
 been exceedingly awkward and ungracious to do so. Thus it 
 ha])pened that Victor's vote counted in exact accordance with 
 his personal wish, though not at all with his sense of justice. 
 The amendment was adopted ; and after the appointment of a 
 further connnittee on the permanent organization and the order 
 of business, the convention took a recess until tlie hour of two, 
 to give the committee time to rei)ort. 
 
 The signal advantage gained over their opponents ))y the 
 friends of Colonel May, developed after the reassembling of the 
 convention in the afternoon. The lirst business in order being 
 the I'cport of tlie connnittee on credentials, its chairman 
 announced that in the oi)inion of the conmiittee, all sitting- 
 members were entitled to their seats ; concluding with the 
 recommendation that the petitions of the contestants be laid on 
 the table. A minority report read by a warm adherent of 
 Colonel May's opponent, declared it to be the opinion of said 
 minority that the election of the delegates from several of the 
 wards including the First and Fourth, had been clearly inegu- 
 lar, and that the contestants ought of right to be recognized as 
 the legitimate representatives of the Democratic voters of these 
 wards. The motion to ado])t the minority report was ruled to 
 be out of order, as violative of parliamentary usage, and the 
 question stated to be on the adoption of the majority report. 
 Victor was surprised at this ruling, especially in view of the 
 temporary chairman's opi)Osition to Colonel May's interests, 
 nnd wondered ndiether to ascribe it to his idea of parliament- 
 ary usage, or perhaps to a shrewd move to conceal his real 
 position from the Colonel's followers, or even to some of 
 Leslie's maneuvering during the recess. At all events, Vic- 
 tor, conceiving that the convention ought to be permitted to 
 
DEMOCRACY IN CONVENTION. 353 
 
 express its preference between the two reports, before coniniit- 
 ting themselves to either, rose, Avith the obvious intention of 
 appealing- from the ruling of the chair ; l)ut in doing so caught 
 the eye of Leslie May, who indicated by a slight but nnmis- 
 takable motion of the head, decided disapproval of Victor's 
 purpose. At the same time Mr. Becker tugged at his coat 
 tail, whispering energetically "Don't." And again Victor 
 was too slow to seize the proper moment for his purpose, and 
 again a vote was recorded that outraged his sense of pro- 
 priety, but accomplished precisely what Victor most wished. 
 The majority report was adopted, and thns all question of a 
 contest avoided. 
 
 The convention now settled down to its business in good 
 earnest. In the struggle for the permanent presidency the 
 temporary chairman, notwithstanding his ruling just made, 
 and supported by the opponents of Colonel May, was de- 
 feated. The president elect, in returning thanks to the con- 
 vention for the honor conferred upon him, called attention 
 to the perilous condition of the country, which, he said, 
 was about to be shaken in its very foundation by a partv 
 of zealots who in their reckless fanaticism menaced the 
 sacred constitution itself. "So shape your action," he con- 
 cluded, "as to bring about the triumi^h of those principles 
 of our party, rather than the victory of this or that man, or 
 of this or that section. Never for a moment forget that 
 although you are democrats, you are first of all Americans, — 
 that you are democrats bfx'aise you are true Americans ! ' ' 
 
 Victor was much pleased with the president's remarks. He 
 was in full sympathy with their import and registered an 
 inward vow that he would, to the best of his ability, vindicate 
 the grand cause of Democracy. As if in response to this 
 patriotic resolve, came from the president the announcement 
 assigning him to a place on the committee of fifteen to drauo-ht 
 the platform of the party for the impending campaign. It 
 was with a profound sense of responsibility that he followed 
 the chairman of his committee into the side-room assigned 
 
 23 
 
354 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 them for their deliberations. He found himself closeted with 
 the most prominent men of the party in the city, feeling at 
 once depressed with a sense of littleness in their presence, and 
 elevated by a consciousness of the magnitude of the trust 
 imposed upon him. 
 
 In the committee room the high pitch to which his expec- 
 tation had been raised was toned down. The chairman 
 submitted a paper, directly after the reading of which he 
 called for a vote. It pledged the Democracy to the support 
 of the platform of principles announced by the national con- 
 vention that had adjourned from Charleston to Baltimore. 
 Discussion grew passionate, and when at last a vote was 
 reached, it was by a majority of one that the committee de- 
 clared its preference for the national democratic platform. 
 
 No sooner had the committee risen, than a call was heard 
 demanding the minority to remain and vote upon the question 
 of submitting a report to the convention recommending for its 
 adoption the platform of the free Democracy, which had just 
 been rejected by the majority. Every member of the minority 
 favored the proposition, and so it came about that the com- 
 mittee on the platform submitted two reports to the conven- 
 tion, — one signed by eight, the other by seven of its members. 
 
 If the contention had been hot in the committee, the wrangle 
 that follow^ed in the body of the convention itself on the read- 
 ing of the two reports was fierce to begin with, and increased 
 in passionate intensity with each speaker that succeeded in 
 obtaining the floor. 
 
 Victor could not understand how any true democrat should 
 entertain the slightest doubt on the subject. He was eager to 
 join in the debate, fully convinced that if gentlemen would 
 only listen to the reasons he had to urge as to the imperative 
 necessity of preserving inviolate the constitution, they could 
 not help seeing where the path of duty la^-. But as yet he was 
 too inexperienced in the ways of politicians to secure recogni- 
 tion by the chairman, and entirely too diffident of his own im- 
 portance to force himself on the notice of the convention. 
 
DEMOCRACY IN CONVENTION. 355 
 
 And so the convention lost the benelit of his wisdom, and had 
 to content itself with the aid given Ijy his unexplained vote. 
 
 As soon as the president succeeded in making himself heard 
 long enough to state the question and call for the roll, the up- 
 roar subsided and breathless silence immediately settled on the 
 convention. All eyes were turned toward the secretary as he 
 called the names of the delegates ; all ears were strained to 
 catch the responses, and but few of the members omitted to 
 keep close tally of the yeas and nays. An exultant shout of 
 triumph on the part of the national democrats proclaimed their 
 victory long before the secretary or president could be heard 
 to announce the adoption of the majority report. But pres- 
 ently the deafening yells ceased. The sullen faces of the 
 defeated side served to sober down the exuberance of the 
 victors. Thoughful men saw trouble ahead. Victor trembled 
 for the success of the party under the circumstances. How 
 could men, whose earnest convictions were so emphatically 
 ignored by the platform just adopted, be enthusiastic in the 
 support of the party ? 
 
 Just then the smiling face of Leslie May appeared to Victor 
 like a harbinger of good tidings. " We have done well, so 
 far," he whispered into Victor's ear. " Things are o-oing 
 exactly as I hoped. A little prudence now in the selection of 
 the ticket, and there can be no doubt of our success." 
 
 " But will the free democrats submit, and heartily support 
 a party with whose fundamental tenets they are not in accord ? " 
 queried Victor, who was, nevertheless, much soothed and com- 
 forted by the assuring smiles of his friend, and eager in the 
 hope that he would be able to dispel his own doubts and 
 misgivings. 
 
 " What can they do? " suggested Leslie. " They want 
 offices for themselves or their friends. They can get them only 
 by the nomination of this convention. It would be suicidal 
 for them to withdraw in wrath, or to give aid and comfort to 
 the enemy, by either active or passive opposition. But we 
 must make it to their interest to support the ticket by givino- 
 
356 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 them a liberal share of the offices. You needn't be afraid for 
 yourself," he added, with a smile that, however friendly it 
 was meant to be, was deeply offensive to Victor ; " your name 
 is sure to be on the ticket, and you are sure to be elected. So 
 much 1 will undertake to guarantee to you." 
 
 " So Professor Rauhenfels has told me," said Victor 
 dreamily ; " though how either he or you should know, I don't 
 understand." 
 
 As Leslie turned away the president was addressing the 
 convention. His words sounded like an echo to what Leslie 
 had just told Victor. He counselled harmony, reminding the 
 victorious majority that had shaped the platform to their own 
 views, that it was now their duty to conciliate, on the less 
 important matter of nominating candidates for office, their less 
 successful brethi-en. " Let me again beseech you," he said, 
 " to have an eye single to the success of the party as such. 
 It matters not so much what democrat you nominate, as that 
 your nominee shall be elected. Remember that ' United we 
 stand; divided we fall.' Let the Democracy, of the county 
 present an unbroken front to the enemy, and victory will perch 
 on our banner. — Nominations for the office of sheriff are now 
 in order." 
 
 The address of the president seemed to have a good effect on 
 the ruffled temper of the minority, as well as on the minds of 
 the majority. The nominations ])rogressed without disturb- 
 ance. If there had been danger of a bolt, it was allayed by 
 the liberal concessions made to the minority. They received 
 the lion's share of the lucrative offices, the candidates for 
 Congress and the legislature were alone given to the national 
 democrats. It was resolved, also, though by as clos« a vote as 
 that by which the platform had been carried, that the candidates 
 for the General Assembly be instructed to use their influence, 
 if elected, to secure the election of the Honorable Leonard May 
 to the United States Senate. 
 
XXIII. 
 
 TOO LATE. 
 
 W ND so it was that Victor becarne a candidate ; for tlie 
 present, a patliway not strewn with roses ; involving 
 duties not only onerous, but most distasteful to him. 
 It was not his nature to shirk duty, recognized as such. 
 Hence he willingly attended the gatherings of the Democracy 
 at mass meetings and ward meetings. He even executed, to 
 the best of his poor ability, stump speeches, whenever thereto 
 appointed by the central committee. But when his col- 
 leagues on the ticket demanded other things, — such as visit- 
 ing bar-rooms, treating crowds promiscuously, shaking hands 
 with the unwashed sovereigns, and professing friendship and 
 brotherhood with bummers, beats and frauds, he demurred. 
 To Leslie and Professor Rauhenfels, with both of whom he 
 silent much of his time in those days, he confided that he 
 thought such methods of soliciting votes to be degrading and 
 vile. Leslie laughed at him in his pleasant way, twitting him 
 on his aristocratic pride ; and when he gave indications of dis- 
 tress, endeavored to reassure him and put him at his ease by 
 reminding him that there was really no need for exertion on 
 his part at all. But the professor took him reluctantly to task 
 for his silly prudishness, — so he called it — and lack of logic. 
 " A rational man," he harangued, " who proposes to accom- 
 plish an object, must not shrink from using the necessary 
 means. None but a fool hopes for success otherwise." 
 
 When Victor, abashed by the professor's dogmatic assertions, 
 which yet seemed to have a basis in sound reason, timidly in- 
 quired whether he meant to assert that the end ever justified 
 tlie means, the answer came quick as thought: " Always! else 
 how could any end be accomplished? " 
 
 (357) 
 
358 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 " But does this mean, that I may do wrong that good may 
 come thereof ?" Victor persisted. 
 
 " Wrong is never justifiable ! " the professor proclaimed, his 
 eyes sparkling, " But what is wrong? I dare say that you hold 
 it wrong to lie. And so, indeed, it is, if you lie to gain an 
 unfair advantage over your neighbor. But how, if you lie to 
 2)leafie your neighbor, as you do every time you smile upon a 
 bore who keeps you from your work, instead of kicking him out 
 of the office as you would like to do ? In a similar way you lie 
 twenty times a day, and I doubt that you consider it wrong. — 
 It is surely wrong to kill ; but only if the killing is without 
 adequate motive. You would not blame the executioner for 
 carrying out the sentence of the law on a condemned criminal ? 
 So the most rigid code of law deems killing in self-defense a 
 justifiable act. Aye, — the law itself commands killing, and 
 that by wholesale, when deemed a means to accomplish a higher 
 end ; and none but Quakers object. Let me use a loftier illus- 
 tration : Rebellion is the gravest offense against either human or 
 divine law ; yet the apostasy of Luther is glorified by all Prot- 
 estants ; and the rebellion of the colonies is looked upon, by 
 Americans at least, as the grandest achievement in our history. ' ' 
 
 "Lucifer rebelled, also," said Victor, musingly, " and the 
 world assigns to him the lowest pit in hell." 
 
 "And justly so! " the professor replied with animation. 
 " Lucifer, according to Dante's Divine Comedy, abides in hell, 
 because he would rather be First there, than Second in Heaven. 
 Rebellion against tyranny is loyalty to the divine Right ; but 
 Lucifer rebelled against the divine order, — doing wrong for 
 the sake of wrong — and has hell for his reward." 
 
 ' ' But how does all this affect my electioneering ? ' ' Victor 
 inquired. 
 
 "Don't you see? Then let me tell you. I assume, that 
 when you accepted the Democratic nomination for the General 
 Assembly, you honestly meant to be elected. You honestly 
 mean to be, now ; if you did not, you would be a fraud and a 
 hy]xicrite. To accomplish this end, you must have votes, — 
 
TOO LATE. 359 
 
 more of thi'in than your competitors on the other tickets. You 
 want as many as you can get, for you do not know how many 
 either you or your opponents are going to get. The rational 
 thing, then, is, to get them ! Get them by all lawful means at 
 your command. Get them with clean fingers, if you can, — 
 but get them ! Nor let the fear of dirtying your hands deter 
 you from doing your work. You can wash your hands when 
 the work is done, and the ballots do not smell after they are 
 counted." 
 
 Poor Victor, who had a powerful motive to be elected, 
 beyond what even the professor suspected, was carried along 
 by the eloquence of his philosophical friend, and knew not 
 how, if even he had wished it, to meet the arguments advanced. 
 And as his duty was thus plausibly shown to be identical Avith 
 his strong desire, namely, to secure his election to the 
 legislature, he bravely set about doing the things that were 
 popularly supposed to be necessary to catch votes, — such 
 things as he supposed the professor meant when he spoke of 
 dirtying his fingers. He professed to enjoy the rough jokes 
 current in bar-rooms. He pretended to believe in the disin- 
 terested friendship of professional patriots, who proffered their 
 services in behalf of the good cause, stijjulating for a dollar or 
 two to set up the drinks for the boys, so as to get a chance to 
 talk to them. He bought tickets for raflfles which he sus- 
 pected would never come off, and for concerts which he did 
 not mean to attend. He invested heavily in charity fairs, and 
 subscribed liberally to funds for the relief of supposititious 
 widows and orphans. He shook hands with everybody he 
 knew or supposed that he ought to know, heroically dispensing 
 bland smiles and sugary compliments promiscuously. And 
 he did all of these things with a show of such hearty good will 
 as to challenge the admiration of his friend Leslie, and even to 
 command the approval of Professor Kauhenfels, notwithstand- 
 ing his secret conviction, that all this cajolery, flattery, — this 
 sycophantic fawning and toadying to the voters in reality 
 never changed any one's mind, and that he was a despicable 
 
360 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 coward, truckling to a base and really unfounded popular 
 prejudice. 
 
 Down at Busch Bluff bis course did not meet with unani- 
 mous favor. The old gentleman, to be sure, thought his can- 
 didacy quite the proper thing for an editor and a lawyer, 
 and was not disposed, therefore, to find fault with Victor's 
 efforts to court popularity. His sister Pauline, too, looked 
 upon his prospective election to the legislature with not a little 
 pride, never once questioning its absolute certainty, and took 
 pleasure in hearing the subject discussed, particularly when it 
 was discussed by the young lawyer, who was such a firm friend 
 of her brother, and who could talk so fascinatingly about her 
 brother's jjrospects — or about anything else that formed the 
 subject of talk between them. But Woldemar's aristocratic 
 notions, accumulated during his European experience, rebelled 
 against what he termed cowardly cringing before the rabble. 
 It was bad enough that a member of the family should be 
 identified with politicians, and he could hardly forgive Victor 
 for standing as a candidate. But that he should degrade him- 
 self to the level of the scum of the city, fawning like a servile 
 dog before the rag-tag populace supposed to have votes, — 
 this was more than the stomach of Woldemar Auf dem Busch 
 could stand without violent protest. And so he protested. 
 Protested in sharply sarcastic rebukes administered without 
 stint. All the more bitter when the young lawyer was by, 
 whom he never failed to include in his sneers, and whom he 
 openly blamed as the seducer of his cousin, misleading him 
 and corrupting his morals. 
 
 Toward Pauline Woldemar's manner had undergone a re- 
 markable change of late. The lofty condescension, that had 
 formerly characterized his intercourse, was no longer observ- 
 able. His patronizing airs were now supplanted by a show of 
 deferential devotion that puzzled, while it pleased, Pauline. 
 Assiduous court he paid when alone with her, or at least when 
 the young Southerner was not bj', so that Pauliue often avou- 
 dered whether Cousin Woldemar was profiting by Mr. May's 
 
TOO LATE. 361 
 
 example of politeness. But the frigid reserve displayed when- 
 ever the latter was present, as well as the severity of his com- 
 ments on the disgraceful doings of Victor under the influence 
 of Mr. May, too plainly indicated his aversion. 
 
 One other member of the family, — Mrs. Auf dem Busch 
 herself, — took sides with her son in these dissensions, so far 
 at least as to show herself less gracious than formerly in her 
 intercourse with both the young politicians. Victor, on his 
 part, ascribed the loss of favor to the fact that he was a can- 
 didate, and it did not trouble him much. Nor did her haughty 
 deuieanor toward Mr. May lessen the frequency of this gentle- 
 man's visits to the villa. What with friendly calln on the 
 ladies, such as might be demanded by, or at least find excuse 
 in, social etiquette, calls on the old gentleman for advice (which 
 he professed to value most highly), on imi^ortant business 
 matters, calls in the comjDauy of the professor, appointments 
 with Victor to start out on some pre-arranged electioneering 
 jaunt, which invariably landed him at Busch Bluff — there was 
 never lack of occasion to visit the place where Pauline Wald- 
 horst dwelt. 
 
 Perhaps Victor was mistaken as to the cause of Mrs. Auf 
 dem Busch 's coolness toward him. It may have been less the 
 sympathy with her son's aversion to politicians that produced 
 it, than the conviction, reached by a mother's reasoning, that 
 Victor was to blame for Woldemar's uncomfortable state of 
 mind, because he had originally brought the smooth-tongued 
 Southerner into contact with the family. Victor was blissfully 
 ignorant of the offense he had thus given, as also of the dis- 
 comfort experienced by Woldemar in consequence of the 
 intimacy springing up between the Southerner and his sister 
 Pauline, — an intimacy patent to every one but him. The old 
 gentleman noticed it with profound regret, for it sadly threat- 
 ened his pet plan of obtaining Pauline for a daughter-in-law. 
 Mrs. Auf dem Busch saw it, of course, for it gave uneasiness 
 to her son. It was not in her nature to hate cordially ; but 
 Leslie May came as near to arouse this feeling in her breast as 
 
362 THE REBEL'S DAUGIITEB. 
 
 anyone had ever done. She did not love her foster-daughter 
 with any degree of cordiality ; but she had accustomed herself 
 to look upon her as Woldemar's future wife, and the evident 
 favor with which the young girl received the attentions of the 
 stranger, she thought unbecoming in one aspiring to the honor 
 of becoming her daughter-in-law. The thought of serious in- 
 tentions on the part of the young lawyer did not trouble her ; 
 she was, on the contrary, firmly convinced that he was an arrant 
 flirt, playing with the girl's affections for his mere amusement. 
 That Pauline should, in her giddy vanity, permit this trifling, — 
 that she should so far forget her own dignity and the relations 
 she sustained to the family — this it was that tried her patience. 
 And on this point there was perfect unanimity between mother 
 and son, although not a word had ever been spoken on the sub- 
 ject by either. But the mother's eye was quick to discern, 
 and her heart tender to sympathize, with the trouble of her off- 
 spring. It needed no words to reveal to her that Woldemar 
 suffered, — more keenly, perhaps, than he was willing to con- 
 fess even to himself. 
 
 It was indeed a strange experience through which the young 
 merchant was passing. Why should he be so keenly vexed by 
 Pauline's impropriety of conduct — for he was honestly con- 
 vinced that it was improper — toward this presumptuous young 
 Southerner? He was not her guardian, not her brother, — not 
 even her suitor. 
 
 Not her suitor ! 
 
 Yet she must know that it was his father's darling wish that 
 she should be his wife. To be sure, he himself had never 
 spoken a word either to her or to any one else, that might be 
 construed as a promise, or as in any wise pledging him. He 
 had been too wise and too guarded in his conduct for that. 
 And, coming to think of it, might not her conduct be accounted 
 for on the theory that Pauline was piqued by his lack of lover- 
 like attentions toward her? He had heard of such things as 
 young ladies coquetting with others for the purpose of rousing 
 the jealousy of those whom they wished to attract. Yes ! 
 
TOO LATE. • 363 
 
 That must be it. Well, thcu, he would drive this presump- 
 tuous stranger out of the field by treating the lady with a little 
 more cionsideratiou and devotion. He might go so far without 
 irretrievably committing himself. This thought flattered his 
 vanity. He found it easy, — found it delightfully agreeable, 
 indeed, — to j^ay courtly attentions, in a mild, non-committal 
 way, to his fair cousin. But the effect on Pauline was not as 
 he had anticipated. She seemed very much pleased, indeed, 
 by his kind treatment ; but the smile of sisterly gratitude with 
 which she rewarded him was cold and tame in comparison with 
 the beaming joy that flushed her cheeks when welcoming the 
 young lawyer. The flirtation with the latter, as he was pleased 
 to consider it, continued unabated, and Woldemar began to 
 suspect his cousin of being a heartless coquette. How strange 
 that he should discover this trait in her character just now ! 
 How, stranger still, that he found it so difficult to believe ; how 
 ■strangest of all that this discovery should make him miserable ! 
 
 Miserable ! That Pauline was a coquette ! What business 
 was that of his ? His pride took alarm. The coquette must 
 be left to her fate. This savage resolution soothed his ruffled 
 temper for a time, at least when Leslie May was present. But 
 in his absence, a word, a look from Pauline was sufficient to 
 melt it into thin nothingness. Then he came to the conclusion 
 that charity toward the poor girl demanded a heroic sacrifice 
 on his part. Filial duty pointed in the same direction. He 
 must commit himself openly by appearing as Pauline's suitor. 
 
 It astonished Woldemar how little effort it cost him to 
 adjust himself to this situation when he had resolved to make 
 the plunge. He admitted to himself, with a feeling something 
 like compunction, that he ought to have done so long ago. It 
 would have pleased his father. It would have saved Pauline 
 the humiliation of this disgraceful flirtation with a stranger. 
 And he gloated veugefully on the anticipated discomfiture of 
 the detested lawyer, to forbid whose further intercoure with 
 Pauline would be his first care after informing the fortunate 
 young maiden of the distinction awaiting her. Still, he put 
 
364 THE REBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 off the decisive word from day to day, hardly knowiug how to 
 account to himself for the delay. Surely, it could not be that 
 he was afraid? Oh, no! Diffidence was not his weakness. 
 He had fully made up his mind ; his opportunities to be alone 
 with the maiden — he might now truly say, the maiden of his 
 choice — were ample ; there was no conceivable obstacle in the 
 way: Why, then, delay? 
 
 But one morning, — the morning of a glorious, mellow Sun- 
 day in October, full of sunshine and that soft, hazy Indian 
 Summer brightness peculiar to Western Autumn weather, — 
 the young lawyer was on hand directly after breakfast, wait- 
 ing, he said, for Victor and the professor, who were to meet 
 him here for a canvassing tour into the suburbs, to make sure 
 of some voters supposed to be doubtful. He ])rofessed sur- 
 ])rise that the others had not yet arrived ; but Woldemar sus- 
 pected that he did not feel his disappointment too keenly. 
 And the readiness with which he joined Pauline in a walk over 
 the grounds, to insi)ect chrysanthemums and asters, the dahlias 
 and what other floral tribute generous Autumn yielded, and the 
 ])leasure mirrored in Pauline's face seemed to sujjport his mis- 
 givings. It was very evident that the time before the arrival 
 of the other conspirators against Woldemar 's peace passed 
 more heavily to him than to either Mr. May or his cousin. 
 During the exceedingly tedious interval of half an hour, while 
 he was watching the yoiuig couple from an upi)er windoAv of 
 the house, the resolution rii)ened in Woldemar's breast that he 
 would not Avait another day — not another hour — before he 
 would claim at Pauline's hand the privilege of getting rid of 
 the hated, dangerous, soft-spoken — intruder, — rival, he 
 came near thinking, but that he indignantly suppressed the 
 word as being unworthy of himself. In accordance with this 
 resolution he threw off his dressing gown, worn, as was cus- 
 tomary at Busch Bluff Villa on Sunday mornings, for comfort ; 
 made an unusually careful toilet, and placed himself in ambush 
 to intercept Pauline before she should return to the house after 
 seeing the politicians off. 
 
TOO LATE. 3G5 
 
 Presentlj' he saw her wave her handkerchief to the young 
 men, as they drove away in the barouche, and turn her face 
 toward the villa. He watched her fi'om a bosquet of dense 
 foliage, as she stepped leisurely along the graveled pathway, 
 not aware that she was being observed. Her face glowed with 
 unusual animation, though her eyes had an absent, dreamy 
 look, as if her thoughts were far away. When she passed the 
 bosquet, Woldemar stepped forth from his ambush, accosting 
 her with an abrupt request for a moment's conversation. 
 
 "Cousin Woldemar! " she exclaimed, with a little shriek 
 of surprise at the sudden apparition. " How 3'ou have fright- 
 ened me ! ' ' 
 
 "I beg your pardon, Pauline," he said in reply. "And 
 I hope that your surprise will be of a more pleasing nature 
 when you have heard what I wish to say to you. May I 
 detain you for just a little while before you return to the 
 house? " 
 
 " Why, certainly. Cousin Woldemar," said the girl, recover- 
 ing herself. " But why not go in ? We have all the forenoon 
 before us ; and if what you have to say is pleasant, as you 
 suggest, let uncle and aunt share the pleasure with us. Or," 
 she added, casting a glance at his full toilet, " are you on your 
 way up town ? ' ' 
 
 "Not unless you send me away," he said with a com- 
 plaisant air, and a smiling look into her wondering eyes, which 
 for some reason unaccountable to her, she was not pleased 
 with. " Can you not guess what it is that I wish to say? " 
 
 " No, Cousin Woldemar, I have not the least idea. Unless," 
 she added archly, "you have changed your mind about poor 
 Victor's electioneering. Is it something about the election? " 
 
 " Election ! " he repeated, disgust audible in his voice, and 
 a shade of disappointment visible in his eye. " You can think 
 of nothing, of late, but polities and politicians. No ; I have 
 that to say that concerns you and me more nearly." 
 
 The light died out of Pauline's eyes. The roguish smile 
 that had accompanied her last words, faded from her face. 
 
366 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Woldemar could not but notice the change. " Be not afraid," 
 he said, forcing a smile, but not able to hide all traces of 
 disappointment. " I am not going to scold you. Although," 
 he added, with an indifferent attempt at playfulness of manner, 
 " some people might have deemed it their duty, in my place, 
 to caution you against such improprieties of conduct as you 
 have indulged in. But — " 
 
 "Improprieties of conduct?" the girl repeated, turning 
 pale. " What do you mean? " 
 
 " Oh, nothing in particular," was the answer, given a little 
 reluctantly. " Let it go. I was about to say — " 
 
 "But wherein have I been guilty of improprieties?" 
 Pauline demanded, in a low, but emphatic voice. " I have a 
 right to know." 
 
 " Well, I mean of course, your toleration of the shameful 
 way in which this young hot-blood of a Southerner has been 
 paying court to you," said Woldemar. 
 
 " Shameful, Cousin Woldemar? " The blood had retreated 
 from the face of the young girl, leaving it as white as the lace 
 collar that encircled her throat. " What word has he spoken 
 that was not gentle and courteous? What act has he been 
 guilty of, that was not worthy of a gentleman? " 
 
 " Oh, I dare say that he was polite and courteous enough — 
 to you at least. But do you believe it to be consistent with 
 maidenly modesty and good manners, that one, who is to be 
 the wife of another man, should accept such attentions? " 
 
 " Was I to be the wife of another man? " Pauline asked, 
 fixing a searching glance on the young man's face. " If so, 
 it is strange that no one ever told me of it." 
 
 " Oh, well, the matter has not been put into the shape of a 
 written contract, ' ' Woldemar replied, a little petulantly. "But 
 you know, as well as I do, that it is my father's wish that I 
 should marry you. Why do you, then, let this fine-spoken 
 gentleman play with you as if you belonged to him ? Why 
 lavish upon him smiles, and favors, and compliments, such as 
 you have never bestowed upon me? " 
 
He oazed into her face with unleiiiiied tenderness. 
 
TOO LATE. 367 
 
 A deep Hush for a momeut crimsoued Pauline's face, to 
 leave it, iu the uext, as pale as before. " Cousiu Woldemar," 
 she said, speaking in a low unimpassioned voice, hardly above 
 a whisjjer, yet with an emphasis that deeply impressed her 
 cousin, " 1 am glad, that you throw all the blame on me. For 
 that proves, that Mr. May has not, even in your estimation, 
 been guilty of the shameful improprieties of which you speak. 
 I doubt that he or any one else could infer from your conduct 
 that I was to be your wife, or that you loved me. As to myself, 
 I sincerely grieve that by any act of mine I have forfeited your 
 esteem. But would you have deemed it maidenly modesty in 
 me to give Mr. May to understand that any other than a cousinly 
 relation existed between you and me, when you had never, 
 by any word, conduct, or even gesture, hinted such a thing? " 
 
 Her words fell heavily on his ear. He felt himself decidedly 
 at a disadvantage. But never before had Pauline appeared to 
 him so queenlike in her dignity, so charming in her exquisite 
 beauty, so altogether lovable as now. And he understood, 
 now, what a faux pas he had committed in opening the conver- 
 sation, and was eager to repair his mistake, 
 
 ' ' But I do love you ! " he exclaimed with greater warmth of 
 feeling than he had ever displayed in her presence before. " I 
 love you with all my heart ! And I came here to tell you so. 
 Pardon me, Pauline, for offending you. I did not mean it. 
 Forget my rude words. It was a mistake I made ; I see now 
 that I have been iu the wrong all the time. You are good and 
 wise; you wnll forgive my blindness, will you not? And all 
 will be well with us, now that you know that I love you." 
 
 He gazed into her face with unfeigned tenderness ; he sought 
 to seize her slender white hand. But the hand moved away 
 from his, and his eager ^aze was met by an earnest, almost 
 sympathetic look out of her soft brow^n eyes, — a look so 
 eloquent of tender regret, and withal of a deep joy which she 
 could not wholly conceal, that it thi-illed him with ecstatic de- 
 light, while yet it gave him vague alarm. "*I have nothing to 
 forgive, Cousiu Woldemar," she said, " although some of your 
 
368 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 words have deeply pained nie. I, too, may pain you by what 
 I have to say ; but you will be glad of it in the end. For you 
 are right in saying' that I knew it to be your father'.s wiyh that 
 I should marry you. At least I was presumptuous enough to 
 so imagine from his genuine kindness and fatherly tender- 
 ness toward me at all times. But it was never your wish, Cousin 
 Woldemar. You never loved me. You do not love me now. 
 If it be your intention to marry me, it may be beeause you are 
 angry with Mr. May ; or because you wish to please your 
 father ; or even because you wish to please me. That is kind 
 and generous of you ; but it is not love." 
 
 Her words stung Woldemar to the quick, for he felt them to 
 be literally true, so far as they referred to the past. And in 
 his present mood it maddened him to think how foolishly he 
 had underrated the priceless treasure so long as it was within 
 easy reach. But why should she doubt his protestations 
 now? That his present feeling toward her was that of 
 love — of passionate, mad, unreasoning love — was beyond 
 question to him. And she ought to know it, because he 
 had told her so. Perhaps he had not been emj^hatic enough 
 in his declaration. Was she right, — had he given her 
 sufficient reason to suppose that he was acting simply in obe- 
 dience to his father's wishes? It began to dawn upon him that 
 Pauline might possess a degree of pride that he had never sus- 
 pected, and that she might insist on being wooed for her own 
 sake. It cost him no effort, now, to meet her on this level. 
 So he repeated his assurances with greater warmth and emphasis. 
 He called on God to witness the sincerity of his passion. He 
 had recourse to the vows and oaths of which lovers are so 
 prolific to gain their ends. He would have knelt to her, but 
 for Pauline's imperious gesture forlAdding it. For the first 
 time in his life he doubted his oratorical powers, and condes- 
 cended to precatory phrases. 
 
 With indifferent success, or rather, without success. For a 
 faint smile of incredulity curled the girl's lips as she answered, 
 improving the first pause he made in the flow of his earnest 
 
TOO LATE. 369 
 
 protestations, " How can you believe that you love me, when 
 you have such sharp eyes for my ' improprieties ? ' Is not Love 
 usually depicted with bandaged eyes, and ought he not to l)e — 
 just a little — blind ! " 
 
 Her self-possession and calmness, emphasized by that shadow 
 of a smile, contrasted sharply with the fever of passion into 
 which he had worked himself. Her lack of response to his 
 l)leadiugs began to alarm him. The thought maddened him 
 that his suit might meet with a rebuff. His wounded pride 
 got the better of his judgment. 
 
 " What is it that you demand of me.lr " he exclaimed hotly. 
 " Must I be blind, in order that you may believe in my love, 
 or in the sincerity of my words ? ' ' 
 
 The smile vanished from her face. "I do not doubt the 
 sincerity of your words, Cousin Woldemar," she said, the 
 calm assurance of her manner impressing him more even than 
 her words. " I am sure that you are incapable of any inten- 
 tion to deceive me. But I am equally sure that you are 
 deceiving yourself." 
 
 " Oh, Pauline, how can you speak so cruelly! " he protested 
 anew. " Do you doubt the genuineness of my passion, when 
 every fiber of my heart quivers with intense longing for your 
 love ! What can it be but love that compels me to confess to 
 you how wrong I have been all this time ? Or am I indifferent 
 to you? Have I sinned, in my blindness, beyond forgive- 
 ness? " 
 
 Pauline was about to answer, when the voice of Mrs. Auf 
 dem Busch was heard from the house, summoning the girl to 
 the performance of some household duty, which summons she 
 hailed as a most welcome pretext to shirk an answer. But as 
 she turned to obey, Woldemar seized her hand with a firm 
 grasp. 
 
 "Let mama wait! " he exclaimed peremptorily. "Speak 
 to me before you leave me." 
 
 "Then listen, Cousin Woldemar," she said, speaking in 
 low, measured accents, looking him full in the face, for a sec- 
 
 24 
 
^70 THE BE BE US DAUGIITEB. 
 
 ond, then dropping her eyes to the grouud. "I do not love 
 you. I know, now, that I never did love you. There was a 
 time when I would gladly have assented to your father's wish 
 to become your wife ; that time is gone by. I can never be 
 your wife." 
 
 She again started to go ; again he stopped her. " Stay! " 
 he cried. " Tell me, when did you learn that jow cannot love 
 me? When did you find out that you can never be my wife? " 
 " You have no right to ask me such a question," she replied, 
 drawing herself up to her full height. " But I will tell 3"Ou. 
 It was when I became convinced that you did not love me. 
 Then I knew that I could not ; that I would not accept your 
 hand or fortune as a beggar accepts alms." 
 
 " Ah, that is it! " he exclaimed, in a tone blending sarcasm, 
 anger and defiance. " This fine Southern gentleman has 
 taught you what love is, and now you turn your back on your 
 earlier friends. You and your brother Victor worship this 
 paragon of a backwoodsman as if he were a superior being. 
 You are both attracted by him as the moth is by a brilliaut 
 light. And you will both learn, that although his light is but 
 the murky flame of a tallow dip, it is sufficiently hot to burn 
 to a cinder your showy wings, and leave you maimed for 
 life." 
 
 Then, flinging away the hand he had held in his iron grasp, 
 as if he were hurling the girl herself from his pathway through 
 life, he made for the garden gate in angry strides, leaving 
 Pauline free to join his mother iu the house, 
 
 Mrs. Auf dem Busch had witnessed the angry departure of 
 her son, and probably heard the last loudly sj5oken words. 
 She accosted Pauline as to what had happened between her 
 and Woldemar. 
 
 " He is angry with me," said the girl, hoping, though 
 faintly, that something might happen to avert the necessity of 
 an ex})lanation. 
 
 " I could see that myself," the lady replied. " I wish to 
 know what von naid to make him angrv." 
 
TOO LATE. 371 
 
 Pauline looked around uneasily as they passed through the 
 hall toward the sittino- room. She knew that Uncle Auf dem 
 Busch was in the library reading his Sunday paper: If he 
 would only call her! They reached the sittihg-room, and 
 Pauline, seeing no escape from the impending doom, nerved 
 herself for the ordeal. She gave a simple and truthful account 
 of what had been said, making no attempt to shield or excuse 
 herself, or to throw any blame on her cousin. 
 
 A cloud had been gathering on the face of Mrs. Auf dem 
 Busch which made Pauline exceedingly uncomfortable. When 
 it broke at the conclusion of the recital, there was a storm which 
 the girl suffered to blow over without murmur or resistance. 
 Mrs. Auf dem Busch summoned and pressed into service her 
 whole stock of sarcasm (easily exhausted) and invective (of 
 which she possessed a goodlier store) to do justice to the 
 occasion. The poor girl was enlightened as to many traits in 
 her character the existence of w-hich she had not before sus- 
 pected. Fickleness, ingratitude, head-strongness, coquetry, 
 self-conceit, silliness, were some of the ingredients composing 
 it, as she might learn from her aunt's schedule of them. The 
 voice of the latter lady was somewhat more emphatic than 
 usual. It was sufficient in volume to penetrate to the library 
 and attract the attention of her husband, who presently made his 
 way into the sitting-room to learn the cause of the excitement. 
 Mrs. Auf dem Busch spared the girl the pain of repeating her 
 confession by volunteering the desired information, given not 
 so tamely, perhaps, as Pauline had given it to her, but with an 
 emphasis and accentuation of particular phrases, which, to- 
 gether with some embellishments that added spice to the plain 
 truth, made Mrs. Auf dem Busch' s version much more pointed 
 and exciting to the old gentleman than Pauline's would have 
 been. 
 
 But Mr. Auf dem Busch did not duly appreciate the rhe- 
 torical accomplishment of his spouse ; or, perhaps, overrated 
 the same. For he capriciously insisted on hearing the story 
 over again from Pauline herself, ungallantly suggesting that 
 
372 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 perhaps the lady's presence was ueeessarv in the^kitchen, to 
 insure the success of their Sunday dinner, while he put the girl 
 through her catechism, 
 
 " Yes," said Mrs, Auf dem Busch, getting ready to obey 
 her husband's broad hint, " this hussy is not worth the spoiling 
 of our dinner on her account. To refuse our Woldeniar ! 
 Does she expect a prince out of a story book to come and 
 marry her ? ' ' 
 
 She was about to leave the room, when she suddenly turned 
 to the girl, commanding her to see to the cooking in the 
 kitchen. Then, when the girl had obeyed, she addressed 
 herself to her husband, " Now what are you going to do about 
 the matter? You will have to speak an earnest word, to In'ing 
 her to her senses. If the shameful ogling and coquetting with 
 this wind-bag of a lawyer, whom Victor has brought into our 
 house, is not stopped, and that right soon, she will become the 
 talk of everybody that knows us. It looks as if she has got 
 it into her silly head that this coxcomb :neans to marry her : 
 but he has no more notion of it than of marrying our kitchen 
 girl. He is just making a fool of her for his amusement. 
 Now, you talk to her, as you can when you are in earnest. — 
 The idea of her refusing our Woldemar ! " 
 
 The old gentleman was more deeply affected than he cared 
 to show, " It is a case of much stupidness," he said at last, 
 interrupting the strides with which he was measuring the lloor. 
 " Much stupiduess ! More of Woldemar than Pauline, If I 
 had the chance, like Woldemar has the chance, this Mr. May 
 would have no chance. But Woldemar learned stupidness in 
 Germany, and he brought it home with him. And he lets it 
 grow here. So a fool he is! The beautifullest plun'i just 
 waited that he opened his mouth, and wanted to just plump 
 in. And he looks in the clouds, and lets another fellow 
 snap up the plum right before his nose. It is enough to get 
 mad ! ' ' 
 
 '^ Busch, you are a fool! " Mrs. Auf dem Busch informed 
 him, with an air of sincerity that ought to have carried con vie- 
 
TOO LATE. '373 
 
 tion to the merchaut's mind, " You are so gone on this girl, 
 that I do jjelieve you would marry her yourself, if you had the 
 chance." 
 
 " Then I would be not a fool ; contrary, wise. But because 
 I am not a widower, and possess not the right of a Mormon, 
 you are enough wives for me." 
 
 " And are you going to uphold this vixen in her self-willed 
 foolishness? " the lady went on, ignoring his allusion to Mor- 
 monism. "She will listen to no one but you. I might talk 
 to her until I am hoarse, and she would no more mind it than 
 if I talked to the wind. A stern,, severe sermon from you 
 might bring her to her senses." 
 
 " Mean you, that I shall frighten her to love Woldemar? " 
 he asked, soberly. " I will not shame my son so much as that. 
 If he is proud, as he shows to be, he wishes not a wife that I 
 court for him. And it is not right that I thrash Pauline if she 
 says no. But you have so much right : I must talk to her. 
 Go, send her here. But scold her not, mind! You don't 
 know how your talk makes her grieve, and it is not her fault, 
 when your talk does no good. It is I who shall scold so much 
 as it is good for her." 
 
 Mrs. Auf dem Busch shook her head doubtlngly as she left 
 the room. She clearly mistrusted her husband's willingness 
 to impress the wayward girl with the enormity of the offense 
 of rejecting the suit of her son Woldemar. 
 
 Some minutes passed before Pauline came back. Whatever 
 her uncle had intended to say to her, was postponed for the 
 moment, when he noticed a suspicious redness about her eyes. 
 ' ' Did your aunt say something to you before you left her ? ' ' 
 he inquired instead, betraying ungallaut doubt whether his 
 spouse had obeyed his parting injunction. 
 
 Pauline shirked a direct answer. She approach him with 
 downcast eyes. But when she raised her face to look into 
 his, he saw therein freshly shed tears. " Are you very angrv 
 with me. Uncle?" came from her lips, in a voice of anxious 
 solicitude. 
 
374 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 "You feel, that I have right to be angry, — not?" he 
 blustered, more sternly than was his wont in speaking to her. 
 
 "Oh, Uncle, I am so sorry! So sorry!" she went on, 
 looking at him out of her great, tear-dimmed eyes in pathetic 
 appeal. " Oh, if you knew how sorry I am ! " 
 
 "You have right to be sorry, not? " His voice sounded 
 rougher, even, than before. 
 
 " It makes me so miserable, dear Uncle, to know that you 
 are displeased with what I have done." 
 
 " Nonsense! " the father of Woldemar exclaimed, a gleam 
 of hope brightening for a. moment his sober face. "If you 
 sorry, all is yet right. Woldemar is not so a fool, as he tries 
 to be to you. He will speak over, and you speak so that you 
 are not sorry." 
 
 " But oh, dear Uncle, I cannot speak so that you will not be 
 sorry," the girl sobbed out in keen distress. " For 3^ou wish 
 me to say yes, do you not? That is what makes aunt angry, 
 because I did not say yes. And I must say no, dear Uncle, 
 indeed I must! " 
 
 " So, so, you must say no? " he remarked, eyeing her 
 sharply. " Why must you say no? Is not Woldemar good 
 enough for you ? " 
 
 " Oh, how can you ask me such a question! " she replied, 
 looking at him reproachfully. " Cousin Woldemar is high- 
 minded, noble and generous. He is good enough for the 
 proudest lady in the land. And I thought it would be so easy 
 a task to love him — ' ' 
 
 ' ' Easy task ! ' ' the old gentleman shouted. ' ' Task ! Well , 
 and why loved you him not ? ' ' 
 
 A deep blush suffused her cheeks. Whether of anger or of 
 shame he could not be sure. She dropped her eyes as she an- 
 swered, almost in a whisper : "Because he did not ask me to." 
 
 "So an ass! " the irate man almost shouted. Then, turn- 
 ing to the girl with scowling face, he added: " Because you 
 never helped him, — not? Because he could read in your 
 face that you would say no, when he would ask you, — not? " 
 
TOO LATE. 375 
 
 " If he had asked me, I would not have said no, dear rneli', 
 I am sure I would not." 
 
 " But you said no, when he asked you this mornino-, — not? 
 Why said you no this morning? " 
 
 " Because, " she stammered, "he — he asked me — too 
 late! " 
 
 A low whistle, a look into her face betraying genuine sur- 
 prise, regret and unmistakable vexation, marked the effect 
 upon him of her words. " So, — that is the time of day? " he 
 said, after a little pause. "Too late! Then, also, you are 
 already bespoken ? ' ' 
 
 " No, oh no," she exclaimed hurriedly. " Do you mean, 
 whether I am engaged? No. If you mean that, you are mis- 
 taken. Uncle." 
 
 " Not engaged? " he queried wonderingly. " Then if you 
 are not engaged, why spoke Woldemar too late? You like 
 him. You say he is good enough for anybody. He asks 
 you to marry him. Then, if you are not engaged, Avh}^ say 
 you no? " 
 
 "Because, dear Uncle, I cannot love him." Her eyes 
 sought the floor, and a crimson flood suffused her neck and 
 cheeks, mounting upward over even her forehead as she spoke. 
 "I know now, that it would be a lie, if I promised to love 
 him." 
 
 " More and more stupiduess ! " Uncle Auf dem Busch ex- 
 claimed. " Woldemar betook himself like an ass, I know. 
 Because he was in Germany. But you have been here with 
 me. I am proud over your good sense. What makes you 
 a fool now ? ' ' 
 
 " Dear Uncle, be not angry," said the girl, in low, pleading 
 accents and with a look of painful distress he found diUicult to 
 resist. " I could not do otherwise, indeed I could not." 
 
 " Women and mystery! " the old gentleman mused. " You 
 like Woldemar. You like to please me. You like to please 
 your aunt. And you are not engaged. Then why not marry 
 Woldemar? " 
 
376 THE BEBEL'S DAUQHTEB. 
 
 " Because it would be wrong to man-y a luau I do not love." 
 
 " Then love Woldemar ! " 
 
 '•But, Uncle, Love comes not for the asking. Do you not 
 know, that he laughs at the foolish heart that would compel 
 him? And when he comes, he knocks not for admittance. He 
 takes possession of the heart and rules tvTaunically. All the 
 senses are in league with him ; all the affections center in him. ■ 
 He glorifies our very being. He elevates us into the realm of 
 the Divine ; for love is the God-like gift of God to those whom 
 he exhalts." 
 
 Pauline stood erect, as she spoke. A rosy hue overspread 
 her face and glorified its expression, as she raised her spark- 
 ling eyes, looking, — not at, but thiough her uncle, into the 
 beyond. 
 
 "Oh! " said the uncle, raising his eye-brows. "Well, 
 Pauline, if you are not bespoken, maybe you ought to be. It 
 is a case of much stupidness." 
 
XXIV. 
 
 PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL. 
 
 ^ECCAVI! I freely confess, adorable sister mine, that 
 six months, — or is it seven? — is entirely too long to 
 keep you waiting for the answer to that pathetic ques- 
 tion you put to me about the railsplitter's ballad of The 
 Glove. And since I am no better acquainted with Schiller's 
 poems than yourself, I can only give, by way of an excuse for 
 the answer, a rough guess : Let us suppose that the Ger- 
 mans, in their inscrutable philosophy, spurn the distinction 
 between a mitten and a glove ; and let us suppose, further, 
 that the ceremony of presenting the mitten is, among poetical 
 Germans, not exclusively a privilege of the lovely sex, as it is 
 among us prosaic Americans; then, — don't you see? — the 
 application is easy enough. He would politely decline your 
 thanks, — give you the mitten, as Victor did when you asked 
 him to marry you — in fun. If this explanation is not satis- 
 factory, let me suggest to you to get Leigh Hunt's The Lady 
 and the Glove, or Bulwer's translation of Schiller's Poems, — 
 either of which you will find, no doubt, in the congressional 
 library — and read the poem for yourself. 
 
 And having now fully answered the momentous query, I 
 will proceed to do such ample penance for my remissness in the 
 epistolary duties of an exemplary brother, as shall secure abso- 
 lution from even so stern a Father Confessor as Lovely Woman 
 can be when she's in a tantrum. I propose to send you such a 
 budget of spicy news, as shall cause your feminine heart to 
 beat with the very ecstasy of feminine delight. I give you 
 fair warning that I mean to disarm your just anger by tickling 
 your palate and cramming your maw with the choicest morsels 
 of gossip and delicate tid-bits of a swell brother's confidence. 
 
 (377) 
 
378 THE llEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 — To begin with, I might say, as did Citsar to his frieud 
 Armiutus, Veni, Vi(h\ Vici. For that is about the size of 
 it. But then your woman's fancy might jump to a woman's 
 conclusion, and tempt your diminutive wits to set about the 
 unmaking of a match that is not yet made. I am sorry that I 
 cannot indulge you in such exquisite sport, just now. For 
 spoiling a match is, to the girl of the jjeriod, the rarest fun, is 
 it not? Always saving, of course, that pinnacle of her ambi- 
 tion, — of hooking a lish for one's self, and then flinging the 
 silly gudgeon back into the water, with lacerated gills ; or leav- 
 ing him to gasp away his miserable life at one's feet, while 
 bating the hook for a fresh victim. Oh, no, Nell. I have, 
 sometimes, swallowed bait; but never the hook. I manage, 
 mostly, to turn the laugh against the fair anglers. 
 
 — But you may congratulate me all the same. For have I 
 not realized the maxim taught us by Caleb Amos, — business 
 before pleasure? — Nay, have I not inade of business a 
 })leasure, while you, poor slave of Society and shuttle-cock of 
 Fashion, are making the pursuit of pleasure a laborious, un- 
 satisfactory business ? At least I judge from your last effusion 
 that you are beginning to realize how high a price you are pay- 
 ing for the morbid ambition of shining as the acknowledged 
 bell-wether — I mean belle — at Saratoga, or even at the capi- 
 tal. I can well imagine how sated — surfeited, rather, — you 
 are by this time, of the fulsome adulation of short- witted fojis, 
 who brag among themselves of the favors secretly granted 
 them by that " adowable creecher ; " and how skeptical you 
 have grown of the gushing admiration and friendship of lesser 
 stars of the feminine persuasion, who do not believe half the 
 horrid stories of your being an incurable flirt and shameless 
 coquette — until they have repeated them the half a dozenth 
 time. Of course I know how immaculate my charming sister 
 is in this respect ; but how are you to stop those tongues from 
 wagging, when they Avag in such lovely feminine mouths ? 
 
 — But to my text. The way I took this city by storm, and 
 became at once a famous, if not case-hardened lawyer, would 
 
PBIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL. 379 
 
 have astouislied Blackstoue himself, and is, if uot miraculous, 
 at least a trifle romantic. My gushing young friend Victor 
 Waldhorst (of whom I shall have something more to say by 
 and by) was the first to discover my dormant genius, you 
 know, and is now fii'mly convinced that destiny means me to 
 wear the silken gown and bestride the woolsack as Chief 
 Justice of these United States. You would agree with him, I 
 have no doubt, in ascribing my phenomenal success to my own 
 sterling merits, did not my equally phenomenal modesty impel 
 me to give the devil his due, — that is, to admit, that I owe 
 my success chiefly to our whilom overseer, old Jeffreys ; it 
 came about thusly : 
 
 — On my arrival in this city, I joined shingles with an old 
 fox of a lawyer named Simms, and launched my barque to 
 pilot confiding clients upon the storm-tossed billows of litiga- 
 tion into the haven of success — or defeat. AVell, our firm 
 was retained to defend the Quixotic proprietor of a beer gar- 
 den, who was indicted for selling beer on Sunday. There had 
 been many hundred indictments of the same kind ; for the 
 Germans are partial to a drink of beer or wine on Sunday, 
 even such of them, if any, that drink nothing but water during 
 the balance of the week, and the Sunday law had not been 
 enforced until the know-nothings captured the city. So it 
 came hard on the keepers of the beer houses to knock under 
 to the new regime. I spoke of our client as Quixotic, because 
 there was hardly a chance in a thousand to clear him. For 
 every phase of the Sunday law had been passed on by the 
 Supreme Court. Conviction must inevitably follow proof of 
 selling, or even of keeping open an establishment for the sale 
 of, beer, or any other alcoholic di'ink, on Sunday. So we 
 informed our client of the hopelessness of any defense we could 
 make, and suggested to him that by a plea of guilty he would 
 not only save his lawyer's fee, but also escape with a far 
 smaller penalty.- But he was clear grit : he insisted on being 
 defended against an iniquitous and tyrannical law, holding that 
 it would be cowardly and wrong for him to submit Avithout 
 
380 THE BEBEU8 DAUGHTER, 
 
 resistance. So, you see, we lawyers were put on our mettle, 
 and I, for one, determined to secure an acquittal, if it were 
 within human endeavor. 
 
 It fell to my lot to bear the brunt of probable defeat, as 
 being the junior partner, old Simms telling me with a sly wink, 
 that one of the most important things for a young lawyer to 
 learn was to bear defeat with equanimity. But I determined 
 to die game, if die I must ; and knowing that there was no 
 hope on the law of the case, I set about studying the chances 
 on the facts, by which I mean that I tried to find out what kind 
 of evidence would likely be given before the jury to prove our 
 client's guilt. With this view I visited the establishment kept 
 by him — a beer garden of considerable pretensions and cor- 
 responding popularity. There I made some important, at 
 least very interesting discoveries ; but of these I will tell you 
 later on, for they had no connection with the case in hand, and 
 afforded no encouragement in that direction. So I next visited 
 the clerk's office of the criminal court, to examine the indict- 
 ment. And here, at last, a gleam of light broke in upon the 
 hitherto gloomy outlook. Not that I found the indictment 
 defective, or the smallest loophole through which I might have 
 attempted to extricate my client: The work of the State's 
 attorney was properly waterproof. But on turning over the 
 paper I found indorsed thereon the name of our former over- 
 seer as the sole witness for the prosecution. Here was a pros- 
 pect of fun, at least, if not of success. My face must have 
 shone with exultation ; for one of the clerks, looking at me 
 with an expectant smile, asked me what flaw I had found in the 
 indictment. I duly blushed for the unlawyerlike freshness I 
 had displayed. A case-hardened lawyer, you know, would have 
 reserved all show of feeling for the jury. 
 
 But when the trial came off, I showed my brethren of the 
 bar what a lawyer from the backwoods can do by way of 
 dressing down a swift witness. The old villain knew me at 
 once, of course, and I could see by the fiu'tive glances with 
 which he regarded me, that he was not quite at ease. But he 
 
PlilVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL, 381 
 
 gave his testimony with remarkable directness and effect, so 
 long as he was in the hands of the prosecuting attorue3% He 
 had evidently improved in style by the experience he had gone 
 thi-ough in the criminal court, — for he was the prosecuting 
 witness in a large number of the Sunday cases docketed for 
 that term. And even when my turn came to put questions to 
 him, he answered boldly and readily enough, until I tackled 
 him about his Brookfleld experiences. Of course he denied 
 that he had run off from there, and that he had sworn falsely, 
 and that he had abused his position as gi"and juror to revenge 
 himself upon his employer for having discharged him. Of 
 course, too, he lied glibly in answer to my questions as to what 
 he had done before he left Brookfleld. It was then that I put 
 him through a course of sprouts that opened the eyes of the 
 jury. It was absolutely painful, though amusing in the highest 
 degree, to witness his awkward attempts to wi'iggle out of one lie 
 by telling another, until at last he stuck in the quagmire of his 
 lies so firmly, that every motion he made but sunk him deeper, 
 and he finally gave up in sullen helplessness. It was an 
 easy thing, then, to show by his own testimony that he had 
 been hired by a temperance lodge to visit as many of the beer 
 houses and pleasure gardens as he could on a Sunday, and 
 either to buy and pay for, or induce some other person in 
 his presence to order and pay for, beer, wine or other alco- 
 holic di'ink so as to be able to swear to enough to secure con- 
 viction, in which event he was to be paid by the lodge, in 
 addition to the witness fee to be paid out of the costs of the 
 case, a certain sum of money. My success was complete. I 
 take credit to myself for the hit I made about the pay from 
 the temperance lodge ; that was not a random shot, but a 
 shi'ewd guess, based on the fact that Jeffreys was the prose- 
 cuting witness in so many cases, and my opinion of the narrow- 
 minded calibre of the average temperance fanatics. Not only 
 was our client cleared, but every defendant, against whom 
 Jeffreys was the witness, came off scot-free, because the State's 
 attornej' with the approbation of the judge, refused to go to 
 
382 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 the jury iu auy single ease on the unsupported testimony of 
 the self-convicted perjuror. There was great rejoicing among 
 the Teutons, you may believe, and the law-fii-m of Simms & 
 May now enjo^^s great popularity among them. 
 
 — So much for my success at the bar. My career as a poli- 
 tician, though equally brief, was even more brilliant. In this 
 regard the laconism of Ci^sar would, also, be appropriate and 
 expressive. You need not excuse me in your shallow-brained 
 fashion, of tooting my own horn, when I say to you: Get 
 ready your frippery to shine on the next higher round of the 
 Washington Society ladder. Let mama practice to put a little 
 extra stiffness into her courtesies to the lions visiting the cai)i- 
 tal, so as to support the projier dignity of a senator's wife. 
 Now I do not claim the merit of having elected pa._ As you 
 hint, in your famous letter to me, he is a perfect team in him- 
 self, and has done, no doubt, Herculean work in canvassing 
 the State. And I hoi)e, among other things, that Ralph 
 Fayton has done his share of work in the vSouthwest, as he 
 promised, and as was not only his duty, but to his own inter- 
 est to do. But this I may say, defying contradiction, that I 
 have done such work, as a veteran wire-puller might be proud 
 of. I have hitched teams with a cranky philosopher in run- 
 ning the primaries, and keeping the convention straight. We 
 succeeded in pledging most of the members nominated for the 
 General Assembly, from this county, for pa, and the conven- 
 tion endorsed him b}^ special resolution. But above all things 
 1 have secured a powerful element of the press, — an element 
 that will most likely gain us a number of votes outside 
 of our own party. And I have succeeded, — not without 
 the aid of the cranky philosopher aforesaid, — in pledging 
 Victor Waldhorst to our cause, and securing his powerful 
 influence in the interest of pa. You think that was not much 
 of a job, do you? But you should know better. You should 
 remember that he carries his squeamish conscientiousness to a 
 ridiculous extent. He would no more vote for pa, if he be- 
 lieved him to be wrong on some serious question of public 
 
PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL. 383 
 
 policy, tliau he would lie or steal. But I flatter myself that 
 we have him pretty safely bound. He was chairman of a mass 
 meeting that instructed for pa ; he was a member of the com- 
 mittee, in the convention, that reported in his favor, and 
 things must happen strangely indeed, if he can be induced to 
 desert our cause, even if he be put to a severe test. 
 
 — Speaking of Victor Waldhorst reminds me, that I must 
 tell you the i)articulars of my visit to Vaux Hall Park. That 
 is the name of the public garden kept by the client I spoke of. 
 Do you remember the place we visited one Sunday afternoon 
 while at Stuttgart, called Fran Harm's Garden? Well, this 
 Vaux Hall Park is in many respects very much like it. If 
 you can bring your mind to bear on the amusing things we 
 witnessed there, you will have an excellent idea of the circum- 
 stances under which I made the acquaintance of its patrons. 
 One of these was a quaint old gentleman, who lectured me in 
 a droll compound of Teutonic and Anglo-Saxon on the danger 
 of drinking iced lemonade in hot weather. While conversing 
 with him and drinking — not lemonade ! — w^ho should rush in 
 on us, with radiant face and an exclamation of glad surprise, 
 but Victor Waldhorst ! This was interesting in itself ; but it 
 became more so by the fact, that he was accompanied by a 
 sister, and a cousin and an aunt ; and that the old gentleman 
 who had cautioned me against lemonade turned out to be the 
 father of the cousin and the husband of the aunt, and therefore 
 the uncle of Victor and the sister. Not exactly an uncle in 
 fact, as Victor subsequently informed me, but a distant rela- 
 tive, called " uncle " by courtesy, as was the " cousin," also 
 by courtesy. But the sister was genuine. He introduced her 
 as Pauline. That makes her Pauline Waldhorst, — a name 
 that sounded not unfamiliar, and not at all unpleasant. Rather 
 euphonious I found it in contrast with that oddity that served 
 the others for a patronymic, — Auf dem Busch ! — But I think 
 the name Pauline alone so pretty, and so much nicer than the 
 formal Miss Waldhorst, that you will permit me, at least in the 
 privacy of our confidential correspondence, to call her Pauline. 
 
384 THE EEBEUS DAUGHTEE. 
 
 Well, we had a great afternoon of it. I was polite to the 
 ladies (note that I use the plural!) and tried to put my best 
 foot foremost, entertaining the company with as lively an ac- 
 count of our travels (for I took care to keep you in the fore- 
 ground) as I knew how. I needed but slight varnish to my 
 colors, for I had very attentive listeners. Pauline, at least, 
 and Victor, displayed a degree of interest that was very flat- 
 tering to the narrator. Even the old gentleman (who, in spite 
 of his whimsicalities, is by no means a fool) never took his eyes 
 off my face, except to press upon me, now and then, the very 
 excellent Khein wine he had ordered. The cousin alone, whom 
 they had introduced as Woldemar Auf dem Busch, seemed 
 really bored. I must have trodden on some corn of his. 
 Perhaps dimming his lustre as a traveler, for I learned he had 
 returned, not so very long before, from a sojourn of several 
 years in the old country. Whatever may have been the cause, 
 the fact was, that he took no sort of pains to conceal his bad 
 humor, and I was rather amused at the grimaces by which he 
 betrayed it, and may have, on my part, transcended the limits 
 of good form in trying his patience. You need, however, 
 waste no sympathy on him. He is big enough to take care of 
 himself, and has been to Germany. If he learned manners 
 there, it is about time that he should conform to our American 
 standard. He deserved all he got from me, and more than I 
 gave him, for the exasperating air of proprietorship with which 
 he lorded it over that glorious creature who calls him cousin. 
 
 Glorious, did I say? Well, let it stand. I may as well 
 confess that I mean it. She is glorious. No newly opening 
 rose-bud, gemmed with pearls of dewy morn, can vie with her 
 in loveliness. (These words may sound to you like something 
 you have heard before ; so I will claim no copyright to them. 
 But they express my opinion of her exactly. So I may as well 
 employ a few more flowers in sketching her to you.) No daisy 
 is more simple, no mignonette more unpretendingly modest 
 than she ; yet no camelia more queenlike in regal grace and 
 beauty! Her smile, when it comes, (and it is easy to make it 
 
PBIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL. 385 
 
 eomc) nc'celerates the pulse and wuims the heart, as if one had 
 drauk sweet wiue. She is not a bkie-stocking ; but has akuack 
 of applying dainty scraps of poetry just in the right places. 
 Neither forward with her opinion, nor of what you might call a 
 talkative disposition, she converses charmingly, and when her 
 interest is aroused, her sallies are effective, usually, by their 
 naive drollery and vivacious playfulness. 
 
 But she has her faults, too. In all the arts of coquetry her 
 education has been sadly neglected. And then her angelic 
 goodness makes one feel uncomfortable. I miss the wings on 
 her shoulders. Her perfection puts me out of conceit with 
 myself. I can see that she ought to naarry some good man, — 
 some such paragon of excellence as her brother will be some 
 day, when he gets his sentimental nonsense knocked out of 
 him by a little rough experience ; or even as her cousin Wol- 
 demar might be. if he had not been to Germany. From these 
 confessions you will understand that 1 do not propose making 
 Victor your brother-in-law, nor, on the other hand, do I con- 
 template to give up, just yet, the exquisite sjjort of rousing the 
 angry jealousy of the imperious, self-sufficient German Cousin 
 Woldemar, by playing lover to this rare piece of girlish love- 
 liness. It may prove a blessing in disguise to both. Do you 
 understand ? 
 
 — The discovery in Vaux Hall Park had other consequences 
 also. It is evident to you, I suppose, that I made liberal use 
 of my invitation to visit the villa of Mr. Auf dem Busch. 
 There, on my fbrst visit, I became acquainted with an odd 
 genius, — no less a personage than a live philosoj^her, who 
 gave us a scientific disquisition of the art of carving — in 
 which, to do him justice, he is an adept — involving the law as 
 a science, and winding up with a sermon on Cats' Tails and 
 the absurdity of slave laws. A strange man! Repellant, yet 
 fascinating. His influence over the inmates of the old mer- 
 chant's household is truly marvelous, though exceedingly di- 
 verse. The old gentleman himself admires him as a hunter, 
 and is thoroughlv convinced that there is not a more learned 
 
386 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 or profound man in the State. Pauline is infatuated with him 
 as a poet ; for she told me that he was the only man who 
 had been able to make Goethe speak to her in English. She 
 regards him as a superior man, I doubt not; though I hardly 
 believe she likes him. Woldemar Auf dem Busch is, in this 
 one respect at least, like me : We both look upon him as crack- 
 brained, having succumbed to the influence of German meta- 
 physics and speculative philosophy. But, unlike Mr. Auf dem 
 Busch, who believes him to be an impractical visionary, I am 
 convinced that he possesses, in spite of his cranky notions 
 about philosophy, a keen insight into the motives and weak- 
 nesses of human nature, and a power of organization that is 
 truly astonishing. I have akeady indicated to you that it was 
 chiefly through his aid that we succeeded in pledging the mem- 
 bers of the legislature in pa's favor, and what is almost of 
 graver importance, that both Victor and the paper he edits are 
 indissolubly attat^hed to his interest. It would have amused 
 you to listen to the arguments by which he corrected Victor's 
 squeamishness. The latter's nice sense of honor rebelled 
 against employing any but the most scrupulously straightfor- 
 ward means in carrying on the canvass. But the professor 
 convinced him, in spite of himself, that h\^ocrisy and lying were 
 conunendable in a good cause. It sounded odd to hear him 
 defend hypocrisy and prevarication, and I was sorely afraid 
 that he was di'iving Victor into the opposition to our cause ; 
 l)ut the professor's words were to him " confirmation strong as 
 proof of Holy Writ," and Victor swallowed them all. Young 
 Auf dem Busch once told me, that the professor's influence 
 over Victor was like that of a snake charming a bird. Now 
 doesn't that look like it? Yet Victor would indignantly deny 
 that the professor had any influence over him at all, but that 
 he only yielded to the force of the reasoning employed by him. 
 If so, then reason is the God he worships, and Professor 
 Rauhenfels is his Prophet. 
 
 — By the way, Nellie, are you not a little curious to know, 
 whether Victor is given to worship any other idol besides Rea- 
 
PBIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL. 387 
 
 son ? I dare say that you have not forgotten the devotion that 
 attached him to a little lassie, who played havoc with the hearts 
 of the laddies ever so long ago. Have you not his scalp dan- 
 gling from your girdle-belt, — one of the earliest trophies of 
 your prowess in the warfare against the sterner sex? His 
 scalpwound, however, seems not to have proved fatal, — so 
 much I can demonstrate, for he still wears a goodly head of 
 hair. But as to the condition of his heart — why, you might 
 come here yourself. You mean to come at any rate, don't 
 you? To help electioneer for pa, you know; for you can do 
 more in this line, than any other person, or half dozen per- 
 sons, — more than even the professor. For in a certain con- 
 tingency, which may or may not arise, his interest will be 
 adverse to us, and in that case, nothing will hold Victor, unless it 
 be your coaxing. If that contingency should come to pass it may 
 turn out, too, that nothing can save pa but Victor and his ad- 
 herents. So, if you are in earnest about doing something for 
 the honor of our family, don't fail to induce pa and ma to 
 make a stay of a few days, on your way home from Washing- 
 ton, at this gay metropolis of the West! Don't shirk duty! 
 You know as well as I, that your power to lead Victor is 
 limited only by the limits of the possible. So come, at the 
 risk, if need be, of arousing a little jealousy on the part of your 
 intended. — For I suppose that by this time 3^ou have com- 
 mitted yourself in the direction of that "sturdy Western 
 beau " who went all the way to Washington to angle for an 
 heiress and a seat in Congress ? You ought to be weary of 
 distributing mittens ; and I judge that Payton has laid close 
 siege to your heart, or what there is left of it. I cannot say that 
 he is the one whom I would have selected as my brother-in-law ; 
 but then this match is your funeral, not mine. I don't admire the 
 grit of a man, who has promised his support to pa, in a highly 
 important election, and who is himself a candidate for Con- 
 gressional honors, and instead- of attending to his business, 
 wastes his time in running after his girl, — even if he does 
 believe the heiress to be worth more to him than his seat in 
 
388 
 
 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Congress. For I iufer from some of pa's letters that he must 
 have been dancing attendance on you at Saratoga, and followed 
 you to the mountains ! — But then he's a lucky man, I suppose, 
 in having wormed himself into the heart of my giddy sister ; 
 and the Germans have a jjroverb that it is the lucky man that 
 brings home the bride ! And I hope that it may be his luck to 
 lead home the daughter of a United States senator. To insure for 
 him this luck, I strongly advise, out of abundance of caution, 
 the careful lawyer would say, that you arrange a stay of at 
 least a few days, in this city, and duly notify of the day of 
 your coming, 
 
 Your indulgent brother 
 
 Leslik May. 
 
XXV. 
 
 STORM-CLOUDS IN THE HORIZON. 
 
 MEMORABLE to Victor Waldhorst was the election of 
 1860. While his party had carried their legislative 
 ticket by a slight majority, his own vote had been 
 largely in excess of that of his colleagues, notwithstanding in- 
 cessant vituperative attacks made upon him during the whole of 
 the cauvass, in the columns of the rival newspaper. It was a 
 vindication, also, of Professor Rauhenfels' prediction of the 
 rival editor's discomfiture. " Naturally," he said, in talking 
 over the result, "The jaundice-livered miscreant lied; and 
 lies have the trick of the boomerang to cut back, sometimes, 
 on the projector." 
 
 "Now do you see," said Leslie May triumphantly, "what 
 I told you at Brookfield, so many years ago, that you have the 
 address of an adroit politician ? ' ' 
 
 The pleasant smile that accompanied Leslie's words carried 
 Victor back to the delightful time when they two, with Nellie 
 May as an enthusiastic listener, had talked over the colonel's 
 chance of success. 
 
 " Of course," had been the echo from Mr. Becker, " our 
 editor of the Beobachter has been, thanks to our friend of the 
 ojjposition paper, the best advertised candidate in the State." 
 And, rubbing his hands in high glee, he added: " He will 
 have things his own way in the legislature, and will have no 
 trouble in electing a State printer." 
 
 " I hope," was Woldemar Auf dem Busch's comment, 
 " that Victor will not sink the character of a gentleman in 
 that of the politician, no matter how successful he may be 
 as such." 
 
 " Fear you not for our Victor," the old gentleman spoke up. 
 
 (389) 
 
390 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " Our Victor is through and through a gentleman. When he 
 is a politician, then a politician is a gentleman." 
 
 Memorable, too, was the election of 1860 to politicians ; even 
 to statesmen. Memorable, because Democracy, triumphant 
 hitherto in the Federal elections, had been hurled from power. 
 Not by the verdict of the people in their original capacity : a 
 majority of them had cast their votes against the man who 
 would be President of the United States by choice of the 
 electoral college. A large majority had been cast against those 
 who would represent the people in the Congress. But 
 Democracy had been dethi'oned, because a house divided 
 against itself cannot stand. The democrats had split their 
 forces into two angrily contending factions, neither of which, 
 alone, was strong enough to outnumber the common adver- 
 sary. And thus, although know-nothingism had received its 
 quietus, — a fate from which not even the magic of its watch- 
 word ' ' Constitutional Union ' ' had saved it — the republicans 
 had succeeded, by uniting their vote (not much larger than 
 that of either moiety of the democrats) to elect an overwhelm- 
 ing majority of the electoral college and of the members of the 
 House of Representatives. And politicians and statesmen were 
 confronted with a problem whose solution would tax to the 
 utmost their united astuteness and wisdom. 
 
 Memorable, above all others, was that election of 1860 to 
 patriotically-minded citizens in every part of the Union. It 
 aroused fierce anger in one section of the country, finding 
 utterauce in wrathful threats of forcible disruption : while in 
 the other it fortifled a determined spirit to check the growth 
 of slavery and maintain the Union at all cost. As yet there 
 was only talk on both sides, though talk fierce and passionate. 
 Most people fondly imagined that the quarrel was but a squab- 
 ble among politicians ; that the vindictive threats and taunts 
 hurled forth and back were but the ravings of magniloquent 
 fire-eating fanatics ; and that whatever of real difference there 
 
STOBM-CLOUDS IN THE HOBIZON. 391 
 
 might be between the sections would be smoothed over, as so 
 many previous quarrels in the history of the nation had been, 
 by compromise. For it was monstrous to contemplate that a 
 nation of brothers, grown mighty and prosperous under a 
 common flag, having by a common effort shaken off the yoke 
 of tyranny, shining, the glorious beacon of freedom to all the 
 world, should now bespatter the Goddess of Liberty with reek- 
 ing gore in fratricidal strife. It was horrible to imagine 
 brothers thirsting for their brothers' heart-blood, — kinsmen 
 devastating the homes of kinsmen with sword and fire. So 
 monstrous and horrible was the contemplation of these things, 
 that few people deemed them possible in a Christian country, 
 in the nineteenth century. 
 
 Yet there were those, who, albeit not pessimistically inclined, 
 were deeply anxious. 
 
 Among these was Victor. The result of the election had 
 forced on him the recognition of a phase in the issue between 
 North and South which he had hitherto i)ersistently ignored, 
 and which now gave rise to gloomy forebodings touching the 
 fate of the Republic. As an opponent of slavery on principle 
 he had indulged in the hope that its limitation to the States in 
 which it now prevailed would of necessity bring about its 
 final extinction, and had hailed such a result as the most 
 natural and desirable solution of the problem. Now that the 
 election had demonstrated the hopelessness of further aggrand- 
 izement of slave territory, he saw with appalling distinctness 
 that the people of the South understood fully as well as he what 
 such limitation of slavery must necessarily lead to. Having 
 lost the political ascendency hitherto enjoyed, which had 
 enabled them to legislate for the protection of their property, 
 they now struggled for its bare preservation. The gradual 
 extinction of slavery, Victor now saw with deep anxiety, was 
 as much a deprivation of property solemnly guaranteed by the 
 constitution, as direct abolition. If aliolitiou was wrong, how 
 could it be right to reach the same result by other means? 
 And if the South was right in this struggle, w^hat course did 
 
392 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 duty point out for himself ? He was deeply perplexed by the 
 distressing uncertainty as to what Justice and Right demanded 
 touching this burning question, which he was soon to be called 
 on for decisive action. 
 
 But care and anxiety were forgotten when, one day, Leslie 
 May informed him that his father, with mother and sister, had 
 arrived in the city, and would make a stay of some days be- 
 fore proceeding on their way to the capital. Leslie had 
 spoken in his usual quiet way, but was keenly observant of the 
 effect of his statement on Victor. 
 
 " Really? " the latter exclaimed, steadying his voice with an 
 effort, but unable to repress the flush spreading over his face, 
 ' ' Have you seen them ? And how are they ? ' ' 
 
 " I have seen them, and they are well," replied Leslie, 
 smiling at Victor's illy-concealed eagerness. " Both the gov- 
 ernor and Nellie inquired after you, and are impatient to see 
 you . " 
 
 " I thank you." And after a swift glance into the eyes of 
 his friend he added: " And them. Of course 1 shall pay my 
 res[)ects to Colonel May. It is highly important that I should 
 consult him. And if Miss Nellie — pardon me, I mean Miss 
 May — " 
 
 " Now, have done with that nonsense! " Leslie interrupted 
 him, assuming that half-dictatorial, half -precatory, but wholly 
 irresistible air that he found so effective in cajoling Victor. 
 " It is not a question of mock marriage to-day, and you know, 
 or ought to know, that my sister is quite ashamed of her 
 conduct on that occasion." 
 
 " — If Miss Nellie will do me the honor to receive me, I will 
 also call on her." The blush deepened on Victor's cheeks as 
 he spoke, but Leslie was, for a moment, uncertain, whether the 
 name " Nellie " possessed for the young editor the charm of 
 old. 
 
 '•'• You need not call on the governor," he said. " I have 
 given him your address, and he will hunt you up as soon as 
 he has the time. But Nellie and ma ai-e at their rooms in the 
 
STORM-CLOUDS IN THE UOlilZON. 393 
 
 Planters' House, and they will no doubt feel highly compli- 
 mented if you will take the trouble to call on them." 
 
 " I shall be happy to do so," said Victor speaking in a tone 
 of indifference assumed with a powerful effort. " What hour, 
 do you think, would be proper for a visit to the ladies? " 
 
 " No hour better than the present," Leslie answered, con- 
 sulting his watch. " They are through with dinner by this 
 time, I suppose, and if you do not object, we will just step over 
 to the Planters.' " 
 
 Victor was ready for a visit to the ladies of the May family, 
 no matter how important the business in hand might be. The 
 walk to the hotel was but short. In less than five minutes the 
 gentlemen had sent up their cards to the ladies, but were 
 informed by the returning messenger that the ladies were not 
 in, although their doors were unbolted. 
 
 " Well," said Leslie, " this is unpleasant. But they can- 
 not be far off at any rate. Will we wait for them in the 
 parlor? " 
 
 Victor had no objection, and followed Leslie. They had to 
 pass the ladies' parlor, the door of which stood ajar. Victor 
 cast a glance into the richly appointed saloon, and stood sud- 
 denly still, — his eyes fixed upon a tableau that deeply im- 
 pressed him. On a sofa facing the door sat Ralph Pay ton, 
 engaged in eager conversation with a lady by his side, — a lady 
 whom Victor so well knew ; and yet he beheld for the first time 
 that perfection of beauty that burst upon his intoxicated gaze 
 from the sofa there. He stood spell-bound. Every fibre of 
 his body thrilled with ecstatic transports. Those clear, gray 
 eyes were Nellie's eyes, whose bright flashes had so often pene- 
 trated to his heart ; yet now, as they were bent upon her com- 
 panion's face, they beamed with a tenderness that was a new 
 experience to Victor. That sweet mouth with its rosy lips, that 
 had so often charmed him with its make-believe pouts, its 
 droll mimicry, its irresistible smiles, was Nellie's mouth, 
 tempting, as of old, but expressive, now, of a capacity for 
 pathos, as well as humor, that was a new revelation. The 
 
394 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 lady ou the sofa was undoubtedly Nellie May : not the lovely 
 child that Victor had known, but a radiantly beautiful 
 woman, — the full-blown flower redeeming in resplendent 
 brightness the promise given by the exquisite bud. Nellie 
 May : But Victor felt as if it would be a desecration to apply 
 the endearing diminutive to that maguilicently beautiful woman, 
 and repeated mentally : Eleonora ! 
 
 As Victor paused, Leslie looked around. 
 
 " So, this is where you receive your friends? " he said, as 
 his eye fell on the occupants of. the sofa. " Well, Mr. Fayton, 
 how do you find yourself ? And to what are we indejjted for 
 the pleasure of seeing you here ? ' ' 
 
 The lady promptly rose on hearing her brother's voice, and 
 while Payton and Leslie were shaking hands she held out hers to 
 Victor with a cordial smile of welcome. The blood rushed 
 hotly to Victor's head as he stepped forward to clasp the hands 
 so graciously extended. " Mr. Waldhorst! " she exclaimed, 
 her face beaming with such genuine, unfeigned pleasure as to 
 throw her visitor into raptures of delight. "You cannot 
 believe how happy it makes me to see you after so long a time. 
 You are glad too, are you not? " 
 
 " Indeed I am very glad to see you. Miss May ! " 
 
 " There — please don't Miss May me, unless you wi^sh to 
 dis-may me, by remembering those silly words of mine that I 
 had hoped you had forgotten ! ' ' She accented her word-play 
 with a ripple of low, silvery laughter. " To you, you know, I 
 wish to be Nellie. Or have I changed so much, that you do 
 not recognize in me your old classmate ? By the way, Victor — 
 pardon, Mr. Waldhorst, I should say — you have changed in- 
 deed, and very much for the better. I would like to say, if 1 
 were not afraid that you would deem me guilty of clumny 
 flattery, that you have grown to be quite handsome." 
 
 " Have I outgrown the scarecrow, do you think? " 
 
 " Well, I don't know that I can, or wish to, say that! " she 
 replied looking at him with a smile of unmistakable admira- 
 tion. " For, do you know, Mr. Waldhorst, that I shall 
 
STORM-CLOUDS IN THE HORIZON. 395 
 
 always cherish the memory of that brave act of yours as a 
 bright, romantic incident in my prosaic life ? That scarecrow 
 has taken, in my mind, the shape of a chivalrous knight, whose 
 devotion to me I would not willingly forget. — But the change 
 I notice in you is less, perhaps, a physical growth, than an in- 
 tellectual development ; you have certainly improved in this 
 respect since I last saw you at Brookfield." 
 
 " How silly I must have appeared to you in those days! " 
 
 " Unless, indeed," she continued, taking no notice of his 
 remark, "it is my own growth and development that enables 
 me to see you more truly now. For I, too, have grown some- 
 what since then, don't you thiuk, Mr. Waldhorst? " 
 
 To answer this question advisedly, required a closer sui-vey 
 of her person, and afforded Victor an excuse to feast his eyes 
 anew without seeming to be rude, — an opportunity of which 
 he availed himself to the utmost limits of propriety. " Won- 
 derfully ! " he said at last, in a subdued voice. Ralph Payton 
 was within earshot and Victor felt annoyed by the thought of 
 being overheard, so he said nothing. 
 
 Mr. Payton meanwhile chafed under the necessity of answer- 
 ing Leslie's questions, and Avas casting uneasy glances in the 
 direction of the lady, — a decided frown darkening his fea- 
 tures whenever his eye fell on Victor. He was unsuccessful 
 in concealing his vexation, if he made the attempt at all, in 
 having his tete-a-tete with Miss May interrupted, and Leslie, in 
 the sprit of mischief, or for some reason sufficient to himself, 
 proceeded to add fuel to the flames of his anger. He took the 
 young gentleman's arm and said, in his bantering, pleasant 
 voice : 
 
 "Come, Ralph! You have not yet spoken to Mr, Wald- 
 horst. Tell him how glad you are to see him ; and then let us 
 go and hunt up the governor. NelUe, I suspect, and our friend 
 Victor will not be sorry to have us leave them to themselves. 
 They surely have a good deal to say to each other after such 
 long absence." 
 
 Payton grew wroth. But what was there for him to do? 
 
396 THE REBEL'S DAUGIITEB. 
 
 Miss May looked as if her -brother's remark quite suited her. 
 So he stepped forward to shake hands with Victor, saying, 
 with a scowl on his face that belied his words: " I rejoice to 
 see you so well, Mr. Waldhorst? " 
 
 Victor's acknowledgment sounded just as cordial. 
 
 After shaking hands. Pay ton bowed to the lady, and saying 
 that he hoped to see her later on, when she might be at more 
 leisure, he left the room, without wasting another look at Victor. 
 
 " Come and sit down by me," said Nellie, as soon as the 
 others had left. -'I am sorry that both papa and mama are 
 out, but they will be back soon, and you must content yourself 
 with my company the while. I am anxious that papa should 
 find you here, for he is real desirous of having a talk with 
 you." 
 
 Victor gladly complied with her request to sit down beside 
 her. He secretly hoped that some propitious power might 
 postpone indefinitely the return of both Colonel and Mrs. 
 May, while he was contenting himself with Miss May's com- 
 pany. The conversation between them was lively, as conver- 
 sation with Nellie always was. So lively, that before Victor 
 thought the time long, they had thoroughly talked over the 
 probabihty of Colonel May's election, agreeing that small 
 room for doubt remained, — the daughter ex]>ressing not only 
 hope, but firm confidence on this point, and Victor pledging 
 his utmost efforts to bring it about. They had engaged, also, 
 in a stirring debate on the political situation, their opinions 
 diverging just enough to make the discussion highly interesting. 
 The lady had the advantage over him in having formed a de- 
 cided opinion as to the course which it was the duty of the 
 Federal government to pursue toward the States. There was 
 no room for doubt in her mind. The whole matter lay in a 
 nutshell : The Federal government had absolutely no right to 
 interfere with the domestic affairs of the States, but must 
 protect the right of property in the slave-holding States as 
 effectually as in non-slaveholding States. Any usurpation of 
 power to distinguish between them was a breach of the consti- 
 
STOHM-CLOUDS IN THE HORIZON. 397 
 
 tutiou and must be resisted, — by force, if necessary. Her 
 reasoning- was plausible, to Victor, at least, who was carried 
 away by it in spite of a vague, uneasy suspicion that she was 
 repeating the arguments of Southern extremists, which he could 
 not wholly sanction. 
 
 After one of her enthusiastic utterings in this direction, 
 Victor ventured to suggest: " Don't you think. Miss Nellie, 
 that our opponents Avould be right in calling you a pronounced 
 flre-eater? " 
 
 " Well, sir, if the assertion of our rights and of our deter- 
 mination to maintain them, makes me a fireeater, you may 
 set me down as one. And I look upon a man who would do 
 less as upon a coward not fit to live in a free land. Is it not 
 your opinion, Mr. Waldhorst, that tyi-anny exists, not because 
 oppressors are tyrants, but because the oppressed are cowards? 
 Then give me a brave fire-eater always before a tamely sub- 
 mitting coward ! ' ' 
 
 The conversation was interrupted by a soft knocking at the 
 open door. Victor beheld a neatly clad servant of striking 
 appearance. Was not that Lucre tia, the slave-maiden belong- 
 ing to Nellie? As he looked at her, a slight flush suffused her 
 face. It might be because of his rude stare, or it might be 
 because she recognized him, — not the slightest twitching of a 
 muscle of her face gave indication, unless the dropping of her 
 eyes before his gaze might be counted as such. She too had 
 grown to be very beautiful, and his mind recalled vividly a 
 scene when this superb woman of Junonic grace even then, was 
 threatened with the lash in the hands of a brutal overseer. 
 
 "Well, Cressie, what is it?" the mistress inquired, while 
 Victor still gazed and mused. 
 
 " Missis May sent me to find you; she is in her room," 
 was the answer, spoken in a mellow, pleasant voice, possessing 
 all the sweetness but hardly a trace of the pfdois, or lingo 
 peculiar to negroes. 
 
 " Very well, Cressie. Tell her I am coming. And tell her 
 I. will bring Mr. Waldhorst along, who has called to see her." 
 
398 THE BEBEVS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 " Yes, ma'am," said the octoroou, casting one eager glance, 
 though furtively, at Victor. 
 
 The latter was still looking at the oi)eu door through which 
 the gii'l had disappeared when Nellie asked him : 
 
 " You remember Cressie, don't you? Has she not grown 
 and improved as much as any of us? " 
 
 " As much as any of us ! " he echoed. 
 
 " I am proud of her," Nellie went on. " She is perfectly 
 devoted to me. I can trust her as if she were a sister. I 
 sometimes think — now don't you laugh at me ! — I sometimes 
 really think that she is trustier, and — well, wiser than I am. 
 Now what do you say to that? " 
 
 " That you are fortunate in having so reliable a servant," 
 said Victor; "and that her praise, out of your mouth, is 
 doubly your own. Imagine her at the mercy of a t>T:ant like 
 Jeffreys ! ' ' 
 
 " Don't mention the brute! " Nellie exclaimed, puckering up 
 her face into a momentary scowl. Then, brightening, she 
 added : " Come now, Mr. Waldhorst, and pay your respects to 
 mama. She will be delighted to see you." 
 
 When Victor parted from the ladies, it was after a cordial 
 invitation from both to call again before they left the city. 
 
 Victor stepped out of the hotel in exuberant spirits. He 
 walked with head erect and eyes turned sk^'ward, as if soaring 
 through space. He felt as if he must shout out to the world 
 the wild joy of his heart in having found the maiden that had 
 won his undying love, — his boyish ideal, cherished so loj^ally 
 as the embodiment of feminine grace and beauty transformed 
 into a revelation of the Divine, before which he must kneel and 
 worship. Yes ! This woman transcended the image hitherto 
 enshrined in his bosom as far as his imagination had idealized 
 the Nellie May of his boyish days. And she had been so 
 gracious, — had received him with such cordiality! How 
 could he help reveling in the memory of her smiles, of exulting 
 in the touching confidence she so trustfully placed in his ability 
 to further the interests of her father ! 
 
STORM-CLOUDS IN THE HOIilZON. 399 
 
 It was a comfort to reflect, that they had, iu the inaiu, 
 agreed in their political views. Yet, on recalling her positive 
 statements as to the rights of the .South, and the duties of 
 freemen, a vague presentiment of trouble crept stealthily into 
 his mind, imj^artiug to his blissful day-dreaming the spice of 
 uncertainty. What if they should disagree? He choked 
 down the doubt as quickly as it arose. Were they not, Nellie 
 and he, of one mind on the all-important, to the loving daugh- 
 ter overshadowing, subject of Colonel May's election to the 
 Senate ! He surely desired his election as ardently as did she ; 
 and she knew that he did. What mattered then, disagreement 
 on minor points? Could it, if it did exist, endanger the 
 cordial relations between them ? 
 
 Then loomed up, in the midst of his busy imaginings, the 
 frowning physiognomy of Ralph Payton. A dark shadow ; 
 first contrasting with, then imparting its somber hue to, the rose- 
 tinted pictures his fancy was weaving. The shadow grew 
 darker as he dwelt upon the eagerness depicted on the two 
 faces that he had seen turned to one another on that sofa. 
 
 To be sure, there was great unanimity on polities between 
 these two, — greater than that between Miss May and himself. 
 Naturally : They were both Virginians by birth and Southerners 
 by instinct, while he, Victor, had grafted his Southern j)ro- 
 clivities on a vigorous stock of anti-slavery convictions. It 
 was quite possible, then, that their conversation had turned 
 upon the relations between Payton, as the colonel's successor 
 in the House of Representatives, and the colonel as a candidate 
 before the legislature. But then, why that frown on Payton 's 
 face when Victor appeared? If he and Nellie had been talk- 
 ing politics would not Payton have hailed Victor as a co-worker 
 in a common cause ? And that look of eager tenderness on 
 Nellie's face — was it not eloquent of an interest more tender 
 than that conditioned by a common political purpose ? The 
 brightly colored visions darkened under the shadow of gloomy 
 doubt, asserting itself, and demanding recognition. Lucretia's 
 pathetic face haunted him, too. Wh}' should it? What had 
 
400 THE RE BE US DAUQHTEB. 
 
 he done to the beautiful oetoroou, that her peusive features 
 should disturb his peace of mind? Perhaps, — if he had ana- 
 lyzed his feelings — he saw in her concrete case the difficulty 
 of the problem that was agitating the nation, — a problem that 
 had no difficulty for Ralph Pay ton, nor, as he well knew, for 
 Miss May. But Miss May's solution was incompatible with 
 human rights for the octoroon girl ! 
 
 Nellie's letter to her brother occurred to Victor. " Poor 
 Victor," she had written. — And she had told him of her 
 " sturdy rural beau," who was to her more than a mere gen- 
 tleman, — Poor Victor, indeed ! He experienced an agonizing 
 revulsion from the height of human bliss to the depths of doubt 
 and despair, as the thought confronted him that the cordial 
 welcome she had extended to him was possibly but a form 
 demanded by common politeness. Her smiles and pleasant 
 words were but the tribute of courtesy and good-nature. She 
 felt some compunction, perhaps, for the cruel words she had 
 spoken to him before leaving Brookfield, and meant to atone 
 for them in this way. Perhaps — he paled at the thought, but 
 it forced itself upon him again and again — her feeling toward 
 him was simply that of pity. Pity! Oh, if so, what a fool 
 he had been ! 
 
 The thought was too humiliating to be borne with equanim- 
 ity. A touch of pride came to his aid and for a moment 
 assuaged the poignancy of his woe. She need not pity him ! 
 No ! Not even from Nellie May, — though dearer to him than 
 his heart's blood — would he accept such alms. He would com- 
 pel her to respect him. He would teach her that he was the 
 equal, at least, of the man upon whom she lavished the price- 
 less boon of her affections. 
 
 As for Ralph Payton, — let him beware how he cross the 
 path of Victor Waldhorst ! 
 
 Victor had looked forward to the interview with Colonel May 
 in the eager hope that the veteran statesman might clear up 
 the doubts that harassed him about the political situation. 
 
STOEM- CLOUDS IN THE IIOBIZON. 401 
 
 Vaguely apprehensive that the attitude of some of the Southern 
 States might call for coercive measures on the part of the 
 Federal government not consistent with the views of extreme 
 adherents to the doctrine of States' Rights, and that in such 
 case it would become necessary to take sides for or against the 
 adoption of such measures, he yearned for light to guide him 
 in determining the course he oiight to take. 
 
 But when they met, their conversation hardly touched upon 
 politics at all. The colonel, being well aware of Victor's 
 loyalty and devotion to him and his cause, spoke upon matters 
 personal and easily can-ied Victor along, — obtaining from him 
 a minute account of his life and experiences after leaving 
 Brooklield, including a description of his present surroundings. 
 Victor's narration led the colonel to express a desire to become 
 acquainted with some of the people whom he described, where- 
 upon Victor immediately proposed a visit to the store of the 
 Auf dem Busches on Main Street, where the colonel and the 
 two merchants were introduced to each other. 
 
 The junior meml)er of the llrm showed a decided reserve in 
 his demeanor, unwilling to enter into conversation beyond what 
 mere politeness required ; but the two elder gentlemen took a 
 liking to each other at once. So well pleased with his distin- 
 guished visitor was Uncle Auf dem Busch, that he extended to 
 him and to his wife and daughter an invitation to spend an 
 evening at Busch Bluff before leaving the city, — an invita- 
 tion which the colonel, in behalf of himself and his ladies, 
 promptly accepted. 
 
 '• To-morrow, if it be suiting to you," the merchant pro- 
 posed. "Or, if it be that you have not fear before philosophers, 
 after-to-morrow. On that evening the Philosophical Society 
 hold a sitting at our house, and the philosophers will reckon 
 it to their honor if you shall be present." 
 
 ' ' What — a regular society for the cultivation of philos- 
 ophy?" the colonel inquired. "Then, will it not disturb 
 them if strangers intrude on their deliberations? " 
 
 "Oh," said the merchant, "you disturb them not. See 
 
 26 
 
402 THE EEBEUS DAUOHTEtt. 
 
 you, that they disturb uot you. They are not a club, you 
 know, — eorporated ; they are meu who meet together, to study 
 how to know things. And sometimes women come and help 
 them, when it is a fine paper to read. They have meetings 
 sometimes in one house, and then in another house, and after- 
 to-morrow they shall have meeting at Busch Bluff." 
 
 " You arouse my curiosity, Mr. Auf dem Busch," said the 
 colonel. " I take it for granted that you are a member of 
 this i)hilosopliical society? " 
 
 " Oh, no! " the merchant rei^lied, with a humorous chuckle. 
 " I am not philosopher; sure not speculative philosopher. I 
 speculate only sometimes on Main Street. The president of 
 the Philosophical Society is a friend, and he honors me to 
 bring the society to my house : and 1 like it to hear them talk, 
 and sometimes I understand it what they talk. But when I 
 understand it, then it is not si)eculative philosophy: contrary, 
 common sense. I make no doubt it will interest Colonel May 
 and his ladies, to take tea, once, with speculative philosophers." 
 
 "Indeed it will be," said the colonel. "Mrs. Ma^^ will 
 feel highly honored, and I am sure my daughter Nellie will 
 look upon such an opportunity as a rare treat." 
 
 ' ' So after-to-morrow will be fitting to you ? ' ' 
 
 " Certainly. I hope that the ladies will be through with 
 their shopping by that time, and will have the more leisure to 
 enjoy their visit to Busch Bluff." 
 
 " Also, then on after-to-morroAV evening," said the merchant, 
 nodding his head. " I will do me the honor to send the car- 
 riage for you, at the Planters', at four o'clock." 
 
XXVI. 
 MAGNETISM — REPELLANT AND ATTRACTIONAL. 
 
 ff/HE news of the iuvitation, wheu auuounced by the 
 *• colonel at the Planters' House, did not produce the 
 same effect upon the mother as upon the daughter. 
 Mrs. May expressed, and still more emphatically looked, de- 
 cided disapprobation. " I do not understand," she explained, 
 in tone of unmistakable protest, " how you could accept so 
 Yery informal an invitation. Who is this man with an un- 
 pronounceable name, that he should invite ladies to his house 
 who are perfect strangers to him ? ' ' 
 
 " But, Mama," Xellie broke in, " surely, jaapa's name is 
 well enough known to be received as a voucher for the respecta- 
 bility of his wife and daughter ? ' ' 
 
 " I dare say it is," the elder lady replied, a touch of sarcasm 
 in her voice, while a slight nod of the head might have been 
 understood as suggestive of reproof to her daughter. " The 
 question, however, is not as to our, but as to his respectability. 
 Who is there to vouch for the respectability of his wife and 
 daughter? " 
 
 " Why, Mama, Leslie is on intimate terms with the family ! " 
 the sister urged with some warmth. 
 
 " You are aware, my daughter," came from Mrs. May 
 frigidly, " that your brother Leslie enjoys a degree of freedom 
 in the choice of his associates, that is not permitted to ladies. 
 And I dare say that you are aware, also, of your brother's 
 propensity to run after every pretty face, or what he deems a 
 pretty face, without inquiring into the social standing of its 
 owner." 
 
 "But he — I mean Mr. Auf dem Busch — is Victor's 
 uncle," the young lady persisted. " And I am just wild to 
 become acquainted with Victor's sister." 
 
 (403) 
 
404 THE BE BEL'S DAUOHTEB. 
 
 "Perhaps, my dear," the mother admonished, "it would 
 be more appropriate for you to speak of Mr. Waldhorst with 
 less familiarity. He is uo longer the young shopkeeper whom 
 it was our pleasure, — or let us say, our duty — to patronize 
 in Brookfield. It might now displease him, as well as Mr. 
 Payton, to hear you call him by his first name." 
 
 A merry little laugh preceded the daughter's answer. 
 " Why, to be sure, he has become the Honorable Victor Wald- 
 horst ! And 1 have really forgotten to tease him with his new 
 title. He is the editor of a newspaper with a name unspeak- 
 able except in the German tongue. And the Honorable Ralph 
 Payton honors him Avith his jealousy. You are right, Mama, I 
 must be more cautious to avoid taking the Christian names of 
 these Honorables in vain. At least in their absence." Then 
 she added more soberly, " Now is not that respectability 
 enough? The uncle, the aunt and the sister of an Hon- 
 orable? And, Mama, coming to think of it, this uncle has 
 quite a claim to papa's recognition on his own account. He 
 presided at the mass meeting which instructed for him as 
 United States senator, and was a member of the convention." 
 
 " Such an upstart he must be! " the elder lady ejaculated, 
 in no wise propitiated by Nellie's playful attempts at concilia- 
 tion. " To think, that he should put upon us the affront of 
 offering to send us his carriage ! " 
 
 " Pray, Louise, is that the head and front of his offending? " 
 the Colonel queried, smiling quizzically. " I ask for informa- 
 tion, because I was impressed with the notion that it was 
 rather thoughtful of the old gentleman, to spare us the annoy- 
 ance of having to inquire our way to his villa." 
 
 " Villa ! " the lady repeated disdainfully. " What airs these 
 Germans put on about their suburban roost ! ' ' And then she 
 added, a little more resignedly, assuming the air of an injured 
 victim to the exactions of tyrannical Democracy, " To think, 
 that the wife and daughter of a — congressman, should be 
 called on to ride in the carriage of a parvenu, merely to gratify 
 his vulgar ambition! " 
 
MA GNE TISM— B E FELL AN T AND A TTRA C TIONAL . 405 
 
 " Well, my dear, the mischief is done," said the colonel, 
 good-naturedly. "There is no use crying over spilt milk. 
 We are going to see what a galaxy of speculative philosophers 
 looks like, when assembled at tea." 
 
 And Mrs. May accepted the inevitable with what grace she 
 might, solacing herself Avith the reflection that the ladies they 
 were going to visit were unknown to Washington society, and 
 strangers to Brookfleld, so that it w^as very improbable indeed 
 that she should ever be called on to extend social recognition, 
 as a senator's wife, to any of the family. 
 
 Uncle Auf dem Busch passed through a similar experience 
 on making known to his family the honor in store for them by 
 no less an event than the visit, with wife and daughter, of 
 a prospective United States senator. " It was very thought- 
 less of you to invite guests for the evening when you know the 
 philosophical society is going to swarm here," Mrs. Auf dem 
 Busch remarked, the while a perceptible frown darkened her 
 comely features, caused, perhaps, by honest dread of the task 
 of entertaining guests of such high quality. 
 
 " Contrary, thoughtful," was the merchant's reply. " The 
 colo-nell and the ladies from Washington will find pleasure to 
 look at philosophers when they drink tea. The colo-nell said 
 it expressly. 
 
 "Drink tea?" the lady inquired. "Did you invite them 
 for tea, or for supper, or dinner? " 
 
 "Tea? Supper? Dinner? the merchant repeated with a 
 look of bewilderment. " I invited riot for dinner, not for sup- 
 per ! I invited for four o'clock. Four o'clock p. m. Means 
 that dinner? Get we dinner, after four o'clock p. m., before 
 next day? " 
 
 " Yes, Uncle," said Pauline pleasantly. " I have been 
 told, that at Washington the dinner hour is usually six. Some 
 aristocratic people in our own city have dinner even later, when 
 they have company. So you see it is difficult for aunt to know 
 how to receive her Washington guests properly, if thej'^ have 
 not been informed of the nature of the entertainment to which 
 
406 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 they have been invited. They should know in what dress to 
 appear." 
 
 " It affects nothing how they dress," the merchant ex- 
 claimed, vexed as well as amused by his wife's distress, which he 
 ascribed to a hypercritical vagary of the female mind. " They 
 know they come to sit down with philosophers, and they get to 
 eat. Now you give them to eat something nice, how you can 
 cook, and tea, or something else what they like to di'ink. 
 Then the colo-nell and his Washington ladies eat supper, or if 
 they like better, dinner ; our philosophers drink tea ; and it 
 shall be a party A No. one, — if they dress white, or black, or 
 if they put on a rainbow. Not, Pauline? " 
 
 The diversion attempted by Pauline for the benefit of her 
 aunt, had not been graciously received by that lady. But, 
 nothing daunted, the young girl persisted in her effort to put 
 the hostess at ease, and therefore said, with a pleasant smile, 
 " I am sure that Colonel May will be pleased with you and 
 with our philosophical friends, whether we give them a dinner, 
 or other meal. And if the ladies should be bored by meta- 
 physical discussions at table, aunt and I will leave the lords of 
 creation to enjoy their inevitable smoke in dining-room or 
 library, and retire with Mrs. and Miss May to the parlor. I 
 am sure," she added, addressing herself with a smile of perfect 
 confidence to Mrs. Auf dem Busch, " that aunt will make it 
 pleasant for the ladies, even if the gentlemen should prefer 
 smoke and philosophy." 
 
 The lady addressed vouchsafed no indication whether 
 Pauline's effort was a success. But the old gentleman seemed 
 to understand the situation. He nodded with a smile of dry 
 humor, as he said: " When the}^ like to smoke, better as talk 
 to you, they are in a fog." Turning to his wife, he continued : 
 " Believe you, that you can manage, as Pauline has well said? 
 She has right. She can make an evening pleasant for an3'body. 
 You and she," he hurriedly added, as his wife cast a searching 
 glance at him. " If the gentlemen are like me, the ladies will 
 not be alone." 
 
MAGNETISM— REPELLANT AND A TTEACTIONAL. 407 
 
 "No, I expect not," muttered Mrs. Auf deui liuseli, 
 turning her reproachful eyes from her husband to PauHne. 
 " Not if that coxcomb of a lawyer is among them." 
 
 Mrs. May was destined to receive one more shock to her 
 sense of propriety, when, punctual to the appointed hour, the 
 colonel and his ladies were invited to step into — not an 
 elegant carriage, such as she had anticipated, but an open 
 barouche ; driven — not by a coachman in livery, but by the 
 merchant Auf dem Busch himself. "The insolence of this 
 man ! ' ' she exclaimed (though in a whisper) to her daughter 
 as they descended the steps leading to the sidewalk in front 
 of the hotel. " See, how he is appropriating us, just as if^we 
 were his equals." 
 
 " Indeed, Mama, I hope we are! " Nellie remarked, with an 
 arch smile. " The fact, that papa is just noAV expecting most 
 important services from them need not raise them above our 
 level at all." 
 
 They had by this time reached the sidewalk, and Nellie 
 exclaimed with a little shout of delight, " Oh, just loolv at 
 that splendid span of horses ! I am going to sit on the front 
 seat with the driver. It will be a delightful drive." 
 
 Sure enough, when the merchant, having bowed to the ladies 
 on being introduced to them by the colonel, not without stately 
 courtesy, was handing Mrs. May to her seat in the rear, the 
 girl leaped nimbly up into the front seat, saying, with the 
 enchanting smile that was at her command when she wished to 
 please, "You will let me sit by you, will you not, Mr. Auf 
 dem Busch ? Papa must for once take a back seat. I admire 
 your splendid horses, and would like to see you handle them." 
 
 Of course the young lady had her way. She completely 
 won the merchant's heart by the intelligent questions she put 
 to him, and by her enthusiasm over his really fine turnout. 
 It was not long before she had coaxed him to intrust her with 
 the reins, and then she challenged his admiration by the skill 
 and coolness with which she managed the spirited steeds. All 
 
408 THE BE BEL' 8 DAUGHTER. 
 
 iu all, the two on the front seat were on excellent terms with 
 each other long before they reached the merchant's pretty 
 villa. 
 
 The meeting between Mrs. May and Mrs. Anf dem Busch 
 would have amused Leslie, If his attention had not been 
 engrossed in watching the first approaches between his sister 
 and Pauline Waldhorst. This circumstance deprived him of 
 the enjoyment of marking the expression of mutual aversion 
 which for a brief moment marred the features of each 
 matron, — con])led here with a look of haughty superiority, 
 there with a glance of sullen antagonism — before the smile 
 accompanying the conventional phrases stereotyped for such 
 occasions masked their countenances. He saw, instead, a more 
 l)eautif ul s(;ene : Pauline watching the descent of his sister 
 from the barouche, her features animated with eager expectation, 
 lips slightly parted, her face gradually brightening into an ex- 
 pression of hearty approval of the beautiful stranger, whose 
 graceful elastic movements she followed with sparkling eyes, 
 until they encountered Nellie's searching gaze. Then, a vivid 
 flush heightening the color of her cheeks and betokening the 
 pleasure of mutual recognition, the bright smile on Nellie's face 
 found glad reflection in her own. 
 
 A scene charming enough to quicken even Leslie May's 
 pulses. 
 
 Nellie waited for no formal introduction. Impulsively she 
 flew toward Pauline, exclaiming, " You are Victor's sister? " 
 ' ' And you are Miss Nellie May ? ' ' Pauline rejilied in a soft 
 glad voice, looking eagerly into Nellie's eyes, and reading there 
 such assurance of friendly good will, as to prompt her to meet 
 half-way the proffered kiss and embrace. 
 
 There had been other eyes besides those of Leslie May to 
 watch the meeting of the young gii'ls. Victor, when he saw 
 the cordial welcome of each to each, breathed a sigh of deep 
 joy. He felt as if the dawn of friendship, rose-tinting the 
 horizon of the maidens, had for him, too, a ray of brightness, — 
 and of promise. 
 
MAGNETISM — BEPELLANT AND ATTRACTIONAL. 409 
 
 Youug Auf clem Busch was likewise affected. Not with 
 pleasure wholly unalloyed ; for his self-comi)lacency was dis- 
 turbed. He had in his own mind set down the Southern belle 
 as a much spoiled pet of society, and concluded that it would 
 be the proper thing for him to ignore her so far as he might 
 without downriglit rudeness. On witnessing the strong attrac- 
 tion that drew the young girls toward each other, and noting the 
 exquisite play of her features, whose beauty was not at all 
 marred by their intellectual expression, a vague apprehension 
 dawned upon him, that it might be difficult to carry out 
 his program, if she should take it into her head not to be 
 ignored. But relying on his superior tact, he resolved to 
 let her see, that he, too, had seen the world, and that he knew 
 how^ to keep arrogance within proper bounds. But for some 
 reason unaccountable to him he found his thoughts dwelliuof 
 on the ridiculous proposition, how he would take it to be 
 ignored by her. 
 
 The introduction of the Washington guests to the gentlemen 
 of the Philosophical Society took place in the parlor. Among 
 the latter was Doctor Taylor, with whom the young Mays had 
 become acquainted at Venice, during their European tour. 
 Doctor Taylor was a man of rather slender build, tall, and of 
 comely appearance. His complexion, contrasting with his 
 luxuriant, densely black hair, seemed fairer than it was. A 
 mustache, sparse, but as dark in hue as the hair of his head, 
 added piquancy to his frank ingenuous countenance, the pre- 
 dominant expression of which was that of calm serenity. His 
 eyes, deep set, not large, snapped and sparkled with infectious 
 mirth on slightest provocation of fun or humor, for the detec- 
 tion of the slightest trace of which he possessed a keen sense. 
 This quahty, which Miss May had not been slow to discover, 
 as well as the zest with which he enjoyed a joke, which he in- 
 variably emphasized with Homeric laughter that never failed to 
 carry his auditors with him, had led both the brother and sister 
 during theu" sojourn in the city on the Adriatic, to cultivate 
 his acquaintance. 
 
410 THE BE BE U 8 DAUGHTER. 
 
 Nellie, in particular, was pleased to meet with him again. 
 " I am so glad to see you here," she said, on shaking hands 
 with him. " Do you live here? You never told us, that you 
 were from our own State, when we met in Venice." 
 
 " No," said Doctor Taylor, evidently pleased by her words. 
 "I have not lived here long. — So, you remember me, do 
 you? " 
 
 " Indeed, sir, I should be ashamed of myself , if I did not," 
 said Miss May with some emphasis. 
 
 " 1 am very glad of it. This meeting with you is such an 
 unexpected, agreeable surprise." 
 
 " Ah, I am sure I shall never forget how deeply we are in- 
 debted to you for the pleasant days we spent in Italy," said 
 Nellie. " But for the highly interesting criticisms with which 
 you favored us, we should have come away from that classic 
 land without seeing, or, having seen, without understanding, a 
 tithe of the literary and art treasures which you so kindly 
 taught us to see, with the mental as Avell as the i)hysical eye. 
 You made so clear to us — to me, at least the world-historical 
 significance of what I would otherwise have passed by as com- 
 monplace or unmeaning. Do you recall the time we met you 
 at the Grand Square of St. Mark's, when we spent the time, — 
 all that was at my disposal — in the Great Council Chamber of 
 the Ducal Palace one day, examining the manuscripts and pic- 
 tures of the St. Mark's Library, and how we listened — oh, 
 for an hour or more — to your fascinating talk on Art, sug- 
 gested by our inquiries touching Tintoretto's great painting of 
 ' The Paradise? ' " 
 
 " I remember," said the doctor, breaking into a peal of 
 merry laughter; and then added: " And I remember, how my 
 eloquence drove you away from the PJazzo Ducale; how, in- 
 terrupting me with a lame excuse, in the middle of a linely 
 worded sentence, you made your escape, rushing down the 
 Giant's Stairway in a headlong run, colliding with, and nearly 
 upsetting your own clumsy gondolier, who stood there, waiting 
 for you." 
 
MAGNETISM — REPELLANT AND ATTIiACTIONAL. 411 
 
 " Yes," Nellie admitted with a smile. " We had planned an 
 excursion that day for Trieste, and came very near missing 
 the steamer, notwithstanding our hasty and undignified retreat. 
 And so I missed the sight of the Bridge of Sighs, and of more 
 than half of the wonderful things marked down in our guide 
 book as being crowded together there." 
 
 " And, Doctor," put in Leslie, who had been attracted by the 
 laughter, and had heard the latter part of the conversation, 
 " we might as well have given up that trip to Trieste, for all 
 the pleasure or profit we had of it." 
 
 " Why? " queried the doctor. '• Was it so dreary an 
 affair?" 
 
 "Stupid," said Leslie. "If I had not, fortunately, had 
 the copy of your ' Epigrammatic Voyage ' with me, which you 
 had so kindly placed at my disposal, I don't know how I should 
 have passed the time. And Sis, here, fared not much better." 
 
 ' ' And so you had a stupid time of it with my ' Epigram- 
 matic Voyage,' did you? " asked the doctor, with a grin. 
 
 " On the contrary," said Leslie, " I got so interested in 
 trying to find out what your verses meant, that I forgot the 
 dullness of the company." 
 
 " Not on the homoeopathic principle, I hope? " And after 
 another peal of laughter the doctor added : "So my epigrams 
 were conundi'ums to you, were they? " 
 
 " That is what you meant them for, did j^ou not? " asked 
 Leslie in his turn, with a quizzical look at the doctor. 
 
 " Why — what makes you think that I meant the epigrams 
 for conundrums? " 
 
 "Because you say, or rather you have one of the epigrams 
 to say : 
 
 ' Voyager, I cannot say I am modest, because I am modest ; 
 If I could tell what I am, thou wouldst love me no more.' 
 
 This epigram cannot tell what it is, for fear of becoming 
 prosaically plain ; therefore the reader must guess. That is 
 your purpose, is it not? " 
 
412 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 A renewed burst of laughter was all the answer Leslie got. 
 Then, turning to Miss May, he asked her, whether she, too, 
 had taken a hand at riddle-guessing. 
 
 " I like your closing verses best," the young lady replied, 
 " and they are not riddles. At least to me they are word- 
 paintings that tell their story very eloquently." 
 
 Doctor Taylor regarded the fair speaker with a pleased and 
 eager face. "Word-paintings?" he repeated. "What do 
 you mean? What did the picture say to you? " 
 
 " It seemed to open up before me a mythological landscape, 
 crowded with temples and statues of gods and goddesses 
 taking on Homeric life. The columns, of the temples dance, 
 like a chorus of dazzling Greek maidens, beckoning the wan- 
 derer from the other side of the world to enter and behold the 
 Goddess, combining with the wisdom of age the beauty of 
 youth, filling the heart of her worshipers with classic joy." 
 
 " Go on ! " the doctor cried, as the lady paused. 
 
 She continued : " The picture brought to mind the delightful 
 talks you had given us on the construction and meaning of 
 great art works, so that I enjoyed over again the pleasure of 
 your company, almost as if you had been personally present." 
 
 The doctor's eager, hungry eyes, fixed in a keen gaze on the 
 lovely face before him, said, more emphatically than the words 
 he had just spoken, that he longed for her to "go on." But 
 Nellie had caught a glimpse of Pauline, out in the garden all 
 by herself, and obej^ed a sudden impulse to join her. Offering 
 a brief apology, she left him ; and as she glided out of the 
 room, his gaze followed her with a wistfulness that even the 
 Greek maidens of his own Epigrammatic Voyage would hardly 
 have called forth. 
 
 The early frosts of October had ruthlessly stripped the gai'- 
 den of its softer floral wealth, leaving only the hardiest autumn 
 blossoms to brighten the lovely Indian Summer days that fol- 
 lowed. Among these Pauline was busy, cutting what flowers 
 she found, when Nellie approached her. 
 
MAGNETISM— BEPELLANT AND ATTEACTIONAL. 413 
 
 " Do you propose to get flowers enough out of this garden, 
 at this time of the ,year, for a presentable nosegay? " she 
 asked, as she watched Pauline's deft fingers snipping away 
 among the chrysanthemum stalks with a pair of scissors. " I 
 would say, you will find hardly enough flowers for buttonhole 
 bouquets to go round among your gentlemen guests." 
 
 " Oh, yes," Pauline replied, smiling and blushing at sight 
 of Leslie's sister. " You underrate the capacity of our garden. 
 There are blossoms enough here, spared by the nipping frost, 
 for several hundred buttonhole bouquets. But my purpose is 
 a little more ambitious. I wish to fill a vase or two with 
 flowers for the table. Will you help me? " 
 
 " If you will let me," said Xellie, with alacrity. " But 1 
 have no scissors. Shall I run into the house and get a pair? " 
 
 " Take these, if you please, and cut as many crysanthemums 
 as you may find with long, straight stems. Meanwhile I will 
 try to find some asparagus ferns, if the frost has left any 
 uuinjured." 
 
 Nellie, like all her fair sisters, was fond of flowers. When 
 Pauline returned, with quite a handful of the desired ferns, 
 she showed her a formidable collection of perfect blossoms, in- 
 cluding, besides the chi'ysanthemums of various shades of color, 
 salvias of dazzling scarlet, and a few chalices of deep blue ; 
 besides dahlias of exquisite hues, and a number of gaudy Ian- 
 tanas. " What do you say to this? " she exclaimed, holding 
 out her floral treasures for Pauline's inspection, with a trium- 
 phant smile. Where are the vases? Let us fill them out 
 here." 
 
 Pauline turned toward a little pavilion. "In here, if 3'ou ' 
 please. The vases are on the table." 
 
 The filling in of the flowers occupied the girls but a short 
 time. Yet they produced a couple of bouquets, that without 
 too great a stretch of laudation might be designated as works 
 of art. Beautiful, both. Yet so different in construction and 
 effect, as to astonish the young artists themselves, perhaps 
 most of all'. That they complimented one another on their 
 
414 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 respective successes, was but natural, characteristic, however, 
 was the sincerity with which either ascribed to the other the 
 superior skill. Nellie had chosen the brightest blossoms at 
 her command and combined them with such consummate taste as 
 to produce an exquisite effect in the contrast and harmony of 
 colors. Pauline had paid more attention to the contour of the 
 material employed, building up her floral structure with the 
 eye of an architect rather than that of a painter, pleasing 
 less by brilliance of color than by the grace and symmetry of 
 outline. 
 
 "Oh, what an exquisite picture you have composed! " 
 Pauline exclaimed. " If I had not seen you do it, it would be 
 hard for me to believe that so brilliant an effect can be pro- 
 duced with such common flowers. I could not equal it^ 
 beauty with a hot-house full of exotics at my disposal." 
 
 " Ah, but where in my bouquet is the charm of symmetr}-, 
 the elegance of pose, if 3'ou won't laugh at the expression, of 
 every blade of grass and leaf of fern that makes of yours a 
 clief-cVoeuvre? " Nellie's face shone in such genuine admira- 
 tion, as she spoke these words, as to put their sincerity out of 
 doubt. "But, never mind!" she added. "The two to- 
 gether will complement one another, and thus keep each other 
 in countenance, if you put them on the same table. And 
 together they will proclaim the floral wealth of your garden, 
 and the taste of its mistress ! " 
 
 " And the skill of Miss May! " added Pauline with an an- 
 swering smile. " Your composition suggests the luxuriance 
 of a Jiright June morning bathing his blooming treasures in the 
 mellow sunlight of a serene autumn day — " 
 
 " Do not, please, cast about for complimentary phrases," 
 Nellie interrupted her. "They put me in mind of the con- 
 ventional taffy they expect us to feed on in fashionable society. 
 And I hate shams — " 
 
 ' ' Meaning flattery ? ' ' 
 
 " Meaning flattery, most decidedly! " 
 
 " Therein, then, we quite agree," said Pauline. " The 
 
MAGNETISM— REPELLANT AND ATTRACTIONAL. 415 
 
 only trouble is, to detect it; for its iusidious charm so easily 
 cheats our judgment. Decius, you know, says of Citsar 
 
 ' But when I tell him he hates flatterers, 
 He says he does, being then most flattered.' " 
 
 "Then let us drOp compliments, and speak rational^, like 
 the good friends we are going to be," Nellie suggested. 
 
 " With all my heart," responded Pauline promptly, a flush 
 of pleasure coloring her cheek. " And since it is the office of 
 a friend to speak the truth, whereat the friend's friend must 
 not take offense, let me remind you, that it was you that set 
 the example of paying compliments — ' ' 
 
 " While you, I suppose you want me to believe, spoke the 
 unadorned truth," Nellie broke in with her silvery laugh. 
 " Well, for the sake of peace, let us pretend that all we said 
 to one another is true." She was playfully arranging some of 
 the flowers remaining after filling the vases, into pretty little 
 bunches, as she added: " Would you mind telling me some- 
 thing of the philosophers we are to meet at table ? Doctor 
 Taylor, for instance ; do you know him well? " 
 
 Pauhne followed the example of her guest in working up the 
 flowers into tiny bouquets. It was not long before a number 
 of the dainty posies lay before the young girls. " I am very 
 slightly acquainted with Doctor Taylor," she said ; " but my 
 brother Victor thinks highly of him." 
 
 " Your brother thinks highly of every one, does he not? " 
 
 Pauline cast a searching glance at her questioner, as if to 
 make sure of her sincerity. " Of every one that commands 
 his respect," she answered. " He entertains a very high opin- 
 ion of the gentlemen of the Philosophical Society ; Mr. Taylor, 
 in particular, he esteems not only as a philosopher, but also as 
 a poet of high power." 
 
 " Poet ! " Nellie repeated, musing. " Yes ; that must be it. 
 None but a poet could so fascinatingly discourse on subjects 
 that were usually dull and indifferent to me. Why, he held 
 brother Leslie and me spellbound, one day at Venice, explain- 
 
416 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 iiig to us what art meant. He made me forget and nearly miss 
 an engagement I had that day, and ever since then I thought 
 more highly of art, and of artists." 
 
 Pauline regarded Nellie with a shy little glance, as she asked : 
 " Mr. May — I mean your brother — shares j^our admiration 
 of Mr. Taylor as a poet, does he not? " 
 
 " What makes you think so? " 
 
 Pauline as she answered, was very busy, taking extraordi- 
 nary pains about the flowers she was tying, so that she could not 
 look at her companion. " I heard him say something of the 
 kind. He seemed to be much pleased with something the doctor 
 had written, and which he repeated to me." 
 
 " That is great news," said Nellie. " I never knew Leslie 
 to take interest in any kind of poetry. At least not in lyric 
 poetry. Was it something in the lyrical line he quoted to 
 you ? ' ' 
 
 Although Nellie's look and voice betrayed no interest save 
 that of innocent curiosity, still the delicate pink on Pauline's 
 cheek deepened preceptibly as she made answer : "I cannot 
 tell exactly. Perhaps it was didactic. It was in praise of 
 modesty." 
 
 " Ah ! in praise of modesty ! " Nellie repeated with perfectly 
 sober mien. "Yes; it must have been didactic, if brother 
 Leslie took enough interest in it to remember it. It must have 
 been one of the epigrams that he admires as conundrums." 
 
 Pauline, still concentrating her attention on the posy she was 
 so assiduously at work on, said nothing. After a brief pause, 
 Nellie went on : 
 
 " So this is all that you know about Doctor Taylor? — Well, 
 who is that benevolent looking gentleman that wears blue 
 glasses? He was introduced to me as Professor Something — 
 I have forgotten his name — ' ' 
 
 " Rauhenfels ? " Pauline suggested. " But he does not wear 
 glasses." 
 
 " No! " was Nellie's prompt response. " Nor is benevo- 
 lence a salient feature of his physiognomy. I shall never for- 
 
MAGNETISM — BETELL ANT AND ATTBACTIONAL, 417 
 
 gt't tlic expii'ssion oi his Jacc wlu'ii he was iutrochiccHl to mo. 
 It wiis tliat ol' a liawk on the h>okout for pre v." 
 
 PauHiie smiled. '' You are severe," she said. '• There is, 
 it must l)e granted, something eagle-like in his face, when seen 
 in i)rolile ; but when, i)artieularly under excitement over some 
 ])ernieious error, or public wrong, he utters withering sarcasms 
 and lierce denunciations in his powerful, deep voice, he puts 
 me in mind of an ancient Hebrew seer proclaiming the divine 
 wrath of Jehovah." 
 
 " Ah, PauUne, I suspect that you, like your brother Victor, 
 are given to idealizing people. He is of a lively imagination, 
 and seizes upon and exaggerates all the plausible traits 
 he finds or invents — charitably ignoring even grave defects — 
 in those with whom he comes in contact. But the gentleman 
 aliout whom 1 am asking you — ah, now I remember. Professor 
 Altrue is what they call him — has a round, fair face, a massive 
 forehead, and a mouth of almost feminine sweetness. I did 
 not catch the color of his eyes behind his glasses, but they 
 must be blue, to harmonize with the expression of kind-hearted- 
 ness and intelligence beaming from his countenance." 
 
 '•O, of course, I know Professor Altrue," said Pauline, 
 looking np as if interested. " They mostly call him Domine, 
 or, in a playful way, Doctor Domine. Because," she added, 
 in answer to a questioning look of Nellie, '* he is looked up 
 to as a great authority on pedagogy." 
 
 ■■' A schoolmaster, is he? " 
 
 " Well, yes, you may call him a schoolmaster. He was 
 once the principal of a grammar school ; but now is at the 
 head of the school system of our city. Professor Rauhenfels 
 says that he has a national reputation as an organizer, and has 
 secured for our public schools the fame of being the best 
 organized in the United States. He is very proud of the 
 Domine, as being one of the very few of his disciples that has 
 really mastered Hegel's logic — whatever that means." 
 
 ''Disciples, did you say? Is Professor Rauhenfels also a 
 schoohnaster ? " 
 
418 THE REBEL'S DAUQHTEB. 
 
 " lu a seuse, yes. He is the leader of what my brother 
 calls the Philosophical Class." 
 
 " And is your brother a philosopher too? " 
 
 "Only a most devoted disciple," said Pauline, smiling. 
 "And he is thoroughly convinced that there is not a pro- 
 founder thinker in all the State, than Professor Raahenfels, or 
 a more competent teacher." 
 
 " Cease to laud this paragon of wisdom in my presence, or 
 I shall hate him!" said Nellie, frowning. "Indeed, I hate 
 him as it is." 
 
 " How can you hate one of whom you know little or noth- 
 ing? " Pauline asked, looking a little surprised. 
 
 "It is a woman's privilege, don't you know, to love and 
 hate without reason or rhyme," Nellie ansAfered, smiling, as if 
 she enjoyed Pauline's wonderment at such levity* "But I 
 may know more about this Rauhenfels than you imagine. 
 Never mind now. — That line looking young man, Mr. Auf dem 
 Busch Junior, — he is your cousin, is he not? " 
 
 " A very distant cousin, so far as blood relationshiii goes." 
 
 "So far as blood relationship goes, — I see," remarked 
 Nellie, with a meaning smile that embarrassed Pauline. " Is 
 he a philosopher, too? " 
 
 "Not of the Hegelian kind, at least," smiling. "He 
 sympathizes with you in hating Professor Rauhenfels, whom he 
 calls a Mephistopheles." 
 
 " How came he to call him Mephistopheles? " 
 
 " Oh, brother Victor, one day, remarked of the philosophy 
 class, that some of its members reminded him of the Olympian 
 Gods, ascribing to the Domine the attributes of blue-eyed 
 Athene, to Doctor Taylor those of the song-dispensing, sun- 
 light-shedding Apollo, and to Professor Rauhenfels the 
 majesty of thunder-voiced Jupiter, when cousin Woldemar 
 interrupted him, saying that he was cheating the devil of 
 his due, for that Rauhenfels was as complete a Mephistopheles 
 as Gothe had in mind when he wrote his Faust." 
 
 "Good for your cousin! " said Nellie. "He shall have 
 

 ' But what are we goiug to do with these bouquets :■ " 
 
MAGNETISM — BEPELLANT AND ATTBACTIONAL 419 
 
 ouc of my li nest posies for that. Mepliisto ! That describes 
 him better thau hawk ! ' ' 
 
 " But it is time that I should be thinking of the table," said 
 Pauline. " Would you mind carrying one of the vases? " 
 
 " With the greatest pleasure. But what are we going to do 
 with these bouquets ? ' ' 
 
 " They are to be utilized in giving the table a cheerful ap- 
 pearance. Each one of the guests is to have one tucked in his 
 napkin." 
 
 " Here is a little beauty that I mean to pin on your uncle's 
 coat-lapel," said Nellie. " I owe him an acknowledgment for 
 his courtesy in letting me drive his glorious team." 
 
 " That will please him greatly," Pauline remarked. " You 
 must have made a very favorable impression on him, if he 
 intrusted you with the reins while he was by." 
 
 "And one for your cousin — Woldemar, is it? What a 
 fine name ! — for the smart thing he said of Eauhenfels. And 
 your brother Victor shall have one, for old acquaintance' sake. 
 I am quite sure that he will be proud to wear a flower that I 
 gave him, don't you think? " 
 
 " But if you thus decorate the gentlemen of the house, it 
 will be a slight to our guests, unless we remember them the 
 same way." 
 
 " Well, you may honor my father if you will," said Nellie, 
 smiling pleasantly. " And if Leslie has behaved i^roperly, you 
 may put one in his buttonhole. As to the philosophers, we 
 will go snacks in supplying them with floral favors. It looks 
 as if there were enough to go round." 
 
XXVII. 
 
 PHILOSOPHERS AT TEA. 
 
 'HE meal passed off pleasantly. The distribution, by the 
 yonng ladies, of the pretty posies, had put the gentle- 
 men in good humor, and started the conversation in 
 merry mood. Like a babbling brooklet the stream of talk 
 flowed on, — smoothly now, now breaking into purling ripples 
 of sparkling repartee ; not deep, but gliding briskly over the 
 well-worn pebbles of generalities, moving over such topics as 
 educed from each guest some jjleasant remark. Doctor Taylor, 
 for instance, said something pretty about the atfinity lietween 
 the bloom of flowers and the bloom of the maidens dispensing 
 tliem ; Professor Rauhenfels indulged in some i)unning on the 
 names of May and Waldhorst, which latter he explained as 
 meaning a nest in the forest ; he was in turn corrected by 
 Professor Altrue, who asserted that the word " horst " meant 
 not a nest, but the place where birds of prey build their nests, 
 the exact equivalent of our " aerie," or, as the word is spelled 
 in our editions of Shakespear, " eyry." Then Woldemar Auf 
 dem Busch had his fling at Professor Rauhenfels, wherein he 
 was seconded by Miss May, who said some sharp things about 
 German names, but was glad, in the end, that the professor's 
 barbed shafts of cutting retort were aimed rather at the young 
 merchant than at her. Pauline spoke but little. By a judicious 
 remark, now and then, she suggested a i)leasant subject, u])on 
 which otliers dilated. Colonel May noted, with silent approval, 
 the unpretending efficiency with wliich she assisted the hostess. 
 Both he and Mrs. May were highly amused by the curioiis 
 English in which Auf dem Busch Senior served up the few 
 remarks in which he indulged, — furnishing to the lady proof 
 indul»itable of the correctness of her estimate of his low origin. 
 (420) 
 
rillLOSOPllEES AT TEA. 421 
 
 But a remark made by the host himself presently turued the 
 conversation into a deeper channel . ' ' Go you straightway 
 home from herewith your madam and daughter," he inquired. 
 ' ^ or go you first to the State capital ? ' ' 
 
 " Our route home passes very closely by tlu- cnfjitnl, so thai 
 we shall not lose much time by a visit there," was thf 
 colonel's answer. " I shall be detained a few days in the 
 city; but then Ave shall start for home. If we find it necessary 
 on reaching the cajiital, we shall remain there until the 
 convening of the General Assembly. Otherwise I may take 
 the ladies home first, and then return to the capital." 
 
 '' But you will let me stay in .the capital, papa? " said Miss 
 May, in a tone that was at once precatory and confident. "• I 
 have never attended at a governor's reception yet, and thisjs 
 too good an opportunity to be neglected." Then, with a sly 
 look at Victor, she added: "'And I wish to have a dance 
 witli the Honorable Victor Waldhorst at the governor's rece[)- 
 tiou . ' ' 
 
 •' May 1 tai\e you at your word. Miss Nellie? " said \'irlor, 
 rtushing deeply. 
 
 '' Of course, Miss May will be at the governor's reception," 
 Professor Rauhenfels spoke up. '-I take it for granted, that 
 you wish to be elected to the United States Senate, Colonel 
 May; and even if it should not be your wish, you owe it to 
 these gentlemen here, most of whom have been pretty active 
 in your l)ehalf, to make the best race you know how. And 
 if you do not suspect it yourself, these gentlemen here — Mr. 
 Waldhorst not excepted — are satisfied, that ISIiss May's pres- 
 ence at the capital next week will put your election out of 
 doubt, whatever your chances otherwise may be." 
 
 "■ The professor has right, like always," Mr. Auf dem 
 Busch Senior proclaimed. ''If the colo-uell is prudent, then 
 Miss May shall be in the capital. The colo-uell's election is 
 may be sure ; but double-stitched holds better." 
 
 " Apropos of the election," said Woldemar, thereby cutting 
 off whatever reply might have been intended to Miss May's 
 
422 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 suggestion, " is the outlook quite so clear as the present com- 
 pany seem to wish? To me it seems, that Lincoln's election 
 has so complicated the slavery question, that political combina- 
 tions are uncertain." 
 
 " One thing, however, is certain," the colonel observed, 
 amid profound silence of the others. " If this Union is to be 
 preserved, as I devoutly hope and trust it shall be, it will be 
 upon condition that one-half of the people shall not be robbed 
 of their property by the other half." 
 
 " Robbed? " said Woldemar. " Is not that a stronger term 
 than you meant to use ? ' ' 
 
 " It is not too strong a term ! " Victor almost shouted in his 
 eagerness. " It is just the right term. If a lot of pharisaical 
 hypocrites should demand of you to turn loose your horses and 
 cattle, because they are God's creatures as well as you, — 
 would you do it? And if you were made to do it by force, 
 would not that be robbery ? ' ' 
 
 " Horses and cattle are not human beings," said Woldemar 
 confidently. " Nor is it proposed, so far as I understand, to 
 liberate the slaves by force, or at all." 
 
 " Call it liberation or not as you please," said Leslie May. 
 " You deprive us of our property, if you interfere with us in 
 its use. And mark me, sir, the South will not tamely submit 
 to such monstrous spoliation, as the abolition of slavery would 
 involve. If it be attempted under color of law, it will be such 
 law as the highwayman imposes upon his victim, with the knife 
 at his throat." 
 
 " The South will never yield to force ! " Nellie added, with 
 flashing eyes. "If it comes to that, the Yankees will find that 
 two can play at the game. I hope — no, I don't hope for war. 
 But if war ever comes, let the Y^ankees beware ! " 
 
 " Peace, children! " the colonel demanded. " Y"ou talk as 
 though it were proposed to fight. The dauger does not lie 
 there. There will be no fighting ; l)ut there may be disruption 
 of the countr\'. It is very clear, that if the abolitionists carry 
 out their fanatical program, the constitution will be violated — 
 
FHILOSOPHEBS AT TEA. 423 
 
 broken, in fact, — and what will there be then to hold the 
 country together? " 
 
 " There will be a new constitution," Doctor Taylor now 
 spoke. " Our i:)resent constitution seems too narrow for the 
 vigoi"Ous people to which we have grown. Our nation has 
 been expanding in every direction, — in territorial extent, in 
 population, in power and wealth, and, — may I add? — in 
 moral tone. But our constitution which fitted us very well 
 just after the Revolution, is now the same as it was then. 
 Fixed and rigid in its inflexible written form, it could not, like 
 for instance the British constitution, ffrow with the OTowth of 
 the nation — " 
 
 " You forget, sir, the chief characteristics of the American 
 constitution," the colonel thi'ew in, " which is precisely the 
 quality that your statement denies it, — its capacity to conform 
 to the changing views and needs of the people." 
 
 " By means of constitutional amendments, do you mean, 
 sir? " 
 
 "Exactly." 
 
 " But if what I say is true, — if the growth of the constitu- 
 tion has not kept pace with the growth of the people, then its 
 amendability has been of little avail, so far. Nor is the pros- 
 pect promising, that the slavery quarrel will be settled by that 
 means. Your son has just now stated, — and I believe that 
 he fairly voices the Southern sentiment in this particular — 
 that the South will not submit to what he calls — justly, let us 
 admit — being robbed of their slaves. Mr. Auf dem Busch — 
 the young man, I mean — incHnes to the view that the aboli- 
 tion of slavery is demanded by public opinion, at least by a 
 sufficient majority of the people to put it into the shape of a 
 law. Thus you will have a breach of the constitution : for 
 interference with the right of slaveholders in the States, in any 
 manner other than by an amendment of the constitution, is, I 
 take it, indubitably a breach of that instrument." 
 
 " I beg that you will not misunderstand my statement," 
 young Auf dem Busch protested. "■ I distinctly disavow any 
 
424 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 intention that Congress sluill interfere with slavery in the 
 States. I siin])ly desire that it shall be con lined to the States 
 in which it now exists." 
 
 "Well," said Victor, rather warmly, "do you not intend 
 thereby to eventually exterminate slavery? For, whether you 
 confess it or not, is it not i)erfectly evident, that your policy 
 will ])revent any new slave State from Ijeing added to the 
 Union? And do you not therel)y deprive those States, whose 
 interest requires the recognition of slavery, of their due share 
 of influence in the councils of the nation ? And will not that 
 lead to the abolition of slavery as inevitably as direct al)olition 
 would ? ' ' 
 
 '' It strikes me that my young friend has fairly and accurately 
 stated the case," Colonel May remarked. " Whether it l>e the 
 conscious policy of the free soil party to enhance the prosperity 
 of one section of the country at the cost of the ruin and beg- 
 gary of the prosperous citizens of the other, or not, — tliat is 
 certainly the prospect before us, if Lincoln should side with 
 the radical wing of the party that elected him. I am happy to 
 say, that I do not believe he will." 
 
 " There is an element of profound truth in what our friend, 
 Doctor Taylor, has suggested, that deserves, 1 l)elieve, closer 
 attention." 
 
 It was Professor Altrue that spoke, in a low, melodious 
 voice, that, however, made itself distinctly heard. " He has 
 pointed out the impossibility that a written constitution should 
 acH'urately or truly represent the consciousness of a nation. 
 Sir, I dare say, that if you will abstract from the political 
 bearing of the question, you will readily see that this constitu- 
 tion, which you, very properly, so strongly defend as the safe- 
 guard of your rights, does not reflect the conviction which you 
 yourself entertain on the morality of slavery." 
 
 '' Whether I see this or not, you will readily grant me," 
 said the colonel, " that an individual cannot be i^ermitted 
 to set up his own opinion as the standard of right and 
 wrong:," 
 
rillLOSOPHEBS AT TEA. 425 
 
 " Clearly not for others," Professor Altrue asseuted. 
 " Else no one's rigUts foiild be protected — " 
 
 "Then," the colonel interrupted, "let me say, that the 
 constitution is good enough for me, and that I do not propose 
 to sit in judgment on its morality." 
 
 "• That is a thing that you cannot help doing, sir," said the 
 Domine amid the breatldess attention of the others. '■ For 
 while your own opinion has no binding force for others, it is 
 the voice of God to yourself, and this very constitution that 
 you set up as your standard demands of you that you judge it 
 by that divine criterion." 
 
 " Wliy must I judge it at all? " 
 
 " By judging I do not mean, necessarily condemning. But 
 you do decide (for yourself, and so far as your influence goes) 
 whether the constitution adequately performs its functions. 
 The humblest citizen does this every time he performs his 
 duty at the polls : how much more yourself, who are called on, 
 as an illustrious statesman, to guide the ship of State. You 
 certainly know it to be your duty to actively assist in amend- 
 ing the constitution so as to purify it from any defect that has 
 become api)arent to you. Is not that a judgment against 
 its adequacy ? Or you may opi^ose any suggested amendment, 
 or simply remain inactive. Is not that a judgment in its favor? 
 In this way every human being that owes allegiance to our 
 government continually passes judgment on the sutliciency of 
 the constitution." 
 
 " And in doing so," Doctor Taylor interjected, " they have 
 no higher criterion than their conscience." 
 
 " Precisely," the Domine assented. " Now, what I wished 
 to comment on is, as Doctor Taylor happily pointed out, the 
 necessarily unequal development of the people and their con- 
 stitution. Grant that a law, when enacted, represents the 
 clear judgment of a majority of the people. That is the theory 
 upon which we recognize its binding validity. To-morrow, 
 changing circumstances, or it might be, the riper judgment of 
 the people, may have changed the views of some of them, so that 
 
426 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 the law no longer represents, the opinion of the majorit3^ Such 
 changes are of daily 'Occurrence ; and it is obvious, that until 
 such law can be amended or repealed, there is a tension between 
 the will of the people and the law which, theoretically, ex- 
 presses it. Ordinarily, such amendment or repeal follows as 
 soon as this tension has made itself felt by the majority. But 
 how, when the amendment requires more than a majority? 
 Such substantially unanimous concurrence of opinion, for 
 instance, as is conditioned by a majority of two-thirds of each 
 House of Congress, to be ratified by a majority of everyone of 
 three-fourths of the State legislatures? It is evident, that a 
 determined minority — it may be of less than one-tenth of the 
 people — may defeat the will of the other nine-tenths, provided 
 that they constitute the majority in one more than one-fourth 
 of the States, though they be of the smallest. If the majority, 
 then, is as determined as the minority, the tension will be- 
 come so great, that a rupture, such as is dreaded by Colonel 
 May, would not be surprising ; nor, as Doctor Taylor sug- 
 gests, that a new constitution — even several new constitu- 
 tions — should result, if the old one, instead of being amended, 
 should be fractured by the tension." 
 
 " Which may God hinder! " the old merchant exclaimed. 
 " Professor Rauheufels, you have said us nothing over this 
 point. We might hear an opinion of you." 
 
 ' ' Why do you want another opinion ? ' ' the professor re- 
 sponded, looking around at all the company, and then address- 
 ing the host with an amiable face. " Opinions are cheap, and 
 worth about what they cost. Every man has, or ought to 
 have, one of his own, worth more to him, probably, than to 
 any one else. Does any one expect to change his opinion on 
 hearing some one else's? I can give a shrewd guess, that 
 Colonel May still wishes to preserve the Union, slavery and 
 all, although he may not be able to refute the argument of 
 Doctor Taylor that it is superannuated and needs overhauling ; 
 or the reasoning of our friend, the Domine, that written con- 
 stitutions are like a tightly fitting garment on a fast growing 
 
PHILOSOPHERS AT TEA. 427 
 
 youth, that must presently be rent asunder, unless replaced by 
 one of ampler dmiensions. And so, I suspect, our young 
 friend Auf dem Busch Avill still insist that it is the duty of a 
 Christian government to abolish slavery, although Mr, Wald- 
 liorst indignantly proves this to be highway-robbery, and 
 young Mr. May shows us that if it is done, it must be done 
 by sheer force, the which Miss May is equally sure, will be 
 met with like force." 
 
 "But will you not favor us with your views on the sub- 
 ject? " Colonel May inquired. " I will confess that I am very 
 eager to hear from you, after what Leslie has written and 
 spoken to me of your part in the election." 
 
 "Do, Professor," said the Domine. " I am sure the whole 
 company are anxious to hear your views." 
 
 There was general assent to this statement. 
 
 "My views as to what?" said the professor. "Do you 
 wish to know, why I am in favor of Colonel May for the 
 United States Senate? I will tell you : Because, by his course 
 in Congress, he has given ample proof of his devotion to the 
 American principle, — which demands Liberty through Law, 
 and Law in Liberty. He knows, that there can be no liberty 
 without law% and therefore demands the strict and literal 
 compliance with our written constitution, as the only safe- 
 guard of our rights. And yet I agree with the Domine and 
 Doctor Taylor, that a written constitution does not grow with 
 the body politic, hke the bark of a tree, which expands as the 
 tree grows. But I see just in the tension which these gentle- 
 men emphasize, as a possible consequence of the fluctuation, 
 in public sentiment, the Magna Chartaof individual liberty, — 
 since it operates as a check upon the caprice of the people. 
 For no tyranny is more oppressive and galling than the des- 
 potism of unbridled majorities. Colonel May recognizes in the 
 conservative element of our government the sheet-anchor of 
 Freedom and Right. So do I. He has evaded the question 
 put to him by the Domine, as to his view on the morality of 
 slavery : I care not what it is ; under the present condition of 
 
428 TEE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 tilings it is of far greater importance to humanity, — to the 
 cause of freedom — that our government remain intact, than 
 that the normal condition of the slaves be changed. As 
 Doctor Taylor once neatly expressed it, — 
 
 ' 'Tis not the outward bond that makes the slave, — 
 But the base craven thought within the man.' 
 
 Slaves are such upon their own compliance. No freeman, 
 loving liberty above life or ease, was ever yet made a slave. 
 To the slave, then, manumission is of no benefit. The 
 vice of slavery consists in its degradation to the master, 
 because slavery is incompatible with his own freedom. Its 
 recognition in the constitution is a monstrous contradiction of 
 the principle of our government, and of the solemn declaration 
 upon which we achieved independence. In depriving a human 
 being of his liberty (for though this cannot be done with the 
 slave's consent, neither can it be done without the master's 
 act) he destroys the divine quality wherein man is the image 
 of (xod. This is the sin that will bring upon us retributive 
 punishment as surely as effect follows cause. But the forcible 
 abolition of shnxny would be no remedy : It would be a new 
 crime. Not only sinning against the constitutional rights of 
 the slave-owner, but adding the base perfidy of violating our 
 own solemn covenant. Colonel May, whether abhorring slav- 
 ery or not, abhors the treachery involved of robbing the South 
 of the property solemnly guaranteed to them by the constitu- 
 tion. To this extent he truty represents my political convic- 
 tion." 
 
 "It is your conviction, then, that slavery cannot be abol- 
 lished under the constitution?" This question was put by 
 Victor. 
 
 "Only by the spontaneous co-operation of the States," 
 the professor answered, with impressive emphasis. 
 
 "So! " said Woldemar Auf dem Busch, a perceptible touch 
 of sneering sarcasm in voice and mien. " That means, that 
 under the constitution human freedom is at a discount, — good 
 
PHILOSOPHERS AT TEA. 429 
 
 only for oue class, wicked in iinotUcr. How glorious the ' Ituid 
 of the free, and the home of the brave!' " 
 
 " That means," the professor repeated, closely imitating the 
 young man's sneering voice and manner, " that in this ' land of 
 the free and home of the brave ' neither covert theft nor open 
 robbery are reckoned, as yet, among the virtues to be culti- 
 vated." Then, laying down his knife and fork, and fixing his 
 opponent with a look of fierce contempt, he added, his voice 
 pitched to the deepest bass, the impassioned earnestness of 
 which impressed his audience with the solemn gravity of the 
 subject: " Sir, you have probably studied Mrs. Stowe's ' Uncle 
 Tom's Cabin,' and learned from her soul-stirring pictures of 
 Life among the Lowly how easily Eva St. Clair Avould have 
 settled this question that is agitating the country. Romantic 
 sentiment makes short work of problems, such as these, that 
 sorely try the wit of the anxious statesmen, philanthropists 
 and philosophers. It is so easy to follow the dictates of the 
 heart if you can only stifle the skeptical protests of the head, — 
 most easy to tliose w^ho are least oppressed with brains. What 
 a glorious task is that of the poet, or even of a poetess, or one 
 who is reckoned so, to divide mankind into two classes, — the 
 wMcked, who, like Shylock, stand on their bond, in this case 
 the constitution, and the pious, the good, w^ho insist that their 
 neighbors shall liberate their slaves, constitution or no consti- 
 tution — taking the latter to the place where little Eva and 
 Uncle Tom are supposed to have gone, while providing for the 
 former a warmer reception elsewhere. Is this, sir, what your 
 wisdom comes to ? Out upon such hypocritical cant ! Such 
 nursery-room morality, such St. Crispin virtue ! You will not 
 solve the eternal conflict between conscience and law by 
 imposing your conscience as law upon others. Liberate your 
 slaves, if you have any, and appease your conscience ; but let 
 your neighbor liberate or keep his, as his conscience may 
 demand. That, sir, is the law of the land. Let no one 
 violate it, pleading a higher law of God. Be warned by the 
 fate of Antigone: She obeyed what she felt to be the law 
 
430 
 
 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 written in her breast by tlie gods themselves in preference to 
 the king's decree, and perished, because Institutions are valid, 
 though individuals deem them cruel or absurd. So shall they 
 perish, who lay sacrilegious hands on the constitution, come 
 they from the North, or come they from the South! " 
 
 ^ 
 
 i^^^i^ 
 
 a 
 
 1^ 
 
 
 1 
 
 ^S 
 
 i 
 
 
 ^^^^^ 
 
XXVIII. 
 
 "THE DEMOS KRATEO PRINCIPLE." 
 
 ESLIE MAY did not share the confidence of his father 
 and sister in Victor's loyal adherence to the colonel's 
 cause. The speech of Professor Rauhenfels had con- 
 firmed him in the conviction, that neither the professor, nor 
 Victor, nor any of their friends,, would ever co-operate with 
 avowed secessionists. He himself thought secession to be 
 as efficient a plan as the South could adopt for the furtherance 
 of its own interests, and accordingly believed so much more 
 readily than did his father, that the threats in which the slave- 
 holding States were indulging, would be carried into execution. 
 That in case of actual disruption his father would not be able 
 to retain his seat in the Senate did not trouble his mind, nor 
 in any wise abate his strong desire for his father's election ; 
 for not only would his influence in such case be highly valu- 
 able in securing favorable terms of separation, but Leslie 
 reflected, his father's claim to preferment in the new govern- 
 ment would be projDortioued to the height of the place he gave 
 up in the old. Who could surmise, what distinction was not 
 in store for a patriotic Southerner, who threw up a United 
 States senatorship to serve the South ? — On the other hand he 
 was well pleased to note the zeal of Victor in vindicating the 
 constitutional rights of the South. And he noted with equal 
 satisfaction that his sister had taken a decided liking to 
 Pauline Waldhorst, and that she had adopted just the most 
 effectual course in her behavior toward the Auf dem Busch 
 family. 
 
 The political exposition of Professor Rauhenfels had taken a 
 load off of Victor's mind. His duty now lay plainly before 
 him : Obedience to the law of the land, unswerving fealty 
 
 (431) 
 
432 THE BEBEU8 DAUGHTEB. 
 
 to the cou.stitutioii, whatever might lie his eonvietion as to its 
 morality from the standpoint of his private conscience. How 
 happy the coincidence of duty with inclination ! He was now 
 in ])erfect accord with the Mays, — the father, the son, and — 
 how his heart leaped to think it ! — the daughter. Nellie had 
 been very gracious to him at his uncle's house. She had given 
 him a bouquet with a smile that was brighter than the flowers, 
 and had begged him to accept her gift — for old acquaintance' 
 sake. A firm friendship seemed forming between her and his 
 sister Pauline. And beside all this, he was to meet her at the 
 capital, under circumstances enabling him to approach her 
 more nearly upon her own social level. She had promised him 
 her first dance at the governor's reception ; and Victor grate- 
 fully remembered the persistency with which his sister had 
 coaxed him to take dancing lessons during the pi'eceding win- 
 ter. No wonder, then, that he revelled in blissful anticipation 
 of the moments when, while guiding her through the mazes of 
 the waltz, it would be his precious privilege to hold her hand, 
 ti) hold within his arm that divine form, — forgetting in his 
 rapture all about Kalph Payton I 
 
 The meeting of the General Assembly required the presence 
 of Victor Waldhorst at the State capital. He met there a 
 motley crowd of all sorts of people : Not to mention the mem- 
 Ijers of the legislature, of both houses, there were aspirants for 
 the United States Senate, their agents, friends and understrap- 
 pers. Candidates for the various clerkships in either House of 
 the Assembly, their friends and backers. Applicants for 
 smaller places, such as door-keepers, sergeants-at-arms, fold- 
 ers, pages, and what not. Mr. Becker was there, to Victor's 
 disgust, who had vainly hoped to keep him at home by repre- 
 senting to him the necessity of looking after the interests of the 
 Beohacliter during the absence of its regular editor. But Mr. 
 Becker was convinced that the paper would be best subserved 
 by securing the appointment as State printer, and his chances 
 for this would be improved ]\v his own presence at the cai)ital, 
 
''THE DEMOS KEATEO PIUNCIPLE.'" 433 
 
 with his friends, to explain to the members how the welfare of 
 the State would be greatly enhanced l)y his appointment. 
 Numerous other patriots were there, ready to serve the country 
 by accepting place in whatever capacity they should be called 
 on. Disinterested statesmen, also, in great numbers, ready to 
 lighten the labors of the members in the arduous task of law- 
 making, having brought with them carpet-bags full of bills 
 ready drafted, — embryonic laws for the advantage and profit 
 of scheming adventurers, corporations, rings and syndicates. 
 Men among these lobbyists of highest ability, whose services 
 commanded a higher price than the State could afford, or was 
 wiUing to pay its officers without indirection: Plausible men, 
 skilled in the use of logic, enabling them to convince skeptical 
 legislators of the wisdom of measures of hidden import ; orators 
 of rhetorical powers to persuade the superficial and enthuse the 
 emotional ; of honeyed phrases to entrap the vain and conceited 
 with gross or covert flattery. Others, too — of smaller calibre, 
 yet able, on occasion, to eke out an argument with glittering 
 sophisms, for want of solid reasons ; smaller fry of smaller pre- 
 tensions (to be had, therefore, at smaller price) who retailed the 
 pettifoggers' and shysters' tricks, — not afraid to lie, or if need 
 were, — to swear to a lie, in the real or imaginary interest of 
 those who paid them. Not to forget those, who were enabled to 
 reinforce their eloquence by bribes in the most varied shapes, — 
 seductive smiles of wily Cyprians, dispensing favors at the 
 beck of those fishing for big game, whose plethoric purses 
 allow them the use of such costly bait ; promises of prefer- 
 ment, influence, patronage ; by the furthering of schemes 
 known to constitute a member's hobby, or supposed to be so ; 
 and the more simple, but a little hazardous expedient of direct 
 payment of money, in sums proportioned to the virtue of the 
 members to be bribed, or the magnitude of the job to be 
 accomplished. Thus the population of the town was swelled 
 by a numerous lol)by, termed, in legislative slang, the Third 
 House, — more potent, probably, than either of the legitimate 
 houses, for effective legislation in special directions. 
 
434 THE BEBEVS DAUGHTER. 
 
 Professor Rauhenfels was there. IMueh to the surprise of 
 Victor ; for the professor had never even hinted an intention to 
 visit the capital. It was a surprise too, tliat he lodged in the 
 house' that Colonel May had selected for his headquarters. 
 Leslie was at some pains to exi)lain to Victor, that this court- 
 esy had been extended to the professor, because he had been 
 disappointed in obtaining suitable accommodations elsewhere. 
 But greater, far, than his surprise, was Victor's dehght over 
 the professor's i)resence in the capital ; for he anticipated valu- 
 able assistance from him in the discharge of his legislative 
 duties, and Leslie had informed him that he would remain until 
 the senatorial election was over. 
 
 Less unexpected but all the more unwelcome was the pres- 
 ence of Ralph Payton. To be sure, they had not offered him 
 lodgings at the colonel's headquarters, as they had done for 
 the professor ; but Victor doubted not but that, as the colonel's 
 successor in Congress he would be expected to be very active 
 in the colonel's canvass for the Senate, which would necessarily 
 require him to spend much of his time in the company of 
 Colonel May and his family. He knew, too, that Nellie was 
 quite as enthusiastic in her father's cause as her brother, and 
 would thus be thrown much in Payton 's company. The con- 
 templation of the opportunities that would thus be enjoyed by 
 his rival to press his suit for Nellie's hand embittered his life, 
 and clouded even the brightness of the anticipated enjoyment 
 of the dance that Nellie had promised him at the governor's 
 reception. 
 
 It was well for Victor that the 0})ening of the legislative 
 session just then distracted him from the morbid fancies tliat 
 disturbed his mental equilibrium. His lirst experience as a 
 legislator impressed him profoundly. The presiding officer 
 happened to be an able iiarliamentarian, of stately presence 
 and dignilied deportment. His voice possessed the rare com- 
 bination of musical sweetness with resonant power, so that it 
 reached without effort or shrillness, to the remotest parts of 
 the chamber, commanding attention although the members, in 
 
''THE DEMOS KRATEO PBINGIPLE.'" 435 
 
 tui'buk'nt mood, ong'aged in noise and confusion. Victor 
 would never forget the thrill of solemnity, — akin to awe — 
 that electrified him on first hearing the speaker address him 
 as one of the representatives of the sovereign people. 
 
 To his vivid imagination the speaker appeared the eml)od- 
 ied spirit of the State constitution, giving voice to the will 
 of the people in their sovereign majesty, — while he himself, 
 in casting his vote, felt that the people were speaking their will 
 through his mouth. It was. a sublime moment to the young 
 legislator. 
 
 His glowing enthusiasm was toned down somewhat by the 
 shower of motions that followed the passage of the appropria- 
 tion bill. It was moved and resolved, that the sergeant-at- 
 arms supply each member, officer and employee of the House 
 with one hundred three-cent postage stamps, and a like num- 
 ber of two-cent stamps, to be paid for out of the contingent 
 fund of the House. Stationery, in liberal quantity, was voted 
 to each member and officer, including clerks of committees and 
 pages. Clerks were allowed to each standing committee, with 
 per diem and mileage equal to that of the members. Quite a 
 breezy debate sprang up on the motion, numerously seconded, 
 to authorize the sergeant-at-arms to order, for the use of each 
 member, during the session, three newsjjapers (named in the 
 resolution), to be paid for out of the contingent fund. Numer- 
 ous amendments were offered, substituting the names of other 
 papers. To Victor's disgust, Mr. Becker approached, de- 
 manding of him in all seriousness, to suggest the naming of 
 the Beobarhter as one of the papers to be ordered. Of course, 
 lie indignantly refused : but his indignation turned to disgust 
 on hearing a member from one of the interior counties making 
 the same demand for an insignificant little weekly of his 
 county, and a dozen or more similar motions from all sides of 
 the House. Victor wondered whetiier he was dreaming, or 
 whether the House was taking leave of its senses. 
 
 A similar grab-game came off in relation to the governor's 
 message. Motions to print it, " with the accompanying docu- 
 
436 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 nients " in fabulous numbers — five thousand, ten, fifteen, 
 twenty, fifty thousand — chased each other in swift succession. 
 Again Mr. Becker approached Victor, "suggesting, in energetic 
 whispers, that Victor move the printing of ten thousand copies 
 of the message — or say, since it was just as easy to carry, 
 twenty-five thousand — with the accompanying documents in 
 the German language. " The Deobachter will get the printing 
 just as sure as you ask for it," Mr. Becker urged, " and the 
 translation will be a fat job for you, or for some of your 
 friends, if you are too proud to do it yourself." But the 
 obtuse editor failed to see the good thing within his reach, and 
 Mr. Becker's little scheme fell through. And again Victor's 
 sense of honesty, as. well as decency, was shocked, by 
 the passage of a resolution authorizing the printing of ten 
 thousand copies of the message and accompanying documents 
 in the German language, by the State Printer ; and again he 
 owned to himself that his chief was not far wrong, when, with 
 a reproachful look, he grumbled: "We might have secured 
 that plum to ourselves, if you had only consented." 
 
 The inauguration of the governor-elect, which took place in 
 the presence of both branches of the legislature, assembled 
 for this purpose in the hall of the House of Representatives, 
 was witnessed by as many of the temporary and permanent 
 residents of the capital as the spacious chamber could hold. 
 A number of seats, elevated above the level of the floor, so as 
 to command a fair outlook over all the chamber, had been 
 reserved for the ladies, a bright bevy of whom, in elegant cos- 
 tume, were assembling in the lobl)y, affording, in the bright 
 colors of their robes and gaudy headdresses, a cheerful con- 
 trast to the soberly clad visitors of the male sex. Many an 
 eager glance strayed in the direction of their division of the 
 lobby, from the seats of members, — and not exclusively from 
 the rustics representing interior districts. For the capital had 
 turned out an array of beauty challenging the admiration of the 
 most fastidious critics. Victor's eyes, too, were bent in this 
 direction, with a wistful, expectant look. If any one had 
 
''THE DEMOS KRATEO PIIINCIPLE." 437 
 
 watched him at this time, it might have puzzled the observer 
 to aeeount for the swift changes of expression chasing each 
 other over Victor's face. Eager expectancy, vanishing for an 
 instant as Raljih Fayton stalked into the chamber, beneath the 
 shadow of sharp disappointment. This cloud passed away as 
 soon as he saw that Payton was alone ; a look of pleasant 
 anticipation took its place when Leslie May appeared at the 
 door, changing into an uneasy apprehension as the colonel fol- 
 lowed, also alone. But a tlash of exultant joy illumined his 
 whole countenance as Nellie entered, escorted by Professor 
 Rauhenfels. She took her seat with quiet dignity and looked 
 about her with the air of a queen graciously accepting the 
 homage that lay in the admiring glances she attracted from all 
 sides. As her eyes encountered those of Victor, she recognized 
 him with a gracious nod and pleasant smile, eliciting from him 
 a vivid blush and answering bow. 
 
 The maneuver did not, apparently, escape notice, for his 
 seat-neighbor to the right inquired of him, '' Do you know the 
 lady who has just taken her seat in the lobby? " 
 
 " I do," Victor answered proudly. " I have known her 
 from her childhood." 
 
 " Could you manage to give me an introduction? " asked his 
 neighbor to the left. 
 
 " With the greatest pleasure," said Victor, glad to find so 
 convenient an opportunity for conversation with the .young 
 lady. "She is the daughter of Colonel May, — one of the 
 candidates, you know, for the United States Senate. She 
 will, no doubt, be highly pleased to make your acquaint- 
 ance." 
 
 " And will you do the like favor for me? " asked the gen- 
 tleman who had first spoken. 
 
 " It will give me great pleasure to do so," said Victor, ris- 
 ing. " If you have no objection, gentlemen, we will call on 
 the young lady at once." 
 
 But just as they were about leaving their seats, Professor 
 Rauhenfels stepped up to Victor, saying, with an air of mock 
 
438 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 pomposity, " I am commissioned by her ladyship, Miss 
 Eleonova May, to summon you into her presence that you may 
 there give an account of yourself and your doings since your 
 arrival at the capital. And hereof you are in no wise to fail, 
 at your peril." 
 
 "It behooves her ladyship's loyal servitor to obey with 
 alacrity," said Victor, playfully imitating the professor's 
 solemn voice. " You will pardon me, gentlemen, for a few 
 moments?" he added, turning to his colleagues. "I will 
 return as soon as her ladyship has granted me absolution for 
 my offense, whatever that may be. But before I go, let me 
 introduce you to my friend. Professor Rauhenfels." And 
 after mentioning the names of the two members, he left them 
 together to talk over the topic uppermost, just now, in the 
 minds of most of the members of the legislature, — the senato- 
 rial election. 
 
 Nellie received Victor with a roguish pout. " Is this the 
 way you treat your friends? " she said, shaking her finger at 
 him. " Here you have been more than two days in the city, 
 and have never called on me. And I really believe that you 
 would not even now have deemed it worth your Avhile to walk 
 the distance from your seat to this lobby, if I had not sent 
 your old master after you with strict injunction to bring you 
 before me, dead or alive." The pout melted into a gracious 
 smile as she shook hands with him and i)ointed to a seat by her 
 side, which the professor had vacated. 
 
 " You see that the professor, Avho has proved a kind master 
 indeed, had no trouble to fetch me ; for here I am, and very 
 much alive at that," said Victor, with beaming face. " But 
 there was no occasion for the embassy ; I had already started 
 to pay you my compliments and inquire after your health, 
 when your message reached me." 
 
 " Truly? Then I am sorry that I sent away the professor." 
 
 " I hope, not sorry, — " 
 
 " Coming to think of it, no. You must keep that seat 
 awhile, and point out some of the lions here. Who, for 
 
"THE DEMOS KBATEO PRINCIPLE.'' 439 
 
 iustauce, is that gcntk'iuuii with whom the professor is tulkiiig 
 so busily, and that other one, listeuiiig so intently? " 
 
 "The three of us occupy adjoining seats in the House," 
 Victor informed lier. " He on the right is Mr. George 
 Wasliington Colly, of Pulaski ; the other, Mr. Lafayette 
 Jackson Morrow, of Newton." 
 
 "Do you know anything about them? Of what party are 
 they?" 
 
 "Oh, they are democrats to the core, both of them. Mr. 
 Colly is, so he tells me, a country merchant — " 
 
 " Married? " Nellie interrupted. 
 
 "He has not informed me; but I judge that he is 
 single." 
 
 ' ' Where does he room ? ' ' 
 
 "At the City Hotel— " 
 
 ' ' Where you also put up ? ' ' 
 
 " Exactly." 
 
 "How is he on the senatorial question? Is he safe for 
 pa ? ' ' 
 
 " I fear not," Victor answered soberly. " He is an enthu- 
 siastic admirer of our present senator, and I have found it 
 impossible to shake his loyalty to him." 
 
 " So! "mused Nellie, with her eyes on the group engaged 
 in earnest couTersation. " The professor seems to hold his 
 attention. And how about the other? " 
 
 " I have hopes of gaining over Mr. Morrow," said Victor; 
 " although he, too, has expressed a decided preference for 
 General Hart." 
 
 " Indeed ! " exclaimed Nellie thoughtfully. " Why do you 
 believe, that you can win over Mr. Morrow? " 
 
 " Oh, because he is a very fair-minded man, who seems to be 
 feeling his way cautiously," Victor answered confidently. " I 
 can argue with a man like him : and there is little danger that 
 Colonel INIay will fail to command the sup[)ort of any man open 
 to reason." 
 
 " Thank you," said Nellie, rewarding the young man's trib- 
 
440 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 ute to her father with a gracious smile. " Can you tell me 
 whether either of them came uuder instructions from their 
 constituents how to vote ? ' ' 
 
 Victor did not know. 
 
 "Then will you be so good," she continued, "to hunt up 
 brother Leslie — he is over there talking to the president of 
 the Senate — and get me the information from him ? He has 
 a list of all the counties that have instructed, and for whom. 
 And would you mind stepping up to the professor as you go, 
 and get him to introduce these gentlemen? " 
 
 " Pardon me," replied Victor, the " gentlemen lioth have my 
 promise to introduce them to you. Indeed, the professor in- 
 terrupted us as I was in the act of bringing them here. May 
 I do so now? 
 
 " By all means," said Nellie, apparently much pleased. 
 ' ' Bring them at once ! ' ' 
 
 As he was leaving her, she called him back, adding in a 
 whisper, " if they are still here when you return with the in- 
 formation about the instruction, just give it me by a nod or 
 shake of the head." 
 
 The introduction was speedily accomplished, and Victor 
 sought out Leslie. When he returned, he found Mr. Colly 
 seated in the chair beside Miss May, rising, however, to make 
 room for Victor, while Mr. Morrow was standing in front of 
 the lady, deep in conversation with her. When Victor ap- 
 peared, she accosted him with eager face. 
 
 " Just imagine, Mr. Waldhorst," she said, excitedly, as if 
 she were communicating the most joyful news, " I have discov- 
 ered a relative in Mr. Morrow. It turns out that his grand- 
 father was mama's own cousin." 
 
 Just then the gavel of the president of the Senate, who was 
 presiding over the joint session together with the speaker of 
 the House of Representatives, called the meeting to order, and 
 Mr. Colly, as well as Mr. Morrow, hurried off to their seats. 
 As they took their leave of Miss May, she said to the latter, in 
 beseeching voice, " Be A^ery sure to call on mama, as soon as 
 
''THE DEMOS KRATEO rBINCITLE:' 441 
 
 ever you liiul the time, iiud do uot I'tiil to bring your Irieud Mr. 
 Colly, with you." 
 
 Which Mr. Morrow gladly promised. 
 
 The ceremony of the inauguration had begun. The retiring 
 governor had introduced his successor to the audience ; the 
 oath of office was administered l\v the chief justice of the 
 su})reme court, and the new governor was delivering his 
 inaugural. Victor, still standing by Nellie's side, was debating 
 with himself whether propriety would permit him to occupy 
 the chair next to hers, when the appearance of Professor Rau- 
 henfels settled the question for him. As he bowed himself 
 away, he heard the professor say to Xellie, that Senator Essex, 
 of Randolph, desired an introduction ; to which the young lady 
 nodded a gracious assent. 
 
 The governor spoke well. Victor was soon deeply inter- 
 ested in his speech. So, it seemed, was the whole audience ; 
 for profound silence prevailed throughout the hall, densely 
 crowded as it was. Victor noted, not without serious misgiv- 
 ings, the defiant attitude assumed by the speaker toward the 
 general government. An involuntary glance toward Nellie 
 and the professor showed him that both of them were also 
 listening with rapt attention, — one of them with evident 
 gratification, the other with knit brow. 
 
 At the conclusion of the address, there was clapping of 
 hands, stamping of feet, and rattling of canes, as well as loud 
 shouts of applause, followed by a lively buzzing and humming 
 of voices. Every one seemed to have something to say about 
 the course of action pointed out for the State by the governor's 
 address. Opinions, however, were clearly not unanimous, 
 although the governor's partisans seemed to predominate. 
 
 The hammer of the presiding officer fell after the declaration 
 that the meeting was adjourned ; but the masses were loth to 
 quit the hall. Victor naturally bent his eyes in the direction 
 of Nellie's seat. He beheld her the center of a numerous 
 group of admirers, of whom some had evidently just been, 
 while others were waiting to be, introduced ; for there was 
 
442 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Leslie, talking pleasantly to those al)oiit him, and there was 
 Ralph Pay ton, regarding the young lady, the cynosure of all 
 eyes, with a complacent air of proprietorship. Nellie herself, 
 though her eyes sparkled with animation, was cool and col- 
 lected, and nodded graciously as Pay ton presented this, or 
 Leslie that gentleman, having a bright smile and a pleasant 
 word for each. It put Victor, as he was slowly moving toward 
 the group, in mind of a sovereign lady, deigning to accept the 
 homage of her loyal courtiers. 
 
 A hush seemed suddenly to have fallen upon them. All 
 eyes turned in the direction from which Victor was approach- 
 ing. The gentlemen fell back on either side, thus opening an 
 avenue of approach toward the young lady. Looking around 
 for the cause of this commotion, Victor beheld, close behind 
 him. Colonel May, who was walking with deliberate step and 
 proud bearing toward his daughter, accompanied by General 
 Hart, United States senator, candidate for re-election, and 
 thus the rival of Colonel May. Victor had never seen a man 
 of more imposing appearance than Senator Hart. Tall and of 
 magnificent stature, proudly erect in bearing, of majestic, 
 commanding physiognomy, he presented a strong contrast to 
 Colonel May. The first impression of which Victor became 
 conscious, was that of awe, followed by a chilling sense of in- 
 feriority, which instinctively put him on his guard, as if appre- 
 hensive of tyrannical abuse of the colossal will-power evidenced 
 by that massive forehead. It afforded him quite welcome re- 
 lief to turn from the icy features of General Hart to the genial 
 face of Colonel May, illumined by the irresistible smile that 
 always warmed Victor's heart on beholding it. 
 
 The two gentlemen stood before Miss May. 
 
 " My daughter," said the colonel, " General Hart has done 
 you and me the distinguished honor of requesting an introduc- 
 tion. General Hart, my daughter, Eleonora." 
 
 The venerable senator bowed with courtly grace. " I am 
 indebted," he said, while taking the chair by Nellie's side, 
 " to my honorable adversary for this act of courtesy. For it 
 
The veuenible seiiutor bowed with courtly grace. 
 
''THE DEMOS KRATEO FRINCIPLE.'' 443 
 
 is indeed a pleasure to become acquainted witli you." His 
 voice, ricli, deep and melodious, possessed a singular fascina- 
 tion. As he spoke, his eyes rested on the bright young face 
 before him with an intensity that deepened the carmine on her 
 cheeks. 
 
 . " Sir, you are most kind," she said, " Let me assure you 
 that I, for my part, am deeply impressed with the honor that 
 you are conferring on me — on papa, I mean." 
 
 "Tut, tut! Don't mention it! " he replied, with gracious 
 condescension. " Your father is an aspirant for the high office 
 now held by me : and on this floor, on which Ave both appear 
 as candidates soliciting favor at the hands of the representa- 
 tives of the Demos, we are equals. And you were right in 
 ascribing, as you involuntarily did, to me, the desire of honor- 
 ing you. For I accord all honor to a daughter who bravely 
 does battle in her father's cause." 
 
 Again the color deepened on Miss May's cheeks. But there 
 was a sparkle of mischief in her eyes as she said: "Now, 
 Senator, your gallantry overwhelms me. You surely do not 
 take me for a politician? " 
 
 " If I did, young lady, you need not be ashamed — " 
 
 " No," she interrupted him. '^ But if I were a politician, I 
 ought to be doing battle in my country's, not my father's, 
 cause." 
 
 " Ah, my dear Miss May," the old senator continued, after 
 another searching glance into her face, "yours is an exalted 
 o])inion of politicians. It were well for our beloved country, 
 if they deserved the high compliment which your words imply. 
 For our government is based upon the principle Demos Krateo. 
 But they do not. The average politician thinks of country 
 last, and least, if at all." 
 
 "I hope, Senator, that you exaggerate! " exclaimed the 
 yoiing lady. 
 
 "I wish I did," the senator replied: "or that I could 
 truthfully Vtelieve 1 did." Tiie tinge of sadness with which he 
 had spoken these words, disappeared, as he added, almost 
 
444 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 playfully, '' But does it uot occur to you, that if you believe 
 your father to be in the right, as you surely do — " 
 
 "You judge me truly, Senator!" the lady promptly 
 assented. " I surely do." 
 
 " — that in serving your father, you are serving your 
 country? For at your age one does not doubt the final tri- 
 umph of right over wrong." Looking around at the group 
 surrounding them, he continued, "Yes, yes; I suspect that 
 you have been making sad havoc of my prospects for re- 
 election among my younger friends! " with a slight accent on 
 the latter adjective. 
 
 "Ah, Senator," came with a frank smile from the young 
 beauty, "I suspect that you permit your proverbial courtesy 
 to my sex to shape your statements, rather than regard for 
 strict accuracy, whereby you would humble me. You overrate 
 both my patriotism and my filial devotion. For — just 
 imagine my indolence — 1 have not asked one of these gen- 
 tlemen, though opportunity had offered, to vote for papa, or 
 even against you . ' ' 
 
 Colonel May chuckled. " You see," he said to General 
 Hart, " what a poor hand she is at electioneering." 
 
 But the general shook his head. A faint smile stole into his 
 austere countenance, not distinctly visible as such, but lighting 
 up his features into a pleasing exj^ression. " Qui s' excuse, 
 s' accuse!" he said as if in answer to the colonel's remark. 
 Then to the lady: "I did not accuse you of having asked 
 these or any gentlemen to vote for your excellent papa. I dare 
 say that your electioneering is of a much more subtle charac- 
 ter, than a mere clumsy, direct begging for votes would be. 
 I could wish, for my sake, that your influence were limited to 
 that. But a glance from your bright eyes, a smile from your 
 ruby lips, are weapons more dangerous to my cause than 
 political harangue or precatory prattle." 
 
 " Political harangue," said Nellie, with some animation, " is 
 as distasteful to me, I suppose, as it is to most ladies ; and 
 my precatory prattle, as you are pleased to style it, is, I will 
 
''THE DEMOS KB ATE PBINCIPLE.'" 445 
 
 vouch, of no greater force than a girl's gossip elsewhere. But 
 I hope, that our Southern statesmen and legislators are made 
 of sterner i^tuff, than could be moulded by a woman's whim." 
 Indicating witli a sweeping gesture of the hand the group of 
 men around her, she added proudly: " Of all these gentlemen 
 not one, I am sure, would betray his party, or become untrue 
 to his conviction, for my sake, or for the sake of my father." 
 
 "Nor for my sake, let us hope," added General Hart, the 
 severity of his features relaxing into a pronounced smile, 
 " unless he can do so conscientiously; and for a little strain 
 upon his conscience, I promise him absolution." Then, the 
 smile fading out of his face, he continued : " You have spoken 
 bravely and well, young lady, and like a consummate poli- 
 tician, though you disclaim being one. But men have before 
 now betrayed party and country, lured on to recklessness by a 
 woman's smile not more fascinating than yours can be. The 
 women of the South are enthusiastic, — their iutluence greater, 
 l)erhaps, than that of their brothers and lovers. If ever that 
 terrible scourge of humanity, civil war, engendered by rebellion 
 or secession, should devastate our fair land — which the 
 Almighty in His infinite mercy, may forefend — no small share 
 of the responsibility will fall on the women of the South." 
 
 " And of the glory, if God vindicate the right! " exclaimed 
 Nellie, not defiantly, but as if in self-defense. But the words 
 sent a cold chill to Victor's heart, nevertheless. 
 
 The senator bowed, as if he had nothing to say in reply, and 
 rose from his chair. Nellie followed his example. " Colonel," 
 he said to his competitor, " let me repeat, that I appreciate 
 your courtesy. And you, young lady, will you pardon me any 
 words distasteful to you that I may have spoken? " 
 
 " Oh, General, there is nothing to pardon," she replied 
 promptly. 
 
 " Then give me your hand," he said, extending his own. 
 
 " With all my heart," she responded cordially. 
 
 " Nay," he said, smiling, " if that be still at your disposal, 
 I must leave it for you to bestow upon some more fortunate 
 
446 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 mortal." He kept her hand a trille longer, in his own, than 
 was necessary for the conventional shake of new acquaintances 
 at parting, while she retorted with a gay little laugh : 
 
 " Just at present, sir, my heart is wholly in my father's 
 cause, which, as you have taught me, is my country's cause ; 
 wherefore, on your authority, I am a patriot, notwithstanding 
 my Southern nativity." 
 
 " And proclivity," the venerable senator added. " I am 
 sure that you mean well, and wish, though I hardly dare hope, 
 that you may think the same of me." 
 
 There was a mutual bow, a majestic wave of the hand toward 
 the gentlemen around, and the senator, escorted by Colonel 
 May, walked slowly away. 
 
 A buzz of lively conversation arose on the part of those who 
 remained, though Nellie herself was, perhaps, a shade more 
 thoughtful than usual. So at least thought Victor, who was 
 watching her with keen interest. He pondered, uneasily, over 
 the words that had fallen from the lips of the venerable states- 
 man, who was Colonel May's rival for the suffrages of the 
 legislature. Ralj:)]! Payton was extravagant in laudation of 
 the keen retorts given by Nellie to the audacious insult of 
 Southern ladies by that " insufferably conceited old senator." 
 But instead of rewarding him for his fulsome compliments, 
 Nellie turned eagerly toward Professor Rauhenfels, who was 
 approaching with Senator Essex, asking him what he thought 
 of Senator Hart. 
 
 " He is a grand old man," rephed the professor, " to defeat 
 whom will redound greatly to the fame of your father." 
 
 " And will he defeat him, do you think? " she asked with 
 an eagerness unusual to her. 
 
 " As sure as Colonel May does not defeat himself," was the 
 answer. 
 
XXIX. 
 THE FIAT OF KING CAUCUS. 
 
 , III HE inauguration ball at the governor's mansion, pre- 
 *^- ceded by the governor's reception, was a swell affair ; 
 so the denizens of the capital delighted to boast. 
 Invitations had been issued on a lavish scale ; no lady between 
 fifteen and iifty had been overlooked. Few of those so favored 
 failed to avail themselves of the governor's hospitality. A 
 tacit understanding among the people of the capital had grown 
 up to make the sojourn among them of the members of the 
 legislature, most of whom were compelled to remain away 
 from home all winter, as pleasant as possible, by enabling them 
 to become acquainted with the inhabitants, their wives, and 
 daughters. To this end it had grown into a custom to supple- 
 ment the biennial inauguration reception of newly elected 
 governors with an inauguration ball, and a laudable emulation 
 among the fair ones to favorably imjjress the guests of the 
 city induced them to adorn themselves with all the finery they 
 owned, or could hire or borrow. So there w^as on the present 
 occasion, as usual, a brilliant assemblage of beauty and fashion 
 collected in the spacious apartments of the gubernatorial 
 mansion. 
 
 Victor's ambitious aspiration had been realized : he was the 
 escort of Nellie May to the reception and l)all. It was on his 
 "arm that she leaned when her name, along with that of the 
 Honorable Victor AValdhorst, was mentioned to, and repeated 
 by, the governor, with the stereotype phrases of welcome. It 
 was at his side that she promenaded through the various halls 
 and chambers of the mansion that were thrown open on this 
 occasion. It was in her presence that Victor w'as accosted by 
 numerous gentlemen claiming acquaintance with him. At 
 
 (447) 
 
448 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 every turn, or step almost, some representative or senator 
 nodded to him familiarly and extended his hand for a friendly 
 shake. It was surprising, (most of all to Victor himself), to 
 how many gentlemen he had become known during the brief 
 period of his legislative career. But few of them were known 
 to him personally ; but they all had a pleasant way of men- 
 tioning their names, and joking him upon his forgetting theirs, 
 by reason of his devotion to his public duties. Gratifying as 
 was this proof of his popularity in presence of Miss May, it 
 became annoying as Victor found that they naturally stopped 
 long enough to make it necessary for him to introduce the lady 
 on his arm. She herself seemed greatly to enjoy these intro- 
 ductions ; her face glowed with animation ; her lips were 
 wreathed in the most fascinating smiles, and her eyes twinkled 
 with fun and humor, as she replied to the small talk retailed 
 to her by the gentlemen introduced, with bright and witty say- 
 ings, ever original, pointed and appropriate. Even Victor, 
 who had alwaj^s admired her for her gay vivacity, marveled 
 at her inexhaustible fund of sprightliness and humor. 
 
 While yet the seemingly endless presentations to the gov- 
 ernor and shaking of hands was going on, the fine band, im- 
 ported for the occasion from the metropolis, struck up a 
 polonaise. Such of the visitors as felt inclined to dance 
 repaired to the great hall used as the ballroom to which as 
 many couples only were admitted as would comfoi'tabl}^ fill it. 
 The principal feature of the polonaise consisted of a figure, in 
 which each dancer changed his partner every few seconds, 
 until, every lady having paired off with each gentleman, the 
 original couples were again brought together. At this point, 
 the music glided into one of Strauss' enchanting waltzes, so 
 irresistible to youthful feet in their dance-compelling rhythm. 
 Victor and Nellie stepped into line at once ; her right hand 
 naturally slipped into his left, while his right arm encircled her 
 waist. And they were carried away with the gay multitude of 
 waltzing humanity. 
 
THE FIAT OF KING CAUCUS. 449 
 
 Carried away — Victor at least — by the witching strains of 
 music ; transported with the joyous consciousness of holding 
 Nellie in his embrace ; thrilled with ecstatic delight by the 
 touch of the divinely beautiful form he held close to his heart. 
 Nellie danced like a fairy. Her nimble feet accented the 
 musical rhythm as truly as did the leader's baton, so that Victor 
 found it easy to keep time with her. And thus the two glided 
 gracefully through the gp-ations of the waltz, abandoning 
 themselves to the delightful exhilaration of the poesy of motion. 
 Once Victor yielded to the temptation to look iuto his partner's 
 eyes. When he met hers, she smiled and whispered a compli- 
 ment to his accomplished dancing. " I did not expect it of 
 you," she added. From any other lips, these words might 
 have annoyed him ; coming from Nellie, he took them as 
 gracious recognition, and they would have quickened his pulse 
 and heightened his joy, if that had been possible. And on 
 they tip-toed, — as if soaring through space, scarcely touching 
 the polished floor, — moving, not with conscious volition, but 
 swayed by the rhythmical harmony of the tuneful orchestra. 
 He guided her skillfully through the surging crowd of awkward 
 dancers without colliding ; yet he saw nothing but her. The 
 outside world was forgotten. The brilliantly illumined hall, 
 with its festive multitude of gay humanity, had no existence for 
 him, as he floated on, alone with Nellie, literally intoxicated 
 with the bliss of holding Nellie's hand, of holding Nellie herself 
 in his arm. 
 
 When the music ceased, Victor's waltz with Nellie had come 
 to an end. All too soon ; and Victor surmised, that the 
 daughter of the prominent candidate for the United States 
 Senate would be sought by too many gentlemen, — whether for 
 her own sake, as the " bright particular star " of the evening, 
 or as a compliment to her father — to allow her to accord more 
 than one dance to any one of them. His apprehension in this 
 respect was confirmed as he led the way to the buffet, where he 
 proposed to capture an ice or a sherbet for his partner ; they 
 were intercepted by numbers of supplicants for her hand in a 
 
 29 
 
450 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 dauce, none of whom Miss May felt at liberty to refuse, for 
 each of them was the formidable possessor of a vote at the 
 impending election. But she staggered Victor by whispering 
 softly : "I have never enjoyed a dance so much in all my life. 
 I wish you would find out for me whether there is to be an- 
 other waltz during the evening ; and if so, be sure to take rae 
 for your partner. I shall make it a point to reserve the waltz 
 for you." 
 
 There was not time to say more ; nor did Victor make 
 answer in words : but his eyes spoke a language eloquent 
 enough to assure Nellie that he would waltz with no other 
 partner. 
 
 It had been written in the stars, that there should be no 
 more waltzing that night at the governor's mansion. The 
 master of ceremonies turned a deaf ear to Victor's ardent 
 pleading for just one more waltz ; he gave it as his conviction, 
 that of fifty persons present hardly one would enjoy a round 
 dance. So Victor had to content himself with living over 
 again in memory the rapturous moments gone by. His exalta- 
 tion was such that he was in no mood even to quarrel with the 
 master of ceremonies for denying him their repetition. Like 
 the Moor of Venice, he might have sighed 
 
 " My soul hath her content so absolute, 
 That not another comfort like to this 
 Succeeds in unknown fate." 
 
 His joy abated not, though Nellie's smiles thenceforth were 
 lavished all on the politicians, who claimed her society in right 
 of introduction by her father, or brother, or even by Professor 
 Rauhenfels, or himself. Until the time came when the festivi- 
 ties closed, and he claimed his privilege of escorting her home, 
 he feasted his eyes upon her from afar, following her every 
 motion with eager gaze, so far as permissible without attracting 
 attention. 
 
 The walk to Nellie's lodging — all too short to permit of 
 much conversation, — afforded him one more copious draught 
 
THE FIAT OF KING CAUCUS. 451 
 
 from the beaker of bliss which the gods theiuselves might have 
 envied him. 'Just before taking leave of him, in front of the 
 entrance to her residence, she turned toward him with bright 
 face, saying, in a voice of playful banter, " You have proved a 
 devoted cavalier to me. Will you remember to be my brave 
 and loyal knight to-morrow ? " - 
 
 ' ' To-morrow ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' Aye ! You have not forgotten the grand tournament to 
 come off to-morrow — to-day rather — in the capitol, have 
 you ? ' ' 
 
 "You mean the caucus!" he exclaimed with animation. 
 " Be assured, Miss Nellie, that no chivalrous knight ever 
 championed lady fair more loyally, than I shall remain true to 
 your colors! Happy I, that in serving my country, I may be 
 serving my friends ! " 
 
 " Then I shall think of you as my cavalier ' sans peur et sans 
 reproche ! ' Good-night!" 
 
 ' ' Good-night ! ' ' said Victor ; and after cordially shaking- 
 hands, they parted. 
 
 The caucus for the nomination of the candidate upon whom 
 the democrats would unite as their choice for the Senate of the 
 United States turned out a lively gathering of the Democratic 
 members of both houses of the General Assembly. They 
 constituted an overwhelming majority of the legislature in joint 
 session, so that it seemed a hopeless undertaking for the 
 republicans to put up a candidate in opposition. The know- 
 nothings, who had never shown great strength in this State, 
 outside of the large cities, were practically unrepresented. 
 Hence the nomination bj^ the Democratic caucus was looked 
 upon as equivalent to the election ; and although there were 
 substantially but two candidates in the field, the friends of 
 both were very zealous, and party feeling ran high. 
 
 General Hart possessed an advantage over Colonel Maj- in 
 the prestige arising out of his experience as the Nestor of the 
 Senate ; for although Colonel May had served several terms in 
 
452 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 the lower house of Congress, and was looked up to as one of its 
 most influential members, the general had represented his 
 State in the Senate ever since its admission into the Union, 
 and was recognized at home as the highly successful champion 
 of its interests in the national legislature. He enjoyed the 
 reputation of being an assiduous worker, studying closely and 
 thoroughly every subject that came before the Senate to 
 prepare himself for the debate thereon and thus acquired 
 powerful influence in that body, which he brought to bear on 
 every question affecting the welfare of his State. And his 
 standing in the Senate naturally gave him great power at home, 
 so that for many years he had substantially dictated the policy 
 of the Democratic party of the State. It would thus appear 
 that his chances of success ought to be much greater than 
 those of Colonel May. 
 
 But the very power wielded by General Hart had made him 
 many enemies, and thus became an element of weakness. He 
 was not of a conciliatory disposition, but proud, and overbear- 
 ing. His egotism, but for his excessive pride, might have 
 passed for self-conceit, and had become proverbial. While the 
 integrity of his character, his sincere devotion to the true in- 
 terests of the people, and the firmness with which he resisted 
 all encroachments on the inviolability of the constitution 
 secured to him the enthusiastic admiration of the masses, who 
 knew him only as their stout champion in the Senate, — his 
 austerity had estranged many of those with whom he came into 
 closer contact, so that in the course of time a faction had 
 grown up of bitter personal enemies, implacable in their hatred 
 of the great senator. 
 
 Colonel May, on the other hand, was a man of great per- 
 sonal magnetism. Though a strict partisan, firm as a rock in 
 his adherence to the policy adopted by his party, yet his ardor 
 never betrayed him into bitterness, or personal offensiveness. 
 Aside from his political conviction and the line of duty con- 
 ditioned by principle, he knew no party lines ; treating all, 
 whether adherents to his own party or opponents, with equal 
 
THE FIAT OF KING CAUCUS. 453 
 
 courtesy and amiable good-nature. He thus attained a degree 
 of popularity utterly lacking in the renown of his more famous 
 rival, which went far to equalize their chances before the 
 caucus. 
 
 But there was another element entering into the present polit- 
 ical campaign that still more leveled the advantage that per- 
 sonal prestige might have given to the one or the other of the 
 aspirants. Political feeling ran so high in consequence of 
 recent events, that the personality of the candidates dwindled 
 into insigniticance before the stirring questions that awaited the 
 action of Congress. The old party lines themselves were be- 
 coming obscured by the overshadowing issues springing up 
 between the Federal and the State governments, or rather 
 among the States themselves, as inclining to the one or other . 
 of the extreme sectional views. For some of the Southern 
 States, — South Carolina in the lead — had verified their 
 threats of attempting to break loose from the Union. Sym- 
 pathies among the democrats were greatly divided. The gov- 
 ernor of their own State had openly espoused the cause of 
 the seceded States, and urged upon the General Assembly to 
 give aid and comfort to the oppressed South, even if averse 
 to immediate secession. A coimnissiouer from one of the 
 seceded States had demanded a hearing, to lay liefore the 
 authorities a plan for concert of action against the encroach- 
 ments of the Federal government on the rights of the sov- 
 ereign States, and the governor had sent a special mes- 
 sage to the General Assembly, urging them to invite the 
 commissioner to address them in joint session. The General 
 Assembly had not yet acted on this message. A pre- 
 monition of the violence of the storm to be expected on its 
 discussion excited the caucus, in consequence of a resolution 
 moved by a member to pledge the democrats in support of the 
 governor's recommendation, which threw open the whole field 
 of discussion on this agitating subject. 
 
 General Hart was known as an uncompromising opponent to 
 any agitation on the subject of slavery, and hence of every 
 
454 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 measure resorted to by the South for the protectiou of its 
 iuterests in this direction. His followers were, self -evidently, 
 opposed to the course recommended by the governor. Colonel 
 May, although a strict constructionist, resting the rights of 
 the South on the rigid adherence to the constitution, was driven 
 to assume the leadership of the partisans of the extreme 
 Southerners, who, of course, favored the reception of the 
 commissioner. After a stormy debate lasting several hours, 
 the vote resulted in a small majority for the motion, and the 
 caucus adjourned, without transacting any other business, to 
 await the action of the legislature, and the addi'ess of the 
 Southern commissioner. 
 
 Victor was greatly troubled by the course the caucus had 
 taken. He had not participated in the debate, although he 
 was decidedly averse to the reception of the commissioner by 
 the legislature. He was eager to meet his friend Rauheufels, 
 to talk over with him the political situation, which, he feared, 
 was beginning to assume a critical aspect, and pondered how 
 he could make him understand the circumstances without vio- 
 lating his imjilied pledge of secrecy touching the doings of the 
 caucus in secret session. Expecting to find Rauhenfels at the 
 headquarters of Colonel May, he directed his steps thither, but 
 found the door locked. Surprised at this unusual thing, he 
 was about to leave w^heu the door opened and Leslie appeared, 
 welcoming him with a cordiality quite unusual in him. After 
 again locking the door, Leslie conducted him into an inner 
 room, where he found Colonel May and his daughter Nellie, 
 Professor Rauhenfels and Ralph Payton closeted together. 
 
 " Your coming is very opportune," said the colonel, shak- 
 ing hands with Victor. " I am informed, that you had a lively 
 time of it in the caucus this afternoon, and that you adjourned 
 without doing anything, except to make trouble for the can- 
 didates." 
 
 " How trouble for the candidates? " inquired Victor. 
 
 " Don't pretend to be so innocent," exclaimed Leslie, some- 
 what brusquely. " No one knows better than you do how the 
 
THE FIAT OF KING CAUCUS. 455 
 
 caiunis has complicated matters for father. Or say," he added 
 regarding Victor with an eager searching look, " does it not 
 bother you, that the democrats committed themselves to side 
 with the governor, in this muddle? Because, you know, you 
 voted the other way yourself." 
 
 " How do you know I did? " asked Victor sternly. 
 
 "Oh, come, Victor!" said Leslie, laughing. "As if I 
 could not swear how you would vote on this question ? But 
 aside from that, we are as well posted as you are, on the doings 
 in your secret conclave, although you did have the doors 
 locked. There are keyholes, and windows and transoms, — 
 besides leaky brethren, that are easily pumped. You need 
 not flatter yourself that you kept us in the dark about the 
 transactions of your caucus." 
 
 " We are glad that you came," said the colonel, " because 
 our friend, the professor, insists that the action of the caucus 
 has been very unwise, and I for my part would like to hear 
 your view in the matter." 
 
 ' ' I can only give you my impression as to the resolution 
 you refer to," said Victor in a low voice, as if desirous to 
 apologize for what that opinion might be. " I deem it in very 
 bad taste. It is not compatible with my view of the dignity 
 of a legislative body to listen to overtures from a foreign 
 State, communicated in an irregular and illegal form. But I do 
 not propose to judge as to its effect upon the candidates." 
 
 " In bad taste, do you say? " the colonel repeated reflect- 
 ively. " Is this the most lenient construction that 3'ou can 
 put on that resolution ? ' ' 
 
 " I should rather inquire of our young friend, whether that 
 is the severest light in which he views it? " 
 
 It was Professor Rauhenfels Avho spoke thus, a sneering 
 expression accompanying his words. 
 
 " Yes," said Victor unhesitatingly. " As yet it has done no 
 further harm than to make the Democracy of our State appear 
 in a false position, from which it may, and no doubt will, 
 readily retrieve itself." 
 
456 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 " But how about the candidates ? " Nelhe spoke up. " How 
 do you think it will affect them ? ' ' 
 
 Victor made answer to Nellie's question ; but in doing so he 
 looked not at her, but at the colonel. " If the caucus follows 
 up this resolution with one committing the party to secession, 
 or even to a friendly attitude toward the seceded States, it will 
 make the situation critical for them." 
 
 " General Hart is opposed to secession," said Nellie, " and 
 if such a resolution receives the sanction of a majority, it will 
 put him in the minority ; and will not that secure papa's 
 nomination? " 
 
 Again Victor's eyes for a swift moment sought those of 
 Colonel May before he fixed them on the eager face of the 
 maiden. " Would your father accept the nomination under 
 such circumstances? " he asked, betraying as much anxiety as 
 Nellie had shown. 
 
 " What a question! " ejaculated Ralph Paytou. 
 
 " Why of course ; " Nellie exclaimed. 
 
 But the eyes of all present in the room, including those of 
 Professor Rauhenfels, were riveted on Victor's face, as he said, 
 " But what, in such case, about his election? " 
 
 "The nomination means the election! " exclaimed Pay ton, 
 confidently. 
 
 " Unless there be treason in camp! " Leslie added. 
 
 " Don't you think so? " the colonel asked quietly. " Our 
 party is so overwhelmingly in the majority, that its nominee is 
 sure to be elected unless there be very great defection." 
 
 " Perhaps that is so," said Victor. -' But then the nominee 
 will be committed to the doctrine expressed in the resolu- 
 tion." 
 
 " Whicli is good sound Democratic doctrine! " exclaimed 
 Pay ton elatedly. " What have you got to say to tliat? " 
 
 Again Victor was the cynosure of all eyes, as he replied 
 looking not at Pay ton but at the colonel, " That I hope it is a 
 mistake. For if this were Democracy, I fear that I would not 
 be counted a democrat." 
 
THE FIAT OF KING CAUCUS. 457 
 
 " Does that mean that you would lly the track if such a 
 resolution were adopted? " asked Leslie, rather warmly. 
 
 " Are you going to set yourself up as authority above the 
 caucus, and above the party?" Pay ton inquired, speaking 
 with a vehemence that imparted a touch of insolence to his 
 voice and manner. 
 
 The colonel cast a frowning glance at the forward young 
 man, and then turned to Victor. " I would not like to put it 
 in that way, Mr. Waldhorst," he said, in a friendly voice, as 
 if desiring to apologize for Payton's rudeness. " But it is 
 really important for me to know, whether I can count on your 
 support in the caucus for the nomination, and in the legislature 
 for the election, if the party should fall in with the views of 
 the governor. You will therefore pardon our solicitude in this 
 matter, and believe us, that no rudeness is intended." 
 
 "Why, father, it is surely an insult to Mr, Waldhorst to 
 put such a question implying doubt," said Nellie, with an 
 expression of such perfect truthfulness in her face, that it made 
 Payton wince. " Don't you know, that you have not a more 
 loyal and staunch supporter in the world, than our old friend 
 Victor?" And with a smile that went straight to Victor's 
 heart, she added, " Am I right, Mr. Waldhorst? " 
 
 " God knows. Miss May, that no one is more keenly alive 
 to the debt of gratitude which I owe to Colonel May, than I 
 am, and that there is no man on earth that commands, in so 
 high a degree, my unwavering confidence, my love, my 
 adoration." 
 
 " Well, I am very proud to know that," said the colonel, 
 good-naturedly. " But the point is, just now, whether I can 
 count on your vote ? ' ' 
 
 "He is quite sure of that, is he not, Mr. Waldhorst?" 
 Nellie said, looking at the young man with eager eyes. 
 
 The question startled Victor. It had loomed up in his mind, 
 this same question, and paralyzed his very thought, like a 
 hideous monster in a nightmare, driving him to this very place 
 in search of help from his friend Rauhenfels, hoping to be 
 
458 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 taught how to answer, or what were even better, how to not 
 answer, this awful question, whether it were possible that he 
 should A'ote against the wisest, truest, best of men, — his 
 generous benefactor, his boyhood's friend? 
 
 As if in response to Victor's unuttered appeal, the professor 
 interposed. " The point of inquiry," said he, speaking in a 
 deep voice that impressed itself upon all within its reach, 
 " would rather seem to be, will Colonel May make it impossi- 
 ble for him to do so, by giving the lie to the record of his past 
 life? A senatorship is no trivial affair. It is important to 
 the nation, in whose council he proposes to lift his voice ; im- 
 portant to the individual who is to embody the divided sover- 
 eignty of both his State and his nation. And such is the 
 quality of ambition, that it warps men's judgment; — aye, so 
 fiercely burn its fires in minds of towering aspiration, that in 
 the strain to reach one single, shining goal the structure of a 
 lifetiihe sinks in ashes. Is Colonel May one of these? That, 
 to my view, is the pertinent question. For though you may 
 hide to yourself, for a while, you cannot avoid the issue attend- 
 ant upon your becoming the candidate of a faction pledged to 
 subvert the government. It will be the passing of the Rubicon 
 that separates the illustrious patriot from the rebel and the — 
 traitor! " 
 
 Nellie, stung to the quick by the closing word of the pro- 
 fessor, turned upon him with a fiush of indignation. "Sir! " 
 she exclaimed, her eyes ablaze with anger, while yet a sneer of 
 contempt curled her proud hps, " you are insolent! " 
 
 LesHe looked at Rauhenfels with a frown, but said nothing. 
 Payton, however, assuming a menacing attitude, blustered 
 out, "How dare j^ou, sir, employ such language to Colonel 
 May?" 
 
 Rauhenfels turned toward Payton. But if he intended a 
 sharp answer for this young gentleman, it was checked by a 
 deprecating wave of the colonel's hand. 
 
 The colonel smiled ; a smile, the sadness of which betrayed 
 to Victor that the professor's words had wounded him as 
 
THE FIAT OF KING CAUCUS. 459 
 
 deeply as they had Nellie, bat that he forebore to resent the 
 personal attack. " You use a strangely harsh word, my 
 friend," he said, somewhat more calmly than was his custom- 
 ary speech, " and, it seems to me, rather inconsistently. For 
 the legal crime of treason consists, under our constitution, in 
 levying war against the United States, or giving aid and com- 
 fort to their enemies. You surely cannot predicate treason, in 
 this sense, of mere friendliness to the South. But if you re- 
 fer to treason in its general sense, — that of attempting to 
 shake off the yoke of tyrannical government — then the word 
 has no terror for me. I deem it a flattery to be classed with 
 such men as, for instance, signed the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence." 
 
 " I would be justified. Colonel May," the professor rejoined, 
 his manner becoming more and more earnest as he proceeded, 
 " to accuse you of quibbling, but for the fact that there has 
 been nothing but quibbling by the politicians, on both sides of 
 the question. Argument has been lost sight of: groundless 
 assertions are in vogue. You, Colonel May, know full weU, 
 that secession means war ; for no government on earth can idly 
 tolerate its own disruption. And if in that war you are found 
 in arms against your government, you will be a traitor, in the 
 legal, constitutional sense ; and no arrogation of the patriotism 
 that has canonized the Fathers of the Revolution will protect 
 you against the punishment due a traitor, — aye, nor even 
 conciliate your conscience. You are attempting to cheat 
 yourself into the belief that it is not dishonorable to be known 
 as a rebel and a traitor to a tyrannical government, or one that 
 you choose to stigmatize as such. Has not the shudder of 
 your daughter at the bare mention of such a possibility, — has 
 not the resentful insolence of this young dandy here, who 
 deems himself called on to champion your honor, as if the 
 mention of that word were a dire insult, taught you in what 
 estimation the traitor is held, even by those who calmly con- 
 template treason themselves ? ' ' 
 
 " Speaking for my daughter," the colonel answered, re- 
 
460 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 garding Nellie with a sad, yet fond smile, " I would bespeak 
 for her the consideration due to the inexperience of her sex, 
 and, if you please, to the nature, hitherto, of her surroundings. 
 You would make allowance for the feelings of a child that has 
 been, foolishly perhaps, indulged by her parents, and by 
 society, and who is not quick to weigh how much truth there 
 may be in a remark that to her unsophisticated ear is degrading 
 to her father," 
 
 " But father," exclaimed Nellie, a vivid blush suffusing her 
 cheek, " I beg of you to remember that I am not a babe ! And 
 I think it is for Mr. Rauhenfels to apologize, not for you." 
 
 " These are my sentiments exactly! " shouted Mr. Pay ton. 
 But a frowning glance from Colonel May arrested any further 
 words of approval he might have intended for Miss May. 
 
 " My child," he then said, turning to the indignant maiden, 
 " Professor Rauhenfels was right to call our attention to the 
 consequences that may attend my candidacy." Then turning 
 to the professor, he continued, " I myself sincerely trust that 
 your apprehensions are too gloomy. I cannot bring myself to 
 believe that the people of this country are so lost to common 
 sense and to common decency, as to undertake to coerce either 
 South Carolina or any other State to remain in the Union, after 
 the constitution that bound them has been violated. It is not 
 the South, — it is the North that has broken the bond. The 
 seceded States have but technically named what the Federal 
 government had in reality already done. I strongly hope, — 
 I am satisfied, that there will be no war ; but if a war comes, it 
 will be provoked by the North, — not by the South." 
 
 " There, Colonel May, lies the vice of your position," the 
 professor responded. " I wish I could make you understand 
 how radically wrong you are in your assumption of facts, and 
 how erroneous your deductions if even your premises were 
 correct. It is not true that the North, or what to Southerners 
 is the same, the Federal government, has violated the constitu- 
 tion. As yet, any interference with the constitutional rights 
 of the South, or of the States, is a phantom conjured up by 
 
THE FIAT OF KING CAUCUS. 461 
 
 the excited imagination of hot-headed Southern politicians, 
 who, to use a slang phrase, squeal before they are hurt. What 
 they complain of, and hold out to the Southern people as a 
 deadly injury to their interests, namely, the forcible abolition 
 of slavery, is as yet but the chimerical scheme of a fanatical 
 faction. But do you not see, that secession is the one, — the 
 only possible condition under which these fanatics might bring 
 their project into realization? Reverence for the constitution 
 is, to this day, so deeply rooted in the hes^rts of the people, 
 both North and South, that they will tolerate no tampering 
 with it, either by Northern ar by Southern fanatics. Break it, 
 as secession must do, and slavery is doomed. For it has no 
 hold on the majority of the people, save as it is guaranteed by 
 the constitution. In the war that must follow secession, the 
 forcible emancipation of slaves will be too powerful a weapon 
 against the South to be neglected by the Federal government. 
 There will be nothing, then, to save this fated institution from 
 annihilation ; and when once extinct, it will be no more forever, 
 on the North American continent at least. I am thoroughly 
 sure, Colonel, that the immediate abolition of slavery is im- 
 possible in this country, unless the way be paved for it by the 
 attempt to destroy the national government." 
 
 " Well, my young friend," said the colonel to Victor, who 
 had listened to the discussion with the keenest interest, ' ' you 
 have not answered my question. Supposing that the caucus 
 should do this thing, which our friend Rauhenfels is pleased 
 to call treasonable ; and suj^posing, further, that I should be 
 a candidate on a platform friendly to the seceding States, to 
 the extent, let us assume, of pledging the government to non- 
 interference ; what would be your attitude toward me in the 
 legislature ? " 
 
 " On that score you need have no apprehension," said 
 Leslie, with a keen glance at Victor, who had not Ijeeu prompt 
 with his answer. " Whatever may be Mr. Waldhorst's pri- 
 vate conviction in this matter, — he is a gentleman, taking 
 pride in the most scrupulous faithfulness to his promises." 
 
462 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEE. 
 
 " Yes," said Nellie, proudly, " Victor has promised to 
 wear my colors in this tournament, and I know him to be a 
 loyal knight. You can depend upon him, at least, although 
 he has not answered your question yet." 
 
 "I would be better satisfied," Payton threw in, "if he 
 would pledge himself to vote for Colonel May. If he is sin- 
 cere, he will not object to do so." 
 
 " He is pledged," Leslie added, still regarding Victor with 
 a searching gaze. " By his honor as a man, — by his fealty 
 as a democrat, — by his loyalty as a citizen. No words of his 
 can add to the sacredness of Ifis obligation." Turning to 
 Professor Rauhenfels, he said: "You will bear testimony to 
 this." 
 
 Before the professor could answer, Nellie again spoke up. 
 " Why do you speak of testimony? " she said. " I pledge 
 my own word, that Mr. Waldhorst is true to his." 
 
 " Precisely," came from the professor's lips. And the deep- 
 ening of the curves of the corners of his mouth gave warning 
 that he was in no gentle mood. " The young lady no doubt, 
 correctly estimates Mr. Waldhorst' s character for probity and 
 honor. But if she accord to him his due meed of common 
 sense as well, it may dawn upon her mind, as it should sug- 
 gest itself to the mind of her brother, here, that to enable him 
 to keep his word. Colonel May must keep his also. Waldhorst 
 is pledged, as Mr. May emphasizes, by his honor as a man, by 
 his fealty as a democrat, by his loyalty as a citizen — to 
 what? " 
 
 " To vote for Colonel May! " exclaimed Leslie, interrupting 
 the professor. 
 
 " To vote for an unflinching Jeffersonian democrat," shouted 
 the professor, " such as Waldhorst is, such as Colonel May 
 has been up to this time ; for an uncompromising champion of 
 the constitution and its strict construction, such as Colonel 
 May has put himself upon the record during his congressional 
 career, — the shining exemplar whom Waldhorst has patterned 
 after ; for the aspirant to a seat in the Senate of the United 
 
THE FIAT OF KING CAUCUS. 463 
 
 States, who has often taken, and proclaims himself ready again 
 to take, his solemn oath to support the constitution of the 
 United States. To this he stands pledged ; and like Miss May 
 I would stake my own word, that he is but too eager to redeem 
 his pledge. What a sneaking, cowardly reijegade, — what a 
 perfidious, dastardly betrayer of the trust reposed in him 
 would he become, were he to vote, instead, for a recusant 
 apostate, who, if not ready to plunge the knife into the heart 
 of the country that has honored and trusted him, yet stands 
 by, refusing to strike down the i^atricidal arm uplifted for the 
 blow, and blandly invokes — non-interference! Yes, Miss 
 May, you may rest assured, that Victor Waldhorst's faith is 
 not of the Punic kind, nor of the quibbling sort 
 
 ' That keeps the word of promise to the ear. 
 But breaks it to the hope.' 
 
 He will vote for the true democrat, the loyal citizen, the 
 champion of the constitution for whom he is instructed to 
 vote ; but he cannot do that by voting for the nominee of a 
 faction that avows its intention to stand by the enemies of the 
 Union." 
 
 Leslie May, whose face had been reddening during the pro- 
 fessor's speech, now turned upon him a look of angry con- 
 tempt. " What kind of faith would you call that, sir," he 
 said, with cutting sarcasm, " which permits you to accept my 
 father's invitation and hospitality — " 
 
 " Faith did you say? " the professor interrupted, regarding 
 Leslie with a look of genuine surprise. 
 
 " I said," Leslie went on, " what kind of faith is that, sir, 
 that permits you to accept my father's invitation and hospital- 
 ity— " 
 
 " And money! " the professor suggested, again interrupting. 
 " Don't be mealy-mouthed about it, if 3'ou wish to lay bare 
 my sins, which, I venture to guess, is your object in asking 
 the questions." 
 
 — " And money, since you yourself insist on it," continued 
 
464 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Leslie, uuable to suppress a shadow of annoyauce at the inter- 
 ruption, " with the unclerstaudiiig that you would devote your 
 time to assist him iu the canvass ; and now to do your l^est in 
 coaxing and frightening away his firmest supporters? " 
 
 " You want to know, what kind of faith permits me to do 
 that, do you? " said Professor Rauhenf els, his features bright- 
 ening into an almost humorous expression. " I will tell you, 
 young man. It is the kind of faith which one gentleman puts 
 in the integrity of another. A kind of faith to which, I hope, 
 you are no stranger. Tliat kind of faith, sir, that would im- 
 pel an honest man to pull away his friend from the brink of an 
 abyss, even at the risk of being considered officious. In a 
 word, good faith in the highest, truest, fullest sense." 
 
 "Bosh!" exclaimed Leslie, with perceptible impatience. 
 " You are dodging the question, sir ; and treating us to grandil- 
 oquent phrases. The point is, how dare jou. betray the interests 
 of a man who has confided in your honor, and whose money 
 you have taken under promise of furthering his interests?" 
 
 " So I did," remarked the professor. " I took his money, 
 and I honestly tried to earn it. Let us see how we stand : 
 Colonel May did me the honor to believe me — at your own 
 suggestion, Mr. May, I have no doubt — capable of doing 
 him some service, valuable enough (in his own estimation, 
 mark I) to justify him in making me the offer to which you 
 allude. Colonel May was, according to my sincere conviction, 
 the best representative that our State could have in the Senate. 
 His political views, under the existing condition of things, 
 were mine. To further his prospects of election was my own 
 desire and duty ; I did so without any promise or pay, to the 
 best of my poor ability, as you well know. But I am not rich 
 enough to quit my avocation and follow Colonel May to the 
 capital without compensation. And as your father, and, I 
 strongly suspect, yourself, wished me to be here during the 
 senatorial campaign, I accepted his invitation, his hospitality, 
 and his money, in the interest, I am sure, of the country, as 
 well as of ourselves." 
 
THE FIAT OF KING CAUCUS. 465 
 
 " But — " Leslie was about to interrupt, when the profes- 
 sor silenced him by an imperative gesture. 
 
 "But," he continued, " Colonel May has to-day intimated 
 that he coutemjjlates a change of his political course. This is a 
 palpable breach of the contract between us. I consider seces- 
 sion as treasonable and wickedly absurd. Neither the price 
 that your father has paid me, nor any price within the power 
 of man to pay, could induce me to advocate the caudidacj^ of 
 a man pledged to such a course. And now, my dear young 
 friend, no more insinuations of bad faith. If there is treach- 
 ery in the camp, you know where to look for it. If you should 
 ever regain your composure sufficiently to reflect calmly upon 
 the situation of our friend Waldhorst, or even of myself, you 
 will understand, that just now your father has no sincerer, 
 more warml}' devoted friend than Waldhorst ; and that no 
 service I may have performed for Colonel May in facilitating 
 his campaign (and I am sure, that both he and yourself believe 
 it to be considerable) deserves his gratitude more fully, than 
 would my attempt to hold him back from the plunge he is con- 
 templating, — the leap into the abyss that will make him a 
 moral suicide." 
 
 Whether Rauhenfels had more to say, remains unknown. 
 For Leslie, whose discretion was succumbing to his impatience, 
 interrupted him with angry words, spoken with sneering con- 
 tempt. " Keep your advice for such as have patience to listen 
 to it," he said. " We did not hire you for a Mentor. Neither 
 are you father's guardian, whatever may be your authority 
 over that boy yonder, who seems to have surrendered what 
 little of spirit or manhood he ever possessed to his lord and 
 master, whose nod and beck he obeys with the submissiveness 
 of a well- trained spaniel." 
 
 Victor started, as though he had received a heavy blow. 
 But he was not quick at retort, and before he had uttered a 
 word, Colonel May had arisen and was addressing his son with 
 uplifted arm, and in stern and commanding tones demanded 
 peace. Then, turning to both Victor and Rauhenfels he said : 
 
 30 
 
466 THE BE BE US DAUOBTEtt. 
 
 " YiXY be it from me, to question the right of either of you, 
 gentlemen, to your own opinion, and to determine your own 
 course of action. Claiming the same right for mj^self , I must 
 be guided by ray own judgment. I cannot lift up my hand 
 against my ow^n State. As Decatur spoke of his country, so 
 would I say of ray State : Ma}' she always be in the right : but 
 my State, right or wrong ! Let us drop a discussion that can 
 lead to no result. I am satisfied that my young friend Wald- 
 horst will not give me his vote unless we succeed in defeat- 
 ing the resolution of sympathy with the seceded States. To 
 that end let us now bend our energies." 
 
 " Amen ! " said Professor Rauhenfels. 
 
 But the fiat went forth from the caucus, and the resolution 
 was adopted by both branches of the General Assembly. 
 
XXX. 
 
 CRUEL CONSCIENCE TRICKING CUPID. 
 
 'HE caucus resolution had sounded the knell to Victor's 
 dearest hopes. It sunk a chasm between him and the 
 May family which he knew he could not overleap, — 
 a chasm as broad as the decree of Fate, and as deep as his 
 moral conviction. To vote against Colonel May would, he 
 well knew, subject him to Leslie's sneering scorn, and to 
 Nellie's anger and contempt. And the caucus resolution had 
 made it impossible for him to vote for Colonel May. 
 
 There were moments when the arch-fiend, taking advantage 
 of his anguish, whispered into his ear. Why not join the domi- 
 nant faction of the party ? And a dazzling light pierced the 
 dismal blackness of his horizon for a brief moment, revealing 
 before him a vision of supreme bliss : Nellie, smiling as she 
 had smiled when last alone with him, Avhen she had called him 
 her brave and loyal knight — holding out, as it seemed to him, 
 her hand, to seize which and claim for his own he need but 
 gratify that other dearest wish of his heart, to serve and vote 
 for the man whom he loved and adored above all others in the 
 world! But like the darkness rendered more intense after a 
 lurid flash of lightning, so the brightness of this vision left him 
 wrapped in deeper gloom, when his manhood reasserted itself, 
 and put the Satanic temptation behind him. 
 
 For it must not be. To vote for Colonel May, as pledged 
 by that treasonable caucus resolution, would make a traitor of 
 himself: Traitor to his constituents, to his country, to sacred 
 Truth. 
 
 He had burned his bridges behind him. When the caucus 
 had committed itself to the doctrine that the Federal govern- 
 ment was powerless under the constitution to prevent its own 
 
 (467) 
 
468 THE BEBEUS BAUGHTEB. 
 
 disintegration by the secession of the individual States, he had 
 given notice, in moderate, but positive words, that he deemed 
 further participation in the proceedings of the caucus imj^roper, 
 because incompatible with his sense of duty to vote for a man 
 pledged, as its nominee would be, to assist, either actively or 
 passively, in the disruption of the Union. 
 
 Victor's statement caused quite an uproar in the caucus. 
 There was no lack of angry protest and warning prophesies of 
 evil to the rash apostate. But amid the din of excited voices, 
 Mr. Lafayette Jackson Morrow, Victor's seat-neighbor in the 
 House, jumped on a chair, and cried, loud enough to secure 
 general attention : 
 
 " Fellow Democrats! All of you who believe, as I do, the 
 real a^^ostates from Democracy to be the majority of this 
 caucus, are invited to meet in the other chamber, to consult as 
 to further steps to vindicate the integrity of the Democratic 
 party in the senatorial election ! ' ' Twenty-two members 
 left the chamber at once, in consequence of this invitation, 
 among them Victor ; and others followed later ; and before even 
 those who remained had finished the business of the caucus by 
 the nomination of Colonel May, as their candidate for the 
 United States Senate, the bolters had organized, 2)assed counter 
 resolutions denouncing secession and expressive of the loyalty 
 of the Democratic party to the Federal government ; and had 
 nominated, as their candidate. General Hart. 
 
 The contest that ensued in the legislature, among the three 
 candidates and their adherents, was fierce and bitter. The two 
 factions into which the democrats had split, made war on one 
 another quite as stubbornly as on the republicans, their com- 
 mon opponents. These had nominated a candidate as a 
 matter of party organization, and as a protest against the 
 principles represented by the democrats. But after the schism 
 in the Democratic camp this nomination assumed a more prac- 
 tical significance. There was not so much disparity, now, 
 between the republicans and either faction of the democrats. 
 And since it' required an absolute majority of all the votes to elect. 
 
CRUEL CONSCIENCE TRICKING CUPID. 469 
 
 the chances for success were about even. And so the ballot- 
 ing proceeded, without result. A second ballot was ordered. 
 Before the roll-call, loud and passionate speeches were indulged 
 in, eulogizing the respective candidates by their supporters, and 
 decrying them by their opponents, without affecting the ballot 
 that followed. Again and again the roll was called ; and again 
 and again no result was achieved. The joint session adjourned 
 at a late hour to renew the struggle next day. The deadlock 
 thus reached was the topic of conversation all over the city, 
 and the next joint session was looked for with eager interest ;• 
 but it brought no change in the situation. So the next, and 
 again the next, — the only difference being in the attendance 
 of the lobby, for the monotony of the unavailing voting began 
 to wear out the patience of even professional politicians. 
 
 In this way over one hundred and fifty ballots had been 
 taken, with slight variation in the vote. A few gains for the 
 one or the other of the candidates raised a flutter of hope, 
 now and then, only to give way to disappointment in the result 
 of the next ballot. The lobbies were gradually deserted by 
 the general public. The joint session felt compelled, at last, 
 to make a rule to take but one ballot on each day, so as to 
 gain time to attend to some of the ordinary business of legis- 
 lation. These daily ballotings were had in a perfunctory 
 manner. Argument had long been abandoned ; no one thought 
 of convincing any one else by speech-making. They hurried 
 through the formality of calling the roll and voting, and then 
 adjourned to go through the same routine on the next day. 
 
 Professor Rauhenfels had left the capital soon after the con- 
 sultation at the colonel's headquarters ; but the colonel him- 
 self and his son and daughter remained, of course ; so did 
 Pay ton. No one of these was ever absent at roll-call in the 
 joint session. Victor had not ventured to visit or speak to any 
 of them ; nor had any of them approached him since the pro- 
 fessor's departure. But his thoughts were as busy with them 
 as ever. More even than the gloomy outlook in the political 
 horizon did the proximity trouble him into which Miss May 
 
470 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 and Ralph Paytou were daily thrown by their oommou interest 
 in the election. Yet he saw nothing in their conduct indicating 
 a closer relationship between them, that was not fully explained 
 by their common interest in the absorbing events concerning 
 her father's election. 
 
 Meanwhile the deadlock in the legislature was assuming a 
 serious aspect. The session had already lasted longer than 
 the period usually consumed by a session, and not one-half of 
 the business before them had been accomplished, aside from 
 the senatorial question, which seemed no nearer its solution 
 than at the outset. For still the daily roll-call in joint session 
 disclosed the obdurate determination of each of the several 
 parties to stick to their nominees without regard to conse- 
 quences. Slight fluctuations in the votes had ceased to excite 
 hope or fear, because, like undulating waves on a sheet of 
 water, they were powerless to affect the general level, and 
 vanished before account could be taken of them. 
 
 Once, indeed, a breeze sprang up which seemed to blow 
 steadily in the direction of Colonel May. He had gained in 
 votes for four or five consecutive ballots, drawn in almost 
 equal proportions, from both of the opposing candidates. 
 Victor watched with the keenest interest, what effect this crumb 
 of comfort was producing on the colonel's friends. Pay ton 
 seemed much excited, hurrying busily from one to another of 
 the members. Nellie brightened up perceptibly. Victor de- 
 tected her once or twace in a furtive glance at himself, and saw 
 her turn to Leslie in eager whispering. Leslie himself remained 
 cool and self-possessed, as did the colonel. The ballot then 
 in process resulted in bringing a new accession of two votes in 
 his favor. Victor calculated, that if there were further voting 
 that day, there would be considerable prospect of success for 
 Colonel Ma}^ He blushed, when he caught himself secretly 
 exulting at this thought, small as the colonel's advantage was. 
 But the joint session adjourned, and no one could tell what 
 result the next session w^ould bring. 
 
 On the evening of the same day, while sitting at his desk in 
 
CBUEL CONSCIENCE TBICKING CUPID. 471 
 
 the House of Representatives, one of the pages notified Victor 
 that his presence was desired in one of the committee rooms. 
 He followed the page, and on being ushered in, stood in the 
 presence of Leslie and his sister. So unexpected was this to 
 Victor, that for a moment he was unable to reply to the warm 
 greeting extended to him by Leslie, and when he did speak, 
 his voice was constrained, and his manner awkward. But 
 Leslie's words and cordial bearing were as winning as they had 
 been of old. " I have come," he said, after shaking hands 
 with Victor, " to apologize for my rudeness that evening when 
 last we met. You forgive me, do you not? " 
 
 Victor's heart yearned for the reconciliation which Leslie 
 proffered. But the insult at his hands had stung too sharply 
 to be easily forgotten. " You do me too much honor, sir! " 
 he said, bowing stiffly. 
 
 " Come, come, Victor! " said Leslie, in his most insinuat- 
 ing manner. " You and I have known each other too long as 
 friends, to permit a few hasty words to separate us." 
 
 "No words of yours, Leslie Maj^ have separated us," he 
 said, a tinge of sadness audible in his voice. " And as to 
 apologizing, it is not necessary. For, cruel as was your 
 taunt, I can fully sympathize with you in your anger, and 
 freely forgive what you said in the smart of your disappoint- 
 ment." 
 
 " Yes, Victor, I know you well enough to understand your 
 great-hearted generosity, as well as your sincerity in this mat- 
 ter, as in all matters. So let us say no more about it. — May 
 I lock the door ? ' ' 
 
 This request startled Victor. He looked at Leslie, then at 
 Nellie, and his heart beat violently, for he divined that the 
 temptation that was awaiting him, would try his very soul. 
 Nellie had not yet spoken but her eyes rested upon his face 
 with an expectant look, so trusting, so confiding, as to shame 
 the resolute determination which he was summoning to his aid, 
 in the instinctive endeavor to fortify himself for the coming 
 ordeal. " If you wish, why not? " he answered simply. 
 
472 THE BEBEU8 DAUGHTER. 
 
 " Now, since your evil genius has quitted you for the time 
 being," said Leslie, after locking the door, " I hope to find 
 you accessible to argument and common sense. Let me say, 
 first of all, that my bitter words, the other day, were meant 
 not so much for you, as for that embodiment of mystical, out- 
 landish abstractions, — your Professor Rauhenfels, who has 
 clouded your usually clear judgment with metaphysical cob- 
 webs that prevent you from seeing things as they are. I 
 confidently hope to find you, now, j'^our old reasonable self." 
 
 "I will try at least to deserve your kind criticism," said 
 Victor soberly. — " What do you wish to say to me? " 
 
 " Before I come to the main point, let me also say, that we 
 are not here with the consent of father, much less at his 
 request. It was Nellie, here, that suggested this conference 
 with you. She has such confidence in your good sense, and in 
 your — well, in your loyalty to her and to me, as the friends 
 of your boyhood, — that she thought you would permit us to 
 remind you of the times we had together at the grammar class, 
 and at the barbecue, and how bravely you defended the 
 ' Governor,' as I used to call him, against any doubts of his 
 being the purest and most generous man living — " 
 
 ' ' And would so defend him to-day ! ' ' Victor exclaimed 
 warmly. 
 
 "Don't I know it?" said Nellie triumphantly. "Victor 
 has promised to wear my colors in the senatorial tournament. 
 You will not forget that, Mr. Waldhorst? " 
 
 "Oh, Miss Nellie — " 
 
 " But I told her," Leslie interrupted, " that neither your 
 friendship for her, nor for me, nor yet for even father, would 
 be able to swerve you one inch from the path that duty points 
 out to you." 
 
 " I hope that I may be able to deserve your respect, at 
 least," said Victor with downcast eyes. 
 
 " And so I am going to appeal to your strong common 
 sense," Leslie went on. " Putting aside, now, all considera- 
 tions for the relations existing between us, as acquaintances or 
 
CBUEL CONSCIENCE TBICKING CUPID. 473 
 
 friends, I submit to you as a democrat, that it is in your power 
 to do the party a great service ; to save it, I may say, from 
 defeat." 
 
 ' ' How do you mean ? ' ' 
 
 " As matters stand to-day, the question of election lies be- 
 tween father and the republican candidate. General Hart is 
 practically out of the race. Your vote for father, Victor, 
 would, with the following it will have, secure his election at 
 the next ballot." 
 
 " Just think of it, Victor," said Nellie, looking eagerly into 
 the face of the young man, " it lies in your power to elect pa 
 to the United States Senate ! Do you remember how proud it 
 made you to be told by him that you had greatly helped him 
 to be elected to Congress ? How deeply he will feel indebted 
 to you, if now you give him the senatorship ! And how the 
 munificence of such a gift from you would endear you to brother 
 Leslie and — to me ! ' ' 
 
 Endear him to her ! What a precious guerdon to secure ! 
 Could an;/ price be too high for that ? He turned pale ; beads 
 of perspiration bedewed his forehead. All the kingdoms of 
 the world, and the glory of them, would fail to lure him, — 
 Avould he bend the knee to the temptation in the shape of an 
 angel of light? But while yet regarding Nellie's eager face, 
 the image of Ralph Payton suddenly occurred to him, throw- 
 ing a shadow over the bewildering suggestiveness of her smile. 
 SloAvly he turned his eyes toward Leslie, saying: " You are 
 mistaken. I have no following, such as you suppose." 
 
 But Leslie answered with unusual patience, " Not I, Victor, 
 but you, are mistaken in this matter. It is your excessive 
 modesty that prevents you from seeing your power. But let 
 that rest. Apart from the question of your following, does it 
 not occur to you that you have a duty to perform as a 
 patriot, — as a lover of that party on which rests the hope of 
 our country ? Ought you not to so vote as to help break the 
 deadlock paralyzing the legislature ? The time of the mem- 
 bers is being fruitlessly sacrificed by this unavailing balloting ; 
 
474 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 the money of the peoijle wantonly squandered, the welfare of 
 the commonwealth put in jeopardy by this silly foolhardiness. 
 It is obvious that if the members persist in their wayward 
 caprice, no result can ever be reached. Common sense, then, 
 plainly demands a yielding somewhere. By whom? Clearly 
 by him who understands how foolish and wicked it is to persist 
 against reason and hope. Did you not once tell me that, ac- 
 cording to one of your German proverbs, ' He is the wiser 
 who knows how to yield ? ' " 
 
 Leslie was unusually earnest in his manner. Victor smiled, 
 with a smile that betrayed the agony of his soul. " Do you 
 not see," he answered, soberly, slowly, " that on your show- 
 ing mulish obstinacy would prevail over the yielding wise man ? ' ' 
 
 " But if it be rational to yield, will not the triunn)h of the 
 obstinate fool accomplish the wise man's purpose? " persisted 
 Leslie. " It seems to me, that even Rauheufels could not find 
 fault with such a statement." 
 
 "Perhaps not; and perhaps you are right, — always pro- 
 viding that the effect of the fool's obstinacy serves the wise 
 man's purpose. But let us not continue a discussion which 
 can lead to no satisfactory result. I cannot vote for your 
 father, so long as he does not disavow that resolution of the 
 caucus, even if it were true, and made plain to my comprehen- 
 sion, that my vote would elect him." 
 
 It cost Victor a mighty effort to say these words. He wiped 
 the perspiration from his brow. 
 
 Leslie grew red in the face. 
 
 "Can nothing move you?" he said, after a momentary 
 pause. " Nothing that I have said? Nothing that Nellie has 
 said? " 
 
 " Nothing." 
 
 "Is it true, then, that you have sold yourself, body and 
 soul, to this double-faced friend, this sneering Mephistoj^heles, 
 who, while eating my father's bread, poisons the mind of his 
 most ardent friend against him ? For I happen to know, that 
 it is only at his behest that you oppose our interest." 
 
CRUEL CONSCIENCE TRICKING CUPID. 475 
 
 "You are wrong, Leslie; Mr. Rauhenfels has, himself, 
 disproved your accusation." 
 
 "Wrong! " Leslie repeated, in louder voice. "Was all 
 your regard, then, — all the devotion and reverence that you 
 so constantly and ostentatiously paraded for Colonel May, 
 mere cant and hypocrisy? Do you mean to tell me, that you 
 lied, when you promised to vote for him, — lied when you 
 pledged yourself in primary meeting, in the party convention, 
 and again in accepting the votes of the people, as a democrat? 
 Out upon such cowardly treachery! " 
 
 " Oh, Leslie," said Victor after a brief pause, in which he 
 regarded his adversary with a steady gaze, "you ought to 
 know that you stab me to the heart with your cruelly unjust 
 words, — to the heart that has given up all to preserve its 
 honor." 
 
 ' ' Fie on such honor ! The honor of an assassin that has 
 knifed his truest friend I " 
 
 " That he is ! " exclaimed Victor, interrupting. " As such 
 I have well-nigh worshiped him." 
 
 " With the devil's worship! " Leslie cried. " While bask- 
 ing in the sunshine of his favor, you fawned and cringed, and 
 spared not plentiful protestations of devotion to his person and 
 his cause, in order the more surely to betray them both." 
 
 Nellie had been listening intently. A frown now gathered 
 on her face. She uttered the single word : " Ingrate ! " 
 
 It stung Victor more sharply than Leslie's cutting invective. 
 " Oh, Miss May," he pleaded earnestly, " do not you mis- 
 judge me — " 
 
 " Address yourself to me, sir! " Leslie sternly interrupted 
 him. 
 
 " Sir, it is your sister of whom I crave pardon for an act that 
 in the doing inflicts agony on me a hundred times more bitter 
 than any disappointment it may bring to either of j^ou." 
 
 " The twinge of conscience you may feel is anything but an 
 excuse, sir! " 
 
 " Nor do I seek excuse," Victor continued. " Pray, do 
 
476 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 not misconstrue the torture I suffer into repentance of my 
 course. It is my cruel fate that in the performance of my 
 duty I must forfeit your friendship. But I am not ashamed 
 of my deed . ' ' 
 
 '.' I dare say," Leslie interjected, " that you take pride in 
 your emancipation from the restraints imposed by honor, 
 gratitude and good-faith." 
 
 " Leslie May," said Victor, straightening up and regarding 
 the brother with a defiant frown, " restrain your licentious 
 tongue! Tempt me not too far! I have borne your taunts, 
 your sneers and your insults and remembering what once we 
 were to each other, forbore the fitting answer. But when you 
 say, that I prostituted my honor — " 
 
 " Well? " sneered Leslie, as Victor briefly paused. 
 
 " You lie! " 
 
 Victor spoke the word boldly, l)ut without passion. 
 
 Leslie raised his clenched list, but dropped it, as Nellie 
 softly touched his arm. The two men eyed each Other for a 
 moment, then Leslie, with a bitter, satirical smile, turned to 
 his sister. " Can you unriddle me this riddle, — honor? Here 
 stands a man (for such, no doubt, he deems himself) convicted 
 of perjury, of having basely betrayed friend, party, — the most 
 sacred trust confided in him by his country, — and noAV poses 
 for injured innocence, unblushingly proclaiming his untar- 
 nished — honor ! Bah ! Such honor might Judas Iscariot 
 claim, when he had earned his thirty pieces of silver." 
 
 There was a slight pause before Victor answered. Then, 
 regarding his former friend with a steady eye, he said : " Your 
 words are keen-edged daggers, Leslie May. But they afford 
 me this comfort, that they lighten much a burden on my 
 heart, — the burden of gratitude to you ; for you have this day 
 so heavily freighted the counter-scale, that the account between 
 us is more nearly balanced. You will understand, some day, 
 that I may have something to forgive, as well as my bene- 
 factors." 
 
 Nellie now spoke up, "Oh," she said, imitating, perhaps 
 
CBUEL CONSCIENCE TRICKING CUPID. 477 
 
 unconsciously, the sarcastic tone of her brother, "you have 
 something to forgive us, have you? Now, I am really curious 
 to know what that can be. Is it, that when you came to 
 Brookfield, an awkward, unmannered lad, you found a cordial 
 welcome in our family? Is it, that papa gave you free access 
 to his library, teaching you what books to read, and how to 
 understand them ? Or that his children received you in their 
 midst, as though you had been one of them, and through their 
 patronage secured to you admission to the most select cu'cles 
 of Brookfield society? Or is it, that papa initiated you into 
 the intricacies of politics and statesmanship, honoring you with 
 his confidence, withholding no secrets from you, as if you were 
 his own, beloved child? Are these the things that you are 
 going to forgive us ? " 
 
 Victor made a gesture as if, overcome by her reproaches, he 
 would speak, but Nellie continued : 
 
 " Or do you mean to forgive us, that we have been betrayed 
 and undone by one whom we fondly trusted, to whom we fur- 
 nished the very means and weapons with which he is now 
 assailing his benefactor? " Then dropping her sarcastic tone, 
 she added with genuine pathos, " Tell me, sir, what is it, that 
 you are going to forgive us ? ' ' 
 
 Victor stood erect, pale, but more proudly than he had ever 
 stood before Miss May, as he answered: " You, Miss May, I 
 have nothing to forgive but the cruel injustice of your words 
 just now. And I beg you in turn, to pardon what I say, not 
 in idle boast, but because the torture you inflict upon me 
 wrenches the words from my quivering lips : To keep unsullied 
 mine own honor, I have yielded up the promise of heavenly 
 bliss on earth, and now confront a dreary joyless future." 
 
 Leslie put on his sarcastic sneer and opened his lips for a 
 reply ; but Victor anticipated him. 
 
 " As for you, sir," he said, turning to the brother, " we 
 are quit. You have this day taken payment in full for all the 
 bounties you so lavishly conferred upon me. You have set a 
 price upon that which I held priceless, — your friendship. If 
 
478 THE EEBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 honor has been forfeited in the relations between us, be sure, 
 sir, that the loss has not fallen to me. It is not I that have 
 betrayed a trust." 
 
 "Do you hear that, Nellie?" was the brother's retort. 
 ' ' Next he will recite to us an inventory of our own short- 
 comings toward him ! Such is the logic taught him by his 
 lord and master, that Mephistophelian trickster, to whom he 
 has bartered his soul. Come, Nellie ; let us go. We have 
 done with Mr. Waldhorst." 
 
 As they started to go, Victor turned to the lady, saying, 
 ' ' Would you vouchsafe me hearing for one word more ? ' ' 
 
 •' To my sister? " asked Leslie. 
 
 " Such is my desire, if she will kindly permit." 
 
 " Shall I remain? " he inquired of bis sister. 
 
 " I almost fear to be alone with him," whispered Nellie. 
 " His face is portentous of a weighty purpose." 
 
 " Then I shall remain," Leslie replied. 
 
 " And yet," she mused, " what have I to fear? If he be- 
 come too bold of speech or manner, I shall know how to bring 
 him to senses. Go, Leslie ; I would fain learn what it is that 
 he has to say to me in person." 
 
 " All right, Nellie ; but I shall remain within earshot of your 
 call, if you should want me." 
 
 Leslie left the room. The young lady regarded Victor 
 with an expectant look. 
 
 " Well, sir," she said, " I am ready to hear." 
 
 " I thank you for this act of kindness," he said, speaking 
 with a tenderness he could not master, in spite of his mighty 
 effort at composure. " There were happier days. Miss May, 
 when it was my proudest boast that in your goodness you pei'- 
 mitted me to think of you as a friend. My foolish heart, mis- 
 led by your sweet graciousness, indulged in blissful dreams of 
 yet a dearer name for you — " 
 
 "Presumptuous youth!" the lady interrupted proudly. 
 "How dared you infer the slightest encouragement on my 
 part of such folly? " 
 
CRUEL CONSCIENCE TRICKING CUPID. 479 
 
 "Oh," said Victor, witli a bitter smile, "I know, now, 
 that it was not intentional on your part. It was but my doting 
 heart, so eager to hug the fond illusion, that nourished my 
 aspiration. No Parsee ever worshiped with devotion deejjer 
 the bright Luminary of Day, than I my life's glorious Sun. 
 I beg you, in extenuation of my fault, to retlect that in my in- 
 fatuation I prized a smile from your lips far higher than any 
 woman's beauty in the world." 
 
 "• Tell me," she asked with unbending hauteur, " to which 
 of any words of mine do you attribute such incitement? " 
 
 " Oh, not to any words," he replied sadly. " All that you 
 said to me, as I now recall it, a sister might have spoken to a 
 brother. Not icJiat you said, but hoio you said it, was the 
 Siren's song that lured me to my destinj-. You but recall the 
 words, — not the voice, whose melodious cadences thrilled my 
 ear with ecstatic joy. You but recall the words, — not the 
 sparkling e^^e, that eloquently proclaimed what the beggar 
 speech was impotent to utter. You but recall the word, — not 
 the warm breath that uttered it. You but remember that I 
 held your hand , — not how that touch sent an electric thrill 
 through my veins that like a magic spark set my very heart 
 aglow." 
 
 Nellie listened with rapt attention. In spite of herself, her 
 haughty mien relaxed. 
 
 " My glorious paradise, like some resplendent, sun-painted 
 image in the clouds, has vanished into somber gloom," Victor 
 continued. " The bright ideal, that but now refulgently lit 
 up my pathway, is intercepted by destiny's mighty arm, 
 snatching from me my soul's crowning desire. Should ever, 
 in the future, your thoughts recur to me, then, Nellie May, 
 think of me as one, whose love for you, was so unbounded and 
 unselfish, that he elected rather to be worthy of you, than to 
 possess you unworthily." 
 
 The lady gazed on him in wonder. 
 
 But Victor continued: "My path in the future will be 
 rugged and thorny; j^et I shall pursue it. I shall even bear 
 
480 THE EEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 the loss of your father's love, of your brother's esteem, — 
 heart- woven friends though they were. And I will not chide 
 memory when it taunts me with ingratitude ; for I am patient, 
 and God, in his infinite mercy, will grant me further strength. 
 But Oh, Eleonora, who will save me from despair, when some 
 foul fiend, in an unguarded hour, shall take advantage of my 
 weakness, mocking my aching heart with jeering taunt: How 
 cruel conscience tricked it of its due! " 
 
 " Victor! " exclaimed the lady, in a tone blending entreaty 
 and wonder, as he slowly left her presence. 
 
 He paid no heed. 
 
 Leslie returned, and asked: " What did the knave want of 
 you ? ' ' 
 
 " He is no knave, Leslie! " exclaimed Nellie gazing at the 
 door through which Victor had disappeared. 
 
 '' What do you mean? " asked Leslie, as they were leaving 
 the room. 
 
 " He is a man." 
 
PART THIRD: 
 DEMOCRACY RUN WILD. 
 
 XXXI. 
 
 A CATALEPTIC GOVERNMENT. 
 
 HE interval between the election of President Lincoln 
 and his inauguration witnessed the anomalous spectacle 
 of a government professing itself incompetent, as being 
 unauthorized by the terms of its organization, to assert and 
 vindicate its own existence. The monster Secession, a many- 
 headed hydra, assailed the Union, striking its venomous fangs 
 into the vitals of the ReiDublic. From one after another of the 
 sulking States came the audacious announcement, that it had 
 severed the bond between it and the Federal Republic, thereby 
 resuming its sovereignty as an independent State. In words of 
 haughty bravado the Federal government was cautioned 
 against exercising any authority within the borders of the 
 newly proclaimed sovereignty. While yet sitting in the halls 
 of Congress at Washington, participating in its deliberations 
 concerning the new condition of things, Southern senators 
 were planning a new Union, hurrying its organization as a 
 ' political fact — a fait accompli — with the avowed purpose of 
 rallying outright secessionists, stimulating the masses, and 
 coercing recalcitrants and phlegmatics. Loud and boisterous 
 preparations were going on for the creation of the new republic, 
 with slavery for its cornerstone, to rival and eclipse the old 
 Union in power and prosperity, its individual States cemented 
 by the guaranty of peaceful disruption at the pleasure of any 
 of its sovereign members. By way of casting an anchor to 
 windward, the arms and ammunition of the Federal govern- 
 
 31 (481) 
 
482 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 ment were transferred to Southern arsenals, forts and barracks, 
 and taken possession of by the insurgents, together with the 
 forts and arsenals themselves. The Secretary of War, while 
 yet retaining his place in the cabinet as the President's ad- 
 viser, earned for himself the plaudits of the South — the South- 
 ern press being naively outspoken in the matter, — by his zeal 
 in this behalf. " We are much obliged to the Secretary of 
 War," says one of their papers, " for the foresight he has dis- 
 played in disarming the North and equipping the South for 
 this emergency. The Springfield contribution alone would arm 
 all the militiamen of Alabama and Mississippi." 
 
 And all this without eliciting a single response from the gov- 
 ernment assailed. Fearful, indeed, must be the predicament 
 of a chief executive, who, knowing it to be his duty to execute 
 the laws, feels his inability to do so. Abhorring civil war, he 
 sees it coming, — knows that unless it be met with energy and 
 determination at the outset, it will devastate the country North 
 and South ; yet stirs not a finger nor raises an arm to throttle 
 the infantine monster. He demonstrates with logic unanswer- 
 able that secession is a political absurdity, consistent only 
 with the theory that the Union is held together by a rope of 
 sand. Knowing that under the constitution the withdrawal of 
 a State from the Union is a mere nullity, he is yet unable to 
 say what shall be the relation between a State that claims to 
 have seceded, and the government which claims that it has 
 not seceded, because the States have no such power. To 
 coerce a State to remain in the Union, is, so his constitutional 
 adviser, the Attorney -general, informs him, making war on such* 
 State ; and it were rank usurpation in a mere executive officer 
 to declare war on a State of the Union. So he will leave it 
 to Congress to decide, whether the law can be so amended 
 under the constitution, as to enable the government to assert 
 and vindicate its integrity against discontented rebels. 
 
 Meanwhile the arm of the government is palsied ; its head 
 in a state of dazed bewilderment ; the cabinet divided, — some 
 members advising energetic resistance to the contumacious 
 
A CATALEPTIC GOVERNMENT. 483 
 
 rebels ; others coquetting with them . The .Secretary of State 
 throws up his coimuissiou in patriotic anger, because the Presi- 
 dent declines to reinforce the poorly garrisoned forts in Charles- 
 ton harbor. The Secretary of War (he to whom the South 
 is indebted for the arms with which it proposes to resist any 
 attempt of the government to defend its property) having 
 accomplished "much in the way of crippling the old Union, now 
 relieves the cabinet of his presence, — ostensibly, because the 
 President declines to withdraw the garrison from Charleston 
 harbor. The Secretary of the Treasury tenders his resignation, 
 deeming his position incompatible with his duty to his own 
 State ; his successor does the same, because the President has not 
 stopped the collection of the customs at the port of Charleston, 
 while the Secretary of the Interior will presently resign, " be- 
 cause he has heard that troops have been ordered to Charleston. ' ' 
 Congress is in no better predicament. The republicans, 
 indeed, are a unit, knowing distinctly what they mean to 
 accomplish. But the democrats are in a panic, — demoral- 
 ized, to say the least. Crittenden, for his part, has not lost 
 faith in the virtue of compromise : he hopes to lure the hot- 
 headed Southrons back into the Union by so amending the 
 Federal constitution as to secure to them all the territories 
 South of the Missouri Compromise line. But Congress is 
 stubborn, and will not hear of it ; even the members from the 
 Cotton States flout at the offer. In vain does the President 
 urge, with what influence he can bring to bear, the adoption of 
 this compromise, as the only possible means of averting the 
 threatened disintegration of the United States. In vain do 
 petitions, memorials and addresses pour in from all parts of 
 the North, twenty-two thousand strong from Massachusetts 
 alone, including the Mayor and members of the Board of Alder- 
 men and the Common Council of the Citj' of Boston , pray ing for 
 the adoption of the Crittenden Compromise. The Senate will 
 not so much as listen to the bill, much less vote on it, save in 
 the shape in which a republican senator derisively puts it, — by 
 moving to substitute for it the platform of the republican party. 
 
484 THE BEBEVS DAUGIITEB. 
 
 Virginia, proud in the days gone by of the sobriquet accorded 
 to her of " Mother of Presidents," is slow to catch the South- 
 ern fever of secession, shuddering perhaps, over the prospect 
 of being made the theater of fratricidal war that must ensue, 
 should the old government wake up to a sense of its power. 
 But she is prompt to denounce coercion as an insult to the 
 dignity of a sovereign State, and emphatic in demanding that 
 the Federal government shall maintain the statu quo; but turns 
 a deaf ear, nevertheless, to the Commissioners from Mississippi 
 and Alabama, who would persuade her to take a leading part 
 in the formation of the new Union. Instead, she invites the 
 several States to send Commissioners to Washington, to essay 
 the saving of the Union by a solemn Peace Convention. Though 
 Crittenden has failed — signall}^ — to impress upon Congress 
 the wisdom of mutual concessions by the belligerent sections of 
 the country, yet may there not be some virtue in the admoni- 
 tions of a solemn Peace Convention, meeting under the auspices 
 of grand old Virginia? Peace-loving citizens, frantic with 
 apprehension of dire civil war, breathe more freely at thought 
 of the oil that a solemn Peace Convention may pour on the 
 troubled waters, blessing the hopeful Commissioners that 
 assemble at the national capitol, to the number of one hundred 
 and three-aud-thirty, representing more than one-half of the 
 self-styled sovereign States, and fervently pray that the God 
 of Peace may speed their patriotic purpose. Herculean, 
 indeed, is the task set before them: No less a one than to pre- 
 vail on Congress to so amend the constitution as to induce the 
 Southern States to remain in, and those of the Cotton States 
 that had already seceded, to return to, the Union. Courageous 
 men, they ; of a hopeful turn of mind, to undertake to con- 
 vince a Congress that means not to be convinced ; or else 
 statesmen of the calibre that have faith in the magic of com- 
 promise in spite of the Crittenden experience, and who cannot 
 understand how any one will persist in his own opinion, if 
 offered a sufficient consideration to change it. Patriotic citi- 
 zens they were, willing to go great lengths in sacrificing their 
 
A CATALEPTIC GOVEBNMENT. 485 
 
 convictions, if peace can be had in exchange. It becomes 
 manifest, soon, that the convention has been called at too late 
 a day. For events have moulded ojjinions into full-grown 
 prejudices during the last few months, — prejudices ranged on 
 geographical lines, invisible as such to the sections themselves, 
 though too palpable, unfortunately, each to the other. They 
 will have a committee to report, — not later than the day after 
 to-morrow (for time is very precious, the thirty-sixth Congress 
 having but four weeks longer to exist) — what the convention 
 may deem " right, necessary and proper to restore harmony 
 and preserve the Union." Which committee wrangles for a 
 week or ten days to find a formula suitable to theii* own views, 
 and then report to the convention, which will wrangle for other 
 ten days among themselves, to find that they cannot unite a 
 majority of the States represented upon the proposition they 
 wish to lay before Congress. What can Congress do with a 
 project that does not even command the assent of the conven- 
 tion itself (having received the votes of only nine of the nine- 
 teen States, — three withholding their votes at all, seven voting 
 nay), now, having but four days left within which it can do 
 at all? One thing plainly appears, — it is not in the mood to 
 appreciate the wisdom of the convention as embodied in their 
 patriotic report. The Senate, in courtesy, has it referred to a 
 select committee but will never directly vote upon it ; the House 
 will not even permit its speaker to lay it before them. For 
 Congress itself is in no better plight: it, too, wrestles in vain 
 with the insoluble problem, how to find a formula that will 
 satisfy an excited, frantic, clamorous people. Peace, it would 
 seem from the fate of the Peace Convention, and of the Crit- 
 tenden Compromise, as well as of the deadlock of the parties 
 in Congress, is not to be had for any price short of war, or of 
 the nation's death by inanition. 
 
 The eyes of the nation, therefore, turn with anxious expect- 
 ancy to the President-elect. Fears of violence entertained on 
 the occasion of counting the electoral vote, prove to be un- 
 
486 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 founded. Muttered threats, that the new President shall not 
 reach the seat of government alive, induce tha venerable 
 General-in-Chief of the United States army, who is not so 
 tender of the. constitutional rights of the enemies of his gov- 
 ernment as is the President, to make such military arrange- 
 ments as shall cool the ardor of mobocratically inclined assas- 
 sins, should such infest the crowd of spectators at the inaugura- 
 tion. Cannon planted at both ends of Pennsylvania avenue, 
 armed cavalry lining every curbstone along the line of march 
 of the procession, are sufficient to convince the boldest ruffian, 
 that rioters would make but poor headway, though there were 
 many in the immense throng minded that way. And so the 
 President-elect, who has safely reached Washington despite 
 the conspiracy to assassinate him on his way through Balti- 
 more, is installed. The venerable Chief Justice of the United 
 States, — he, whose celebrated decision of Scott vs. Sandford 
 so thoroughly vindicated the constitutionality of slavery, and 
 demonstrated the impotence of Congress to interfere with 
 it — administered the oath of office. "Whose black robes, 
 attenuated figure and cadaverous countenance," sa3^s an eye- 
 witness to the ceremony, " reminded one of a galvanized 
 corpse." 
 
 Never before, perhaps, had inauguration ceremony been 
 so impressive. At the eastern front of the capitol, upon a 
 platform built out from the steps of the portico, are seated 
 such of the senators and representatives as have remained at 
 Washington ; the diplomatic corps, the judges of the Supreme 
 courtj and the higher officers of the army and navy. Close 
 by the gaunt form of the President-elect, stands the retiring 
 President, — tall, dignilied, reserved; deeply grieved, — so 
 the attentive observer notes, — at the part his party and posi- 
 tion have compelled him to play in a national drama w^hich is 
 now approaching a crisis. Douglas, too, is there, leaning for- 
 ward to catch every word of the inaugural addi'ess, nodding 
 emphatically at those passages that most please him, holding, 
 the while, the President's new silk hat, Another senator is 
 
A GATALEPTIC GOVERNMENT. 487 
 
 there, also ; from Texas, he, staudiug against the doorway of 
 the capitol, 'looking down with folded arms and Mephistophe- 
 lian contempt at the crowd and the ceremony. To him, — so 
 his supercilious mien would indicate — the Southern Confed- 
 eracy is .already an accomplished fact. He shall live to see it 
 the saddest of lictions. 
 
 And now, that a new president stands at the helm of the 
 ship of State, the nation turns its eyes toward him in painful 
 suspense, asking itself, What will he do? 
 
 Victor Waldhorst, the editor of a metropolitan newspaper 
 and member of a legislature with which he is not in sympathy, 
 is deeply anxious. The assurances given by the President in 
 his inaugural, do not satisfy him. They are full of promises 
 to the South. He reiterates the assertions made by him before, 
 that he will not, directly or indirectly, interfere with the insti- 
 tution of slavery in the States where it exists. He quotes the 
 fourth resolution of the republican platform, which he accepts 
 as a law binding upon his party and him, and to Avhich he will 
 firmly adhere, holding inviolate the right of each State to con- 
 trol its domestic institutions according to its own judgment 
 exclusively, and denouncing the lawless invasion by armed 
 force of the soil of any State as among the gravest of crimes. 
 He has no objection to a constitutional amendment classing 
 slavery as one of the institutions so protected, believing, as he 
 asserts, that such is implied by the existing constitution. He 
 deprecates secession ; grows pathetic over ' ' the mystic chords 
 of memory, stretching from every battle-field and patriotic 
 grave to every living heart and hearth-stone, all over the broad 
 land," which, he predicts, "will yet swell the chorus of the 
 Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the 
 better angels of our nature." 
 
 But he cannot doubt the right of the people to rid them- 
 selves of a government of which they have grown weary, 
 
 their constitutional right to amend, or their revolutionary right 
 
488 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 to overthrow it. Such being the program of the new Presi- 
 dent, what comfort brings it to the heart of a Union-loving 
 patriot ? 
 
 To Victor Waldhorst the outlook appears gloomy enough. 
 To be sure to him the darkness of the prospect is deepened by 
 his own sorrow ; for he has suffered disappointment and sore 
 grief. The bright sun that had illumined his future with a 
 halo of glory is eclipsed by the black cloud of adversity. So 
 his usually buoyant mind is now attuned to sinister forebodings. 
 He sees in the President's inaugural an unwillingness to deal 
 with secessionists as with traitors, or to invade the soil of any 
 State #ith armed force. Is this to be the end? Victor finds 
 but too much ground to fear so. For, propitious as had been 
 the attitude of the late President toward the rebellious States, — 
 permitting them to possess themselves of the forts and arsenals, 
 of the arms and ammunition of the Federal government, — the 
 present executive seems hardly more active in foiling their 
 purpose. Under his administration the military officers of the 
 United States, graduates from West Point, where i\xej had 
 been educated at the nation's expense, are permitted to resign 
 from the United States army, avowing theu- purpose of offer- 
 ing their swords and what of military proficiency is theirs, to 
 the new confederacy, until more than one-half of them, includ- 
 ing the most talented, gallant and brave, have gone, — resigned 
 or deserted, — carrying, in some instances, entire companies — 
 even regiments — of the regular army with them, into the 
 service of the seceded States. 
 
 Victor Waldhorst reflects with a heavy heart that the South 
 is fortifying itself with an energy and an enthusiasm that car- 
 ries along the undecided and wavering with irresistible impetus, 
 promising to involve the border States, and to swell the South- 
 ern Confederacy to such power, as will enable it to successfully 
 defy the old government, should it ever awake from its 
 lethargy. No wonder to him, that Southern Commissioners 
 solicit " an unofficial interview " with the Secretary of State, 
 to talk over the matters in difference between the ' ' two gov- 
 
A CATALEPTIC GOVERNMENT. 489 
 
 ernments," which, however, the secretary declines. Nor is it 
 surprising, that on the next clay these gentlemen send a sealed 
 communication to the secretary, in their official capacity, de- 
 manding the appointment of an early day on which they may 
 lay before the President their credentials as accredited agents 
 of the Confederate government, " to negotiate for a speedy 
 adjustment of all questions growing out of the political separa- 
 tion of the seven States that had formed a government of their 
 own." 
 
 Yet there is a grain of comfort in the reply of the secretary, 
 who " has no authority, nor is he at liberty, to recognize them 
 as diplomatic agents," and informs them that his " official 
 duties " do not at all embrace domestic questions, nor ques- 
 tions arising between the several States and the Federal gov- 
 ernment, but are confined to the conducting of the foreign 
 affairs of the country. Plainly, Mr. Seward believes in no 
 Confederate government, as yet. He has not yet lost faith in 
 his prophesy that " all trouble will be over in three months." 
 
 There is a gleam of hope too, in the thorough accord that 
 exists between the President and his cabinet. The Secretary 
 of War is mindful of the start which the South is daily gaining 
 by its aggressive course, and is deeply apprehensive that the 
 Confederate government may, by its very audacity and boast- 
 fulness, achieve recognition from the powers abroad and the 
 people at home, as an independent de /ctc^o government. But 
 he is mindful, too, of the superior power and resources of the 
 North, which, in a prolonged war, are sure to win. 
 
 Is there, then, to be war? 
 
 Virginia is deeply anxious to know. She has called her 
 people together in a convention, and they resolve " that the 
 uncertainty wMch prevails in the public mind as to the policy 
 which the Federal executive intends to pursue toward the 
 seceded States is extremely injurious to the industrial and 
 commercial interests of the country, tends to keep up excite- 
 ment which is unfavorable to the adjustment of the public 
 peace." So they will send a committee to the President of the 
 
490 THE EEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 United States, to find out what he is going to do al^out it. 
 And Victor finds in the answer of the President another gleam 
 of encouragement. Oracular enough is this answer. He will 
 "hold, occupy and possess" the property and places, — 
 meaning the military posts — of the government, in its posses- 
 sion when it came into his hands ; and if it be true that, with 
 the purpose of driving out the United States authorities from 
 these places, an unprovoked assault has been made on Fort 
 Sumter, he will hold himself at liberty to repossess, if he can, 
 like places taken before he assumed the government. In such 
 event he will, too, perhaps, cause the United States mails to be 
 withdrawn from all the States which claim to have seceded. 
 He believes that the commencement of war against the govern- 
 ment would justify^ " possibly demand " — such a measure. 
 Whatever else he will do, he will not attempt to collect the 
 duties and imposts by an armed invasion of any part of the 
 country ; though he will, to the best of his ability, repel force 
 by force. 
 
 Such is the answer which the President makes to the envoys 
 from Virginia. Comfort enough it ought to bring to Virginia, 
 if she be honest in her desire for peace. She knows now that 
 there will be no war unless the South force it on. To so much 
 the President stands committed. But let Virginia, and her 
 sister border States that have not yet taken the plunge into 
 secession, note this, also: that he means, to the best of his 
 ability, to repel force by force. 
 
 Very different is the effect which this answer, taken in con- 
 nection with the President's inaugural speech and the attitude 
 assumed by him since that time, makes upon different indi- 
 viduals, and on different sections of the country. Victor 
 Waldhorst, for instance, is the victim of emotions contending 
 in his breast: Fear, that the nation may not truly estimate the 
 price which it is willing to pay for peace ; Hope that the Presi- 
 dent has come to understand that forbearance has ceased to be 
 a virtue. 
 
 Miss Nellie May, too, hovers between alternate fits of de- 
 
A CATALEPTIC GOVERNMENT. 491 
 
 pressiou aud buoyaucy. Her father has been elected to the 
 Uuited States Senate — a fact in the newness of which she 
 abundantly rejoices, as the consummation of her proud ambi- 
 tion. But her father does not believe that the State which 
 has elected him to the Senate of the United States, ought to 
 secede ; and he has an abiding faith, that the seceded States, 
 if let alone, will presently resume their old places in the Union, 
 under guaranties which shall remove, for all time, the danger 
 to its peculiar property. And Nellie has such faith in the 
 statesmanship of her father, that she dreams of still higher 
 honors that a grateful South will heap upon him, should he 
 succeed, as she knows he is going to, in his patriotic ambition 
 to reunite the States ujoon a foundation more solid than ever. 
 But Nellie is fully convinced, too, of the immense superiority 
 of the chivalrous fighting material possessed by the South, as 
 contrasted with the mercenary, calculating Yankees, and 
 longed for just a battle or two, to enable her knightly South- 
 rons to cover themselves with glory. And she is sorely afraid 
 that the rascally politicians, both North and South, will dicker 
 aud chaffer about terms, and the Yankees, she knows, are 
 going to outwit her generous, gallant countrymen, and to cheat 
 them out of the golden opportunity to show their spirit aud 
 prowess. For it has been dinned into her ear until to her it 
 has become gospel truth, that the North will not fight. 
 
 Ralph Payton, for his part, is eager for the fray. He is one 
 of the " Knightly Southrons" of whom Miss May is proud. 
 And he is going to cover himself with glory, and bask in the 
 sunny smiles of patriotic Southern maidens, who shall look 
 upon him as their deliverer, or at least as one of their deliverers 
 (for he is not so vain as to undertake the job all alone) from 
 the yoke of the detested oppressors. The reward in store for 
 him is none the less alluring, though the patriotic Southern 
 maidens are embodied to him in the person of Miss Nellie May. 
 Miss May, indeed, is largely responsible for the enthusiasm 
 that is upon him. He understands, as plainly as if Miss May 
 had told him so (though she had not by any words of hers) 
 
492 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 that his suit for her heart and hand would prosper poorly if 
 she could uot look upon him as a hero, such as, in her glow- 
 ing imagination, every Southern gentleman must be. Yes, 
 Ralph Payton was eager, — most eager when in the company 
 of Miss May — that there shall be war — not a protracted, 
 devastating war, ])ut just an engagement or two, to impress 
 upon the dull North how terribly in earnest the South can be 
 when standing up for her rights, and to demonstrate to patri- 
 otic women of the South the superiority of their countrymen 
 over miserable Northern mud-sills. 
 
 The politicians of the border States are in a high fever of ex- 
 citement. They discuss eagerly, angrily, fiercely, whether to 
 join the Southern Confederacy, or make terms, such as they 
 can now dictate i^retty much as they please, with the old gov- 
 ernment. For the tradition that the North will not fight has 
 reached others, beside Nellie May and Ralph Payton, and the 
 events of the last few months have tended to encourage, 
 rather than to refute, such a belief. It is now a glorious 
 time for the magniloquent Gascons, who fight in anticipation 
 with a valor that shall challenge the admiration of mankind.. 
 They will die in the last ditch, rather than submit to Northern 
 tyranny, they boast ; and though thei/ may not be in earnest 
 about it, yet their gallant countrymen shall literally fulfill the 
 tragic prophesy. — Hot-headed Southern orators lash them- 
 selves into a frenzy of wrathful indignation over the tyranny 
 of a President who talks about repelling force by force, and 
 who claims for the Federal government the forts, arsenals and 
 navy yards in the seceded States, which they would like to 
 keep for themselves, the more effectually to wipe out the 
 tyrannical old Union. Sharp is the warfare between the 
 friends of the Union and the friends of secession, and doubt- 
 ful the issue. Secession leaders see the necessity of still 
 greater sectional excitement. So they will essay what virtue 
 thei'e is in the shedding of blood. "Strike a blow! " says 
 one of the agitators. " The very moment blood is shed, old 
 Virginia will malve common cause with her sisters of the 
 
A CATALEPTIC GOVERNMENT. 
 
 493 
 
 South." — " Unless you sprinkle blood in the face of the people 
 of Alabama," shouts another, " she will be back in the old' 
 Union in less than ten days." 
 
 And so it was deliberately resolved to " strike a blow," 
 and to " sprinkle blood " in the face of the people of the 
 South. And South Carolina, having been in the lead in the 
 matter of secession, feels it incumbent upon her to take the 
 lead in the bloody Avork also ; and she orders General Beaure- 
 gard to open fire on Fort Sumter. 
 
XXXII. 
 
 THE TORPOR BROKEN. 
 
 ^HATEVER of glory, or otherwise, there be in having 
 struck the first blow at the old government, has 
 been achieved by, and will forevermore belong to. 
 South Carolina, Not so plain is the record as to the indi- 
 vidual that may be entitled to the distinction of having fired the 
 first gun in the bombardment of Fort Sumter. It will remain 
 a subject of contention for many years ; as much as a third 
 of a century will pass away before an officer, high in command, 
 once, of the Southern forces, shall make careful inquiry among 
 the survivors of that battery stationed on Gumming' s Point, 
 and settle the question forever, by certificate over his own sign 
 manual. Whoever the man will be, he cannot receive the 
 token without vividly recalling the sublime scene, — when, at 
 the word of command issued in a voice of hardly suppressed 
 agitation, he touches off the gun: With a flash and a boom 
 the frowning engine of destruction spits forth its deadly charge 
 into the early dawn of the April morning : With lightning 
 eagerness the whizzing, shrieking messenger of defiance seeks 
 out the devoted little garrison on yonder island, — marking its 
 pathway from Morris Island to Fort Sumter with a profusion 
 of angry sparks, in a graceful curve, whose beauty fascinates, 
 even in that moment of sujireme significance, the gaze of the 
 excited soldiers, until the explosion of the shell, visible for 
 some seconds before it is heard, rouses them to a recognition 
 of the grim work before them. 
 
 That fiery streak traced by the burning fuse has been seen, 
 
 even before the report of the gun has reached their ears, by 
 
 the twenty or more thousand excited Southrons gathered at 
 
 Charleston Harbor, who greet the explosion of the shell with 
 
 (494) 
 
THE TORPOR BROKEN: 495 
 
 triumphant exultation, and again and again renew their frantic 
 demonstrations, as battery after battery opens on Sumter, 
 pouring an incessant shower of bombs and balls on the doomed 
 fort, Jfrom Sullivan's Island, from Fort Moultrie, Cumming's 
 Point and from floating batteries. 
 
 As yet there is no response. In gloomy silence, its shadowy 
 outlines dimly visible to the unarmed eye. Fort Sumter gives 
 no token of being garrisoned or armed. What does it mean? 
 The masses at Charleston Harbor wonder and speculate. It 
 occurs to them that Major Anderson is a Southerner, hailing 
 from the gallant State of Kentucky, and may not wish to make 
 war upon his countrymen. Yes ; some one remembers that his 
 wife, too, is, from the South, the major having married her in 
 Georgia, where her folks still reside. 
 
 Grey morning peeps over the Eastern horizon, and presently 
 proclaims, with rosy blushes, the advent of a day that -will 
 impress itself on the memory of Americans, both North and 
 South. The fort is vividly outlined, now, against the morn- 
 ing sky, and the grim artillerists have given their guns the 
 accurate bearing upon it. Fearful is the havoc wrought by 
 ball and bomb : a heavy piece of artillery is seen to topple from 
 its bed ill the uppermost tier of the armament, and fall crash- 
 ing on the rampart below, while the bursting of shells within 
 the very gates of the fort attest the gunners' skill. The sullen 
 silence of Sumter continues. It is commented on by the bom- 
 barding forces. It gives rise to animated discussions among 
 the eager spectators at Charleston Harbor. There is jubilant 
 exultation there: Major Anderson will not fight. Jeering 
 taunts are flung at all of those who persist in the silly notion 
 that the North are going to fight at all. The I-told-you-so 
 faction is clearly in the ascendant. Still, there are those too, 
 who shake their heads, as if to say : Wait ! the end is not yet. 
 And others, who bow their heads in shame and deep sorrow, 
 to see the flag there, plainly visible now in the broad daylight, 
 floating above that fort, defied and derided, and not a hand 
 raised in its defense, — not a shot fired to avenge the insult! 
 
496 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 How often they have suug, with patriotic pride and swelling 
 heart that 
 
 " The Star-spangled Banner in triumph shall wave, 
 O'er the land of the Free and the home of the Brave ! " 
 
 But speculation suddenly takes a different tack when, at the 
 hour of 7 : 30, a puff of smoke is seen to arise from the walls 
 of the fort, a ball comes whizzing and ploughing into the water 
 so near to the shore of Morris Island as to dash the briny 
 spray at the very feet of the gunners, and a sullen roar is 
 heard to thunder forth the proud defiance of Major Anderson. 
 At last ! An iuvoluutary start, as if heaving a sigh of relief, 
 betrays how eagerly the men welcome the gTim challenge. For 
 they are brave soldiers, these i50utheru hot-heads, and it is an 
 odious thing to war with an enemy that does not strike back. 
 They fire now with increased rapidity ; and the point of dis- 
 cussion has come to be, how long will the little garrison hold 
 out? 
 
 Not many days, so much they may rely on.» Perhaps not 
 'many hours j- Befoi-e the morning is over, every piece of the 
 upper tier of guns has been dismounted, demolished or dis- 
 abled, as the eager watchers at Charleston Harbor note with 
 wild enthusiasm. In the afternoon the fort Is battered with 
 red-hot cannon-balls that do fearful execution setting fire to 
 the combustible outbuildings. Half of Major Anderson's 
 force is required to put out the fires ; the other half keep up 
 a faint show of resistance. At nightfall the firing from the 
 fort ceases entirely, giving rise to the erroneous rumor, that it 
 has surrendered, — contradicted, next morning, by a renewal 
 of the perfunctory cannonading from the fort. 
 
 At nine o'clock on the morning of the second day the 
 barracks are again on fire, and most of the garrison are 
 needed to combat the fiames, so that the guns can be served 
 but feebly. Presently it is found necessary to sink the store 
 of powder and M^hat of loaded shells remained, lest they take 
 fire and blow up the fort together with the garrison. Yet 
 
THE TORPOR BROKEN. 497 
 
 Major Anderson keej^s the Stars and Stripes flying proudly 
 over the cripjiled fort, holdiuo- out to the very last minute in 
 which his government might send reinforcement. 
 
 He waits in vain. 
 
 It is now that Colonel Wigfall (late senator from Texas, he 
 who stood watching with contemptuous mien the inauguration 
 of President Lincoln, but now of the Confederate army) is 
 moved with admiration of the gallantry displayed by the 
 intrepid defenders of the fort ; and he undertakes to treat with 
 them, — unauthorized, it appears later, by the Confederate 
 general. Gaining admission under a flag of truce, he is 
 received by Major Anderson, whose dirt-begrimed, smoke- 
 blackened face he is hardly able to distinguish from the soot- 
 covered cannoneers surrounding him. The terms he offers 
 are generous, — honorable alike to the victors and the van- 
 quished, — attesting as well the magnanimity of the one as 
 the undaunted bravery of the other. General Beauregard is, 
 at first, inclined to disavow the unauthorized treaty of Colonel 
 Wigfall, as exceeding in liberality the recognition due to a 
 defeated, though gallant, foe. But finally, after much hesita- 
 tion, he confirms the terms. The garrison, with side-arms 
 and baggage, are to march out, with colors flying, drums 
 beating, fifes playing, and at their departure to fire a salute to 
 the flag waving over the smoking ruins of Fort Sumter, that 
 shall wave there no more until four years of desolating war 
 shall have swept over the land. 
 
 The bombardment has been terrific and incessant for some 
 four-and- thirty hours. More than twelve hundred solid balls 
 and shells had struck the fort on the first day ; yet not a single 
 life was lost, either on that day or on the next, on either side. 
 But, though bloodless in immediate effect, that bombardment 
 has roused the Demon of War. It broke the torpor in which 
 the government had been enthralled. Its echo, reverberating 
 throughout the land, quickens the nation's heart-beat, awakens 
 the phlegmatic from their indifference and the lethargic from 
 their apathy. President Lincoln appeals to the war-power of 
 
 32 
 
498 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 the nation ; he calls for seveuty-five thousand militia-meu " to 
 suppress unlawful combinations for resisting the law," and 
 convenes Congress in extra session for the Fourth of July. 
 The people respond to this call in a burst of patriotic enthusi- 
 asni: instead of seventy-five thousand, three or four times that 
 number of volunteers offer their services, while cajjitalists and 
 bankers tender, unsolicited, the necessary means to carry on 
 effective warfare. Congress, too, will not be backward in 
 voting men and supplies largely in excess of what the President 
 deems necessary " to make the conflict short and decisive." 
 
 Nor is the South less wrought up. Its women especially, 
 are in downright earnest, stirring up public sentiment to fever- 
 heat, inciting a sjjirit of chivalry in the brave, driving even the 
 pusillanimous into the ranks, in response to the call for one 
 hundred and fifty thousand volunteers, with which Jefferson 
 Davis has overtrumped President Lincoln. There is talk, too, 
 of issuing letters of marque to invite enterprising privateers to 
 destroy the shipping interests of the North ; to which the Fed- 
 eral President opposes the threat that they shall be treated as 
 pirates. 
 
 Two of the border States respond to the proclamation of 
 President Lincoln by promptly seceding from the Union and 
 joining the Confederacy. The legislature, of which Victor 
 Waldhorst is an unsympathetic member, having already pro- 
 vided for a convention to pass an ordinance of secession, which, 
 when in session, this body had flatly refused to do, now under- 
 takes to accomplish this purpose by direct legislation. The 
 governor is in perfect accord with them. He has sent a dis- 
 patch to President Lincoln, informing him that his requisition 
 is "illegal, unconstitutional, revolutionary, inhuman, diaboli- 
 cal, and cannot be complied with." Such audacity pleases 
 the General Assembly and convinces them of the governor's 
 sincere intention to " take the State out of the Union." So 
 they enact a number of laAvs to that end, — arming the gov- 
 erncn- with practically unlimited power, annexing the death 
 l)enaltv to conviction of horse-stealing, and of enticing slaves 
 
THE TORPOB BROKEN. 499 
 
 to run away from their masters. Since the most determined 
 opposition to secession is shown in the larger cities, the power 
 over the police force is taken away from the metropolis and 
 its authorities entirely, and lodged in a board of commissioners 
 appointed by and solely responsible to the governor. A new 
 militia law is passed, requiring the enrollment of every able- 
 bodied male between the ages of eighteen and forty-five, to be 
 commanded by officers appointed by the governor. The State 
 treasury is not in a plethoric condition ; so the legislature 
 provides for the necessary expenses to organize and equip the 
 new State militia by apj^lying to this purpose the money that 
 had been appropriated for the public schools and the mainte- 
 nance of the Asylums for the Insane and the Blind. Such and 
 similar are the means resoi'ted to by the State authorities to 
 accomplish the severance of the State from the Union, after the 
 convention elected by the people had emphatically refused to 
 pronounce for secession. The Confederate Congress appropri- 
 ates a million of dollars ' ' to aid them in the effort to main- 
 tain . . . the constitutional liberty, which it is the purpose of 
 the Confederate States in the existing war to vindicate." 
 
 Victor Waldhorst is struck with amazement at what he deems 
 the unwarranted usurpation of power by the legislature. He, 
 together with a small number of his colleagues from the metro- 
 polis, had remained at his post of duty, protesting against the 
 ruthless violation of the constitution, until the tyrannical ma- 
 jority, impatient of even the slight restraint imposed upon their 
 high-handed doings by being reminded of their lawlessness, 
 silenced all opposition by the application of the gag-rule. 
 Convinced, at last, that his presence at the capital was of no 
 possible utility, under existing circumstances, he seriously de- 
 bated with himself the question, whether duty required of him 
 to join one of the volunteer companies forming, in the larger 
 cities all over the State, for the defense of the Union. 
 
 The qxiestion was a momentous one for the young legislator. 
 Aside from the danger, which Victor certaiul}' did not under- 
 rate, and the personal discomforts and hardships involved in 
 
500 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 the life of a soldier, of Avhich he eutertaiued a perhaps exag- 
 gerated opinion, there was still greater terror for him in the 
 thought, that having once enlisted he would cease to be master 
 over himself or his actions and be subjected to the absolute 
 disijosition of his superior ollicers, — whether tyrant, coward, 
 or hare-brained dare-devil. Nothing but the clearest convic- 
 tion of paramount duty would ever induce him to subject him- 
 self voluntarily to such bondage. He reflected, that he might 
 render more efficient service by resuming his post as editor 
 of the Beohd elite r, than by carrying a muslcet ; but his con- 
 science nagged and pricked him with the unceasing prompting 
 to sacrifice his ease, and if need be, his life and liberty to the 
 cause of his country. 
 
 While in this state of anxious doubt a letter reached him from 
 the metropolis, which i)ut an end to his hesitation and defi- 
 nitely determined his course of action. 
 
 If I have not mistaken your calibre, — wrote his friend, Pro- 
 fessor Rauhenfels, — you are just now the right man in the wrong 
 place. What are you doing up there — what ca» you do, — 
 among a body of nincompoops, who imagine, in their phrenetic 
 zeal, that they are carrying the State on their shoulders 
 straightway into Jeff Davis' camp? You know from Cicero, 
 don't you, that '■'■silent leges inter arma," and if you didn't 
 get the information from the old Roman, why I suppose that, 
 having cut 3'our eye-teeth by this time, you have discovered as 
 much for yourself. So what good is there in law-making wiien 
 the tocsin of war resounds throughout the land ? And what 
 is perhaps more to the point, of what use are you, just now, 
 among a set of madmen? Do you propose to undertake with 
 better success, what, according to Schiller, the gods them- 
 selves have given up as a bad job, — to contend against 
 stupidity ? 
 
 — I, my young friend, have swapped off my Hegel for a 
 copy of Hardee's Infantry Tactics. Go you and exchange 
 the pen for a sword ; the sword is mightier than the pen, if 
 
THE TOItPOR BROKEN. 501 
 
 you know what to do with it. Uncle Sam will soon need all 
 the brawny arms he ean get. Above all things, however, he 
 will want brains for the armies. Contribute your mite. Begin 
 by offering your arm to carry a musket. Study tactics ; 
 practice discipline ; learn to command ; promotion will be sure 
 and swift. Look at me : four weeks ago I was a high jn-ivate 
 in the rear rank ; to-day I wear an eagle on my shoulder 
 straps, in recognition of my services in checkmating our fire- 
 eating governor. Shall I tell you how that was accomplished 
 by the use of a little brains ? 
 
 Well, you see, among my acquaintances is an old class-mate, 
 Jean Jacques by name, who is as hotheaded a partisan as any 
 they can have in the rebel ranks, — only he is on our side of 
 this quarrel. He asked me one day what I thought of the 
 militia encampment, which the governor had located just out- 
 side of our city. " Do you know what it means? " he added. 
 
 " Yes," I answered. " It means a recruiting depot for 
 Jeff Davis' army." 
 
 " Camp of Instruction, the governor calls it," says he. 
 " Instruction in Infantry Tactics." 
 
 " A transparent make-believe," saj-s I, " the real object is 
 to entice young Hotspurs into the Confederate army." 
 
 "Well said. Professor," says he. "So much is pretty 
 plain to a man up a tree. But what I'm driving at, is. Why 
 is the camp located right here, close to the city? " 
 
 Then I began to smell a goodly sized mice. " Uncle Sam 
 has an arsenal here," says I. 
 
 " I should smile," says he, with a sly wink. " With a hun- 
 di"ed and fifty thousand stand of arms stored in it, and am- 
 munition accordingly, and such." 
 
 " Which the rebels are sorely hankering after," says I. 
 " For the double purpose of arming themselves, and unarmino- 
 the Federal volunteers." 
 
 "Ah," says he, "the governor is a sly fox. But some 
 people can look through a millstone, when it has a hole in it, 
 as far as he. Now what bothers me is, that Uncle Sam is per- 
 
502 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 fectly well aware of the meaning of this clumsy move on the 
 military chess-board, and might just as easily turn it to his 
 own advantage ; but doesn't stir a finger." 
 
 "But," says I, "you are a member of the safety com- 
 mittee appointed by the President with full power to act in 
 just such emergencies." (I don't know whether you are 
 aware of the existence of this committee ; it is composed of 
 seven reliable and determined Union men, two of whom are 
 personal friends of mine. The commander of the troops at 
 the arsenal is among them ; and they have the unlimited 
 authority over all the military in this department.) 
 
 " There are seven of us," says he, with a bitter smile, " and 
 the proverbial safety in a multitude of counsel is, in our case, 
 the safety of the enemy. The committee is divided. Captain 
 Lowe, Colonel Pith and myself are agreed that the camp should 
 be bagged at once, before the mischief is fully hatched. But 
 the two lawyers of the committee say that it would be clearly 
 unlawful to interfere with the perfectly legal and legitimate 
 exercise of the governor's function in organizing a camp of 
 instruction of the militia of the State." 
 
 " That is so," says I ; " but it is a mere pretense." 
 
 " Or course," he assented, " and it makes me mad to see 
 how our wiseacres are letting the rebels get the better of us, 
 with their ej^es open, too. There's a safety committee for 
 
 you 
 
 T " 
 
 " Don't they propose to do anything at all? " I asked him. 
 
 "Oh yes!" he replied with a bitter laugh. " They are 
 going to get a writ from the circuit court of the United 
 States, — injunction, or prohibition, or something, I dare say 
 they don't rightly know what themselves — to stop the rebels 
 from taking the arsenal ! That's the kind of fighting that suits 
 the lawyers. I wonder why they don't get a writ of injunction 
 against Jeff Davis and his Confederacy at once ? There's as 
 much chance of its being obeyed, as there is that our foxy 
 governor will keep his hands off the arsenal, when he's ready 
 to take it." 
 
THE TOJRPOR BBOKEN. 503 
 
 " But there are Mr. Colt, and Mr. Houel," said I. '• What 
 do they say al)Out it? " 
 
 " Oh," exdaiincd Jeau Jacques wrathfuUy, " they are so 
 d — d conservative, that they side with the lawyers." 
 
 The two last named gentlemen I know well. Seeing the 
 danger of our situation at once, I determined to show it to 
 these friends, being fully aware that I could make them imder- 
 stand, even if the lawyers should prove invincible in their 
 cast-iron conservatism. With the arsenal in possession of the 
 governor's partisans, and the police force under his control, 
 the city would be absolutely at the mercy of the secessionists, 
 which would seal the fate of the State. What effect that, giving 
 them the command of the Mississippi river, .might have on the 
 Ihlal issue of the Union cause, is fearful to contemplate. So I 
 determined to act promptly, and my plan was formed on the sjjot. 
 
 "Your Committee of Safety," says I, to my friend Jean 
 Jacques, "is posted, I suppose, as to the military force that 
 might be brought to bear against the camp ? ' ' 
 
 "Perfectly," he answered. "I tended to that myself. 
 There ai'e the two companies of regulars under command of 
 Captain Lowe, that are now garrisoning the arsenal ; four 
 regiments of volunteers, mostly Germans, of which one is 
 commanded by Colonel Pith, one by Colonel Scheffel, includ- 
 ing the corps called Liitzow's Jaeger, which has been drilling 
 all the Spring, and two other regiments, including your own, 
 fully armed and equipped, among them four batteries of 
 artillery under command of experienced officers that have 
 served in Europe. Then there are four full regiments of home- 
 guards, that have been sworn into service to protect the city. 
 All these have been under instruction in the manual of arms 
 and the elementary principles of forming into ranks, moving in 
 bodies, marching, etc." 
 
 " Are the regiments complete in numbers? " I asked. 
 
 "There are upward of eight thousand men in all," he in- 
 formed me. "But none of them are veterans, to be sure, 
 except some of the ollicers." 
 
504 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Says I, "is there any danger that these home-guards will 
 take fright and fire at their own men in case of a scrimmage? " 
 
 He laughed. " There is no telling what raw recruits will do 
 in case of a scare." 
 
 It is but fair to him to say, that he seconded my plan very 
 effectually. To his prompt and energetic action under my 
 direction, much of the signal success that crowned it is due. 
 If the Union is to be saved, — and I have an abiding faith in 
 its future — you may ascribe a large slice of the merit to his 
 activity. How the coup was l)rouglit about, is best described 
 perhaps, in a report of my friend Jean Jacques, made to me a 
 day or two after the conversation detailed, and of which I 
 send you a copy : . 
 
 " Acting on your suggestion, I had no difficulty in persuad- 
 ing Captain Lowe to visit with me, in disguise. Camp Jefferson. 
 Our masks were perfect. The captain looked irresistilily droll 
 as a portly negro wench, carrying a basket full of doughnuts 
 and ginger cakes, while I shoved a little haud-eart with an ice- 
 cream freezer imbedded in a tub full of ice. I had shaved off 
 my mustache for the occasion, tanned my face with a cosmetic 
 wash to the color of a bright mulatto, put on a flat nose and a 
 kinky wig, and passed as the son of the cake-vender. The 
 false-face of the captain fitted him to perfection ; and though 
 he is a Connecticut Yankee, he counterfeited the broad dialect 
 of a Southern negro so closely that no one would have sus- 
 pected his nativity. In this disguise we visited every part of 
 the camp. Our only trouble was that we were kept busier 
 soiling our cakes and ice cream than we liked, for it interfered 
 with our opportunities of observing what was going on and 
 listening to the conversation of the soldiers and oflScers. 
 
 " It was a lovely May afternoon when we were there, and 
 the camj) was crowded with visitors. The beauty and fashion 
 of Upper Tendom were in the ascendancy. Ladies in elegant 
 toilets beamed upon the militiamen in their gay uniforms, their 
 eyes outsparkliug the diamonds they wore in profusion, their 
 faces more radiant than the bright May afternoon. Say what 
 you please about these fair secessionists, — they are certainly 
 most captivating sirens, and I do not blame the young hot- 
 heads for coveting their smiles. 
 
 " What we saw and heard there leaves no doubt, that our 
 
THE TOIiPOIi BROKEN. 506 
 
 worst surmises were but too well grounded. Not only is the 
 lending sentiment in the camp that of enthusiastic sympathy 
 with the South and the Southern Confederacy, but no secret is 
 made there of the intended capture of the arsenal. Among 
 other things we saw was the unpacking of several pieces of 
 artillery, which had been taken apart and packed in separate 
 boxes labeled "Marble." The outspoken devotion to the 
 Southern cause of the cai^tain of the steamboat ' Cygnet,' on 
 which the boxes had been shipped, explains how it was possi- 
 ble to bring these cannon (as well as other arms and ammuni- 
 tion) from the United States Arsenal at Liberty and to trans- 
 port them to the camp tlirough the crowded streets of the city 
 without exciting suspicion. Captain Lowe recognized them at 
 once, as property of the United States. 
 
 " Well, the evidence we collected was so convincing as to 
 the treasonable designs of the leading spirits in the camp, that 
 our report at the next meeting of the committee brought both 
 Mr. Colt and Mr. Houel over to our side. We stood five to 
 two, then, and pretty soon one of the lawyers — Mr. Broadly — 
 also gave in. He said, that in so momentous a matter it was 
 highly desirable that there should be unanimity among the 
 members of the committee, and that if the others voted for the 
 taking of the camp, he would not stand ont alone against it. 
 This put Grover on his mettle. He had been pacing up and 
 down the room in great perturbation of mind, while Colonel 
 Pith and Captain Lowe discussed the plan of attack. Most of 
 us thought that it would be best to surprise the encampment 
 during the night, so as to avoid as much as possible all at- 
 tempts at resistance on the part of the militia, and thus reduce 
 the chances of bloodshed. But Mr. Grover was of a different 
 opinion. He presently grasped the little black skull-cap he 
 was wearing, dashed it to floor with an energetic fling, and 
 exclaimed : 
 
 " ' Do the thing in o^^en day, gentlemen, and not like a sneak- 
 thief in the night ; there can't be more than a thousand men in 
 the camp ; half or more of them are mere recruits, and the bal- 
 ance may have learned to parade on holidays and go thi'ough 
 the manual of arms to the admiration of their wives and sweet- 
 hearts, having seen no more of real service than our home 
 guards. If they get no notice of our intention until we march 
 upon them, there can be no trouble. But again I say, let us 
 act openly, not as if we meant to steal, the camp, and I am 
 with vou.' 
 
506 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " Captain Lowe at once sided with bini. He said that as 
 far as fighting went, he would undertake to whip the whole of 
 the militiamen with his two companies of regulars. But he 
 recommended that the whole of the available military forces be 
 massed against the camj), so as to impress not only the officers 
 in command there, but likewise any mob of secessionists in the 
 streets of the city that might feel inclined to interfere, wnth the 
 utter absurdity of resistance." 
 
 Such was Jean Jacques' report to me. I suppose you have 
 read the account of the affair as it was described in the papers. 
 As is usual for the press, they gave a confused and garbled 
 statement of what happened at the camp and on the march 
 with the prisoners to the arsenal, colored to suit their respect- 
 ive prejudices ; not one of them had any real insight into the 
 inception of the decisive move or into its absolute necessity for 
 the safety of the Union cause in our State. 
 
 — So much for the part I took in this master stroke of 
 strategy. The surrender was substantially unconditional. 
 There w'ere curses, both loud and deep, and gnashing of 
 teeth ; but not a drop of blood was spilt nor a skin scratched 
 in the business proper. Our raw troops with one deplorable 
 exception, behaved like veterans, the exasperating taunts, the 
 maledictions and insults notwithstanding, that were plentifully 
 heaped upon them by the disappointed aspirants for martial 
 glory, as these were marched off to the very arsenal they had so 
 confidently counted on taking by storm. Quite interesting 
 was it to witness the behavior of the different individuals in 
 submitting to their capture: Rage, more or less open or 
 heroically suppressed, of the hotheaded Southern partisans, 
 baffled of a promising scheme in furtherance of their interest ; 
 disappointment, sad and deep, of the warm-hearted Southern 
 patriot, to whom severance from the Union meant prosperity 
 for his section of the country, and who therefore saw a 
 calamity in every check to its accomplishment ; the profound 
 regret of those among them who refused to believe the plans 
 of their leaders to be disloyal and looked upon the interference 
 
THE TOBPOR BROKEN. 507 
 
 by tlie Federal goverumeut as an act of liigli-liauded oppres- 
 sion. Que incipient warrior, — the captain of a neatly uni- 
 formed metropolitan volunteer company that had attracted and 
 tilled with admiration the lady visitors to the cantonment — 
 posed for the honor of a tragic hero in melodrama. ' ' Never ! ' ' 
 he exclaimed, in a deep bass of hollow pathos, when our friend 
 Jean Jacques politely requested him to hand over his sword, 
 "Never! No venal hireling of that tja-annical despot, Lin- 
 coln, shall vaunt a true man's sword, save as a sheath for its 
 blade! " And drawing his weapon with a majestic frown, 
 he struck it with such violence flatwise against a fence rail, 
 that it broke to pieces. " Thus," he added, throwing the hilt 
 at the feet of the officer, " be ever the fate of tyrants! " 
 
 — The tragic phase of the affair, distorted and garbled as usual 
 by the press to suit the bias of the respective partisans, came 
 about naturally enough, and in spite of the utmost care and 
 precaution taken by our commanders to ijrevent just such 
 scenes as gave a foretaste of the horrors of civil war. In the 
 hope of avoiding any attempt to rescue the prisoners on the 
 part of the mob of angry secessionists, and impressing the 
 prisoners themselves with the absurdity of any hope of escape, 
 each of the captives was flanked by two Federal soldiers, and 
 sandwiched between two ranks, so that each of the captives 
 was in effect surrounded by a guard of seven men, effectually 
 cutting off all intercourse between them. In this order they 
 were marched through the streets of the city toward the arse- 
 nal. But the preparations consumed much time, requiring 
 frequent halts of the head of the column while the rear was 
 being formed. There was, of course, a vast concourse of 
 people attracted by the military spectacle, and the news of the 
 capture of the camp, which spread like wildfire all over the 
 city, creating the wildest excitement. The streets were 
 literally covered with a surging, jostling, pushing crowd of 
 human beings, — boys, mostly, and men, though not lacking 
 for women, too, — pressing and being pressed against the 
 military, who found it, at times, exceedingly difficult to main- 
 
508 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 tain order iu the ranks. Doors and windows of ttie houses 
 along the line of march were peopled with eager spectators. 
 The trees, even, about and near the camping grounds, were 
 bearing a plentiful crop of venturesome boys and men, excited 
 and wrought up by the unwonted military spectacle. The 
 capture had been planned for an hour at which, it was thought, 
 but few if any visitors would be there. Some, however, had 
 arrived ; among them, notably the captain of the steamboat 
 Cygnet, that had carried the cannon, now mounted, significantly 
 enough, on several of the main avenues of the cantonment. He 
 had been invited, it transpired later, with his family, to witness 
 a dress parade, and partake of lunch iu the general's tent ; and 
 he had brought his wife and daughter, the latter a lovely maiden 
 of fourteen. 
 
 Matters had progressed entirely according to program, without 
 accident or mishap of any Idnd, until the last of the prison-ers 
 were being marshaled into line, and the rear of the column 
 was al)out to leave the grounds. By this time the crowd had 
 become so dense and unruly, that Captain Lowe, who had 
 ordered one of his companies of regulars to bring up the rear, 
 found it necessary to send them on ahead to clear the street, 
 fearing to intrust the task of driving back the multitude, that 
 had now assumed the character of a mob, to any but thoroughly 
 disciplined soldiers. I thought the captain was right ; for 
 there was no telling what havoc might have been made in a 
 collision between the mob and undisciplined recruits armed 
 with muskets and bayonets. But it turned out to be a sad 
 mistake. It so ha^Dpened that the last company in the column, 
 was composed of inexperienced workingmen and artisans, 
 most of whom had never handled a gun in their lives, and 
 who had been sworn into service as home-guards but a few days 
 before. They had not been intrusted with the guarding of 
 any of the prisoners, and were to be followed in the march 
 by the regulars, who had been sent forward. As soon as 
 they had marched on, the crowd that had forced its way into 
 the camp grounds, closed around the company of recruits. 
 
THE TOBPOR BROKEN. 509 
 
 hooting, jeering and deriding them. The officers succeeded 
 in keejjing their men from resenting the insults heaped upon 
 them, and hoped for the return of the regulars, liut just as 
 they were leaving the grounds, a missile was thrown into the 
 ranks of the recruits — not a bomb, dealing death and de- 
 struction generally, but a comparatively harmless piece of dirt, 
 meant for a practical joke rather than an assault on that 
 massive body of military. But it demoralized those undis- 
 ciplined recruits, most of whom believed themselves attacked by 
 the mob and gave way to a morbid feeling of panic. At this 
 critical moment the report of a gun was heard, — or of a pistol, 
 it has not been definitely ascertained which nor by whom the shot 
 was fired — and the panic was complete. Some one in the ranks 
 shouted ' ' fire ! ' ' and the men turned round and discharged 
 their muskets point blank into the dense mass of people. The 
 effect was terrific. Hardly one of the charges fired at such 
 close range that did not find its lodgment in some human body. 
 It afterward appeared, that there were more dead and wounded 
 than men in the company that had fired. You know that I am 
 not overly tender-hearted ; but I hope to be spared such 
 another sight of carnage and butchery, including among the 
 victims women and children. One of the most affecting inci- 
 dents was the death of the steamboat captain's lovely daughter, 
 whom I saw in a sitting posture leaning against the trunk of 
 a tree, a crimson spot in her white robe indicating where the 
 minnie bullet had pierced her heart. Even in that awful mo- 
 ment of consternation and terror I saw a man stop to gaze on 
 the exquisite beauty of that childish face, so tranquil in its 
 deep sleep. Did he think of the precious offering her father 
 was called on to make for the sake of the cause he had 
 espoused? 
 
 — One of the consequences of the taking of the camp is, 
 that this city at least is thoroughly alive to the fact that Uncle 
 Sam has shaken off the torpor into which the impotence of the 
 last administration had thrown the government. Those of the 
 sympathizers with the South, who had been taught by their 
 
510 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 orators and politicians, that no I'esistauce would be made to 
 the secession of the Cotton States, are beginning to realize 
 their mistake. A panic fully as mad as that which wrought 
 the fearful holocaust on the tenth of May has seized upon the 
 people of this city. The absurdest rumors gain ready cre- 
 dence. The wealthy inhabitants of the West End are in a 
 state of unreasoning alarm, fearing a general massacre at the 
 hands of the brutal soldiery. "The Dutch are coming!" 
 was whispered about, there, striking terror into the hearts of 
 the timid, and causing anxious alarm among those better in- 
 formed. For you are aware, I suppose, that three-fourths of 
 the volunteers on the Union side and nine-tenths of the home- 
 guards are German-speaking citizens ; a circumstance arousing 
 at once the wrath of the secessionists and giving color to the 
 rumor, that the enraged soldiery were i)lanning to sack the 
 West End. There was a general exodus from that part of the 
 city. All who could do so, sought safety in flight. Steam- 
 boats and railroad cars were crowded with fugitives. Car- 
 riages, wagons, vehicles of any description were in such 
 demand, that some of the wealthier householders offered five, 
 ten, — in some instances twenty-five — dollars an hour for the 
 use of one. Truly, Victor, Pan is a mighty god, and un- 
 reasoning fright makes abject fools of men ! For the German 
 home-guards were almost equally apprehensive of dire ven- 
 geance from the secessionists ; only they, belonging generally 
 to the poorer classes, had no means of leaving the city, and 
 sought safety in remaining together under arms. War is 
 surely upon us and we are beginning to learn its lessons. Get 
 ready yourself ! 
 
 — I have been out at Busch Bluff. They are all well there, 
 so far as i3hysical health goes. But the capture of Camp Jef- 
 ferson has roused its inmates also from the even tenor of their 
 way in a most remarkable fashion. That old Auf dem Busch 
 should feel stirred up, when I explained to him the real mean- 
 ing of the thing, is natural enough. He was for enlisting in 
 
THE TOEPOB BROKEN. 511 
 
 the war at ouce ; but 1 succeeded in coiiviuciug him, that his 
 proper place was with the home-guards, where, for the purposes 
 of defense, his services would be equal to those of any younger 
 man ; while a more vigorous constitution was required to 
 undergo the hardships and privations of service in the field. 
 But Woldemar and Pauline are the ones whose behavior con- 
 stitutes an unbroken series of conundrums. The former has 
 been going about with a hang-dog look ever since my return 
 from the capital, in strange contrast with his usual self-suffi- 
 ciency ; but yesterday he took my breath away when he 
 announced in my presence, his resolution to enlist. You rec- 
 ollect how he used to sneer and smile in his superior way at 
 the idea of calling a scrimmage between the North and South a 
 war ? I remember one occasion when he quoted from a mod- 
 ern di'amatist : 
 
 " 'Twill be a war as 'twere in Donnybrook, 
 I long to see these rustic cavaliers 
 Set in the field, and hear their oflicers 
 Command with hay and straw for right and left. 
 What service might a thousand soldiers render 
 In such a struggle ! ' ' 
 
 And now to think that he has actually submitted his precious 
 person to the arbitrary control of some such officer ! Can 
 the fact that Leslie May is a prisoner of war have anything to 
 do with his sudden fit of patriotism? For Leslie May is a 
 prisoner of war. It was just after I had related the rather 
 romantic episode of his capture that I noticed what strange 
 effect this news produced on Pauline, and that Woldemar an- 
 nounced his determination to enlist. Your sister was a perfect 
 blaze of color, and though she said nothing, her sparkling eyes 
 hung on my lips as I was leisurely describing the brave bear- 
 ing of young May when he was arrested, as if she would drink 
 in my words. The hot-headed youngster, by the way, was the 
 only one of the seven hundred and odd prisoners we took at the 
 camp who refused to be liberated on his parole. 
 
512 
 
 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 ''' You may deprive me of my birthright as au American 
 citizen," he said (and I could not but admire his manly dig- 
 nity as he said it), " but it must be by your own act of 
 tyi'anny ; for I will not cowardly yield it up, nor forswear my 
 right to take revenge for the outrage you have perpetrated this 
 day." 
 
 — Our friend Ralph Payton was also among the prisoners 
 (he wore a captain's uniform). He was not so refractory as 
 Leslie. I wonder wliether we did him a good turn in relieving 
 him of further duty of fighting for the Confederacy, or whether 
 he will burden his soul with perjury to find favor in the eyes of 
 Miss May. For she will scorn him, don't you think, if he 
 stays at home ? 
 
XXXIII. 
 
 THE WAR FEVER IN A WESTERN TOWN. 
 
 ^m P'TS^R an abseiu'e of some years, Colonel May — now 
 addressed as Senator May — had returned to his home 
 near Brookfield, with the ladies of his household. The 
 presence of the family at May Meadows was one of the themes 
 talked over in Mr. Burden's bar-room, as well as elsewhere 
 about town. The guests at Borden's were now entertained by 
 the gossiping chit-chat of a lively young bartender ; for Bob 
 Rountree had turned his back upon the Dutch Store, and was 
 devoting his talents to attract customers to the groggery, of 
 which he made a real little paradise to lazy bummers and gos- 
 sip-loving idlers. Just now the return of the May family to 
 the old mansion furnished abundant material for talk, and Bob 
 had much to say, particularly when the Honorable Ralph Pay- 
 ton, M. C. elect, happened to be present, about the ravishing 
 beauty of the senator's daughter, whose fame as a society 
 belle in Washington circles eclipsed, according to Bob Roun- 
 tree's account, even the brilliant reputation of her father as a 
 leader in Congress. It was known, of course, that Mr. Pay- 
 ton was a frequent visitor at May Meadows, and Bob Rountree 
 hinted slily, that the close political connection between the 
 senator and the congressman from this district might lead to 
 relations more intimate still : who knows ? Whereat the 
 Honorable Ralph Pay ton was wont to smile complacently. 
 
 A little later on Leslie May also joined the family. For he 
 had been released by the military authorities, who were sorely 
 puzzled to know just what to do with the unaccommodating 
 young rebel, who persisted in his refusal to take the oath de- 
 manded from him, that he would abstain from hostilities toward 
 the Federal government, nor would he even give his parole to 
 
 33 (513) 
 
514 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 remain neutral until regularly exchanged. The State had not 
 seceded, nor declared war against the government, and the 
 young militiaman's presence at Camp Jefferson had been per- 
 fectly lawful ; no overt act of any kind could be proved against 
 him, that militated in the slightest degree against the law of 
 the land. On what pretense, then, could he be held prisoner? 
 The Committee of Safety knew well, that the writ of habeas 
 corpus had not been suspended, and that no Federal or State 
 court would, if applied to, deny him his freedom. vSo the 
 committee deemed it Tvise to avoid an airing in public of their 
 authority ; and rather let the refractory captive go. 
 
 His advent into Brookfield was hailed with pleasure, not 
 only by the old and young people — male and female — of the 
 town (for he was very popular among them all), but also in 
 the groggery. Contrarj^ to his previous habits, he was now a 
 frequent visitor there. So Avas the Hon. Ralph Pay ton ; for 
 though the earlier friendship between him and Bob Rountree 
 had (iooled considerably after the trial of Victor Waldhorst ; 
 yet his candidacy last summer had brought him into closer 
 contact, with the bar-room, and thus revived the old relations 
 between them. And Bob Rountree had developed into so 
 glowing an admirer of the candidate for Congress, was so elo- 
 quent in lauding the statesman-like qualities of his friend, and 
 supplied him with such generous quantities of " soft sawder," 
 that the young congressman found Burden's a pleasant place to 
 spend a leisure half hour at, now and then, — even after the 
 election — to talk over matters and things in general; mostly, 
 now, the chances of war, and what Congress, and particularly 
 what he himself was going to do at the coming extra session. 
 It happened sometimes, that Mr. Payton and Mr. May (Jr.) 
 would meet at Burden's. Not by preconcert, however. On 
 the contrary: Leslie had permitted himself, once, to hint, that 
 he deemed the visiting of a tippling house by a member of 
 Congress an impropriety. Payton would surely have resented 
 such words if spoken by any one but the brother of the sena- 
 tor's daughter ; as it was, he contented himself by retorting. 
 
THE WAE FEVER IN A WESTERN TOWN. 515 
 
 that he thought himself in good company with the sou of a 
 United States Senator, — a remark, which the young bartender 
 apphiuded as a good hit, turning the laugh against Leslie. 
 The eyes of the latter sparkled for a second, as if intending a 
 sharp reply ; but he, too, refrained from offensive words, turn- 
 ing the matter off with the good-natured quip, that he had 
 been licensed by the supreme court to practice at the bar, — a 
 privilege not shared by the congressman. 
 
 For Leslie had a purpose in visiting the bar-room. A pui*- 
 pose, not recognized as a purpose at all until it sprang into 
 conscious existence on being taken prisoner at Camp Jefferson. 
 Until then, the idea of forcible resistance to the separation of 
 any State from the Union was to him, as it was to many in the 
 South, simply preposterous ; and when the conviction flashed 
 upon him that the government was employing its military 
 force to prevent secession, his hatred of jDuritauism and cant 
 was centered against the government of the United States, 
 which, in his estimation, was guilty of tyrannical ursurpation of 
 power in suppressing and violating the sovereignty of the 
 States. He had left the metropolis with the determination to 
 resist, to the utmost of his power, such despotism. He threw 
 up his practice of law, just then beginning to be remunerative, 
 to recruit for the Confederate service. His success exceeded 
 his own expectation. For Brookfleld and the surrounding 
 country was in as high a state of excitement as other parts of 
 the State ; and Leslie May, when he had a purpose, could talk 
 pleasantly, and sway men's minds with a jest or a smile that 
 would have meant nothing in any one else. And he added to 
 his personal popularity the prestige of a name that connected 
 him with one of the oldest families of Virginia. 
 
 Events of war -like character chased each other in rapid suc- 
 cession throughout the State, keeping the excitement at fever 
 heat. A Confederate army was known to approach from the 
 South, which had been raised by the Confederate Congress for 
 the special purpose of wresting the State from Federal control, 
 marching directly toward the capital. But the Federal forces 
 
516 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 reached the capitol long- before the Confederates, spreading 
 consternation in the halls of the legislature. The members, 
 trembling with fear of the treatment to be expected at the 
 hands of a soldiery they had vilified in unmeasured terms, 
 sought safety in flight, although the commander of the Union 
 forces had, immediately on reaching the city, issued a proc- 
 lamation guaranteeing that no citizen or officer should be 
 molested in any way so long as he kept the peace and obeyed 
 the law, but threatening condign punishment for every offense 
 against Federal authority, and particularly for any molestation 
 of citizens on account of loyalty to the Union. 
 
 The governor himself having fled, along with the terrified 
 legislature, as well as most of the executive officers, it became 
 necessary to organize a government for the protection of life 
 and property. So precipitate had been the flight of the mem- 
 bers of the legislature, that they had not found time to close 
 the session in parliamentary form, but left the journals unfin- 
 ished. Raffing what of valuables were within easy reach, not 
 forgetting to deplete the treasury of its last dollar, they boarded 
 an extra train of the railroad, and steamed out of the city, to 
 be seen there no more in their official dignity. 
 
 Before addressing himself to the pursuit of the enemy, the 
 general in command of the Federal troops installed Colonel 
 Rauhenfels as military goyernor, leaving his regiment with him 
 to cover the city and to enforce whatever measures might be 
 deemed necessary for the protection of the loyal element of the 
 population. This appointment, however wise, it may have 
 been in a military point of view, did not contribute to the 
 conciliation of the rebel element of the State. Muttered 
 imprecations and threats marked the indignation of the 
 Southern sympathizers at what they denounced as an insult to 
 American freemen : placing in authority over them a for- 
 eigner, — one of those hated Dutchmen that were abolitionists 
 by instinct, whose very name they could not ^jronounce with- 
 out a grimace of contempt. 
 
 Leslie May was not slow to take advantage of this wide- 
 
THE WAE FEVER IN A WESTERN TOWN. 517 
 
 spread feeliug of reseutment to augment his list of volunteers 
 for the Confederate service. He skillfully supplemented the 
 general bitterness of feeliug against a military governor, by 
 ridiculing the person of Rauhenfels, whom he caricatured as 
 a crazy book-worm, gone mad over German metaphysics, and 
 preaching the perfect equality between the negroes and white 
 men. And the roll of the company he endeavored to raise 
 filled up with astonishing rapidity. 
 
 Not so noisily demonstrative, perhaps, but quite as earnest 
 in their convictions, were a number of loyal citizens at Brook- 
 lield and in the surrounding country. While the Ozark Argus, 
 enlarged, now, to the resi)ectable size of seven columns to each 
 of its four pages, denounced the " outlandish military Dicta- 
 tor '■ in the most violent terms, the opposition paper must self- 
 evidently defend, though with ill-grace, the administration of 
 the military governor. With ill-grace : because the editor of 
 the Brookfield Standard shared the feeling against military 
 interference with the civil administration of the State govern- 
 ment. 
 
 Meanwhile May Meadows took on the appearance of the 
 lively times of old. The presence there of Nellie and Leslie 
 May alone served to add animation to the household, although 
 Leslie had abated somewhat his habit of teasing, and Nellie's 
 blithesome beauty had taken on a touch of soft refinement, 
 subduing slightly her natural vivacity, but in nowise diminish- 
 ing the charm of her winsome ways. Mrs. May received the 
 homage due to a lady of her distinction — as wife to a United 
 States senator — with all the dignity of a lady descended from 
 one of the first families of Virginia ; a little loftily, perhaps, 
 in the estimation of the sturdy Western sovereigns who had 
 so often cast their suffrages for Colonel May ; but with the air 
 of such genuine Southern hospitalitj'' as dispelled all suspicion 
 of patronage. 
 
 The senator maintained his old courteous, urbane self, with 
 a smile and a pleasant word for each of his numerous con- 
 stituents who cared to shake hands with him and to con- 
 
518 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 gratulate him upon his promotion to the United States Senate. 
 To the ladies of his household he displayed his usual cheerful 
 temper ; no casual visitor would have detected the slightest 
 trace of care or anxiety in his conversation or behavior. Nellie 
 alone suspected at times that he felt somewhat keenly the 
 increased responsibility conditioned by his new dignity, and 
 wondered not that he should feel a little anxious in looking for- 
 ward to the new theater of action awaiting him at the approach- 
 ing extra session of Congress. 
 
 But the center of attraction at May Meadows was Nellie 
 May. That the young men should be dazzled by her beauty, 
 and take advantage of her hospitality to enjoy her society, was 
 not a new experience, either to her or her people. Still, it was 
 something of a novelty to find herself poi)ular Avith her own 
 sex. Not only did her schoolday friends press upon her their 
 claims anew, among them Hettie Shannon and Emily Matlack, 
 who gushed over theii* " dearly beloved friend, after an 
 absence of so many years," but newer acquaintances among 
 the fair denizens of Brookfleld, — and many who had no claims 
 either as friends or acquaintances — eagerly sought the privi- 
 lege of being on visiting terms with the reigning belle. Her 
 drawing-room was as much resorted to by lady callers in the 
 day-time, as in the evening, by gentlemen, or rather by gentle- 
 men cmd ladies, for in the first flush of her popularity, the ladies 
 enjoyed the company usually assembled at May Meadows as 
 much, almost, as did the gentlemen, though Nellie May monop- 
 olized the homage of the men, as acknowledged queen of her 
 circle. Conversation was always lively there, for the hostess 
 possessed the rare tact of encouraging others to talk. Timid 
 young maidens and bashful swains sometimes marveled to find 
 themselves possessed of hitherto unsuspected conversational 
 talents, when Nellie had succeeded in drawing them out on 
 subjects that were familiar to them. 
 
 The honorable Ralph Fayton was, of course, a frequent 
 guest at May Meadows. Not only in the evening. For he 
 had many, though sometimes rather transparent excuses, for 
 
THE WAR FEVER IN A WESTERN TOWN. olO 
 
 visits during the day — cousultations witli tlie senator ou 
 political, or with Leslie on military matters — never omitting, 
 however, to visit Miss May on such occasions, if she was 
 visible. There was a rumor that the young congressman was 
 the accepted lover of Miss May ; but just how it originated, 
 or what truth there was about it, was not clearly established. 
 But since the young lady did not take the trouble to contra- 
 dict it — not, perhaps, aware of its existence — and as Pay- 
 on himself, on all occasions encouraged it, there was ample 
 excuse for the jealous chagrin of aspiring swains, who regarded 
 the beautiful heiress in the light of a much coveted prize, and 
 for the secret rejoicing of marriageable belles, who saw in 
 her a most formidable rival. JStill, nothing that toolv place in 
 the drawing-room circles could be fairly pointed to as a con- 
 tirmation of the rumor. Assiduous he was in his attentions, — 
 so much was patent ; but he could boast of no familiarities 
 allowed him, no preference shown him by the charming 
 hostess. Awkward and bashful Orlando Jones was smiled upon 
 as sweetly by her as was he. She dispensed her drawing-room 
 courtesies impartially; even Mr. Danforth, the newly arrived 
 Yankee storekeeper, was made to feel as much at ease as any 
 of her most honored guests of Southern proclivities. 
 
 In this one respect perhaps, the young congressman was at 
 a disadvantage, even. Miss May had caught the war fever in 
 a form characteristic of the women of the South. She was 
 enthusiastic in her conviction of the gallantry and soldier-like 
 qualities of the Southerners and firm in the faith, that any 
 passage of arms with the North must result in a glorious 
 victory for the South. And, like most of her country-women, 
 she admired chivahy for its own sake : to her the crowning 
 glory of manhood consisted in the undaunted courage to assert 
 one's rights, and, if need be, to defend them with a strong 
 hand, regardless of any cost save honor. And Payton, count- 
 ing on Miss May's enthusiastic hero-worship, and her devotion 
 to the. Southern cause, had been eloquent in picturing to her 
 the deeds of valor to be performed by chivalrous Southern 
 
520 THE BEBEL'S DAUOHTEB. 
 
 knights ; and he had counted well. In listening to his brill- 
 iant rhapsody her eyes had sparkled, as he had seen them 
 sparkle once before — on his first visit to her at Washington ; 
 and she had smiled on him as she had smiled at that time, as 
 if she were proud of him. And her smile had inspired him 
 with real enthusiasm and the determination to take up arms in 
 earnest in defense of her beloved South. But now he was 
 under a cloud. For the honors that beckoned to him at 
 Washington had taken firm hold of his imagination, and he 
 had determined to sacrifice to them the tempting opjjortunity to 
 distinguish himself on the field of glory. 
 
 When Leslie, on returning from the metropolis, had sug- 
 gested to him the plan of raising a regiment for the Confed- 
 erate army, he reminded him of the proclamation of the Presi- 
 dent calling a session of Congress for the Fourth of July, and 
 of his paramount duty to serve the country in the council of 
 the nation, rather than in the army. Leslie had been skeptical 
 on the subject of duty, and tried to dissuade him from a course 
 that might expose him to the reproach of lukewarmness in his 
 courage ; whereat the yoang congressman showed a proper 
 spirit of resentment, (pioting the example of Senator May, who 
 had likewise announced his unalterable determination to attend 
 the extra session, which he deemed a high duty to his country. 
 
 "And have you forgotten," he exclaimed, as Leslie sneer- 
 iugly suggested that there might be a difference between the 
 case of an experienced statesman, who had been the acknowl- 
 edged leader of his i)arty for years, and whose counsel was 
 looked for and demanded by the nation, and that of a tyro, who 
 would hardly have time to learn his parliamentary ABC dur- 
 ing the entire extra session, — " have you forgotten that I was 
 compelled to take an oath — my simple promise was not 
 accepted, as you well know — not to take up arras against the 
 United States? " 
 
 " Oh, you took an oath, tlid you? " Leslie remarked, smil- 
 ing sarcastically. " Well, I did not. Though I would not 
 lay much stress on an oath taken under compulsion. To you. 
 
THE WAB FEVER IN A WESTERN TOWN. 521 
 
 I suppose, it comes handy to pose for a persecuted martyr. 
 Aud for fear that that one oath you took might not be strong 
 enough to curb your military ardor, you must needs go to 
 Washington to take another ' to supjDort the constitution of 
 the United States,' etc., which will keep you out of harm's 
 way until the scrimmage is over." 
 
 " What do you mean, Leslie May? " Payton blustered out 
 with frowning brow. " I hope you do not impugn my cour- 
 age? " 
 
 " There is no occasion for that between us two, Ralph Pay- 
 ton," Leslie replied quietly, with a look, however, that in no 
 wise tended to reassure his friend. "But I do admire your 
 prudence, which, you know, is sometimes the better part of 
 valor. Only, it may not be so easy to convince sister Nellie, 
 when she comes to hear of your conscientious scruples, of the 
 high moral quality of your courage." 
 
 Payton was too wise to resent the sarcasm of Leslie's mood, 
 but endeavored instead, to conciliate the brother of the lady in 
 question. " I hope," he said, " that you will not influence 
 your sister's judgment to ray injury in this matter." Then 
 he added, in a beseeching voice, tender in its pathos of self 
 pity, " You cannot know how hard it is for me to be denied all 
 opportunity to show my devotion to the cause of the South by 
 fighting for it." 
 
 " Don't fret about my influencing Nellie," said Leslie, re- 
 assuringly. " Nellie will not permit any influencing by me or 
 anybody else." But the smile that accompanied his words 
 told Payton even more plainly that in Leslie's opinion his 
 sister would need no prompting to resent her admirer's lack of 
 enthusiasm . 
 
 A gay aud lively company had assembled in the parlor at 
 May Meadows. News had reached the town that the Confed- 
 erate army on its way to the capital had arrived mthiu a day's 
 march of Brookfield ; while General Lowe was marching with 
 
522 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 a considerable force to intercept the Confederates ; and expecta- 
 tion stood tip-toe. 
 
 Senator May moved aliout among his guests with easy self- 
 possession, unaffected, apparently, by the excitement of those 
 around him. When pressed for an- opinion, as he was by most 
 of his visitors, he gave it as his judgment that the State would 
 not, as it should not, secede ; that the Confederacy would go 
 to pieces, — not because of military weakness, for that the 
 South possessed much the best fighting material, and had the 
 advantage of enthusiasm under the present condition of things, 
 Avhich would go far to neutralize the numerical strength of the 
 North — but because the real interests of the South lay in the 
 Union, — a fact of which the Southern States would soon con- 
 vince themselves. Meanwhile every advantage gained by the 
 Confederate armies would strengthen the cause of the South, 
 enabling it to dictate so much more effectually such better 
 terms for the reconstruction of the Union as would secure the 
 South in the undisturbed enjoyment of its property rights, 
 and remove the bone of contention between the two sections. 
 
 " But what will become of us in the interim, until the bellig- 
 erent powers have settled matters to their notion ? ' ' demanded 
 Mr. Huffard, who was one of the company. " It is all well 
 enough to hope better things for the future ; l)ut meanwhile, 
 the two armies may meet here ; and it is a (question that I 
 would not give odds on to guess which is going to whip, and 
 which of them would be more tender of our property rights." 
 
 "Why, Mr. Huffard!" Payton interfered. "Can you 
 doubt, for a moment, who are our friends? The army under 
 command of General Ciper has been organized for the express 
 purpose of protecting us against the tyranny of the Federal 
 government." 
 
 "Oh, oh, Mr. Huffard!" echoed pretty Emily Matlack. 
 " Surely you do not mean to doubt our friends, and take sides 
 with the Yankees ? ' ' 
 
 "Oh, no, Mr. Huffard! " the fair Hettie Shannon chimed 
 in. " Indeed you know better than that. Why, you told us 
 
THE WAB FEVER IN A WESTERN TOWN. 523 
 
 about the tyi'auuical Dutch Dictator yourself, and that he and 
 his minions must be driven out of the State. Now, didn't you, 
 Mr. Huffard?" 
 
 The editor of the Ozark Argus laughed, and said, with a 
 polite bow of acknowledgment toward his fair interlocutors, 
 " I am sure, ladies, that I am obliged to you for your good 
 opinion of me. Mr. Danforth, there, will agree with you, I 
 suspect, in acquitting me of undue partiality for the Yankees ; 
 and our friend, here, the congressman, ought to know, if any- 
 body, whether the Southern cause has a stauncher defender 
 than myself ; or whether he had a truer friend than the Ozark 
 Argus during the canvass last summer. I trust he does not 
 mean to spurn the ladder on which he climbed intooltice. But 
 that is neither here nor there. My anxiety is, what is going to 
 happen to us if the neighborhood of Brookfield become a 
 battlefield?" 
 
 " There isn't going to be much of a battle, anyway," said 
 Payton. "Let the riff-raff of hirelings, that have sold their 
 carcasses to the Yankee government, once get sight of a corps 
 of determined soldiers fighting for a principle, and they will 
 skedaddle like a herd of sheep at sight of the wolf. They 
 won't fight at all, unless they outnumber us ten to one, as they 
 did when they took Cam]) Jefferson. Any smaller odds than 
 ten to one we would have fought, — and licked, too, or driven 
 to ignominious flight." 
 
 Among the guests of the evening were a number of young 
 men who had enlisted in Leslie's company of volunteers, in- 
 vited by Nellie herself ; for she delighted to honor the brave 
 men who took up arms in defense of their country. One of 
 these, who had been an attentive listener, now put the question 
 to Payton : 
 
 " You say, we ; were you, then, one of those taken at that 
 capture ? ' ' 
 
 " Unfortunately, I was," Payton answered. 
 
 " There was nothing to be ashamed of in being overpowered, 
 was there?" queried the young man. 
 
524 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 "Ashamed of?" Pay ton repeated with emphasis. "1 
 should thing not. They were ten to one against us, with 
 whole parks of artillery, and regiments of cavalry. But if they 
 had been twenty to one, and every one of them a walking 
 arsenal, none of us would have run." 
 
 "Ah! how brave! " exclaimed Miss Matlack. 
 
 " How glorious! " echoed Miss Shannon. 
 
 Nellie caught sight of Leslie'^ contemptuous smile, and 
 blushed. 
 
 " Why, then, unfortunate? " his interlocutor persisted. 
 
 "Because," Payton answered with defiant swagger, though 
 he blushed likewise as he spoke, " because the cowardly 
 tyrants made me swear on the Bible not to take up arms 
 against the United States government." 
 
 " What a pity! " whimpered Miss Matlack. 
 
 " How cruel I " echoed Miss Shannon. 
 
 " But it seems to me that that ought not to trouble you," 
 Mr. Huffard suggested. " You are going to Washington for 
 the extra session ; at least that is the current opinion about it. 
 If you do, you will be out of the way of any fighting, at least 
 as long as the session lasts; and by the time it is over, the 
 politicians will have the matter in hand again, and will patch 
 up a peace." 
 
 " Yes, I will go to Congress," said Payton, with aggressive 
 positiveness, an angry expression flitting for a moment over 
 his face ; "I will go to Congress, though that Dutch Dictator 
 send an army of his hirelings to stop me." 
 
 " Leslie," said Nellie to her brother, " what is there about 
 this Dutch Dictator that Mr. Payton speaks of ? " 
 
 " Why, don't you know," Mr. Payton hastened to answer 
 instead of Leslie, " that he is that rascally Professor Rauhen- 
 fels, who forced that silly cub, Waldhorst, to vote against your 
 father." 
 
 " Yes, so I learned," Nellie remarked. " But why should 
 he send an army to stop you from going to Congress ? ' ' 
 
 Payton paused for an instant, and Leslie spoke. 
 
THE WAB FEVER IN A WESTERN TOWN. 525 
 
 "I suppose that Ralph knows," he said, " that Victor 
 Waldhorst is the governor's aide-de-camp, or private secretary, 
 and might naturally wish to take revenge upon his old enemy 
 (from grammar-class times, 3'ou know) by clogging his career 
 to glory in the particular sphere he has chalked out for him- 
 self. For you know, don't you, that Ralph is as touchy on the 
 matter of honor, almost, as Victor Waldhorst? He thinks that 
 his career as a soldier is closed to him, because he was a 
 prisoner at Camp Jefferson." 
 
 "" And were not you a prisoner at Camp Jefferson? " asked 
 Nellie. 
 
 " Aye, but that is a grey horse of a very different color," 
 said Leslie, laughing. " I am not a congressman, you know; 
 and while the pathway to glory or death is open to me, poor 
 Ralph's only chance to distinguish himself is to hie him to 
 Washington, take father's place as leader in the House of Rep- 
 resentatives, and demolish the Lincoln government by dint of 
 parliamentary strategy." 
 
 Pay ton frowned darkly. " You are singularly sarcastic and 
 unfair, Leslie," he said, taking his eyes off Nellie's face, 
 which he had uneasily regarded during Leslie's speech. " I 
 did not say, that the dictator would send an army to stop me 
 from going to Congress. I only said, that if he did, he would 
 not stop me." 
 
 Mr. Danforth had been an attentive listener, but had not, so 
 far, taken part in the conversation. He now said, not address- 
 ing anyone in particular, but obviously with the view of 
 smoothing over things for Mr. Payton : 
 
 " It will undoubtedly be a good thing for our town if Mr. 
 Payton carries out his intention. With him in the House, and 
 Mr. May in the Senate, Brooktleld will be well represented in 
 Congress." Then, fixing his eye on Senator May, he contin- 
 ued: " But I am like Mr. Huft'ard. I have some apprehen- 
 sion as to the way in which we will be affected by the two 
 hostile armies in case they meet anywhere near here." 
 
 " Oh, I am sure we need give ourselves no uneasiness on 
 
526 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 that score," said the senator. " It may, certainly, become a 
 source of some annoyance and trouble ; but we should remem- 
 ber that both the contending armies are composed of our 
 fellow-citizens, who will be as careful of the rights of non-com- 
 batants as if we were friends." 
 
 " I don't agree with you, Senator," said Mr. Hulfard. 
 " Once they cry ' Havoc, and let slip the dogs of war,' pas- 
 sion and fury will rule, instead of justice and discretion. We 
 have as yet no disciplined soldiery on either side. And even 
 if no harm come to us from the soldiers themselves, there are 
 always thieves and depredating marauders following an array 
 for the sake of plunder and spoliation. And then," he added, 
 lowering his voice and looking about to ascertain whether any 
 of the servants were within earshot, " there is a kind of prop- 
 erty that might take itself off of its own accord, if the Yankees 
 offered inducement and shelter." 
 
 " Speaking for the Yankees," said Mr. Danforth, with an 
 assuring smile, " I believe that I am justified in announcing 
 that nothing of the kind suggested by you is intended, or need 
 be feared." 
 
 " Granting, that there will be no open confiscation of 
 slaves," said Mr. Huffard, "how will even the Y^ankee gov- 
 ernment prevent the abolitionists that are rushing into the 
 ranks of its armies from running the underground railroads on 
 a lavish scale ? And what of the marauders ? ' ' 
 
 " Why, as to them," said Mr. Danforth, " the people will be 
 able to protect themselves. Captain May, here, has a company 
 of youngsters under his command that would make short work 
 of stopping them in any little scheme of plunder or thieving." 
 
 "Oh, Mr. Danforth!" almost shrieked Miss Matlack. 
 ' ' Youngsters ! ' ' 
 
 "Why, lam sure they are gallant heroes, every one of 
 them!" Miss Shannon added. 
 
 " At least they expect to be," said Leslie, exchanging a 
 pleasant nod with some of the members of his company that 
 happened to be present ; " for as yet they have had no oppor- 
 
THE WAB FEVER IN A WESTERN TOWN. 527 
 
 tuuity to earu their spurs." Then turuiug to Mr. Dauforth, 
 he added: "But you are mistaken, sir, if you expect us to 
 remain at home here, guarding our hen-roosts and posing at 
 parades for the amusement of idlers. There are old men 
 enough to serve as home-guards ; and if need be — ' ' 
 
 " There are women too," exclaimed Nellie, resulutely, in- 
 terrupting her brother, "who, on occasion, can handle a re- 
 volver. Let no man capable of carrying a musket stay at 
 home for our jjrotection. I would blush to furnish an excuse 
 for any coward to shirk his duty to his country." 
 
 Payton winced under Nellie's enthusiastic and spirited 
 words ; but he joined heartily in the applause that rewarded 
 her for the patriotic sentiment to which she had given utter- 
 ance. Leslie noted with much pleasure the glances of grateful 
 appreciation with which his volunteers regarded the fair 
 speaker. Even the ladies shouted : " Bravo ! Well spoken ! " 
 and the features of Senator May brightened with pride as he 
 looked upon his daughter. 
 
 Payton, who had been furtively watching Miss May all this 
 while, now saw her cross the room, meeting the octoroon girl 
 Cressie at the door, who had been beckoning and nodding to 
 her mistress in the endeavor to catch her eye without attract- 
 ing general attention. As Nellie approached, the girl whis- 
 pered something into her ear, at which she was noticed to 
 change color. By this time the attention of the whole com- 
 pany was drawn to them, and a dead silence ensued. 
 
 " You may as well come in and tell us all you know," said 
 Miss May, as she noted the expectant faces of her guests. 
 " What was it that Xerxes told you? " 
 
 The slave girl was evidently under the pressure of some ex- 
 citement, but spoke calmly enough, in almost pure English, 
 remarkably free from the ordinary negro dialect. "Xerxes 
 himself saw nothing," she repeated. " He met Dandy Slick 
 at the Frog Pond ; and Dandy, so Xerxes said, told him, that 
 he had seen more than a hundred thousand soldiers all in grey 
 uniforms — ' ' 
 
528 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 "That is the Confederate army under General Ciper!" 
 shouted Paytou, interrupting the girl. 
 
 "Go on," said Leslie, drawing closer toward Cressie. 
 ' ' Where did he see them ? ' ' 
 
 " Xerxes did not tell me," said the girl ; but added of her 
 own accord: "I suppose it was on Kickapoo Prairie, while 
 standing on the bluff at James' Fork." 
 
 " What makes you think so? " asked Leslie. 
 
 "Because Dandy told Xerxes that he had been fishing at 
 Wiuslo's Run," said Cressie. 
 
 " Well — and what else? Go on! " urged Leslie. 
 
 "He told Xerxes — so Xerxes said to me — that he got 
 frightened at all the soldiers, with their cannons, and muskets, 
 and he ran away as fast as his legs would carry him, through 
 the woods, toward Brookfield. And he almost ran into the 
 bayonet of a soldier in a blue uniform ; and pretty soon this 
 soldier marched him off for a prisoner over to the Boonville 
 road, and there, — so Xerxes said that Dandy told him — he 
 saw more than another hundred thousand soldiers, all in blue 
 uniforms, marching — " 
 
 " When was this? " Leslie interrupted her. 
 
 " He did not tell me," answered Cressie. But it must have 
 been in the middle of the afternoon ; because Xerxes just got 
 back from the Frog Pond — ' ' 
 
 ' ' What on earth was he doing at the Frog Pond ? ' ' Leslie 
 again interrupted. 
 
 " I don't know, he did not tell me. But I suspect he went 
 there after some rushes to fix his chair with. And it's a good 
 nine miles from Wiuslo's Run to the Frog Pond." 
 
 Leslie looked sharply at the octoroon girl and then at Nellie. 
 
 " What do you think of this cock-and-bull story? " he asked 
 the latter. " Cressie, I suppose, is to be trusted, and maybe 
 Xerxes. But what about this Dandy Slick? I have never 
 heard of him before." 
 
 " Nor I," said Nellie. " He must be a new arrival." 
 
 " Oh," said Mr. Huffard, " he belongs to Jake Boyd. He's 
 
THE WAIt FEVER IN A WESTERN TOWN. 529 
 
 as lazy u st^oiiiuliol as you'll Ihid, even anioiig the darkies of 
 this region. It is likely eiiougli that he's been out fishing, for 
 that's what he spends half: his time at. And if he got home 
 from Winslo's Run in less than half a day, he was mightily 
 scared, you bet. But you may back a scared nigger against a 
 second class race-horse, any day." 
 
 " Did Xerxes tell you anything more? " asked Nellie. 
 
 " Bring him here at once," shouted Leslie, before Cressie 
 had answered the last question. 
 
 When the girl had withdrawn, he turned to his father, asking 
 him what he thought of the matter. 
 
 " There's no doubt on earth, but that it is General Ciper's 
 army," Fayton vohmteered. 
 
 ' ' And what about the blue-coats ? ' ' asked one of the vol- 
 unteers of Leslie's company. " If they have met, there must 
 have been a battle before now." 
 
 "Why, yes!" Miss Matlack exclaimed with animation. 
 " Now, I am sure, that I heard the roar of cannon about sun- 
 down. I thought it was thunder at the time ; but it must have 
 been cannonading." 
 
 Before the return of Cressie with Xerxes there was a lively 
 interchange of opinion among the ladies and gentlemen, whether 
 cannonading had been heard, or could have been heard at 
 Brookfield, if there had been an engagement. Mr. Huffard 
 ridiculed the idea that the armies could have met in the time 
 indicated.. He begged the ladies and gentlemen to remember 
 that niggers were constitutionally addicted to lying, and if 
 Dandy Slick had even stumbled across a scout, or a corporal's 
 guard of skirmishers, he would naturally magnify them into an 
 army. 
 
 Even after the negro Xerxes had been examined and cross- 
 examined with all the astuteness that Leslie could bring to 
 bear, the company separated without having learned whether 
 an action had taken place, or was to be expected ; or whether 
 the whole story of Dandy Slick was a fabrication, or the hallu- 
 cination of a badly scared negro. 
 
 34 
 
XXXIV. 
 
 AFTER THE BATTLE. 
 
 ^[HE jDopulation in and about Brookfield were much 
 divided in political fsentinient. The majority undoubt- 
 edly sympathized warmly with the South. Many of 
 them were pronounced secessionists, eager to separate the State 
 from the old Union and to join the new republic, strong in their 
 faith in the glory and prosperity of an empire based upon the 
 cherished institution of .slavery made sure and safe from let or 
 hindrance. Others, and not a few, adherents to the doctrine 
 of State sovereignty, saw in the attemi)t on the part of the 
 government to coercion submission, tyrannical interference 
 with their rights and liberty, and felt it to be the duty of free- 
 men to resist. Among those, too, whose sympathies were on 
 the side of the Union, there was a difference in motive. Of 
 the zealous, conscientious fanatics, who hailed the war as a 
 scourge employed by Providence to punish the South and bring 
 aljout the abolition of slavery, there were not so many in the 
 Southwest ; the predominant element among the loyal poi)ula- 
 tion were indifferent on the subject of slavery — some oppos- 
 ing it on principle, others as unwise in policy, quite a large 
 pi'oportion favoring it as an economic and beneficial institu- 
 tion — but all condemning secession as a political heresy, 
 equally illogical in principle and unwise in practice, whether 
 the war resulted in restoring or in wi])ing out slavery. 
 
 So it was that the meeting of the two armies was looked for- 
 ward to with ihe keenest interest — hope and fear shared about 
 equally between both sides, the former, perhaps, predominant 
 in both. And when, on the day after Cressie had startled the 
 guests at May Meadows by Dandy Slick's wild story, news 
 I'ame to Brookfield that a battle w^as being fought, it roused 
 (o.SO) 
 
AFTER THE BATTLE. 531 
 
 the i)eople to the highest pitch of excitement. Rumors of the 
 events transpiring at Winslo's Run chased each other, — vague 
 at lirst ; contradictory, exaggerated, during the whole day. 
 So eager were all to hear of the issue of the battle, that when 
 night came, few of the men, or women, either, felt disposed to 
 retire to their beds, or having done so found oblivion in sleep. 
 They gathered in little groups on the Square, conversing in 
 e^ager whispers, — wondering, hoping, fearing. Mr. Burden's 
 dram-shop was crowded with gossips, waiting for and discuss- 
 ing the news ; indulging in wildest speculations, — giving ready 
 credence to the absurdest reports, and dilating, with blenched 
 cheeks, on the fate of the town and its inhabitants, if the Fed- 
 erals should whip the Confederates, or vice versa. 
 
 Leslie May's company of volunteers (who had neither been 
 sworn into the service, nor received arms) had been ordered 
 to assemble at May Meadows, with such weapons as they could 
 lay hands on, to hold themselves in readiness for such services 
 as emergeucies might render necessary. 
 
 For the negro population was most excited of all. Not the 
 fewest of them expected immediate liberation, if the Lin- 
 coln soldiers should gain a victory over the Confederates, and 
 naturally awaited events in feverish anxiety. It was chiefly 
 the fear of trouble from this source that made the volunteer 
 companies, including those on the Union side, so welcome just 
 now. 
 
 Just before the break of day the dull tread of a marching 
 army was heard approaching from the. direction of Winslo's 
 Run. No beating or di'ums, no playing of fifes, nor fanfar- 
 onade of any kind : only the sullen, spiritless tramp, tramp of 
 weary men marching. On reaching the Square of Brookfield, 
 the general called some of his officers for consultation ; and 
 presently a bugle signal was heard, repeated all along the line 
 of the moving column, and there was a halt. Hoarse words of 
 command, distinctly audible in the deep stillness of the morning- 
 dawn, preceded a brief bustle and commotion among the men, 
 and in a minute or two two hundred fires blazed up along the 
 
532 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 roadside and in tlie adjacent fields, — fence-rails and here and 
 there an abandoned outhouse furnishing abundance of fuel. 
 Sentinels were posted to guard against a surprise, while a part 
 of the men busied themselves cooking coffee, and the rest lay 
 down in full accoutrement, knapsacks serving as pillows, to 
 snatch some little sleep before the anticipated order to resume 
 the march. In less than half an hour most of the men were 
 sleeping soundly on their arms. 
 
 For the battle had been a fierce and bloody one. The 
 number of slain, wounded and prisoners reached many thou- 
 sands. The Confederate army, recruited in the main from the 
 seceded States, but swelled, in its advance toward the capital 
 of the State, by companies, even whole regiments of volunteers 
 eager to vindicate the cause of the South, was met and opposed 
 by the Federal army under command of General Lowe. Gen- 
 eral Ciper thought to brush aside the handful of Union men, 
 or, if need be, annihilate the obstinate fools. This seemed 
 not a difficult thing to do, judging from the information upon 
 which he was called to act, and Avhich placed the opposing 
 forces at a number of raw and undisciplined volunteers not 
 exceeding one-fifth or one- fourth of his own strength. This 
 information was, in its general outlines, substantially correct; 
 only it left out of account the battalion of regulars that had 
 garrisoned the arsenal under the immediate command of Gen- 
 eral (then Captain) Lowe, and the regiment of volunteers that 
 had been di'illed by veteran officers during the whole of the 
 winter and spring preceding their enlistment, — composed 
 chiefly of several companies of Turners and the corps styling 
 itself " Liitzow's wilde Jager." 
 
 There had been a council of war when the strength and posi- 
 tion of General Ciper 's army became known to the Union 
 forces, and it had been resolved, with great unanimity, to con- 
 test the enemy's advance on the capital, notwithstanding the 
 disparity of the forces. This being decided, General Lowe 
 did not wait to be attacked by the enemy, but stole a march 
 on them during a dark and stormy night, surprising the unwary 
 
AFTER THE BATTLE. 533 
 
 troops at early dawn iu their camps. Dividing his forces, he 
 sent one corps under command of General Seele to attack the 
 enemy's left wing, while with the rest of his troops, including 
 the Turners and the Liitzow's Jagers, he himself made an 
 onslaught on the main body. 
 
 The men under General Lowe's immediate command fought 
 like lions, driving the Confederates from one position after an- 
 other, until the superior numbers of the rebel army began to 
 tell. The division under General Seele was, at first, even 
 more brilliantly successful ; his artillery did terrific execution 
 among the startled and bewildered rebel soldiers, di'iving them 
 forth from their tents in wild confusion. But this very suc- 
 cess had proved disastrous to the Union side. A considerable 
 number of General Seele's men — raw, inexperienced, undis- 
 ciplined — could not resist the temptation to rush into the 
 deserted tents for plunder, thereby throwing the whole column 
 into disorder. In vain did the officers make frantic efforts to 
 restore order and reduce the unruly mob to subordination and 
 obedience: in the time so occupied, the Confederates rallied, 
 and in a well sustained charge routed the whole Union force on 
 this part of the field, capturing their artillery, killing great 
 numbers, taking many prisoners, and scattering the rest like 
 chaff before the wind. For the panic that seized the demor- 
 alized masses was as extravagant and irrational as had been 
 their morbid greed for plunder ; and the rout became so com- 
 l)lete as to put an orderly retreat out of the question. The 
 men ran, like frightened hares, in senseless terror, throwing 
 away their weapons and accoutrements, and leaving guns, gun- 
 carriages and horses on the field. As an effective military 
 organization this part of the Union army was practically anni- 
 hilated. The captured arms were of the greatest importance 
 to the Confederates. Many of the lately arrived volunteers 
 being poorly equipped, — their arms consisting of shot-guns, 
 ordinary rifles, scythes, bowie-knives and the like ; to these the 
 muskets and ammunition found scattered all over the ground 
 evacuated by the flying Federals were most welcome booty, 
 
534 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 adding largely to the efficiency of General Ciper's army. The 
 cannons, of which several batteries, fully equipped and ready for 
 action, fell into their hands, were immediately moved to the 
 left, and used against General Lowe's division. 
 
 They had fought bravely, and with marvelous success, until 
 the fearful odds against them began to wear them out. Fresh 
 troops from the enemy's rear kept pouring in to take the place 
 of those driven back. General Lowe looked anxiously in the 
 direction from which he expected General Seele to appear with 
 his artillery to support him. Long he looked in vain. There, — 
 in the very nick of time, — for he felt that he could not hold 
 his position much longer — a regiment came in sight, with 
 artillery too, — but it was in the possession of a Louisiana reg- 
 iment, and it was used against- his own men with tremendous 
 effect. It was then that the undaunted spirit of this truly 
 great commander shone forth a bright example to his brave 
 soldiers. Though confronted with fearful odds, now increased 
 by the victorious troops that had so obviously vanquished 
 General Seele's divisiou, — though wounded severely, so that 
 it was with difficulty that he kept his seat in the saddle, — he 
 lired his weary men with new energy. " Come on, brave 
 men! " he shouted, spurring his horse, and waving his sword 
 on high, " Come on ! I will lead you ! " 
 
 His words and heroic example did wonders, arousing anew 
 the enthusiasm of his soldiers. With a shout of defiance for 
 the enemy they charged with such impetuosity as to carry 
 everything before them. The rebels were driven back once 
 more. 
 
 But it was the last charge ever led by gallant General Lowe. 
 He fell at the head of his command, pierced b}' a bullet in his 
 left side — a loss far greater to the Union cause than the gain 
 could have been had there been a victory. 
 
 But there was no victory. The fighting continued until 
 nightfall with doubtful success on either side. In the after- 
 noon General Seele succeeded in collecting a part of his scat- 
 tered troops and leading them back into the action, retrieving 
 
AFTER THE BATTLE. 535 
 
 in some slight degree, their character as soldiers, so shame- 
 fully forfeited in the morning. Under cover of the darkness, 
 General Seele retreated with what was left of the Union army 
 toward Brookfield. The losses to the Union forces had been 
 heavy: nearly one-fifth of their entire number had been killed, 
 wounded or taken prisoner ; and besides a vast amount of small 
 arms their most effective artillery had fallen into the enemy's 
 hands. But a heavier blow than all these was the death of 
 their ablest leader ; this was in reality an iiTeparable loss. 
 
 To offset these reverses, the advance of the Confederates 
 toward the capital had been checked ; for the Confederate 
 army, too, had decamped during the night, leaving the battle- 
 field in a different direction, so that it had really been a drawn 
 battle, — a battle, at least without a victory on either side to 
 compensate for the terrible sacrifice of human life and limbs. 
 For the losses of the Confederates were heavy too, — heavier 
 perhaps, than those of the Federals, 
 
 The general and his staff had found accommodation at Mr. 
 Smith's Hotel, where they had ordered an early breakfast. 
 Mine host, of course, was eager to find out how the battle had 
 gone, and plied the general and his officers with questions, but 
 got very little satisfaction. Mr. Huffard, too, paid his respects 
 at headquarters, hoping to collect material for a stunning sen- 
 sational report in the next issue of the Ozark Argas, but met 
 with no better success. Neither did Mr. Farmer, although he 
 hinted very broadly that the Brookfield Standard was doing- 
 yeoman's service in the Union cause. The general pleaded 
 fatigue and pressure of business, and persistently avoided all 
 reference to the events of the previous day. 
 
 In passing out, Mr. Huffard met a man in the uniform of a 
 Union soldier, bearing the insignia of a subaltern officer on the 
 sleeves of his coat. Something in his face struck Mr. Huffard 
 as if he ought to know him. A question touching his identity 
 was on the editor's tongue when it suddenly occurred to him that 
 this was the n-devant overseer of Colonel May, — Gregory 
 Jeff revs. So he omitted the question, wondering, how it 
 
536 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 was that Jeffreys found ready admittance to the general's 
 presence. 
 
 He was announced to the general as Sergeant Jeffreys, Com- 
 pany I, Fifteenth Volunteers. Once in the presence of 
 
 the staff officers he assumed a rigid posture, standing at the door 
 as stiff as a ranu-od, heels together, feet turned out equally, 
 eyes fixed straight to the front, — having evidently mastered 
 the ' ' position of a soldier ' ' as taught by the drill-master in 
 the first lesson. He saluted by touching his cap with his right 
 hand, extending his arm to the right with the prescribed flour- 
 ish, and then dropping it, so as to touch with his hand the 
 seam of his trousers. 
 
 " Sergeant Jeffreys," the general addressed him, " you have 
 intimated that you have important information to impart touch- 
 ing the safety of the loyal population of this place. I am 
 ready to hear what you have to say. Speak ! " 
 
 " There's a right smart chunk o' well-to-do-country 'round 
 'bout yere," said Jeffreys, his eyes staring at an imaginary 
 point in the floor, " about fifteen paces to the front " as pre- 
 scribed in the regulation. 
 
 " Well? " urged the general. 
 
 " There be some nobby 'ristocrats close by ; 'n thy 're all on 
 'era cantankerous secesh." 
 
 " Well? " the general repeated, as Jeffreys paused. 
 
 " 'n some on 'em own an ungodly sight o' niggers." 
 
 " What of that? Go on." 
 
 The eyes of the posing sergeant wandered for a moment 
 from the regulation angle, as he cast a furtive glance in the 
 direction of the general's face. "I were think'n', 'at some 
 o' them thar niggers 'ud be mighty handy to hev 'bout the 
 camp. They'd be mighty glad to work fur hard tack 'n' 
 water, so's they'd git a chance to git away from thar mas- 
 ters." 
 
 A cloud gathered on the face of the general. "You sent 
 Avord that you had something to communicate touching the 
 safety of loyal citizens," he said sternly. " As yet you have 
 
AFTER THE BATTLE. 537 
 
 suggested nothing but stealing slaves from non-combatants. 
 Is this all you have to say ? ' ' 
 
 Again the eyes of the model soldier sought, for a brief 
 moment, those of the general, while he stated, a little pomp- 
 ously. "I'm a truly I'y'l man, General ; 'n' I hate rebels. 
 A good many I'y'l men 'round yere hate rebels ; an' they hate 
 Kernel May, 'at's now a senator, 'n' a red-hot rebel 's 'e is. 
 An' I sorter guess 'e's wuth more'n a crack regiment to the 
 secesh." 
 
 The general began to grow impatient. " What do you 
 mean by all this? " he asked sternly. 
 
 " If Kernel May, 'at's now a senator, 'ud be 'rested fer 
 treason," Jeffreys hinted, with a malicious grin, " an' made a 
 prisoner o' war on it, 'ud be a good thing fur the Union and fur 
 the I'y'l people ; an' it 'ud keep 'im out'n a sight o' mischief. 
 An' 'is niggers 'ud be handy to dig ditches and 'trench- 
 ments." 
 
 " Stuff aud nonsense! " the general exclaimed angrily. " I 
 will have you arrested, if you keep on talking such humbug." 
 
 If the general had seen the defiant, resentful look that 
 Jeffreys shot at him, it might have entailed unpleasant conse- 
 quences on the sergeant ; it would have caused him to be 
 watched more closely, at least, than would have been to his 
 liking. But with a peremptory " Leave us now," the general 
 had turned away, and Jeffreys added, without change of post- 
 ure or inflection of voice : 
 
 " I cud take a corporal's guard 'n' fetch 'im 'u' all 'is nig- 
 gers, an' it 'ud be wuth 's much 's if we'd a won yeste'day's 
 battle." 
 
 Instead of replying to this last suggestion, the general com- 
 manded sternly : 
 
 ' ' Sergeant Jeffreys ! ' ' 
 
 The sergeant saluted. 
 
 ' ' About — face ! F'orward — march ! ' ' 
 
 The sergeant dared not disobey an order so peremptorily 
 given, but marched out of the door. 
 
538 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 One of the subalterns in attendance on the general's staff, 
 Sergeant-Major Obeuaus, acting adjutant to Colonel Scheffel, 
 was seen to approach his colonel, and after a few yhispered 
 words he left the room immediately after Jeffreys. 
 
 When the door had closed behind his adjutant, Colonel 
 Scheffel, who, though a naturalized American citizen and an 
 ardent supporter of the Federal government, stood on terms of 
 hostility Avith the English language, addressed his commander 
 in the vernacular of the fatherland. But General Seele 
 remarked, with a glance at the other officers present, " We do 
 not all understand you. Colonel!" 
 
 " Der sershe-ont iss not fallen on his hedt! " he repeated, in 
 such English as he had mastered. " Dem nigkers, Tsheneral, 
 kin help us, so goot as white men. Uud dey pelongs mit our 
 site." 
 
 The major of another regiment, who was also present, said : 
 " I fully agree with Colonel Scheffel. I see no reason why 
 the negro, on whose account this war is being carried on, should 
 not be made to do his share in overthrowing the rebellion. The 
 slaves constitute a formidable element of the strength of the 
 South, which they are using against us. For every woolly- 
 heatl that works on a plantation, or even serves in the house- 
 hold, a white man can be spared for the ranks of the army." 
 
 The general turned sharply round. " They are the property 
 of the South, Major, not our property." 
 
 " Broperty? " shouted the colonel. " Dey be no broperty. 
 Godt maked dem, like me und you." 
 
 " Exactly so," the major coincided. " But granting them 
 to be property, then why are they not contraband of war? 
 Why should we not confiscate them as readily as we would 
 confiscate an enemy's horses, guns, or ammunition? " 
 
 " What? " exclaimed the general, " confiscate negro slaves? 
 Confiscate the property of non-combatants? And, for aught 
 we know, the property of good loyal citizens? " 
 
 "Goot I'y'l citissens got no sclehf s ! " proclaimed the 
 colonel. 
 
AFTER THE BATTLE. 539 
 
 " The one whom the sergeant referred to is a rebel," the 
 major remarked. " He distinctly said so ; and he seems to be 
 well acquainted with the people around here." 
 
 " Yes," the general assented. " And don't you see that 
 that fellow simply wishes to wreak vengenance upon some one 
 against whom he has a spite ? The idea of making ourselves 
 the tools of a sneaking hound, to do his dirty work for him! 
 You noticed, did you not, how he let the cat out of the bag 
 when he offered to take a corporal's guard, and fetch him and 
 all his niggers? " 
 
 "But, General," the major persisted, " if our cause is 
 served, by carrying out any course of action, even the nefari- 
 ous scheme of a dirty scoundi-el, ought we, for that reason, to 
 forego an advantage to our cause? " 
 
 " Suppose, General," said another of the officers, " that the 
 slaves of this rebel — -colonel, 1 believe he called him — " 
 
 " 'at's now a senator," the major mimicked. 
 
 " — Senator, then — were known to be on their way^to build 
 a fort or thi'ow up earthworks from which the rebels might 
 attack us ; would you hesitate to confiscate them? " 
 
 "The case you put is not in point," the general rephed. 
 " If the owner used his slaves for such a purpose, he would 
 not be a non-combatant ; neither would the slaves be property 
 to be confiscated, but active enemies to be treated as such. 
 Besides, what guaranty have we, that that scoundrel did not 
 lie about the owner of the negroes being a rebel ? On general 
 principles, I am inclined to believe the reverse of what such a 
 sneaking scamp asserts." 
 
 " On general principles," said the major smiling, " I would 
 believe the owner of any considerable number of slaves to be a 
 rebel, until he proves the contrary." 
 
 "Especially," added the other speaker, "if he has been 
 elected senator by the legislature of this State." 
 
 ' ' Even then he should have the opportunity of proving his 
 loyalty, before we proceed against him on the authority of so 
 transparent a traducer," replied the general warmly. "And 
 
540 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 just at present we have not the time to bother with questions 
 of this kind. Besides, gentlemen, you know that it is the 
 President's policy to conciliate the people of the slave States, 
 rather than irritate them by any action on our part which might 
 give color to the rebel cry that we intend a general abolition of 
 slavery." 
 
 The matter dropped here, for the officers did not wish to 
 press a subject, on which their general had expressed so 
 decided an opinion. Colonel Scheffel alone seemed to be put 
 out by the general's decision, but refrained from carrying on 
 the discussion himself. 
 
 The sergeant-major who had followed Jeffreys out of the 
 room, overtook him before he had quitted the hotel porch. 
 The latter started when his follower touched him on the shoul- 
 der, and addressed him in an easy, off-hand way. 
 
 "I would like to know something more about this Colonel 
 May that you have mentioned to the general," he said, " But 
 let us step aside ; there is no need that anybody should 
 overhear us." 
 
 " An' who may you be? " Jeffreys inquired, looking the new 
 comer over from head to foot. 
 
 " My name is Obenaus," said the other suavely. " I am 
 acting adjutant just now, in the Second Infantry. Colonel 
 Scheffel appointed me temporarily, because the regular adjutant 
 is disabled. The colonel can't write English, whatever you 
 may think of his talk, and so I do his writing for him, and 
 talk to his officers j So much for who I am; now I'll tell you 
 what I want." 
 
 Jeffreys, naturally suspicious, was, at first, exceedingly re- 
 served. But Sergeant Obenaus was a man of plausible speech 
 and engaging manner, who knew how to melt away the dis- 
 trust of the kindred spirit he had met, and readily wormed 
 out of him such information as he desired concerning the cir- 
 cumstances of Senator May. The two had soon reached a 
 
AFTER THE BATTLE. 541 
 
 secluded place, where they were not likely to be overhead by 
 auy human being, 
 
 " If you are the man I take you for, we can do a big job 
 for the country and not forget ourselves the while. Do you 
 catch on ? ' ' 
 
 " Can't say that I do," said the sergeant, pretending not to 
 understand the drift of his new acquaintance. 
 
 " Come, don't be as big a fool as you look," suggested the 
 adjutant, administering a neighborly poke in the ribs of 
 Jeffreys. ^' You want to get even with the senator, and I am 
 not the one to blame you for it. I take it for granted that he 
 has insulted you in some way that an American gentleman 
 cannot forgive, nor pass by without doing something to get 
 even with him. I want to get even with him too," the 
 adjutant added, smiling encouragingly. " That is, you know, 
 I should like to relieve him of some of his superfluous wealth, 
 and add it to mine, so as to make things more even. Not that 
 I have any wealth to be added to ; but I would like to have 
 some to begin with. Now you want something, too, besides 
 helping loyal people. What is it? " 
 
 Jeffreys did not possess the moral stamina to resist the 
 seductive wiles of Sergeant Obenaus. It was not long before 
 the latter was in full possession of the overseer's grievances, 
 extending even to the spite against Miss May, and the cause 
 of it. 
 
 ' ' Ah ! Now" this is an adventure in my line ! ' ' exclaimed 
 the adjutant, rubbing his hands in high glee. "You shall 
 have that saucy yellow wench to flog at your leisure, and I'll 
 attend to her mistress." 
 
 The two walked slowly back to their respective regiments, 
 as they discussed the details of the plan to " get even with " 
 the rebel senator, to serve the cause of loyal Union men, 
 including themselves, and have a jolly lark in the bargain. 
 
 "Leave it all to me," said the adjutant finally. " I will 
 get my colonel to send me out foraging with a squad of men, — 
 say five or six — any greater number would be awkward and 
 
542 THE EE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 dangerous. All you need do will be to pilot us through the 
 place and point out where the valuables are kept." 
 
 " I kin do that," said Jeffreys, complacently. " Ye might 
 blindfold me, an' I'd find my way to the desk an' the iron box 
 whar' they keeps thar' cash, 'n' thar' ear-bobs 'u' dimeus 'n' 
 sich. It's lucky 'at the kernel fetched home 'is family, as I've 
 hearu say, cause 'is wimen folks 's got an ungodlv sight o' 
 rings, 'n' pins, 'n' sich, 'at we kin pounce on." 
 
 " The cash box is the main thing, however," the adjutant 
 urged. " Do you suppose they have much cash at home? " 
 
 " If he ain't gone to Washington," said Jeffreys, " fur I 
 hearn say 'at 'e's gwiue tuh Congress — 'e'll have a right 
 smart chunk o' money laying' tuh hum. " 
 
 " Are you quite sure, that there are no other white men to 
 encounter in the house ? ' ' 
 
 " 'is cub of a son 's way off to the city, I reckon ; or if 'e 
 aint, 'e's somewliar' playin' soger, 'e's a cantankerous devil, 
 is that son o' the kernel ('ats' now a senator) an' it's lucky ef 
 'e' aint tuh hum." 
 
 " No others? " 
 
 " I can't count on anybody else, leastwise ef they don't 
 have company. They're the plaguiest fools fur company ye 
 ever hearu tell on." 
 
 " They shall have plenty of company when we get there," 
 said Obenaus, facetiously. "Are they pretty? The ladies, 
 I mean." 
 
 "Purty?" Jeffreys repeated, with a scornful expression, 
 and such a sneering inflexion of voice as indicated his decided 
 opinion to the contrary. But then, as he found the matter not 
 quite so clear on reflection, he added : " Well, ya-as ; I reckon 
 'at some folks, mebbe might count 'er fur a beauty. Ev'ry 
 one to 'is taste, as the old woman said when she kissed the 
 cow. An' the madam — well, when she's got 'er duds on she 
 struts like a silly peacock, prouder 'n a dozen o' 'em, 'f ye 
 like peacocks, she'll take yer fancy in 'er Sunday go-to-meetiu' 
 duds." 
 
AFTEB THE BATTLE. 543 
 
 " Will they make much of a fuss wheu we houor them with 
 our visit? " 
 
 " The old uu, I guess, '11 be faiut'n', or possumiu', or 
 squealiu' ; but the youug uu's game. She'll light like a wild- 
 eat. We'd better stop up 'er mouth soon 's we cum 'cross 'er. 
 I'll teud to that. I've got 'er on the chalk auy how, fur some 
 of her old tricks. It'll be a fust rate chauce to git squar' with 
 her." 
 
 " Better leave 'er to me," said the adjutant, winking jocosely. 
 " Maybe she would like to have her mouth stopped with a kiss. 
 I know just exactly how to manage young ladies." 
 
 " 'f ye know what's good fur ye," Jeffreys cautioned his 
 newly found friend, " ye'll not kiss 'er 'thout ye got 'er 
 hands tied, or me holdin' on to 'em. 'f ye do, she'll put a 
 mark on yer face, so's to know you by when she meets ye 
 agin." 
 
 " Scratch ?" suggested the other, chuckling complacently. 
 " You pique my curiosity to meet this lovely she-rebel. It will 
 be rare sport to tame her." 
 
 " Mebbe yer '11 find your hands full," said .Jeffreys, con- 
 torting his face into as near an approach to a. grinning smile 
 as he rarely indulged in. 
 
 " I expect to," said Obeuaus, " and my arms too. — But let 
 us separate here. Be sure to meet me in the Square in half an 
 hour. I'll be marching with my squad, and you can join us 
 there." 
 
 The night had been one of unrest at May Meadows. The 
 inmates were eagerly waiting for tidings from Winslo's Run. 
 Senator May hoped for a decisive victory of the Confederates, 
 which might put Congress into the mood of treating with the 
 seceding States, and enable him and his party to bring the 
 Northern hot-heads to terms, so that the country might be 
 restored to peace and harmony on a basis securing to each of 
 the belligerent sides their rights and interests. 
 
 Leslie May was enthusiastic in predicting a Southern 
 
544 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 triumph. He fumed and fretted over his hard luck that eou- 
 demned him to inactivity while glorious fighting was going on 
 almost within sight and hearing in an action that might, per- 
 haps, decide the war, depriving him of all opportunity of win- 
 ning a name as a soldier. For a while the young Hotspur 
 actually contemplated the project of marching his volunteers — 
 unorganized and unequijjped as they were — over to the field of 
 action and there offering their services to General Ciper. His 
 father finally persuaded him to abandon the ridiculous notion, 
 chiefly by reminding him of the imi^ortant services confidently 
 expected of the company at the present critical condition of 
 things at home. 
 
 Nellie May, for her part, was so sure of the glorious success 
 to be achieved by her gallant countrymen, that she actually 
 regretted the absence of her father and brother from the field 
 of glory. She thought of Payton, too, in connection with the 
 engagement. Was it not hard for him to be debarred the glo- 
 rious privilege of distinguishing himself on the field of honor? 
 To be sure, his course proved him to be a man of high moral 
 calibre. It was noble for him to renounce glory and renown 
 for the sake of patriotic duty. Were he only a little less punc- 
 tilious in responding to the call of his country for his wisdom 
 in the nation's council — he might be there, reaping the honor 
 and glory accorded to the soldier who stakes his life in the 
 defense of his country. A puzzling thought troubled her in 
 connection with this subject. She remembered how Victor 
 Waldhorst had grown in her estimation when he sacrificed his 
 hope and aspiration to highest earthly bliss, on the altar of 
 sacred duty, — how, for the first time in her life, she had been 
 awed into the recognition of a will stronger than her own, — 
 of a purpose more exalted than the gratification of passionate 
 desu'e, of one who held his manhood higher than her favor. 
 Well she remembered how her anger at his stubborn persistency 
 changed into regard for his manly firmness. She wondered 
 why Payton 's self-sacrifice to duty had not a similar effect 
 upon her. To the question, Wh}'? she found no answer; but 
 
AFTER THE BATTLE. 545 
 
 the fact remained : a distinct consciousness, that her ardent 
 admirer had not gained in her estimation by his moral 
 scruples. 
 
 It was long after midnight when she went to bed ; though 
 not to sleep. Strange fancies chased each other through her 
 fevered brain. Strong was her faith in the prowess of South- 
 ern soldiers, and firm her conviction in the right and ju^stice of 
 the Southern cause. But her intelligence did not permit her 
 to disregard the possibility of temporary defeat, in the vicissi- 
 tudes of war, on either side. What if the array now fighting 
 under General Ciper should meet with a repulse? What if 
 Lincoln's hirelings should, in the flush of victory, rush upon 
 Brookfleld, and glut their vengeanc^e on the enemies of their 
 cause? Would not her father be one of the first, — conspicu- 
 ous as w^as his position, and well known as were his views — 
 to fall a victim to their wrath? 
 
 The members of the embryo company of volunteers, whom 
 Leslie had summoned to May Meadows, were as keenly eager 
 as their captain for news from the scene of action. After 
 spending the greater part of the night in discussing the military 
 situation, relieving their restlessness time and again by pro- 
 tracted lessons in drilling, they accepted, long after midnight, 
 Leslie's suggestion to quarter themselves for the hour or two 
 remaining before morning, in the barn and hay-loft, where they 
 were soon fast asleep. 
 
 Neither Leslie nor his father found it possible to follow 
 their example. A little before the break of day Nellie rose 
 from her restless couch and joined the gentlemen, inquiring 
 for news from the battlefield. Leslie offered to run over to 
 the town to ascertain whether further tidings had been re- 
 ceived there ; whereupon, the father, averring that a walk 
 would much refresh him and relieve him in his harrowing sus- 
 pense, offered to accompany him, if Nellie were not afraid to 
 remain alone. 
 
 '' I am not at all afraid. Papa, for myself," said the cour- 
 ageous girl. " I have that little bull-dog, you know, whose 
 
 35 
 
546 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 bark, if uot his bite, will be a protection to me. But I wish 
 you to be careful. Promise me that you will uot expose your- 
 self uunecessarily ; aud that you will return home at once, if 
 any blue-coats show themselves." 
 
 " Why, of course," said the senator. " I can safely prom- 
 ise you that, for I would return at any rate to let you know 
 any news I may learn. But what has come over my brave 
 daughter's spirit, that she should give way to faint-hearted 
 solicitude for her prudent old father ? It is not like you to be 
 afraid of shadows." 
 
 " Well," said the girl gently, " I am not exactly afraid, you 
 know. But it is not wise to court danger, is it? And — well, 
 I suppose I am a little nervous on account of the sleepless 
 night and the excitement." 
 
 " I hope to be able to bring you such news as will enable 
 you to recover your spirits," said the father. " Meanwhile I 
 would suggest that you have Cressie, or some other servant, 
 within call, if you should want her. Good-bye, for a while, 
 my darling ! " 
 
 " Grood-bye, Nellie! " the brother also said. '• We will be 
 back in a jiffy ! " 
 
 Nellie, when left alone, felt heavy at heart. She followed 
 her father's advice, and called Cressie. 
 
 The two maidens sat alone on the veranda. The intense 
 stillness of a summer night had given way to the faint audible- 
 ness of the indistinguishable sounds preceding the buzzing 
 of insects, the twittering of birds aud the lowing of kine, of a 
 balmy summer morning in the country. Presently, too, the 
 sober grey of dawn glided into the rosy harbinger of Aurora, 
 to be again supplanted by the brighter rays of Phcebus as he 
 climbed upward from the horizon. Subdued voices, now and 
 then, reached the ears of the listening maidens from the direc- 
 tion of the negro quarters, where the field hands were getting 
 ready for the day's work. 
 
 " Cressie! " said the mistress, softly. 
 
 ''' Yes m'm? " said the servant, in sympathetic response. 
 
AFTER THE BATTLE. 547 
 
 "What do you think our hauds would do, if the Yankees 
 won the battle they are fighting? " 
 
 " I've heard some of them say, that they expect to be free 
 when the war is over." 
 
 " But before the war is over, — now — what would they do 
 if the Yankee soldiers got the better of ours? " 
 
 "Maybe some of them will run," the octoroon suggested, 
 with downcast eyes. 
 
 " I fear they would, Cressie," said Nellie, and then relajjsed 
 into silence. 
 
 After a pause, " Cressie! " she repeated. 
 
 " Y^es m'm? " very gently. 
 
 " Do you wish the Yankees to win in this war? " 
 
 " I ? " said the octoroon looking timidly at her mistress. ' ' It 
 makes no difference what I wish. And it will make no differ- 
 ence to me whether they win or not." 
 
 " Would you leave me, Cressie, if they gave you your free- 
 dom? " 
 
 " Not if you do not wish me too." 
 
 " Oh! " mused the mistress ; "I believe you, Cressie. You 
 are faithful. But if you were free, it would be perfectly right 
 for you to leave us, — me." 
 
 ' ' Only if you made it right for me to leave you ; only if you 
 wished me to." 
 
 " But if you were perfectly free, — as free as I am — and a 
 man came along, — a man that you loved, Cressie, — and asked 
 you to go with him? " 
 
 A far-away look came into the octoroon's eyes as she said, 
 smiling sadly, " The man, whom I love, will never, never ask 
 me to go with him." 
 
 Something in the girl's voice, or in the look, perhaps, that 
 accompanied her words, or perhaps the pathos of the words 
 themselves, made a deep impression on Nellie. She regarded 
 her servant with a new interest, which for a moment drew her 
 thoughts away from the engrossing subject on which they had 
 dwelt. But her attention was suddenly claimed hj the look of 
 
548 TEE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 terror which crept into Cressie's face, and the half-smothered 
 cry of alarm that escaped her. 
 
 •' Oh, see there ! " 
 
 Nellie looked in the direction indicated by Cressie's eyes, and 
 saw what for the moment filled her with superstitious fear as 
 uncontrollable as that of her servant. What she saw, coming 
 in swift realization of the newly entertained dread that even in 
 its high improbability had impressed her with awe, might well 
 excuse her blenching cheeks. Six men, clad in the blue uni- 
 form of Yankee soldiers, were marching, with muskets shoul- 
 dered, straight toward the house, led by a seventh, who 
 marched at their head, a pace in advance of them. 
 
 What could these soldiers want, at this early morning hour, 
 at the house of her father? Her busy imagination pictured 
 direful possibilities, of all of which her father was the centre. 
 And for a moment it was doubtful whether maid or mistress 
 was more thoroughly enthi-aUed by unreasoning terror. For 
 Cressie, too, was horror-stricken by what she saw : not the 
 soldiers approaching, nor yet their leader in the blue uniform. 
 But there, a little to the right of the negro quarters, stalked 
 Jeffreys, peering intently in the direction of the cabins, — the 
 man whose face, when she last had seen it, had been distorted 
 with a rage all the more intense for being baffled of its pur- 
 pose, boding ill to the victim that might fall into his unre- 
 strained power. That face had graven itself on her memory, 
 for she had been conscious that she herself w^as, however 
 iimocently, the cause of his anger. There now was that face, 
 orinnino- with a diabolical malice. Cressie slu'ank back invol- 
 untarily, seeking instinctively to hide from those baleful eyes, 
 which, she felt, were in search of her. 
 
 Nellie quickly recovered her self-possession. The military 
 bearing of these men, approaching in steady, measured step, 
 betokened them to be disciplined soldiers. She reasoned that 
 no harm could come to her father from them. With this 
 thought her fears vanished, and curiosity soon possessed her. 
 
 " What can these men want here? " she said, not noticing 
 
AFTER THE BATTLE. o49 
 
 either the scared look ou Cressie's face, or the mau who 
 occasioned it, but still regarding the steadily advancing squad 
 of soldiers. 
 
 " Oh," the octoroon answered, as if the question had been 
 addressed to her, "I am sure that he can mean nothing but 
 mischief." 
 
 The emphasis on the word "he," as well as the deep alarm 
 betrayed by Cressie, caused Nellie to look at her, and then in 
 the direction indicated by Cressie's eyes. "Ah! " she ex- 
 claimed, coloring slightly with surprise and vexation, "it is 
 Jeffreys ! " Then turning with an air of comforting assurance 
 to the frightened girl, she added, " See, Cressie, it is well for 
 you that these blue-coats are comiug ; they will be a protection 
 against a ruffian. The worst they can do will be to run you 
 off. But we have not come to that yet, I hope. At any rate, 
 do you remain at my side, so long as that Jeffreys is about." 
 
 The soldiers had by this time arrived opposite the veranda, 
 and Nellie arose. She recognized in their leader a subaltern 
 officer, as he commanded the squad to halt and right face, and 
 then saluted the young lady by touching his cap and grace- 
 fully flourishing his right arm. 
 
 "If the ladies will kindly permit," he said with a bow of 
 meek deference, but in a tone the bold assurance of which 
 contrasted perceptibly with his ostentatious show of deference, 
 " I shall first put my men at ease, before I give myself the pleas- 
 ui'e of waiting on the ladies." 
 
 Then he i^ompously commanded: " 'tention — Company! 
 Support — arms ! Shoulder — arms ! Present — arms ! 
 Shoulder — arms ! Order — arms ! Rest ! " 
 
 Having thus complied with military etiquette, he ascended 
 the steps to the veranda and addressing himself to the young 
 lady standing before him, again bowed. 
 
 Something in this man's boldness and coarseness, notwith- 
 standing all his outward show of obsequious politeness, warned 
 Nellie. Acknowledging his bow with a slight nod, she looked 
 at him, waiting for him to speak, 
 
550 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 " It makes me unhappy, fair lady," he began, his eyes rest- 
 ing on her face with a wollish glitter, his hps puckered into an 
 affected smirk, " that I am fated to perform a ver}^ disagree- 
 able duty ; disagreeable far more to me, I assure you, than 
 to you and yours. But I take comfort in the conviction, that 
 a lady of the high refinement and intelligence with which you 
 are gifted, will not visit her resentment upon a poor subaltern, 
 who, in the discharge of his stern duty, but executes the 
 orders of his superior. May I be assured, dear lady, of your 
 forgiveness under the circumstances? " 
 
 " It seems to me, sir, that if you are carrying out the orders 
 of a superior officer, it ought to make no difference to jou 
 whether I forgive you or not," said Nellie, coldly. "And you 
 seem to forget, that I have not yet been informed as to the na- 
 ture of the duty you wish me to forgive." 
 
 The grin with which Sergeant Obenaus regarded the young 
 lady while she spoke, was probabl}^ meant to express admira- 
 tion. " Ah," he said, "I was not mistaken. Even before I 
 heard the music of your voice, and before I had occasion to 
 admire the simple directness of your speech, I knew that I was 
 dealing with a superior woman. And this makes it all the 
 harder for me to do the harsh thing — ' ' 
 
 " Perhaps, sir, it were better that you attended to your duty, 
 whatever it may be," she interrupted him. "Your soldiers 
 seem to be waiting for orders." 
 
 "Noble sentiments for a lady to utter in your circum- 
 stances!" exclaimed the adjutant, fairly beaming with irre- 
 pressible admiration. "It is a vast pity that so grand a 
 character should be subjected to the harassments sometimes 
 incident to civil w^arfare. And since you are so well aware 
 what it must be, will you then have the kindness to lead me 
 into the presence of the master of the house? " 
 
 Meanwhile Jeffreys had sauntered up to the veranda, a 
 fiendish grin of triumphant malice distorting his face as he saw 
 Cressie, who on his approach had crept behind her mistress in 
 an agony of terror. 
 
AFTER THE BATTLE. 551 
 
 He intercepted Nellie's response to the request of Sergeant 
 Obenaus with a chuckle, and the remark, " Yer needn't wait 
 fer 'im ; 'e ain't yere, I guess, no how ; an' 'tmight be sorter 
 onpleasaut, I guess fur 'is darter to wait on ye on sich an 
 arrand. I guess I'll show ye round myself." 
 
 " So sorry, Ma'am," remarked the adjutant, " to miss the 
 pleasure of your company for a while, and the comfort of your 
 assurance or pardon for our intrusion on this painful occasion. 
 But I shall give myself the happiness of a renewed interview 
 later on." And with another bow to Miss May he turned to 
 accompany Jeffreys. 
 
 But Jeffreys was not quite ready to conduct his companion 
 through the house. " Hold on a spell," he said ; " yere's that 
 'ere wench ,' at I been tellin' ye on. Let's make sure o' her 
 afore we go further. She'll be a handy thing to have 'bout 
 the camp, don't you think? " 
 
 "Why, yes," the adjutant assented; "she'll make a fine 
 piece of furnitui'e indeed. Are you quite sure that she is really 
 a contraband ? " 
 
 "You bet!" the ci devant overseer replied. "An' she's 
 spry, I will say, ef I do owe 'er a floggin' fur 'er contrariness. 
 Let's make sure on 'er. She's a nigger, — leastwise she's a 
 colored wench — an' she b'longs to a rebel, an' she's got to 
 be confiscated." And he stretched out his hand toward the 
 trembling girl, saying, in a tone of mock tenderness, " Come 
 me bute ! You and 1 know each other, don't we? " 
 
 Nellie's eyes flashed. "Stand off, sir! " she exclaimed, 
 with imperious gesture and commanding voice. " Touch that 
 girl, sir, and I will shoot you like a mad cur! " 
 
 "Magnificent!" shouted Sergeant Obenaus, clapping his 
 hands. " So must Joan of Arc have looked at the head of the 
 French army. Is it not sad, that so much beauty and heroic 
 valor must go unrewarded on account of the stern necessities of 
 cruel war? You make me, indeed, blush for what duty compels 
 me to do ; and again I must humbly beg your i>ardon." And 
 seizing the hand of Nellie, he attempted to carry it to his lips. 
 
552 TEE REBEL'S DAUQRTEB. 
 
 But Nellie in disgust had quickly jerked away lier hand. 
 
 "Ah," he said, somewhat taken aback by her prompt ac- 
 tion, " I understand! Mademoiselle desires a warmer salute! 
 And indeed her regal beauty entitles her to be gratified." 
 
 With a motion so sudden that she was pow'erless to prevent 
 it, he seized both her hands, one in either of his, and forcing 
 her arms behind her, he attempted to embrace and kiss her. 
 
 But he had underrated the strength and agility of this 
 daughter of the South. Maddened with indignation at the 
 insult offered her, the intense loathing which her assailant's 
 touch produced, gave her strength beyond her sex. With a 
 frantic effort she flung off the miscreant, and in the next 
 instant there was a blush on the adjutant's cheek — a decidedly 
 novel experience, certainly, to the valiant soldier, — planted 
 there by Nellie's energetic hand. 
 
 The adjutant's discomfiture was aggravated by a malicious 
 chuckle uttered b^^ Sergeant Jeffreys. 
 
 " Didn't I tell yer," he jeered, " 'at she's a perfick wild cat 
 to fight? But ye know'd better an' now ye got it. Kiss'n' 
 'er, eh? Well, how do you like 'er kiss'n'? " 
 
 But here the exemplary temper and gallantry of Sergeant 
 Obenaus gave out. Nor was he in a mood for joking. 
 
 " Quit your silly trifling," he said, with a decided frown, 
 ' ' and help me tame down this piece of contrariness. If you will 
 lend a hand, I guess we will have her quiet enough presently." 
 
 "Let's confiscate t'other one, fust," Jeffreys insisted. "She's 
 someth'n' wuth totin' to camp ; an' what's the use o' this un? " 
 
 " Let some of the men take care of your wench," the adju- 
 tant urged angrily, "and do you come here and assist me. 
 Catch hold of her right hand, while I seize the other, and we'll 
 have her bound in a jiffy." 
 
 " An' then," sneered Jeffreys, " what'Uye do with 'er when 
 ye got 'er tied? " 
 
 " Do you never mind," snapped the adjutant. " This high- 
 flung young she-rebel has got to be taught the consequence of 
 trifling with a loyal soldier," 
 
AFTER THE BATTLE. ^oZ 
 
 " Well, I guess a smart dressiu' down '11 be a wholesome 
 less'u to the sassy minx," said Jeffreys, as he moved forward, 
 apparently to obey his comrade's command. Nellie stepped 
 backward toward the hall door, and in doing so produced her 
 revolver from her dress pocket. The men gave an involuntaiy 
 start when they saw the glittering weapon in her hand and 
 heard the ominous click. 
 
 " Stand back, ruffians, both of you I " rang out in clear, fear- 
 less voice, her eyes ablaze with anger, her lips curling in scorn, 
 her face eloquent with indomitable resolution. "Loyal 
 soldiers, indeed ! But that I know you for immoderate liars, I 
 should rejoice in your l)oast of loyalty. Such loyalty would 
 turn the nation's stomach, and there were no need of Southern 
 armies to rid us of you. But you lie ! You are neither loyal, 
 nor soldiers. I have no love for your Yankee government; 
 but this I know, that you foully asperse it by claiming to act 
 in obedience to its behest. You are not commissioned to in- 
 sult women and steal slaves. Poltroons ! It will take more 
 than two of you to finish your work of insult and outrage, and 
 more than a squad of your blue-coats to get away with our 
 slaves. — And such as you have come to meet our gallant boys 
 in gray, and aspire to the honor of being thi-ashed by them ! 
 Go home, and tell your government, that the foulest insult 
 that has yet been offered to the outraged South, is the sendiug 
 among us of an army of such rapscallions as you, wearing the 
 uniform of soldiers, and following the profession of freebooters 
 and highwaymen ! ' ' 
 
 Cressie had not taken her eyes off Jeffreys. In an un- 
 guarded moment, the latter was listening in a dazed sort of 
 way, to the invective poured forth by her incensed mistress, 
 she darted past him like a frightened doe, running in the 
 direction of the barn, where men were sleeping that might pro- 
 tect her mistress and herself, if only they had notice of what 
 was going on. But Jeffreys, watching his prey with cat-like 
 alertness, ran after and quickly overtook her, not, however, 
 before she had uttered one piercing scream. In vain, it seemed ; 
 
5a4 THE liEBEL S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 for the sleepers in the barn gave no token that they had been 
 awakened. Jeffreys effectually prevented further outcry on 
 Cressie's part, by roughly grasping her throat and choking her, 
 while with his other hand he closed her mouth. 
 
 Obenaus, when Jeffreys had thus unceremoniously left him, 
 bethought himself of the soldiers, and summoned them to his 
 assistance. Nellie, raising the hand in which she had the re- 
 volver, motioned them back. 
 
 " Keep away, men! " she exclaimed. " You do not wish to 
 be shot, do you, by a woman? You may overpower me, I 
 know. But the first man that approaches, dies! And think 
 a moment: Did you enlist to help a miscreant insult a woman? 
 He may be your sui^erior otlicer. But has he authority to 
 command you to do the cowardly thing he has called you for ? 
 As you are men, — as you are Americans: respect a woman's 
 distress! As you are soldiers, shame not your profession by 
 making war on a woman ! ' ' 
 
 Nellie's appeal staggered the men. In spite of the peremp- 
 tory orders of Sergeant Obenaus they moved not, but stood 
 looking at each other in puzzled uncertainty what to do. At 
 last one of them spoke uj) : "This is not a regular order. 
 Such a command is not mentioned in the School of a Soldier. ' ' 
 
 " But he is our sergeant ; we must obey him ! " said another. 
 
 " I heard ihe Judge Advocate say, that we must obey only 
 the lawful orders of a superior olilcer. This don't seem to me 
 to be a lawful order." 
 
 "I'll be d — d if I charge against a woman, command or 
 no command! " said a fourth. 
 
 This last remark found favor with the men, and for a while 
 it seemed as if Sergeant Obenaus would have to fight it out 
 single-handed with the young lady, in which case the final 
 issue was by no means a dead certainty in his favor. But a 
 new actor appeared on the stage and completely changed the 
 situation. For Cressie's outcry had been heard, though it had 
 not awakened the sleepers. 
 
XXXV. 
 
 FRIENDS AND FOES. 
 
 HE road by which Winslo's Run was reached from 
 Brooklield ran in a Southwesterly direction, while May 
 Meadows lay to the Southeast of the town ; so that 
 Senator May and his son did not become aware of the prox- 
 imity of the Federal army before they reached the Square. 
 The first intimation they had of it was the arrival of a number of 
 ambulances in the Square, from which severely wounded men 
 were being removed and taken to the extemporized hospital 
 into which the courthouse had been converted. For General 
 Seele had received information that the Confederate army had 
 withdrawn from the battlefield about the same time the Fed- 
 erals left there, moving in a Southerly direction, so that no 
 immediate pursuit was to be expected, and he had there- 
 fore ordered a halt, in order to give his men a few hours of 
 much needed rest. The ambulances containing the most des- 
 perately wounded of yesterday's battle moved in the rear of 
 the main body and had just reached the town. 
 
 " See, Pa," said Leslie, as they approached the courthouse, 
 " that looks as if they had been whipped ! See, those soldiers 
 running to and fro are all Yankees. Those wounded men are 
 all Yankees, too. They must have been traveling all night to 
 reach here at this time ; at least a good part of the night. 
 That means that they have been whipped, does it not? " 
 
 Senator May was not so sanguine, nor so ready with his 
 inference. "It may just as well mean that they have been 
 victorious. For, if defeated, would they make a hospital of 
 our courthouse ? And I see no Confederates. If they had 
 been victorious, they would not have permitted the enemy to 
 escape unpursued." 
 
 (555) 
 
556 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " But that would hold just as good for the other side," 
 Leslie replied in an eager whisper. " If the Yankees had been 
 victorious, would they have marched ten or twelve miles in the 
 dead of night, carrying their wounded with them? And see, 
 these men do not look as if they had been winning a battle. 
 They are as glum as mourners at a funeral." 
 
 " Their task is a sad one," mused the senator. " See*, some 
 of the poor fellows they are carrying will soon be beyond 
 rejoicing over victory, or grieving over defeat." 
 
 They were very near, now, to one of the ambulances from 
 which the inmates were being removed to the interior of the 
 courthouse. One of the army surgeons directed the transfer. 
 " Handle this fellow gently," he said to his assistants. " He 
 must be suffering intensely, although he is bearing up with 
 great fortitude." 
 
 Senator May looked at the face of the wounded man — pale, 
 and gaunt, with mouth firmly compressed — and he started. 
 " See! " he whispered excitedly, " is not this he that was our 
 young host down at Busch Bluff? " 
 
 Leslie looked and recognized Woldemar Auf dem Busch. 
 "So he is," he said. " But he has changed so that I should 
 hardly have recognized him, if you had not pointed him out to 
 me. To think that he should have volunteered as a soldier! " 
 
 " They are sterling people, these Auf dem Busches," said 
 the senator, " although this young fellow was rather opiniated. 
 They are sadly in error about the political interests of our 
 country ; but you see that he has had the courage to fight for 
 his conviction, and may have to die for it." 
 
 When Woldemar Auf dem Busch was placed on the stretcher, 
 he opened his eyes, and for a second they dwelt on Senator 
 May. As soon as the latter saw that he had been recognized, 
 he spoke, in as cheerful a voice as he knew how to assume, 
 his features beaming with a sympathetic, encouraging smile, 
 saying : 
 
 " Why, my young friend, this is a sony plight I find you 
 in. Can you give me your hand? " 
 
FBIENDS AND FOES. 557 
 
 The surgeon interfered. 
 
 "Whoever you are, sir," he said gently, but with a per- 
 emptoriuess that commanded obedience, " you must not interfere 
 with our work." Then he added, in a whisper not audible to 
 the patient, " his life may depend on absolute quiet. Do you 
 understand? " 
 
 Woldemar raised his hand, slowly and with obvious effort, 
 regarding the senator with an appealing look, which the latter 
 promptly interpreted by the question : 
 
 " Can I do anything for you ? ' ' 
 
 "You are very kind," said the sick man, in a distinct, 
 though low voice. " If you would look after my father — " 
 
 " What — is your father here? " the senator interrupted him 
 in undisguised surprise. 
 
 "He is badly hurt. If you would kindly see him! It 
 would do him so much good." With a feeble smile, the 
 pathos of which touched the senator, he added: " He thinks 
 so much of you. Almost — as much — as of Professor Rau- 
 henfels." 
 
 "Where is he? " 
 
 " Perhaps Doctor Behr will kindly find out," said the pa- 
 tient, with an appealing glance toward the surgeon. " I do 
 not know. He was badly hurt. And I — " 
 
 " He is. all right," said Doctor Behr cheerfully. " When I 
 have made you comfortable, I will take this gentleman to see 
 him and they can talk over old times together. But just 
 now we must be getting you into a more comfortable place ; 
 and you must not be too garrulous." He nodded to the bear- 
 ers of the stretcher to proceed, and looked at Senator May as 
 if he expected him to say something. 
 
 " I will meet you here in fifteen minutes," said the senator, 
 " and I will be under great obligations to you if you will take 
 me to Mr. Auf dem Busch, Sr." 
 
 "Dr. Behr, this is Senator May," came in feeble accents 
 from Woldemar's lips. " We used to call him Colonel before 
 the war." 
 
558 THE BE BEL'S D AUGHT EB. 
 
 While the doctor and senator were shaking hands, the man 
 on the stretcher was carried into the courthouse hospital. 
 
 Leslie had not shown himself to the wounded man, but hailed 
 some of the acquaintances he met, to extract from them such 
 information as was to be had touching the outcome of the bat- 
 tle, and the probable movements of the Federal army. It was 
 pretty well known by this time that neither side had gained a 
 straight-out victory, and that the losses on both sides had been 
 heavy. The death of General Lowe was hailed with undis- 
 guised satisfaction by the rebels, and even Leslie put on a 
 brighter look as he said: " I knew the general. He was my 
 captor at Camp Jefferson. The Yankees will never be able to 
 fill his place." 
 
 On rejoining his father, the latter requested him to repair at 
 once to May Meadows, to bring the news to his mother and 
 sister, and added that he himself would be detained for a time 
 in town. 
 
 " Be sure to allay any apprehensions that Nellie may have 
 for my safety," his father enjoined on him, as Leslie started 
 for home." 
 
 His thoughts on the way were busy with the events that had 
 transpired, and dwelt on the issue of yesterday's battle and 
 the prospect of his joining General Ciper's army. That 
 Woldemar Auf dem Busch had voluntarily become a soldier, 
 was to him a stunning surprise. That the old gentleman had 
 done so he had not yet learned ; it would have been still more 
 incomprehensible to him. The transition of his thoughts from 
 the Auf dem Busches to Pauline Waldhorst was natural : It 
 was some months since he had last seen her, — on that da}^ 
 when they had met the philosophers at tea. When he recalled 
 the scene of her meeting with his sister Nellie, he unconsciously 
 accelerated his pace. Her image loomed up in his mind as 
 that of a charming woman, of whom he had resolved to think 
 no more. It vexed him, that in spite of his resolution his 
 thoughts would wander back to her. " I do believe I am 
 erowing sentimental! " he muttered. " Bah! What is Wol- 
 
FRIENDS AND FOES. 559 
 
 deroar Auf dem Busch's sweetheart to me ? ' ' Yet be wondered 
 how Pauline had taken it when Woldemar enhsted for the war. 
 And he wondered how she would take it if Woldemar should 
 happen to die. Again he wondered how Pauline would behave 
 toward him if they should meet again — whether she would 
 resent his conduct toward her? He wondered, too, what his 
 sister Nellie would say, if she knew that he had won Pauline's 
 heart, and then thrown her over? 
 
 While his thoughts were thus busy, he nearly reached May 
 Meadows, and Cressie's cry of distress broke rudely in on his 
 meditations. Running in the direction whence the cry pro- 
 ceeded, he reached the spot just as Jeffreys had overpowered 
 Cressie and was dragging her away toward the negro quarters. 
 So intent to secure his prey was the brutal overseer, that he 
 did not become aware of Leslie's approach, and the latter 
 dealt him a stunning blow that sent him sprawling to the 
 ground. Cressie, thus released, sped swiftly back to the 
 house, while Leslie was about to inflict summary chastisement 
 on the prostrate overseer, wearing the uniform of a Union 
 soldier. But at this moment he caught sight of the group of 
 soldiers near the veranda, where his sister stood, revolver in 
 hand, in an attitude showing clearly that she was on her 
 defense against the man standing near her, — a subaltern 
 Yankee officer, Leslie supposed him to be. 
 
 ' ' Marauders ! ' ' was the thought that flashed through Les- 
 lie's mind. He gave a vigorous yell, calling on the men he 
 knew to be sleeping in the barn, and rushed up to the house. 
 
 Sergeant Obenaus heard the yell, and saw Leslie approach- 
 ing at full speed. It was plain enough to the sergeant that 
 this man, whoever he might be, was bitterly in earnest. Reso- 
 lute action seemed urgent. Addressing himself to his squad 
 of soldiers, he commanded energetically : ' ' Company ! Charge ! 
 Ready ! Aim — ' ' 
 
 This order was quite a different thing from that to charge 
 on a woman, and the soldiers promptly obeyed. 
 
 But Nellie, however intrepid in facing personal peril, was 
 
560 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 seized with deadly terror on seeing her brother about to be 
 shot down. She flew from the veranda, passing the com- 
 mander, and before the word " Fire! " was uttered, she stood 
 in front of the muskets leveled at her brother. 
 
 Leslie had aproached to within a few paces, and covered the 
 sergeant with his revolver. 
 
 Nellie's action had again startled the soldiers. They could 
 not fire at Leslie without killing her, and it is doubtful whether 
 they would have obeyed the command to fire, at this moment, 
 if it had been given. But Sergeant Obenaus never gave the 
 order. Simultaneous with Nellie's action in throwing herself 
 before the soldiers' muskets, was the report of Leslie's revolver, 
 and Sergeant Obenaus fell. 
 
 From the barn a number of men now rushed to the scene, 
 and before the bewildered soldiers, whose attention was cen- 
 tered on their fallen leader, on the woman who had interposed 
 herself between them and the man with the revolver, at whom 
 they had been about to fire, could well defend themselves, they 
 had been seized, their muskets taken away from them, and 
 any resistance rendered unavailing. 
 
 For a minute or two there was confusion. The men of Les- 
 lie's company made eager inquiry as to what all this meant. 
 Nellie had sunk in her brother's arms, overcome by the reaction 
 from the intense strain on her nerves. But for a brief mo- 
 ment only. She quickty rallied, and anxiously inquired what 
 had become of her father. His report reassured her as to his 
 safety. But Leslie's face sobered, as he looked upon the mo- 
 tionless form of Sergeant Obenaus. He exacted from his 
 sister an account of all that had happened during his absence. 
 Such members of Leslie's company as were not engaged in 
 guarding the soldiers gathered around her, and listened eagerly 
 to her recital of the conduct of Jeffreys and Obenaus. Her 
 words produced profound sensation among the hotheaded 
 rebels who had enrolled their names as defenders of the 
 Southern cause. When she mentioned the attempt of Jeffreys 
 to carry off the slave girl Cressie, their scowling faces and 
 
> ^*i. 
 
FBIENDS AND FOES. 561 
 
 clenched fists gave token of the wrath that incensed them. 
 Their blazing eyes were tnrned in the direction where the mis- 
 erable wretch, recovering from the effects of the blow that had 
 been dealt him by Leslie, was about to sneak off. It needed 
 but a hint from the latter to start half a dozen men in pursuit. 
 While he was secured and led back, Leslie bent over the fallen 
 sergeant to search for his wound. A small red spot on his 
 uniform marked the place where the bullet had entered his 
 body ; he tore away the clothing and discovered a small puncture 
 in the skin, with hardly a drop or two of blood oozing there- 
 from. There was no respiration. The most eager search and 
 delicate touch of Leslie's fingers failed to indicate the faintest 
 trace of a pulse. The bullet had evidently penetrated to his 
 heart ; life was extinct. 
 
 Nellie had watched Leslie's features during the examina- 
 tion. Their expression alarmed her. " Is he dead? " she 
 whispered. 
 
 " Quite dead ! " said Leslie, soberly. " He will never again 
 insult a woman." 
 
 ' ' What could have been the meaning of his coming here with 
 a lot of soldiers? " Nellie inquired. 
 
 " I am puzzled to guess," said Leslie. " That it was an 
 unlawful purpose there can be no doubt. The attempted ab- 
 duction of Cressie by that cowardly dog Jeffreys proves that. 
 But then he must have had authority from his superior officers ; 
 for these men seem to be regular soldiers. There would be no 
 such discipline among them, if they were marauders or common 
 thieves." 
 
 "Yes," added Nellie, "and why should he exhibit such 
 disgusting cringing toward me, asking me to introduce him to 
 the master of the house? " 
 
 " I wonder if I could pump some information from Jef- 
 freys, " said Leslie. " I suspect that he does not feel in a 
 communicative mood toward me. But I have, before now, 
 made him talk against his will." 
 
 Contrary to his expectation, however, he found Jeffreys 
 
 36 
 
562 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 nothing loth to talk. A sardonic smile of triumph accompanied 
 his words as he replied to Leslie's questions. He volun- 
 teered the statement, that the dead officer was a " truly I'y'l " 
 man, and stood high in the favor of his colonel. And that 
 his murderer would surely be punished by the military authori- 
 ties. Also, that he himself would be a witness against Leslie 
 before the court-martial, where they would allow no hired 
 lawyers to bother the witnesses and fool the jury. By dint of 
 skillful questioning Leslie finally ascertained that Jeffreys did 
 not belong to the same regiment with Obenaus, and that while 
 the latter had come to forage for his comjDauy, he himself had 
 no orders to accompany him. 
 
 Leslie also engaged some of the soldiers in conversation, 
 with the view of eliciting from them further facts, or at least 
 such scraps of information as might assist him in coming to a 
 conclusion as to the course to be pursued in regard to them. 
 He incidentall}^ learned from them some additional news about 
 the battle at Winslo's Run, from which he inferred, that there 
 must have been some valiant fighting on the part of the 
 Yankees ; and that the victory of the Confederates, if victory 
 they had gained, had cost them dearly. Leslie was far from 
 easy in his mind ; the presence of the six Federal soldiers, held 
 as prisoners by the men of his company, raised an awkward 
 dilemma. But in Nellie's presence he put on the appearance 
 of cheerfulness and in response to her questioning look, said : 
 " It is all right. But I don't intend to do anything until pa 
 gets back. I must be careful not to implicate him in any col- 
 lision with the authorities, civil or military. I wish he were 
 here ! ' ' 
 
 When he came there was a surprise in store for him, equal- 
 ing, at least, the one with which he had meant to astonish his 
 family, — a surprise that greatly increased his thoughtfulness" 
 and anxiety. But he communicated the news he had brought 
 with an air of quizzical humor. " Why, we are having a taste 
 of war, sure enough," he said, as the events of the morning had 
 been related to him. " Leslie and I have seen some stirriuof 
 
FBIENDS AND FOES. 563 
 
 evidences of it in town over there. And 1 lun going to bring 
 some of them here to complete the picture, adding romance to 
 stern reality. What say you to a visit from our city friends, 
 the Auf dem Busches, father and son, just at this interesting 
 juncture? " 
 
 And he proceeded to astonish his wife and daughter with 
 the announcement that he had not only invited, but actually 
 made arrangements for, the conveyance of the severely wounded 
 men to May Meadows. 
 
 " I could not permit myself," he said, by way of apologizing 
 to the ladies, " to let the old gentleman lie there helpless and 
 unattended but for the rough ministrations of some unspnpa- 
 thetic fellow detailed for sick service. You ought to have seen 
 his face brighten up as I shook hands with hhu ; one might 
 think we had been life-long friends. I am afraid that he is 
 badly hurt; but his first thought was for his son, as Wolde- 
 mar's first thought had been for his father. I did not believe 
 these blunt, brusque men capable of the tender solicitude 
 w^hich they unconsciously displayed before me. And so I told 
 both of them that it would give us pleasure if they would allow 
 me to have them brought to our house, and if they would con- 
 sider it their home during convalescence." 
 
 Tiu'uing to his wife, he asked her : " What say you, Louise? 
 Did I do right ? ' ' 
 
 Her assent was prompt, though not cordial. But Nellie 
 spoke up unasked, and said warmly: 
 
 " Indeed, Papa, you could not do otherwise without abnegat- 
 ing your character for Southern hospitality. They are foes, 
 but they have been punished by our gallant defenders ; and we 
 will only remember that they have been friends, and claim our 
 hospitality." 
 
 " They may give us some information touching the sei'geant 
 and the soldiers," said Leslie. 
 
 " I trust you are not uneasy on that score, my son," said 
 the father cheerfully and confidently. " If the military take 
 cognizance of the affair at all, they are bound, in their own 
 
564 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 interest, to vindicate your conduct. In this war, public opin- 
 ion is a potent factor. They cannot afford to defy, or even 
 to ignore it. And in a court of law, — well, you know better 
 than I do, that no jury on earth would hesitate a single moment 
 to acquit you . ' ' 
 
 " I am confident that there is no cause for fear, except that 
 the facts may be perverted by a court-martial composed of com- 
 rades of the dead sergeant and of Jeffreys, ' ' was Leslie's answer. 
 
 " Jeffreys? " exclaimed the senator, laughing. " You don't 
 think that he has a comrade that would ever be called on to sit 
 in a court-martial ? ' ' 
 
 " I should hope not! " Nellie added. "And as to his 
 testimony, you have on two occasions shown what that is 
 worth. Besides, there is the testimony of the soldiers. I 
 believe them to be honest men, though they are Yankees. I 
 could easily see that they were ashamed of their commander." 
 
 " As soon as our guests arrive, we will take these soldiers to 
 the commanding general of the Federal army," said the sena- 
 tor. " I judge that it will be best for you, Leshe, to report 
 the facts yourself, and make a clean breast of it." 
 
 " Of course I shall," Leslie informed him. 
 
 " Of course," Nellie remarked, " he will do that. But I 
 have a notion that it will be best for pa to have a talk with the 
 general first. Don't you think so ? If Leslie and his company 
 escort these soldiers through the town, there will be a crowd of 
 people following you, and it may arouse the prejudice of the 
 Federal officers against him." 
 
 " I believe Nellie is right," said her father. " At any rate, 
 it will not be amiss for me to chat with Cxeneral Seele. And 
 coming to think of it, it will not do at all to parade your men 
 before the enemy or even to let them know that you are about 
 to enter the Confederate army with them. I am glad, that 
 Nellie called our attention to this." 
 
 Before leaving, Senator May took his daughter aside and 
 put the question whether she was aware of any difficulty or 
 quarrel between Leslie and young Auf dem Busch. ' ' Because, ' ' 
 
FRIENDS AND FOES. 565 
 
 he said, " when I remarked to him that both he and his father 
 were to be brought to this place, a decided expression of paiu, 
 or at least of disappoiiitmeut, clouded his face. His father, 
 ou the contrary, had shown in every way that he was grateful 
 for the proffered hospitality, and Woldemar was evidently very 
 glad to have his father here. It was onlj to his own removal 
 to May Meadows that he seemed averse. Now, can you 
 account for this ? ' ' 
 
 "I think I can," said Nellie smiling. "You need give 
 yourself no uneasiness on that account. Young men are 
 sometimes in each other's way, when they wish to be particu- 
 larly polite to the same damsel. She is not here, so I think I 
 can kee}) them on their good behavior." 
 
 " Y'ou don't mean to say, Nellie, that Leslie — is jealous? " 
 said the astonished senator. 
 
 "No; not Leslie," Nellie assured him. " But 1 fear that 
 young Auf dem Busch is." 
 
 " Of our Leslie? But how can that be? " 
 
 " Entirely without cause," said Nellie, with an arch look at 
 her father that made him laugh. 
 
 "Well, well! This is news indeed. Under the circum- 
 stances, I think, that the young fellows should not meet, just 
 yet. Young Auf dem Busch is very low, and any agitation 
 might prove fatal to him. I leave it to your tact to keep them 
 apart for a while." 
 
 " I will do my best. Mr. Auf dem Busch is our guest, you 
 know, and we will make his stay as agreeable as possible." 
 
 " And don't neglect the old gentleman. He was much 
 pleased, I think, with the prospect of coming here, and I don't 
 wish him to be disappointed." 
 
 " Rest easy on that score, Papa. The old gentleman and I 
 are on excellent terms with each other." 
 
 When Senator May reached Brookfield, for the second time 
 that day he found the town in a lively stir. Numerous groups 
 of soldiers were standing and walking to and fro about the 
 
566 THE BEBEL'S DAUQHTEB. 
 
 Square, beset hy citizens, loyal and otherwise, eager to hear 
 them talk. Busy officers crossed toward and from the head- 
 quarters and the courthouse, frequenting the stores to make 
 purchases, dividing their patronage impartially between the 
 Dutch Store and Mr. Barnes' establishment, or otherwise im- 
 proving the time of the halt. The Square presented as lively 
 a scene, and certainly a more picturesque one, as on court or 
 election days. 
 
 The senator inquired for General Seele, and was shown to 
 his room at the hotel. As he entered, the general was exam- 
 ining the card he had sent in, and met him with the question : 
 
 ' ' You are known as Colonel May ? ' ' 
 
 " Yes, General," the senator answered with a smile. " But 
 I owe the title to the good will of my fellow-citizens. I have 
 never been in military service." 
 
 " And you have been elected to the United States Senate 
 from this State? " 
 
 " That position, also, I owe to the good will of my fellow- 
 citizens." 
 
 The general smiled and begged his visitor to be seated. 
 Then he continued : "I am pleased to make your acquaintance, 
 Senator, not only because I deem it an honor to receive your 
 visit, but also, because your name has been twice mentioned to 
 me to-day, under circumstances engaging my attention. — 
 Are you acquainted with a man by the name of Jeffreys ? ' ' 
 
 "I am, to my son'ow," said the senator, somewhat dis- 
 turbed by the general's question. " If it is he who mentioned 
 my name to you, I fear that I do not stand high in your esti- 
 mation." 
 
 "If it is not unpleasant to you," said the general with 
 simple directness, " I wish you would tell me in what way you 
 have drawn upon yourself the enmity of that man. I make 
 this request out of sheer curiosity. So if you feel the slightest 
 repugnance to speak of him, consider my words unspoken." 
 
 " On the contrary, General, I am very glad that you have 
 asked me to speak ; for my visit to you concerns, in part, that 
 
FRIENDS AND FOES. 567 
 
 very man." The seuator then proceeded to state the eircuni- 
 stauces under which his former overseer had left him, and re- 
 lated, also, how, to revenge himself, he had tampered with the 
 grand jury, and committed rank perjury in the trial of his 
 young friend Victor Waldhorst. 
 
 " How? " the general asked, with obvious interest. " Vic- 
 tor Waldhorst ? Was he a friend of yours ? And he was under 
 trial, here, in Brookfield, did you say? " 
 
 "Yes, sir," said the senator, noting with pleasure the evi- 
 dent interest the general took in his protege of former days. 
 " He was a mere lad, then, of whom, however, I thought a 
 gi'eat deal ; and he has since risen to some distinction." 
 
 " Yes, I have heard of him," said the general. " He was a' 
 member of our legislature ; and is now doing valuable service 
 as adjutant general to the military governor." 
 
 " I have reason to know that he was a very staunch and 
 uncompromising Union man while in the legislature," the sen- 
 ator remarked with a significant smile. 
 
 The smile was reflected in the general's face ; but he did not 
 pursue the subject further than to say, ' ' It must have been pain- 
 ful for him to vote against the friend of his youthful days." 
 
 Without awaiting an answer, the general then said: " Your 
 name has also been mentioned by Doctor Behr, in connection 
 with that of some of our wounded men. He asked me to con- 
 sent to have them transferred to your residence, which, of 
 course, I gladly did. The surgeon thought 3'our offer a very 
 generous one, and believes that it may save the life of one of 
 them, who, he says, is in a very critical condition. You may 
 rest assured, sir, that Avhatever may be the business that brought 
 you here, you have a friendly ' cousin at court ' as we say in 
 Germany." 
 
 The senator then proceeded to state the octuirrences as they 
 had been related to him, at May Meadows, that morning. 
 The general listened with very evident interest, and frequently 
 interrupted the narration with questions, evincing a desire to 
 possess the most accurate information. 
 
568 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 Then, regarding Senator May with a deprecatory smile, he 
 added: "You will understand, of course, that the matter 
 must be looked into. It is important that discipline be ob- 
 served. Nor can it be permitted that an officer should be shot 
 down with impunity, while in the discharge of his duty. And 
 therefore, if the sergeant had orders for what he did, there 
 may be trouble for you, or at least for your sou. Permit 
 me to suggest, that he had better surrender himself to the 
 military authorities at ouce, and voluntarily, so as to render 
 unnecessary any compulsory proceeding for his arrest. I 
 trust that in this way no harsh measures need be appre- 
 hended." 
 
 " But it will be such a shock to the ladies at home, to see 
 him under arrest ! " 
 
 " It need not be known to them at all, unless you wish it," 
 said the general pleasantly. " I will send an officer with you 
 to take command of the squad of soldiers, whom, I understand, 
 you still hold in custody at your home. Mr. May can accom- 
 pany them in the character of a witness against this man Jef- 
 freys, whom we will arrest in good earnest, and the ladies need 
 be none the wiser. If necessary, I will rejiort the matter to 
 the military governor, and request him to send his adjutant, 
 or some other discreet officer, to act as judge advocate, if a 
 court-martial should be decided on. You need give yourself 
 no uneasiness at all, if Mr. May will act in accordance with 
 my suggestions." 
 
 Senator May took leave of General Seele with a hearty hand- 
 shake, and was accompanied home by an officer, who was to 
 take charge of the prisoners and soldiers. 
 
XXXVI. 
 
 A STUDY IN BLACK AND WHITE. 
 
 'HE Fourth of July had come and gone. Senator May 
 had departed for Washington, leaving his family — for 
 ^^ the first time since his election to Congress — at May 
 Meadows. The Honorable Ralph Pay ton accompanied him. 
 Both had left their respective homes reluctantly. Payton, 
 though full of ambitious schemes, and inspired by a laudable 
 resolution to distinguish himself as a political leader in the 
 House of Representatives (now that his illustrious predecessor 
 had cleared the way for him), felt some uneasiness in leaving 
 behind him the brilliant young heiress ; and that, too, while 
 the wounded men from Busch Bluff were guests at the May 
 mansion. The intimacy between the members of the May 
 family and the Auf dem Busches had been exceedingly 
 distasteful to him from the first, and, though he looked down 
 on Victor Waldhorst as so greatly his inferior in social position, 
 yet he resented the necessity which had compelled Miss May to 
 correspond with Waldhorst's sister. For the condition of both 
 the elder and younger Auf dem Busch had become so critical 
 that it was deemed advisable to acquaint Mrs. Auf dem Busch 
 and Miss Waldhorst with the situation. He did not for a 
 moment doubt that one, or perhaps both, of these ladies, would 
 gladly avail themselves of the cordial invitation to visit May 
 Meadows which Nellie had sent them in the name of her 
 mother, with a postscript in her own name to Pauline. To 
 this rather fanciful grievance of the young congressman. Sen- 
 ator May unwittingly added a solid reason, justifying a flutter 
 of apprehension, at least, if not dowm-ight anxiety, not to say 
 jealousy, on the part of his young friend, by dropping a hint 
 that Victor might be detailed to conduct the trial of Leslie 
 
 (569) 
 
570 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 May, as judge advocate. The imagining of all sorts of possi- 
 bilities growing out of a more or less intimate intercourse be- 
 tween young Waldhorst and Leslie May, and perhaps even 
 with Nellie May (for she would necessarily be an important 
 witness), thoroughly spoiled for the incipient statesman the 
 enjoyment in anticipation of his triumphs in the arena of 
 national politics on this, his first visit to Washington as a 
 congressman. 
 
 Senator May's heart was even more heavy than that of his 
 young traveling companion. There was a vague dread of 
 impending harm to Leslie on his mind, which neither his own 
 firm conviction of the perfect propriety of his son's conduct, 
 nor the confident assurance of General Seele had been able to 
 banish. 
 
 He did not quite comj^rehend the necessity of a court- 
 martial, nor why his son could not be released on bail, or why, 
 indeed, he should be held in custody at all. But he explained 
 to himself, that this was probably one of the rules of military 
 service ; and with a melancholy smile he recalled how well he 
 had succeeded in allaying the suspicious of his wife and 
 daughter, putting aside their inquiries after Leslie by the 
 plausible pretext suggested by General Seele, that he was held 
 as a witness against Jeffreys, who was to be court-martialed 
 for his marauding expedition. But all of these reflections failed 
 to quiet his own misgivings, as to what might happen at a court- 
 martial, composed of Federal officers, sitting in judgment upon 
 a man of such decided Southern views. 
 
 Yet it was not apprehension for Leslie's fate that weighed 
 most heavily on his mind. In his conversation with General 
 Seele he had caught a glimpse of the spirit which animated the 
 volunteer soldiers in the Union cause. There was, perhaps, less 
 of exuberant enthusiasm observable on the surface than that 
 which characterized the Southrons. Instead he marked a firm 
 earnestness of purpose springing, evidently, from a profound 
 conviction of the sacredness of their cause. These men, if 
 General Seele was a fair specimen of them, had taken up arms 
 
A STUDY IN BLACK AND WHITE. 571 
 
 as though performing some sacred religious duty, and Senator 
 May reflected that such an army, though it might give way 
 before an impetuous onslaught, would in the end prove invinci- 
 ble. The war had begun, and the senator, having some notion 
 of the enthusiasm with which the Southerners had gone into the 
 fray, saw with a feeling of dismay almost, the calm determina- 
 tion of the enemy they would have to meet. His confidence in 
 a peaceable adjustment of the differences between the two 
 sections, by anything that Congress could do, was rudely 
 shaken. For the first time he harbored a doubt as to the 
 wisdom of further attempts at compromise. 
 
 What, then, had he to do in Washington? What, if Con- 
 gress was powerless to help the country? If, after all, the 
 sword, swayed by angry passion, was to be the final arbiter of 
 the quarrel, ought he to go there at all? Was it not his duty 
 rather, to take to the field, and throw the weight of his arm, — 
 however feeble — into the scale for the cause of the South ? 
 
 Then he would in truth have become an enemy to the gov- 
 ernment of the United States, as that strange man, Professor 
 Rauhenfels, had predicted as the consequence of his crossing 
 the Rubicon. Ah! Had he, indeed, crossed the Rubicon? 
 Had he become a traitor? 
 
 No! Not yet. How his daughter had winced, when Rau- 
 henfels first mentioned the word, in connection with his candi- 
 dacy before the caucus ! How her eyes had flashed when 
 rebuking him for what she took to be a wanton insult to her 
 father ! No ; he had not yet become a traitor. He was no 
 traitor then ; for he had honestly and to the best of his ability 
 fought the passage of that fatal caucus resolution, and should 
 not be held responsible for what was not within his power to pre- 
 vent. Nor yet was he a traitor when he accepted the caucus 
 nomination, although Professor Rauhenfels had ruthlessly as- 
 serted that he would thereby give the lie to the whole of his past 
 life. He could not justly be called a traitor for that, because 
 he had done honestly and fearlessly what he believed to be 
 for the best interests of his country. 
 
572 THE BEBEUS DAUQHTEB. 
 
 But if lie now took the field — ah, then he would be a traitor, 
 a traitor in the legal constitutional sense — unless the South 
 should win ! 
 
 Such considerations as these pressed heavily on his mind as 
 he left home, and made his joui"ney to Washington anything 
 but cheerful. The war had begun : the sanguinary battle at 
 Wiuslo's Run had shown how terribly in eai'nest both sides 
 were ; the occurrence on the morning after the battle, at his 
 own home, had given warning of the danger to which his wife 
 and daughter would be exposed, and the necessity of leaving 
 them unprotected filled him with deep anxiety. To this was 
 added the apprehension of the consequences of the proclamation 
 issued by the major-general at the head of the Department of the 
 West, emancipating the slaves of all citizens bearing arms against 
 the United States. This proclamation was promulgated on the 
 Fourth of July, — the very day on which Congress convened 
 for the extra session. Although it was subsequently dis- 
 avowed by the President, yet while in force it created great 
 consternation and wrath among the population of the rural 
 districts, and added to the uncertainty of his son's fate in the 
 hands of the court-martial. 
 
 Meanwhile the ladies at May Meadows remained in blissful 
 ignorance of the troubles lying heavily at the senator's heart. 
 Mrs. May was highly indignant that her son Leslie should be 
 deprived of his liberty merely because his testimony was de- 
 sired against a miscreant, who was to be punished for attempt- 
 ing to, steal a slave. And she felt hurt that her husband had 
 refused to take her to Washington. Now that she was a sen- 
 ator's wife, she longed to air her new dignity in Washington 
 circles, and was slow to understand that the present was not a 
 time to indulge in social merry-making, and that her place was 
 at home rather than in that Maelstrom of political excitement 
 and war fever that swallowed up all other interests at the 
 capitol. But however distasteful her compulsory stay at 
 home was to her, she endeavored to do her duty as an 
 
A STUDY IN BLACK AND WITITE. 573 
 
 obedient wife. Although she had uo love for the guests 
 brought into the house by her husband, she failed not in ex- 
 tending to them the proverbial hospitality of a Southern house- 
 hold. 
 
 Nellie had marked the change in her father, though he kept 
 from her all knowledge of his troubles, so far as lay in his 
 power. But in an unguarded moment, when he believed him- 
 self unobserved, she had caught a glimpse of his clouded 
 brow and thoughtful mien betokening deep anxiety. The very 
 fact that he was so carefully concealing from her every trace 
 or indication of care rendered what she saw more significant ; 
 but she bravely kept her counsel, lest by betraying apprehen- 
 sion on her part she add to his trouble. Once only, just before 
 his departure, she had betrayed by a slight tremor in her voice, 
 when alone with him, and by a sympathetic tenderness in the 
 eager look with which she regarded him, that she was not at 
 perfect ease of mind. But the father had succeeded admirably, 
 so he flattered himself, in reassuring his daughter. He had 
 pointed out the brilliant prospects for a speedy settlement of 
 the national troubles, on a basis both honorable and advanta- 
 geous to the South. 
 
 " Our successes, both in the East and West, are marvelous," 
 he said. " Even the affair at Winslo's Run has redounded to 
 our glory. The Federal army occupying Brookfield just now, 
 will soon be di'iven out by General Ciper, who is receiving re- 
 inforcements daily, and will soon march into the capital, to 
 put an end to that military governorship. You have no cause 
 to be downhearted, little girl ; Payton and I will fix up matters 
 in Congress, and Leslie will soon come home from the field of 
 glory ; and you are going to be very proud of us all. Think 
 of it: Father, brother — and shall I add, lover? — all adding 
 luster to our family name, and our cause ! " 
 
 Her arm had been about his neck as she kissed him. But 
 there had been no ring of exultation in her voice as she said : 
 " I am proud of you, dear father, and oh, how I glory in 
 brother Leslie's bravery! For he is going to come home cov- 
 
574 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 ered with glory. But dou't mention lovers. This is not a 
 time to think of love." 
 
 When he was gone, Nellie set about the discharge of her 
 duties — consisting mainly, now, in assisting her mother in the 
 entertainment of visitors, and looking to the comfort of the 
 wounded men. Their presence at May Meadows drew many 
 callers to the house, who came to satisfy their curiosity. For 
 rumor had invested the strangers with the nimbus of mysterious 
 interest, springing from the desire to pry into the relations 
 between them and the May family. Speculations were freely 
 indulged in, of course ; fated, for the present, to remain 
 unproved and uncontradicted ; for the men were much too ill 
 to see or be seen by any visitors. The military surgeon, under 
 whose care they had been removed from the battlefield, had 
 enjoined absolute quiet. He had requested that the family 
 physician be called in to assume the treatment of the patients, 
 since he himself might receive marching orders at any moment, 
 but meanwhile continued his visits together with Doctor Pur- 
 ham with whom Nellie stood on excellent terms. The latter 
 informed her, in answer to her questions on the subject, that 
 while there was little of real danger from the wounds as such, 
 the loss of blood, before they had received any attention, had 
 been so great as to make the condition of both somewhat 
 critical. The weakness of the old gentleman, in particular, 
 gave him uneasiness ; the younger man would, he thought, 
 soon get well, although for the present he suffered more 
 keenly from his injuries. He fully indorsed the orders of his 
 colleague. Doctor Behr, dwelling upon the absolute necessity 
 of perfect quiet for both the patients ; and Nellie obeyed his 
 instructions to the letter. 
 
 Cressie was installed as nurse in the sick room. Her minis- 
 trations were performed with a graceful ease and quiet self- 
 possession, alike soothing to the sufferers and efficient in 
 carrying out the course prescribed by the physicians. When 
 Woldemar's fever had somewhat abated, he was enabled to 
 notice the graceful movements of his young nurse, and followed 
 
A STUDY IN BLACK AND WHITE. o75 
 
 them with admiring eyes. He wondered who she could l)e. 
 Not a daughter of the house, surely? For the features, 
 tliough of a beauty even more striking than that of Miss May, 
 Avere too utterly unlike those of either of the ladies whom he 
 had seen to admit of such a thought. Not a hired servant? 
 For she carried herself with a grace and dignity which Wolde- 
 mar thought inconsistent with the character of a menial ; and 
 besides, he was well aware that in the interior of a slave State 
 hired help was out of the question. It must be a guest — 
 some relative, perhaps, on a visit to May Meadows, who had 
 volunteered her assistance in waiting on the patients. Daugh- 
 ter, perhaps, of some wealthy Southern jjlanter. For that soft, 
 creamy complexion, brightened by a subdued glow on her 
 round cheeks and the vermillion of the exquisitely shaped 
 lips — the dreamy languor of her dark, lustrous eyes — the 
 intense blackness of her glossy hair, coiled in great plaits 
 about her shapely head, gave unmistakable token of Southern 
 origin ; while the easy grace of her carriage suggested famili- 
 arity with luxurious sui'roundiugs. 
 
 Having settled on this theory,* he determined to inquire 
 about her of his young hostess, for he felt a strong desire to 
 become acquainted with the lovely girl ; yet a shyness that 
 would have astonished those who knew him well — himself 
 most of all — if they had reflected on it, prevented him from 
 speaking to her about herself. He was now rapidly improving, 
 and the opportunity to converse with Miss May soon offered. 
 She came into the room one day just after the military surgeon 
 had quitted the house, bringing with her a bundle of stuffs 
 and her work-box, evidently contemplating to do her sewing in 
 the sick-room. 
 
 " The doctors have given us a very cheering account of their 
 patients," she said, while a reassuring smile brightened her 
 face ; " and if the gentlemen have no objection, I will change 
 places with Cressie for an hour or two. And so I have brought 
 my work with me." 
 
 The face of Mr. Auf dem Busch Senior brightened percejiti- 
 
576 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 bly, as Miss May's pleasant voice fell ou his ear. He, too, had 
 thrown off the stupor that had held him unconscious ; but he 
 was still very weak. " You give us too high honor," he said 
 with feeble voice, and a pathetic attempt to smile. " Your 
 face is bright sunshine ; and your voice lilve the lark-song. It 
 is pleasure — to be sick — in your house." 
 
 " Why, Mr. Auf dem Busch," was Nellie's pleasant answer, 
 " your politeness is overwhelming. Sir, I must positively for- 
 bid you such exertion. The doctors have strictly enjoined rest 
 and quiet for you." 
 
 " It shall be rest for me," said the old gentleman, " if I 
 look at you. And I will be quiet." 
 
 " Father is very proud of you," said Woldemar, " You 
 took his heart by storm the first time he saw you. And I add 
 my grateful thanks to his for the very great kindness that you 
 and yours have conferred upon us. I am afraid, tliat I shalj 
 never be able to thank you sufficiently." 
 
 " Your best expression of thanks, and such as will be most 
 highly appreciated by my parents and myself, will be to show 
 us that you are perfectly at home with us, and say nothing 
 about thanks. By the way, are you satisfied with Cressie's 
 waiting on you ? Does she attend to your wants as she 
 should ? ' ' 
 
 " Cressie ! " Woldemar repeated. "Is that the young 
 lady's name? She has been untiring in her ministrations, and 
 father and I are deeply indebted to her for her devoted care 
 and kindness to us, although we are perfect strangers to her. 
 But — pardon me: Cressie is not the family name of your 
 young friend, is it? You have never introduced us, you 
 know." 
 
 Nellie regarded the young man with a look of intense amuse- 
 ment. Her voice broke into a ripple of pleasant laughter, as 
 she replied to Woldemar's question. "No," she said, "I 
 have never introduced you. And Cressie is not her family 
 name." 
 
 " Of course not," Woldemar rejoined. 
 
c 
 
A STUDY ly BLACK AND WHITE. 511 
 
 "Of course not," Nellie repeated. "And would it sur- 
 prise you very mueh, if I told you, that I do not know her 
 family name?" 
 
 " But is she never called by another name besides that of 
 Cressie?" asked Woldemar wonderingly. 
 
 "Oh, yes," the young lady informed him, still beaming 
 with hardly concealed merriment. ' ' Some of the darkies call 
 her ' Creeshie,' and if you wish to be very accurate in i)ro- 
 uouncing her name, you may call her Lucretia." 
 
 Woldemar looked puzzled indeed. "Is she not — your 
 friend? " he asked, 
 
 " My friend? " Nellie repeated. " Why, no, Mr. Auf dem 
 liusch ; I am afraid I cannot call Cressie my friend, in the 
 senge in which you evidently mean." 
 
 " Not your friend? " with emphatic astonishment. 
 
 " At least Cressie does not stand on terms of social equality 
 with me." 
 
 A feeble chuckle was heard from old Auf dem Busch. " See 
 you not," he said, his features struggling with a faint smile of 
 amusement, " how it is? " 
 
 "Ah, — but you do not tell me, that she is a — slave?" 
 exclaimed Woldemar. 
 
 " I fear that I must shock your moral sensibility to the ex- 
 tent of admitting that Cressie is my bondmaid. But I, 
 nevertheless, believe her to be my friend." 
 
 " Your friend ! " exclaimed young Auf dem Busch, showing 
 that he was shocked indeed. "Friend — and slave ! It is 
 difficult to understand how that can be." 
 
 Further conversation was interrupted by the entrance of 
 Cressie herself, bearing a letter, which she informed her mis- 
 tress had been brought from Brookfield by Xerxes. Begging 
 permission from the gentlemen, Nellie opened the letter. 
 
 " Good news! " she exclaimed, as she raised her eyes from 
 the page over which she had glanced. " Good news for you, 
 gentlemen, as well as for myself. For however glad you will 
 be to greet your friends from home, it is I who will be de- 
 
 37 
 
678 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 lighted to welcome Pauline Waldhorst at May Meadows. We 
 may expect them here iu two or three days. And here is a 
 message for you, Mr. Auf dem Busch: 'Tell Uncle,' she 
 writes, ' that Aunt and I are coming just as soon as we can. 
 I would have come on at once as soon as I received your kind 
 invitation, but that I thought it wrong to let Aunt travel alone, 
 and she cannot be ready for a day or two. So, knowing that 
 you will kindly look to the comfort of dear Uncle and Cousin 
 Woldemar, I thought it best to wait for her, so that we may 
 travel together.' Now I think that this was very thoughtful 
 of Pauline ; don't you? " 
 
 Woldemar colored at mention of Pauline's name. But the 
 news of her expected arrival affected him less than he would, 
 a month or two before, have believed possible. He said 
 nothing ; but his father remarked, sententiously : 
 
 " Kindred souls find out themselves — on water and on land. 
 Pauline's generous soul — and Miss May's generous soul — 
 they know one another. And we know both." Then chuck- 
 ling, " Not so, Woldemar? " he added. 
 
 " Pauline was right, of course, to wait for mother," said 
 Woldemar. " I only wonder how she finds the courage at all, 
 to travel all the way across the country, even if Pauline is with 
 her." 
 
 " So I Avonder," said his father. " I guess Pauline has the 
 merit of it. But I find myself glad if the old lady comes. If 
 it gives not — too much trouble to Miss May — and Mrs. 
 May." 
 
 "Don't think of such nonsense," Nellie protested. 
 "Trouble, indeed! Why, it will be the greatest pleasure to 
 us. Oh, it will be just too lovely to have Pauline here." 
 
 Next day the old gentleman felt more poorly. But Wolde- 
 mar was so much better, that the physicians permitted him to 
 leave the room and to spend a part of the day on the porch, 
 where Nellie presently joined him. His eyes were following the 
 motions of Cressie, who busied herself with some domestic 
 work a little distance from the house. 
 
A STUDY IN BLACK AND WHITE. .')79 
 
 " Still pouderiug over Cressie's auouimity ? " the young lady 
 inquired, smiling mischievously. 
 
 " Rather over the anomalism of her relations to you," 
 Woldemar made answer, slightly coloring under her glance. 
 
 ' ' And have you arrived at any conclusion ? ' ' 
 
 Woldemar did not take his eyes off the slave-girl as he re- 
 plied. He spoke in a dreamy sort of way, at lirst. " I had 
 begun to debate the question with myself, when I saw how 
 much in earnest the rebels are, whether it would not be best, 
 after all, to let the South go in peace, and regulate the slavery 
 problem to suit themselves. But when you told me yesterday, 
 that this young lady — pardon me, this girl, I mean, — was held 
 in bondage for life, my eyes were opened to the enormity of 
 the crime, that has hitherto found sanction in the Federal con- 
 stitution." Then, turning his eyes on his young hostess, and 
 speaking with positive though deliberate emphasis, he went on .»• 
 "Miss May, this war will never end until the country has 
 purged itself of the foul stain on its bright escutcheon. I 
 enlisted to vindicate, so far as my poor ability went, the 
 integrity of the nation ; I feel now, that the grander task 
 before us is the restoration of its tarnished honor." 
 
 " Ah, Mr. Auf dem Busch," said the hostess, " you are at 
 least honest enough to confess the true purpose of this wicked 
 war, which your government is fighting under the false pretense 
 of upholding the constitution. To do you justice, I believe 
 that you follow your conviction." 
 
 Woldemar bowed. He was about to answer, when Miss 
 May interrupted, saying: 
 
 "It is a German trait, is it not, Mr. Auf dem Busch, to 
 follow the dictates of conscience regardless of consequences ? 
 I half believe," she added, a far-off look in her eyes and a 
 faint smile giving her face a thoughtful expression, " that a 
 genuine German would refuse St. Peter's invitation to enter 
 heaven, if he thought that duty called him to the other place, 
 because the recording angel had made a mistake in casting up 
 his account." 
 
580 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " You are severe ou my eouutrvnien, Miss May," said 
 Woldemar, " But I grant you that I abhor slavery, as all 
 Germans, with rare exceptions, do; and I grant you, also, 
 that its abolition, as one of the consequences of this war, is 
 confidently hoped for by us." 
 
 "Wherein, my hope is, that you may be disappointed," 
 said Nellie, a little positively. " Why do you wish to meddle 
 with what concerns you so little ? ' ' 
 
 " I trust that this matter concerns me more than a little," 
 the young merchant replied, deferentially, yet soberly. " The 
 honor and glory of my country are nor indifferent to me. 
 Liberty is the proudest boast of American freemen. The 
 negro is a human being. Then why is he not as free as the 
 white man ? " 
 
 "• Because," said Nellie, speaking in a tone of earnestness 
 that impressed Woldemar, " there is a practical as well as a 
 theoretical side to this question. Theorizing on this subject 
 is, I suspect, another peculiarly German trait; is it not? And 
 the negro in America constitutes an interesting problem, which 
 the Germans solve in the abstract, according to the approved 
 methods of speculative reasoning. Begging the premises, which 
 you so dogmatically announce, that the negro is a human 
 being, and that human beings are free, the conclusion is easily 
 reached that the negro is, theoretically, free. But to the 
 Southern people, who wear him, — if you will excuse the 
 homely phrase — next to the skin, this problem is a most 
 practical one. We assign to him the status, which in the 
 monarchical countries is assigned to the people at large — 
 obedience, or the lash! " 
 
 Woldemar listened in wonder to the remarks of the Southern 
 belle, whom he had not credited with the general intelligence 
 betrayed by her words. Her last remark about the lash in 
 monarchical countries nettled him. With a touch of his old im- 
 periousness, he replied with the question : " What enables you 
 to speak in this fashion of monarchical governments ? Is it, that 
 you have heard, or read, of Russia, and the barbarous knout? " 
 
A STUDY IN BLACK AND WHITE. 581 
 
 " Chiefly that," she admitted. " Aud what little 1 have 
 seen with my own eyes." 
 
 " Ah, yes ! You have been to P^urope," he exclaimed. " I 
 remember hearing your brother say so at one time." And with 
 increased interest, as if this fact had added value to her oihu- 
 ions, he asked her to state her views as to the relative merits 
 of P^urope and America. 
 
 " But, Mr. Auf dem Busch, we ' did ' all Europe in scarcely 
 more than a year," she apologized. " And we were bent on 
 having a good time, at that. Surely, my opinion cannot, 
 under such circumstances, be worth listening to? " 
 
 " But still I am eager to hear it." 
 
 " Then give me Europe for a year or two; America for a 
 permanent home." 
 
 " But Europe teems Avith culture, while America has hardly 
 put forth a leaf," 
 
 " I, for my part, prefer Spring to Summer." 
 
 " But not rudeness to culture? " 
 
 "Manhood, then, to abject cringing, Mr, Auf dem Busch," 
 said the young lady, growing warm with the subject, "to me it 
 was a humiliating spectacle to see the great mass of a nation 
 crawling in the dust to the titled few. Counts, barons, dukes, 
 lords — I have seen them all, bespangled hke gypsy women, 
 and about them the awed multitude gaping reverence," 
 
 " And did it not occur to you that these titled few have 
 acquired the skill to rule that multitude, and transmitted it 
 from father to son through generations ? ' ' 
 
 "Sir," said Nellie, with sparkling eyes and eager voice, 
 " that touches the pith of the difference between us, and — I 
 submit — between the old and the new world. Why should one 
 man hold privilege over another by virtue of some ancestor's 
 deed? In America, thank God, the ruler is determined, not 
 by the chance of birth, but by the will of the people," 
 
 Woldemar, forgetting time and place, grew warmer. " Will 
 of the people? " he exclaimed sneeringly. "Say rather, by 
 the will of scheming tricksters, who barter office for cash or 
 
582 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 l^ledges to the highest bidder. If eternal watchfulness be the 
 ouly price, liberty is a costlier article than the average Ameri- 
 can cares to pay for. He contents himself with the counterfeit 
 shadow of self rule, having long ago yielded up his birthright 
 to self-appointed political hucksters, unprincipled demagogues 
 and bosses, who harness the sovereign voters to the hack of 
 partisanship and drive them with the lash of party discipline 
 whither they will. No, Miss May, the will of the people is but 
 a small factor in the machinery of determining our rulers in 
 America. How far more rational is the rule of the monarch, 
 whose sole care and purpose is the welfare of his subjects." 
 
 "Poor souls!" said Nellie, affecting mock sympathy. 
 " These rulers l)y the chance of birth, or, as they themselves 
 more euphoniously put it, by the grace of God, are fully as 
 disinterested in governing their subjects as, I dare say, our 
 slave-owners are in dealing with their slaves. And on your 
 showing, Mr. Auf dem Busch, our slaves ought to be as grate- 
 ful for being ruled by their owners as your subjects in mo- 
 narchical States are to their hereditary masters. Then why 
 would you deprive them of the protection they enjoy, any more 
 than you would drive your countrymen, for instance, into 
 revolt against their masters?" 
 
 " You are not just in comi)aring the German subject with 
 the American slave. The former have not been robbed of their 
 human rights, as your countrymen are robbing the negro. 
 There, all men are under the equal protection of the law ; here, 
 you deny the servient race that equality given of God to all 
 men." 
 
 " We are white ; the negroes are black. Did we create this 
 inequality? Is not inequality ordained of God, rather? Is 
 not inequality an inevitable condition of our existence? Let 
 not the seal-skiuned Esquimo, then, compel the Hottentot to 
 wear his furs." 
 
 Woldemar suppressed what answer he was about to make, 
 when he saw Cressie approaching her mistress. But in a low 
 voice he remarked ; 
 
A STUDY IN BLACK AND WHITE. 583 
 
 " Cressie, at least, is not black." 
 
 " No," said the mistress. " But she has enough of African 
 blood in her veins to make a most excellent servant, who, 1 
 Urmly believe, would spurn freedom if offered to her." 
 
 " It would prove black ingratitude, and the meanest treach- 
 ery," said Woldemar, " were I to put the correctness of your 
 assertion to the test. Otherwise it might prove an interesting 
 experiment." 
 
 The young lady regarded her guest with the same mischievous 
 smile that had somewhat disconcerted him when she surprised 
 him gazing at Cressie. 
 
 "Try it, Mr. Auf dem Busch ! " she exclaimed. " You 
 may not succeed in giving me cause for complaint or vexation ; 
 but it is probable that you will be both humiliated and disap- 
 pointed in the attempt. If there is any one, who can coax 
 Cressie away from me, pardon me, Mr. Auf dem Busch, for 
 asserting that you are not he." 
 
 Woldemar did not answer; perhaps, because Cressie had 
 approached and was conferring with her mistress touching 
 some domestic duty. Or, perhaps, he was pondering Miss 
 May's w^ords, and the meaning of the smile that had accom- 
 panied them. At any rate, he made no reply, even after 
 Cressie had gone about her business ; but he dropped his eyes 
 before Nellie's quizzical look, and suddenly colored without 
 ostensible cause. 
 
 
XXXVII. 
 CONFESSIONS AND CONFIDINGS. 
 
 lAULlNE WALDHORST, meanwhile, looked forward to 
 her meeting with uncle and cousin in nervous excite- 
 ment. She loved her uncle and benefactor with a 
 fervency that made her anxiety for his safety as keen, jjerhaps, 
 as Mrs. Auf dem Busch's apprehension for her husband's con- 
 dition, while the dread of meeting her Cousin Woldemar added 
 to her agitation. She was to meet him, too, in the midst of 
 the May family ; whom, she felt, he must cordially hate. Then 
 there was the prospect of meeting Nellie, for whom she had 
 conceived a fond affection, which excited her eager expectation ; 
 and the possibility — how her heart fluttered to think it ! — of 
 meeting Leslie May. 
 
 To these exciting topics the prospect of traveling through a 
 comparatively wild tract of country, that might now be swarm- 
 ing with soldiers and marauders belonging to either of the 
 belligerent armies, added another element of uneasiness. She 
 had written to her brother in this respect, on receiving Nellie's 
 letter, inquiring as to the feasibility of making the journey 
 with Mrs. Auf dem Busch ; and Victor, answering promptly, 
 had informed her that the military governor, taking a warm 
 interest in the members of the Auf dem Busch family, had so 
 arranged as to send him with an important commission to 
 Brookfield, directing him at the same time to take the ladies 
 with him under military escort. This gave Pauline comforting- 
 assurance in one direction ; but when Victor after his arrival in 
 the city, indicated to her the nature of his commission at 
 Brooktield, a new and more poignant anxiety racked her mind, 
 overshadowing for the time every other emotion. The very 
 (584) 
 
CONFESiSIONS AND CONFIDISGS. o85 
 
 mention of the word " court-martial " la connection with 
 Leslie May struck terror to her soul. 
 
 Under these circumstances the journey to Brooklield was 
 not a cheerful one for Pauline ; nor indeed, for Mrs. Auf dem 
 Busch. The ill-humor of the latter sprang not alone from 
 anxiety for her husband and son, though she fretted much 
 about them, but lay in a different direction. She bemoaned 
 the unpardonable weakness that had led her husband to 
 acquiesce in Woldemar's enlistment, as well as the inconceiv- 
 able folly of his enlisting himself, thus bringing all this trouble 
 on his helpless wife. And she laid a heavy grievance at the 
 door of Victor Waldhorst, holding him responsible, in some 
 vague fashion, for this unholy war, with all its train of 
 suffering and trouble. 
 
 But Victor, too, was glum and taciturn. He had seen 
 neither Leslie nor his sister since the day he parted from them 
 at the capitol, save as he had caught a glimpse of them on the 
 next day, when the final vote was taken, by which Colonel 
 May had been elected to the United States Senate. The stirring 
 events that agitated the country, as w^ell as the new sphere of 
 action into which he had been removed by enlisting in the Union 
 army had served to distract his thoughts from the disappoint- 
 ment that had burned into his heart. But now, when again 
 approaching Brookfield on the road he had traveled in 
 Yahkop's company, memories crowded ujion him thick and 
 fast. He showed his sister the steejo declivity down which he 
 had rushed with headlong impetuosity, eager to rescue the 
 child that had charmed him with her silvery laughter ; and the 
 place, on the other side of the creek, where he had intercepted 
 the runaway horses. A pensive smile flitted over his face, as 
 he recounted the incidents following. A far-off look came 
 into his eyes as he ceased speaking. His thoughts dwelt on 
 the dreams of bygone days. Pauline had listened with rapt 
 interest to his words, and would gladly have lured him into 
 further confidences on this topic, but for Victor's obvious 
 preoccupation. Only when they reached the ford where they 
 
586 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 must cross the creek, swollen, just now, to unusual fullness 
 by recent rains, she asked him whether the child had really 
 been alone in the wagon, when the runaway horses dashed 
 through the water. 
 
 Victor's eyes sparkled with enthusiasm, as he answered. 
 " She had no equal as a child, even as she has no peer as a 
 woman. You have seen her, Pauline. You have been attracted 
 by the personal magnetism she exerts upon all who come within 
 her influence. You have been charmed by her witching beauty, 
 and won by her sweet loveableness. And you will see her again, 
 Pauline ; and I know her well enough to be sure that she will 
 not let you feel the resentment that fills her heart against me — ' ' 
 
 " Resentment? " Pauline exclaimed. 
 
 "For my base ingratitude, as she must judge it, to her 
 father. Yes, Pauline ; and she is rights from her standpoint. 
 She had set her heart on her father's election to the Senate, 
 and I promised him my vote and influence. She will never 
 forgive me for opposing him, for she does not comprehend the 
 cruel necessity that made it my duty to vote against him. To 
 her, the cause of the South is a just and holy cause ; and she is 
 enthusiastic in her loyalty. She is a woman, and a woman's 
 opinion is unreasoning and immovable. It will be better, 
 believe me, that I should see as little of her as may be com- 
 patible with my duty in conducting the trial. When we have 
 reached Brookfield I will remain at the hotel, while you proceed 
 to May Meadows with aunt. You will explain matters to 
 uncle. I Avould like to call on him ; but I must not intrude 
 my unwelcome presence on Miss May." 
 
 "You wrong Nellie! " Pauline asserted, with an assurance 
 that Victor wished might rest on a more substantial foundation 
 than her admiration of Leslie's sister. " I know her better 
 than to believe her capable of harboring ill will against any 
 one for simply doing his duty. Nellie is as proud as she is 
 beautiful: but she possesses a bright intellect, and, aboA^e all, 
 a warm, generous heart that would (^ause her to blush at the 
 mere suspicion of u mean thought or impulse." 
 
CONFESSIONS AND CONFIDINGS. 587 
 
 Victor looked at his sister with eager approval. " How 
 wonderful is Avomau's intuition!" he exclaimed. "Your 
 estimate of Miss May's character, based on an hour's conver- 
 sation with her, is as unerring and accurate as my knowledge 
 of her, based on an intercourse of years." 
 
 Pauline blushed as she smilingly replied: " But, remember, 
 that you have told me all you know about her, and perhaps 
 more. So that I have all your knowledge, besides my own, as 
 well as my ' woman's intuition,' as you call it, to guide me. 
 And believe me,- this instinct is more reliable, sometimes, than 
 the deliberate judgment of a man ; at least so far as a woman 
 is in question." 
 
 A faint reflection of Pauline's smile stole into Victor's face. 
 But instead of brightening his features, it served rather to 
 accentuate their somber earnestness. 
 
 "You are right," he said; "and just because you are 
 right, Miss May must despise me. No one knows better than 
 I her warm-hearted generosity. She has proved it to me in 
 ways that I can never forget. It is this very enthusiasm of 
 her nature that must condemn me in her eyes. Were she less 
 womanly in her disposition, could she judge from the glacier 
 realms of prosaic intellect, — could she look down on and reason 
 upon the patriotism that makes her an enthusiastic — I may 
 say a fanatic — rebel, and the bitter duty which cruelly de- 
 mands of me to see in her and hers but traitors and enemies, 
 she might forgive my course against her father, and respect 
 me at least for doing my duty. As it is, I am to her a per- 
 jured, ungrateful wretch, who betrayed her father's interest 
 and her own confiding trust in my promise. — No, Pauline ; I 
 will not annoy her by entering her house as a guest, and put- 
 ting her to the necessity of refusing me that whole-souled hos- 
 pitality, which it is her nature to extend to all whom she 
 welcomes there." 
 
 Pauline shook her head doubtingiy over Victor's self-dis- 
 paraging words. She remembered Nellie's gracious smile, that 
 evening among the philosophers, as she presented him with a» 
 
588 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " posie for old acquaintance' sake," and Victor's vivid blush 
 on receiving it ; and she was too thoroughly convinced of her 
 brother's sterling qualities to believe it possible that either 
 Nellie or any other girl should look down upon him. But what 
 Victor said about their being enemies, set her to thinking. If 
 Nellie and Victor were enemies, then were not Leslie and she 
 enemies too ? And if she were to meet him now what would 
 be his attitude toward her? And what is the attitude of 
 Cousin Woldemar toward Leslie May ? 
 
 Anxiously she pondered these questions, and soon became 
 as silent as Victor. It was well for Mrs. Auf dem Busch 
 that she made no demand on the conversational powers of her 
 companions ; for she would have been poorly entertained by 
 them . 
 
 When the travelers arrived at Brooklield, Victor ordered the 
 guard to proceed with the ladies to the May Mansion, not- 
 withstanding the vehement protest of Mrs. Auf dem Busch, 
 who insisted on Victor's accompanying them to the end of 
 their journey. But Victor quietly left them to pursue their 
 way to May Meadows while he himself reported to General 
 Seele at the hotel headquarters. 
 
 The guests were received by Mrs. and Miss May with the 
 courtesy to be expected of them. Mrs. May was polite, though 
 Pauline, if she had not been so preoccupied, might have fancied 
 her to be a trifle condescending in her manner ; but Nellie was 
 very gracious to Mrs. Auf dem Busch, while she embraced and 
 kissed Pauline with the warmth of sincere friendship. The 
 two girls were at once on terms of perfect ease with each other, 
 and exchanged their small confidences with great gusto. 
 
 Uncle Auf dem Busch received his wife in bantering mood, 
 though as yet unable to leave his bed. "Come you all the 
 way to Brookfield," he inquired of her, "to curry my grey 
 hairs, and tie my cravat, when I come on my legs once more? " 
 And after a feeble chuckle, made pathetic by his weakness, he 
 added: " Ah, these ladies shall know how proud I can be of 
 my caresome wife ; and how I shall be thankful to her, when 
 
coyFESsioys and confidinqs. 589 
 
 she shall make me to look well, before them. Or," with a 
 comical grimace, "at least, so well as she cau make me to 
 look." 
 
 When Pauline bent over him to kiss him, he grasped her by 
 both arms and holding her away from him, said: " Stop, little 
 girl ! I like your kiss better as sugar or honey. But if you 
 got not more as one to spare, better you give it to that hungry 
 boy there, looking at you like if he wants to eat you with his 
 eyes." 
 
 " Oh, I am not sting}- with kisses," said Pauline, blushing 
 deeply, however, as she pressed her lips upon those of the old 
 gentleman. " And I have one to spare for my cousin," she 
 added, as she turned to embrace and kiss Woldemar, who had 
 risen from the lounge on which he had been reclining. " I am 
 so glad. Cousin Woldemar, to lind you so much better than I 
 feared, from the news we had of you. You will soon be well 
 enough, will you not, to escort us home? " 
 
 Woldemar responded to the kiss and embrace with a cool- 
 ness that surprised both his father and himself. The suffering 
 from his wound must have drained his vitality very low, so his 
 father feared, if Pauline's kiss failed to bring the slightest 
 color to his cheeks. Bat Pauline felt grateful to her cousin 
 for his admirable bearing under the circumstances, and Nellie, 
 not appearing to notice at all, indulged in a furtive smile to 
 herself. 
 
 "I would gladly escort mama and you," said Woldemar, 
 in answer to Pauline's remark, "if they would let me. But 
 when I get well, which I hope to be in a few days, I must re- 
 join my company. My term of enlistment will not expire for 
 some weeks yet." 
 
 " We shall have a word to say about that, will we not, 
 Pauline?" Nellie interposed. "For the present, you are a 
 prisoner of war, Mr. Auf dem Busch ; and I, under orders 
 from my superior officer, am your inexorable jailer. Do not 
 flatter yourself, sir, that I am so tame a rebel, or so recreant to 
 my trust, as to send a redoubtable warrior back to swell the 
 
590 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 ranks of the enemy, before he is exchanged, or at least 
 paroled." 
 
 " Old lady," said Auf deni Busch, Sr., with a sly wink at 
 his wife, " it has the seeming that you go home with uueffected 
 purpose. Because, see you not, if Miss May be jailer, then I 
 am a prisoner in her hands, too? " 
 
 " Of course you are," said Nellie, with smihng emphasis. 
 " And I shall put you under strict surveillance, as well as my 
 other prisoner. Mrs. Auf dem Busch, I appoint you my dep- 
 uty and give it you strictly in charge to keep a watchful eye 
 over the safety and comfort of your husband. And you, 
 Pauline, shall bear the responsibility for the younger pris- 
 oner." 
 
 " Ah, what strategy in a petticoat! " mused the old gen- 
 tleman, regarding his young hostess with admiring eyes. " It 
 is great luck for our side that Miss May wears not gray 
 trousers and some stars on her shoulders. She would be unre- 
 sistible as an enemy. What brave hojs in blue would stand 
 before the artillery of her eyes, they would be overcome with 
 her strokes of genius." 
 
 " Look to your prisoner, Mrs. Auf dem Busch ! " the young 
 lady commanded. " He is evidently delirious, and needs an 
 application of cold water." Turning to Pauline, she con- 
 tinued, with mock severity: " Miss Waldhorst, I warn you to 
 keep strict v/atch on your prisoner also. I suspect him of 
 entertaining treasonable designs on one of our ' contrabands,' 
 as the Yankees now call our 'peculiar institution.' Mind, I 
 shall hold you responsible for the safety of our domestics. 
 There is one," she went on, nodding slightly in the direction 
 of Cressie, and smiling mischievously, " upon whose rescue the 
 Yankee warriors, including your gallant cousin Auf dem Busch, 
 seem intent. Your task in guarding her will not be a very 
 arduous one, however. For I suspect that she will not willingly 
 be carried off b}^ any of them, save by one, who has not shown 
 up, so far." 
 
 Pauline looked at Nellie as if she did not understand. She 
 
CONFESSIONS AND CON RIDINGS. 591 
 
 looked at her cousin, and the distinct blush of embarrassment 
 on his face puzzled her. It was so unusual a thing in Cousin 
 Woldemar to blush, on any occasion. From Woldemar she 
 turned her eyes on the octoroon maiden, and was struck by 
 her marvelous beauty. As Victor had asked on first seeing 
 her, Can she be a slave? So now Pauline, shocked by what to 
 her appeared a monstrous incongruity, whispered in her 
 friend's ear " Is she — ? " 
 
 "Yes," Nellie answered, loud enough to be heard by all, 
 not excepting Cressie, " she is a bounden slave ; my own special 
 property. Shocking, is it not? " 
 
 "It is ! " Pauline exclaimed, still gazing in wonderment at 
 the slave girl, who was j)erforming some menial office with the 
 unconscious grace of a well-bred lady. 
 
 '-'■ It is! " Nellie echoed with mock solemnity, enjoying for a 
 second Pauline's eloquent, though silent protest. Then she 
 broke into a ripple of musical laughter, and continued : "I 
 think it is your brother's voice I hear saying these words, and 
 your brother's face, on which I see the horror that seizes you 
 on this discovery. Oh," she went on, more soberly, as if 
 indulging in reminiscence, " it was a sight, when he bravely 
 defended Cressie from the lash of the brutal overseer ! His 
 blazing cheeks and flashing eyes made him look really hand- 
 some, when he told father that he ought not to permit Cressie 
 to be flogged." 
 
 A swift glance at Victor's sister from Cressie's eyes, and a 
 tell-tale blush coloring her cheeks with crimson glow, betrayed 
 that she had not forgotten the episode in her lowlj^ life, that 
 had thrown her into contact with her master's guest. 
 
 But Nellie continued: "By the by, that brutal overseer 
 is now one of the loyal patriots defending your government, 
 and therefore Victor's comi-ade in arms. What a curious pair 
 of patriots! Jeffreys, whom Victor has made an enemy for 
 life, and who hates him worse than he can hate any rebel — 
 unless it be brother Leslie — fighting alongside of Cressie's 
 brave champion, in Lincoln's army, which is fighting, as 
 
592 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Mr. Aul dera Busch here admits, for the liberation of the 
 slaves ! ' ' 
 
 " Only because the rebels compel us," said Woldemar. 
 " If they laid down their arms to-day I fear that our govern- 
 ment would not only forgive them, but secure them more firmly 
 iu the possession of their slaves." 
 
 " You /ear so, " Nellie repeated. " Yes ; you are a German, 
 and would prefer, I suppose, to he a slave — to your gracious 
 master by the grace of Clod — than to see one in a free coun- 
 try. Well, you are at least a little better than the Yankees in 
 this respect : You Germans fight slavery on instinct, as Don 
 Quixote fought the wind-mill, while the Yankees grudge us 
 our slaves on the principle of the dog in the manger." 
 
 " I guess Miss May has right with the Yankees," Mr. Auf 
 dera Busch Senior remarked. " The Yankees make blue laws 
 for Sunday, because they feel blue on Sunday, and it makes 
 them mad when some folks be jolly on Sunday, and they make 
 laws to make everybody feel blue on Sunday." 
 
 " Come Pauline," said Nellie, taking her guest by the 
 hand, " I see that mama is ready to show Mrs. Auf dem 
 Busch to her room, and I must take you to yours. Which 
 is also mine," she added, as the two girls were leaving 
 the room. " You do not object to me as a room-mate, do 
 you? " 
 
 " Oh, how kind of you ! " Pauline exclaimed, regarding her 
 friend with a radiant face. " You don't know how glad you 
 make me to take me to your own room." 
 
 " My kindness in this respect as in most others has a selfish 
 basis," Nellie confessed, in a confiding way. " I want you 
 to myself as much as I can get you ; and I give you fair 
 warning, that I shall monopolize as much of your time as you 
 will let me." 
 
 " Command me! " Pauline replied, as the girls reached the 
 privacy of their chamber. "I only fear that you will soon 
 get tired of me. My conversational talent is poorly developed, 
 and when my small stock of gossiping news is exhausted, the 
 
CONFESSIONS AND CONFIDINOS. 593 
 
 burden of colloquial entertainniont Ijetweeii us will rest chiefly 
 on you." 
 
 " Have no fear," said Nellie, " but that we will fully de- 
 velop your dormant talent in that direction. You shall learn, 
 before you leave May Meadows, not only how to chat, but to 
 chatter like a magpie. Meanwhile, let us draw on what you 
 call your small stock of gossipping news. Tell me, for 
 instance, where is your brother, Mr. Waldhorst, and what is he 
 doing? " 
 
 "Why, don't you know?" Pauline asked in surprise. 
 " He is here, — I mean in Brooktield, — to act as judge advo- 
 cate in the trials before the court-martial." 
 
 "Judge advocate?" counter-queried Nellie, in equal sur- 
 prise. "I did not know that he was a commissioned officer. 
 I heard of him last as the military governor's private secre- 
 tary." 
 
 "I don't know about his being a commissioned officer," 
 Pauline informed her. "They call him Captain, I believe; 
 and he was the governor's adjutant until he was sent here to 
 conduct the trial of your brother." 
 
 "Trial of my brother?" exclaimed Nellie, turning pale. 
 " You mean the trial of Jeffreys, — that miscreant who came 
 here to carry off Cressie, and against whom Leslie is detained 
 as a witness, — do you not? " 
 
 Pauline was startled by Nellie's vehemence. It was a genu- 
 ine surprise to her to learn that Leslie's sister had been left in 
 ignorance of the charge against him. 
 
 " Have you not been informed?" she inquired, in a voice 
 tender with genuine sympathy. " Where, then, is your 
 brother? " 
 
 "Ha! " exclaimed Nellie, aghast, and white as a sheet, 
 " that is the miserable secret of Leslie's protracted absence, — 
 ever since the horrible day when he marched oil with the 
 guards that arrested Jeffreys ! And I — simpleton that I 
 was ! — thought he was detained as a witness when he was him- 
 self a prisoner ! He has been in vile durance all this time, 
 
 38 
 
594 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 and neither his mother nor his sister as much as dreamed of 
 visiting him ! Oh, this was a cruel kindness^ father, to keep 
 us uninformed as to my brother's fate! " 
 
 " How careless I have been! " Pauline lamented. " I am 
 so sorry, — your father must have had good reason to conceal 
 the truth from you ; and by my awkwardness I have thwarted 
 his intention." 
 
 "Hush !" said Nellie waving her hand in a peremptory 
 gesture. "Don't be silly. As if you could have suspected ! 
 And besides, I nmst have heard all about it in a day or two, 
 at all events." Then, as if wishing to put her visitor at ease, 
 she added: "So your brother is in Brookfield, and I have 
 heard nothing of it ! " 
 
 " Wiiy, yes. He came with us. It was he that escorted 
 us to this place." 
 
 " And why have I not seen him? " 
 
 "Aunt audi both endeavored to persuade him; but — " 
 
 Pauline had it on her tongue's end to repeat to Nellie the 
 reason Victor had given her for refusing to visit May Meadows ; 
 but she thought better of it. She finished the sentence by 
 adding: " But his business with the commanding general was 
 too pressing to allow him time to accompauy us here." 
 
 " No ; of course," her friend remarked. " Victor, you say, 
 is judge advocate. Then it will be his office to prosecute 
 Leslie, — to urge the court to couvict him. Convict him of 
 what, Pauline?" And in her sisterly anxiety she addressed 
 herself to her visitor in the eager hope of learning from her her 
 brother's opinion of the case. " He has done nothing, has he? 
 Nothing that is wrong, that a court-martial can punish ? To 
 be sure, he has tried to raise a company for the war. But 
 they cannot punish him for that? " 
 
 " No, of course not," said Pauline, timidly. For while iier 
 interest in the fate of Leslie May was fully as deep as that of 
 his sister, she had gathered from some of her brother's remarks, 
 tliat tlie charge on whicli Leslie May would be tried was a 
 serious one, involving danger to his lil)erty, if not his life. 
 
CONFES, SIGNS AND CONFIDING^. 595 
 
 And she naturally shrank irom imparting her own apprehen- 
 sions to the anxious sister. 
 
 But Nellie, in the instinctive hope of being contradicted by 
 Pauline, went on: " .Surely they cannot call him to account 
 for shooting that odious beast that came here to rob us, and 
 insult me? Tell me, Pauline, they cannot, surely, hurt him 
 for that?" 
 
 '' You forget, dear Nellie, that I know nothing at all about 
 what happened here. But this I know, that Victor will never 
 permit injustice to your brother — " 
 
 " Why yes ; " she interrupted. " Victor is to be his pros- 
 ecutor. And think, Pauline, Leslie has mortally offended 
 him — has offended him beyond forgiveness — ' ' 
 
 " Don't you believe it, Nellie ! " Pauline broke in. " Leslie 
 could not offend my brother so deeply, but that he would 
 readily forgive. Oh, you do not know how he idolizes every 
 member of your family ! ' ' 
 
 " But Victor is the soul of honor — Oh, don't I know it? — 
 And Leslie and I too, have reviled him as base, and ungrate- 
 ful, and treacherous! " 
 
 Pauline drew herself up to her full height. Her cheeks 
 reddened ; her eyes flashed . ' ' Treacherous ? ' ' she repeated 
 with the emphasis of indignant surprise and amazement. 
 " My brother Victor, treacherous? And you, Miss May, 
 you, — and your brother, — you, both of yoii^ — of all the 
 people in the world, you had the heart to tell him that? " 
 
 As Pauline stood there, the very embodiment of indignant 
 protest against the cruel wrong to her brother's character, 
 Nellie regarded her with undisguised admiration. " How like 
 your brother you are ! " she said. " And yet how unlike ! If 
 he had your spirit, what a man he would be ! " 
 
 " You will find that he has plenty of spirit on occasion," 
 Pauline retaliated. " But you need fear no return of evil for 
 evil from him," she added, regarding Miss May with lofty 
 pride. " He will be all the more scrupulous in shielding 3'our 
 brother against injustice and wrong for the cruelty he has 
 
596 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 suffered at your hands. You have said it, Miss May, and you 
 spoke truly when you said it, — my brother is the soul of 
 honor." 
 
 " Can any one in the wide world know it better than I? " 
 the young lady emphasized. There was exultation in her voice 
 and bearing, as she said it, yet a tone of resignation withal, 
 which caused Pauline to wonder. " But there is little comfort 
 in that," she continued, " either for me or for Leslie. He is 
 loyal to his government. In his eyes Leslie is a traitor ; we 
 are enemies. His nice sense of duty in conducting the trial 
 will take alarm at every memory or sentiment of ten- 
 der regard or affection into Avhich his warm and generous 
 heart may betray him. He will do his duty all the more sternly 
 and inexorably — he will prosecute Leslie as rigorously as if — 
 he had never known us." 
 
 There was a tone of anguish in Pauline's voice, as she 
 answered, "I dare say he will, Nellie!" For she, too, 
 trembled for the fate of Leslie May, 
 
 " He will ! — He loves you, Pauline, — I know how tenderly ! 
 But he would sacrifice you as surely as he would Leslie or me, 
 if he thought the interest of his cause demanded it." 
 
 " Oh, no, Nellie! Only \t justice demanded it. Be Of good 
 cheer, dear; for I am as certain as I am of m}^ OAvn life, that 
 your brother has done nothing that is not high-minded, and 
 honorable and right. So if Victor be his judge, you ought not 
 to fear for him." 
 
 "You are right, my dear!" said NeUie, impulsively 
 embracing aud kissing her friend. 
 
 Y'et neither of the gii'ls felt assured. The issue of a trial 
 before a court composed of enemies of the accused was looked 
 forward to by both of them with awe and trepidation. 
 
XXXVIII. 
 
 JUDGE AND ADVOCATE. 
 
 ^HEN Captain Waldhorst — that being now A'ictor's 
 military title — delivered the disi)atehes of which he 
 was the bearer from Governor Rauhenfels, General 
 Seele detained him for a lengthened interview in which the 
 contents of the dispatches were under discussion. They con- 
 tained the order directing the general in command of the Fed- 
 eral forces of the Department of the Southwest to convene a 
 general court-martial for the speedy trial of the prisoners in 
 custody. Sergeant Jeffreys was charged with attempted kid- 
 naping and provoking an aggravated breach of the peace, 
 and conduct unbecoming a soldier. The civilian Leslie May 
 was arraigned for the nuirder of Sergeant Obenaus, an officer 
 of the United States army in the lawful discharge of his duty 
 as such. There was a further order detailiug Captain Wald- 
 horst of the governor's staff, to be attached to said court, when 
 convened, as judge advocate. 
 
 Victor was agreeably surprised to find how much interest the 
 general evinced in the case of the prisoners. The questions 
 put by him elicited from the young captain a rather full account 
 of all that Victor knew about the matter. His every word 
 became a glowing tribute to the sterling character of father and 
 son ; and though he never mentioned the name of Miss May 
 further than was necessary to explain her attitude toward Jef- 
 freys in regard to the threatened flogging of Cressie, yet it was 
 not difficult for the general to guess the secret that Victor 
 thought he was safely hiding. 
 
 " I learn from our surgeon. Doctor Behr, who attends the 
 patients at the house of Senator May, that his daughter is a 
 most estimable lady, whose cheerful devotion to the comfort of 
 
 (597) 
 
598 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 the sufferers goes far in aiding their recovery. I also learn 
 from the doctor, that she is ignorant of the real charge against 
 her brother, believing him to be detained merely as a witness." 
 
 " What a fearful shock it will be to her, to learn of the peril 
 of her idolized brother! " Victor exclaimed. 
 
 " It will be your task to help her to bear it," said General 
 Sede, a scarcely perceptible humorous smile lighting up his 
 countenance. "The governor's action in selecting you as 
 judge advocate in these trials seems to l>e a most fortunate 
 thing for the May family. Do you happen to know whether he 
 is acquainted with them? " 
 
 " He is." 
 
 " Ah, that explains it. I am very glad ; for 1 feel that with 
 you to conduct the proceedings, no injustice will be done." 
 
 " I shall certainly do my duty. General." 
 
 " 1 know you will. Since you have made me aware of the 
 high esteem in which you hold your friend May, your conduct 
 in the senatorial election challenges my unqualified admiration. 
 In voting against your old benefactor, you must have felt 
 something of the anguish of Junius Brutus when he signed the 
 death warrants of his sons for treason to the State." 
 
 " I might have truly said, in the words of that other Brutus, 
 Cajsar's friend and assassin, ' Not that I loved my benefactor 
 less, but my country more. ' " 
 
 "Go now," urged the general, "and confer with the 
 prisoners, so as to be ready to go on with the trial at the 
 earliest possible moment. You are aware, I suppose, that we 
 may receive marching orders at any time, and it would be 
 awkward if the trials were begun and not concluded before we 
 leave here. The enemy is concentrating an overwhelming 
 force, and if he should think of attacking us, nothing but a 
 speedy retreat would save our forces from annihilation. 
 Besides, it would be a cruel thing to the prisoners to be dragged 
 hence under guard, and remain in (uistody for an indefinite 
 time." 
 
 " Not to speak of the anxiety of his mother and sister," 
 
JUDGE AND ADVOCATE. 599 
 
 Victor added, thinking of but one of the prisoners. " 1 will 
 enter on my dnty at once, if your Excellency will grant me 
 access to the prisoners." 
 
 " Self -evidently," said the general. " You have unlimited 
 authority to visit or cause to be brought before you not only 
 the prisoners, but any witness or other person from whom you 
 may wish to obtain any information. I have one request to 
 make of you, hoAvever. One of the witnesses, is, I infer, the 
 young lady, his sister, and I would not like to have her 
 frightened b}^ being dragged here under military escort. Could 
 you," he added, a humorous twinkle again appearing in his 
 eye, " manage, perhaps, to pay your visit to her without taking 
 a squad of soldiers with you ? ' ' 
 
 " 1 may as well admit to you, General, that the fear I have 
 of meeting with Miss May would not be relieved if not only a 
 squad, but a whole regiment of soldiers were to accompany me." 
 
 " Fear? " the general repeated in surprise. " Why, what a 
 strange man you are for a soldier ! I learn that she is a most 
 charming young lady, and must be a friend of yours. And 
 your uncle and cousin are in the house, too. I must say, that 
 these May people, although they are rebels, have acted most 
 handsomely in taking to their home two wounded Federal 
 soldiers, and caring for them as if they were dear friends 
 instead of enemies." 
 
 " But I am not a wounded soldier," the young man replied, 
 with a sad smile of resignation. "I will be to her only the 
 enemy in the hated uniform, and the prosecutor of her idolized 
 brother. It will not be a pleasant task. General, to bring to 
 her the tiding of the grave accusation against him." 
 
 " Still, it will give her comfort that it is you and not some 
 hated Yankee that is to be the judge advocate at her brother's 
 trial." 
 
 Victor made no answer, but, on being dismissed, hurried to 
 the room in which Leslie May was kept under guard. 
 
 The meeting between the young men was characteristic. 
 Leslie, having already been informed of the nature of Victor's 
 
600 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 errand, cordially shook hands with him, and said, with that 
 winsome smile which had always won Victor's heart, more 
 touching now for an eager, expectant look that accompanied 
 it: "I may truly say, Victor, that I am glad to see you! 
 Very glad, indeed, in view of the errand that brought you 
 here. You came to prosecute me, did you not? " 
 
 " To try you, Mr. May," said Victor. " I assure you that 
 I deeply feel the painful necessity of this visit." 
 
 A dark look, as of keen disappointment, crossed Leslie's 
 face. Dropping the hand he had held in his own while speak- 
 ing, he said : " Mr. May, is it? " And with icy politeness he 
 added: "Then pardon me, Captain Waldhorst — that, I take 
 it, is your military rank ? — for my seeming disrespect in 
 addressing you by a name that was once familiar to me." 
 
 "Do not misjudge me, Mr. May," was Victor's quiet 
 answer. " It is not your friend or comrade that stands before 
 you — ' ' 
 
 "No, I should say not," Leslie interrupted, a touch of 
 sneering sarcasm in his voice. " I suppose that I dismissed 
 that friend and comrade some time ago. But we are liable to 
 make fools of ourselves sometimes. Captain Waldhorst ; and 
 so I forgot for a moment that a newer influence has come 
 between us. It is not your fault ; your stubborn persistence 
 in tantalizing us — my sister and me, I mean, and I have no 
 doubt yourself, also, — ought to make it plain enough, that 
 you wished no further friendship with us." 
 
 " You wrong me, Mr. May, as you did on that awful occa- 
 sion you speak of. Your father, at lea^st, understood that I 
 could not act otherwise than I did. If you had not been pas- 
 sionately absorbed in your ambitious purpose, you might have 
 known what it cost me to vindicate my honor and self-respect, — 
 what anguish it gave me to lose your and Miss May's friend- 
 ship, to be looked upon by both of you as perfidious and basely 
 ungrateful. But I may say, without humiliating myself, that 
 your cruelty on that occasion abated not one jot of my regard 
 and admiration — I may add, of my affection — for you — " 
 
JUDGE AND ADVOCATE. 601 
 
 ' Then why address me as ' Mr. Maj^ ' ? " 
 
 " Because, as I was about to say when you interrupted me, 
 I stand before you as an officer with the duty of prosecuting 
 you on a serious indictment. I come to request of you an 
 accurate statement of the circumstances attending the death 
 of the Federal officer, so that I may know how best to con- 
 duct the examination of the witnesses." 
 
 Leslie smiled and looked at Victor with a puzzled mien. 
 " Cool, that, is it not? " he said. " You soberly tell me, that 
 you come not as a friend, but as an officer charged with the 
 duty of prosecuting me — possibly on an indictment for a 
 felony, for there is no telling to what extent the facts may 
 have been exaggerated and distorted — and you ask of me to 
 help you convict me ? Does it not strike you that you are 
 trenching on the sacred privilege, guaranteed by mcujua charta 
 and the constitution, according to which no man shall be com- 
 pelled to testify against himself ? ' ' 
 
 Victor cast a reproachful glance at the prisoner. He was 
 about to answer, when Leslie hastily added : 
 
 "There — don't think that I believe you capable of any 
 intention of taking advantage of me. I know you so well, that 
 I am perfectly sure you would not have called on me with any 
 sinister motive ; for you would ten times rather suffer than do 
 wrong. Only it appears so outlandishly absurd to me that the 
 prosecuting officer should consult with the prisoner. It looks — 
 would look in any one else but you, I mean — so much like a 
 cowardly attempt to trick him into an unguarded statement, to 
 be used against him on the trial." 
 
 " You seem to forget, Mr. May, that courts-martial do not 
 proceed according to the course of the common law. In all 
 but English-speaking communities, the examination of the 
 pi-isoner himself is a most important factor in ascertaining guilt 
 or innocence. Under rare circumstances, only, could his 
 statement militate against him, if he were really innocent, as, 
 permit me to say, I believe you to be — " 
 
 Leslie's hand sought Victor's and pressed it. 
 
602 THE BEBEVS DAUQHTEli. 
 
 " Nevertheless I must do my duty. And you will pardon 
 me, will you not? for the suggestion, that your situation is not 
 entirely free from an element of danger. Men are liable to err. 
 The officers that are to compose the court to try you, are men, 
 of whom it would be expecting too much to imagine them 
 exempt from bias, prejudice, or even passion. You see, then, 
 that it is not enough for safety to know yourself to be innocent 
 of the charge laid against you, nor that I, tlie judge advocate, 
 am convinced of the justice of your cause. It behooves us to 
 disarm suspicion, remove prejudice, and cancel unfavorable 
 bias. Remember that your judges will be men who took up 
 arms from a sense of duty, to crush out a reliellion which they 
 deem unholy and wicked, and to which you and yours are 
 lending powerful aid. Do you see how a mistaken sense of 
 duty may turn their very patriotism into injustice against you ? ' ' 
 
 The prisoner's eyes flashed. "Victor!" he exclaimed, 
 " do you mean to tell me, that men who wear a soldier's uni- 
 form, who hold commissions from your government, who pro- 
 fess to be flghting for a righteous cause, can be guilty of the 
 pusillanimous tyranny you suggest? Do you want me to 
 believe that you would associate with men, who would trample 
 right and justice under foot, and call it patriotism — " 
 
 " Calm yourself, Mr. May," said Victor, laying his hand 
 gently on Leslie's arm. " I but caution you against over- 
 weening confidence ; and I again remind you that a court- 
 martial is a different thing from a nisi prius court at common 
 law. What I have suggested is a remote possibility ; but a 
 possibility that should be taken into account." 
 
 " More the shame for a cause that is supported by men whom 
 you deem capable of such things ! ' ' exclaimed the prisoner 
 indignantly. " Why, you might scour the South from end to 
 end in vain for a man so low as not to spit at a tribunal sus- 
 pected of the possibility you suggest." 
 
 " And yet," said Victor with a sad smile, " I mistrust that 
 under similar circumstances a tribunal in your Secession might 
 iiKHir similar suspicion. Human nature, I suspect, is much 
 
JUDGE AND ADVOCATE. 603 
 
 the same whether it manifests itself under a bhie, or under a 
 gray, uniform." 
 
 Leslie was about to answer, but closed his lips firmly with- 
 out uttering what may have been in his mind. 
 
 "You demand justice," Victor added. "Then try to be 
 just. Remember that these men are nursing a wrath against 
 you, — as one of the originators of this wanton and reckless 
 assault on our common country, — that appears to them as 
 just and as patriotic, as does the fierce indignation to you, 
 which incenses you against the government, to destroy which 
 you are honestly doing your best. Passion, though in the 
 garb of patriotic indignation, clouds the judgment : What they 
 might excuse as justifiable homicide in a non-combatant, may 
 seem to them a heinous murder when committed b}^ one en- 
 gaged in recruiting for the enemy in this unholy war." 
 
 Leslie seemed illy pleased with Victor's homily. But with 
 something of an effort he forced a smile, and said: "It is of 
 less importance to me, just now, which side is right or wrong ; 
 or even whether the judges that are to pass on my case are 
 patriots or bigots. The one thing needful is to show them, 
 that justice requires my acquittal. What am I to do? " 
 
 " For the present," said Victor, soberly, "you are to tell 
 me all you know about the facts." 
 
 When Victor was announced at May Meadows, it was late in 
 the afternoon. The convalescents, — for the old gentleman had 
 also recovered sufficiently to be able to leave his bed at times — 
 had been enjoying the open air on the porch, for an hour or 
 two, in the company of the ladies, but had retired just before 
 Victor's arrival, to their room, followed by Mrs. May and Mrs. 
 Auf dem Busch ; while Nellie and Pauline had gone to their 
 own room. Cressie handed Victor's card to her mistress, her 
 face flushed, her voice in a tremor of excitement, as she told 
 her that Captain Waldhorst desired a few moments of conver- 
 sation with Miss May. 
 
 '■'■ Captain Waldhorst! " Mrs. May read from the card, 
 
604 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 with an emphasis on the title as if it was an offense that must 
 be resented. " Well, show him into the drawing-room, and tell 
 your mistress ta join him there," When Cressie had left the 
 room, taking the card with her, Mrs. May added, conciliat- 
 ingly : " I must say for the young man, that it is quite con- 
 siderate in him to send in his card, considering that he used 
 to be perfectly at home here, and that his whole family is at 
 home here now. What business can he have with my daughter, 
 I wonder? " 
 
 Nellie held Victor's card in her hand when she entered the 
 drawing-room. He had for days been schooling himself for 
 this meeting ; and now, as she approached him with extended 
 hand, her eyes seeking his, that exquisite smile wreathing the 
 lips that bid him a hearty welcome, once more, to May 
 Meadows, — now he could not control the vivid flush that 
 mounted to his very forehead, leaving his face, as it receded — 
 as white as marble. But with a herculean effort he steadied his 
 voice, as he replied to her greeting, bowing very low, — so low 
 that it might seem as if he had not seen the hand so gracefully 
 proffered. " I thank you. Miss May, for j^our kindness in 
 replying so readily with my request for an interview. I shall 
 trouble you no longer than will be absolutely necessary for a 
 proper discharge of my duty." 
 
 Nellie noted the vivid flush, and a faint reflex of it shone on 
 her cheeks ; for it enabled her to see that she had not become 
 indifferent to him. She noted, too, the ignoring of her ex- 
 tended hand, and the color deepened; for this seeming act of 
 impoliteness assured her that he had been schooling himself to 
 self-control and self-reliance. The discovery, however, did not 
 diminish whatever regard she might have entertained for the 
 young soldier, nor increase her anxiety for the fate of her 
 brother. But she answered promptly : " We highly appreciate 
 the honor you are conferring upon us by this call," as she 
 placed a chair for him. " Your sister has already informed us 
 of the nature of your duties here. I am so glad, Captain, that 
 it is you into whose hands the conduct of the trial against 
 
JUDGE AND ADVOCATE. 605 
 
 brother Leslie has been intrusted. For I know that, c^onie what 
 will, 3'ou will not let him suffer unjustly." 
 
 " If Pauline has told you the nature of the charge against 
 your brother, I am spared the painful task of doing so," said 
 Victor, with a look of relief at his hostess. " It remains, then, 
 only for you to tell me the circumstances preceding the arrest. 
 May I beg of you to do so as fully and as accurately as pos- 
 sible, distinguishing between what you saw and heard yourself, 
 and what you may infer, or have learned from others? " 
 
 The account which Nellie gave was clear, succinct and 
 graphic, commencing with the intense excitement produced 
 among the inhabitants of Brookfield by news of the battle going 
 on at Winslo's Run, and her own nervousness in the morning, 
 when her father and brother had gone to Brookfield. She re- 
 lated even her conversation with Cressie, dwelling smilingly on 
 the octoroon's pensive renunciation of a possible lover. Of 
 course, she grew indignant over the memory of the insults that 
 had been heaped upon her by Sergeant Obenaus ; her feelings 
 carried her away to such extent, that she did not hesitate to 
 repeat the strong language she had used, until she suddenly 
 checked herself, remembering that she was addressing a Union 
 soldier. " Pardon me," she said then, " I ought to bear in 
 mind that I am speaking to a fellow-officer of the miscreant, — 
 to a representative of the same government which he professed 
 to serve." 
 
 Victor had listened with rapt attention to the fiery flow of 
 her words. So fully did he share the speaker's indignation, 
 that he jumped up as she ceased, exclaiming: " You are right. 
 Miss May ! Such a scoundrel disgraces the army and the gov- 
 ernment. A bullet in his heart from an honest man's weapon 
 is too much honor for the coward." 
 
 Nellie had also risen. She regarded him with a triumphant 
 sparkle of her eyes. " Could my brother do otherwise than 
 shoot him? " she exclaimed, fixing an eager, questioning look 
 upon the young officer. 
 
 Victor gazed at her admiringly, but made no answer. 
 
606 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " Not tliat be would have found me an unresisting victim," 
 she continued, speaking proudly, her lips curled with ineffable 
 disdain, while drawing from her pocket and displaying before 
 her visitor a revolver of proportions rather formidable for a 
 lady's toy. " This faithful friend would have laid him low, 
 if need had been ; or, failing in that, — though I am no poor 
 shot — it would have held in reserve one friendly bullet to 
 place me beyond his power." 
 
 " Ah, you were armed ! " exclaimed Victor. 
 
 " Yes. My father and brother both insisted on my carrying 
 this reliable protector, and themselves instructed me how to 
 use it. The cowardly villain was in greater danger than he 
 knew, even before brother Leslie appeared. But it was Leslie 
 that fired, with probably surer aim than mine would have been 
 the next moment." 
 
 From this point on, the account given by Nellie was but in 
 corroboration of what he had akeady learned from Leslie. 
 But Victor questioned her closely as to the minutest details, so 
 as to be sure of what the prisoner's sister would testify to at 
 the trial. 
 
 He had not yet ceased questioning when Cressie appeared, 
 announcing that supper had been served, and that the com- 
 pany were waiting in the dining-room for the honor of being 
 joined by Captain Waldhorst and Miss Nellie. This was a 
 move in the game on which Victor had not counted. He had 
 resolved to confine his intercourse with the members of the 
 May family to the merest formalities dictated by the rules of 
 common politeness. To sit down at table with them was far 
 from his purpose. His absorption in the gathering of the 
 facts for the trial had prevented him from noting the approach 
 of meal-time. Greatly annoyed as he was at his inadvertence 
 in this res^ject, he saw at once that to decline participation in 
 the meal would not only be in shockingly bad taste, but would 
 amount to a confession of weakness which would humble him 
 before the woman, to whom of all others he did not wish to 
 appear weak. Steeling his nerves for the trying ordeal await- 
 
JUDGE AND ADVOCATE. 607 
 
 iug him, he bowed to the young lady and offered his arm to 
 escort her to the supper table. 
 
 Nellie acknowledged the courtesy with a graceful smile ; but 
 Victor remained stolidly indifferent. Her graphic account of 
 the occurrences in which she had played so conspicuous a part, 
 had stirred up his very soul, so that it had required all his 
 mental resources to steer clear of an open betrayal of his deep 
 feeling. Now, when her soft hand rested daintily on his arm, 
 her bright face upturned trustingly to his, as they walked 
 toward the sujjper room, he felt more than ever the dire need 
 of fortitude to maintain the bari'ier of reserve behind which he 
 proposed to intrench himself against the dangerous fascina- 
 tion. He would rather incur the imputation of churlishness, 
 than hazard the succumbing, once more, to the witching charms 
 that had so often enthralled his whole being. So her spright- 
 liest sallies elicited but monosyllabic answers, and her sweetest 
 smiles met seeming indifference. But it was a seeming that 
 cost him heavily. 
 
 They found the company already assembled, Mrs. May hav- 
 ing, in honor of their military guest, persuaded the convales- 
 cents to join the family at the general table, at which Mr. Auf 
 dem Busch Senior appeared for the first time. Mrs. Auf dem 
 Busch and Pauline were, of course, present also ; and so it was 
 quite a little party that Nellie and Victor sat down to. 
 
 The conditions for a free tlow of conversation were not the 
 most favorable. Mrs. Auf dem Busch felt constrained by the 
 recognition of the obligation both she and her husband, as well 
 as her son, were under for the generous hospitality and unre- 
 mitting kindness that had been extended to them, yet lacked 
 the grace to show her gratitude in any acceptable manner. 
 Mrs. May, on her part, in no wise came to her aid : on the 
 contrary, she added to her chagrin and annoyance by the cool 
 display of her superior elegance and polish, doing the honors 
 at table with the air of a princess, until Nellie, in very pity, by 
 a well-directed question or two, put her at comparative ease. 
 
 The relations between Woldemar and Pauline had under- 
 
608 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 gone no perceptible change since the day on which Woklemar 
 had been rejected as a lover ; at least on the part of Pauline. 
 The cool, dignilied demeanor on his part, studiously calculated 
 to impress her with his profound misery and heroic attempt not 
 to hold her responsible for his suffering, was met on her side 
 by unvarying friendliness, such as might be expected from a 
 loving sister. Some hope he had entertained that Pauline 
 would relent on learning of his resolution to enlist in the service 
 of the country ; some hope, too, — when he had learned of the 
 invitation to his mother and Pauline, — that the wound he had 
 received on the field of honor would enlist Pauline's sympathy, 
 and with it, perhaps, a warmer feeling in his favor. vSuch 
 hope he now" no longer entertained. And though it surprised 
 him that he felt no keener pang of disappointment on settling 
 down to the conviction that Pauline was irretrievably lost to 
 him, yet he felt] sufficient resentment to make pleasant conver- 
 sation between him and her, for the present, at least, extremely 
 difficult. 
 
 The only person at the table that was on entirely pleasant 
 terms with every other, was the old gentleman Auf dem Busch. 
 He rallied Victor on having monopolized Miss May to an un- 
 christian extent. " Just like he was master here, or general- 
 issimo," he suggested. "You will clip him the wings, Mrs. 
 May, if he takes too soaring a flight. What say you to it, 
 Miss May ? ' ' 
 
 " I don't think Mr. Waldhorst is in a soaring mood this 
 evening," the latter replied, with a sidelong glance at Victor 
 before she looked at the old gentleman. "He seems to be 
 carrying a burden that might crush a weaker man. But 
 being an ardent rebel, I am glad that he is not generalissimo 
 of the Union army, although, as Leslie's sister, I might wish 
 him to be." 
 
 The others looked at Nellie as if they did not understand. 
 But Mr. Auf dem Busch remarked with a chuckle, " I guess 
 our Victor has been in Leslie May's sister's company and has 
 not talked with a rebel at all, this afternoon. I guess the 
 
JUDGE AND ADVOCATE. 609 
 
 sister's wish for him to be generalissimo is the burden what 
 he carries. What, Victor? " 
 
 " Nay," said Victor, with a weak attempt to smile it off as 
 a joke, " I fear that Miss May's honesty as a rebel has been 
 getting the better of Leslie May's sister in that wisli of hers. 
 Her wish to see the rebel forces victorious is perfectly natural ; 
 and she is, of course, right in supposing such an event prob- 
 bable, if I were generalissimo of the Union forces. And she 
 is right, too, in supposing that such an apprehension on my 
 part would be a heavy burden to carry." 
 
 For a wonder, Nellie seemed annoyed at Victor's sally. 
 "Sir," she retaliated, rather more warmly than was her wont 
 in conversation, " I protest that you are most unjust to your- 
 self, and ungenerous and unfair to me, in the construction you 
 put upon my Avords. We are enemies, it is true; but neither 
 of us can help that. But you will not persuade me, Mr. 
 Waldhorst, that even as an eneni}^, one may not be generous 
 and just. Then why should I not rejoice to find my enemy 
 a man of probity and sterling worth, though it pain me that 
 he is an enemy ? ' ' 
 
 " Miss May has surely right! " exclaimed the elder Auf 
 dem Busch enthusiastically. " She has hammered that nail 
 square on the head. It is a miserable shame, that we shall be 
 enemies of Colo-nell May, and of his excellent lady, and of 
 his charming daughter. But must I be blind to Miss May's 
 beauty, and a blockhead to her wisdom, and a fool to her wit, only 
 because her father is on the other side of our fence in this war, 
 or because her brother would like to shoot Yankee hypocrites ? " 
 Just then the slave Xerxes entered, bringing the mail for 
 which he had been sent to town. There was one letter each 
 for Mrs. and for Miss May. 
 
 " My letter is from Washington," said Mrs. May ; and then 
 added with an apologetic bow to the company, " You will 
 please excuse me for a few moments, until I see what the 
 senator has to say to me." 
 
 While Mrs. May left the room, Nellie opened her letter, 
 
 39 
 
610 THE REBEL'S DAUQETER. 
 
 saying, " You will pardon me, gentlemen, and you, Pauline, 
 for opening ray letter in your presence." 
 
 Victor thought that he recognized the handwriting of Ralph 
 Payton on the back of the letter, and closely watched her face 
 as she perused its contents. She turned pale, and a frown 
 settled on her features. 
 
 " I have unpleasant news," she said presently, without tak- 
 ing her eyes off the paper. " Mr. Payton informs me that 
 the Senate is about to expel a number of the Southern senators , 
 and that although father is not yet named among them, still it 
 is probable that he will share the fate of all of those who will 
 not bow before the tyrannical majority. The same treatment 
 is in store for Mr. Payton, and both he and father are debating 
 the propriety of resigning before either the Senate or House has 
 acted on their cases." 
 
 " I wonder me," said the elder Auf dem Busch, " that Mr. 
 Payton has not long ago resigned. If I understood him not 
 false, he is not honest to sit in a Congress that he is willing to 
 conquer." 
 
 " I have no doubt but that he will enter the army as soon as 
 he leaves Washington," said Nellie, dropping the hand with 
 the letter into her lap, and looking at Mr. Auf dem Busch in a 
 pensive mood. "Is it not strange, that government should 
 wantonly drive its best friends into the ranks of its enemies ? 
 For I know father well enough to be certain that he, too, will 
 offer his sword to the Confederacy, if he can no longer serve 
 the country in Congress." 
 
 " Congress has right when it throws out Mr. Payton," Mr. 
 Auf dem Busch asserted. " He can do more harm with his 
 vote, as he can do with his sword. But Senator May — ah, it 
 is a great sadness that his wise counsel shall be lost for the 
 nation. The country needs much the counsel of good and 
 wise men in these times." 
 
 Nellie was touched by Auf dem Busch's tribute to the 
 character of her father, even though she may have resented the 
 reflection on Payton 's integrity. 
 
JUDGE AND ADVOCATE. 611 
 
 Victor cast a grateful look at his uncle for the opiuiou ex- 
 pressed by him, which so completely agreed with his owu ; but 
 he contented himself by saying that it was sad to know that 
 such men as Senator May and his son Leslie must be found in 
 the ranks of the enemy. 
 
 " And yet I could wish that he were there now," said Nellie. 
 " My brother Leslie, I mean." 
 
 " And Mr. Payton? " suggested Woldemar. 
 
 " I was not thinking of him," the girl replied. " He will 
 take care of himself." 
 
 " Yes," chuckled the old gentleman, " better as Mr. Leslie. 
 Mr. Payton knows the German sa\nng, that • Far away is wise 
 in danger.' " 
 
 Nellie made no answering remark, and it was impossible for 
 Victor to tell, — though he watched her features ever so 
 sharply — whether she was offended by his uncle's remark. 
 
XXXIX. 
 
 JUSTICE AT THE DRUM-HEAD. 
 
 'HE trial of the two prisoners at Brookfield. before a verit- 
 able court-martial, had for some days been the talk of the 
 town and the country around, among civilians as well as 
 in the tents of the Federal army. The town was rife, of course, 
 with wild speculations and rumors. It had become known tliat 
 the former overseer of Senator May was to be tried for the 
 attempted kidnaping of one of his slaves ; and was vaguely 
 connected^ with the emancipation proclamation by the znajor- 
 general commanding the Department of the West, which had 
 just been promulgated ; and that Leslie May was under 
 charges for shooting a Federal otticer implicated in the kidnap- 
 ing. Busy was Bob Rountree in explaining the condition of 
 affairs to the numerous customers, in those days, at Burden's 
 bar-room ; for Leslie May was very popular, and the recruits 
 he had enlisted were impatient to take pai't in the fighting, 
 uuder his leadership. But, though so pronounced a seces- 
 sionist, he was hardly less popular in the Dutch Store, where 
 Van Braaken still presided, — neutral, he, in the quarrel between 
 the belligerent sections, remembering that he still owed alleg- 
 iance to the King of Holland, but proud of his young appren- 
 tice, that had now arisen to the dignity of a judge advocate. 
 Popular, too, was Leslie May, even at the Yankee store, 
 whose proprietor was one of the staunchest adherents to the 
 Union cause ; not to mention his popularity at the establish- 
 ment of the old pioneer, Mr. Barnes. In all these places the 
 expected trial was talked over, and if the voice of the people 
 could foreshadow the judgment of the court, there was no doubt 
 as to the fate of either of the prisoners ; for the indignation 
 (012) 
 
JUSTICE AT THE DBUM-IIEAD. 613 
 
 agaiust Jeffrej^s was at least equal to the favor in which Leslie 
 was held. 
 
 Thus, expectation stood on tip-toe ; and when at last the 
 court assembled, a crowd of eager people filled the Square 
 around the courthouse. The gathering would undoubtedly 
 have been far more numerous and turbulent but for the prox- 
 imity of the Union army, and for the imposing array of military 
 guards stationed about the Square. 
 
 The court, presided over by the commanding general by 
 virtue of his rank and by the terms of the commission from the 
 governor, was composed of officers chosen by lot. One of 
 them was Colonel Scheffel, commanding the Second Regiment 
 of the Metropolitan Volunteers, whose acting adjutant had 
 been Sergeant Obeuaus. 
 
 The trial of Jeffreys was taken up first. The facts in this 
 case were simple. The testimony of Miss May, given in dig- 
 nified, straightforward, candid answers to the questions pro- 
 pounded to her, seemed to impress the court favorably, and 
 left no doubt on the minds of all unbiased hearers that there 
 had been a conspiracy between the two sergeants to carry off 
 the octoroon girl and rob the house of its valuables. Victor 
 debated with himself whether to rest the case on Nellie's testi- 
 mony alone, or to corroborate her statement by the evidence to 
 be given by the soldiers whom Obenaus had taken with him. 
 But he soon found that he was not to be alone in the manage- 
 ment of the case. 
 
 Colonel Scheffel had noted with displeasure the evidently 
 favorable disposition of his brother officers toward the witness, 
 and determined to break the force of her testimony. So, when 
 Victor signified that he had no further questions to ask of her, 
 the colonel took her cross-examination into his own hands. 
 
 " You know we got war, ain't it? " he asked the witness, 
 with a severity of tone that effectually dispelled any notion 
 that he was, possibly, joking. 
 
 "I have rejisou to be aware of that fact, sir," Nellie 
 answered. 
 
614 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " Und you kuow, oss sclehfs be conterbaud? " 
 
 " I do not know that slaves are contraband," she answered, 
 her clear, sweet voice contrasting strongly with the harsh, 
 almost angry tone of the colonel. " The girl is my property ; 
 and I have not made war on the United States." 
 
 " You be a rejibe'll, ain't it? " 
 
 Nellie's eyes sparkled, as she replied ; but her voice did not 
 lose its musical accent, and her serene dignity did not forsake 
 her. " If I were a man," she said, " I think you would be 
 right in calling me a rebel ; for I would try to prevent the 
 wrong that is beiiig inflicted on the South by the Federal 
 government. Being a woman, I can do nothing for the South, 
 but give it my sympathy." 
 
 The frown on the colonel's face grew darker. " A repbell' 
 in a petticoat do worser mischief oss a he-repbell ! " he 
 exclaimed. " Und your brodder ish a repbell? Und your 
 fahder ish a repbell, ain't it? " 
 
 " But, sir, I am not my brother ; and my father is a United 
 States senator." 
 
 "Und a high traitor!" added the colonel, flinging the 
 words at the witness with triumphant defiance, as if with this 
 accusation he had canceled the whole of her testimony, and 
 thrown upon her the crime with which the prisoner stood 
 charged . 
 
 But the judge advocate interfered with his triumph. He 
 suggested that Miss May was not on trial, nor was Senator 
 May. 
 
 ' ' Und it ish right oss his sclehf s be confiskehted ! ' ' added 
 the colonel, not heeding Victor's words. 
 
 Victor arose and addressed himself to the presiding officer. 
 
 " I feel bound to interpose my objection, please your 
 Honors," he said, "to the course pursued by his Honor, 
 Colonel Scheffel, and wish this objection to be noted on the 
 record. I need not explain to your Honors the impropriety of 
 the court's bandying arguments with a witness,' not to mention 
 the display of bias in favor of the accused," 
 
JUSTICE AT THE DRUM-HEAD. 615 
 
 The general presidiug promptly sustained the objection, and 
 ruled Colonel Scheffel's questions to be out of order. 
 
 The decision had been rendered so promptly, as to cut off 
 any debate on the objection. This aroused the fierce wrath of 
 the colonel ; but the energetic use of the president's gavel 
 effectually prevented him from giving expression to his opinion 
 on the subject. So he had to content himself with the eloquent 
 protest that lay in the black scowl with which he regarded the 
 insolent young judge advocate. 
 
 The latter cast a swift glance in the direction of Miss May, 
 to note the effect upon her of the ruling of the court. It net- 
 tled him, somewhat, to see upon her face the expression of 
 vexation, rather than of relief. Perhaps she deemed herself 
 fully able to cope with her unfriendly interrogator, and re- 
 sented Victor's interference in her behalf. But Leslie, who 
 had watched the proceedings with breathless interest, was 
 fully in accord with the course pursued. He felt greatly re- 
 lieved, therefore, by the prompt ruling of General Seele ; but 
 he also knew, as well as Victor, that the real danger was still 
 to be met. 
 
 Jeffreys had listened with unbounded satisfaction to the 
 questioning of Colonel Scheffel. A grin of malicious triumph 
 had settled on his face, and he feasted his eyes in turn on the 
 anxiety depicted in the features of Leslie and Victor. But the 
 grin changed to a scowl of hatred as the president of the court 
 ruled on Victor's objection. When asked whether he had any 
 witnesses that he wished to have examined, he asserted, with 
 an insolent swagger, that he was a " truly I'y'll " man ; that 
 Colonel May was well known to be a rebel and a traitor ; and — 
 taking his cue from the remarks that he had heard Colonel 
 Scheffel make — he was about to justify the " confiscation " of 
 Colonel May's slaves, when he was interrupted by Colonel 
 Scheffel, who called for the reading of the proclamation of the 
 major-general in command of the Federal forces of the Depart- 
 ment of the West emancipating the slaves of such rebels as 
 had taken up arms against the Union, 
 
616 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 This was what Victor feared as the most dangerous element 
 in the case against Leslie. He determined to meet the ques- 
 tion in the outset and rose to object. He put forward every 
 argument he could think of to induce the court to rule out all 
 evidence touching the proclamation, suggesting that the Presi- 
 dent had promptly disavowed and retracted the proclamation 
 the moment it had come to his knowledge. To which the zeal- 
 ous colonel replied vehemently, that the President's foolish 
 retraction of his general's wise order could not affect the valid- 
 ity of an act done before such retraction. 
 
 Colonel Scheffel was deaf to all considerations militating 
 against the prisoner's innocence and insisted vehemently on 
 the reading of the proclamation, while Mctor, in his anxiety 
 for the life of Leslie May, cared little for the outcome of the 
 trial of Jeffreys, save as it might affect the case of the other 
 prisoner. He therefore jjurposely abstained from emphasizing 
 any of his arguments, contenting himself with the dry state- 
 ment of the point which it might seem his duty as judge advo- 
 cate to urge, and offered no further resistance to the reading 
 of the proclamation. 
 
 After it had been read, Colonel Scheffel could not forbear 
 the remark, uttered triumphantly, that a soldier, who obeyed 
 the orders of a superior officer, ought_]to be commended, and 
 not punished. 
 
 The acquittal of Jeffreys surprised neither Victor nor Les- 
 lie ; but it did surprise both that the court had spent nearly 
 an hour in deliberating, with closed doors, over their 
 judgment. 
 
 '' So ish it right! "said Colonel Scheffel, when the judgment 
 had been announced. " Und now will we see, w'y de young 
 repbeir shot mine adshutant." He was eager to proceed on 
 the spot: l)ut the court voted an adjournment until after the 
 dinner hour. 
 
 To Nellie May and her mother the iiupunity of the criminal 
 Jeffreys appeared, more impressively^, j^erhaps, than to the in- 
 habitants generally, in the light of an unparalleled outrage. 
 
JUSTICE AT THE DltUM-IIEAD. 617 
 
 It was inconceivable to Miss May, how the blackest crime 
 known to a Southern consciousness, — a crime for the com- 
 mission of which the legislature had enacted the death penalty — 
 should be condoned by a tribunal calling itself a court. For 
 the first time she saw herself confronted with the terrible 
 reality of civil war. She had not reckoned, hitherto, with the 
 dark side of the dreams of glory Avhich her enthusiasm in- 
 dulged in, as involving the peril of life and limb to the gallant 
 defenders of the South, as well as woe and tears of anguish to 
 their mothers and sisters. Deep down in her heart a glimpse 
 of the possibility that she might be called on to yield up, 
 on the altar of her country, her idolized brother, or even her 
 adored father, would sometimes insist on being recognized, to 
 be bravely fought off by resolute cheer. But this thing shook 
 her very faith in human nature. That a court, armed with 
 the power over life and death of fellow-men, — organized to ad- 
 minister justice ! — should prostitute itself and its high trust 
 by making common cause with evil-doers, rewarding hypocrit- 
 ical protestations of loyalty with immunity from punishment 
 for cowardly crime ! This, — so it seemed to her — was put- 
 ting a premium upon hypocrisy, and inviting atrocious crime 
 to hold high revel in the land. The deptli of iniquity thus 
 revealed staggered and dumfounded her. 
 
 But the shock to her moral instincts soon gave way to fierce 
 indignation. Her wrath still grew with the contemplation of 
 her utter heljjlessness against the brutal power of the soldiery, 
 and the wish burned into her heart, that the Southern army 
 might appear and avenge this outrage, crush the tyrannical 
 court into nothingness. The barbarous brogue in which Colo- 
 nel Scheffel had hurled at her his offensive epithets, intensified 
 her vindictive resentment, so that, for once, she gave way to the 
 popular prejudice of Southerners against Germans, on account 
 of their almost universal loyalty to the Union cause, hating 
 Colonel Scheffel for a " cowardly Dutch infidel " even more 
 cordially than she hated the cold-blooded Yankee abolitionists. 
 
 The young judge advocate was no less deeply excited. His 
 
618 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 anxiety was for Leslie. He knew — none better than lie, save 
 Leslie himself — that the young man's life hung trembling in 
 the balance, and that a hair's weight might incline the scales 
 for life or death. He felt deeply the responsibility resting 
 upon him as the advisor of the court — a responsibility all the 
 heavier because he was conscious of his bias in favor of the 
 prisoner, as well as of that of the majority of the court against 
 him. To stand between Leslie May and an unjust sentence, — 
 to shield the family of his early benefactor from sorrow and 
 deep humiliation, — to place Nellie May under obligations of 
 gratitude for the life of her idolized brother, — these were 
 motives powerful, irresistible. But while not ashamed of 
 them, he felt them to be personal and selfish. A higher, more 
 exalted consideration was suj)eradded : He must prove loyal 
 to his country's cause. So unjust an act as the punishment of 
 Leslie May would be looked on by fair-minded men of all par- 
 ties, would prove a heavier blow to the Union cause, than the 
 loss of a great battle. The army that was battling for the 
 rights of humanity must be protected against the obloquy and 
 shame of so odious an act. And so Victor was nerving him- 
 self for the encounter with Colonel Scheffel ; for he felt that 
 nothing could save Leslie May from conviction and death 
 sentence by that court-mai'tial , unless Colonel Scheffel's 
 influence over it could be broken. 
 
 . It was in this frame of mind that Victor, after the adjourn- 
 ment, approached Miss May and her mother, having promised 
 to procure for them permission for an interview with the pris- 
 oner. The ladies received him in sullen silence, — Mrs. May 
 with icy politeness, her daughter with eyes flashing angrily. 
 Victor, whose heart Avas heavy with his own trouble, failed to 
 take warning by their hostile demonstration, addressing them 
 with his usual deference. But Nellie, smarting under the sense 
 of wrong and personal insult at the haiids of that tyrannical 
 Dutch court, identified Victor with his brother officers, and he 
 was the only one upon whom she could vent her wrath. She 
 accosted him with a look of superb scoi-n. 
 
JUSTICE AT THE DRUM-HEAD. 619 
 
 " Sir," said she, " I suppose you expect to be congratulated 
 on the victory you have gained." 
 
 " I fail to understand," he answered, regarding her with 
 questioning eyes. "Victory? Congratulated?" 
 
 ' ' Are you not proud of what you have done ? ' ' she contin- 
 ued, sneeriugly. " You and the rest of yo\w outlandish court 
 of Dutch rutfians? Oh, it was so brave in you all to insult 
 women, who have no one to defend them! " 
 
 "Brave? Proud?" Victor asked, his astonishment in- 
 creasing. " What do you mean? " 
 
 " Pardon me. Bravery is an American, — at least a South- 
 ern quality. Perhaps you do not understand." 
 
 Victor colored violently. 
 
 " Let me, then, congratulate you on your success in vindi- 
 cating negro-thieves. Do you understand that? " 
 
 " Madam," said Victor, drawing himself up to his full 
 height, regarding her with a look of commanding superiority, 
 and addressing her in a stern voice, such as she had never 
 heard from him before, " I understand nothing, except that 
 you wish to wound and insult me. But I am not in the mood 
 to pose as your toy, nor to submit to your splenetic abuse, or 
 to humor you in this silly outburst of a childish fit of passion." 
 
 "Sir!" exclaimed Nellie, amazed at Victor's earnestness. 
 
 " To hold me responsible for the act of the court is not only 
 cruelly unjust, but ridiculously silly." 
 
 " Mr. Waldhorst, I — " 
 
 But Victor paid no heed to her. "I will not forget 
 that you have been wronged," he continued more gently, but 
 with unabated firmness and dignity. " In the intensity of 
 your anger you have permitted yourself to be caiTied beyond 
 the control of your judgment. You may, when your mad pas- 
 sion has cooled, be thankful to remember what I now say to 
 you — that your unjust words have not so deeply wounded me, 
 but that I can distinguish between them and your usual high- 
 minded, lady-like self. I shall not hold you responsible for 
 them, further than to suggest that if you really believed me the 
 
620 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 coward you represent me, you might feel that your taunts 
 would but poorly serve the cause of your brother, who is now 
 to be tried for his life." 
 
 Nellie's anger had rapidly abated on hearing Victor's indig- 
 nant reproof. Once more, this man had shown her, that his 
 will was stronger than his passion. No man had ever dared to 
 openly rebuke and humiliate her before ; this man had chided 
 her Hke a naughty child, yet her feeling was rather one of 
 wonder and awe, than resentment. But when Victor had 
 reminded her of the peril of her brother, the words smote 
 heavily on her ear. As she realized their awful significance, 
 the revulsion of her emotion was terrible. She knew as well 
 as did Victor, that Leslie's trial before that court meant con- 
 viction and — death! Death — to her brother Leslie. Not 
 the glorious death he had reckoned with, on the field of glory, 
 battling for his country's right, but the death of a convicted 
 f elou ! 
 
 " I have promised to conduct you and your mother to his 
 room," Victor continued, not noticing her agitation ; "there 
 is no time to spare. He doubtlessly expects your coming. 
 The sympathy of a mother and loving sister will not fail to 
 cheer him and add to the fortitude with which he is facing his 
 fate." 
 
 Her brother was waiting for her — waiting for the 
 cheering words of a loving sister ! And he had reminded 
 her of a sister's duty, — he whom she had studiously 
 reviled and wounded to the quick! The contrition under 
 which she writhed, and that had so suddenly followed on her 
 towering passion, produced a shock that tried her nerves. It 
 required all her energy for the effort to keep her feet ; for a 
 second or two the power of speech forsook her. But by exert- 
 ing all her strength, she recovered herself sufficiently to say to 
 Victor, though with trembling lips : 
 
 " You will despise me, Mr. Waldhorst, as I deserve that 
 you should. But you will not forsake vaj brother whom you 
 love?" 
 
JUSTICE AT THE DRUM- HE AT). 021 
 
 " Madam," he luiswered, "you know well, that 1 shall do 
 my duty, to your brother, — aud to my country." 
 
 "You are right!" she mused. "Yes, I know that you 
 will do your duty. But oh, God, is it your duty to condemn 
 my brother ? ' ' 
 
 "It is not I that will condemn or acquit," said Victor. 
 " And I have already informed you, that I do not believe your 
 brother guiltj^ of any wrong." 
 
 A look of gratitude, of bright .hope, withal, aud of trusting 
 confidence,' suddenly transfigured Nellie's face, as she begged 
 Victor in a voice so gentle and humble that he mistrusted his 
 senses, to bring them to him. 
 
 Victor silently complied. Though his heart beat tumultuously, 
 he hushed its jubilant promptings with unrelenting sternness. 
 ' ' How dearly she loves her brother ! " he mused ; and he 
 remembered that he had no place in the heart of the haughty 
 woman, who now walked so meekly by his side. Nothing 
 more was said between them until he brought the ladies into 
 the presence of Leslie. 
 
 But he never forgot the glorious beauty of her face, when 
 she had electrified him with a look of radiant hope, and thank- 
 fulness, and trusting faith, on repeating to her his belief in her 
 brother's innocence. 
 
 There was some delay in the reassembling of the court after 
 the dinner hour. Victor was engaged in an earnest conversation 
 with the prisoner, which Colonel Scheffel, who was promptly 
 in his seat at the hour to which the court had adjourned, 
 noted with undisguised displeasure. The opening remarks of 
 the judge advocate, when the case against Leslie May had been 
 called, did not serve to sweeten the colonel's ruffled temper. 
 He informed the astonished oflicers, that the prisoner demurred 
 to the jurisdiction of the court, as a court-martial, observing 
 that he, the judge advocate, concurred in the defendant's view 
 that it was at least doubtful whether a military court had 
 power to try a civilian, or non-combatant, on a charge of 
 felony, while access was open to civil courts, to whom the ju- 
 
622 THE BEBEUS DAUOHTEB. 
 
 risdiction clearly belonged. After a brief discussion carried on 
 mainly by Colonel Scheffel, and in which Victor participated 
 no further than to quietly state his points and answer such 
 questions as he was asked by different members of the court, 
 the demurrer was overruled. 
 
 Colonel Scheffel, after the announcement of the ruling, 
 called for the reading of the charges and specifications with 
 evident impatience, concluding his remarks with the expression 
 of his hope, that " we don't will haf no more foolishness." 
 
 But if objection to the power of the court over the prisoner 
 was the foolishness of which Colonel Scheffel wanted no more, 
 he was disappointed ; for the judge advocate next read the 
 prisoner's plea to the jurisdiction of this particular court, 
 alleging that by the trial of Jeffreys, involving many facts 
 bearing on the case of Leslie May, they had disqualified them- 
 selves from granting the prisoner that fair and impartial trial 
 to which he was entitled under the constitution, and according 
 to fundamental principles of justice. Victor volunteered no 
 opinion himself ; and on being questioned directly, stated that 
 he believed the plea, in the shape in which the prisoner had 
 presented it, to be groundless. Whereupon the court made 
 short work of overruling the plea, to the obvious gratification 
 of Colonel Scheffel, who now again demanded the reading of 
 the charges. 
 
 But the colonel's patience was put to the strain once more. 
 The judge advocate was not through with the presentation 
 of the prisoner's objections to the competency of the court. 
 He now announced his intention to challenge one of its 
 individual members. 
 
 This was too much for the colonel. " Mishter Bresident! " 
 he shouted in great wrath, " der shutsh adfocaht shall be put 
 in arresht fur foolen' mit der kohi-t. Der kohrt be here fur 
 bissness, und der shutsh adfocaht be here fur foolen'. Shet 
 him up in arresht, odder he pull der kokrt on der nose." 
 
 ' ' Colonel Scheffel will come to order ! ' ' the president pro- 
 claimed. " Captain Waldhorst is an officer of the court, and 
 
JUSTICE AT THE DBUM-IIEAD. G23 
 
 must be respected as such." He gave emphasis to his ruling 
 with a vigorous rap of his gavel. 
 
 But the colonel was too angry to heed the president's call to 
 order. " Who ish dis Capt'n Milkbeardt," he thundered 
 forth, " Wot got no hair on his teefs, and comes here, in ke- 
 hoot mit a repbell' murdtrer fur foolen' mit I'y'l shutshes — " 
 
 • ' Colonel Scheff el will take his seat ! ' ' the president again 
 shouted, using his gavel vigorously. 
 
 The colonel, though with ill grace, obeyed ; and Victor pro- 
 ceeded to state the grounds upon which the prisoner denied 
 the competency of Colonel Scheff el as one of the judges. 
 "Besides," he concluded his statement, "the prisoner in- 
 forms me that Colonel Scheff el will be needed as one of the 
 witnesses." 
 
 Whether the grounds for the challenge mentioned b}' Victor 
 had staggered, or the prisoner's unheard-of audacity in ques- 
 tioning his, Scheffel's, fitness as a judge, had dumfounded him 
 so that he forgot to answer, the colonel himself w'as not per- 
 haps quite sure. For it is proper to say, that although his 
 hatred of rebels was as deep as his contempt for lawyers, yet 
 he was not impervious to considerations of justice presenting 
 themselves in the garb of common sense. At any rate he said 
 nothing in refutation of the challenge, but contented himself 
 by calling " fur a wote, Mishter Bresident ! " in which he had 
 the grace not to participate. 
 
 It was an unfortunate circumstance for the success of the 
 challenge that the rule demanded the vote to be taken viva 
 voce, and according to the seniority of the officers, the young- 
 est voting first. For these, — whether moved by their es;»v'^ 
 de corps^ or in deference to their senior in command — voted 
 in favor of the prominent military magnate, until a majority 
 had been recorded against his disqualification — the votes of 
 the older generals, including General Seele, whose name was 
 called last, coming too late to change the result. General 
 Seele announced with evident reluctance, that the challenge 
 was overruled. 
 
624 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Victor had couuted on this result. But although he was 
 profoundly impressed with the peril menacing Leslie May he 
 did not fully share the generally expressed opinion, produced 
 by the hostile attitude assumed by the court toward the pris- 
 oner, that his conviction was a foregone conclusion. Even 
 Mrs. May, whose proud consciousness of superiority, as a 
 descendant of one of the first families of Virginia, as well as 
 the wife of a United States senator, had hitherto befogged her 
 judgment, so as to hide from her vision her son's danger, 
 began to realize that he was in a critical position. The tenac- 
 ity with which she clung to a fond mother's hope was giving 
 way to the agony of fear. 
 
 Nellie's distress, though borne with brave firmness, was none 
 the less poignant. She had hitherto placed unreasoning con- 
 fidence in Victor's ability to save her brother. Even while 
 flinging at him those stinging taunts, she had not for a moment 
 doubted his unwavering loyalty to the May family. But now 
 it occurred to her that his efforts to rescue Leslie from the 
 grip of that ruthless court-martial had been lukewarm and 
 perfunctory, and a sickening dread crept into her heart that 
 Victor, too, might believe her brother guilty, in spite of his 
 assurance to the contrary. Then she realized, more fully than 
 ever, to what extent her confidence in Leslie's acquittal had 
 rested on her faith in Victor's friendship ; and with heart- 
 crushing weight the thought came to her of that day at th? 
 Capitol, when, the perspiration of agony pearling his forehead, 
 he yet with unbending firmness sacrificed to duty his hope of 
 earthly bliss. She felt now, with contrition and shame, how 
 superficial and unthinking had been her remark to Pauline, 
 that she knew well that he would do his duty ! 
 
 She looked at Leslie. He bore up bravely, and she could 
 not repress, e^en in her agony of suspense, a thrill of sisterly 
 pride on beholding his undaunted courage. 
 
 Unconsciously, almost, her eyes turned again to Victor. 
 He, too, looked brave, as he confronted the frowning officers 
 of the court. How proud he stood there, his mouth com- 
 
JUSTICE AT THE DRUM-HEAD. 625 
 
 pressed with stem determiuation, his eyes ablaze, his very 
 stature, toweriug, as if upborne by the strength of indomitable 
 purpose ! Nellie Avondered. Never had she seen hiui so 
 moved, save that once, when he afforded her a glimpse of the 
 intensity of his passion, and had compelled her admiration of 
 the might by which he mastered it at the call of honor. And 
 her wonder changed to horror at the thought, that Victor was 
 nerving himself for the performance of a duty even more awful 
 to him than that of voting against her father had been, — the 
 duty, if so he deemed it, of prosecuting her brother to the 
 death ! For she knew that he would do it ; do it with anguished 
 heart, indeed, suffering in the doing more keenly than the 
 prisoner himself, but do it — if he deemed it his duty, — if he 
 thought Leslie guilty. 
 
 Oh, how could he ! 
 
 The young judge advocate was indeed deeply stirred. He 
 loas nerving himself for the discharge of a solemn duty. A 
 duty imposed by his sense of gratitude and of obligation to 
 the friends of his youthful days, — by his strong sense of 
 justice, — and above all, by his i^atriotic love for the cause 
 of his country. To shield the Federal army from the disgrace 
 and odium that would surely follow the sacrifice of Leslie May 
 to the vindictive animosity of this court-martial he had 
 determined, if need be, to sacrifice himself. For he was well 
 aware that by the course he had resolved on he would incur the 
 hatred of a number of the officers of the court, and the deadly 
 enmity of Colonel Scheffel. 
 
 The trial began. After the reading of the charges and speci- 
 fications, for which Colonel Scheffel had so long clamored, the 
 witnesses were examined ; first of all Jeffreys, Neither Leslie 
 nor Victor were surprised by the perverted account he gave of 
 the affair in which Sergeant Obenaus had found his death. 
 Of the actual facts he stated just enough to serve as a frame- 
 work on which to hang the web of malicious falsehoods he wove 
 for the gratification of his spite. Aided by the suggestions 
 conveyed through the leading questions put to him by the 
 
 40 
 
626 THE BEBEU8 DAUGHTER. 
 
 colonel here and there, he made out a strong ease of willful 
 murder against the prisoner. His mother and sister stood 
 appalled. Though Nellie, for her part, was not surprised by 
 the outrageous lies of Jeffreys, — for she had never looked 
 upon him in any other light than that of a brutal slave-driver 
 devoid of principle or honor. But that the Avitness should be 
 permitted to pursue other members of the May family with his 
 scurrilous aspersions, — that he should be encouraged to tra- 
 duce her absent father, and to besj^atter with the venom of his 
 ribald tongue the prisoner's mother and sister, against whom 
 no charges had been pref ered — this was an outrage on com- 
 mon decency for which not even the experiences of the morn- 
 ing had prepared her. And so, when in answer to one of the 
 colonel's suggestive questions, he repeated a foul defamation 
 against her mother and herself, it exasperated her beyond quiet 
 endurance. She rose from her seat with glowing cheek and 
 blazing eyes. 
 
 " Gentlemen — " she said, and paused for a second, as if in 
 doubt. "You Avi 11 pardon me if I use a wrong term in ad- 
 dressing you. But you seem to forget, that you have placed 
 neither my mother nor myself under charges." 
 
 Leslie was startled by his sister's unexpected outburst. As 
 to Victor, though her honest indignation exactly suited the 
 plan he had outlined to himself in conducting the trial, yet he 
 saw in her flashing eyes the same reckless spirit she had dis- 
 played toward him an hour or two before, and feared lest she 
 might destroy the sympathy in the breast of some of the officers 
 upon which he so largely counted to attain his end. 
 
 He turned sharply upon her. " Madam," he whispered into 
 her ear, in stern rebuke, " please remember we are not posing 
 in your drawing-room. Those men are to cast the lot of your 
 brother for life or death. Do you mean to destroy his one 
 chance for liberty, by giving way to a babyish flt of temper? " 
 
 Once more Victor's allusion to her brother blenched the 
 cheeks that had burned with flerce indignation. Nellie sat 
 down leaving unsaid what she had commom^ed to say. 
 
JUSTICE AT THE DRUM-HEAD. 627 
 
 But Colonel Scheffel. scenting some new indignity to the 
 majesty of the court, inciuired gruffly: " Wat means de she- 
 repbeir ? ' ' 
 
 Victor, turning toward the speaker, encountered the eyes of 
 several of the officers of the court, and noted in them an ex- 
 pression of disapproval. He lost no time in utilizing what he 
 deemed a favorable mood for his pui'pose. " She means," he 
 said, speaking slowly and with emphasis, and fixing his eyes 
 on Colonel Scheffel, " that it is an outrage on justice and de- 
 cency for a court not only to permit, but to invite a scurrilous 
 scoundrel to revile defenseless women, because they are of kin 
 to the accused." 
 
 '' You mean," retorted the colonel sharply, and with a black 
 frown, " yoti mean so yourself? " 
 
 ' ' Your honor is right, ' ' Victor answered deliberately ; ' ' that 
 is most certainly my meaning. But I only answered your 
 honor's question as to the young lady's meaning. It excited 
 her wonder — she herself may mistake the feeling for righteous 
 indignation — that a court should delight in listening to the 
 venomous gossip of a malicious slanderer, even if they did not 
 know, or find sufficient proof in the eager pruriency with which 
 he details his foul-tongued calumnies, that he lied out of whole 
 cloth." 
 
 Victor anxiously scrutinized the faces of the judges, to note 
 what effect this thrust at the colonel produced. He thought 
 that he detected signs of acquiescence on the faces of some of 
 the younger members, and the rage depicted in the colonel's 
 face taught him, that he had fully accomplished his purpose in 
 that direction. 
 
 The cross-examination of Jeffreys was conducted by Leslie 
 in person. The situation which Jeffreys had boasted of, had 
 come about : Leslie May stood arraigned before a court-mar- 
 tial of " loyal " officers, charged with the murder of a " loyal " 
 soldier, and he, Jeffreys, was a witness against him, and there 
 was no hired lawyer to bother the witnesses and fool the 
 jai'y. But he soon found, that Leslie May was not more 
 
628 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 easily dealt with in his character as a defendant, than he had 
 found him when he had acted in the defense of another. 
 Under his shrewd questioning the contradictious in his testi- 
 mony were made conspicuous. His deep-seated hatred of all 
 the May family appeared in a strong light. He was driven to 
 narrate his former experiences, his threats of revenge against 
 Colonel May, his daughter, and even against the slave girl her- 
 self. To the iuiluite chagrin of Colonel Scheffel, the malig- 
 nant witness was trapped, cajoled, and frightened into so 
 many significant, though involuntary statements conceruing the 
 presence of the two sergeants at May Meadows, that no one 
 could for a moment doubt the nefarious scheme they had 
 concocted for the robbery of Senator May's house. 
 
 The testimony of Miss May and that of two or three of the 
 soldiers that had accompanied Sergeant Obenaus concUided the 
 trial, so far as the taking of evidence was concerned. 
 
 Victor now arose, pale with the responsibility resting upon 
 him, and addressed the court. 
 
 " May it please your Honors," he said, " I beg of you to 
 pardon the presumption which impels me to a step that may 
 appear to you as a breach of olHcial etiquette and decorum. 
 The rules of the service require, that any argument as to the 
 guilt or the innocence of the accused must be made iu writing. 
 The prisoner, I have no doubt, will do so on his part, and I 
 shall give you my views, why the prisoner ought to be acquitted, 
 in writing also. But preliminary thereto I wish to explain to 
 you my views of the duties incumbent upon me as the law 
 oflficer of this tribunal. And I crave your patient hearing 
 for what I may say to you, as an officer of this court, — 
 as a soldier, loyal to the fiag aud to the sacred cause to which 
 you have all sworn allegiance, — but above all, as a man, 
 demanding justice for a fellow man. I do so iu the sincere 
 hope that I may thereby assist you in deliberating on the 
 judgment which you are so soon to render. 
 
 " My position imposes upon me a twofold duty. Mark 
 the title — Jiidf/e — Adroeate. As judge, which term implies 
 
JUSTICE AT THE DRUM-HEAD. 629 
 
 merely, that I am the legal advisers of your Honors, it be- 
 hooves me to declare the law applicable to the case before 
 you. I conceive it to be my solemn duty, in this capacity, to 
 act with the most scrupulous impartiality, with an eye single 
 to the accomplishment of justice as embodied in the law, 
 advising you without fear, favor or affection. I trust, that to 
 the extent of my poor ability, I have done so, and shall con- 
 tinue to do so in discharging the duties yet remaining to be 
 performed. 
 
 " But as the advocate I am to represent the interests of the 
 prisoner, — alwaj's under the law, keeping in view the para- 
 mount duty to accomplish justice, as defined by the law. It 
 is not my duty, as I understand it, to press the prisoner's 
 guilt ujjon your minds, unless I believe him to be guilt}^ My 
 office is not to demand conviction, but to see that justice be 
 done. I am not the prisoner's advocate against the court, 
 nor yet the advocate of the court against the prisoner ; but 
 emphatically the representative of the State between them 
 both." 
 
 Victor was deeply in earnest. His purpose was not so 
 much to persuade the judges, as to convince himself, that his 
 championship of Leslie May had a legal, as he knew it to have 
 a moral, sanction. For he was perfectly sure of this one 
 thing, — that in securing the acquittal of the prisoner, he 
 would sei've his country's cause, even while serving his friend. 
 
 ' ' And now let me remind you of the high and sacred char- 
 acter of the function you are called on to perform. Do you 
 assist me — I implore you! — in the discharging of my duty, 
 by dismissing from your minds all side-considerations, all 
 passion, all prejudice. Concentrate your energies to rightly 
 answer this one question : What does justice demand of 30U r 
 Remember, that the wish to redress a fancied wi'ong may 
 itself become a grievous wrong, if indulged at the cost of 
 impartiality. Remember, that even patriotism affords no 
 excuse for injustice ; that it is not the function of the court to 
 avenge, but to judge. Remember, that in illegally convicting 
 
630 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 the prisoner you would none the less perjure yourselves, 
 degrade yourselves as soldiers and gentlemen, and prostitute 
 your sacred otlice as judges, though your motive were to van- 
 quish an enemy, or to punish a rebel." 
 
 Victor had addressed the last few remarks singly to Colonel 
 Scheffel. So pointed was his manner in doing so, that a num- 
 ber of his fellow-oflflcers turned their eyes in his direction. 
 Perceiving this, the colonel colored violently. 
 
 " Mean you me?" he inquired, wrathfully. " W'y mean 
 you me? " 
 
 " Because," said Victor, deliberately, " I believe you to be 
 the only officer on that bench who needed to be told." 
 
 " Wat? You young puppy! Wen der kohrt isli out, den 
 I shpauk you mit mine flat sahbel ! " 
 
 The colonel's face was blue with rage when he roared out his 
 threat. If it had been Victor's purpose to rouse him into 
 fiercest auger, he had fully accomplished it. But he himself 
 turned as white as his wristband, as he retorted: 
 
 " If you mean tight. Colonel, I shall not accommodate you. 
 For if your arm be no truer than your judgment, it would be 
 murder in me to accept your challenge." 
 
 The president rapped vigorously for order. " Gentlemen," 
 he said, "I regret that justice to the prisoner demands that 
 this trial shall be brought to a close before you can be dealt 
 with as your highly indecorous conduct deserves. I now 
 •adjourn court until — shall it be to-morrow morning? Mr. 
 May, and Mr. Waldhofst, will you have sufficient time to pre- 
 pare your flTitten arguments by to-morrow ? ' ' 
 
 And it was so determined. 
 
 ^•^^ 
 
XL. 
 
 A WOOER'S WILE, 
 
 HERE was rejoicing at May Meadows. Colonel May, 
 having resigned his seat in the United States Senate, 
 had returned home in time to participate in the jubila- 
 tion over the acquittal of his sou Leslie. Great was Nellie's 
 joy in welcoming home her father. Never had his daughter's 
 greeting been so tender, — never her smile so radiant, as when 
 he pressed her to his heart on his return from Washington. 
 
 Mrs. May, too, was abundantly happy. Not only because 
 she had her husband home once more, nor because her son 
 had, so to speak, been snatched from the jaws of death ; there 
 was other cause for exultation in the glorious news her husband 
 brought from Richmond : he had been offered a seat in the 
 cabinet of President Davis. This was cause for rejoicing in- 
 deed ! She had found it hard to forgive him for refusing to 
 take her with him to Washington, as a senator's wife. Now 
 she would be compensated. To shine a star of the first mag- 
 nitude in that glorious galaxy of Southern women that would 
 be assembled at Richmond almost filled the measure of her 
 ambition. To be looked up to as the leader of the most select 
 circles of society in her native State, at the capitol of the new 
 republic, whose splendor would eclipse the waning light of 
 sleepy old Washington, was a dazzling prospect to con- 
 template. 
 
 Leslie May's spirits, rebounding from the depression of the 
 last few days, had risen high. He too, like his mother, felt 
 elated by the prospect of seeing his father a cabinet minister 
 of the new government. But the exuberance of his joy was 
 less demonstrative than it would have been before his late ex- 
 periences. Neither he, nor his sister Nellie, were so enthusi- 
 
 (631) 
 
632 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 astic over the distinction as Mrs. May. There was a tinge of 
 sober thoughtfulness in both of the children which, thongh 
 nnusual in them, accorded too nearly with his own mood to 
 challenge their father's notice. 
 
 The liberation of Leslie May gave, self-evidently, great sat- 
 isfaction to all the Auf dem Busches, — not excepting Wolde- 
 mar, who had come to look upon the persecution of his enemy 
 as unwarrantable tyranny, unworthy of the cause for which he 
 had joined the army. To the old gentleman it gave great 
 pleasure, too, to shake hands with Colonel May, express to 
 him his heartfelt thanks for his generous hospitality, and con- 
 gratulate him on the vindication of his son. 
 
 But what of Pauline? Though not so demonstrative, her 
 joy shone brightly forth from every lineament of her radiant 
 face. She had impulsively hugged Nellie to her heart and 
 kissed her fervently when news of Leslie's acquittal came to 
 them. " Oh, Nellie! " she had exclaimed, " I am so happy! 
 Because," she quickly added, with a scarlet face, "I am sure, 
 that Victor did his best to help him ! ' ' 
 
 Nellie responded to the kiss and embrace with warmth ; but 
 even in the exuberance of her joy Pauline noticed that at the 
 mention of Victor's name her friend's face sobered. A shadow 
 passed over it, as of a summer cloud mellowing the brightness 
 of a sunny landscape. " Yes," she said, " he did." And as 
 she spoke, she took her eyes off Pauline's face, gazing beyond 
 her into vacuity. "No one but he could have saved my 
 bi'other from ignominious death." 
 
 " How happy it will make him to think, that he has been 
 able to repay, to some slight extent, the great debt of grati- 
 tude he owes you all ! " 
 
 " Only the debt happens to be the other wa}^ if your brother 
 but knew it," said Nellie, still with the absent look in her eyes. 
 " But he is not one to keep tally of generous deeds, if they 
 swell the credit side of his account." 
 
 Pauline's heart beat tumultuously, just then, for Leslie May 
 entered the room. Though she had looked forward to this 
 
A WOOER'S WILE. 633 
 
 meeting iii feverish expectation, now tliat tiiey Iiad met, her 
 maidenly instincts put her on her guard, and she seemed the 
 more self-possessed of the two. 
 
 Leslie May, of course, was profuse in his protestations of 
 delight to see Miss Waldhorst in his home. But Pauline 
 missed the spontaneous expression of his pleasure, — the in- 
 voluntary kindling of his eye which, on former occasions, had 
 spoken more eloquently to her heart than his choicest com- 
 pliments, or his most delicately Mattering speeches. He 
 pressed her hand, but withdrew his own more readil}' — at 
 least less reluctantly — than had been his wont when accosting 
 her. Pauline yearned to congratulate him on his honorable 
 discharge; but his manner, — decidedly more deferential and 
 respectful towal'd her than she had ever known him — chilled 
 her enthusiasm, and her words came with a hesitancy that de- 
 prived them of the candor and spontaneity otherwise natural to 
 her. 
 
 Nellie was quick to note that something was amiss, and 
 meant to come to Pauline's aid by taking part in the conversa- 
 tion. 
 
 " I have just been telling Miss Waldhorst, Leslie, how 
 deeply we are indebted to her brother for the favorable issue 
 of this terrible trial. Never shall I forget the fearful suspense 
 we were under during the last hours of the examination, nor 
 the reassuring confidence inspired in our hearts by Mr. Wald- 
 horst's powerful support of Leslie's cause." 
 
 " You are right, Nellie," said Leslie, speaking with unusual 
 warmth. " If any other Federal officer had conducted the 
 trial as judge advocate, or if Mr. Waldhorst had not, at his 
 own personal peril, dared to show up the iniquity and despotic 
 t;yi'anny of this Colonel Scheffel, the court would have made 
 short work of ordering me to be shot. I fear that he has 
 incurred the deadly enmity of that officer. 
 
 " 1 am glad," said Pauline, " that his duties will demand 
 his presence at the capital, so that he will not, probably, meet 
 with Colonel Scheffel very soon." 
 
634 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " Ah? " queried Nellie, her swift look iuto Fauliue's face 
 betraying an eagerness not indicated by the tone of her voice. 
 "Is he called away from here ? ' ' 
 
 "I do not know whether he has received any special order," 
 Pauline answered. "But Governor Rauhenfels commissioned 
 him, so he informed me, to attend the trials here as judge 
 advocate ; and of course, now that the trials are over, there is 
 nothing to detain him longer. Unless," she added, " he will 
 wait to escort us back home. For it was also part of his duty 
 to protect Aunt Auf dem Busch and myself on our way here 
 from the city." 
 
 " I am glad to know that your brother will not have Colonel 
 Scheffel as an immediate superior officer," said Leslie. " He 
 might make the service a burden to Victor, even if he did not 
 jeopard his life. I am glad, too, to know that you will be under 
 your brother's protection on your way to the city. And so you 
 intend to leave us so soon ? ' ' 
 
 " It will depend on brother Victor," Pauline answered. 
 " Since our patients are now strong enough, in the opinion of 
 the doctors, to travel, there can be no reason to further tax 
 your generous hospitality. I expect notice from Victor, now 
 at any moment, to get ready for the homeward journey." 
 
 Ralph Payton had likewise returned from Washington, He 
 had made of necessity a virtue, and resigned his seat in Lin- 
 coln's Congress to avoid expulsion. Before paying his respects 
 at May Meadows he called on his friend Bob Rouutree, at the 
 groggery on the Boonville Road. The garrulous barkeeper 
 professed to be overjoyed to see the ex-congressman, whom he 
 hailed as a persecuted victim of Lincoln's tyrannical govern- 
 ment. He was, of course, full of important news to communi- 
 cate. The court-martial and the trials of Jeffreys and of 
 Leslie May, were graphically depicted. Payton listened 
 eagei'ly. 
 
 "And so Jeffreys got off scot-free?" he asked, when 
 Rountree had related, not without liberal embellishments, the 
 
A WOOER'S WILE. 635 
 
 iucideuts of his trial. " He's a lucky dog to escape iu this 
 way." 
 
 "Lucky?" Bob repeated. "He's a dirty scalawag! 
 That's what he is. He joined the abolitiou army just to get 
 even with Colonel May, and to get that smart wench Cressie 
 into his clutches. The judges that tried him were d — d 
 abolitionists themselves, and so they thought it no harm to steal 
 a nigger." 
 
 " How did May's women-folks behave when they acquitted 
 Jeffreys? " Pay ton inquired. " Didn't it rouse their anger? " 
 
 " Anger? Why anger's no name for it. It was a treat to 
 see Miss May. I thought her blazing eyes would burn a hole 
 in the face of that Dutch colonel that quizzed her while she 
 gave her testimony. But that was nothing to what happened 
 at the trial of her brother. Why, she absolutely insulted the 
 court, telling them they were no gentlemen." 
 
 " Miss May, do you mean? She is a trump ! " 
 
 "You bet she is ! " the barkeeper assented. "But that 
 Dutch storekeeper of old Van Braaken's spoiled it all. I 
 guess it made him mad to hear his Dutch colleagues talked to 
 in that way ; he turned on Miss May with a black frown, and 
 frightened her into silence. You know, he was what they call 
 the judge advocate, and had a good deal to say." 
 
 "The insolent boor!" scolded Paytou. "To forget his 
 manners in the presence of Miss May ! ' ' 
 
 " He is an insufferable upstart! " was the judgment of Bob 
 Rouutree. " But I guess that Colonel Seheffel will take him 
 down a peg or two." 
 
 ' ' What do you mean by that ? ' ' 
 
 " Why the conceited puppy undertook to lecture the judges, 
 and told Colonel Seheffel about as much as that he was a preju- 
 diced tyrant. That riled the colonel, and I guess he will make 
 sparks fly from the young Dutchman yet." 
 
 " Are they going to fight, do you think? " 
 
 " Well, there's no telling. The old fellow is full of mad- 
 ness, and threatened to spank Victor with the flat of his sword ; 
 
636 THE BE BE V 8 DAUGHTEB. 
 
 but Victor told him that he could not accommodate him by 
 fighting a duel. What a little coward he is ! " 
 
 "But Leslie May was acquitted! " said Payton. "How 
 far has he got with his company ? Have they been sworn in 
 yet? " 
 
 " How could they? " Bob asked back, " when the town has 
 been in possession of the Federal army all the time ? But the 
 boys are boiling over with impatience to join General Ciper's 
 army ; and now that their captain is at liberty, I guess they 
 Avill find some way of getting out of town." 
 
 " If they do, they can easily reach General Ciper's men," 
 say Payton. " The general himself was at Richmond when we 
 were there — ' ' 
 
 " Were you at Richmond? " asked Bob Rountree, interrupt- 
 ing the congressman. " How in the world did you get 
 there ? ' ' 
 
 " Well, you see. Colonel May, as soon as he had determined 
 to resign from the Senate, wrote a letter to Jeff Davis, who is 
 an old friend of his, and the President invited him to Rich- 
 mond. So I resigned my seat too, and accompanied the colo- 
 nel, thinking that there might be a chance for some place for 
 me, or at least for a commission to command some regiment in 
 the army, to be had from the government of the Confederacy." 
 
 " I see ! " said Bob with a smile of intelligence. 
 
 " But they are as stingy with their favors at Richmond as 
 they are at Washington," the ex-congressman continued, 
 frowning at the obtuseness of the new President in failing to 
 divine his merits. " Don't you think, old Jeff had the mu- 
 nificence to offer me a — lieutenancy! 'Yes,' says he, 'I 
 think there will be no trouble in giving you a second, perhaps 
 even a first lieutenancy in one of the new regiments forming 
 beyond the Mississippi.' And that, too, when Colonel May 
 had himself introduced me, and when there was talk of 
 appointing him Postmaster General, in the place of that Texas 
 man of whom Jeff Davis would like to get rid." 
 
 Mr. Rountree was about to offer a severe criticism on the 
 
A WOOER'S WILE. 637 
 
 inefficiency of the Confederate government, l)ut was pi-evented 
 by the entrance of no less a personage than Orlando Jones, 
 who burst into the barroom with the triumphant announcement : 
 
 "'The^- are moving! The d — d Dutch invaders are leaving! 
 I guess old Ciper's boys are after them. Hurrah for Jeff 
 Davis ! ' ' 
 
 As if in corroboration of the news brought by Orlando 
 Jones, drums were heard to beat the long roll, and bugle 
 signals resounded near and far. Rountree and Pa^i;on rushed 
 to the door. There was lively commotion of the Federal army ; 
 officers were seen to repair to their tents and orderlies and 
 adjutants hurried to and from the headquarters. It was evi- 
 dent that some important and sudden movement was going on. 
 
 " They are running away, sure enough! " cried Paytou, in 
 high glee. " The pitiful cowards! " 
 
 " Oh, if we had our arms now! " exclaimed Orlando Jones. 
 " What a glorious chance for our boys it would be ! " 
 
 " What a glorious chance it is, you mean," suggested Pay- 
 ton. " Leslie May, if he is the man I take him for, will lose 
 no time to march at the head of his company and take revenge 
 for the wrong they have done him and his folks." 
 
 "By George, that is so!" exclaimed the barkeeper. 
 " Now, I wish I could join Leslie's company. Wouldn't it 
 be fun to run after the Dutch cowards ! " 
 
 " Why don't you? " said Orlando Jones. " There's room 
 yet in our company ; and if General Ciper comes along with 
 his quartermasters, we will soon be uniformed and sworn in." 
 
 " Can't leave the old man," Mr. Rountree replied, with a 
 sly wink. "Besides we want some folks to tend to matters 
 at home. There are some things that can be done without 
 wearing a uniform." 
 
 " Yes," Orlando Jones admitted, his brows contracting 
 into a frown of discontent, " we might, as Leslie May once 
 said, be appointed to guard the henroosts and oversee the 
 niggers, — if any of them are left when the abolition army 
 gets awa}^ from here. That's not my style of service." 
 
638 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " Talking about niggers," said Payton, " I wonder whether 
 Jeffreys is going to leave here without making another grab for 
 that yellow wench - — ' ' 
 
 "Yellow!" exclaimed Orlando Jones. "She's a heap 
 whiter than he is, any day." 
 
 " Well, white or yellow," continued Payton, " she's a nig- 
 ger ; and he is making himself a crazy fool about her. I would 
 not be at all surprised if he repeated the maneuver for which 
 he was court-martialed. He might have better success this 
 time." 
 
 "If so he'd better be about it! " remarked Bob Rountree. 
 " He will stand a mighty poor show in this neighborhood, once 
 the Lincoln army has left." 
 
 " I hope it will be our turn soon," Orlando remarked. " I 
 am fairly burning to do something against this d — d Dutch 
 Dictator that is lording it over free-born Americans at the 
 State capital. It makes me mad to see that pet of his strut- 
 ting about in his captain's uniform insulting his superiors and 
 putting on airs, as if he owned the universe." 
 
 "I wouldn't mind taking down his pride anytime," said 
 Rountree. " And who knows," he added, winking knowingly 
 at Payton, " but that our chance is coming? Waldhorst does 
 not belong to the army of General Seele, but came here long 
 afterward to prosecute Leslie May. He may not leave with 
 them. If we could catch him na2)ping — ! " 
 
 "But you won't! " said Orlando Jones, sullenly. "We 
 tried that once before. I should think you would remember 
 that for the balance of your days." 
 
 " It was not he that beat us that time," Rountree replied. 
 " It was Leslie May ; and Leslie is with ?fs now." 
 
 " Not against Victor Waldhorst," said Payton. " As I 
 understand you. Captain Waldhorst insulted the officers of the 
 court-martial, in the defense of the prisoner, Leslie May will 
 not forget that soo'i." 
 
 "Nor will he forget that Waldhorst is an enemy, and 
 a sneaking al)olitionist," Rountree continued doggedly. 
 
A WOOER'S WILE. 639 
 
 " Somebody might make a good haul by bagging the whole 
 family, with that outlandish name, that has been quartering at 
 May Meadows for a mouth or more. Victor Waldhorst's uncle 
 and cousin, and his aunt and sister." 
 
 Paytou looked at Rountree as if struck with the suggestion. 
 " What do you mean? " he asked. 
 
 "Oh, nothing in particular," said Rountree. "Except 
 that if Leslie is not a sentimental fool, he might initiate his 
 company into the Confederate service by a coup that would put 
 the Confederate authorities under great obligations to him." 
 
 "Yes," mused Paytou. " The Auf dem Busehes are 
 among the richest merchants of the metropolis. They would 
 be exceedingly valuable to hold as hostages, and to exchange 
 for prisoners taken from our side. But Leslie won't do any- 
 thing of the kind. He is entirely too high-toned to lend his aid 
 to what might be looked on as a breach of hospitality ; for 
 these people are guests at his father's house." 
 
 " And don't you forget that Victor Waldhorst is on hand," 
 Mr. Jones jjut in. "If he goes with General Seele's army 
 corps, you may bet high that he is going to take his folks along 
 with him ; and if he stays behind, he. will have a detachment 
 of soldiers to guard them." 
 
 " I wish he would just stay behind until General Ciper 
 arrives," said Bob Rountree, maliciously. " Our friend Pay- 
 ton might lay a trap for him, even if Leslie May should be 
 mean enough to betray his cause and his country for the favors 
 of a Dutch sweetheart, that he is fooling with just to make her 
 Dutch lover jealous." 
 
 " How did you learn this ? " demanded Paytou. 
 
 ' ' Learn what ? ' ' 
 
 " That Leslie May is sweet on that Dutch girl? " 
 
 " Oh, well, don't let on, now," said Rountree. " I guess 
 you knew it before I did. Leastwise it was you that told me." 
 
 ' ' Yes ; I certainly thought so when I saw them down at the 
 city," Paytou said. " But now, you say, Victor's sister is 
 still at Mav Meadows ? ' ' 
 
640 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 " A nice cosy arraugemeut, now, isn't it? " Orlando Jones 
 broke in. " The sister, as Miss May's guest, ogling with the 
 new-fledged captain, while pretending to wait on her uncle and 
 cousin ; and her brother, prosecuting Leslie May before a 
 Dutch court-martial, all the while casting sheep's eyes at Les- 
 lie's sister. If I were you, Ralph Payton, I would stir my 
 stumps in laying siege to the beautiful heiress. There is no 
 telling what may happen, if you are an Honorable M. C." 
 
 " Pshaw! " exclaimed Payton, making a show of confidence 
 he was far from feeling. " The idea of Miss May throwing 
 herself away on a Dutch simpleton ! And he one of Lin- 
 coln's hirelings, wearing the hated Yankee uniform! " 
 
 " I guess she is playing with the silly cub, as Leslie is 
 playing with Waldhorst's sister," Rountree remarked con- 
 solingly. 
 
 But Ralph Payton, whether sure of his game or not, thought 
 it not amiss to put in an appearance at the house of his lady- 
 love. So he excused himself to his friends, and started out 
 into the Square on his way to May Meadows. 
 
 Rountree's suggestion of a coup to be executed by making 
 prisoners of war of the guests at Senator May's mansion, kept 
 haunting him as he walked on. And what was still more ex- 
 citing in the prospect, a trap to be laid for Victor Waldhorst. 
 To be sure, it might be of great advantage to Leslie May's 
 company of volunteers, if they began their military career by 
 so signal a service as would be the capture of such prominent 
 personages as prisoners of war, as the two Auf demBusches, — 
 men of heavy weight on 'change at the metropolis. And the 
 ladies — Payton wondered if the usages of war jjermittM the 
 capture of women. But it occurred to him, that whether this 
 were so or otherwise, Leslie would never sanction it. He 
 doubted, whether Leslie, indeed, would have anything to do 
 with the taking of his father's guests as prisoners of war — 
 
 Then Leslie need not know anything about it. 
 
 Indeed, it would be of much more value to him, by way of 
 iuoratiating: himself with the Confederate areneral, than it 
 
A WOOER' i^ WILE. 641 
 
 could possibly be to Leslie May or his company. If he suc- 
 ceeded, perhaps the general would not refuse him the commis- 
 sion to a colonelcy which he had in vain expected of President 
 Davis, through the influence of ex-Senator May. 
 
 And the trap to catch Victor Waldhorst ! 
 
 " 1 suppose Bob Rountree meant that I should bag him 
 along with the balance of that Dutch crowd. That would 
 indeed be a feather in my cap ! But how set the trap ? I 
 must consult with Bob about it." 
 
 " Meanwhile I will keep my eyes open to see how the land 
 lies." 
 
 Ruminating thus, he was suddenly accosted by a horseman, 
 who overtook him on the way to May Meadows. 
 
 " Hello! Back home again? " he addressed the pedestrian. 
 
 " Hello ! What are you doing in town? " was the reply. 
 
 "I have a message for Senator May," said the horseman, 
 ' ' and meanwhile I want to find out what the Feds are doing 
 here." 
 
 A conversation ensued between the two, which lasted until 
 they came within a short distance of the house, and they sep- 
 arated, each continuing his w'ay alone. When Payton reached 
 May Meadows, he found things rather lively. There was stir 
 and preparation. News had been received that the Federal 
 army had been ordered to evacuate the town and fall back ou 
 Division-General Freeberg's corps, and that General Ciper's 
 army was approaching with the evident purpose of engaging 
 the Federals. Victor Waldhorst had sent a note to his uncle, 
 informing him that he himself had been ordered to report to 
 Governor Rauhenfels, to escort the ladies back to the city, and 
 to take along the wounded men, if able to travel. He had in- 
 closed a few lines to his sister, requesting her to express to 
 Mr. and Mrs. May his high appreciation of their generous 
 kindness to his relatives ; and to say to them, how^ sorry he felt 
 that official duties made it impossible for him to make his 
 adieux to them in person. In a postscript he informed her, 
 that she must hold herself and the others in readiness to 
 
 41 
 
642 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 accompany an officer that would be detailed to escort them to 
 headquarters as soon as the body of the army had passed from 
 the towu. 
 
 Nellie May coaxed the letter away from Pauliue, who, for a 
 reason not quite clear to herself, felt a reluctance to let Nellie 
 see her brother's note; but, as usual, she found herself unable 
 to resist her friend's playful cajolery. 
 
 Nellie read and reread the few lines. Pauline noted a slight 
 increase of color in her cheeks. It might have meant vexation 
 at being so closely watched by Pauliue ; or it might have meant 
 something else. She laughed as she handed the paper back. 
 A rather loud, merry laugh ; but it sounded unsympathetic in 
 Pauline's ears. 
 
 "So the young captain is too busily engaged to And time 
 for a farewell visit to May Meadows! " she presently said. 
 " What, think you, can it be that keeps him away, now that 
 the mission which brought him here has been accomplished? " 
 
 '• Why, he is a soldier, Nellie," said the sister, wondering 
 why her friend had laughed, and why she put the idle ques- 
 tion. " He must obey orders. Now that the army is on the 
 move, there must be much to do ; and with him, you know, 
 duty is always first." 
 
 ' ' Yes ; I suspect that he is deeply wrapped up in solving 
 the problem as to what officer he is going to send to take you 
 away from here." There was a faint smile on her lips, and 
 just a touch of resentment, as Pauline thought, in her voice, 
 as she spoke these words. " Do you imagine that it will be a 
 subaltern? Or will he honor us, by sending some one of rank 
 superior to his own? Your brother Victor is so deferential, 
 you know. It would not surprise me, if he sent the com- 
 manding general of the Union army to hand you to your 
 carriage in person," 
 
 Pauline felt hurt. "I do not think this levity becomes 
 you," she said, looking reproachfully into Nellie's eyes. 
 " However excessive my brother's deference may seem to you, 
 it is not a thing to be laughed at, least of all by you. If 
 
A WOOER'S WILE. 643 
 
 General Seele sjionid pay a visit to this house — which, by the 
 by, would uot be so wonderful as you seem to think it — he 
 would come to thank you all for your generous kindness to 
 his wounded soldiers. I" or Victor has not been niggardly in 
 his laudation, you may rest assured." 
 
 "I dare saj^," said Nellie, with a provoking smile of' 
 patronizing assent. " Your brother has a trick of looking at 
 what he deems meritorious in others through a magnifying 
 glass of marvelous power, and to invert the telescope when 
 looking at his own merit. Well, perhaps he has lent his 
 spectacles to General Seele ; and if this august magnate does 
 come here," — a melodious little ripple of laughter interrupted 
 her words — " why, who knows but that he may learn to con- 
 sider us dyed-in-the-wool rebels almost as good as other 
 people." 
 
 Another reproachful look from Pauline was all the answer 
 she got from this young lady. 
 
 While yet the two maidens were conversing, Cressie appeared 
 in her master's room and announced that a dust-covered horse- 
 man had alighted in the rear of the house, demanding to speak 
 to him. 
 
 " Show him up here," Colonel May said. 
 
 The visitor proved to be a farmer living in the nerghborhood 
 of the battlefield of Winslo's Run, whom the colonel addressed 
 with cheerful voice as Mr. Boyd. Although there was no other 
 occupant of the room, and Cressie had closed the door after 
 her, yet Mr. Boyd spoke in whispers. 
 
 " I have a letter for you from General Ciper," he said. 
 
 " From General Ciper? " the colonel asked in some surprise. 
 " Why, I left him a week ago in Richmond." 
 
 "He is to take command of the corps now in charge of 
 General McCullom," Mr. Boyd explained. " And he is 
 anxious to catch up with the Yankees here, to finish the work 
 begun at Winslo's Run." 
 
 "He is too late," said the colonel thoughtfully, "if he 
 means to fight before General Seele effects a junction with 
 
644 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 General Sturdy. I have iiiformatiou that C4eueral Seele has 
 orders to fall back, and to avoid an engagement with the Con- 
 federates until the two generals can co-operate. The Federal 
 troops at this place are moving now. and in an hour there will 
 not be a man left here." 
 
 " That is just what I came here to find out," said Mr. Boyd. 
 " For the general intends coming here to await the arrival of 
 his army, which follows in the rear." 
 
 ' ' You may assure him that it will be a great honor to me to 
 offer him and any attendants he may have with him, such poor 
 accommodations as May Meadows affords. But where have 
 you the letter you spoke of ? " 
 
 " You must excuse me, Colonel," said the messenger, " for 
 seeming disrespect. But one cannot be too careful in war 
 times." He took off his coat and vest, and proceeded to rip 
 open a part of the lining near the top seam, from which he 
 produced a very greasy piece of paper. " I begged the gen- 
 eral for permission to oil this letter," he exjDlained, " so that 
 its rattling might not create suspicion in case anything hap- 
 pened to me." 
 
 " Why," said the colonel, smiling, " is it a treasonable cor- 
 respondence you are inveigling me into? " 
 
 " I don't know what is in the letter," replied Mr. Boyd. 
 ' ' But I suspect that the most important information he is after 
 is not written in that letter. I guess he wants to know whether 
 he is safe in coming here in advance of his army." 
 
 " Perfectly! " said the colonel, opening the well-oiled letter. 
 It proved to be a brief note intended, probably, as a mere 
 indorsement of the trustworthiness of the messenger, and 
 informing him that it was the desire of President Davis that 
 Colonel May should repair to Richmond as speedily as possi- 
 ble, to assume the duties of his office and " put some life into 
 the postal service of the Confederacy." 
 
 The allusion to the duties awaiting him as a member of Pres- 
 ident Davis' cabinet did not tend to exhilarate the colonel. 
 But true to his hospitable instincts, his first care was to urge 
 
A WOOER'S WILE. 645 
 
 upon the nu'ssenger some refreshments before returning, and to 
 order his horse to be rubbed down and fed. But as soon as 
 opportunity offered he sent for Nellie, to impart to her the news 
 of the expected arrival. She was delighted. 
 
 " How glad Leslie will be! " she exclaimed. " He is wild 
 to be at the head of his company and to take part in the 
 liberation of our country. General Ciper, I know, will be 
 very glad of the accession of such a gallant company to his 
 forces." 
 
 " And you, my daughter, are you glad too? " asked the fond 
 father, grasping Nellie's hands, and looking wistfully into her 
 eyes. 
 
 " What, — glad that General Ciper is coming? " 
 
 ' ' That Leslie is going away to the war — and that I am to 
 go to Richmond." 
 
 Nellie's arms were quickly about her father's neck. 
 
 " How can I be otherwise than proud — exultantly proud, 
 dear father — over the distinction you have achieved! " she 
 said ; but her voice had not the ring of jo}^ that her words 
 implied . 
 
 " But you w^ould like to have me stay at home with you, 
 would you not? Yes, I can understand that. But I must not 
 be a drone in the hive, you know. You would despise me if I 
 did not willingly add my little mite to the success of our cause. 
 And so I must go, and leave you in charge of the plantation. 
 For I believe it to be best to take mama with me. She has set 
 her heart on accompanying me to Richmond ; and when Leslie 
 has gone, you will be here all alone." 
 
 " I am noc afraid, dear father! " said Nellie, resolutely. 
 
 " For I fear," he continued, " that if I left the place in 
 charge of the overseer alone, it might go to ruin before we got 
 back." 
 
 "Yes — six years is a long time!" his daughter agreed. 
 " They elected their President for six years, did they not? " 
 
 "Not yet, my daughter," the colonel said, smiling sadly. 
 " As yet the Southern Confederacy is but a provisional affair, 
 
646 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEE. 
 
 aud its government has but the tacit, — not the expressed — 
 sanction of the people. I sometimes think that — but never 
 mind. I am getting old, Nellie; and most naturally take a 
 more sober view of things than you and Leslie, in the bright 
 enthusiasm of youth, can bring yourselves to see. And I would 
 like to knoAv you safe, before I leave you. I could think of you 
 with better assurance, if I knew you to be a happy wife." 
 
 " Do you not trust me? " the girl asked anxiously. " Am I 
 not amply able to take care of myself even when you and 
 Leslie are gone, that yon should think of marrying me off? " 
 
 " Is the idea distasteful to you? " asked the father, evincing 
 some surprise. 
 
 " It is preposterous! " exclaimed the girl. " Wh}-, did you 
 not just now mention how necessary it will be forme to remain 
 here in charge of our place? " 
 
 " But it would be most natural, that your husband Avould 
 live here with you," said the colonel. " I thought that you 
 and Payton had been engaged now long enough — ' ' 
 
 " Engaged? " asked Nellie, surprised, almost frightened by 
 the suggestion. 
 
 " Am I mistaken? " 
 
 "I should think so ! " said the girl, proudly. "I have 
 never been engaged to any man in my life." 
 
 ^' Then Pa\i;on is mistaken also. I luiderstood from him 
 that there was nothing in the way of your marrying him. I 
 have befriended him, helped him into position, and received 
 him in our home believing him to be your choice for a 
 husband." 
 
 " Payton permitted you to believe so? " 
 
 "He certainly did; nor did your conduct militate against 
 such a supposition." 
 
 "Oh, Papa; You humiliate me. How flippant must you 
 believe me, to suppose that I would promise to marry a man 
 without your counsel aud consent ! ' ' 
 
 " You might have taken my consent for granted, from the 
 manner in which we all have treated Mr. Payton." 
 
A WOOER'S WILE. 647 
 
 " Tell me honestly, dear father, would my marriage with 
 Mr. Payton please you very much? Have you set your heart 
 on him as your son ? ' ' 
 
 " In-law, you mean. I have certainly accustomed myself 
 to look on him in that character. It would not be the worst 
 thing you could do in that direction." 
 
 " And did Mr. Payton permit you to believe that he would, 
 after marrying me, settle down and stay at home — manage 
 your plantation, and — take care of me? " 
 
 " That is what I hoped, and inferred from his conversation 
 with me. I looked on the arrangement as being so desirable 
 for you, and as such a simple solution of the complication 
 arising out of my unlooked-for call to Richmond, that I may 
 have taken more for granted, perhaps, than your conduct, or 
 his words, really warranted. But that is certainly the impres- 
 sion I was under." 
 
 " How could you wrong Mr. Payton so ! " exclaimed Nellie. 
 " Does it seem possible to you that he would consent to stay 
 idly at home while the tocsin of war is sounding through the 
 land?" 
 
 " He would be excusable in doing so," said the colonel, 
 smilingly soberly. " You know, even Moses exempted newly 
 married men from military duty." 
 
 " But he would forfeit honor, manhood and every claim to 
 respect, were he to turn a deaf ear to his country's call to stand 
 by her in her struggle for liberty and independence! " 
 
 The young girl spoke earnestly, almost indignantly, as if 
 she were defending her own honor against unjust aspersion. 
 The colonel looked at her, evidently disappointed, yet unable 
 to repress his admiration. 
 
 " You take a heroic view of the matter," he said, " and I 
 ought to feel proud of the patriotic ardor of my children. I 
 wish I could share your enthusiasm." 
 
 The tone of resignation in which he uttered these words 
 struck Nellie as more despondent than she had ever heard from 
 her father. She turned to him with tender solicitude. 
 
648 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 " Do not feel disheartened on my account," she said, speak- 
 ing with cheerful assurance. " You know me well enough to 
 trust nie, do you not? Although you cannot leave me here as 
 Mr. Payton's wife, — for if I marry him he will certainly not 
 be the man to take his ease and comfort at home before the 
 independence of our beloved South has been achieved — you 
 need not worry on my account. When you and Leslie and all 
 our guests are gone, the Union forces will also be gone from 
 this part of the State. We have nothing to fear from our own 
 people. You may take mama to Richmond with perfect assur- 
 ance that I will take care of our plantation as effectually as — 
 Mr. Paytou could." 
 
 Cressie now appeared, and announced that Mr. Pay ton 
 wished to pay his respects to Miss May. 
 
 " I expected him before this," said the colonel. "What 
 will you say to him ? ' ' 
 
 " That will depend upon Mr. Pay ton. Papa," she answered, 
 resolutely. " I still believe that you have wronged him in 
 supposing that he contemplates the role of a craven recreaut. 
 I shall put him to the test." 
 
XLl. 
 
 THE TESTER TESTED. 
 
 HE Honorable Ralph Paytou might have chosen an hour • 
 more propitious to his wooing-, than the one following 
 on the interview between Nellie May and her father. 
 He rose to meet her, as she entered the drawing-room, with 
 his usual self-possession. 
 
 Miss May had nerved herself to appear before her visitor in 
 her usual sprightly humor, for the purpose of testing, as she 
 had intimated to her father, her lover's character. Humiliat- 
 ing task, to a spirited woman. If she had ever indulged in 
 the fond fancy that she loved this man, the very consciousness 
 of her purpose to test him must have opened her eyes to the 
 dispiriting truth, that her affection for him had never been 
 more than a fancy. She was wholly heart-free. There was a 
 feeling of relief in the reflection, that if she should find him 
 wanting in the trial to which she would subject him, it would 
 not break her heart. But she was fully determined to act 
 fairly and honorably by him. Let him prove to her the sincer- 
 ity of his love and his integrity as a man, and she would not 
 say him nay. But he must be ready to fly to the rescue of her 
 beloved South, he must prove his loyalty to her by unswerving 
 loyalty to his country, he must be able to sink the lover in the 
 patriot. This was the test that she had resolved to try him by. 
 
 " Welcome back home, Mr. Pay ton ! " was her greeting, as 
 they shook hands. " I heard from papa that you had returned 
 with him, by way of Richmond. You were somewhat slow in 
 making your appearance at our house? " 
 
 " Truly, I snatched at the lirst opportunity to come and see 
 you," he protested eagerly, " and if you will pardon me for 
 saying so, I did not feel I'ealty at home until now." 
 
 (649) 
 
650 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 "I am glad to hear you say so," she replied, smiling 
 sweetly. " Then make yourself at home, and be seated. So, 
 you accompanied papa to Richmond? The place must have 
 looked small to you after leaving Washington. But I suppose 
 you were filled with admiration of President Davis, and the 
 new cabinet, and the first Congress of the Confederacy — of 
 the government, in a word, of a young nation just launched on 
 the billows of history? " 
 
 "Why, yes — of course," he answered, dropping his eyes 
 from Nellie's face. "There is considerable stir there, just 
 now — ' ' 
 
 " Especially in the War Department, I suppose," said Nellie, 
 interrupting him. "They are making war plans there, and 
 organizing armies, are they not? " 
 
 " Naturally. That is the matter of uppermost importance 
 in Richmond. The people are very enthusiastic, and wonder, 
 why our State still holds out against the Confederacy." 
 
 " So do I wonder," said Nellie, with some animation. " I 
 hope, however, that the combined forces of Generals Ciper and 
 McCullom, who are now co-operating, will deliver our people 
 from the yoke of the oppressor, drive the usurping dictator and 
 the whole of the Federal army out of the State, and allow it to 
 take its natural place in the New Republic." 
 
 " I hope so with all my heart," Payton responded. " The 
 Federal forces that have occupied Brookfield are abeady 
 retreating from the neighborhood," Nellie continued, " and 
 Leslie is fretting and fuming to take part in the fray. He 
 hopes to be among the pursuers with his company, when oui 
 gallant boys overtake and whip the Federals. By the way," 
 she added with a searching look into Payton's face, " do you 
 propose to join the company? " 
 
 " Leslie has the war fever bad, I can imagine," said Payton, 
 without heeding Nellie's question. ** He has a heavy score to 
 settle with the Yankee minions. First, his imprisonment at 
 Camp Jefferson — ' ' 
 
 " You kept him company there, did you not? " 
 
THE TESTER TESTED. 651 
 
 "Indeed I did! And I shall not forget it, eitlier. Then 
 tlie cowardly conduct of that beast whom he shot down, and 
 the still more brutal outrage of arresting him and trying hini for 
 it by a court-martial of Dutch blockheads — " 
 
 " Don't be unjust, Mr. Payton. That court-martial 
 acquitted Leslie." 
 
 " How could they help it? " Payton exclaimed, taken aback 
 by Nellie's remark. " They would have liked well enough to 
 sentence him to be shot, so as to get rid of one dangerous 
 enemy, anyhow. But they did not dare! " 
 
 " No ! " Nellie repeated, with a far-away look. " They did 
 not dare ! ' ' 
 
 " They were swift enough to excuse Jeffreys for his dirty 
 hand in that outrage," Payton continued, a little puzzled by 
 the young lady's absent look. " I don't wonder at it, either ; 
 for they are all birds of the same feather, — chicken- heai'ted 
 abolitionists, every one of them." 
 
 " I would not say, every one of them," Nellie observed 
 quietly, yet in a tone of conviction. " There are those among 
 them who, for courageous devotion to duty, might shame some 
 of our stay-at-home Southern patriots." She looked at him, as 
 she said this, with a demure face, and then added coaxingly : 
 " But you have not answered my question, whether you mean 
 to join Leslie's company? " 
 
 The pointed allusion to Southern stay-at-homes warned the 
 eager wooer to be on his guard. He knew that lukewarmness 
 in the Southern cause would sink him in the estimation of this 
 enthusiastic young woman ; yet he shrank from the prospect of 
 entering the service under the very eyes of bold and daring 
 Leslie May. It was a time for the development of that keen 
 diplomacy upon which he prided himself. He must not only 
 convince the fair patriot before him of his unbounded zeal in 
 the cause of the Confederacy, but also imj^ress upon her his 
 own importance and the brilliant part he was called on to perform 
 in the war for the liberation of the South. 
 
 ' ' Nothing would give me greater pleasure and more genuine 
 
652 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 satisf action, " he answered, in a tone of heartfelt regret, " than 
 to be permitted to fight under the leadership of your brother. 
 But I stand committed, substantially, to accept a commission 
 at the hands of his Excellency, President Davis." 
 
 " Ah! " exclaimed Nellie, her increased respect for a pros- 
 pective colonel, or general, showing itself, involuntarily. " So 
 President Davis has made a military magnate of you ? Papa 
 has never told me of this." 
 
 " He could not have told you, because it is not a fact," Mr. 
 Pay ton hastened to explain. " I did not say that I had 
 received a commission ; only, that I had, in a manner, com- 
 mitted myself to accept one." 
 
 " I understand, Mr. Payton," said Nellie, her face beam- 
 ing upon him with radiant glow that he had rarely seen there. 
 " But surely the President will be as good as his word, and we 
 may look on the thing as accomplished." 
 
 " And you also understand," Mr. Payton urged with some 
 earnestness, "that under the circumstances it would be an 
 affront to his Excellency, were I to enlist in your brother's 
 company." 
 
 " No, I do not understand that," said Nellie. " But I sup- 
 pose it is against some military rule of etiquette. I do, how- 
 ever, understand that you are going to devote yourself to your 
 country's cause, and it gives me great satisfaction." 
 
 " I am proud and happy to hear you say so," said he, with 
 a polite bow. 
 
 " Because it quite vexed me, when I understood from papa, 
 that he had recommended you to President Davis for some 
 civil otlice, though unsuccessfully. Oh, I am so delighted, 
 Mr. Payton, to imagine you leading your gallant columns to 
 the onslaught, — Brother Leslie, it may be, following you at 
 the head of his company, both of you pointing the way to the 
 enemy with your swords, shouting : 'Follow me, brave com- 
 rades, to Victory, or Death! ' And Victory will perch upon 
 your banners, and glory forever ci'own my heroes! " 
 
 Nellie, though more than half in earnest, spoke the latter 
 
THE TESTEB TESTED. 653 
 
 words in a playful bauter, smiling piquantly. Payton believed 
 that the propitious moment had come for him to press his 
 suit. 
 
 "Ah! "he exclaimed, in a voice of tender supphcation ; 
 ' ' would that you smiled upon me ever thus ! Let me beg of 
 you to be my inspiration, as you are my ambition, my heavenly 
 queen ! A word of encouragement from you would carry me 
 to the pinnacle of bliss ! Speak the word, adored one, — be 
 mine ! " 
 
 The moment was not badly chosen. His skillful insinua- 
 tions had aroused the patriotic enthusiasm of the excitable 
 maiden. Her imagination was fired by the gallantry and 
 heroism with which it invested the man now pleading before 
 her, — qualities, though existing nowhere else, that were 
 for the moment a reality to her. But when, to emphasize his 
 ardent supplication, he bent his knee before her, she was 
 rudely disenchanted. A cloud passed over her countenance 
 on remembering that it was her purpose to test his character. 
 He must give her better proof of his manhood than the half- 
 extorted admission that he might allow himself to be placed at 
 the head of a regiment, or of a brigade. So she summoned to 
 her aid whatever skill she had acquired by her experience as 
 a reigning society belle in dealing with importunate beaux, and 
 pursued her object under cover of coquettish badinage. The 
 cloud passed as swiftly from her face as it had aj^peared, 
 leaving in its stead a sportive smile. 
 
 " Get up, you ridiculous man! " she said, playfully extend- 
 ing the tips of her fingers to assist him to his feet. " How 
 could you be so cruelly awkward as to dispel the brilliant 
 halo my fancy wove around you ! Think of the leap from the 
 sublime to the comical, when you showed me the conquering 
 hero of my dreams dropping from the clouds to grovel at my 
 feet!" 
 
 "Cruel, cruel woman! " he exclaimed, regarding her with 
 rueful face. 
 
 " Why cruel, Mr. Payton? " 
 
654 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 "You laugh at aud mock me, when I am pleading for my 
 life's most sacred boon." 
 
 "But even Solomon says, there is a time for all things," 
 she suggested. " Surely this is not time for love and dal- 
 liance. When the sea runs high, the crew and the captain of 
 the vessel laboring in the stress of the tempest, dream not of 
 roses and forget-me-nots." 
 
 " You will break my heart, Nellie ! " 
 
 " Never fear," the lady replied, smiling archly. "Hearts 
 are not so fragile. I warrant you, that neither yours nor mine 
 will break. We are both too — wise for that. Like the fibre 
 of the slow growing oak hearts grow tough with time. Come, 
 rouse yourself! Show me the man that you are. Listen to 
 the call of your country ! ' ' 
 
 " Incorrigible ! " 
 
 " Why, I am your best friend." 
 
 " You are inexorable." 
 
 " I am mindful of my country's glory, and of what should 
 be your own! " Then, as if in relenting mood, she added 
 coaxingly, "Come; the war cannot last forever! But while 
 it lasts, you must not think of shirking your part in it." 
 
 ' ' But then — then may I hope ? ' ' 
 
 "Hope? Why not? 'Hope springs eternal in the human 
 breast,' you know; and though the cruel poet adds 'Man 
 never is, but always to be, blessed," why, you are blessed in 
 that you hope. And that makes hope a blessing canceled by 
 fruition, does it not? Then make the best of this blessing, nor 
 let fruition end it all too soon." 
 
 The battled suitor's view of this aspect of things was not 
 divulged. Before he found time to answer, his eye fell on two 
 horsemen approaching the house on the road from Brooktield, 
 whom he pointed out to his companion. 
 
 " Why, that is General Seele ! " Nellie exclaimed, unable to 
 quite conceal her astonishment at the fulfillment of the banter- 
 ing remark she had made to Pauline. " And there is Captain 
 Waldhorst! They are coming here, sure enough." 
 
THE TESTER TESTED. G55 
 
 ' What oil earth can brnig these bhie-coats to your house, 
 Miss May? " asked Paytou, showing his displeasure iu unmis- 
 takable fashion. 
 
 " Captain Waldhorst's people are here, you Ivuow," said 
 Nellie, and added, with a tinge of sarcasm in her voice, " and 
 I suppose the general of the Union army is escorting him on 
 his farewell visit. Or, maybe," she continued, her sarcasm 
 emphasized by a sneering smile, " he has come to apologize 
 for the rude handling some of us received at the hands of his 
 court-martial." 
 
 Payton saw with undisguised satisfaction how unwelcome 
 the visitors seemed to the young lady. He felt reassured as 
 to the influence that Victor Waldhorst might have obtained 
 over the sister of the prisoner, whose fate he had, to some ex- 
 tent, controlled as judge advocate. Nevertheless he awaited 
 the entrance of the Union officers with some degree of uneasi- 
 ness. He did not like the obvious distinction enjoyed by 
 Victor though he endeavored to console himself by the reflec- 
 tion , that he might be accompanying the general in the capacity 
 of an official subordinate ; but even then tlie familiarity 
 between the two was remarkable, and to Pa^-ton, alarming. 
 
 It was a minute or two, during which the military guests 
 were being received at the front door by Senator May in per- 
 son, before Cressie entered the parlor announcing them. They 
 were ushered in by the senator, who was, in his turn, followed 
 by the messenger from Winslo's Run. 
 
 " Permit me. General," said the host, as he led the latter 
 up to Nellie, " to present to you my daughter Eleouora. This, 
 my child, is General Seele, the commander of the army that 
 is about to evacuate the town of Brookfield. And this," he 
 added after an interchange of bows between Nellie and the 
 General, " is my friend, Mr. Paytou, late a member of the 
 Federal Congress." 
 
 The recognition between the two gentlemen was a formal 
 affair, Payton contenting himself with a sullen bow, the general 
 takino- no further notice of him. 
 
656 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " My frieud, Mr. Boyd," said the seuator, as be introduced 
 tlie messenger from Winslo's Run. The latter eyed the mili- 
 tary visitor with keenest interest ; but the general bad nothing 
 to say to him. He turned to the young lady, who anticipated 
 his words by a remark upon the distinguished and truly 
 unlooked for honor conferred upon the house by the visit of 
 military gentlemen of such high rank. 
 
 " As for Captain Waldhorst," she continued, turning 
 abruptly to Victor, " we had given up the hope of ids coming 
 to see us at all." 
 
 " And yet there was a time, when he was quite at home in 
 our house," Senator May added. 
 
 "That was before he sided with our enemies," Payton 
 remarked, to the visible chagrin of the senator and his 
 daughter. 
 
 " Whatever this young gentleman may think," said the 
 general, casting a contemptuous glance at the ex-congressman, 
 and then resting his eyes with evident admiration on Nellie, 
 " You, at least, Miss May, have no cause to look upon him in 
 the light of an enemy. Nor you. Senator May. And I happen 
 to know, that there is not a heart in all your ardent South 
 more genuinely loyal to those high and chivalrous Southern 
 virtues, of which the ladies and gentlemen of this household 
 are shining examples, and which he knows so well how to 
 appreciate." 
 
 " Give me your hand, young man," said the senator, advanc- 
 toward Victor. " You have evidently greatlj^ exaggerated to 
 the general what little we have been able to do for your uncle 
 and cousin ; but I am proud to think that you bear us no 
 malice, and that you have not ceased to be a frieud, though we 
 think differently on the unfortunate quarrel that divides the 
 nation." 
 
 " Believe me, Seuator," the general addressed him, " I, too, 
 appreciate the sterling qualities which have compelled the 
 admiration of my young friend, the captain here. I am greatly 
 indel»ted to him for the privilege of having been permitted to 
 
THE TESTER TESTED. 657 
 
 shake bauds with you, without the humihatiou I must have 
 experienced, had the trial of your son taken a different turn. 
 Thanks to the fearless integrity of Captain ^^^aldhorst, our 
 side has been sjjared the stigma, whifch so great a wrong as 
 the sacrificing of justice to fancied interest, or mistaken 
 patriotism, must have fastened on us. For however grateful 
 you may feel toward the young man — and not even you can 
 know at what peril to himself, at what risk to his standing in 
 the army and reputation among his comrades he snatched 
 young May from a tragic fate — his countrj^ is indebted to him 
 for a service of infinitely greater importance to its cause — ' ' 
 
 "Spare me, General!" exclaimed Victor impatiently. 
 " You are ungenerously abusing your authority as my supe- 
 rior — " 
 
 " Silence, sir! " the general interruj)ted him, gruffly. " I 
 cannot permit my subordinates to criticise my words, or im- 
 pugn my conduct." Theu, addressing himself to the senator, 
 he continued: " I was about to say, sir, that my acquaintance 
 with you and your family has been productive of sincere re- 
 gret, but also of hopeful assurance of a bright future for our 
 country : Regret, that men having a common aim — I may add 
 without boasting — the most exalted motives, should stand 
 arrayed against each other in deadly combat. But an abiding- 
 faith, withal, in the final triumph of Right and Truth. For 
 however at fault our judgment may be, — clouded, for the 
 time, by passion and prejudice — where the purpose and aim 
 of both sides is the vindication of Right and the accomplish- 
 ment of Justice, Right and Justice will surely preyail, whichever 
 side may win." 
 
 Nellie was deeply impressed, though she looked puzzled at 
 what to her seemed a paradoxical inconsistency. But Senator 
 May, who had listened attentively, smiled drearily as he 
 answered . 
 
 "Yes, General," he said; "but it will be the Right as 
 established by our conquerors' Might ; and to the vanquished 
 it will ever remain Wrong." 
 
 42 
 
658 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 "No, Senator," rejoiued the general, in earnest though 
 gentle voice, ' If the vanquished took up arms to vindicate 
 a cause in which they have faith, — such as you have in yours, 
 and I have in mine — then they were firmly convinced that 
 Right was Might, for they appealed to Might to establish the 
 Right; and they must see, in the end, that what Might 
 establishes, is Right." 
 
 " Grant God, that this may be so," said the senator. " But 
 I am afraid that ' Convince a man against his will. He's of 
 the same opinion still.' " 
 
 " Never fear," said the general smiling. " There is won- 
 derful poAver of persuasion in the Logic of Events." Then 
 he turned to the young lady and continued: "But this is 
 indifferent comfort to the eager, impassioned young enthusiasts, 
 such as you and your brother have shown yourselves to be. 
 To you the world is still divided into two classes : On the one 
 hand the Good, to which I ain glad to know that you and all 
 of yours belong; and on the other, the Wicked, among whom, 
 I am afraid, you must class me and my young friend, the 
 captain, here, on account of our skepsis touching the Gospel 
 of Secession. To you, it will and ought to be a day of jubi- 
 lant rejoicing when, if such shall be our fate, you see us 
 humiliated and crushed. But the world will seem dark and 
 cold to you, if the God of Battles should smile on our side. 
 May the losers, whosoever they be, learn to confide in the 
 magnanimity of the conquerors, and accept the decree of the 
 Arbiter of War as the vindication of Justice ! " 
 
 " Let us shake hands on that," said the senator, " and hope, 
 that when we meet after this war is over, it will be in a Union 
 s'trengthened and purified, and guaranteeing Justice to all its 
 parts ! ' ' 
 
 Victor had meanwhile remained a silent listener. But for 
 the protest uttered against the general's laudatory speech, he 
 had uttered not a word. He regarded the gentlemen that were 
 speaking, mostly, save that now and then, when he thought 
 himself unobserved, he turned his eyes furtively on the form 
 
THE TESTER TESTED. 659 
 
 of Nellie, .standing there by Payton's side. Once, when the 
 general mentioned her classing the good and wicked, he no- 
 ticed that she was about to speak ; but she must have thought 
 better, for she closed her lips again, without saying a word. 
 But turning her eyes toward Victor, she intercepted the stolen 
 glance, looking him full in the face. He flushed deeply, as he 
 looked away from her, and noted the sullen frown on Payton's 
 face. 
 
 " Now, Senator," said the general, " I must beg of you to 
 kindly conduct me to your guests, our wounded soldiers, and 
 the ladies, whom Victor is to escort home. It is time that he 
 should be on his way, if he means to reach his first stopping 
 place before dark." 
 
 " Why, " asked Senator May," do they not accompan}' the 
 main army on the march? " 
 
 Both Mr. Boyd, the messenger from Winslo's Run, and 
 Ralph Payton listened eagerly for the answer. 
 
 " No ; his course is in quite a different direction," the gen- 
 eral mentioned. " He is to escort your guests as far as Rolla- 
 ville, where they take the train for the city, while he, Avith his 
 military escort, will proceed to the capitol, where he is to 
 report to the governor." 
 
 " Military escort? " the senator asked. " So you are going 
 to divide your forces ? ' ' 
 
 " To the extent of detailing a body guard of thi-ee men to 
 accompany the captain," said the general, smiling. " We 
 anticipate no trouble, of course ; the escort is more a matter of 
 etiquette, than a military precaution." 
 
 Whether by concert, or purely by accident, Ralph Payton 
 and the messenger from Winslo's Run exchanged rapid glances, 
 and then both turned their eyes toward Victor. 
 
 " Shall I have the pleasure of seeing you again. Miss May," 
 said the general, addressing the young lady. " Or am I to 
 say good-bye here, and now? " 
 
 Nellie, too, seemed surprised on learning that Victor was not 
 to accompany the troops. As the general addressed her, she 
 
G60 THE REBEL'S DAUOHTEB. 
 
 advanced toward him, offering her hand with a frauk smile. 
 " We have met under exciting- circumstances, General," she 
 said, " and I need not assure you that I will not soon forget 
 them. But I do wish to tell j'ou, that yoxx will be associated 
 in my memory with some of the most stirring experiences of 
 my life ; and I shall ever think of you as — an enemy, whom 
 I would like to number among my friends." 
 
 "You make me, indeed, proud," said the general, with a 
 profound bow. 
 
 " And I cherish the hope, that we may meet again under 
 more favorable auspices," she added. 
 
 "Such, indeed, is my fervent wish," the general replied, 
 reluctantly quitting the hand he had been holding ; ' ' and so I 
 make bold to say " Au revoir ! " 
 
 General Seele left the room with Senator May, and Victor 
 was in the act of following, when Nellie, in a reproachful tone, 
 exclaimed: " Captain Waldhorst ! " 
 
 Victor iDaused. 
 
 " Have you no valediction for me? " 
 
 He looked about the room, his eyes sweeping the forms of 
 Mr, Boyd and Ralph Payton. As they rested upon her face a 
 cold, haughty expression darkened his own. 
 
 "I have the honor. Miss May," he said, bowing ceremoni- 
 ously, " to say to you that I wish you may ever fare well." 
 
 "Victor!" she exclaimed, in a voice blending earnest 
 remonstrance with such tender entreaty as to thrill him to the 
 very soul. " After what you have done for us, — for us all, 
 but most of all for me — must you leave without listening to a 
 word of thanks? " 
 
 Victor was in torture. To clasp that outstretched hand, — 
 to press it to his burning lips, — were bliss supreme. But she 
 had too often toyed with his most sacred feeling, and his man- 
 hood rebelled. 
 
 Before he could respond, Payton stepped forward and seized 
 the hand which Victor had ignored. 
 
 " You lower yourself," he said, endeavoring to lead her 
 
THE TESTER TESTED. 661 
 
 away, " before this — boor, whose very presence in your par- 
 lor, in the garb of the enemies of our country, is an affront to 
 you . ' ' 
 
 Nellie flung off his hand with an angry gesture, but kejjt her 
 eye on Victor, to note the effect on him of Payton's audacious 
 assertion of authority over her. 
 
 Whatever may have been Victor's thoughts, he did not utter 
 them. One contemptuous glance of deliance he shot at Pay- 
 ton ; then bowing with icy politeness to Nellie, he left the 
 room. 
 
 For a moment she gazed at the door through Avhich he had 
 disappeared. The pallor of her cheeks gave way to a flood of 
 brilliant color as she turned her flashing eyes on Payton, only 
 to be again succeeded by the paleness of Parian marble. The 
 scathing rebuke that had seethed for utterance remained un- 
 spoken. For with the conviction, — that Payton's presence 
 had closed Victor's lij^s, and his presumptuous conduct, con- 
 sistent only with an accepted lover's privilege, driven him from 
 the room — had come the revelation of a secret that had long 
 lain dormant deep down in her heart. Now that it had leaped 
 into vivid consciousness, it kindled a passion before which all 
 previous experience paled into insignificance. 
 
 Nellie knew that she loved. It had come late to her, this 
 master passion ; but now that she was under its spell, it 
 threatened to rule with sovereign might, engrossing all other 
 interests. How lukewarm had been her most exalted enthu- 
 siasm, how tame the most thrilling excitement she had experi- 
 enced, compared with the new power that in her bosom held 
 sway supreme ! 
 
 What boots it now to put Payton to further test ? Were he 
 as brave as Achilles, or as gallant as Tancred, he must be 
 found wanting, if tried by the measure which Nelhe would 
 apply. Nor he, nor any man would henceforth approximate 
 to the standard of excellence to which Nellie had elevated her 
 ideal. 
 
 But with the recognition of her love had come the humili- 
 
662 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 atiiig consciousness, that it was an enemy to her country to 
 whom she had surrendered her heart. How could she face 
 her friends with this fateful secret burning in her bosom? 
 What would her father, what her brother say, when they 
 learned of her shameful weakness ! 
 
 Swiftly these thoughts passed through her mind. 
 
 She had not yet answered Pay ton. He stood there, regard- 
 ing her Avith a puzzled air, trying to account for her sudden 
 change of color, and the strange expression of her countenance. 
 One thing she was perfectly clear about : that she must, above 
 all things, guard her secret from this man. And she felt that 
 it might require all her tact to allay any suspicion his jealous 
 mind might entei'tain. With an effort she recovered her self- 
 possession to a sufficient degree to answer him calmly. 
 
 "You will pardon my petulance, Mr. Payton," she said. 
 "Your language to Captain Waldhorst was rude; and it an- 
 noyed me that a guest at our house should be treated rudely. 
 But you may have been right The visit of the commander of 
 the Federal troops may have been, under the circumstances, 
 in bad taste, even though he came accompanied by Captain 
 Waldhorst ; for he put a restraint on our conversation — " 
 
 " I am so proud to hear you say this," Payton interrupted. 
 " You may be sure, that it was only for your sake that I 
 ventured to remind that — Dutchman of his manners." 
 
 Nellie did have need of her power of self-control to choke 
 down the resentment of her wooer's bungling speech. Her 
 social accomplishments again stood her in stead ; she had a 
 conciliating smile ready to sugar the rebuke which her reply 
 conveyed. "Yes," she said, "and I thank you for also 
 reminding me of my manners to you. But you know he was a 
 guest under father's roof, and father, somehow, thinks so 
 much of him. And I must really go to say good-bye to the 
 Auf dem Busches, and to Captain Waldhorst's sister, though 
 the captain would nave nothing to sa}^ to me." 
 
 Slie left the room, Payton looking after her in doubting 
 mood. Mr. Boyd, who had remained, looked at Payton. He 
 
THE TESTER TESTED. ' 663 
 
 had been highly interested to see the Federal comniaiuler at the 
 house of so prominent a Southerner as Senator May, and the 
 tone of cordial amity between them was a surprise witli which 
 to embellish his report to General Ciper. 
 
 "This young woman — she's your intended, ain't she? — 
 seems to have high notions of hospitality to Union soldiers," 
 was Boyd's remark when he was alone with Pay ton. "She 
 kind of resented the interference between her and the Federal 
 captain. I thought once, that she had a sharp tongue-lashing 
 ready for you. What changed her mind, do you think? " 
 
 "I hate the d — d upstart! " Pay ton exclaimed, with an 
 angry scowl. " He's always hanging round the family. And 
 Miss May and her brother amuse themselves by a sort of pat- 
 ronizing toleration of him; and the old man — well, he lets 
 them." 
 
 " Don't you think," said the messenger, insinuatingly, 
 ' ' that the young rascal has an eye toward Miss May hisself ? ' ' 
 
 "The d — d. puppy is just fool enough to imagine such a 
 thing ! ' ' 
 
 " If I were in your place," Mr. Boyd suggested, " I'd try 
 to get rid of him. I half believe that she don't hate him a 
 bit." 
 
 "By God, I mean to! " Payton exclaimed, stung by the 
 insinuation of Mr. Boyd. 
 
 ' ' Who are the people he is going to escort ? ' ' 
 
 " Oh, an old uncle of his, and a cousin, who were wounded 
 at the battle of Winslo's Run, and who have been nursed and 
 fed here like a couple of pets." 
 
 " But I heard some ladies mentioned," said Boyd. 
 
 " Yes, two of them. His aunt and his sister." 
 
 " What a pity, that there are ladies in the crowd," sug- 
 gested Bo3'd. " Otherwise you might make a stunning haul — " 
 
 " What do you mean?" 
 
 " I mean," said Mr. Boyd, " that two Federal soldiers and 
 a captain are worth bagging, and that as a prisoner of war, the 
 captain would not be so much in your way." 
 
664 THE EEBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 Paytou evinced less surprise over this suggestion than Boyd 
 seemed to have expected. The two men looked at each other 
 for a moment, when the door opened, interrupting any reply 
 that might have been intended. It was Cressie, the slave-girl, 
 that entered. 
 
 "What do you want here?" Payton addressed her 
 brusquely. 
 
 " Misses May sent me to look for her thimble," she replied, 
 without looking at either of the men. " She suspects that she 
 lost it here this morning." 
 
 She busied herself with the search, and was taken no further 
 notice of by the men, except that they carried on their further 
 conversation in whispers. 
 
 While looking sharply about for the lost article, she had her 
 ears open also ; because the secrecy with which the two men 
 carried on their conversation had challenged her curiosity. 
 Of the conversation she caught here and there a disconnected 
 word, of which she could make nothing. But as she left the 
 room, followed by the two men, who seemed to have come to 
 some understanding, and while concealed by the shadow of 
 the staircase in the hall, as they passed her, she heard Boyd 
 say distinctly: " If they show fight, make sure of the young 
 captain first." 
 
 These words startled her. They smote upon her ears like 
 a danger-signal ominating peril to the young officer. What 
 could these men want of Captain Waldhorst ? 
 
 "If they show fight! " she ruminated. "If who showed 
 tight?" 
 
 " Make sure of the young captain first." That must mean 
 danger to the young soldier's life! 
 
 Then the word " Shackleford's " occurred to her, which she 
 had heard one of the men pronounce. And she remembered 
 the further word " morning." 
 
 "Shackleford's!" Was not that the name of a roadside 
 inn. out on the Rollaville Road? Then it flashed into her 
 mind, that she had heard Miss Pauline tell her mistress, that 
 
THE TESTER TESTED. 665 
 
 they expected to reach Shackleford's about dark, on their way 
 to Rollaville, where they would take the cars. That made it 
 certain to Cressie, that danger menaced the travelers, at that 
 inn, if they reached it by dark, and remained there that night. 
 
 Now Miss Waldhorst, as well as her uncle and cousin, had 
 treated the young slave-girl with a kindness and respectful 
 consideration, that was to her a pleasant experience, eliciting 
 on her part a feehng of profound gratitude. 
 
 But it was not any of the guests at May Meadows, that en- 
 grossed her thoughts just now. She trembled for one whom 
 she had enshrined in her innermost heart, who had, however 
 unconsciously, commanded her loyal homage, almost from the 
 first moment she had seen him, above even her beloved mis- 
 tress ; — for one whom she worshiped and adored with an 
 unhoping devotion, which nevertheless possessed the intensity 
 and ardor of passion. 
 
 Her first impulse on conceiving the danger that menaced 
 Victor, was to warn him of his peril. But it occurred to her, 
 that a simjjle statement of her suspicion, without more tangible 
 proof than her own surmises from the fragments of a conver- 
 sation overheard, would only result in one of his indulgent 
 smiles, and that he would thank her, without paying further 
 heed to her caution. And when she entered the room where 
 she supposed him to be, she learned, to her great disappoint- 
 ment and trouble, that he had ah-eady left, as well as the 
 general. 
 
 What do now ? 
 
 The guests were in the act of leaving. Senator May was 
 gallantly escorting Mrs. Auf dem Busch to the stage-coach 
 waiting for them in front of the house, on which thi-ee Federal 
 soldiers had already taken outside seats. Her husband followed , 
 accompanied by Mrs. May and leaning on the arm of Wolde- 
 mar, who, however, was not yet firm on his legs himself. 
 Pauline and Nellie walked arm in arm, both pensive to a 
 degree unusual in them. 
 
 At any other time, the deep thoughtfulness of the young 
 
666 THE BE REUS DAUGHTEB. 
 
 ladies, so entirely unlike either of them, would have given 
 Cressie cause for wonder. But her own mind was oppressed 
 with her weighty secret. In her eager solicitude to convey 
 warning to the absent captain she overlooked the circum- 
 stance that Miss Pauline was a fellow traveler with her 
 brother, and would probably share any danger to which he was 
 exposed. But as the two girls kissed each other good-bye, it 
 did occur to her, that her mistress might put the sister on her 
 guard, and that she would probably inform her brother of any 
 danger apprehended. She had just determined to speak to 
 her mistress, when Woldemar Auf dem Busch, having helped 
 his father to enter the coach, stepped back toward her and 
 said : 
 
 " I ought not to leave you, Miss Lucretia, without thauking 
 you for the kind attentions aud the uutiriug devotion which 
 you have displayed toward my father and myself. Will you 
 shake hands with me ? " 
 
 With a vivid blush, — less of pleasure, however, or even of 
 embarrassment than of pain — she submitted her hand to the 
 strong grasp, saying: " I only did what I was bid to do." 
 
 " If others did their duty as well, as cheerfully and as 
 efficiently as you did yours, then the world would be a brighter 
 place. Good-bye! " 
 
 Woldemar was followed by Pauline. She turned her eyes 
 wistfully u}? and down the road ; but Leslie was nowhere to be 
 seen, aud a look of keen disai)poiatmeut made way for the 
 sadness of resignation that settled on her face. She had hardly 
 taken her seat, when Nellie rushed to the door, and tearing it 
 open, said : 
 
 " Oh, Pauline ! I almost forgot to tell you, that Leslie asked 
 me to say good-bye to you in his name. He is so sorry that 
 he could not be here to see you off ; but the organization of 
 his company for active service tills his Avhole soul now. He 
 thinks of nothing else." 
 
 " I thank you," was Pauline's faint answer. The message 
 seemed to crush her utterly. 
 
THE TESTER TESTED. 667 
 
 Cressie stood on needles. Tlie stage was starting, and her 
 mistress stood gazing intently on tlie departing guests, Avaving 
 her handkerchief slowly. 
 
 " Don't make a spectacle of yourself ! " said Nellie's mother. 
 " Everybody is looking at you." 
 
 Nellie made no reply. " What is it, Cressie? " she said to 
 the octoroon girl, noticing her eager anxiety. 
 
 As Mrs. May followed her husband back to the house, the 
 girl approached her mistress and whispered: "Please m'm, I 
 fear Mahster Victor is in danger." 
 
 " Victor? " Nellie repeated, forgetting to chide the slave for 
 the freedom of using Victor's given name. And thei'e fol- 
 lowed a long and anxious interlocution between maid and 
 mistress. 
 
XLII. 
 
 CUPID'S COUNTER COUP. 
 
 HE capture of Victor Waldhorst aud the party with him, 
 to ])e delivered as prisoners of Avar to the Confederate 
 authorities, suggested originally by crafty Bob Rouu- 
 tree, had busily engaged the thoughts of the Honorable Ralph 
 Payton, The project itself met his hearty approval, promising, 
 among other substantial advantages, riddance of what he 
 deemed an inconvenient obstacle to his designs upon Miss May. 
 But guerrilla warfare, which later on in the war became the 
 terror of the border States, had not yet been recognized as a 
 feature of the war ; those engaged in it were looked upon as 
 outlaws and criminals, pursuing their marauding enterprises 
 for the gratification of personal malice aud rapacity. 
 
 He therefore hailed with satisfaction the suggestion of Mv. 
 Boyd, in that conversation which Cressie had partly overheard, 
 to give the affair a military coloring by obtaining from the 
 general of the Confederate forces an order for the capture of 
 the bearer of important dispatches from General Seele to the 
 military governor. A detail of two or three ^Drivate soldiers to 
 cover the transport of the prisoners to the Confederate head- 
 quarters, would certainly make the project, or at least give it 
 the appearance of, a mihtary enterprise. 
 
 While Boyd, then, hurried off to make his report to General 
 Ciper and obtain the necessary order, Ralph Payton, after 
 concerting with him the place of meeting on the Rollaville Road, 
 rushed off to talk the matter over with Bob Rountree. He 
 hoped to secure the co-operation of the crafty young man in 
 whose fertile brain the plan had originally germinated. His 
 confidence of success rested largely more on stealthy approach 
 and sudden surprise, than on the issue of an open combat. 
 
 (668) 
 
CUPID'S COUNTER COUP. ^69 
 
 But the very quality which Payton admired so highly, induced 
 the young fox to keep aloof. He was profuse in regrets and 
 plausible in excuses for denying himself the rare fun of partici- 
 pation in bagging the Dutch gang, including Leslie May's 
 sweetheart, who alone, Bob put it, was a prize for which Cap- 
 tain May might be gTateful. 
 
 While they were talking the matter over, Orlando Jones 
 burst into the room with news that the last of the Federal troops 
 had left Brookfield. 
 
 " Are you sure? " asked Payton. 
 
 " No mistake," Orlando asserted. " The last man to leave, 
 as, I believe, he was the first to enter the tow^n, was General 
 Seele himself." 
 
 " Why, he was out at May Meadows not more than an hour 
 ago," said Payton. 
 
 "I know," was Jones' answer. "I saw him come out. 
 And he wasn't alone, either. That little Dutchman that wears 
 a captain's uniform was with him ; and the two hobnobbed 
 with one another as if they were cronies. Oh, how I would 
 enjoy it to smash his nose for him ! ' ' 
 
 " But I thought you told me, Payton," said Bob Rountree, 
 " that he was escorting his kinfolks as far as Rollaville, where 
 they are to take the cars for the city ? ' ' 
 
 " Of course he is," Payton asserted. " I heard the general 
 himself say so." 
 
 " I guess that's so," said Jones. " Leastwise he was gal- 
 loping across fields when I last saw him, over toward the 
 Rolhfville Road ; and for all I know he is following the stage 
 coach this very minute." 
 
 " Then he accompanies them on horseback," mused the 
 congressman. " I wonder whether the military escort is 
 mounted also? " 
 
 " A part of them are on top of the stage-coach," Orlando 
 informed him. " I was watching when they put in the whole 
 Dutch cargo. Three blue-coats climbed on top. And who, do 
 you think, was one of them? You'll never guess in a life-time." 
 
670 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " Well? " urged both Payton and Rouutree, 
 
 " Jeffreys! " 
 
 " What — Jeffreys? " exclaimed the others, simultaneously. 
 ' ' Do you meau it ? " 
 
 "Jeffreys! " Orlaudo reiterated. "The scamp, that got 
 us into the scrape with the d — d Dutchman, that time. A 
 queer watch-dog he'U be to guard his particular pet ! " 
 
 "Yes," said Payton with a triumphant smile. "It is 
 just like committing the lamb to the jwotection of the 
 wolf." 
 
 " You are in luck, as usual, Payton," Bob Rountree 
 observed. " I shouldn't wonder, if it turned out that this is a 
 trick played by that Dutch colonel on the judge advocate that 
 bearded him on that court-martial." 
 
 " But are you sure, Orlando, that it was really Jeffreys you 
 saw?" Payton insisted. 
 
 "Sure as rolling off a log;" Mr. Jones asserted. "I 
 couldn't be mistaken in that hang-dog look of his phiz, for all 
 that he's shaved off his whiskers and wears a mustache, and 
 transmogrified himself with his soldier-trappings into a sort 
 of military cut-throat." 
 
 "Now, then, Orlando," said Pajiiou insinuatingly, "how 
 would you like to take a hand in the fun ? ' ' 
 
 "Yes, Jones," Bob Rountree seconded his friend, "this 
 comes just in your line in the soldiering business. And maybe 
 your first practice will be the smashing of your Dutch friend's 
 nose, for which your fists are itching." 
 
 Orlando shook his head. " I don't much lilce the job,'" he 
 said, " if there's a hitch anywhere, some other noses might be 
 smashed." 
 
 " But," Payton added eagerly, " there will be you, and I, 
 and Boyd. Don't you think we will be an overmatch for the 
 little Dutchman, and his invalid relatives, even if they should 
 wake up before we have secured them, which 1 don't propose 
 they shall do? " 
 
 " But how about the o-uards? " suffofcsted Jones. 
 
CUPID'S COUNTER COUP. 671 
 
 " Why, Boyd is going to bring three picived Confederate 
 soldiers," Pay ton informed him. 
 
 "And of the bhie-coats, one is Jeffreys! " Rountree ex- 
 claimed. " And that is as good as if he counted three on your 
 own side." 
 
 Orlando Jones finally allowed himself to be persuaded to be 
 of the raiding party, and promised to accompany Faytou to 
 the place of meeting on the Rollaville Road, to join Boyd and 
 his military escort, on their way to Shackleford's inn. 
 
 Meanwhile the slave-girl Cressie proceeded on the way from 
 May Meadows to the Dutch Store in Brookfield. A swiftly 
 moving mass of murky clouds eclipsed the reclining October 
 sun, and a brisk breeze soughed through the waving tree-tops 
 as she passed thi'ough the grove of stately forest trees on the 
 way to town. Her errand in the Dutch Store was an insig- 
 nificant purchase, hardly justifjdng the trip from May Meadows ; 
 but she was waited on by Mynheer Van Braaken himself, who 
 was eager to retain the custom of the May family. As she 
 was about to pay for the article she had purchased, she saw 
 Yahkop, the teamster, enter the store ; whereupon she be- 
 thought herself, that a churn was wanting in the dairy, and 
 expressed a regret that she could not carry one home with her. 
 Of course, Mynheer Van Braaken offered to send it, and com- 
 missioned Yahkop to carry it for her. So it happened, that 
 YahkojD accomjianied the girl on her way home. 
 
 Cressie, though a slave, and as such far below the social 
 scale of even Yaliko^), was too well bred to speak to a white 
 man unless first spoken to ; and as Yahkop, shy and awkward 
 as he felt in the presence of ladies, drew no distinction between 
 the lady-like slave girl and a real lady, conversation between 
 the two was not lively. 
 
 The wind increased as the evening wore on. When they 
 entered the grove, it shrieked and whistled tlii'ough the 
 branches, stripping them of the seer and yellow autumn 
 leaves, shaking them down in rustling showers, spinning them 
 about in whirling eddies, and when reaching the ground, still 
 
<372 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 chasing them onward, in a rolling, bounding, leaping race, as 
 if eager to reach May Meadows before the silent pedestrians. 
 Yahkoj^ seemed to enjoy the sport of the merrily dancing- 
 leaves ; but Cressie looked anxiously upward, at the swaying, 
 storm-tossed treetops and at the threatening clouds visible in 
 the sky beyond. 
 
 " Do you think it will rain?" asked the girl, finally; not, 
 evidently, by way of making conversation, but in such anxious 
 tone as to rouse the attention of even Yahkop. 
 
 He looked at her with a kind of commiserating contempt. 
 " Yahs," he replied, after a close scrutiny of the clouds, " I 
 guess it vill rehn. Mahbe to-night it vill rehn. Und der sun 
 vill shine in der morning." 
 
 " Will it shine on him? " Cressie involuntarily asked her- 
 self, but did not put the thought in words. She said, instead, 
 with a wan little smile, "Do you think so?" For she 
 wronged the teamster with the suspicion that he had attempted 
 to perpetuate a joke, which politeness required her to appreciate. 
 
 " Shoor! " he comforted her. And this w^as the extent of 
 their conversation until reaching May Meadows. 
 
 When he was about to leave, after depositing his burden in the 
 kitchen, Cressie invited him to Miss May's room to receive 
 payment for the churn. 
 
 Miss May received him with a smile of captivating friend- 
 liness, thanking him as if he had performed the errand at 
 her own request. . As she counted out the money she put 
 several questions to him about his affairs, which made the 
 honest teamster think her exceedingly inquisitive. 
 
 " Did you see much of your old comrade Victor when he 
 was here? " was one of the questions she asked. 
 
 " Fictohr? " he repeated, his face brightening with an inter- 
 est she hardly deemed him capable of entertaining. " Fictohr 
 be an cap'n now und he come, und he shehk hands mit me und 
 mit der boss. Und if he got an cumpanee, I fight mit he." 
 
 " Ah, you would like to be a soldier," said Nellie insinuat- 
 ingly. " Wouldn't you like to join my brother's company? " 
 
• CUPID'S COUNTER COUP. 673 
 
 " Capt'u Meh, he belongs mit der Sout ; mid I fights der 
 Sout," he explained. 
 
 "1 see. Aud I suppose you like Mr. Waldhorst very 
 luuch'r " 
 
 " I likes Capt'u Meh ; uud I likes Fictohr more better." 
 
 " And would you be willing, Mr. Yahkop — pardon me for 
 not knowing your other name — to put yourself to some trouble 
 to save your friend from great danger ? ' ' 
 
 " Vhat you mean? " asked Yahkop, in astonishment. 
 
 " I am afraid Victor has some enemies," Nellie said, speak- 
 ing very earnestly. " You know, do you not, that Mr. Roun- 
 tree, for instance, is not friendly to him? " 
 
 " Bop? " inquired Yahkop. " Der shneak vhat runned off 
 from der Dutcli shtohi-? " 
 
 ' ' And Mr, Jones — ' ' 
 
 ' ' Der old man Tshones ? I ken lick him ! ' ' 
 
 " Orlando Jones, I mean — " 
 
 ' ' Vhat Fictohr ken lick alretty once befohr ? ' ' the teamster 
 interrupted eagerly. " Fictohr don't be afraid from him." 
 
 " But there is one who is more formidable than these, and 
 who has never gotten over a boyish quarrel, in which Mr. 
 Waldhorst worsted him. I mean Mr. Pay ton." 
 
 Nellie had involuntarily betrayed deep apprehension, and 
 Yahkop listened with some alarm to her latter words. But when 
 she mentioned Payton's name his face brightened for a moment 
 in evident relief, and instantly assumed an expression of pro- 
 found contempt. 
 
 "Pehton?" he repeated scornfully. "Vhat goes to der 
 Cohn-gre'ss ! Bah ! He be one awful bully mit hismout, uud 
 one shneak uud cowert mit his heart." 
 
 Yahkop 's blunt characterization of the man who aspired to 
 her hand, stung Nellie to the quick. *' Bully ! " he had called 
 him. " Coward ! " Her first impulse was to resent the affront 
 on the part of this boorish clown, so far beueath her and beneath 
 this man in social standing. But it occurred to her, that Yah- 
 kop stood before her on her own invitation, and for a purpose 
 
 43 
 
674 THE BE BE us DAUGHTER. 
 
 of pressing importance. And it came to lier with a pang that 
 blenched lier cheeks, that he had but used plain and unpolished 
 language to express wliat the high-spirited young belle had 
 begun to suspect herself. 
 
 When she resumed the conversation, her color returned in a 
 vivid blush, unnoticed, probably, by her downright auditor, 
 as she ti'ied to conceal her own feeling, and yet impress upon 
 Yahkop the peril of his friend, if not warned in time. " If 
 we can give him, or those with him, notice," she concluded, 
 " the danger may be easily averted ; for I do not believe Mr. 
 Payton contemplates an open attack. His plan is, probably, 
 to surprise them unawares." 
 
 " Like an shneak, und an cowert! " Yahkop muttered ; but 
 he eagerly volunteered to place himself under Miss May's 
 directions for any service to which she might put him. It was 
 finally arranged, that Cressie should proceed to Shackle- 
 ford's and there seek admission to the house through some 
 of the colored servants, and thus communicate with Victor's 
 sister* 
 
 " Cressie is anxious to serve these jjeople, who have been 
 very kind to her," Nellie explained, " and would willingly 
 undertake the message alone. But there is the greatest dan- 
 ger, that a slave away from home in the night time would 
 surely be held up and taken into custody, and that would frus- 
 trate the whole plan. It is therefore that I am so anxious to 
 have some one accompany Cressie on this ride. With a white 
 man accompanying, she will not be molested." 
 
 Yahkop's ready acquiescence took a load off Nellie's mind. 
 She requested him to hold himself in readiness to meet Cressie 
 in the grove on the way to Brookfield, so that no one might see 
 them start together. "For you will understand," she. ex- 
 plained to him, " that neither my brother, nor any of his 
 friends, must ever find out that either Cressie or I have helped 
 a Union soldier to escape. Cressie would be cruelly punished, 
 I fear, if it were discovered that she had a hand in the rescue. 
 And I don't know what would happen to me ; for my brother 
 
CUPID'S COUNTER COUP. 675 
 
 and his company of recruits are very zealous jjartisans of the 
 South." 
 
 Yahkop took his departure with the promise of pi'ompt 
 appearance at the tryst with the girl. 
 
 At the gate he was met by Leslie May, who was returning 
 from a drill of his company in the town, and greeted the well- 
 known te*amster in his usual pleasant manner ; wondering, how- 
 ever, what could have brought him to May Meadows. 
 
 In the house he accosted his sister with the laconic question : 
 "Have they gone?" Whereat she blushed, and answered 
 with equal brevity " Yes." 
 
 " What had Van Braaken's teamster to do here? " he 
 asked her. 
 
 Her answer was cut off by the entrance of Senator May, 
 who seemed glad to meet his son, and somewhat eagerly asked 
 him, whether he knew of the expected arrival of General Ciper 
 and his staff. 
 
 " They will be here within an hour," Leslie answered. 
 
 "I am very glad," the old gentleman remarked, " that our 
 guests are safely out of the house. It would have been 
 awkward all around, if the Confederate officers had found 
 Federal soldiers quartered with us." 
 
 ' ' What would they have done in such case ? ' ' Nellie 
 asked . 
 
 '• Made prisoners of them, I suppose," Leslie answered, 
 with ostentatious indifference, which Nellie easily perceived was 
 assumed. 
 
 " Shocking! " Nellie exclaimed. " Surely they would not 
 have violated the obligations of hospitahty to such an extent ? 
 Think of it — to lay violent hands on our guests, on Victor's 
 friends, after what he has done for us ! " 
 
 " I do not think I should have suffered it," said the old 
 gentleman, with proud dignity. 
 
 "It is indeed well, that the occasion for you to test your 
 authority as master of the house has passed away," Leshe 
 observed. " For I fear that j^our opposition to Victor's arrest 
 
G76 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 if he had been here, or that of any of his friends , would not 
 have availed them. A soldier's duty is paramount, even to the 
 claims of hospitalitj'." 
 
 "Mr. Auf dem Busch and his son are wounded soldiers," 
 said Senator May, " and they ought to have been as safe under 
 our roof, as under the yellow flag of a hospital, which all civil- 
 ized nations respect. As to Victor, that is a different matter. 
 He is an officer on active duty. And from what I know of 
 him, he would be the last man to complain, if the fortune of 
 war should cast him into a Confederate prison." 
 
 " A fate," said Leslie, " that may very likely overtake him 
 as it is. I understand that he has an escort with him of only 
 three men, in passing through a district that is thoroughly 
 Southern in sentiment, and bitterly incensed against the mili- 
 tary governor. Under these circumstances, the uniform he 
 wears will rouse their anger, and the escort prove an element 
 of danger rather than a protection ; for what can three or four 
 men avail against an infuriated mob ? ' ' 
 
 "Your fears are unfounded, I take it," said his father, 
 " Victor is well known to most of the people in this region, and 
 generally liked. He will not be molested. Unless, indeed," 
 he added, a little more seriously, " he should fall a victim to 
 the treachery of some personal enemy." 
 
 " He has personal enemies," Leslie rejoined, also in more 
 serious tone than was habitual to him. " And it might not be 
 held treachery to waylay and surprise an enemy bearing dis- 
 patches to the hostile commander. Nor am I quite easy as to 
 what may befall his uncle and cousin, or even the ladies with 
 him." 
 
 "For shame, Leslie!" his sister hotly protested. "How 
 can you so cruelly wrong our brave defenders, as to deem 
 them capable of making war on women ? ' ' 
 
 "I have no fear that our soldiers, will do so," Leslie re- 
 plied. "But Victor's enemies are not soldiers, though, per- 
 haps, they may wear a uniform. There are miscreants who 
 disgrace their uniform ; whose valor takes the shape of cunning 
 
CUPID'S VOUNTEll COUP. 677 
 
 and intrigue, — wlio do tlieir ligliting ))y steulth, uud upon 
 those least able to strike back. To such, neither age nor sex is 
 sacred . " 
 
 Nellie's cheeks turned paler. Leslie's words greatly inten- 
 sified her alarm for Victor's safety. Never had anxiety so 
 harrowing oppressed her heart before : not even when her 
 brother's life had hung trembling in the balance. Oh, that 
 Cressie may reach there in time ! Oh, that Yahkop be punctual 
 to meet her ! 
 
 Should she take Leslie into her confidence ? For a moment 
 she harbored the thought. He could, with half a dozen of his 
 men, shield from threatening danger the man, who had stood 
 between him and a felon's doom. 
 
 But then she remembered that she must not betray her secret. 
 The very thought of it sent the blood in a mighty rush to her 
 face and forehead. Not a living soul, — least of all, just now, 
 her brother — must suspect that a foreigner, a Northerner, a 
 Federal otlicer, commanded the homage of her heart. And she 
 knew that she could not ask her brother to interfere without 
 betraying herself. 
 
 But it was torture to rest idly, with that terrible uncertainty 
 as to Victor's fate oppressing her. Her fertile imagination 
 conjured up a thousand possible contingencies each one of 
 which might prevent the message from reaching him in time, 
 or render it unavailing if it should reach him. Those porten- 
 tous words, " Make sure of the young captain first," contin- 
 ued to haunt her, until anxiety and excitement goaded her into 
 the resolution to join in the midnight ride herself. 
 
 It surprised her to find what relief there was in having 
 formed that resolution. She set about the task at once to 
 make such arrangements as would conceal her absence from 
 home. Nellie was not an adept at lying ; but her simulation 
 of being trouliled by a violent headache — a malady so unusual 
 to her, that it was difficult to summon the requisite patience to 
 stifie her vexation and annoyance — was a piece of superb 
 acting that would have been creditable in a professional. To 
 
678 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 deceive her father and brother was easy enougli ; but even her 
 mother was vexed by the imj^atience and petulance displayed 
 by her wayward daughter, and advised her, before the evening 
 meal had been concluded, to carry her violent headache and 
 savage temper to bed. 
 
 " You are right. Mama," she answered, rising from the 
 table. "To bed I shall go; and I give fair warning that 
 nothing short of an earthquake will induce me to open the door 
 of my bed-room before to-morrow morning." 
 
 Meanwhile Boyd had met the Confederate general, who Avas 
 on his way to Brookfield with his staff and a small detachment 
 of troops, and brought him the tiding — no longer a matter of 
 news to General Ciper, however, of the evacuation of the town 
 by the Federal forces. A more interesting piece of news was 
 the report by Boyd of the conversation he had heard between 
 General Seele and Senator May, in which the messenger 
 emphasized the cordiality between them, and the friendly foot- 
 ing on which the Federal general and a young cajDtain accom- 
 panying him had been received at the senator's house. And 
 when the messenger further mentioned, that the young captain 
 was now on his way to the capital — bearing, probably, 
 important dispatches to the military governor — escorting, at 
 the same time, a party of relatives, that had for a long time 
 been guests at the senator's house, it was the general himself 
 who promptly ordered the capture of the whole party, directing 
 them to be brought before him as prisoners of war. 
 
 " You may take a corporal's guard of picked men," he said, 
 " whom I put under your command. Proceed at once, so as 
 not to miss them at the inn of which you spoke. And as to 
 Senator May," he added thoughtfully, " why, his conduct 
 will bear looking to. I suspect that he is but a lukewarm 
 supporter of our cause." 
 
 ' ' He is a firm believer in the policy of restoring the old 
 Union," Mr. Boyd volunteered to suggest. "He is different 
 from his son in that respect, who is a rampant rebel. He has 
 
CUPID'S COUNTER COUP. 679 
 
 raised quite a company of volunteers, — active, entliusiastic 
 felloAvs, who are l)uruing for a chance to drive out the foreign 
 invaders from our State." 
 
 " They shall have that chance," said the general. " I shall 
 gladly welcome so valuable an addition to our forces. — Has 
 the general any other children ? ' ' 
 
 " Only a daughter." 
 
 " Why, yes ; I remember having heard of her at Washing- 
 ton. She was mentioned as a lady of great beauty, who 
 played havoc with the hearts of her numerous admirers ; and 
 as being an ardent supporter of the Southern cause." 
 
 "There is no mistake about her beauty," Boyd admitted, 
 adding with apparent reluctance, " but as to her Southern 
 sentiments there may be room for doubt. She seemed to me to 
 be rather partial to the Federal officer that was with General 
 Seele, during the few minutes that I saw her." 
 
 " Coquetry, I dare say," the general replied with a smile, 
 and graciously dismissed Mr. Boyd, to select the men he 
 wished to take with him. 
 
 And so, while the general and his staff proceeded on their 
 way toward Brookfield, Mr. Boyd and the guard he had selected 
 galloped across the country toward the Rollaville road, to the 
 place appointed for the meeting with Payton. He chuckled on 
 learning from Orlando .Jones, whom he gladly welcomed as an 
 addition to their number, that Jeffreys, Captain Waldhorst's 
 implacable enemy, was among the guards of the other party. 
 
 " It bids fair to be easy work for us," he remarked to Pay- 
 ton, " if we should happen to reach there while Jeffreys is on 
 duty as sentinel. We may bag the whole lot of them, women 
 and all, before they can rub the sleep out of their eyes." 
 * * * 
 
 Instead of one, Yahkop found two women waiting for him at 
 the appointed rendezvous, both closely veiled, mounted on 
 steeds which the practiced eye of the teamster recognized, not- 
 withstanding the darkness, as the finest out of Colonel May's 
 stable. One of these he knew must be the slave-girl Cressie, 
 
680 THE BEBEU8 D AUGHT EB. 
 
 though he could uot distinguish which. The other, then, must 
 be Miss May herself. It puzzled him to imagine what weighty 
 reason could have induced the daughter of Senator May to 
 brave the howling storm at so late an hour of the night, merely 
 to see her slave safely off in the company of a white man. For 
 darkness had indeed set it. Not a star twinkled in the sky ; an 
 inky canopy of dense clouds spread from horizon to horizon in 
 every direction. The storm of the afternoon, which had oc- 
 casioned Cressie's misgiving, had increased to a tempest, 
 sweeping over the land with terrific fury. No sound was audi- 
 ble save its dismal wails, swelling into angry howls as it vented 
 its wrath upon the writhing tree- tops, and now and again the 
 crackling crash of a branch or limb wrenched from its quaking 
 trunk. It hardly needed Yahkop's urgent warning to apprise 
 them of the danger from the proximity of the storm-tossed 
 trees, and caused them to pass through the grove as speedily 
 as jDOssible. Out in the open prairie, though exposed to the 
 full fury of the storm that now raged with the violence of a 
 hurricane, they breathed more freely, as though they had left 
 danger behind. Still it was difficult to converse. The fierce 
 blasts of Boreas shrieked about their ears, and cut off, as with 
 a knife, the words as they left the lips of the speaker. But 
 Nellie managed to make Yahkop understand, that, to his great 
 astonishment, she meant to be one of the party proceeding 
 toward Shackleford's that night. 
 
 As yet, not a drop of rain had fallen. But soon the distant 
 roll of thunder added its diapason to the shrill treble of the 
 piping wind, and sudden flashes of lightning, playing in the 
 far off clouds, made visible the intense blackness of the night. 
 The weather-hardened teamster shook his head, marveling at 
 the pluck of a young lady whom he had regarded in the light 
 of a pampered pet, and who now calmly and serenely braved 
 an uproar of the elements calculated to strike terror into the 
 hearts of boldest men. Her conduct was an enigma to him, 
 which he finally dismissed with another shake of his bothered 
 head. 
 
CUPID'S COUNTER COUP. 681 
 
 But Cressie, though her anxiety was uot less keen than that 
 of her mistress, and though she would, to serve the man whom 
 she secretly worshi])ed, unflinchingly brave danger and death, 
 had inherited from her remote African ancestry an intense fear 
 of thunderstorms, and now trembled like an aspen leaf. She 
 kept as closely by the side of her mistress as she could. In- 
 deed, it was necessary that the nocturnal travelers should 
 separate from each other as little as possible, else there might 
 be danger of missing each other entirely, on account of the 
 intense darkness. 
 
 Under the circumstances, their progress was but slow. 
 Before they reached the woods, through which the remainder 
 of the road lay, the rain poured down in torrents. The wind 
 abated somewhat, but the lightning became more vivid, and 
 the peals of thunder grew louder, and succeeded each other 
 more rapidly, to the terror of poor Cressie. They were rather 
 glad when they reached the wood ; for the trees afforded some 
 protection against the driving rain. Yahkop proposed a halt 
 for a while, if they could find a sheltered nook ; but Nellie 
 would not hear of it. After proceeding for some distance in 
 the wood, Nellie's horse came to a halt, and refused to go on. 
 She was slightly in advance of the others, and when Yahkop 
 came up, he dismounted, leading his horse by the bridle to 
 reconnoiter. He found the road obstructed by a large tree, 
 extended entirely across it, having evidently been blown down 
 by the storm. While communicating the result of his exam- 
 ination to Miss May, the sky was suddenly illumined, turning 
 the blackness of the night into the glare of the midday sun. 
 A bolt of fire shot from the clouds, striking the ground appar- 
 ently within a few feet of the road. Simultaneously with a 
 shriek of agony from Cressie, a terrific clap of thunder shook 
 the very earth, and was echoed in a deafening roar reverberating 
 through the woods. 
 
 Nellie now saw what Yahkop had been at some pains to 
 describe to her. But Yahkop himself took advantage of the 
 momentary light to scan the surroundings. His quick eye dis- 
 
682 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 cerned at once that it would be impossible to lead or urge the 
 horses across the fallen tree. But he also noticed traces of 
 horses' hoofs in the down-trodden grass around the stump. It 
 was evident that some persons had passed this way since the 
 tree had fallen ; and the teamster communicated this surmise 
 to his companion. 
 
 " Oh," exclaimed Miss May, " we shall be too late! Who 
 else could it be that traveled in a night like this, but Victor's 
 enemies ? ' ' 
 
 And she became more urgent in her demand for the utmost 
 speed possible to them, 
 
 Yahkop, accordingly, led his horse and carefully felt his way 
 around the stump, insisting that the ladies should dismount 
 also, and lead their horses ; for the darkness, more dense than 
 before the vivid illumination, made it dangerous to venture on 
 horseback into the thick growth of trees that lined the road on 
 both sides. 
 
 When they had gained the other side of the fallen tree, 
 Yahkop assisted them to mount again, and they pursued their 
 way as rapidly as was prudent under the circumstances. Pres- 
 sently, the rain ceased, and the storm abated its violence. 
 The sky began to clear up, and the moon, just past its full, 
 was dimly visible by the time they reached the vicinity of 
 Shackleford's inn. They halted in a thicket some distance 
 from the house. 
 
 No light was visible in any of the windows. Yet Yahkop 
 thought he saw a shadow moving away from the door, followed 
 by another and another. " Yes," Miss May replied to the 
 whispered communication of his suspicion. 
 
 "I guess, mehbe, secesh fellers be 'round. Odder mehbe 
 Bop Rountree, odder Mishter Pehton. Cressie, shneak you up 
 and see, und gum und seh, who ish dere." 
 
 Frightened as Cressie had been by the lightning, she now 
 wished for a vivid flash, and would have welcomed even the 
 clap of thunder, if she had been able to see what was going on 
 at the inn. But when her mistress seconded the suggestion 
 
CUPID'S COUNTER COUP. 683 
 
 of Yahkop, she took it as an order, aud proceeded to obey. 
 The storm was about over, and the flashes of lightning too far 
 off to afford much illumination ; but as she stealthily ap- 
 proached the building, she distinctly saw a number of men 
 moving toward the woods in the rear of the house. She quickly 
 removed her veil, and thought she saw too, that some of the 
 men had their hands tied behind them, and that these were 
 being led by the others. But even as she gazed after them, 
 they disappeared in the woods. 
 
 Cressie crept softly toward the outbuilding in the rear of the 
 house, where she hoped to find one of the negroes. Before 
 she reached it the sight of two men rooted her to the spot 
 and curdled her blood. Distinctly visible in the light of the 
 moon that had broken through the clouds, she saw Payton 
 and — Jeffreys, approach from the woods. Pressing closely 
 to the wall of the house, she was unobserved by the men, who 
 whispered energetically to one another as they passed her. 
 
 "Wait till Boyd gets back with the guards," she heard 
 Payton hiss out. 
 
 "Make sure of the young Dutchman fust! " Jeffreys an- 
 swered. " You 'n' me ken gag 'im an' tie 'im in a jiffy. 1 
 know the room 'at 'e sleeps in." 
 
 But Payton seemed averse to proceed in the absence of Boyd. 
 He stopped at the door, looking back in the direction they 
 had come from. " They must be here in a minute," he whis- 
 pered. " One or two of the guards can watch the Feds, and 
 Boyd and Jones will soon return, aud then we will be sure of 
 our game." 
 
 Jeffreys ripped out an oath of impatience, but acquiesced. 
 As he looked about, surveying the surroundings by the light 
 of the moon that now shone brightly, he detected the figure of 
 a woman standing in the shadow of the building. Nudging 
 his companion, he clutched his revolver, and moved slowly 
 toward the dimly visible figure. 
 
 Silent as death stood Cressie, leaning closely to the wall. 
 But when she saw him approach, and knew that he must recog- 
 
684 THE REBEL' >^ DAUGHTEB. 
 
 nize her, she uttered a piercing scream that rang out loudly in 
 the deep stillness of the night, and darted away with the swift- 
 ness of a frightened doe. 
 
 ' ' Stand ! " he shouted frantically after her, as he rushed 
 forward in pursuit. " Stand, or I'll send a bullet after ye, 
 at'll fetch ye ! " 
 
 Cressie, however, was less afraid of his bullet than of falling 
 into the power of the brutal overseer, and ran, as if her life 
 depended on her speed. 
 
 For a moment it seemed as if the frightened girl would dis- 
 tance her pursuer. Her outcry had stirred up quite a com- 
 motion. Yahkop had heard it, and he rushed to the rescue. 
 From a different direction Orlando Jones and Boyd sped 
 toward the flying girl, followed by two of the Confederate 
 guards, who had stowed away the Federals whom Jeffreys had 
 Ijetrayed to them in their sleep. Cressie had not, in her terror, 
 noticed the two men running at her, and before Yahkop had 
 reached the scene, Jones had suddenly grasped her by the arm, 
 and in the next instant she was seized by Jeffreys, who held 
 her in a vice-like grip. 
 
 "Aha! " he shouted, with a grin of diabolical triumph, 
 " I've got ye at last, me sassy wench! Jist come 'long o' 
 me. Honey ; I mean to freeze to yer, this time !" 
 
 Jeffreys Avas about to drag her to the woods, where they had 
 left the Federal soldiers under guard of a Confederate sentinel, 
 when Yahkop caught up with him. 
 
 " You let go dat lehdy! " he thundered out, at the same 
 time hauling off with his mighty list for a blow that would 
 have effectually cooled down the kidnaper's ardor, but for 
 the interference of Jones and Boyd, both of whom grasped the 
 teamster's arm, and thus gave Jeffreys an opportunity to tear 
 himself and the girl away, while the struggle between them and 
 Yahkop raged fiercely. 
 
 But the girl's desperation lent a strength to her limbs that 
 effectually battled him in his design of carrying her off, and 
 before he had dragged her many steps, Captain Waldhorst 
 
CUPID'S COUNTER COUP. 685 
 
 appeared on the scene. Having been awakened from his sleep 
 by Cressie's scream, he leaped out of bed, struck a light, and 
 donned his nether garments. Too eager to learn the cause of 
 the strange outcry to take time to dress, he rushed out in shirt 
 sleeves. Seeing the wrestling between Yahkop and his assail- 
 ants, the Confederate soldiers approaching them, his first 
 thought was to run back for his weapons. But recognizing the 
 girl Cressie in her struggle with Jeffreys, he lost no time, but 
 ran to her assistance at once. 
 
 Nellie May, on hearing Cressie's scream, had followed 
 Yahkop for some distance. But when she saw Victor plunge 
 out of the house, she shrank back, abashed by the thought of 
 betraying her presence to him. Instinctively she sought a 
 place to hide herself. But her interest in the development of 
 the scene before her was too intense to permit her to lose sight 
 of the actors for a single moment. 
 
 Victor, half clad as he was, rushed upon Jeffreys. " Let 
 go that girl! " he commanded, using almost the same words 
 that Yahkop had addressed to him. Jeffreys, holding on to the 
 girl with his left hand, used his right arm to parry the blow 
 that Victor aimed at his face. In the rough-and-tumble fight 
 that ensued, Jeffreys was compelled to unhand Cressie. But 
 even then he was no match for the vigorous young captain, 
 notwithstanding the i^-ce passion that infuriated him. In a 
 second he lay sprawling on the ground, and Victor, holding 
 him by the throat, shouted to Cressie to run into the house. 
 
 From her hiding place, that served her as a point of observa- 
 tion, Nellie looked eagerly on. A thrill of admiration swelled 
 her bosom as she witnessed the dexterity and ease with which 
 his sinewy arm bore down his infuriated antagonist. But her 
 exultation over Victor's prowess was speedily dispelled by 
 intensest anxiety ; for Payton, who had gone to meet the Con- 
 federate guards, returned, leading them to the assault on Vic- 
 tor. Again she remembered the words of the conspirators : 
 ' ' Make sure of the young captain first ! ' ' and they caused her 
 heart to beat in dire apprehension. Their verification seemed 
 
686 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 inevitable : tliree, — four to one was odds enough to make sure 
 of any man, though armed to the teeth ; and Victor had no 
 weapon. 
 
 A ray of hope relieved for a brief moment the intensity of 
 her fear. It was when she saw Woldemar Auf dem Buseh 
 emerge from the house, followed a moment later by his father. 
 Cressie's cry had awakened them from their sleep. Woldemar 
 had jumped out of bed, hurried on his clothing, snatched up 
 his revolver, and dashed out of the house to ascertain the 
 meaning of that outcry. 
 
 But she reflected that Woldemar was barely convalescent from 
 his wound, and that his father was little better than an invalid. 
 Of what avail would they be in a fierce fight ? There was little 
 of comfort in the reflection. 
 
 As soon as Jeffreys had quitted his hold of the girl, Victor 
 called out to her to make good her escape, and released his 
 discomfited opponent, who, as soon as he had regained his 
 feet, again pursued Cressie, but did not reach her before 
 Woldemar was at her side. 
 
 A sharp altercation ensued for a moment between Woldemar 
 and Jeffreys, interrupted by the girl herself, who pointed 
 toward Victor, now defending himself against the attack by the 
 soldiers, and said, in accents of the deepest solicitude, " Oh, 
 see, what they are doing with Master \A^ldhorst! " 
 
 ' ' Take care of this fellow ! ' ' Woldemar shouted to his 
 father, and ran to Victor's assistance. 
 
 Old Auf dem Busch, nothing loth, pointed his revolver at 
 Jeffreys and said: "Quiet, now, my comrade! You have a 
 blue uniform on ; also I. So we will not fight. If you show 
 me your hands, and reach not for your pistol, I shoot not. If 
 you reach for your pistol, you are a dead man before you reach 
 your pistol." 
 
 Jeffreys fumed and raged ; but he saw cold determination in 
 Auf dem Busch's eye, and made no attempt to draw his 
 weapon. 
 
 Nellie, looking on with keenest anxiety, was horrified to see 
 
CUPID'S COUNTER COUP. 687 
 
 another Confederate soldier emerge from the woods, and mak- 
 ing straight for Yahkop, who was still wrestling with Jones and 
 Boyd. She was sure, then, that the sturdy teamster could 
 hold out no longer, and that Victor would be attacked by the 
 united force of the enemy. 
 
 Nellie's soul was wrapped up in watching the fierce struggle. 
 It escaped her notice that Cressie had darted away toward the 
 woods, and that Jeffreys was only prevented from running 
 after by Auf dem Busch's ready revolver. It was Victor that 
 concentrated her attention. He was fighting with the fearless- 
 ness of a lion, keeping his assailants at bay with mighty blows 
 to the right and left. The strength displayed by his muscular 
 arms amazed her, while the lightning-like rapidity and easy 
 grace of his motions compelled her admiration. His valor 
 kindled a glowing enthusiasm in her wildly beating heart : for 
 the man that was holding his own against such heavy odds was 
 the man that had conquered her love. 
 
 What a contrast between him and her Southern beau ! A 
 hot blush of shame she felt on recalling that a few brief hours 
 before she had idealized the latter into the ' ' conquering hero ' ' 
 of her dreams, — him, who stood there, at a safe distance be- 
 yond the reach of Victor's brawny arms, cavalierly baiting his 
 subordinates to the attack. She shuddered at the thought how 
 near she had come to give her life into the keeping of this sham 
 hero. 
 
 But it is not a time to indulge in reflection. The report of 
 fire-arms rings out — two i:)istol shots in quick succession. 
 Jeffreys has broken and run ; for there is Cressie, returning 
 from the wood, followed by the two Federal guards, whom she 
 has freed from their fetters. Auf dem Busch has fired and 
 missed ; but a bullet from Woldemar's revolver, who has turned 
 upon seeing his father in danger, takes fatal effect. At this 
 moment, when Woldemar's back is turned, Pay ton suddenly 
 covers Victor with his revolver and calls out to the guards : 
 " Make sure of him now ! " This rouses Nellie to the highest 
 pitch of excitement. Forgetting all else in the intensity of her 
 
688 THE REBEL'S DAUQHTEB. 
 
 fear for Victor's life, she rushes forth into tlie midst of the 
 combatants, uttering, in a voice blending ineffable tenderness 
 with the anguish of alarm, the single cry: 
 
 " Victor! " 
 
 The sudden apparition causes awe and consternation. Pay- 
 ton lowers his pistol, and gazes in mute astonishment. Even 
 the guards are startled, and for a moment stand inactive, 
 while Jones and Boyd, who have approached, stand agog. 
 
 But on Victor that cry has a magical effect. He, too, 
 gazes for a moment in bewilderment. He is utterly at a loss 
 to comprehend the meaning of Nellie's presence. Then sud- 
 denly the thought flashes into his mind, that Nellie must have 
 been advised of the contemplated midnight attack, and has 
 come to save him! The deathly pallor of her face, the look 
 of energetic defiance with which she rushed between him and 
 his assailants, is compatible with no other theory, than that 
 she is there for his sake — that she loves him ! 
 
 For a second the too sudden revelation dazes him with its 
 dazzling brightness. But as he realizes the truth, ever fiber 
 of his body thrills with ecstatic joy. There is no time for 
 words ; for one of the Confederate guards, taking advantage 
 of his bewilderment, rushes in upon him. Nellie has seen the 
 motion, and would have thrown herself in the way of the 
 thi-eatened blow, but that Victor, electrified by the sight of 
 Nellie's peril, springs upon his assailant with the vigor of an 
 infuriated tiger. 
 
 The melee has now become general, but is ended by the 
 appearance of the two Federal guards, whom Cressie has 
 released, and who, with the aid of Yahkop and the two Auf 
 dem Busches, quickly overpower the Confederates. Jones is 
 the first to seek safety- for himself in flight. Boj^d, in terrible 
 wrath over his defeat, follows ; and Payton slinks away, cowed 
 and deeply mortified to witness Victor's triumph. 
 
 Victor, as soon as he finds time to breathe, looks about for 
 Nellie, whom he longs to embrace. She is in deep conversa- 
 tion with Yahkop. He is horrified to find himself in his shirt- 
 
CUPID'S COUNTER COUP. 689 
 
 sleeves, aud runs hastily into tlie liouse to complete his toilet. 
 As he passes Woldeniar, he is a little surprised to see the 
 redoubtable warrior actually bend his knees before the slave 
 girl, who looks deeply distressed, aud is evidently trying to 
 disengage her hand from his grasp. But he passes on, his 
 heart beating violently in anticipation of his meeting with 
 Nellie. 
 
 He finishes dressing in a wonderfully short time. But 
 when he reappears, he finds no Nellie ; and Yahkop and 
 Cressie have disappeared as well. 
 
 To his eager questioning. Woldemar makes answer, with a 
 sad smile, "Yes; she is gone. And she has taken Cressie 
 with her ! " 
 
 44 
 
XLIII. 
 
 GLIMPSES OF WAR. 
 
 f AY MEADOWS is gay with military pageantry. Gen- 
 eral Ciper and staff made it their headquarters 
 while the army under his commad are marching 
 through Brookfield in pursuit of the Federals, who have a full 
 day's march the start of them. Now has come the long looked 
 for opportunity for Leslie Ma}'^ and his companj' of volunteers 
 to join the army of the Southern Confederacy. The general 
 has graciously consented to review the eager recruits. It is a 
 proud day for the young captaiu, as in realization of his ardent 
 ambition he finds himself in command of as gallant a body of 
 young patriots as ever swore allegiance to the Confederate 
 States of America. 
 
 It is a proud day, too, for his sister Nellie as she gazes, with 
 adoring eyes, upon her brother, who is gravely marching at the 
 head of that baud of chosen heroes. She notes the hearty good 
 will and confidence beaming upon him from the faces of sub- 
 ordinates ; nor do the approving glances of the reviewing officers 
 escape her observing eye. Leslie May is the center attracting 
 all eyes. 
 
 Not less proud a day is it for the ])atriotic belles of Brook- 
 field, assembled there to do honor to the young aspirants for 
 military fame, and to feast their eyes upon the martial specta- 
 cle presented by the soldiers in their natty gray uniforms, 
 marching, countermarching and deploying before them, their 
 bayonets glittering in the bright October sun. Right well do 
 these deserve the praises lavished upon them by the officers of 
 General Ciper's staff for their soldier-like bearing and their 
 veteran proficiency in drill. But appreciation more precious 
 smiles upon them from the ruby lips and sparkling eyes of 
 (G90) 
 
GLIMPSES OF WAB. 691 
 
 that galaxy of beauty, an-ayed, in honor of the occasion, in 
 the colors of the new republic. They make a charming pic- 
 ture in their robes of white, relieved by scarfs of brilliant 
 crimson. 
 
 For the ladies of Brookfield have not been idle while its 
 young men were assiduously striving, by dint of constant drill 
 to acquire the rudimentary accomplishments of soldiers. 
 Thej^ have, with their own cunning fingers, embroidered a 
 beautiful banner in red, white and red, — the colors ordained 
 by the Confederate Congress to be the symbol of the new 
 nation ; transmuting the stars and stripes of the old flag into 
 the stars and bars of the new. If any there be, who look upon 
 the transmutation as puerile plagiarism, or as a sacrilegious 
 mutilation of the time-honored star-spangled banner, there are 
 certainly none here at May Meadows on this sunny October 
 afternoon, who permit such scruples to dim their jubilant 
 mood. The fair artificers, at any rate, take commendable 
 pride in their handiwork, and in their enthusiastic patriotism 
 it is glorified into a work of fine art. Their faces are wreathed 
 in radiant smiles, and eager in expectation of the things to 
 come. 
 
 For Nellie May, as was her due in consideration of the lead- 
 ing part she has taken in the enterprise, has been deputed as 
 spokeswoman for the presentation. 
 
 At the appointed time the young captain draws up his com- 
 pany into a semi-circle facing the reviewing officers and flank- 
 ing the line of the white-robed ladies arrayed on either side of 
 them. Nellie stands in front, steadying with her left hand the 
 pole upon which the flag is furled, and raises her right hand as 
 a signal for silence. In a moment all eyes are focused on the 
 fair speaker. 
 
 " Soldiers! " rings out, in a musical, bell-like voice that 
 thrills the men addressed. " The women of Brookfield hail in 
 you the champions of our country's cause, the defenders of 
 our honor, and the protectors of our homes. We are here to 
 tender you a pledge of our firm faith in your steadfast loyalty 
 
692 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 and gallaiitiy. We entrust to your keeping our country's sa- 
 cred banner — the glorious emblem of the Confederate States 
 of America, destined, we firmly ):)elieve, to take a high place 
 among the nations of the earth. To this our hope we have 
 given emblematic expression on this banner ; each one of us 
 has, with her own hand, embossed upon it the sentiment of 
 her own heart. In presenting to you the colors of your coun- 
 try, we also invest you with our own colors, — each one of us 
 to each one of you — and dub you our doughty knights in 
 the strugle for our independence and liberty. LOok upon this 
 banner, as I unfurl it to the breeze, and let it ever remind 
 you, that you are our, as you are your country's, hope! " 
 
 Suiting the action to the word, she draws away the cord that 
 holds the folds of the flag ; then, swinging it gracefully to and 
 fro', she displays the suggestive symbol — a crimson anchor in 
 the middle white bar, enwreathed by the legend 
 
 " IN GOD WE TRUST, AND IX OUR BROOKFIELD BOYS ! " 
 
 Her words have been listened to in deep silence. But now, 
 at a signal from Captain May, the color guard advances amid 
 the lively rattle of drums and the martial piping of fifes play- 
 ing "Dixie; " a flush of exultation tinges her cheeks as she 
 surrenders the banner into the keeping of its new custodian. 
 Her eyes, shining with the subdued fire of reverential enthu- 
 siasm, are fixed upon the fluttering flag, while the general and 
 his officers raise and lower their swords in salutation, the com- 
 pany present arms, and from the lookers-on, of whom a goodly 
 crowd had collected at May Meadows to-day, a frantic shout 
 of applause goes up. There is shaking of hands, tossing 
 up of caps, and vociferous shouting and hurrahing. 
 
 In the evening May Meadows presents a desolate appear- 
 ance. The gay multitude that had enlivened it, has vanished. 
 General Ciper and his staff have followed the army ; the 
 newly enrolled company have marched with it. Its gallant 
 captain, inspired with patriotic ambition, had taken leave of 
 home and friends in buoyant spirits. Leslie's mother, like a 
 
GLIMPSES OF WAR. 693 
 
 loyal Southern matron, had dismissed her son with the injunc- 
 tion to come back to her a general, or at least a colonel. His 
 sister Nellie had borne up bravely as she kissed him good-bye, 
 masking her heart ache with a bright smile. Colonel May alone — 
 although he, too, tried hard to put on a cheerful face, looked 
 sober as he pressed his son's hand, and said, in a sober voice, 
 " God bless you, my son! " 
 
 And so the Confederate army has marched through Brook- 
 field in determined pursuit of the enemy, leaving the town 
 deserted and lonely. So many of its young men have gone off 
 to the war, — some with the Confederates, some with the 
 Fedei'als — that their absence left a noticeable void. 
 
 At May Meadows there were not so many visitors now. 
 Nellie found leisure to devote herself to gentle ministrations to 
 her father, for the brief space before his and her mother's 
 departure for Richmond, and, now and then, for indulgence in 
 self-commuuings. Not but that the visitors who did come 
 were entertained in her usual sprightly manner, exhibitino- 
 unal)ated enthusiasm in the Southern cause, and abiding faith 
 in its triumphant vindication. But when no visitors were pres- 
 ent she found a sti-ange fascination in the talks with her father ; 
 instead of the spirited and hopeful mood she displayed in the 
 di'a wing-room, she listened soberly to his speculations upon the 
 possibilities attending the success of the Southern arms, and 
 
 the terms upon which the new Union was to be built up, 
 
 mightier, far, and more glorious than the old : for it would be 
 cemented with the blood of the best and the bravest of both 
 the North and the South. And Nellie learned, with a imtience 
 begotten of the new faith in her father's wisdom, that he had 
 never, from the beginning, believed that the civil war would 
 result in the establishment of a new nation, or even in a per- 
 manent new government ; but that he looked upon it as simply 
 the determined effort of the South to compel from the North 
 such guaranties, in the negotiations of the peace to be con- 
 quered, as would secure their rights. She learned, too, that 
 he realized the fearful price the nation was paying for the 
 
694 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 experiment, and how sadly uncertain was the outcome. No 
 wise man was there to presage, no prophet to foretell the end, 
 save as faith in the justice of their cause turned hope into 
 certainty in the breasts of the thousands and hundreds of 
 thousands who staked their lives and fortunes, and the fortunes 
 of those dear to them, ujdou the issue, — strong, every one 
 of them, in the conviction, that their side was right and must 
 win. 
 
 Reflections of this kind recalled to Nellie the parting words 
 that General Seele had spoken that day on his farewell visit. 
 She dwelt upon them with a new, if unconscious, toleration, 
 resulting from a dawning doubt, whether the appeal to arms to 
 settle the quarrel between the North and South had been an 
 imperative necessity, or even a serious duty. " That men," 
 he had said, in tones of sincere sorrow, " having a common 
 aim, and inspired by the most exalted of motives, should 
 stand arrayed against each other in combat ! " — And, strangest 
 of all the novel experiences of those days, she took real com- 
 fort in remembering the serene confidence with which he had 
 announced, as an indubitable truth, that, whichever side 
 should win, it would be the triumph of eight and justice. 
 The tender regret expressed by him for her disappointment, if 
 the God of Battles should smile on his side, which at the time 
 had seemed an empty phrase, assumed to her a new meaning, 
 affording a glimpse of something higher than even victory in 
 battle. If the South conquered — and oh, it must, it will! 
 for surely it is in the right ! — then all these earnest, mis- 
 guided men, who are fighting for the North, will see that they 
 are wrong ! It is easy for her to understand that the Auf dem 
 Busches, and General Seele, even, are in the wi-ong, because 
 they do not understand the subject of slavery at the bottom 
 of the quaiTel. But Victor, whom she knows to be at one 
 with the South on the slavery question, — at one, in fact, with 
 all of her father's political views, save this one of secession — 
 will he see the error of his course ? Will he accept at the hands 
 of the relentless war-god the utter demolition of the granite 
 
GLIMPSES OF WAB. 695 
 
 edifice of his convictiou, hailing the havoc of his faith as the 
 vindication of Justice and Right? 
 
 She begins to find it a bewildering problem, this question of 
 the right and wrong of the rebellion. She shrinks from 
 attempting the solution, for on either alternative cruel disap- 
 pointment and humiliation attend. Whatever of glory and 
 exultation victory may afford is conditioned upon the bitterness 
 of shame and defeat to the vanquished. 
 
 And now her parents have left for Richmond. It has been 
 a sadder parting between father and daughter than either of 
 them have before experienced. All the more trying to Nellie, 
 because she has so well guarded her secret. Her father has 
 been reconciled easily enough with the peremptory rejection of 
 her lover's suit. He has even lauded the wisdom of her 
 decision. "For," he remarked, " he who turns a deaf ear to 
 the call of his country will have but small regard for duty to 
 his family." Her mother, she knows well, is grievously 
 offended, and will never forgive her for wantonly declining an 
 alliance with one of the very oldest families of Virginia. 
 
 Harder has it been to hide from the loving solicitude of her 
 father the master-passion, which had furnished her the criterion 
 before which Ralph Payton's showy figure sank into insignifi- 
 cance. But she has succeeded. Neither her mother, who 
 would scout the idea of her daughter's possible marriage into 
 a family of German emigrants, nor her father, suspects that her 
 regard for Victor Waldhorst is other than gratitude for his 
 standing between her brother and an ignominious death, or 
 perhaps a lingering interest in one who had been patronized 
 and befriended in his youth by the whole family. 
 
 She is sole mistress, now, at May Meadows, and settles 
 down to this new phase of her life. Her father had se- 
 cured the services of a trusty man as overseer, who keeps the 
 negroes to the out-door work, while she, with the faithful as- 
 sistance of Cressie, manages the household, much, indeed, as 
 she had done before her mother's absence. Her duties keep 
 her fairly busy ; still, she finds time to think often and anx- 
 
696 THE REBEL'S DAUQHTEB 
 
 iously of her absent ones. Of her father, in the far-off capi- 
 tal of the young republic : she thinks of him as a leading 
 spirit in President Davis's cabinet ; and she wonders, how it 
 is, that she feels so little enthusiasm over the distinguished 
 honor that has thus come to him. 
 
 But her sisterly heart swells with pride when her thoughts 
 recur to her brotlier Leslie. He is ever present to her as the 
 gallant soldier he looked that day when he marched Brook - 
 field's contingent to the Southern armies in review before the 
 commanding general. Her vivid imagination always pictures 
 him in the thick of battle, leading his gallant Brookfield boys 
 on to victory and glory. The romantic halo she weaves around 
 him is dimmed, however, at least temporarily, on receipt of 
 short messages from him, — mere notes jotted down on the 
 march or in camp, informing her of the whereabouts of the 
 army, and also of his impatience over the Fabian policy of 
 General Ciper, which condemns the eager soldiers to utter in- 
 action, save by marching and countermarching, and, as he dis- 
 respectfully terms it, " dodging the enemy." There has been 
 no decisive engagement since the army have left Brookfield, 
 nor is there prospect of any in the near future. Nellie sym- 
 pathizes with him in his disappointment, and hopes for better 
 news soon. 
 
 From Leslie her thoughts glide naturally to Victor, as, indeed, 
 they do from almost any subject ; and never without stirring 
 the depths of her soul. She remembers him, at times as the 
 gentle lover, laying at her feet his loyal, faithful heart. And 
 with that memory comes another: how, in her wanton igno- 
 rance, she has spurned the priceless treasure, and brings even 
 now the blush of shame to her cheek. And again he stands 
 before her mental vision as he stood that day in the committee 
 room of the capitol, immovable as the eternal rocks amid the 
 seductive billows of temptation, revealing to her wondering 
 gaze the grandeur of a man whose will is mightier than the 
 mightiest allurements of passion. To the admiration of his 
 courage is joined deep gratitude as she sees him, in memory. 
 
GLIMPSES OF WAB. 697 
 
 boldly confronting that frowning tribunal, mighty in its power 
 over life and death of the accused. His voice still rings in her 
 ear, pleading her brother's cause with an earnestness that lends 
 eloquence to his words and carries conviction to unprejudiced 
 judges. The memory of his flashing eyes and stern face, as he 
 hurls defiance and scathing rebuke at the tyrannic colonel, still 
 quickens her pulses with exultant triumph, and she never 
 wearies of recalling to her thoughts Victor's glowing vindica- 
 tion of Eight against despotic Might. 
 
 But sweetest of all her meditations is the reflection, chasing 
 the blood through her veins in thrills of rapture, that as the 
 sovereign queen of his adoration she has no rival in Victor's 
 heart. She knows, that he is hers, and that she is his, forever- 
 more. What though a Southern woman can never wed with 
 her country's enemy? What though he know her to be a rebel 
 and a traitress ? In their souls they are one ! Of this she is 
 sure, albeit cruel fate decree them to live sejDarate lives. Is it 
 not enough that his love is hers ? And does she not exult in 
 her own love as the crowning glory of her womanhood ? Thus 
 she rejoices, and looks back with pitying contempt upon the 
 girl that could soberly contemiDlate a life-long union with a — 
 Ralph Payton ! 
 
 The days pass, and grow into weeks, and the weeks into 
 months; and Nellie hears little of parents or brother. Com- 
 munication with Richmond has become difficult ; the post- 
 office no longer mediates between the belligerent countries. 
 From Leslie, brief missives reach her at long intervals, bring- 
 ing little of comfort. Stripped of the sportive garb in which 
 he serves up such news as he finds to communicate, they tell 
 always the same story of wearying delay, — marching, maneu- 
 vering, and wonderful success in eluding the enemy — never an 
 action to satisfy his aspiring ambition. His grim jokes upon 
 the inscrutable ways of Confederate strategy are due to his 
 blissful ignorance of the knowledge which General Ciper pos- 
 sesses of the overwhelming forces at the disposition of the 
 Federal generals, sufficient to annihilate General Ciper 's corps, 
 
698 THE BEBEUS 'DAUQHTEB. 
 
 wei'e he rashly to offer battle. He cannot afford to gratify 
 the eager demands of such hotheads as Leslie May, and thou- 
 sands like him, for he, brave and undaunted by the danger 
 confronting him, seeks success rather than glory at the cost of 
 the cause he is serving. But Nellie sympathizes with her 
 brother, and hopes for better news soon. 
 
 Although no battles of decisive importance are being fought, 
 it is not to be supposed that the State is to escape the calam- 
 ities inseparable from civil war. Brooklleld is a rather impor- 
 tant strategic point, and as such is occupied in turn by F'ed- 
 erals and Confederates. The Union troops are well supplied, 
 usually with the salt meat and hard tack provided by the com- 
 missary department of the army ; but gladly accept contribu- 
 tions of fresher provisions from the loyal people of the town 
 and surrounding country (mostly women, now, so many of 
 the men having themselves become soldiers) : Nor are they at 
 all backward to help themselves if voluntary offerings, in their 
 opinion, come too slowly. The commissariat of the Confed- 
 erates is not, in the border States, so thoroughly organized, as 
 to relieve even their regular troops of the necessity of collect- 
 ing supplies from the inhabitants of the country through which 
 they pass, — by impressment from those friendly inclined, with 
 promise of compensation in the future ; without such promise, 
 by right of the strong arm, from those suspected of sympathy 
 with the Federals. Nor is there immunity from the plunder- 
 ing trami)s, roughs and marauders that follow in the wake of 
 armies, and commit ravage and spoliation on their own account. 
 
 May Meadows is not exempt from the common fate of Brook- 
 field in this particular. Whether the town is occujjied by 
 friend or foe, the raids on Nellie's larder, as well as on the 
 corn cribs and warehouses, are equally damaging. Nor are the 
 stables safe from prying quaxtermasters, who ruthlessly impress 
 Colonel May's thoroughbreds for the Confederate service, to the 
 great disgust of the faithful overseer, who is ambitious to main- 
 tain the reputation of May MeadoAvs for the superiority of its 
 live stock. But Nellie ciiides his impatience and calls it lack 
 
GLIMPSES OF WAR. 699 
 
 of patriotism to grudge what little aid they cau bring to the 
 Southern cause. " And do you see," she smilingly consoles 
 her trusty assistant, " that for each of the animals carried off 
 there will be one voracious mouth the less to feed from a stock 
 of provender that is growing distressingly scant ? ' ' 
 
 Of the two newspapers which Brookfield once boasted, one only 
 now survives. The Brookfield Standard has succumbed to the 
 pressure of the times. Mr. Farmer, its Yankee editor, has 
 suspended its publication and joined the Union army, rather 
 than to witness its death from inanition. The Ozark Argus., 
 however, ekes out a precarious existence. He keeps his hun- 
 dred eyes wide open for what is, or might be, happening at the 
 theater of war. Mr. Huffard is now, in very truth, the factotum 
 of his printing office, uniting in his own person the capacity of 
 editor, proprietor, compositor and pressman, with his little son 
 for a devil to ink the forms at the press. His list of Southern 
 exchanges has dwindled into a very small compass ; but the 
 equally small number of subscribers that remain never want for 
 stirring accounts of battles fought and victories achieved by the 
 Southern armies. It is this feature of the Ozark Argus that 
 secures Nellie's attentive perusal. It furnishes to her the chief 
 source of information of what is going on in the world. To it 
 she turns with ever new hope of finding therein the announce- 
 ment of the final success of the Confederacy and of the expul- 
 sion from the sacred soil of Virginia of all its ruthless invaders. 
 For Mr. Huffard is indefatigable in extolling the invincible 
 prowess of the Southern troops, and the Napoleonic genius of 
 their generals. According to him the world has never seen 
 such brilliant achievements on the field of glory. It has 
 become a certainty that France can no longer withhold her 
 recognition of the Confederate States of America as an inde- 
 pendent nation ; and England, impatient of the blockade of the 
 Southern ports, is going to take a hand in that game herself. 
 It is now, indeed, a question of da3"s only, or of weeks at the 
 outside, when the Union forces will be vanquished, and the 
 tvrant Lincoln laid low. 
 
700 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 But again the days pass, and grow into weeks and months ; 
 and the end is not yet. 
 
 One dreary Saturday afternoon the wind was moaning dis- 
 mally and dashing pattering rain-diops in fitful gusts against 
 the window panes, and Nellie waited for the paper, for which 
 she had sent Xerxes to the printing office. She was hungry 
 for news from General Ciper's army ; for the Ozark Argus had 
 for some weeks been entirely silent on the subject, nor had Les- 
 lie sent the slightest token of his being still alive. She watched 
 with some anxiety, growing impatient as Xerxes, on his return, 
 went into the kitchen, instead of bringing his newsdirectly to her. 
 Just as she was about to call Cressie, that girl herself entered 
 with smiling face, holding up not only the newspaper, but also 
 two letters. 
 
 ' ' What do I get for bringing good news ? ' ' she said showing 
 the letters with a triumphant air. 
 
 " Good news? " Nellie asked. " How do you know there is 
 good news ? " 
 
 " Look at the post-marks," Cressie suggested. " They are 
 both from the city." 
 
 " Why, so they are," Nellie exclaimed with brightening face. 
 ' ' One seems to be from Pauline Waldhorst — ' ' 
 
 " And the other from Master Leslie," the octoroon broke in. 
 " If master is in the city, I guess he has been to see Miss 
 Pauline and her folks, and maybe — " 
 
 She did not complete the sentence, but blushed beneath the 
 searching glance of her mistress' eyes, as she stood regarding 
 her with a good-natured smile of amusement. 
 
 " Victor Waldhorst, do you mean? " 
 
 Cressie's answer was an affirmative nod of the head, while 
 the color on her cheek deepened. 
 
 " That would indeed be good news, Cressie," said the mis- 
 tress, smiling with affable condescension, and a touch, withal, 
 of genuine sympathy. For great as was the disparity between 
 the lowly bondwoman and her aristocratic mistress, yet in the 
 sphere of woman's supreme aspiration they meet as equals. 
 
GLIMPSES OF WAR. 701 
 
 Though separated by the whole realm of social distinction, in 
 their love they stand ou a common level. 
 
 When the mistress bad lirst discovered Cressie's secret, she 
 had smiled at what appeared to her a romantic infatuation, the 
 tragic pathos of which appealed to her less strongly than did 
 the absurdity of its utter hopelessness. But is not her own 
 love as hopeless ? Is the barrier of caste really much more 
 formidable between the slave and the freeman than the gulf 
 which the war has opened between the Southern maiden and 
 the ruthless assailant of her country's rights? 
 
 And as she looks upon the blushing woman standing before 
 her, her heart goes out to the loving octoroon in gentle sym- 
 paty. " Let us see," she said, in a tone so cordial as to send 
 a thrill of joy to Cressie's heart, " how well you can guess. 
 Shall I open Pauline's letter first? " 
 
 " Unless you are anxious about Master Leslie," Cressie 
 suggested. 
 
 Nellie opened Pauline's letter, and read, pausing at times to 
 impart to her servant such of the contents as she thought would 
 interest her. 
 
 " Just listen to this ! " she suddenly exclaimed, and read the 
 following passage from Pauline's letter: 
 
 ' ' We are beginning to feel the iron heel of war in very truth 
 now. Our city is in a panic. The rebel army, they say, is 
 marching upon us, threatening to take possession of the city, 
 aud if it is not surrendered to bombard it and set fire to it with 
 red-hot cannon balls. Uncle says there is no danger, for that 
 General Seele has been sent to meet them with an army twice 
 as strong as theirs ; and that at any rate there will be no fight- 
 ing in or near the city. But I fear that he only wishes to con- 
 ceal from us the real extent of the danger. For thousands of 
 soldiers are busy in fortifying, — digging trenches, and throw- 
 ing up what Uncle calls parapets all about the suburbs. They 
 are building a fort just back of our house, not a hundred yards 
 away. They have put the city under martial law, — sword- 
 law, so Uncle explains, the entire government of the city being 
 
702 THE BE BEL'S DAUQHTEli. 
 
 in the hands of the military, under a provost marshal. Oh, 
 Nellie, it is dreadful to think what may happen to us all! " 
 
 Cressie listened with eager interest. As Nellie paused, she 
 ventured to suggest : " Is there nothing in the letter about her 
 brother?" 
 
 " Very little, Cressie. Here is what she writes: 
 
 " ' We see little of Victor these days. You know, I suppose, 
 that Governor Rauhenfels has been succeeded by a regular 
 elected governor, so both he and Victor have come back from 
 the capital. The professor wears epaulettes, now, with golden 
 fringes, and a silver star on each shoulder strap. That makes 
 him a general, does it not? But, though he pooh-poohs all 
 titles, I suspect that he dearly loves to be styled governor, and 
 so we will keep calling him so. He has appointed brother 
 Victor for his aid-de-camp, and breveted him Major — " 
 
 "Major Waldhorst! " Nellie interrupted herself with a 
 pleased expression. " That sounds musical, does in not, 
 Cressie? " 
 
 " It would sound very pleasant to him, if he heard you say 
 it," the slave girl, thus appealed to, replied. " And so he 
 ranks Master Leslie, now? " 
 
 " Only by brevet," the mistress answered. " But when I was 
 in PZngland, a young officer, who had just been appointed aid- 
 de-camp to an English general, took pains to inform me, that 
 the appointment carried with it the full rank of colonel. So I 
 supi)ose, Cressie, that we might promote him to a colonelcy. 
 And then how would his title sound? " 
 
 "Colonel Waldhorst, Ma'am!" Cressie repeated, as if 
 announcing a welcome visitor. And after a sportive courtesy 
 she added : ' ' But is there nothing more in the letter about — 
 Colonel Waldhorst? " 
 
 " Yes, just this: " Nellie said, and continued to read: 
 
 ' ' ' The governor and Victor dined with us last Sunday ; and 
 it was a treat to see two such distinguished looking military 
 magnates at our table. For Victor, too, is greatly improved in 
 looks by his new major's uniform, with the tassels of gold 
 
GLIMPSES OF WAB. "03 
 
 bullion on his shoulders and the full beard he is uow growing. 
 They had a lively discussion about war matters. I felt greatly 
 relieved to learn from them that the war would soon be over, 
 for that General Ciper and his army could not possibly escape 
 without a crushing defeat, and that General Grant was sure to 
 take Richmond, and the Confederacy must collapse. And oh, 
 Nellie ! General Rauhenfels is going to take part in the attack 
 on General Ciper, and Victor is his aid-de-camp. They are 
 both to leave ' for the fx'out,' or have already left as I am 
 writing this. And if Mr. May (your brother, I mean) is with 
 General Ciper, as I am almost sure he is, then he and Victor 
 may meet on the battle-lield ! Is it not horrible to think of ? 
 Your brother is so brave, so fearless, so fiery ; and Victor, 
 whatever you may think of him, is no coward either — ' 
 
 "Coward, indeed! " exclaimed Nellie, interrupting herself 
 and casting upon Cressie a glance of proud exultation, " if 
 Lincoln's armies were composed of such cowards as he, there 
 would never, I fear, be a Southern Confederacy ! " 
 
 In picking up the letter for further perusal, her eye chanced 
 to fall upon the date on the last page. " Why, Cressie," she 
 remarked, in evident surprise, " this letter has been on its way 
 from the city for more than two w^eeks ! The battle, that 
 Pauline dreaded so much, must have taken place days ago." 
 Then she looked at the letter from Leslie. " See," she said, 
 " this letter is five days younger." 
 
 Eagerly opening it, she was soon devouring the contents, 
 forgetful of Cressie's presence, and of all her surroundings. 
 Cressie observed the expression of her face as she read, — 
 pleasant, at first, evidently enjoying her brother's playful ban- 
 ter ; growing serious, then, and finally betraying anxious 
 alai'm. 
 
 ' ' Adorable Sissy : 
 
 You are anxiously waiting for news, I dare say. Well 
 for once I am able to furnish you with food for gossip to do you 
 some days. At last fortune has favored me witli the glorj'^ for 
 
704 THE BE BE us DAUQHTEB. 
 
 which I have so long thirsted. It has come to me thick aud 
 heavy. You may now look up to your bigger, older, aud I trust, 
 wiser brother, as one of the immortal heroes of this our second, 
 iuliuitely grander war of independence, whose name is destined 
 to go down to posterity on the muster roll of a liaekwoods 
 rebel company. 
 
 I don't mean to waste my eloquence to try and prove to you 
 what a glorious war this is. We have explained that to each 
 other long ago. We have doubled our fists, you and I, and 
 dared Uncle Sam to make himself ridiculous by attempting to 
 coerce us fiery Southerners into tame subjection to Northern 
 tyranny. We used to glory in the prospect of driving the 
 Northern invaders from our sacred soil, and how superbly 
 you used to turn up your nose at mention of the Yankee mud- 
 sills ! And I — well, you know how I thirsted aud panted for 
 just a dash at the brutal invaders of our beloved State, when 
 our Ciperian Cunctator zig-zagged us through marshes aud 
 forests, wearing out our patience and our army shoes, like 
 Moses leading the Lord's chosen people through the wilderness. 
 
 But the day came at last, — the day of glory, glorious ! 
 
 I was beginning to fear, that our Cunctator meant to turn 
 the war into a game of hide and seek, at which we were fast be- 
 coming experts, when one day as we were marching through a 
 valley of moderate width, and considerable length, inclosed on 
 both sides by gently rising, densely wooded ridges, our buglers 
 sounded the signal to halt. Halt ! What could that mean in 
 our situation, with General Seele but an hour or two's march 
 behind us, with the pick of the Union forces twice our number? 
 It was almost too good to believe — it must be, that General 
 Ciper meant to strike at last, and to give us a sight of the 
 enemy from the front. But so it turned out. Quick as 
 thought came a perfect shower of orders. Our troops were 
 posted on both sides of the road, concealed from the side on 
 which the Feds were approaching, more than one-half the army 
 placed in ambush behind the hills, so that in an incredibly 
 short space of time our whole force must have been as in- 
 
GLIMPSES OF WAB. 705 
 
 visible from the road, as if it luul disappeared from the face 
 of the earth. Our batteries, effectually masked by the dense 
 foliage, commauded both sides of the road for more than 
 a mile back, exposing the enemy, should they a})proach from 
 our rear, to a sweeping crossfire on both flanks. If old Ciper 
 meant light, he had certainly chosen the spot for the sport to 
 come off with consummate skill. In my enthusiasm I saw 
 no possibility for the Yanks to escape complete annihilation. 
 
 Mars and Minerva ! But it was a moment to lash the blood 
 into fever heat! I felt elated, inspired, intoxicated with glory 
 in anticipation of the victory we were going to achieve. Now 
 we would teach them that we knew a thing or two al)out light- 
 ing, besides zig-zagging and dodging ! 
 
 The suspense for the next few minutes after we had taken 
 our positions, while waiting for the approach of the enemy, was 
 simply terrific. The burning question was, would the Federals 
 discover our ambush in time to avoid the cross-fire of our 
 artillery? Surely it would be the sheerest recklessness and 
 unparalleled imprudence for them to defile into the valley with- 
 out advancing scouts to reconnoitre. And this it seemed was 
 precisely what they were doing. They were walking blindly 
 into the trap set for them hy our crafty commander. Their 
 foolhardiuess is explainable only on the ground, that our won- 
 derful success in dodging them up to this time had convinced 
 them that we were neither Avilling nor able to fight them at all. 
 
 The excitement on our side was in no wise abated when 
 their vanguard appeared in sight and came within range of our 
 guns. First, a strong detachment of cavalry, marching in 
 massed column ; then the glittering bayonets of serried ranks 
 of infantry became visible, which in turn were succeeded by a 
 long train of artillery. Our gunners sighted their pieces, and 
 eagerly awaited the command to fire. 
 
 The moment the signal was given, a dull red flash along the 
 line of our batteries preceded the terrific roar of a hundred 
 cannon pouring death and destruction into the ranks of the 
 unwary Yankees, and a dense volume of smoke hid them for 
 
 45 
 
706 THE BE BE us DAUGHTER. 
 
 a time from our view, so that we could not see what execution 
 our fire had done. As the smoke cleared away a scene of 
 wonderful transformation met our view. By a series of mili- 
 tary evolutions, the coolness, rapidity and precision of which 
 challenged our admiration, notwithstanding their deadly sig- 
 nificance to us, the marching columns of the Yankee troops 
 had been formed in line of battle and a squadron of cavalry, 
 as well as several companies of infantry, were rapidly advanc- 
 ing upon us. This meant work for our company, which had 
 been assigned to the honorable post of defending the foremost 
 batteries against cavalry or infantry attack. For it was evi- 
 dent that the advancing troops were skirmishers detailed to 
 silence our batteries. 1 fairly trembled with eager excite- 
 ment ; for I felt as if the glory of a lifetime was concentrated 
 in the next few moments. As yet the assailants were within 
 the sweep of our guns, and I noted with savage joy the terrific 
 havoc wrought among them by the iron hailstorm they had to 
 face. But on they rushed, filling the gaps cut in their ranks 
 by our murderous artillerj^ fire as coolly and promptly as if 
 in drill on the parade ground. Presently they reached the foot 
 of the hill on which our artillery was planted, and were safe 
 from the tire of our cannon. In a minute or two they would 
 reach the gunners. Then without waiting for orders from my 
 superiors, I rushed on, sword in hand, calling on my brave 
 Brookfield boys to follow. With a deafening yell we stormed 
 down the hill. If you had seen us, Nell, rushing on 
 toward the enemy, with the increasing momentum of an 
 avalanche, — I in the lead with waving sword on high, my 
 gallant company with bayonet leveled — you would have tilted 
 high your nose in swelling pride over your Brookfield heroes. 
 Well, there is not much more to tell. At least not by me. 
 But this let me tell you in brotherly confidence : The Yankees 
 are the very devils to fight. For neither the violence of our 
 onslaught, nor dur terrific rebel yell (which by dint of dili- 
 gent practice we had brought to hideous perfection) scared 
 them one bit. Or if it did, the cusses wouldn't let on. Thev 
 
GLIMPSES OF WAB. 707 
 
 eoolly leveled their muskets, and before we reached them, a 
 flash of light and a little puff of smoke issued from each. The 
 next instant a shower of bullets was singing over our heads. 
 The sound electrified us; we broke into a run. A second 
 volley, tired by the rear rank, was better aimed: It decimated 
 our company ! 
 
 " Give it to them ! " I cried, waving high my sword. " Let 
 us take revenge ! Revenge for our fallen comrades ! ' ' 
 
 It gave me grim satisfaction to note, that we were no longer 
 alone in our dash against the onstoriniug enemy. A company 
 or two of our brave Arkansas troops — known to us as excel- 
 lent sharjishooters, every one of them — rushed to our sup- 
 port, uttering that shrill yell, which just now sounded like 
 music in our ears. 
 
 It was at that moment that glory came to me in drastic 
 garb. As I ran, a stinging sensation in my right shoulder 
 caused me to drop my sword ; a second later I felt a sharp 
 twinge in my left knee, and wondered why, without volition on 
 my part, I suddenly lurched forward, instead of stopping to 
 pick up my sword — 
 
 This is all that I remember of my first battle. 
 
 When I recovered consciousness the sun had gone down, 
 and the din of battle had ceased. Some one was removing my 
 cravat and shirt collar. The firm, yet gentle, touch of his 
 hands, as he laid bare the wound on my shoulder, convinced 
 me that I was in the hands of a surgeon. 
 
 " I wonder, whether this young fellow has blood enough left 
 to stand transportation?" I heard him say to his assistant. 
 ' ' His hurt is not so bad ; but he seems to have bled ijretty 
 freely." 
 
 I attempted to rise. 
 
 " Lie still, sir! " he commanded, in a firm, though not un- 
 sjanpathetic voice. 
 
 1 gladly complied ; not so much in obedience to his behest, 
 as because of excessive weakness and the pain which the slight- 
 est attempt to move caused me in mv wounded knee. 
 
708 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 He must have noticed my exhaustion, for he pulled from 
 his breast pocket a flask and held it to my lips. " Drink! " 
 he coimuanded. " A hearty swig of this elixir will make you 
 smack your lips and put new life into you." 
 
 I begged for water, for I was burning Avith a feverish thirst. 
 
 " Of course you shall have water," he said, cheerily. 
 " You don't suppose I would give you a dram — though it be 
 this finest specimen of old rye that ever put spirits into a fam- 
 ishing man — without water to wash it down ? But drink it 
 first, and then your stomach will take more kindly to the 
 water." 
 
 He was right. I took a copious draught, which infused a 
 generous warmth through my chilled body, and together with 
 the water from his canteen, relieved my thirst. I felt like a 
 new man, and now demanded how the battle had gone. 
 
 I need not repeat to you, what you have long since learned 
 from other sources. We had been beaten. I could not un- 
 derstand why, or how. And now two wounds and confinement 
 in a prison represent the glory I have personally achieved in 
 this war. And so, you see, I have new and drastic proofs how 
 glorious a war it is ! 
 
 The men that found me treated me kindly enough — much 
 more so than I expected, or had any right to expect at the 
 hands of a victorious enemy ; but I don't mind confessing to 
 you that the news upset me. I submitted with what grace I 
 could muster. Doctor Behi- dressed my wounds ; and then 
 they put me into an ambulance and hauled me an interminable 
 distance to the city, where they landed me at a hospital filled 
 with hundreds of Federal wounded, — for the battle had been 
 a bloody one, the wounded on both sides numbering by thou- 
 sands. Oddly enough, they call this place a college, — Mc- 
 Donald's College — and it served as a prison, until the arrival 
 of so many damaged heroes from the sanguinary fields of glory 
 made it necessary to turn it into a hospital for their accommo- 
 dation. I believe I am the only rebel soldier here ; but there 
 are a number of former inmates left, — political prisoners, who 
 
GLIMPSES OF WAR. 
 
 709 
 
 are immured, not for anything they had done, but for fear of 
 what they might do ! Among them is an odd genius, whom 
 they call by the name the prison bears, Doctor McDonald ; a 
 surgeon, who is very popular among the patients, though as 
 crabbed as an unripe persimmon, and a rebel to the core. He 
 has taken quite a fancy to me. He is treating my wounds, and 
 I am doing very well, — so well, that I hope I may soon be 
 exchanged for an able-bodied Federal, and put in the way of 
 being treated to another dose of glory." 
 
 Nellie dropped the letter in her lap, and folded her hands, 
 looking straight before her in deep thought. Cressie, seeing 
 her mistress in distress, asked her in a voice of anxious sym- 
 pathy, whether her master was in trouble. 
 
 " Oh, Cressie," Nellie broke out, the tears gathering in her 
 eyes, " your master is wounded, and a prisoner! And I must 
 visit him. You must help me get read}'. Do you think you 
 can manage, so that I can get off ? " 
 
 
XLIV. 
 A REBEL DOCTOR. 
 
 |j( DONALD'S COLLEGE was a curious specimen of 
 ante-bellum metropolitan architecture. Boldly cir- 
 cular in its outline, supporting upon a wall of 
 unhewn limestone, laid in rubble-range, a hemispherical, 
 dome-shaped I'oof, crowned, in turn, by a semi-ellipitical 
 cupola resting on six slender columns, it challenged atten- 
 tion from afar. The main building was connected by an 
 arched passage way with a tall, narrow side building, which, to 
 a beholder not entirely void of imagination, might suggest a 
 minaret along with its mosque. Its daring architectural style 
 Avas not, however, its chief claim upon public notice. Its 
 founder and owner, Doctor McDonald, was famed, even beyond 
 the limits of his State, for his surgical skill and profound 
 learning. His colleagues admired, envied, hated him. Hated 
 him because of the relentless war he waged against what he 
 called the antiquated superstitions of the medical profession. 
 For he denounced blood-letting by venesection as a cruel 
 assault on the vitality of a patient, destroying just so much of 
 nature's recuperative energy. The use of lint in the treatment 
 of wounds and sores, he combated, designating it as the most 
 mischievious propagator of infectious diseases. So he regarded 
 the withholding of cold water from thirsty fever patients, and 
 of fresh air from the sick-room of languishing sufferers, as 
 wanton barbarity, thwarting, rather than assisting, nature in 
 her healing process. Such and similar " learned stupidities," 
 as he termed them, he combated with persistency and vigorous 
 zeal ; and McDonald's College owed its existence to the phi- 
 lanthropic purpose of founding a medical school for the tuition 
 of the science upon a rational basis. He meant to place the 
 
 (710) 
 
A REBEL DOCTOR. 711 
 
 tuitiou fee at a low llgure, so as to induce as uiauy students as 
 he could to attend, or even in case of necessity, to open the 
 college for free attendance. His ample income from a lucrative 
 practice enabled him to indulge so charitable a hobby. 
 
 The public at large took little interest in the medical quar- 
 rels with the doctors, Init all the more in a rumor that had 
 gained currency in relation to the cadavers which he was 
 supposed to furnish to his students in the dissecting room. It 
 was said that he required a fresh subject to be delivered at the 
 college every night or two. This was not pleasant news to the 
 dwellers in the neighborhood ; but the rumor, in spreading to 
 wider circles, had taken on a more serious aspect. It was 
 whispered about, and finally boldly asserted, that for the want 
 of corpses, and for the furthering of anatomical studies, living 
 subjects were sometimes captured by the doctor's emissaries, 
 and taken to the dissecting room for experimental vivisection. 
 The very absurdity of such assertions gave them extensive 
 circulation. The doctor's well-known character as a man of 
 iron nerve and sovereign contempt for the opinion of the 
 public, his very devotion to the cause of medical reform, as 
 well as his numerous eccentricities, gave color, in the minds 
 of even well-educated people, to the theory that he would not 
 scruple to sacrifice individuals for the benefit of the human 
 race in general. No wonder, then, that timid people hesitated 
 to venture alone, in the night time, into the neighborhood of 
 the college, and gave it a wide birth even by day. 
 
 At the breaking out of the rebellion the doctor's pronounced 
 partisanship in the Southern cause furnished new food for 
 gossip ; public rumor was so busy with the fantastic and 
 quixotic plans for destroying the Union armies ascribed to 
 him, that the horrors of the dissecting room were gradually 
 forgotten. 
 
 Doctor McDonald was a fierce and fearless rebel. He 
 laughed to scorn the idea of coercing a sovereign State to 
 remain a member of the Union that had become distasteful to 
 its people. The employment of military force to that end he 
 
712 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 pooh-poohed as a ridiculous aud wicked farce. " A million of 
 Dutch hirelings and mercenary Yankee abolitionists," he 
 prophesied, " will run before the freemen of a single Southern 
 State when rising in her majesty to vindicate their liberty and 
 independence." The taking of Camp Jefferson he stigmatized 
 as a dastardly outrage, and for the mihtary governor he had 
 no name but that of Dutch Dictator, although a personal 
 friend of Professor Rauhenfels. He gave loud-mouthed utter- 
 ance to his hatred of President Lincoln, whom he persistently 
 called a usurper of tyrannical power, and an enemy of the 
 American people. 
 
 It was not strange, under these circumstances, that Doctor 
 McDonald was lionized by the >Southern sympathizers, and 
 cordially hated by the loyal element of the population. 
 
 At first, this mutual animosity found vent in hard talk on 
 either side ; but when martial law had been proclaimed over 
 the city, one of the first acts of the provost marshal had been 
 to take" possession of McDonald's College, and convert it into 
 a prison for the incarceration of such of the notable rebels as 
 were deemed dangerous to the government interests. And so 
 it came al)out cpiite naturally that Doctor McDonald became 
 one of the first inmates of the new Bastile, — a prisoner in his 
 own castle; and he was there Avhen, after that bloody battle, 
 the prison was converted into a hospital, and when there was 
 plenty of work for all the army surgeons, and for as many of 
 the practitioners of the city as volunteered their services. 
 Cordially as the doctor hated soldiers in the blue uniform, his 
 professional instinct to serve suffering humanity got the better 
 of his partisanship. Without asking questions or waiting for 
 consent of the authorities, he fell to and rendered such effectual 
 help as secured him the blessing and deep gratitude of patients 
 aud the hearty good will of his jailers. Many precious lives 
 and limbs owed their preservation to his skill and unwearying- 
 devotion. Rough and pngnacious as was his general deport- 
 ment, to the bedside of his patients he brought a manner as 
 gentle and winning as that of a woman. His honliommie was 
 
A REBEL DOC TOE. 713 
 
 irresistible. His simple presence gave clieer and confidence to 
 tlie sufferers, who liailed liis approach with undisguised pleas- 
 ure, and felt the magnetism which he exerted over them as a 
 soothing charm, even when painful operations demanded utmost 
 fortitude and courage. 
 
 But tender as was the touch of his skillful hand, and cheery 
 as sounded his voice, so long as the relation of doctor and pa- 
 tient lasted, he had no sympathy for the convalescents. 
 Gruffly, even rudely, he repulsed any manifestation of grati- 
 tude or appreciation. " Have done ! " he was heard to say on 
 such an occasion. '' I know well enough what a fool — aye, 
 what a traitor I have been to my country, to patch you up as 
 good as new, and send another able-bodied enemy in the field 
 against us, instead of sending you to that warm place, where 
 such villainous tools of a tyrant belong." 
 
 Among the patients that fell to his care was Leslie May. 
 When he noted the gray uniform, his face brightened. 
 " Hello ! " he exclaimed, " who the devil got you into this rat- 
 cage? Been a hotheaded fool and let them trap you while 
 chasing an enemy? For I'll give the odds that you fight like 
 a wild cat, and bet the drinks now, that your captors did not 
 get away without carrying off a souvenir of your regard to 
 remember you by." 
 
 The faint shadow of a smile crept into the captive's face 
 as he answered. " Done ! " he said. " You are not as good 
 at guessing as you ought to be for a Yankee. I came with my 
 captors as meekly as a lamb, nor crooked a finger to resist." 
 
 "Yankee be d — d!" the doctor exclaimed wrathfully. 
 " Don't you call me a Yankee! No man shall do that with 
 impunity, not even a brave Confederate officer, whom I would 
 proudly shake by the hand. But you have fairly won the 
 drinks, though I stand by it, that you fought valiantly before 
 they took you. I am not often mistaken in judging faces. 
 Now do me the honor to join mo in a pledge to our better 
 acquaintance I ' ' 
 
 Producing from his breast pocket a flask, the top of which 
 
714 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 he unscrewed, he used it as a small drinking cup. " These are 
 rather primitive beakers," he said, fdling the cup with an 
 amber-colored liquid and handing it to the patient, while he 
 raised the flask itself, ready to drink from it; " but the stuff 
 in them deserves the name they gave it in old times : Eau de 
 vie! It comes to us from that spirited, wide-a-wake nation, 
 that, besides tliis fiery Cognac, has also invented the exhilar- 
 ating, sparkling Champagne, in which to drown our crotchets 
 and melancholy vagaries. Ah!" he added, strolling his 
 stomach and half closing his eyes as if in a transport of bliss, 
 "this is water of life indeed! This quickens the flagging 
 spirits ; this stirs the blood, and spurs the imagination to 
 bolder flights ! Sir, this is the best medicine I can jjrescribe 
 for you ; and you see that I am not, like most physicians, afraid 
 to take it myself." 
 
 Leslie was, indeed, greatly invigorated by the generous 
 potion administered by the doctor, and readily responded to 
 the inquiries he made, while dressing Leslie's wounds. " This 
 hurt on your knee," he 'said nonchalantly, ■' is going to give 
 us some trouble. For a time to come it is going to make 
 graceful waltzing a difficult task for you." 
 
 *' Never mind," the patient replied, " if I can't dance my- 
 self, it will be my business to make the Yankees dance. Just 
 get me on my legs again, and I'll show you what a genuine 
 rebel can do, even with a stiff knee." 
 
 Doctor McDonald displayed an amiability toward his Con- 
 federate patient which went far to accelerate his convalescence. 
 To all appearances his wounds were healing speedily, and 
 Leslie hoped that he would soon be in condition to be 
 exchanged, and to take a fresh start on the path to glory. 
 
 "A deucedly fine constitution," the doctor murmured to 
 himself as he left his bedside. " Sound as a dollar in all the 
 vitals ; jolly as an Alabama piccaniuny, and brave as Julius 
 Caisar, I'll warrant. It would be a burning shame to let him 
 catch this nuu'derous gangrene that is going to make a pest- 
 house out of my lieautiful college inside of a week. What a lot 
 
A BE BEL DOCTOB. 715 
 
 of d — d asses these military wiseacres show themselves, to cram 
 five hundred poor devils into a place just big enough to comfort- 
 ably lodge fifty, and expect them to get well ! But that is none of 
 my funeral. Let them kill off the d — d Yankees as fast as they 
 please ; it will save our boys in gray the trouble of shooting 
 them in battle. But this young hero must be got out of their 
 clutches. Zounds ! It would be too bad to let him fall a vic- 
 tim to official asininity after escaping death on the battle- 
 field. I must see what the Dutch Dictator can be got to do for 
 him." 
 
 General Rauhenfels, whose command was stationed at the 
 metropolis for the city's protection, was closeted with General 
 Seele at the headquarters, when a message was handed him, 
 marked " Private and Important." Eyeing the messenger for 
 a moment, while opening the dispatch, he inquired: "Is the 
 message from old Sawbones, the college doctor? " 
 
 Saluting deferentially, the messenger replied: "It is, Gov- 
 ernor." For such was the title accorded to him, generally, in 
 military circles. 
 
 ' ' Are you to wait for an answer ? ' ' 
 
 " I have no order to such effect. Governor." 
 
 " Wait, anyhow, till I find out what the chronic grumbler is 
 after." 
 
 The messenger touched his cap in token of obedience, and 
 General Rauhenfels read the following note : 
 "Most Puissant Commander: 
 
 Noblesse oblige! Though no longer, thank God, an auto- 
 cratic dictator, you still hold the city's destiny in the hollow 
 of your hand ; ergo, you are responsible for its behavior. 
 Now, I want to apprise you of a wholesale murder in con- 
 templation — no, not in contemplation, for asses do not con- 
 template — but in prospect. The victims are to be those piti- 
 able tools of the Lincoln tyranny, who hire out as targets for 
 our Southern soldiers to shoot at. They have escaped with 
 their lives, — some of them with their limbs, too, — from the 
 encounter with our soldiers, to be condemned to a surer death 
 
716 THE BEBEVS DAUGHTER. 
 
 at the hands of their owu asiuiiie superiors, who invite gangrene 
 into an overcrowded hospital. Gangrene, I tell you ! Do you 
 know what that means ? And all on account of the stupidity 
 of the asses in authority, among which you may reckon your- 
 self, or not, as the case may be. And now, I wash my fingers 
 of the affair. I ought not, perhaps, to interfere with the kill- 
 ing off of a hundred or two of the d — d abolitionists ; but it 
 goes against my grain to see a herd of bullet-riddled cripples 
 sacrificed to the brutal stupidity of supercilious military 
 magnates. 
 
 But this en passant. What I really want of you is, that 
 you bring about the exchange of a rebel prisoner, who is too 
 fine a fellow to share the fate of the other patients in this 
 doomed pest-house, into which you have turned my Temple of 
 Science. He is badly wounded, but doing well, for he has a 
 magnificent constitution. But if he remains here another 
 week, his life won't be worth the toss of a copper. Mortifica- 
 tion is bound to ensue, and not the skill of all the hospital 
 surgeons can save him. Now, I want you to procure his ex- 
 change ; a week or two of uncontaminated fresh air will set him 
 up, and you will have saved the life of a man worth all the 
 poor cripples that will have to stay here put together. 
 
 Don't say, serves him right for being a rebel. His intellect 
 is of so high an order that he really couldn't help it. Besides, 
 you may obtain for him a Federal officer of high grade ; for 
 though my protege is only a captain, he seems to have consid- 
 erable backing among the Confederates. His father, he says, 
 is in Davis' cabinet, and was a United States senator before 
 the war, — Senator May — " 
 
 " Tell the doctor," the general exclaimed, as soon as he had 
 read this name, with an imperative nod to the messenger, 
 " that I will see him within an hour." And as the messenger 
 was leaving, he turned to General Seele with the abrupt ques- 
 tion : " Do you remember the young rebel whom you court- 
 martialed at the beginning of the war, out at Brookfield? " 
 
A REBEL DOCTOR. 717 
 
 '■' Of course I do," was the answer. " 1 remember well the 
 (chagrin of Colouel Scheffel over his acquittal, as well as the 
 eloquent earnestness of our judge advocate in his defense, and 
 my own anxiety, lest our court should, in the zeal of mistaken 
 patriotism, commit an act of partisan hatred under guise of 
 sacred justice, which, under the circumstances, would have 
 been not only a wrong, but a blunder fraught with possible 
 peril to our cause. Well, what of him? " 
 
 "• He is a prisoner in our hands, wounded, and a patient in 
 Doctor McDonald's College. Old Sawbones thinks he will 
 take gangrene if left there, and suggests his exchange." 
 
 " But what is the young man to do, if liberated? We can- 
 not send him home, and here he will be among strangers, alone 
 and helpless." 
 
 " He shall not be among strangers nor helpless," General 
 Rauhenfels exclaimed with warmth. " There are those in this 
 city who will be proud and thankful to serve him in any way 
 that may be in their power." 
 
 " You refer to those Auf dem Busches, I suppose? " Gen- 
 eral Seele remarked. "Why, yes! They certainly owe the 
 May family a debt of gratitude. Do you know where to look 
 for them ? ' ' 
 
 "Certainly: The old gentleman inhabits a perfect little 
 paradise down below the arsenal — just an ideal sanitarium for 
 a convalescent. Now, General, — you know 1 don't often ask 
 any one for favors. But in this matter I don't mind laying 
 myself under obligations to you ; I want you to wire to the 
 Secretary of War at once — or can you approach the President 
 directly? — for authority to exchange, or better still, to release 
 unconditionally this Confederate prisoner." 
 
 " Consider it done, my dear Governor: I would cheerfully 
 do so without intercession on your part, and even stretch my 
 authority to order the young man's immediate release. I be- 
 lieve this to be in the interest of the service. And Doctor 
 McDonald's savage prediction touching our own patients in his 
 college must be inquired into. It would be an awful thing if 
 
718 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 half of what he says about the sanitary condition of the hos- 
 pital were true." 
 
 ' ' I have full faith in what the old crank says about medical 
 matters. Nothing is plainer than our duty to see the patients 
 removed to some other quarters. I hope you will lose no time 
 in taking the necessary measures in this matter, while I pre- 
 pare the Auf dem Busches for the guest they are to welcome. 
 I have an idea that the young rebel will meet with a warm 
 reception in the enemy's camp." 
 
 " Let us hope, that the enemy may convert the freedom 
 which we are giving him into more enduring bondage," said 
 General Seele, with a suggestive smile. " The Auf dem 
 Busches may open his eyes to the hopelessness of the Southern 
 cause." 
 
 "Nonsense, General," was the emphatic reply. "Leslie 
 May is one whom not even the logic of events can swerve from 
 his conviction. Like Napoleon's Guard he can die, but will 
 never surrender. So far from being converted to our side, the 
 danger is rather that he will lay siege to the enemy's citadel 
 and carry off one captive, at least, cripple as he may be." 
 
 At Busch Bluffs the war had made some changes, as well as 
 at May Meadows. The old gentleman, it is true, had retired 
 upon the laurels gained by him in the battle of Winslo's Run, 
 and cherished the scars of his wounds as so many trophies 
 brought back from his memorable campaign. But Woldemar 
 had enlisted, much to the disgust of his mother, for three years, 
 or as long as his services might be acceptable in the establish- 
 ment of the government's supremacy, and the liberation of the 
 slaves. He had hailed the Emancipation Proclamation of 
 President Lincoln as the sublimest achievement in the history 
 of the American nation, cleansing its escutcheon from the foul 
 stain upon it, and redeeming the people from the rule of wily 
 tricksters and scheming politicians. Pauline, too, hoped for 
 the success of the Union cause. She was truly and thoroughly 
 loyal ; but more ardently than the defeat of the rebels, or the 
 
A BEBEL DOCTOB. 719 
 
 triumph of the government, did slie yearningly hope and pray 
 for the end of the cruel war. She devoted much of her time to 
 working for fairs and charitable entertainments in aid of poor 
 families of soldiers in the field, and so it came about that she 
 was much absent from home, to the discomfort of her uncle, 
 and the vexation of her aunt, who broadly hinted that charity 
 ought to begin at home. But Uncle Auf dem Busch stoutly 
 defended the girl against any interference with her charitable 
 work, even on the part of the wife of his bosom. "Pauline 
 has right," he would say in answer to some stinging reproof 
 of the unmaideuliness of her conduct in loafing about town, 
 instead of staying at home like a well-behaved young woman. 
 "It is Avar; and we must have soldiers to fight; and Pauline 
 would be a soldier, but she wears a petticoat, and so she does 
 what she can, and helps soldiers' wives and families. Be you 
 glad that Pauline goes not off for a soldier's nurse in the 
 hospitals." 
 
 Uncle Auf dem Busch never dreamt how near the truth he 
 had stumbled, in holding out this threat to his wife. For 
 Pauline w^as deeply impressed with a sense of duty to the brave 
 men who returned from the field of honor with mangled limbs 
 and shattered health, and had of late seriously contemplated 
 the very step to which her uncle had alluded. 
 
 But the task involved, to her, a fearful sacrifice of personal 
 inclination. She had a horror of seeing blood, and shuddered 
 at the thought of witnessing those painful operations that she 
 knew must be common in the hospitals ; and she gravely 
 doubted her ability to be of any use as a nurse. Some mis- 
 givings, too, she had, whether it would be right for her to act 
 in opposition to the wishes of her relatives. Nor could she 
 take counsel with any of them, knowing in advance what their 
 advice would be. 
 
 While in this frame of mind, she bethought herself of Gov- 
 ernor Rauhenfels, remembering the implicit confidence which 
 her uncle and brother placed in the wisdom of the professor, 
 and concluded that she w^ould oo to him for advice as to the 
 
720 THE liEBEVS DAUGHTER. 
 
 course she ought to pursue. She therefore prevailed upou her 
 brother to send an escort with her to the general's head- 
 quarters. 
 
 Pauline, as was her way, came straight to the point of her 
 visit, informing Governor Rauhenfels of the promptings of her 
 conscience, and of her doubts and misgivings. 
 
 " And so you want me to tell you what is right for you to 
 do? " he asked, when she had stated her case. " Then let me 
 say to you, that it is always right to do just what you believe 
 to be right. Conscience is to you your safest guide, — more 
 unerring than profoundest Avisdom of philosopher. We may 
 call it the voice of God. You want no higher authority for 
 your conduct than the will of God? " 
 
 Pauline listened eagerly. But a shade of disappointment 
 flitted over her face as she answered: " Of course not! Only 
 tell me, what is the voice of God? My conscience bids me 
 offer my little mite of service to the suffering heroes ; and is it 
 not my conscience, too, that warns me not to vex and grieve 
 the friends to whom I am bound by the strongest ties of grati- 
 tude and affection? Whither, now, leads the path of duty? " 
 
 " And do you not perceive, that your heart has decided the 
 question? You distinguish between duty, common as such 
 to all mankind, — charit}^, let us call it — and duty personal 
 to you, which you call gratitude. Let me make it clear to 
 you : Suppose your uncle, or brother, or even your cousin, had 
 espoused the Southern side in this war — instances are not rare, 
 you know, that brother and bi'other, or father and son, have 
 taken different sides — and were lying wounded and helpless 
 in a hospital of the enemy ; would you brave the discomfort, 
 or even the displeasure of the Federal authorities, by going to 
 comfort and assist him ? ' ' 
 
 " How can you ask such a question! " Pauline replied with 
 a reproachful look. 
 
 "Oh," said General Rauhenfels, "do not think that I 
 could for a moment be in doubt what a heroic Antigone you 
 would prove ! Though the penalty for high treason stared 
 
A REBEL DOCTOR. 721 
 
 you iu the face for giving- ' aid and comfort to the euem}',' 
 you would not hesitate to obey the law which God himself has 
 written in your heart, in defiance of all the articles of war and 
 drum-head courts-martial. But such a crown of martyrdom 
 awaits you not just yet. You are to be spared all responsi- 
 bility of deciding between the claims of your friends upon 
 you, and your duty to humanity." 
 
 " What can you mean? " asked Pauline wondering. 
 
 " I mean to bring a rebel prisoner to your house, who is sadly 
 wounded, and in need of just such attention as you can 
 bestow. Was I right in counting upon your charity? " 
 
 " Wounded, and a rebel prisoner? " queried Pauline, 
 regarding the general with keen, searching eyes, and slightly 
 paling cheeks. 
 
 " Wounded, and a rebel prisoner," Rauhenfels repeated. 
 
 ' ' Do I know him ? Is it — " 
 
 "*Yes, of course it is Captain Leslie May," said General 
 Rauhenfels, as Pauline, turning very red, hesitated. 
 
 "And he is wounded? Dangerously?" Her voice was 
 tender with deep concern and anxiety. "Oh, tell me — 
 where, where is he? " 
 
 " We will go to him at once, and you shall bring him the 
 news of his release from prison. You may also convey to 
 him the invitation of your uncle to make Busch Bluffs his 
 hospital during convalescence. Use your own judgment about 
 informing him who shall be his nurse." 
 
 Though eager to follow General Rauhenfels to wherever Cap- 
 tain May might be, she flinched for a moment at the idea of 
 entering a prison. " He is incarcerated? " she asked, with a 
 timid look. 
 
 "In McDonald's College," said the general, smiling at her 
 hesitation. ' ' But you need not fear ; the college is more of a hos- 
 pital, just now, than a prison. Jiist imagine yourself a hospital 
 nurse on duty, and you will have coiarage to go anywhere." 
 
 Captain Leslie May was made much of at the villa. He was 
 
 4G 
 
722 THE EEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 a prime favorite of Uncle Auf clem Busch ; even Mrs. Anf clem 
 Busch conquered her prejudice sufficiently to conceal, or at 
 least to make the attempt to conceal, her strong aversion. The 
 children had not forgotten him. It was a treat to them to be 
 permitted to go to his room and listen to the stories of camp 
 life and of adventures on foraging expeditions and scouting 
 service, which he knew how to tell so fascinatingly to Cousin 
 Pauline. 
 
 The meeting between him and Pauline had been common- 
 place enough, so far as outward manifestation went. The 
 manner of the captive officer had been cordial aud courteous, 
 as his behavior toward Miss Waldhorst, liacl always been ; his 
 voice as pleasant, and his smile as winning as of old. His face 
 brightened as he saw Pauline approach, accompanied by Gen- 
 eral Ranhenfels and Captain Waldhorst, Doctor McDonald 
 bringing up the rear. The young lady, though her heart beat 
 wildly and the hand she extended to the invalid was rather 
 unsteady, sufficiently controlled herself to avoid the outward 
 sbow of emotion that agitated her bosom. 
 
 " I am very glad to see you. Captain May," she said, in a 
 tolerably firm voice. " Ver^' glad, indeed ; and proud to see 
 you bear up so bravely under the misfortune which has over- 
 taken you." 
 
 "Ah, Miss ^Yaldhorst," he replied, seizing and pressing 
 with joyous c^andor the hand she held out to him, " surely, 
 that is not a misfortune which has protuired for me the excpii- 
 site pleasure of this visit from you, and assured me of the 
 sympathy of so fair an enemy." 
 
 " And you, Victor," he added, turning to Pauline's brother, 
 whose hand he grasped in both his own, " you make me in all 
 things forever your debtor." 
 
 '• Nay, Leslie," Victor rejoined, " say not so. What 1 
 have done, I did not for you, but simply in the discharge of 
 duty : though all I ever could do for you would not discharge 
 the debt of gratitude I owe to you and yours." 
 
 ''Have done bandying compliments! " said the general. 
 
A liEBEL DOCTOR. 723 
 
 stepping up to Leslie's bedside and taking his turn in shaking 
 hands with him while the doctor looked on, smiling. " To 
 listen to j^our gushing, one might forget that you are sworn 
 foemen, and wait but the opportunity to take each other's 
 life." 
 
 " General," said Leslie, with a sad smile, " it does not look 
 like 3'ou to triumph over a vanquished enemy. I am 3'our 
 prisoner." 
 
 " You are no longer a prisoner. Captain May," said Pauline 
 blushing. "Governor Rauhenfels has commissioned me to 
 inform you that you are to be exchanged ; and that until then 
 you are to be released from custody." 
 
 " Not quite that," the general broke in. " Mr. May is a 
 soldier, and understands that he can be released only on 
 parole. You are to pledge your word, sir, that you will not 
 attempt to escape from the custody of Pauline Waldhorst, or 
 such jailer, as Mr. Auf dem Busch may place over you. He 
 is, from this time on, responsible to the authorities for your 
 safety until the exchange may be consummated." 
 
 " Nay, Governor Rauhenfels," Pauline protested, with smil- 
 ing lips and a beseeching glance, " such is not the compact 
 between us. You distinctly authorized me to announce to 
 Captain May his unconditional release. If he will accept 
 Uncle Auf dem Buseh's invitation to make our house his home 
 until restored to perfect health, he shall be an honored guest, 
 not a prisoner under espionage." 
 
 " The young lady is right," Doctor McDonald broke in, re- 
 garding Pauline with an admiring look. ' ' She understands our 
 Dutch Dictator better thau to believe him capable of doing 
 things by halves. And I honor her for the graceful interpre- 
 tation of his rude generosity. As if Captain May could wish 
 to escape from such charming hospitality ! — But there is one 
 thing wanting to complete your gracious intention," he added, 
 addi'essiug the general. " I want you to \n\t me under parole, 
 for such a time only as may be necessary for me to continue 
 the treatment of the captain's case. For, you see, I must ap- 
 
724 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 pease my conscieuee for having put so manj' cussed Yaukees on 
 their feet to fight the Confederacy ; and I mean to do so by 
 restoring to her a specimen of manhood that same day is going 
 to be her ablest general, — an American Napoleon, sir, that 
 ill encounter no Wellington nor Blucher! " 
 
 So Leslie May has become an inmate of the Auf demliiisch 
 mansion. He is waited on by Pauline Waldhorst, whose skill 
 as a sick-nurse excites the admiration of Doctor McDonald, 
 and elicits from him the confession that she is his most eliicent 
 ally in combating the patient's ailments. Yet, though lavish in 
 his praises, he insists most strenuously on exactest observance 
 of his minutest directions; whereat Pauline wonders. For 
 Captain May is in the best possible si)irits, so that it is hai'dly 
 conceivable that his wounds, which are healing so finely, should 
 occasion anxiety in the doctor's mind. He tyrannizes over his 
 fair attendant in a masterful fashion, issuing his commands 
 with a perem})toriousness of which there seems no need ; for 
 Pauline is but too ready in anticipating his slightest wish, often 
 gratifying his desire before he has formulated it in his own 
 mind. His presence so vividly recalls the memorable days be- 
 fore the war, when the young lawyer was a frequent visitor at 
 Busch Bluff, and she was learning from him the astonishing 
 lesson that she could not marry her cousin Woldemar, though 
 Leslie spoke to her no word of love. Nor does he speak of love 
 now. But his eyes sparkle when he looks at her, and his smile 
 sends a thrill of joy through her heart ; and with all of his ex- 
 acting tyranny his smiles are frequent and his eyes speak an 
 eloquent language, though his lips remain silent on the subject 
 so near to her thoughts, and Pauline is happy in the joyful 
 discharge of her duties as nurse. 
 
 Y'et her serenity is not without its soupc^on of anxiety. For 
 Doctor McDonald's visits grow more frequent and he spends 
 many an hour at the patient's bedside. Though he entertains 
 both him and his nurse with the pleasantest chat, giving 
 humorous accounts of his experiences at the prison hospital. 
 
A BEBEL DOCTOR. 725 
 
 interposed, now and then, with characteristic anecdotes gleaned 
 from the lips of the wounded warriors, yet Pauline notes that, 
 though his lips smile encouragingly while readjusting the band- 
 ages, there lurks^ sober look in his eyes after examining the 
 wounded knee. 
 
 One day, during an unusually lively conversation at the bed- 
 side, in which Pauline's uncle took part, the doctor turned 
 abruptly to the old gentleman with the question whether he 
 knew Dr. Martell. 
 
 " Sure I know Dr. Martell! " the latter replied, with a com- 
 plaisant chuckle. " Who knows not Dr. Martell? He says, 
 Martell means hammer ; and so we call him Sledgehammer in 
 our Skat-club, because he hammers the table hard when he 
 wants to win a trick with a big matador. And on the 'Change 
 we call him Hophammer, because he is always in a row with 
 brewers, who, he says, ruin the reputation of our beer by using 
 a surrogate for hops." 
 
 " You don't mean to say that he plays cards, do you? " 
 
 ' ' Plays cards ? He is king at the Skat-club ! ' ' Auf dem 
 Busch exclaimed. "He tells everybody how he must play; 
 and when they don't play like he tells them they win, and he 
 loses, and scolds them because they would lose and he would 
 win if they played right. Oh, you just ask him if he knows 
 how to play skat ! ' ' 
 
 " Well, I did not know that he is an adept at cards," the 
 doctor rejoined ; " but he is certainly the boss in our Medical 
 Society, and is a rough customer if you don't happen to agree 
 with his theories. I mentioned his name, because I would like 
 to get your permission to introduce him to our patient. He is 
 very high authority on surgery, and always eager to augment 
 his stock of experience. It was on that account only that he 
 accepted a commission from the Dutch Dictator to inspect and 
 report to him the condition of our hospital-prison. And as I 
 accompanied him on his round, I happened to mention the ease 
 of our captain, here, which presents some points of interest, 
 on account of the marvelous readiness with which a badlv 
 
726 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 fractured knee-joint yielded to surgical treatment, after a neg- 
 lect of so many hours. He naturally wished to see for himself 
 a patient of such vigorous coustitutioji ; and if no one objects, I 
 mean to bring him with me this afternoon." 
 
 " Fetch him along! " assented the patient. " I am curious 
 to see the king of a card-club and the boss of the Medical 
 Society." 
 
 "Yes, bring him with you! " said Uncle Auf dem Busch. 
 " But look you out, how he will wash your head, if he finds 
 out that you have cured the captain not by his rule. He will 
 scold you like a fish-woman when you won't buy her stale 
 fish." 
 
 " Never fret about Doctor McDonald's getting a tongue 
 lashing! " said Leslie, with a merry twinkle of his eye. " If 
 there is to be any clapper-clawing, I will back Doctor McDon- 
 ald at liberal odds. Let the Hammer-Doctor look to his 
 laurels." 
 
 " Then it shall be the clash of flint and steel," the old gen- 
 tleman remarked, " and we shall see the sparks, fly. Better 
 Pauline have some cotton ready for the captain to put in 
 his ear, if the doctor's consultation be too caustic for his 
 nerves." 
 
 Pauline Waldhorst has listened to the conversation with 
 anxious ears. Her heart is heavy. The doctor's amused 
 smile over Auf dem Busch's remarks has not deceived her. 
 She suspected at once that his object in mentioning Leslie's 
 case to Dr. Martell had been to obtain the opinion of the latter 
 touching Leslie's wound, and the casual mention by her uncle 
 of the word consultation struck terror into her heart. But she 
 did not hint to any one the suspicion that troubled her, for 
 fear that if the patient became aware of it, he might take alarm, 
 Avhich would affect him injuriously. 
 
 Her worst fears proved too well founded when, in the 
 early afternoon, the two doctors jointly visited the patient. 
 There was no scolding or (piarreling between them, nor, indeed, 
 the slightest difference of opinion : but Pauline turned deathly 
 
A BEBEL DOCrOB. 727 
 
 pale, when she saw the eager look on Doctor McDonald's face 
 as Doctor Martell examined the wound on the patient's knee, 
 and noticed the swift glance of intelligence between them that 
 followed the examination. 
 
 " I think you are jjerfectly correct in your diagnosis," said 
 Doctor Martell, " and I believe there is no time to lose, if his 
 life is to be saved." 
 
 Doctor McDonald looked, with a sober face, first at his 
 patient, then at Miss Waldhorst. " You are a brave woman," 
 he said. "And you know the captain to be a brave man. 
 He is going to give you a higher proof of genuine manhood 
 than is required to court the death of a hero on the battle field, 
 by submitting to the inevitable with courageous grace." 
 
 " What do you mean? " Leslie exclaimed, belying the doc- 
 tor's praise of his fortitude by the alarm depicted in his paling 
 features. 
 
 "He means," said Doctor Martell, with cruel precision, 
 ' ' that we are going to perform an operation in preservation of 
 your life." 
 
 " To save my life ! " cried Leslie, in genuine horror, looking 
 from one of the doctors to the other. " You don't tell me, 
 that there is any danger to my life from that scratch on my 
 knee?" 
 
 Pauline's pallor increased, if possible, but she neither 
 screamed nor fainted. 
 
 " That scratch on your knee," said Doctor McDonald, " is 
 the puncture made by a miunie ball which has fractured a part 
 of the kneepan and torn its way through the ligaments and 
 tendons. It is possible that an overworked surgeon put on 
 the bandage a little too tightly, or awkwardly, — at any rate, 
 necrosis has set in and must prove fatal, unless the affected 
 part be removed. ^Ve can do this without much pain to you 
 by putting you under the influence of an auiesthetic." 
 
 " Amesthetic be d — d!" the patient exclaimed angrily. 
 " Am I a puling babe, that I should faint at sight of the sur- 
 geon's knife? Cut away to your heart's content, if you've got 
 
728 TEE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 to remove that necrosis, as you call it, but don't you dose me 
 with your chloroform, as I've seen you do with some of the 
 poor fellows at the hospital." 
 
 Doctor Martell stepped up to the bedside and spoke in a calm 
 but authoritative voice: " Of course, sir, you shall do as you 
 please. But I give it as my opinion, that you had better 
 follow, our advice about the anaesthetic. I am quite sure that 
 you are too brave to flinch on the application of the scalpel ; 
 but the men are rare indeed with nerve enough to stand the use 
 of the saw." 
 
 Doctor McDonald, who had been keenly watching the patient, 
 nodded approvingly, while Pauline, shuddering, covered her 
 face with both her hands. 
 
 But Leslie bolted into a sitting posture. "Saw?" he 
 screamed, regarding the doctors with indignant surprise. 
 ' ' What do you want with a saw ? ' ' 
 
 "Think, sir! " said Doctor Martell. " We cannot sever 
 the femur with the scalpel." 
 
 " But why do you want to sever the femur? There is noth- 
 ing the matter with the bone, is there? " 
 
 " There is this the matter with the bone," the doctor an- 
 swered, incisively, " that unless we sever it above the knee- 
 joint, the mortification will extend until it reaches some artery 
 or vital part, and human skill will not avail to save your life." 
 
 Doctor McDonald took his eyes from the patient, and re- 
 garded Pauline, who stood as if petrified with horror. 
 
 On Leslie, the doctor's words had a different effect. The 
 color, which had for a moment forsaken his face, returned with 
 double intensity. "There shall be no amputation!" he 
 shouted, with angry emphasis. "You doctors are a set of 
 unmitigated humbugs! I don't believe a word of your cock- 
 and-bull-story about mortification and necrosis*. There is 
 neither pain, nor fever, nor inflammation, about that wound." 
 
 ' ' That is the most alarming sympton of your danger ! ' ' 
 said Doctor McDonald, a tinge of regret audible in his voice 
 in spite of his effort to appear composed. 
 
Pauline, kneeling by the bedside, took one of his hands 
 in both her own. 
 
A BE BEL DOC TOE. 729 
 
 " Miss Waldhorst," said the patient, in a voice that blended 
 entreaty with peremptory command, " please bring me my re- 
 volver. I give yon fair warning, that I will shoot the first 
 man that approaches to take off my leg. Look out for other 
 shambles to do your butchering in ! " 
 
 " Miss Waldhorst," Doctor McDonald addressed the young 
 lady, " I am certain, and so is my colleague, that a delay of a 
 few hours must prove fatal to the patient. If I am not very 
 much mistaken, his life lies in your hands. Persuade him to 
 submit to the operation, and his recovery is assured, a human 
 life rescued, a future full of promise to the world and of honor 
 and distinction to our young friend here redeemed from the 
 clutches of the fell destroyer ! Will you use your influence to 
 bring about so desirable a result? " 
 
 " Don't give yourself any trouble, Miss Waldhorst! " said 
 Leslie, his eyes beginning to show the sparkle of feverish ex- 
 citement. " Ha, ha, ha," he broke into derisive laughter. 
 " The irony of fate, that you, of all persons on earth, should 
 be selected to impress upou me the necessity of having me 
 made a cripple ! I imagine myself hobbling into a drawing- 
 room on a wooden peg, making lopsided bows to Miss Shannon, 
 or Miss Matlack, or some other gushing beauty, smiling super- 
 cilious contempt, or even pity — faugh! Don't — don't!" 
 he cried, waving her off with energetic motion of his hand, as 
 Pauline approached, pale as death, but nerving herself bravely 
 for the effort to be made. " I tell you I will not submit ! You 
 might with better grace ask me to commit suicide ! ' ' 
 
 " That is precisely what you are doing, sir! " said Doctor 
 Martell, with deliberate emphasis: "You are committing 
 intentional, cowardly suicide by your puerile obstinacy. Yes, 
 cowardly, I say," he repeated as Leslie winced at the stinging 
 reproof. ' ' Who but a coward would slink away from a post 
 intrusted to his keeping, and shirk duty, because it is 
 irksome." 
 
 Pauline, kneeling by the bedside, took one of his hands in 
 both her own, and, looking into his eyes with pathetic appeal. 
 
730 THE EE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 made eloquent by the unspoken love that moved her, said : 
 " Oh, Mr. May! Why do you deny your own noble nature? 
 Why let strangers suspect your fortitude and lion-like courage ? 
 I know you better. I know, that but a thought of your father 
 and mother, to whom you are dearer than life, or of your 
 sister, who idolizes you, will brace your will to smile at the 
 trial before you. Because you know that your death would 
 cast a shadow on their lives far darker than the fanciful 
 troubles you are conjuring up for yourself." 
 
 "Oh, Pauline! What a woman you are! " said Leslie, 
 with a look and voice that thrilled her to the soul. " What a 
 hero you make of me, and what a cur I have been to you ! 
 But, woman as you are, you would learn to despise me, if I 
 were base enough to profit by your generous sympathy, and 
 most of all I would have to despise myself for the rest of my 
 life. No, no, Pauline! Give yourself no further trouble in 
 this matter: if I cannot be a whole man, — why, then it is 
 better all round that I should make room for one who is." 
 
 Notwithstanding the patient's peremptory negative, the 
 doctors interchanged a look of encouragement, as if to say that 
 the prospect was improving. And it is not improbable that 
 the united efforts of Pauline and the physicians might have 
 succeeded finally, even without the powerful influence brought 
 to bear upon him by the appearance of a new guest at Busch 
 Bluff. 
 
XLV. 
 
 SISTERS AND BROTHERS. 
 
 NCLE AUF DEM BUSCH had absented himself from 
 the sick room when Dr. Martell entered it. He sat in the 
 library, reading an interesting article on the war, when 
 the sound of approaching carriage wheels, stopping just in 
 front of the grounds, caught his ear. On looking up he recog- 
 nized the gi'acef ul figure of Nellie May as she stepped from the 
 carriage door, and, followed by the girl Cressie, who carried a 
 formidable satchel, hurried up the gravel path toward the 
 house. The old gentleman rose alertly and met them at the 
 door, his face beaming a cheerful welcome. 
 
 " Ah, Miss May! " he exclaimed, seizing her hand in both 
 his own and giving it a cordial squeeze. " It makes me 
 great joy that you honor us with your visit. I am happy to 
 see you safely here, but it frightens me to think how you were 
 in danger to travel through all the military ! ' ' 
 
 "How very kind you are, Mr. Auf dem Busch ! " said 
 Nellie, smiling gratefully, " You cannot imagine how glad I 
 am to be here, at last, after such a journey! I was fully a 
 week on the way from Brooklield, and it will take me a week 
 to recount all the adventures we ran, the rebuffs we met from 
 the soldiers, the difficulties we encountered among our friends 
 as well as among our enemies! Many of the latter were, in- 
 deed, more considerate and courteous toward us than our own 
 people. And oh, how relieved I felt when they told me at that 
 horrid hospital that my brother had been brought here among 
 such kind friends ! ' ' 
 
 " Yes," the old gentleman replied, with a smile and a sly 
 wink, " Pauline is good to him. She cares that he misses 
 nothing. She is up in his room now, with the doctors." 
 
 (731) 
 
732 THE BEBEU8 DAUGHTER. 
 
 "Doctors?" Nellie repeated in great alarm. " Oh, tell 
 me, is he so badly off as to require more than one physician? " 
 
 " Fear you nothing! " Uncle Auf dem Busch assured her. 
 " It is some nonsense of Doctor McDonald. He is so proud of 
 his patient, and how soon he made him well, that he would 
 show him to his colleague, the boss surgeon. I guess you will 
 like to see your brother ; I will call my wife to show you your 
 room, and then Pauline shall take you to the captain, and the 
 doctors, if they be yet there." 
 
 " Oh, please take me to his room at once! " Nellie begged 
 of him , "I am so anxious to see him ! ' ' 
 
 " Of course! " said Uncle Auf dem Busch. '•' Just excuse 
 me a moment ; I will call a servant to take Cressie to your 
 room. Cressie," he added, turning to the octoroon, who 
 stood waiting, " it joys me to see you in my house, so I can 
 thank you for your kind waiting on us last year." 
 
 Nellie entered the sick-room just after Leslie's answer to 
 Pauline's appeal. A glance sufficed to make the situation clear 
 to her. Her cheeks paled as she advanced to the bedside, but 
 she smiled bravely as she embraced the patient, and then, after 
 tenderly kissing him, inquired, in a cheerful voice, how he was 
 doing. 
 
 -' Why, Nell," the patient answered, " you have come jp.st 
 in the nick of time ! Save me from the clutches of these 
 butchers ! They Avant to mutilate me — stop them ! Miss 
 Waldhorst — can you believe it ? — has gone over to my 
 enemies! " And with an attempt at a reproachful smile he 
 added, casting a pathetic glance toward Pauline, " that is the 
 most unkindest cut of all! " 
 
 "I am afraid you have been a naughty boy! " said Nellie, 
 lighting down the tears that made her eyelids heavy. " If 
 Miss Waldhorst has scolded you, you surely deserved it." 
 Then, turning a cheerful look on the latter, she added, " now, 
 hasn't he, Pauline? " 
 
 But Pauline's heart was too heavy to make it possible for her 
 to answer in the vein of badinaoe. She threw her arms about 
 
SISTEBS AND BROTHERS. 733 
 
 Nellie's neck and impulsively kissed her. " Save him! " she 
 sobbed ; '• oh, Nellie, save him ! The doctors say that nothing 
 but an amputation will save him from certain death! " 
 
 '' Tlie young lady is right," said Doctor McDonald, in 
 answer to the swift look of interrogation Nellie cast in tlie 
 direction of the physicians. " Nothing but innnediate ampu- 
 tation can arrest the progress of mortification, which is swiftly 
 destroying him." 
 
 " Is that all? " said Nellie, regarding her brother with a 
 look so cheerfully bright, that it seemed as if she had heard 
 a piece of gpod'news. " Why, Leslie, I am sure that you 
 don't mean to give these two gentlemen the impression that 
 you are afraid of a surgeon, or even of two of them ! Some- 
 how I got the notion from your letter, that a whole regiment 
 of hostile skirmishers bearing down on you could not scare 
 you. You can't imagine, how proud that letter made me of 
 my brother ! Now you are not going to make me feel that I 
 ought to blush for you? " 
 
 '' Confound these women! " exclaimed the patient irritably, 
 " They are all alike! Can't you understand that it is not the 
 surgeon's knife that I am afraid of, — nor even of their saw, 
 confound them ! — but — " 
 
 "Yes, Leslie, I can, and do, understand! And so does 
 Pauline, I know. We both understand that it is not the pain 
 you are afraid of, but the contemplation of the figure you 
 would cut in a ball room. But we also know that your gal- 
 lantry will never permit you to grudge your country the sac- 
 rifice it exacts from a true hero. The courage to look death 
 in the face on the battle-field you have proved: I know, that 
 as a true Virginian you will not shrink from the far greater 
 sacrifice of your personal vanity. Think, my brother, that it 
 is your duty to preserve your life for the protection of the 
 bleeding South! And if it is any comfort to you, i-emember, 
 that your appearance even in a ball room with an artificial 
 limb will win you the admiration, the gratitude, and the heart of 
 everv true Southern woman, whose smile is worth the courting ! " 
 
734 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Whether it was that Nellie had touched the right key to 
 which Leslie's soul responded, or whether Pauline's pathetic 
 face was softening his heart, or whether his firmness gave way 
 before the combined assault upon him by the physicians and 
 the ladies, — the patient no longer resisted. " Yes," he said, 
 smiling faintly, " a redhot she-rebel might smile at me for the 
 loss of my leg in the service of the Confederacy. Miss Mat- 
 lack would, I guess; and perhaps Miss Shannon. But," he 
 added, "what chance would I stand before a Northern 
 belle ? ' ' 
 
 Pauline, though the latter words were addressed squarely to 
 her, and accompanied by an eager, though smiling look, made 
 no reply, but dropped her eyes before his, blushing violently. 
 He seemed to accept her silence as a sufficient answer, how- 
 ever ; for he turned upon both the ladies with a stern look and 
 cried, in a voice of mock severity, " Clear out, now! Let the 
 doctors begin their bloody work. But I don't want you hanging 
 around, haunting me with your looks of pity and regret. Go, 
 now ! Clear out ! When the doctors are through with me, 
 you may come back, both of you, and coddle, to your heart's 
 content, what will be left of me." 
 
 " When we return," said Nellie, regarding him with a look 
 of sisterly affection and pride, " it will be to pay homage to as 
 gallant a soldier as ever drew sword for the glorious South." 
 
 Pauline's heart was buoyant with newly found hope and 
 joy. Her eyes beamed with a new light as they fondly rested, 
 for a moment, on the sufferer's face, before, hand in hand, the 
 two left the room. 
 
 " By Jupiter and all the goddesses!" Doctor McDonald 
 exclaimed, as soon as the door closed behind them. " If I 
 were as young a man as I once was, I believe 1 would storm 
 a hostile battery for such a look and such a kiss." 
 
 "That sister is a superb woman," said Doctor Martell. 
 "No wonder that the impressible hotheads of the South are 
 incited to fierce enthusiasm by such alluring sirens I " 
 
 " Aha ! a superb woman indeed ! " the rebel doctor chuckled. 
 
SISTERS AND BROTHERS. 735 
 
 rubbing his hands and smiling triumphantl3^ " She is a fair 
 specimen of the kind of women the South produces. But that 
 Northern belle, as our young friend here called his sweet- 
 heart, — you don't mind my calling her your sweetheart? — 
 (addressing this remark to the patient, then continuing to his 
 colleague) takes my fancy. Our gallant captain had his wits 
 about him when he laid siege to so fair a fortress of the 
 enemy." 
 
 " Come, gentlemen, get to your work, if you are going to 
 do it! " the patient growled, frowning, as if not pleased with 
 the conversation, and disdaining to conceal his feverish im- 
 patience. 
 
 * * * 
 
 The operation had been successfully performed. The doc- 
 tors remained with the patient until late in the evening, pre- 
 scribing an opiate when they left, and returned early next 
 morning, bringing a professional sick-nurse with them, whom 
 they installed as commander in charge of the sick-room. Con- 
 versation with the patient was strictly inhibited, even his sister 
 and Pauline were not to be admitted to the sick-chamber. All 
 the inmates of the house had been given to understand that it 
 would be well for the patient if they avoided it altogether. 
 
 Nellie had, at her own request, been quartered in Pauline's 
 room ; and the two girls utilized to the utmost the leisure thus 
 afforded for an interchange of experiences and confidences. 
 Nellie learned many facts about the war that were new to her. 
 Some of Pauline's statements and opinions she received with 
 skeptical smiles ; and in turn Pauline opened wide her eyes on 
 hearing Nellie's views on the military successes of the bellig- 
 erent armies, and the probable outcome of the war. But though 
 both maintained strong faith in the justice of their resjjective 
 causes, there was perfect accord between them in respecting 
 each other's motives, and the sincerity of each other's convic- 
 tions. Pauline was astonished, on one occasion, to hear Nellie 
 regret that she had ever been secretly pleased at the outbi'eak 
 of actual hostilities, just because she had been so thoroughly 
 
736 THE REBEL'S DAUQHTEB. 
 
 sure of the superiority of the South, and wished to see the 
 North humiliated before the world. 
 
 Conversation, of course, touched upon the respective 
 brothers of the friends. Pauline was eloquent in praise of 
 Victor's improved bearing in consequence of his military 
 training, and Nellie skillfully drew her out, so as to obtain 
 from her the most minute circumstances regarding his sur- 
 roundings, occupation and prospects, so far as they were 
 known by the sister ; and she did this without in the least 
 betraying the dej)th of her own feelings. Pauline was equally 
 eager to hear about Leslie May, and never wearied of asking 
 questions ; but she did not possess Nellie's skill to conceal the 
 passion that engrossed her heart. The latter read her secret 
 as in an open book, displayed in glaring capitals. The only 
 point on which she remained in the dark was how far her 
 brother might have committed himself ; and this she failed to 
 learn, because Pauline herself did. not possess the information. 
 
 Pearly in the afternoon their conversation was interrupted by 
 the entrance of Cressie, who handed her mistress a card. 
 Pauline observed a nervous agitation in the octoroon's be- 
 havior, and a swift change in Nellie's face, — the faintest 
 touch of a blush, and only for half a second — before she 
 turned smilingly to Pauline, her eyes still on the card. 
 
 " It is your brother, Pauline," she said. " I suppose you 
 must go down to receive him." 
 
 " I? " Pauline exclaimed, emphasizing the pronoun. " The 
 idea! As if Victor would send in a card to me ! " 
 
 " Major Waldhorst asked expressly to see Miss May," the 
 octoroon explained. 
 
 " Of course! " added Pauline. "Run down, Nellie, and 
 don't grieve him by letting him see that his visit annoys you." 
 
 "Annoys me! " the young lady repeated, smiling signifi- 
 cantly at the slave gii'l. 
 
 Major Waldhorst, meanwhile, measures the parlor floor with 
 impatient step. He had, on hearing of the presence of Nellie 
 May at Busch Bluff, presumed upon the favor of the command- 
 
SISTERS AND BROTREBS. 737 
 
 iug geueitil to tlie extent of coercing from him leave of absence 
 for the rest of the day, by threatening open insubordination in 
 case of refusal, " Go, then," the general had finally said; 
 "you are bent on a fool's errand; go, and reap a fool's 
 reward." And Victor, though hurt at what seemed to him the 
 general's cynical mood, was too deeply engrossed by the pros- 
 pect of meeting Xellie to ponder on the meaning of the strange 
 remark, and had set out on his visit without a moment's 
 delay. 
 
 Nellie's step was light as she descended the staircase, and 
 noiseless the touch of her fingers in opening the parlor door. 
 But Victor's ear was quick to catch the rustle of her dress. 
 On turning his head she stood before him in the panoply of her 
 wondrous beauty. 
 
 ' ' Eleonora ! " 
 
 A vivid blush for a brief moment suffused her neck and face. 
 This man standing before her is he, — Victor, whom she had last 
 seen in conflict with his enemies at fearful odds, whose deadly 
 peril had Avrung from her that outcry, which must have betrayed 
 to him her love. Yes ; he has divined her secret ! She sees it 
 written in his face, — in that triumphant joy that blazes from 
 his eyes ; — in the proud bearing with w^hich he a23proaches 
 her ! This is not the timid lover, who adored and worshiped 
 from afar ; not the despairing wooer, whom an unkind word 
 abashed, and whom her refusal had precipitated into the 
 agonies of cruel torture. He comes with the air of a conquer- 
 ing hero, demanding as his due, submission and homage. 
 And the haughty lady, accustomed to rule as a queen of 
 society, feels a strange delight in the thought of belonging to 
 this proud man, and being ruled by him, and submitting her- 
 self to him in all things. And she is dangerously near forget- 
 ting that the uniform worn by this audacious 3'oung warrior is 
 that of the enemy of her country ; and, in her forgetfuluess, to 
 compromise her dignity and betray her country's cause by 
 treasonable desertion to the enemy. 
 
 But the blush recedes swiftly, and with it the momentary 
 
 47 
 
738 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 weakness is conquered. She frankly holds out her hand to 
 him, smiling a glad welcome. 
 
 Her candor delights Victor, who associates it with the blush 
 that has beautified her face on seeing him. 
 
 ' ' I am so glad to see you. Captain — ah, pardon me, Major — 
 Waldhorst! " she says, withdrawing the hand which he had 
 pressed until it ached. "It is so good of you to remember, 
 and take the trouble of calling on, an old friend." 
 
 She points with an inviting gesture to a chair, and is about 
 to occupy one herself, some little distance away. But Victor 
 ignores the hint. He recaptures the hand before she has time 
 to seat herself, and repeats, in a tone of ineffable tenderness, 
 the one word : ' ' Eleanora ! ' ' 
 
 It has a magical effect. Or perhaps it is the look accom- 
 panying the word — that look of deep, unutterable love — that 
 thrills her soul and calls back the color in a mighty flood to 
 her face. She drops her eyes before that intense gaze — for an 
 instant only : for she is fully aware that to be off her guard for 
 a single moment would make him master of the situation and 
 insure him an easy victory. So she bravely fights back the 
 mighty impulse to throw her arms about his neck and rest her 
 head upon that manly breast. Summoning all her skill in 
 conversational fence, she forces her features into a playful 
 expression. 
 
 "Why do you call me by that long, formal name?" she 
 says. " Once, you told me you thought the name Nellie the 
 sweetest. ' ' 
 
 " The sweetest in the vocabulary of love! " he replies. " It 
 is the synonym to me of all that is lovable." 
 
 " So, so ! " she jDOuts, in playful reproach. " That accounts 
 for your using the other to address me by." 
 
 ' ' But Eleonora is the woman whom I worship ! " he declares 
 eagerly. " Tell me, idol of my soul, that you will accept my 
 adoration, — that you will be mine, to reverence, as the lode- 
 star of my destiny ! ' ' 
 
 The passionate earnestness of her lover makes .it hard for 
 
SISTERS AND BROTHERS. 739 
 
 her to keep up the baiiteriug tone with which she hopes to 
 keep him at a distance. But she returns valiantly to the 
 charge. 
 
 "I should like to compliment you, Major Waldhorst, on 
 your courageous gallantry ; for that is a quality on which you 
 soldiers pride yourselves — do you not? — only to me it seems 
 thoughtless temerity : Does it not occur to you that you are 
 addressing a rebel ? ' ' 
 
 " I am addressing a woman! " he asseverates, vehemently. 
 " The one woman in all the world to me. What if you are a 
 rebel 'i I worship in you none the less your divine womanhood . 
 Though you out-Davised Jefferson Davis, I would kneel to you 
 as the embodiment of sublimest loyalty — the loyalty to all 
 that is pure, and just and true ! " 
 
 " It is well, Major," she responds, still holding herself well 
 in hand, " that we are alone. Such laudation of a dyed-in- 
 the-wool secessionist might, if reported by some zealous loyal 
 spy, procure you the honor of a lettre cle cachet from your pro- 
 vost marshal, and quarters indefinitely in Doctor McDonald's 
 Bastile." 
 
 " This levity. Madam," he retorts, frowning sternly, "• ill 
 befits the woman who braved the fury of. a midnight tempest to 
 warn against the assassin's blow the man whom she loves! " 
 
 Nellie starts. Her auger rises at Victor's words. But she 
 quickly recovers herself. 
 
 " It strikes me. Major Waldhorst," she replies saucily, 
 " that you are relapsing into your old trick of magnifyiug my 
 virtues. Surely I have given you no cause to believe me 
 capable of practicing the Christian injunction to love my 
 enemy? " 
 
 " Your enemy! " he repeats, his eyes flashing with indigna- 
 tion. "How can you, how dare you, Nellie May, speak of 
 me, — to me, or to yourself, as j'our enemy? " 
 
 His earnest words, and the searching look accompanying 
 them, have called a swift flush to Nellie's face, which ought to 
 have shown Victor how deeply she feels the sting of his re- 
 
740 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 proach. But he misiuterprets the emotion, and hears only the 
 flippancy which she has made a strong effort to infuse into her 
 voice as she answers : 
 
 " Why, — does not your uniform proclaim you such? " 
 
 " My uniform! " he iterates, now with scathing sarcasm. 
 ' ' Since when., does Nellie May read a friend by the color of 
 his uniform? And how must you judge that woman who, 
 though as pure, and as proud, and as redhot a rebel as you, 
 challenged the venomous gossip of her rebel friends by inter- 
 posing her own person in protection of the wearer of this same 
 uniform? " 
 
 He drops his iierce tone and continues in pathetic suppli- 
 cation : 
 
 " Cease this unworthy trifling with what is most sacred in 
 your life and mine! I love you, Eleonora! How deeply, is 
 no secret to you. That you love me, I have long known, 
 though your lips have ever disdained to utter the admission. 
 For the eye reveals what the hypocrite tongue would conceal ^ 
 and there is a language that speaks in bugle blasts, though 
 the lips may not move. Soul of my life, we have bartered our 
 heai-ts: Why grudge me the sweetness of the admission? " 
 
 The smile has vanished from Nellie's face : Love, triumphant, 
 for a moment, transfigures her radiant features. Victor, trans- 
 ported beyond his power of self-control, catches her in his arms 
 and strains her to his breast. She is powerless to resist. 
 Their lips meet : her soft, responsive kiss thrills through and 
 through him with ecstatic rapture. 
 
 For a brief time they hold one another in blissful embrace. 
 Then Nellie disengages herself, — softly, though resolutely. 
 
 " You have seen me weak, my Victor," she says in low, but 
 distinct accents. " Forgive me! " 
 
 "Forgive you!" he cries, "forgive you, — for crowning 
 my life with heavenly joy?" And again, in the exuberance 
 of his newly found happiness, he presses her to his heart. 
 But again she puts him away ; gently, but firmly. 
 
 As she does so her eves seek those of her lover with a look 
 
" Soul of my life, why grudge me the sweetness of the admission' 
 
SISTERS AND BBOTHEBS. 741 
 
 of passionate entreaty. "Forgive my cruel weakness," she 
 says, " which seemed to promise what I do not mean to grant. 
 For, indeed, it cannot, must not be ! " 
 
 " Cannot be? What cannot be? " he questions, bewildered, 
 with paling cheeks. 
 
 " You and I cannot belong to one another, Victor," she 
 answers, the calmness of her manner, even more cruelly than 
 the bitter content of her words, casting chilling doubt upon 
 the brightness" of his hope. "For your people are not my 
 people. What we claim as Right, is to yours an Abomination. 
 Between you and me flares in lurid flame the wrath of two na- 
 tions, consuming all within its reach. Pause, Victor, lest we 
 fall victims to its fury ! ' ' 
 
 " Wherein have you or I to fear the nation's wrath! " he 
 exclaims, in a desperate attempt to assail her resolution, which 
 yet, in his inmost heart, he feels to be unalterable as the de- 
 cree of Fate. " Nor you nor I have challenged it, nor in 
 aught transgressed the strictest military code of either 
 1 )elligerent ! ' ' 
 
 " Nay, Victor, you surely forget that I am a daughter of 
 the South I " she urges, sadly, yet not without a touch of gen- 
 tle pride. " And you know, that I have never attempted 
 to conceal my partisanshijj ; and also, that I could not, 
 were I even base enough to desire it, forswear my creed. 
 Is not my presence in this very house a menace to the peace 
 of its inhabitants? Or tell me, what would be my fate, were 
 some craven wretch to denounce me as a Southern spy, con- 
 spiring, uuder guise of a visit to my wounded brother, to fur- 
 nish information to the Confederate generals ? Are you quite 
 sure, that even your eloquence and zeal in my behalf, backed, 
 if 3-0U please, by the influence of General Seele, or Generak 
 Rauheufels, would, in such case, suffice to bar a sentence of 
 incarceration, or of death at the gallows, at the hands of some 
 truculent court-martial ? ' ' 
 
 Victor Waldhorst shuddered, in spite of himself. "You 
 rave ! " he cried. " You cruelly defame our time and country ! 
 
742 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 How cau you conceive of such barlmrity as i:»ossible in tlie 
 nineteentli century, among a Christian nation! " 
 
 " How near was my brother to fall a victim to just such a 
 piece of barbarity? " she says, and adds, with a look of proud 
 admiration: " And I might not have a Victor Waldhorst as 
 my judge advocate, nor a General Seele to preside over the 
 court." 
 
 He is about to answer ; but she puts up her hand in gentle 
 deprecation. 
 
 " If your judgment reject my reasoning," she continues, 
 "let me appeal to your gr6at-hearted generosity. See: You 
 have read the secret of my heart ; nor do I grudge you the 
 victory you have obtained over me. Your love is the most 
 precious boon of my life, as my love for you is the highest and 
 best part of my nature. Knowing this, my Victor, press me 
 no further. You once taught me, proud man, how far nobler 
 it is to renounce, than to possess unworthily. 1 would prove 
 myself worthy of your love by renouncing. Then, oh Victor, 
 urge me not to abase myself in my own estimation. If I 
 yielded now, how could you trust, how honor a woman who 
 proves faithless to her family, her people and her country ! 
 Disgust would supplant your love, merited contempt be my 
 reward. And, dearest Victor, I could not survive the loss of 
 your esteem ! ' ' 
 
 Victor listened with sinking heart. He felt, to a painful 
 degree, his utter inability to refute, by any argument, what 
 appeared to him as the distorted, exaggerated patriotism of 
 this young enthusiast, or to shake her purpose by supplication 
 or entreaty. 
 
 There was a soft knock at the parlor door, and Pauline 
 entered, pale, in evident distress. She took no notice of the 
 I'vusence of her brother, but walked straight up to Leslie's 
 sister. 
 
 " He is sinking, Nellie! " was all she said, as she embraced 
 her friend. 
 
 "Do you come from his roomr" Nellie inquired, and, as 
 
SISTERS AND BROTHERS. 743 
 
 Pauline simply nodded, the sister left the parlor, without 
 apology to Victor. Pauline was alone with her brother. 
 
 '• Is there danger for Leslie May? " Victor inquired, as soon 
 as Nellie was gone. 
 
 " Oh, Victor, he is about to die! " Pauline faltered out, the 
 tears, which she had so valiantly fought back, streaming from 
 her eyes. 
 
 " That is sad, indeed," said Victor, shocked by the sudden 
 information. "I thought he was doing so well! How did 
 this come about ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' I am afraid that Doctor McDonald waited a little too long 
 before he insisted on the operation," Pauline explained, inter- 
 rupted by frequent sobs. " He was so fond of Captain May, 
 and hated so to grieve him by the amputation. When he 
 brought Doctor Martell along they knew at once that the cap- 
 tain had taken the gangrene, and that mortification was kill- 
 ing him. — Oh, Victor, is it not dreadful? So young, so full 
 of vigorous hfe, so bright, and grand and brave ! And now, 
 to die! " 
 
 "It is very sad for his sister," Victor observed. "How 
 do you think Nellie will take it ? " 
 
 " She loves him to idolatry! " Pauline exclaimed, drying 
 her tears as if the contemplation of her friend's grief revived 
 her own courage. " But she will be brave and quiet about it. 
 She is almost as brave and cheerful in her disposition as her 
 brother. I wish that I were as good and courageous as she ! " 
 
 Further conversation between the brother and sister was cut 
 off by the entrance of Cressie, who informed them that Captain 
 May would take it as a favor if Major and Miss Waldhorst 
 would trouble themselves by calling on him in his room. 
 
 The patient had fully recovered his consciousness when th 
 entered the sick chamber. Victor noticed even the old, charn^ 
 ing smile — a mere shadow, now, of its former brightness, bu 
 oh ! so touching in its winsome loveliness ! — as in greeting his 
 visitors he extended a hand each to Pauline and her brother. 
 
 "This is so good of vou to humor the whim of a dvine 
 
744 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 mau," be said, iu a clear, cheerful voice, though much en- 
 feebled by his late suffering. " For old Sawbones, there, has 
 had the manliness to tell me that he had made a botch of my 
 cure, and that at the next roll-call I would be reported ' miss- 
 ing, but accounted for.' " 
 
 "Accounted for, indeed!" said Victor. "It will be a 
 glorious account ; and your absence will leave a great void that 
 will be slow in filling." 
 
 " Yes, I dare say," the patient replied, " that the sutler of 
 my company will sadly miss my patronage on pay-days ; and I 
 suspect that Miss Waldhorst will sigh a sigh of deep gratitude 
 to the skill of Dr. McDonald in ridding her of her most persist- 
 ent tease and torment. Will you not. Miss Waldhorst? " 
 
 ' ' A most sad riddance ! ' ' Pauline forced herself to say in 
 the tone of badinage suggested by the patient, although it was 
 difficult for her to repress the tears that were making her eyes 
 heavy. " But you know that I am not one to sigh vainly for 
 what I cannot have." 
 
 "Ah! then you will consider my death a loss?" Leslie 
 asked, regarding her with a look of such tender affection as he 
 had never before bestowed upon her. 
 
 Pauline made a brave effort to appear unmoved. A pathetic 
 smile enwreathed her lips — a writhing, tremulous smile, more 
 agonizing than heart-breaking sobs — as she answered : 
 
 " I shall never lose you, my friend, though Death claim you 
 for his own ! " 
 
 "Why, Pauline," the sick man remarked, "that sounds 
 almost like some of the Dutch Dictator's iDhilosophy." His 
 eyes softened as he feasted them on her love-beaming face, 
 thinking, perhaps, of what might have been. But with sudden 
 resolution he turned to his sister. 
 
 " You, Nellie," he said, his face brightening visibly, " will 
 shed a tear to my memory when 1 am gone. For we have been 
 good comrades, have we not? But it is mama that will be in- 
 consolable over my shortcomings. She will never forgive me 
 for failing in my mission to smash the old Union and establish 
 
SI ST BBS AND BEOTIIEBS. 745 
 
 the uew Confederacy ; or at least to come back from the war 
 with the shoulder-straps of a major-geueral." 
 
 Nellie took and pressed his hand with an encouraging smile. 
 " I will conciliate her, Leslie, when I make her understand 
 that she is mother to as brave and gallant a hero as any the 
 Confederacy can boast." 
 
 '^If you tell her so, maybe she will believe it," Leslie re- 
 joined. "She has the greatest regard for your judgment, 
 though I was always her pet. And you will comfort the dear 
 old governor? No one would he take comfort from but you." 
 
 " Such comfort, Leslie, as a fond daughter can give, be 
 sure, shall be his ! " 
 
 Then Leslie turned again to Victor, a faint smile recalling to 
 the latter the merry twinkle that was wont to light up his eye 
 when about to utter some pleasantry. 
 
 " You and I, Victor," he said, " ought to feel honored in 
 our sisters.' They have more profoundly impressed the enemy, 
 than either of us, with all our prowess. Nellie's witchery has 
 enslaved one blue-coat, while the most rabid rebel worships at 
 Pauhne's shrine. Nay," he continued, as Victor blushed in 
 deep embarrassment, "I am not alluding to either you or 
 myself. We both surrendered to the fair ones long before 
 Pauline could class me as an enemy, or Nellie became a rebel. 
 I speak of higher game and victories more recent. What do 
 you say to Doctor Martell as a conquest of NeUie's, and Doc- 
 tor McDonald as an admirer of Pauline ? ' ' 
 
 " You exaggerate perfunctory politeness into serious atten- 
 tions,' ' said Nellie ; and then to Victor : ' ' You know my brother 
 well enough, to appraise his assertions at their market-value. 
 Major Waldhorst ; do you not? " 
 
 " Oh, but Victor knows that I never prevaricate — never to 
 him, at least," the patient asserted with mock solemnity. " I 
 am speaking the gospel truth. The learned humbugs declared 
 themselves on this very spot, when alone with me, and thinking 
 I did not hear. At a moment, too, when they were preparing 
 to Immolate me on the altar of science." 
 
746 THE BEBEUS DAUGHTER. 
 
 The effort in speaking seemed to have exhausted his strength. 
 He sank back on his pillow. For a while he closed his eyes as 
 if in slumber. Suddenly he raised himself into a sitting posture. 
 His eyes glittered in feverish excitement as they sought out and 
 rested upon Victor. 
 
 " Major," he exclaimed, " do you hear that bugle call? 
 It is the signal for retreat ! We have been doing nothing 
 but retreat! Old Ciper is emulous of Xenophon's famous 
 Retreat of the Ten Thousand. His name will go down in 
 history as the Great Cunctator for action, and a second 
 Xenophon for Retreat. But it will hardly survive the Con- 
 federacy. Retreat is not the way to win in battle, nor to 
 vindicate a cause. To retreat is to run ; and we rebels are not 
 good at running. And yet they are running — running! The 
 fools think they can save the Confederacy by running ! But I 
 can't help them in that. I was never good to run from an 
 enemy ; and now — ' ' 
 
 A faint smile creeps into his wan features, and a scarcely 
 audible chuckle interrupts his words. Then he continues: 
 
 ' ' — Now they have stopped my running for good and all ! " 
 
 Presently he beckoned Pauline to his bedside. "Miss 
 Waldhorst — let me say Pauline to you, — it is such a sweet 
 name — Pauline, you will love my sister, — for ray sake — will 
 you not? Because I loved you — you know it, though I 
 never told you. And because I loved you, Nellie loved you. 
 Pauline, I dreamed sometimes, before this foolish war, of you 
 as Nellie's sister. But we were proud, we rebels, and 
 foolish." 
 
 A fond admiring look now rested on his sister. 
 
 " Your pride becomes you, sissy mine," he said, " and l' 
 see it reflected on another face. Our cause may triumph, 
 Nellie, and out of the ashes of the old Union may arise the 
 Phoenix of the new Confederacy ; ot it may perish, like a 
 sinking meteor in the sky : But your pride will, carry you 
 safely through the din of victory, or the dirge over a Lost 
 Cause. Oh, that Pauline and you were sisters! " 
 
SISTERS AND BBOTIIERS. 747 
 
 "If Nellie will let me!" said Pauline, embracing her 
 friend. 
 
 " We are! We shall be ! " said Nellie, folding Pauline to 
 her bosom. 
 
 " And you, Victor," said the dying man, " will you l>e my 
 brother? " 
 
 "Yours in heart, in soul, and in spirit! " said Victor, 
 grasping Leslie's hand, and cordially pressing it. 
 
 A smile flitted over the patient's face, as he sank back into 
 his pillows. 
 
 After a brief pause, during which his features composed 
 themselves into an expression of profound rest, he said : 
 
 ' ' Ah ! Do you hear the bugle sound the tattoo ? How 
 mournful, and yet how restful, its cadence charms my ear ! It 
 means rest, rest! Rest for me, but it is the dirge of the Con- 
 federacy. No, not yet! It will die hard. There is more 
 running to do ; there are more ditches to occupy before it 
 reaches the last ; and then ' ' — again there was the semblance 
 of a smile about his pale lips as he added : ' ' We always 
 boasted that we would die in the last ditch, before we sur- 
 rendered ! But I will not be there. I have listened to my 
 last tattoo. Put out the lights — they will give the signal 
 directly — we need no lights after tattoo. When they sound 
 that signal, it will be the knell of the Confederacy : They will 
 put out the lights on a Lost Cause ! " 
 
XL VI. 
 
 BEFORE THE DAWN. 
 
 'O the sable descendants of the curse-laden race of Ham 
 has come the Yeai- of Jubilee. That " peculiar insti- 
 tution," that once piped so shi'ill a discord to the 
 American Hymn of the Equality of Men is now relegated to 
 the past forevermore. At May Meadows the negro cabins 
 stand untenanted ; the negroes themselves have left. Of all of 
 them once owned by Senator May, but three — the sturdy 
 Xerxes, feeble Cassandra and gentle Cressie — have resisted 
 the temptation to follow the Federal soldiers into freedom. 
 Their absence is not regretted of Nellie May. For when she 
 was left in sol^ charge of the i)lantation, having dismissed the 
 overseer for want of funds to pay him further wages, she found 
 it quite a relief to be rid of the hungry mouths of useless field 
 hands. The scant crops they had raised had. been regularly 
 carried off by the soldiery of either army, or plundered by 
 marauding camp followers of friend and foe. To provide 
 food, with purse, larder and granary equally empty, had be- 
 come a harassing problem. Maj' Meadows, in the dark days 
 before the final collapse of the Confederacy, bore a painful 
 resemblance to the depleted South. Xerxes' skill with snare 
 and angle had furnished many a welcome meal to mistress and 
 servants, and oftentimes the mistress sought her couch not 
 knowing where next day's meal was to come from. 
 
 When the end came, it brought new trials and a grief more 
 harrowing than any she had yet experienced. 
 
 The dcath-bloAv to the cherished cause of the South was 
 itself a disappointment hard to bear. But far keener was the 
 anguish of the uncertainty as to her father's fate. 
 
 For well she knew that indictment and trial for high treason 
 (748) 
 
BEFORE THE DAWN. 749 
 
 awaited bini ou his return home. For did not Senator May 
 offer a shining mark to the pharisaical patriots, who loudly 
 paraded their untempted loyalty in justification of their zeal 
 " to make treason odious " by vindictively hunting down all 
 who had participated in the rebeUion ? 
 
 But she bore up bravely, keeping her eyes open to note the 
 trend of public opinion, and to feed hope on the slightest cir- 
 cumstance indicating a change in her father's favor. There 
 was, in those days, much talk about President Johnson's 
 views in regard to the reconstruction of the seceded States. He 
 Avas known to look on secession as an utter nullity, in no wise 
 changing the relation of the States to each other, or to the 
 Union, so that, legally, no one of them had ever ceased to be 
 a co-equal member of the Union, and that while each indi- 
 vidual rebel had made himself guilty of high treason, it was 
 impossible to deal with such multitudes according to the crim- 
 inal laws. It would follow, that a general amnesty to the 
 political offenders was the only solution to the problem con- 
 fronting the victorious government. 
 
 Here again, bitter disappointment awaited her. The Am- 
 nesty Proclamation in terms excluded senators, congressmen 
 and civil otticers of high rank from the benefit of its pro- 
 visions ; all such were to be turned over to the criminal 
 courts of the land ! 
 
 She took new hope on learning that the President had granted 
 special pardons to some of the rebels that ranked high in the 
 list of the proscribed. It occurred to her that if the President 
 were made acquainted with the true facts in her father's 
 case, — if he, the firm champion of an unbroken Union, could 
 be made to understand that Senator May was in reality a com- 
 patriot, who, like himself, had devoted his life to the vindica- 
 tion of a sacred principle, he would surely interpose executive 
 clemency. But how convince the President? 
 
 Victor Waldhorst would do all in his power, if she asked his 
 assistance. He would enlist the co-operation of General Seele ; 
 and Governor Rauhenfels might not refuse his aid. They 
 
750 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 would prove powerful support iu a petition to the President for 
 the pardon of Senator May, But — could she appear before 
 Victor to solicit so great a service? She had peremptorily 
 rejected his suit on the ground that he was the enemy of her 
 people. What would he think of her, if now she came to him 
 as a supplicant ! The humiliation and shame of such a course 
 would be more than she could bear. Her proud nature 
 rebelled at the very thought of such a thing ; every fibre of 
 her being rose up in protest. 
 
 And yet — her father's liberty, perhaps his life, was at 
 stake. And it would be such a happiness to Victor — of this 
 she was perfectly sure — if he were permitted to serve her, or 
 her father, or both ! It was this conviction that finally de- 
 cided the fierce conflict between her love and her pride. She 
 resolved to ask Victor's help in soliciting the President's 
 clemency. 
 
 But the letter she addressed to " Major Victor Waldhorst, 
 in care of Governor Rauhenfels " etc., came back to her un- 
 opened, with the indorsement " not in the city." She had 
 been waiting for an answer from Victor with feverish impa- 
 tience ; the return of her letter, though a grave disappointment 
 to her hopes in one direction, was yet a relief in another: it 
 settled for her the doubt as to the propriety of invoking assist- 
 ance from others. Her resolution Avas promi:)tly carried into 
 effect. The pledge of her jewelry enabled her to raise suffi- 
 cient funds for her journey to Washington, accompanied by 
 Cressie. She was sorely tempted, in passing through the 
 metropolis, to stop at Busch Bluff for a talk with Pauline ; 
 but an instinctive dread that Pauline would urge her to enlist 
 the aid of her brother in the enterprise prevented her. 
 
 It was no easy matter, in those excited times, to gain access 
 to the President, But Nellie had not in vain lived in Wash- 
 ington, and moved in the circles that were no strangers in the 
 White House. She remembered, too, the deference paid to 
 her sex, and counted on the effect of a little hauteur and 
 aristocratic bearing in dealing with waiters and ushers ; nor 
 
BEFOBE THE DAWN. 751 
 
 was she ignorant of the magic shibboleth stamped on silver or 
 gold, before which servants cringed and doors sprang open. 
 
 The President received her courteously, when she was 
 ushered into his presence. " This is not the first time 1 have 
 had the pleasure of seeing you," he said rising, with the card 
 she had sent in his hand. " We have met before; do you 
 remember. Miss May? " 
 
 " How should I forget the honor accorded me by an intro- 
 duction to the lion of Washington society, set agog by the 
 boldness of the Senator from Tennessee? The marvel is, that 
 your Excellency should remember insignificant me! " 
 
 " I have cause to remember that introduction," said the 
 President, smiling playfully. " I had some vigorous elbowing 
 to do in escorting our hostess through the crowd of your 
 admirers to obtain it. And when I made bold to ask the star 
 of the evening for the honor of a dance, I came away with a 
 graciously worded, but flat refusal. And think," he added, 
 with smiling pathos, " you were the only lady I asked to dance 
 with me that evening ! ' ' 
 
 "I remember well," said Nellie, a little puzzled by the 
 meaning smile of the President. " It was at the ball given by 
 the Spanish ambassador in honor of the birth of Alphonso, 
 Prince of Asturia. My disappointment surely exceeded your 
 own, when I found no open space on my programme for your 
 name." 
 
 "So you graciously sugared the pill, Miss May. And I 
 fear that even now your conversational skill will make it hard 
 for me to refuse your petition. For you have come to inter- 
 cede for your father, have you not? " 
 
 "Indeed, sir, I have! " she said, regarding the President 
 with a look of appealing solicitude which he seemed to enjoy. 
 ' ' And I hope that you will accord to me the same magnanimous 
 grace with which you have listened to so many petitioners for 
 your mercy." 
 
 " So many! So many! " he said, a shadow of sombre re- 
 gret passing over his face. 
 
752 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 As he said nothing more, she continued : " It is your Excel- 
 lency's divine privilege to temper the vengeful rigor of the law 
 with heaven-born Mercy, and to transmute the bitter tears of 
 wives and children into sweeter drops of joy and gratitude." 
 
 "Ah! " he exclaimed, "you have varied slightly Portia's 
 panegyric to Mercy, ' that droppeth like the gentle rain from 
 heaven.' It has been dinned into my ears uutil I know it 
 quite by heart, as well as any actress. You will not think me 
 flinty-hearted," he said, again regarding her with that strange 
 smile that to Nellie seemed almost as if he were secretly laugh- 
 ing at her, " will you, if I put myself on guard against your 
 seductive eloquence? It is my duty, you know, to give justice, 
 also, a hearing, besides listening to clamorous demands for 
 nlercy." 
 
 " Clamorous demands? " Nellie repeated, with a little pout 
 of reproach. " I fear that my words have offended you. 
 Portia would more skillfully have reminded you that ' Mercy 
 is an 'attribute to God himself, and that earthly power doth 
 then show likest God's, when mercy seasons justice.' " 
 
 " But remember," he answered, " that the same great poet 
 who spoke these immortal words, also warns us, that ' Nothing 
 emboldens sin so much as mercy.' I knew your father well. 
 He is an able man, and was a shining light in his party. It 
 pained me deeply to see him make common cause with the 
 traitors who conspired to disrupt the Union. Many other wise 
 good men have been misled by his example. To condone his 
 crime would be to share his guilt." 
 
 " Guilt! " the daughter repeated with quivering lips and 
 blenching cheeks. " Can that be guilt which springs from 
 the purest of motives and involves the most unselfish sacrifice — 
 staking life, liberty and sacred honor, on the attainment of a 
 high and noble purpose? Oh, sir, I will not clamor for mercy, 
 since the word, by too much iteration, has grown offensive to 
 your ears ; but I demand the pardon of my father as an act of 
 justice." 
 
 " Of justice? " the President asked wonderingly. 
 
BE FOBS THE DAWN. 753 
 
 " Of justice! " Nellie repeated iu a llrm voice, with retuni- 
 iug color and growing courage. "He is not guilty of the 
 crime of Avhich you accuse him. He has never conspired to 
 disrupt the Union, but devoted the energy of his life to its 
 preservation. Sir, if my father be guilty, then is your Excel- 
 lency guilty likewise. You have been — you are at this 
 moment — committing what in him you designate a crime." 
 
 " Ah ? " spoke up the President with a show of amused 
 curiosity. " How do you propose to make that out? " 
 
 Nellie continued unabashed: " You are waging war against 
 the Congress — are you not ? With all the vigor of a man 
 who knows that he is right you combat their attempt to 
 accomplish what your victorious armies have prevented these 
 States from doing." 
 
 " And that is — ? " 
 
 " The accomplishment of secession ! " 
 
 " Indeed? Do you assert, then, that to treat these seceded 
 States as conquered provinces would in itself involve the viola- 
 tion of the constitution ? ' ' 
 
 "I do, your Excellency! It would be no more lawful for 
 Congress than for a State, to deprive a single State of its 
 constitutional equality in the government." 
 
 ' ' And what follows ? ' ' 
 
 " That your Excellency is right, and your Congress 
 wrong." 
 
 ' ' Well ! And does not that distinguish my case from that 
 of your father ? ' ' 
 
 " Sir, I am a woman, unskilled in questions of statecraft; 
 and I must not forget that my sympathies in this quarrel are 
 with the South. But your Congress asserts emphatically that 
 you are wrong. If this were so — pardon me for positing such 
 a possibility — and that some tribunal should authoritatively 
 so decide, — then would you not be in the predicament my 
 father is in? With a high and noble purpose, actuated by 
 motives whose purity not even your enemies dare impugn — 
 yet are you accused of betraying the interest of your country ! " 
 
 48 
 
754 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 ' ' True — that is what their contention amounts to ! " said 
 the President. " But, my dear young lady, it is fortunate for 
 me that there is no tribunal that can so decide." 
 
 ' ' Not even a High Court of Impeachment ? ' ' Nellie ventured 
 to suggest. 
 
 ' ' Hah ! Let them try that on ! " President Johnson ex- 
 claimed, his eyes flashing proud defiance. "The attempt to 
 impeach me would be but their own impeachment before that 
 still higher tribunal, the American people, and the verdict of 
 impartial history ! No, Miss May, they will never dare drag 
 their absurd contention before a tribunal presided over by the 
 Chief Justice of the United States." 
 
 " But," Nellie went on, gathering new hope from the resent- 
 ment shown by the President on the mere mention of a i:)Ossible 
 impeachment, " if the Congress did persist in their tyrannical 
 course, to the extent of using this weapon against you, — how 
 would you then defend yourself ? ' ' 
 
 " Defend myself? " he ejaculated, almost fiercely. " What 
 defense is there against fanatical party zeal? Where prejudice 
 holds the balance, there Justice is blinded indeed, or sees with 
 but one eye, and lets vengeful passion be thrown into the scale 
 to weigh down innocence itself ! " 
 
 " Oh, sir! " pleaded Nellie with an earnestness that might 
 have had its effect upon a more obdurate judge, " such fanat- 
 ical accusers are they who thirst for my father's blood ! 
 They who are zealous to pronounce a predetermined sentence 
 against him ! They will do this cruel thing unless your 
 strong arm succor feeble Justice ! ' ' 
 
 "How speciously you identify your father's case with 
 mine!" said the President with undisguised approval. 
 "Well," he continued, regarding her with that strange smile 
 that had puzzled her before, " suppose I grant your reasoning, 
 if your premises be correct. You wish me, — do you not? — 
 to accord mercy, rather than law, to your father? " 
 
 " I wish your Excellency to be just to him, even as you 
 desire posterity to do justice between you and the Congress. 
 
BEFORE THE DAWN. 755 
 
 Mercy is justice ; and justice is the soul of the law. Even as 
 the new commandment of love taught by the Savior from the 
 Mount, is not the undoing of the law, or the prophets, but the 
 fulfilling of the law, so is mercy the glorious crowning of the 
 law! " 
 
 The President looked at the fair petitioner admiringly, but 
 with a smile for which Nellie was at a loss to account, and 
 which seemed to her hardly in keeijing with the earnestness of 
 her appeal. " Your reasoning is unassailable. But how about 
 the premise? " he said. " How am I to know that you have 
 not deceived me, being, perhaps, deceived yourself? Ought I 
 to base my official action on the unsupported assertion of a 
 daughter pleading for the life of a father? What welcome 
 proof my enemies might find in it, that I prostituted my office 
 for the smiles of a beautiful woman I ' ' 
 
 For a moment the color forsook Nellie's face. How bitterly 
 she regretted at this moment that she had not waited for Vic- 
 tor's return, and enlisted his co-operation in this undertaking. 
 But she rallied quickly. 
 
 " Your Excellency will, of course, judge for yourself what 
 credence to give to my statement," she said. " But of this I 
 am sui"e, that the man whom neither the frowns or threats of a 
 fanatical mob, nor the yelps of mischievous curs could turn 
 aside from his course is not to be intimidated by the needle- 
 pricks of base slander." 
 
 " But have you no friends who could verify the accuracy of 
 your statements ? ' ' 
 
 Nellie was about to mention Victor's name, flushing deeply 
 as she thought of him, when the President, who had closely 
 watched her, said: '' You are slow to remember friends, Miss 
 May, to ask service of them. Or is Major "Waldhorst less than 
 a friend in your estimation ? ' ' 
 
 Nellie resented the implied doubt of her loyalty to the young 
 soldier. Her voice rang out clearly, as she said with exultant 
 pride and sparkling e^^es : " He is my true and steadfast friend, 
 vour Excellency ! " 
 
756 THE BE BE US DAUGHTER. 
 
 The President's smile broadeued into the expression of 
 hearty good will as he ansAvered : " A right devoted knight to 
 you, I should think, and a warm admii-er of Senator May." 
 
 " Yes, your Excellency, he adores my father," Nelhe 
 assented. " You have seen him? " 
 
 " It may be as much to the point to say that he has seen 
 me," the President answered, '• Nor did he come alone. Do 
 you not remember among your friends one General Seele? " 
 
 " I would be proud to be allowed to call him so," said Nellie 
 soberly. '' I became acquainted with him under tragic cir- 
 cumstances. He presided over the court-martial that tried my 
 brother." 
 
 "And acquitted him," the President added. "General 
 Seele has told me all about it. But you are better acquainted, 
 perhaps, with General Rauhenfels, who once was Governor- 
 General over your State ? ' ' 
 
 ' " Rather so, sir. He is a staunch friend of Major Wald- 
 horst." 
 
 " And of your father, the senator. All of these gentlemen 
 have interceded for him, and their statements so fully corrobo- 
 rate your own, that for once, Miss May, I take unalloyed 
 pleasure in exercising my constitutional prerogative, assured 
 that in pardoning Senator May I am not defeating but vindi- 
 cating the law, as you have so earnestly urged. In this case, 
 I am happy to believe, Mercy — glorious Mediatrix! — blends 
 Justice and Law into divine harmony. You may go home. 
 Miss May, and carry with you the pardon that is to restore to 
 your father his liberty and his civil rights. And please say to 
 him for me, that I congratulate him upon the possession of such 
 friends as have spoken for him, — and on such a daughter! " 
 
XLVII. 
 
 AFTER THE WAR. 
 
 IROOKFIELD is in a whirl of excitement. It is, for the 
 time being, the Western terminus of the great national 
 railway that is to weld together Atlantic and Pacific 
 States. Thus far Pacificward it has been completed, and the 
 auspicious event is now to be celebrated by a gi-aud festival. 
 The preparations, so far as they have leaked into public notice, 
 are on a magnificent scale. The citizens are decorating their 
 houses with silk and bunting in the brightest of the national 
 colors : banners bearing proudly patriotic legends meet the eye 
 on every side, and red, white and blue flags float from windows 
 and housetops. A parade has been planned, in which old and 
 young are going to participate to give public expression to the 
 universal joy over the preservation of the Union, and at the 
 same time to impress themselves, as well as any outsider that 
 may happen to look on, with the grandeur and vast resources 
 of the booming young city, promising a yet greater future. 
 For Brookfield has, during the last few years, leaped into 
 prominence with truly astonishing suddenness, and is now pos- 
 ing as the future greatest inland city of the State. 
 
 After the parade there is to be a banquet to which the most 
 prominent people of the community are to be invited ; and, to 
 add lustre to the occasion, the whole is to conclude with a 
 grand civic and military ball, at which the veterans of both the 
 Confederate and Federal armies are to appear in full uniform, 
 to shake hands and congratulate their common country on the 
 auspicious event. 
 
 The banquet is to be spread in the spacious dining hall of 
 Smith's Hotel, erected on the site of the old building that once 
 faced the court house where the Boonville Road debouched into 
 
 (757) 
 
758 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 the Square. The cupola, with its shrill bell, that ouce per- 
 formed the functious of summoning the hotel-guests to their 
 meals, is no more ; it has fallen a victim to the spirit of inno- 
 vation that is busily transforming the good of yesterday into 
 the better of to-day : the town has grown into a city, and 
 loftier towers over its many churches, boasting tuneful belfries 
 of their own, have shamed the saucy little dinner bell out of 
 existence. 
 
 Burden's barroom, however, has maintained its proximity to 
 the hotel; though it, too, has succumbed to the vivifying in- 
 lluence of the city's onward march. It is no longer the dingy 
 little groggery, whose chief stock in trade had been rum and 
 whiskey; but a smart looking " Sample Room," wherein Bob 
 Rountree serves its patrons with the choicest of liquors and 
 the most fanciful of fashionable mixed drinks. But chief 
 among its attractions may still be mentioned the readiness 
 with which the chatty barkeeper retails spicy morsels of gossip 
 to all who are willing to listen. Just now he is charged to 
 overflowing with special items of interest touching the salient 
 features of the procession — of the various inscriptions and 
 devices to be displayed on the banners ; the tableaux and 
 scenic representations on the floats to be paraded on the mor- 
 row. He knows and is willing to confide to his customers, the 
 names of the illustrious guests who have been invited to the 
 banquet, and of the orators who are going to make the after- 
 dinner speeches. 
 
 One of the most steady customers now is the ex-honorable 
 Ralph Payton ; for the unappreciated statesman has much 
 leisure on hand, and he likes to listen to the barkeeper's recital 
 of the glorious times before the war. But the friendship 
 between these two is not so firm as of yore. Bob Rountree 
 begins to suspect that the ex-congressman is patterned for a 
 chronic failure. He has never forgiven him the miscarriage of 
 the projected capture of Captain Waldhorst and his Dutch 
 companions at Shackleford's Inn, — so brilliantly conceived, 
 and so miserably bungled in the attempted execution. The 
 
AFTER THE WAB. 750 
 
 projected alliance with Senator May's family — confidently 
 expected at one time — has come to naught, owing, as Bob 
 Rountree diagnoses, to the statesman's astuteness in dodging 
 military service in the Southern cause. He has met with alike 
 rebuff from the lovely Hettie Shannon, who, it transpires, pre- 
 fers bashful Orlando Jones to the prudent stay-at-home, be- 
 cause Orlando has been to the war and has come back with a 
 trophy in the shape of a permanently lamed limb. He might, 
 perhaps, have tried his luck with Miss Emily Matlack, but 
 that this young lady is openly encouraging the advances of 
 Bob Rountree himself, — not, to be sure, for the patriotic rea- 
 son moving her friend Hettie to prefer the warlike Orlando, 
 since Bob is as much of a stay-at-home as the ex-congress- 
 man ; but then she has looked kindly on Bob ever since she 
 played him off against Hettie and Leshe May at that barbecue 
 on the Fourth of July, long before the war. It really looks 
 as if it was going to be a love-match between these two. 
 
 The aggressive business spirit of the thriving young city 
 has not spared our old friends of the rival stores. Mr. Barnes, 
 the Pioneer Merchant, has retired upon a well earned com- 
 petency, being unwilling to enter the lists against new men 
 with new business methods, whose restless activity in forcing 
 trade has put him out of breath. — Mynheer Van Braaken, 
 too, has found his favorite maxim " Competition is the life of 
 Trade ' ' a little too much for him when applied with the vigor 
 now in vogue in the feverishly busy city. He has moved the 
 " Dutch Store " into an adjacent county to which railroads 
 have not penetrated as yet. The sturdy Yahkop, still ruler of 
 a stately team of six, supplies the new Dutch Store with 
 goods, as of old ; only he hauls them from — no longer to — 
 Brook field. 
 
 One more change, wrought by the vigorous growth of the 
 self-asserting city, we are to notice. If one were in search 
 now of May Meadows, that so gracefully nestled, once, on the 
 edge of a grove of majestic forest trees, reached by a pleas- 
 ant walk from the Brookfield Square, it might trouble him to 
 
760 THE BEBEVS DAUGBTEB. 
 
 locate the old mansion. Though it is still there, as well as the 
 tastefully kept gi'ounds surrounding it like a miniature park, 
 yet the rural walks over green fields and shady groves are 
 found no more. The daisy-gemmed fields Jiave been wiped 
 out by streets and houses ; brick pavements and macadamed 
 avenues have effaced the foot-paths through the meadows 
 studded with butter-cups and blooming clover, that left no 
 trace, now, save the name by which the May place is still 
 known. 
 
 But if one take suflicient interest in the May family to per- 
 severe in the search, it will be found infected by the general 
 excitement produced by the anticipated railroad festival. Mrs. 
 May, to be sure, is not pleased with the political coloring taken 
 on by the celebration. She has not yet forgiven the North for 
 so mercilessly defeating the South, and the jubilation she heard 
 on all sides over the regenerated Union was not to her ta"ste. 
 But then it is such an honor to her family, that upon her 
 daughter has fallen the choice of the Committee of Arrange- 
 ments to open the ball as the partner of Major-General Seele. 
 The pompously worded invitation, conveyed in an official-look- 
 ing document bearing the seal of the railroad corporation and 
 the signature of its president, operates like a soothing balm 
 upon her wounded patriotism and predisposes her to receive 
 the general and any friend he may bring with him in the spirit 
 of her accustomed hospitality, — the more so, as the general 
 has supplemented the official invitation directed to all the mem- 
 bers of the May family with a neatly phrased note to Senator 
 and Mrs. May, soliciting permission to address their daughter, 
 and a deferential request to the young lady herself to grant 
 him the honor of escorting her to the banquet, and for her 
 hand at the opening dance of the ball. 
 
 The senator is touched by the mark of respect paid to his 
 family by the Federal general, whom he holds in high esteem, 
 notwithstanding their political differences in the past. He had 
 accepted with serene composure the outcome of the war, though 
 it involved the discomfiture of his own theory of rehabilitating 
 
AFTER THE WAR. 761 
 
 the Union. Nor did he conceal to himself that now it stands 
 firmer, — grander and more glorious than ever. The war has 
 devastated the South — yes ! And laid low the towering am- 
 bition of those of its leaders, who had dreamed of strength in 
 division, and of prosperity to grow out of the unremunerated 
 labor of slaves. Now, the slaves have been liberated ; the 
 lands lay fallow, and in a hundred thousand homes there is 
 mournuig for departed heroes. But for those who love their 
 country well enough to welcome its prosperity at the cost of 
 recognizing their own error, the future beckons with rich 
 promise. 
 
 In Senator May's home, too, there stands an empty chair at 
 table, and an unused plate lies on the cloth. A face that once 
 shed sunshine around the board shines there no more. In its 
 stead a hero is enthroned in the hearts of parents and sister 
 whom, it comforts them to know, a weeping nation mourns, 
 and friend and foe honor as an exemplar of exalted chivalry 
 and devotion to his country's cause. In no one respect are 
 father, mother and sister, in more thorough accord, than in 
 the adoration paid to the deified shade of the departed son and 
 brother. No wonder, then, that the senator, in his proud sor- 
 row, attributes to a sentiment of reverence in the breast of a 
 gallant soldier for an honored fallen enemy the attentions paid 
 by General Seele to his daughter. And thus the railroad 
 festival has peculiar significance for the family at May 
 Meadows. 
 
 Nellie May is in high spirits. Even her parents notice, with 
 secret rejoicing, the return of something like her former 
 sprightliness. 
 
 " Can this be the effect of the invitation to the ball, and the 
 prospect of a dance with a major-general? " so wonders Sena- 
 tor May. 
 
 " What is the matter with Nellie? " her mother inquires. 
 " I hope she is not going to throw herself away by flirting 
 with an enemy, if he is a major-general ! " 
 
 But Cressie knows better what is the source of the blushes 
 
762 THE BEBEU8 DAUGHTEB. 
 
 that so frequently, now, enrich her color without apparent 
 cause. She traces it to a letter which she herself had taken 
 from the postman and handed to her mistress. The brightness 
 beaming from her face as she opened it had betrayed to the 
 sympathetic maid that it contained pleasant news. 
 
 "Is it from Busch Bluffs? " Cressie had suggested. 
 
 A pleased nod had been the answer. 
 
 " Is she coming? " the octoroon had ventured to inquire. 
 
 Nellie had looked up from the letter, and smiled as her eye 
 had fallen on the expectant face of the maid. " You mean, 
 Is he coming? " she had said ; and on the impulse of the glad 
 tidings she had added, in a confidentially playful mood: 
 "Yes, Cressie, he is coming! He will attend the banquet, 
 his sister writes, — and I shall see him, Cressie! I shall hear 
 his voice, if even he does not speak to me! " 
 
 "Not speak to you! " Cressie had said reproachfully. 
 " Now, you know better than that. As if anything on earth 
 could stop Major Waldhorst from coming to see you, the first 
 thing after he reaches Brookfleld ! ' ' 
 
 " Do you think so, really, Cressie? " 
 
 " Of course I do! " had been the prompt reply, given with 
 an emphasis of conviction tliat delighted her mistress. 
 
 Nellie had tried hard to control the ebullition of her feelings, 
 for the mere sake of decorum before her servant. But she 
 had not quite succeeded in sui)pressing the note of triumph 
 that stole into her voice as she replied : "I believe you are 
 right, Cressie. And what do you want me to say to him Avhen 
 he does come ? ' ' 
 
 A smile of singular sweetness, tinged with a hint of resigna- 
 tion, had accompanied the octoroon's answer. " You know 
 well what you are going to say to him. And so do I. You 
 ought never to have said anything else." 
 
 "But, Cressie," the mistress had replied, the glow of joy 
 that still brightened her face softening, as if put on the 
 defensive by her servant's gentle reproach, " it would have 
 been wrong for me to say before, what you want me to say to 
 
AFTER THE WAR. 763 
 
 liiiu now. He would have taken me away with him to the 
 North. And think — what trouble there would have been for 
 him and me during the war! " 
 
 " Yes, to be sure," the octoroon admitted. " He and you 
 on one side, and all your people on the other. It would have 
 been an awful mess. But the Good Book says that you shall 
 leave father and mother and cling to your husband. That is 
 Avhat you would have done," 
 
 " Yes; that is what I would have done, if I had followed 
 him. But oh, Cressie ' He so hates renegades and apostates ! 
 And so do I — so do I ! He would have despised me ! ' ' 
 
 " Well, you are all on the same side now." 
 
 " Yes, we are all on his side now. And isn't it strange, 
 Cressie, that it seems so natural to me to be on his side? " 
 
 " Of course it's natural! That is where you belong. You 
 are sure to be right, when you are on his side." 
 
 Nellie had smiled and nodded her head approvingly, and 
 presently said: " I believe you, Cressie. In fact, I am quite 
 sure of it." 
 
 The weather smiles propitiously on the railroad festival. 
 One of those glorious autumn days has come, that are enjoyed 
 in such perfection nowhere but in the southwesterly regions of 
 the United States : The bracing Ijreezes of October add zest 
 to the golden sunshine and the Italian blueness of the sky, 
 accelerating the pulse to a healthful beat and toning up the 
 system to a joyful sense of life and vigor. The inhabitants 
 of Brookfield attune themselves to the serene glory of the 
 autumn day, and in festive mood assemble at the new rail- 
 road station to await the arrival of the first passenger train that 
 is to bring the railroad officials and invited guests. Visitors 
 have poured in from near and far to be eye-witnesses to the 
 momentous event. Even the little railroad stations along the 
 line of the road are gay with green garlands and festive flags. 
 The Brookflelders have a brass band in attendance and a bat- 
 tery of cannons placed in the neighboring heights, ready to 
 
764 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 announce to the surrounding country the precise moment of 
 the arrival of the train, that is now long overdue. 
 
 The Reception Committee, composed of notable citizens dis- 
 tinguishable on this occasion by badges and rosettes in red, 
 white and blue, form a not inconsiderable part of the waiting 
 throng. Among them stands a group of gentlemen, all simi- 
 larly decorated, earnestly discussing the merits and demerits 
 of the Honorable Ralph Payton as a candidate for appointment 
 to a subordinate clerkship in the railroad otRce. Mr. Huffard, 
 of the Ozark Argus, advocates his claim ; so Mr. Farmer, of 
 the Brookfield Banner, must necessarily oppose it. They are 
 talking at Senator May, who is supposed to rule the local board 
 of directors in all sucli matters. 
 
 The discussion serves to while away the time while the multi- 
 tude impatiently wait for the train, that ought to have been in 
 an hour ago, but leads to no other immediate result ; for the 
 senator has not expressed an opinion, pro or con, when the 
 shout is heard : ' ' There comes the train ! ' ' Almost simul- 
 taneously therewith the boom of the cannon resounds from the 
 hillside ; then the ear-piercing shriek of the locomotive greets 
 the waiting ci'owd, the brass band plays " Hail Columbia " and 
 the train thunders into the depot. 
 
 A lively time ensues as the passengers disembark, and the 
 reception committee take charge of the guests amid much 
 shaking of hands and promiscuous introductions. Senator 
 May accosts a party from the metropolis, the particular guests 
 he has insisted on quartering in his own house. General 
 Seele and Rauhenfels readily accept his invitation. " And 
 these gentlemen," he addresses himself to the Auf dem Busches, 
 father and son, " will be generous enough to afford us the 
 opportunity — not of paying off, for that were out of the ques- 
 tion — but of simply showing our appreciation of the deeji 
 obligations for their kindness to me and mine." 
 
 " Senator May," is the answer of Auf dem Busch Senior, 
 " I hold for a grand senator and wise statesman, when he is 
 in the Senate. But for a merchant I fear he would soon make 
 
AFTER THE WAR. 765 
 
 bankrupt, if he keep not better book. He should know that 
 he is not in our debt; contrary, we in his. But Woldemar 
 and I understand business better: we take all we can get 
 under the market price : and so we thankfully accept your offer. 
 What, Woldemar? " 
 
 "So it seems," says General Rauhenfels, " that we are all 
 bound for Senator May's house. Unless," he adds with a sly 
 wink, " my adjutant, here, should prefer to stay at a hotel. 
 What say you. Major Waldhorst? " 
 
 " I have followed you too long. General, while I was your 
 adjutant, to hang back now," is the prompt answer, " Count 
 me in for May Meadows, if Senator May will include me in the 
 invitation." 
 
 "That goes without saying," the senator answers. " But 
 will we not stay to see the parade first ? I see that they are 
 impatient to start. It is a pity that the ladies are not here ; 
 but if we wait until you can pay your respects to them at the 
 house, we shall all miss the sights. So we had better take our 
 seats on the platform erected for the guests." 
 
 The party sets out to view the procession. * All, except Major 
 Waldhorst. He, in shameful disregard of his pledge to follow 
 his old commander, slips away, and starts off in a different 
 dlrectiou. 
 
 The boom of the cannon announcing the arrival of the train, 
 had been heard at May Meadows. To the ladies there, the 
 belating of the train beyond the scheduled time had been most 
 welcome ; an earlier arrival of the guests would have found 
 them not ready, as wall sometimes happen to ladies. Not but 
 that Nellie, on this occasion, had ample excuse for tardiness: 
 she had, in honor of the festival at which she was to be 
 General Seele's partner (and whereat Victor Waldhorst was 
 expected to be present) arrayed herself in a spick-and-span- 
 new costume, fresh from the hands of her modiste ; and had 
 been assisted at her toilet by her mother and the maid Cressie. 
 Under such circumstances it could hardly be expected that the 
 ladies should be ready at the appointed time. It must be 
 
766 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 admitted, however, that Nellie felt ill at ease when the hour 
 arrived at which the guests might be expected before she had 
 half finished her toilet, and correspondingly elated when she had 
 put on the finishing touches, and they had not yet shown up. 
 "It would have been too bad," she said to her mother, " if 
 General Seele had come sooner, and been made to wait. He 
 ^would have set me down for a dawdle, and wanting in proper 
 respect toward him. Now," she added, as she complacently 
 nodded toward the elegantly gowned figure in the mirror, " I 
 have got safely through with primping ; and I dare say that 
 not even a major-general of the victorious army need be 
 ashamed to appear with me on the street or at the banquet." 
 
 " I don't see what makes you so crazy about this major- 
 general ! " the mother growled. " Time was, when my daugh- 
 ter scorned all bluecoats ; now it seems as if there was not 
 finery enough in all Brookfield for you to do honor to one of 
 them." 
 
 " To several of them, Mama, unless I am mistaken," Nellie 
 remarked, exchanging a meaning glance with Cressie. '• Yes ; 
 time was. But time has changed and bluecoats have come 
 into fashion. You would not have me be behind the fashion? 
 Besides," she said more soberly, " think what these bluecoats 
 have done for us all ! Could we do too much honor to any of 
 them? " 
 
 Mrs. May was proud of her daughter, and it pleased her to 
 indulge in the fancy that she would be envied as the finest 
 dressed lady at the banquet. For the combined skill of her 
 dressmaker and Cressie's deft fingers, directed by Nellie's 
 exquisite taste, had produced a dream of loveliness in the 
 shape of a ball dress that even Worth of Paris might have 
 been proud of as a chef d'oe^ivre of his art. So she forgave 
 her daughter's misguided respect for Union officers, and mur- 
 mured a reply in so low a voice that Nellie, whose attention 
 had been caught by the sound of the door bell, did not 
 hear it at all. 
 
 " There is the general ! " she exclaimed a little excitedly. 
 
AFTER THE WAR. 767 
 
 " He has made good time from the depot here. Run, Cressie, 
 and show him into the reception room. Tell him that I will be 
 down immediately." 
 
 Then thi'owing another glance at the mirror, adjusting a 
 ribbon here and there, and giving a last affectionate pat to her 
 coiffure, she followed the maid, composing her features on the 
 way into a radiant expression of cordial welcome. 
 
 But the hand so cheerfully extended was grasped in a dif- 
 ferent fashion from what she expected of General Seele. It 
 was Victor Waldhorst who stood there, and who was trans- 
 ported with joy by the eager welcome he read in Nellie's 
 face." 
 
 "Eleonora!" he exclaimed in jubilant voice, and was 
 about to embrace the ravishingly beautiful apparition, when the 
 sudden change in Nellie's features and the withdrawal of her 
 hand arrested his motion. 
 
 "I — oh, — I thought it was General Seele ! " she gasped. 
 " I expected him." 
 
 ' ' And it is only I ! " he said in tones of gentle reproach 
 and regret, " And I have startl d you. Am I, then, so little 
 welcome ? ' ' 
 
 "Oh, pardon me. Major Waldhorst! " said Nellie, quickly 
 recovering her composure. " It was such a quid pro quo to 
 find you here instead of General Seele, whom I was so sure of 
 meeting." 
 
 " And are you disappointed that it is not he whom you wel- 
 comed so cordially? " he asked, in a voice trembling with 
 eager expectation, yet triumi^haut in his hopeful assurance that 
 her answer would be a negative. 
 
 " Disappointed? Yes. I fully expected to meet General 
 Seele, who is to take me to the banquet. But — " 
 
 "Yes? But — " 
 
 A vivid blush dyed Nellie's cheeks as, for a moment, she 
 cast down her eyes ; then raising them and regarding Victor 
 with a look that electrified him, she said : 
 
 " But I have been expecting yon, — oh, so long! " 
 
768 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Victor caught her iu his arms, aud was uot repulsed. His 
 lips sought hers, and she turned not away. In a kiss of 
 mutual rapture they plighted their troth, 
 
 " You will be mine, Nellie? Mine — my very own? " 
 
 "Yes, Victor, yours — if you want me. Oh, how my heart 
 has yearned to tell you ! ' ' 
 
 " Aud at last you have told me, and all is well ! But have 
 you not been cruel, mj^ Nellie, to deny me so long? " 
 
 "You will forgive me, Victor, now that you know howl 
 love you. I believe I always did love you, only I did not 
 know it, until — ' ' 
 
 " Well, dearest, until — " 
 
 " Until I read in your face contempt for the coquette you 
 thought me." 
 
 " Coquette?" 
 
 " You believed me a coquette — did you not? — when Mr. 
 Payton asserted over me a protectorship which you thought I 
 had authorized." 
 
 " He was not worthy of you," said Victor, sternly, though 
 in a low whisper. 
 
 " No! " 
 
 " Nor am I, dearest, but for your sweet grace in according 
 me your love ! ' ' 
 
 '* Is it not strange, Victor, that not your sterling qualities, 
 nor even your passionate devotion to me, had impressed me? 
 You see, you hid your merits under a mountain of modesty and 
 diftideuce. In rare moments only did you permit a flash of 
 your true nature to pierce my dull perception. It was not 
 until you turned from me in disgust at my Ingratitude and 
 shallowness, — flirting, as you believed, with a man so far 
 beneath you — that I woke up to the knowledge that I could not 
 bear your contempt, and that I should never love any man but 
 you ! And now, Victor, you understand how hard it was for 
 me to give you up when you wooed me so stormily — just 
 before my brother's death ; and for the sake of my love you 
 will forgive me ! ' ' 
 
AFTEB THE WAB. 769 
 
 " Forgive you, oh Idol of my soul? Why, this moment's 
 rapture outweighs au age of heartache, and richly compensates 
 for a lifetime of waiting. In giving me yourself, you have 
 enriched me beyond appraisement. For not another gem in 
 all the universe compares with you. Though sun and stars 
 dropped from the firmament, your radiant smile, your lustrous 
 eyes were sun and stars to me ! " 
 
 "Hush, Victor!" she commanded, playfully laying her 
 rosy fingers on his mouth. "Your extravagance puts me to 
 the blush. But now that you have forgiven me, let me make 
 confession how meek and humble my great love for you has 
 made me. And yet how proud ! For while my life henceforth 
 shall but reflect your own, my task and joy to honor and obey 
 you in all things as my lord, — I would not yield m}^ place at 
 your side to share a monarch's throne! " 
 
 " Would I had a kingdom to lay at your feet ! But as the 
 planet's light is borrowed from the sun, so all my wealth is but 
 reflection of your own : the crowning merit of my life being 
 that you, my Nellie, have given me your love." 
 
 "Yes, Victor, you have conquered that. And let me tell 
 you, sir," she added archly, " that is something! For I hold 
 myself not cheap." 
 
 " So precious do I hold you, that my life shall be one unre- 
 mitting effort to prove not ungrateful. Your own appraise- 
 ment of yourself falls short of your worth to the full extent 
 in which your regard exceeds my merits." 
 
 Nellie pursed her mouth into a pout of mock severity, which 
 Victor thought exquisitely droll. " How dare you, sir! " she 
 scolded, " impugn my good taste in such fashion, and belittle 
 the man whose name I am to bear? Don't you know, sir, that 
 that is very bad form? " 
 
 " But this is the divinest form ! " he exclaimed, attempting 
 to clasp her in a new embrace. 
 
 "Nay, sir, have done! " she said, warding him off with 
 both hands. " Have you no regard for my lovely new 
 dress ? What will General Seele think of me when he comes 
 
770 THE REBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 for his i)artner to the banquet aud tinds her in a tousled 
 dress?" 
 
 Victor looked in vain to discover the damage he had wrought 
 on the wonderful dress, and gave it as his judgment that the 
 general would be the proudest man in the county to be allowed 
 the privilege of atten'ding her. "But," he inqnired. crest- 
 fallen, " are you to be his partner? " 
 
 " With my lord's gracious permission," she answered, 
 courtesying before him with a mischievous smile, '-For this 
 once the major will yield precedence to his superior in com- 
 mand. But don't look so woebegone about it. If you behave 
 SAveetly, I dare say that I may manage to keep one place open 
 on my dance programme for you to write your name in. What 
 say you , shall it be a waltz ? ' ' 
 
 " A waltz let it be, by all means! " Victor decided, as the 
 memory of the heavenly hour at the Governor's Inauguration 
 Ball set him aglow and threw a dazzling light on his present 
 happiness. The piquant face of Nellie, upturned to his with 
 so roguish, yet loving, a smile, was too tempting for Victor's 
 power of resistance. He rushed forward aud was about to 
 repeat the offense for which he had l)eeu chidden, when a knock 
 at the door arrested him in his rash purpose, and for the time 
 being rescued the " Dream of Loveliness " from further peril. 
 
 Cressie ushered in the visitors, who were followed by Senator 
 and joined by Mrs. May. 
 
 General Seele happened to be the lirst to enter. Nellie 
 stretched out both her hands to him, greeting him with her 
 brightest smile. 
 
 " Welcome to May Meadows! " she exclaimed. " Though 
 you have honored this house but once before with your pres- 
 ence, your generous deeds and kind words have made you 
 familiar to our hearts and memories." 
 
 " To be so kindly remembered of you, fair lady, were rich- 
 est recompense for any service, if even it had been my privi- 
 lege to render you such, and leave me still your debtor." 
 
 "Look here. General," said Governor Rauhenfels, taking 
 
AFTER THE WAE. 771 
 
 forcible possessiou of one of the lady's hands, '' you are abus- 
 ing good nature to an unwarrantable extent ! The lady cer- 
 tainly meant one of these hands for me. Now did you not, 
 Miss May ? ' ' 
 
 " Why, Governor, the welcome certainly extends to you! " 
 she said, cheerily,." and you may take both of my hands for 
 a friendly shake, if you like, to make you even with General 
 Seele." 
 
 " Oh, I have the advantage of him," the governor retaliated. 
 ' ' We have had the thrilling ex2)erience of a quarrel with each 
 other. Do you remember? " 
 
 " Don't I! " she answered saucily, and turned to the Auf 
 dem Busches, father and son. " But here are two gentlemen 
 that are more at home with us ; and we have never quarreled, 
 have wer" After shaking hands with Woldemar, her eyes 
 rested for a moment on the benevolent features of the old gen- 
 tleman beaming with heartfelt pleasure on seeing Nellie, and 
 then stepped forward, put her arms about his neck and hid her 
 face upon his shoulder. When she raised her head, she dashed 
 a tear from her eyes. 
 
 " Pardon me, gentlemen," she said, making a strong effort 
 to regain her composure, " for giving way to my emotion. 
 You have all been good to ray brother, and will understand 
 my grief for his loss. He died in the house of Mr. Auf dem 
 Busch. It was through his kindness that I was permitted to 
 perform for him the last kind offices, — that he died among 
 those whom he loved ; and from his house he was carried to 
 his silent home. And now, when I wished to thank him for 
 his great kindness, to my brother and me, the memory of those 
 sad days overcame me." 
 
 Mr. Auf dem Busch was visibly affected. He took the hand 
 she offered him and gently patted it. "I loved your brother, 
 Miss May," he said. " He was a whole man. And I have all 
 esteem and honor for you, because you loved him, and sweet- 
 ened his last days for him like a loving sister." 
 
 General Seele stepped up to the two and said : ' ' We all 
 
772 THE BEBEL'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 honor Miss May, and we honor friend Auf dem Busch for his 
 kindness toward her and her brother. They were both 
 enthusiasts in the Southern cause ; but we appreciate the 
 sincerity of their conviction. And we admire the fortitude with 
 which Miss May bears up under the burden of her sorrow. 
 Let us not grudge her a tear wept to the jnemory of a dearly 
 beloved brother, as well as to the memory of a lost cause." 
 
 " I thank you for these words. General Seele," said Nellie 
 regarding him with a grateful look. " And I wish to tell you, 
 that your generosity as an enemy went far to help me under- 
 stand the lesson which you said the war would teach me. The 
 star of our beloved South has set ; the god of war has pros- 
 pered our enemies. But I am trying hard to believe that what 
 Might has established, is Right." 
 
 " That is a lesson, my dear young lady," said Rauhenfels, 
 " which your father has thoroughly learned, though he must 
 have found it infinitely harder than it can possibly be for you. 
 Am I right. Senator? " 
 
 " No one knows better, perhaps, than you, how hard the les- 
 son has been," the senator admitted. " But the logic of 
 events is unanswerable, and fortune has, after all, dealt gently 
 with me. It has left me the partner of my bosom, the respect 
 of highly prized friends, and a daughter whose love is dearer 
 to me than all earthly possessions." 
 
 " You may well be proud of her," said the whilom pro- 
 fessor. " But if you count on keqjing her, you are doomed to 
 disappointment. There stands a youngster — I mean my old 
 adjutant. Major Waldhorst — who is going to teach her that 
 lesson that you found so hard. And she will find it delightful 
 and easy, under his tuition, for he is deeply interested in the 
 job, and will put his whole heart into it." Then, turning to 
 the major, he commanded: "Report, now, you rascal, why 
 you gave us the slip this afternoon ; and what progress you 
 have made in your siege upon this fair citadel." 
 
 Saluting in military style, the major a'.iswered : "The gar- 
 rison is able to report for itself." 
 
AFTER THE WAR. 773 
 
 " Well, Miss May," the governor demanded, " what is your 
 report in the matter? " 
 
 A rosy blush suffused her cheeks. But a roguish smile 
 brightened her features as she answered : "I followed the 
 impressive example set me at Appomattox Court House. It 
 would have been a reproach to General Lee, if I^had held out 
 against a Northern soldier, when he surrendered the whole 
 Southern array to the Federal commander. And I had not the 
 heart to shame him." Running to her father, she looked into 
 his face with appealing solicitude and said, " Did I right, dear 
 father ? ' ' 
 
 He pressed her close to his heart. "• You could not have 
 given me a dearer son to fill the void left in my heart by 
 Leshe's death," he said. Then, beckoning to Victor, he laid 
 her hand into his and continued: " Take her, my sou, and be 
 as loyal to her as you have been to all that is true and right 
 and noble." 
 
 Mrs. May was wiping a tear from her eye when Nellie 
 approached her and said: "Mama, you will give me your 
 blessing ? ' ' 
 
 " God bless you, my child," the lady responded. " I hope 
 you will do well ; though you might have done so much 
 better." 
 
 "Madam," said Governor Rauhenfels, bowing courteously 
 before Mrs. May, " you have given birth to your daughter, 
 and thus entailed upon her the honor of descent from one of 
 the first families of Virginia. Now Miss May is about to 
 square the account by allying you with one of the first families 
 of the American Renascence, — a Renaissance more truly 
 epochal than was that of the medieval Europe. You will lose 
 no prestige by smiling upon the new Union." 
 
 Mrs. May was at a loss how to take the Governor's sarcastic 
 words. But Mr. Auf dem Busch felt really uncomfortable at 
 the prospect of a disagreement, and essayed to pour oil upon 
 the troubled waters by cutting off further parley between him 
 and Mrs. May. So he pulled out his watch and exclaimed : 
 
774 THE BE BEL'S DAUGHTEB. 
 
 " It is the highest time that we break up for the bauquet! If 
 we start not soon, we will be too late for the soup! " 
 
 General Seele also consulted his watch. " Our friend is 
 right," he said. " We should be going. However, it grieves 
 me, Miss May, to interfere between you and Major Waldhorst, 
 I must remind you of our duty to Society. We are expected 
 at the banquet. Nor can I abate one jot of the privilege, ac- 
 corded me liy your kind promise and the official program, to 
 your company for the rest of the day. The major will not, I 
 hope, grudge me this pleasure." 
 
 "I do envy you every minute of her society! " said Victor. 
 "But I know how ample you have earned her gratitude, and 
 how eager she is to show it ; and shall not complain." 
 
 " Oh, you need not mind him," said Nellie, taking the gen- 
 eral's arm with a mischievous smile at Victor. " I have bought 
 ,him off with the promise of a dance. You won't mind my 
 giving him a waltz? " she added, turning her bi'ight face to 
 the general. " Waltzing is the delight of his life." 
 
 " I believe it," said the general. " With you for a 
 partner." 
 
 The company had filed out, on their way to the banquet. 
 Woldemar lagged behind ; he looked at Cressie, whose gaze 
 was fixed upon the door through which Nellie had disappeared, 
 on the arm of General Seele, but talking animatedly with Vic- 
 tor, who walked at her other side. There was a wonderful 
 expression on the octoroon's face. Eager longing, radiant joy, 
 blissful resignation — Woldemar thought that he read them all 
 in that singularly beautiful countenance, gazing at the door 
 through which Victor had gone by the side of her mistress. 
 
 Woldemar wondered at the girl's strange behavior. But he 
 had come to speak to her, and now was the opportunity. 
 
 He softly spoke her name ; there was no answer. She stood 
 as if in a trance. Then he repeated it, a little louder. 
 
 Cressie started and blushed scarlet. 
 
 '' Miss Cressie,''^ he addressed her, '' I have never properly 
 
AFTER THE WAR. tlh 
 
 thanked you for your devoted kindness and attention to luy 
 father and me, when we were invalids in this house. I wish 
 to do so now — ' ' 
 
 "Oh, sir, please do not!" she begged with such eager 
 earnestness as surprised Woldemar, and increased his 
 wonderment. 
 
 He did not complete the sentence she had interrupted, l)ut 
 asked her instead: " Are you quite happy here. Miss 
 Cressie ? " 
 
 "Happier here, with my mistress, and as the servant of 
 Major Waldhorst, than I could be anywhei'e else on earth I " 
 
 She spoke in a voice of such sincere conviction, that Wolde- 
 mar could not doubt. Whatever else he had wished to say to 
 the octoroon remained unsaid. Her words, and the rapt look 
 on her face, brought a revelation that sealed his mouth. 
 
 ' ' Then let me say good-bye ! ' ' 
 
 " Good-bye, and let me thank you for your generosity! " 
 said Cressie. 
 
RARE BOOK 
 COLLECTION 
 
 THE LIBRARY OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF 
 
 NORTH CAROLINA 
 
 AT 
 
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