——"The insane root, Which takes the reason prisoner."
——"The insane root, Which takes the reason prisoner."
A ride of four miles brought us to Lake Pontchartrain, stretching away in the fading sunlight. Over the broad expanse of swelling water, delicate, foamy white caps were cresting the waves.
The War Spirit in Mobile.
We were transferred to the propeller Alabama, and, when I woke the next morning, were lying at Mobile. With a population of thirty thousand, the city contains many pleasant residences, embowered in shade-trees, and surrounded by generous grounds. It is rendered attractive by its tall pines, live oak, and Pride-of-China trees. The last were now decked in a profusion of bluish-white blossoms.
The war spirit ran high. Hand-bills, headed "Soldiers wanted," and "Ho! for volunteers," met the eye at every corner; uniforms and arms abounded, and the voice of the bugle was heard in the streets. All northern vessels were clearing on account of the impending crisis, though some were not more than half loaded.
Mobile was very radical. One of the daily papers urged the imposition of a tax of one dollar per copy upon every northern newspaper or magazine brought into the Confederacy!
The leading hotel was crowded with guests, including many soldiersen routefor Bragg's army. It was my own design to leave for Pensacola that evening, and look at the possible scene of early hostilities. A Secession friend in New Orleans had given me a personal letter to General Bragg, introducing me as a gentleman of leisure, who would be glad to make a few sketches of proper objects of interest about his camps, for one of the New York illustrated papers. It added that he had knownme all his life, and vouched completely for my "soundness."
Suspicions Aroused—an Awkward Encounter.
But a little incident changed my determination. Among my fellow-passengers from New Orleans were three young officers of the Confederate army, also bound for Fort Pickens. While on the steamer, I did not observe that I was an object of their special attention; but just after breakfast this morning, as I was going up to my room, in the fourth story of the Battle House, I encountered them also ascending the broad stairs. The moment they saw me, they dropped the subject upon which they were conversing, and one, with significant glances, burst into a most violent invective againstThe Tribune, denouncing it as the vilest journal in America, except Parson Brownlow'sKnoxville Whig!pronouncing every man connected with it a thief and scoundrel, and asserting that if any of its correspondents could be caught here, they would be hung upon the nearest tree.
This philippic was so evidently inspired by my presence, and the eyes of the whole group glared with a speculation so unpleasant, that I felt myself an unhappy Romeo, "too early seen unknown and known too late." I had learned by experience that the best protection for a suspected man was to go everywhere, as if he had a right to go; to brave scrutiny; to return stare for stare and question for question.
So, during this tirade, which lasted while, side by side, we leisurely climbed two staircases, I strove to maintain an exterior of serene and wooden unconsciousness. When the speaker had exhausted his vocabulary of hard words, I drew a fresh cigar from my pocket, and said to him, "Please to give me a light, sir." With a puzzled air he took his cigar from his mouth, knocked off the ashes with his forefinger, handed it to me, and stood regardingme a little curiously, while, looking him full in the face, I slowly ignited my own Havana, returned his, and thanked him.
They turned away apparently convinced that their zeal had outrun their discretion. The look of blank disappointment and perplexity upon the faces of those young officers as they disappeared in the passage will be, to me, a joy forever.
Pondering in my room upon fresh intelligence of the arrest of suspicious persons in General Bragg's camp, and upon this little experience, I changed my plan. As Toodles, in the farce, thinks he "won't smoke," so I decided not to go to Pensacola; but ordered a carriage, and drove down to the mail-boat St. Charles, which was to leave for Montgomery that evening.
I fully expected during the afternoon to entertain a vigilance committee, the police, or some military officials who would invite me to look at Secession through prison bars. It was not an inviting prospect; yet there was nothing to do but to wait.
The weather was dreamy and delicious. My state-room looked out upon the shining river, and the rich olive green of the grassy shore. Upon the dull, opaque water of a broad bayou beyond, little snowy sails flashed, and a steamer, with tall black chimneys, left a white, foamy track in the waters, and long clouds of brown smoke against the sky.
"Mass'r, Fort Sumter's Gone up!"
At three o'clock in the afternoon, while I was lying in my state-room, looking out drowsily upon this picture, a cabin-boy presented his sooty face at the door and said, "Mass'r, Fort Sumter's gone up!"
Bells Ringing and Cannons Booming.
The intelligence had just arrived by telegraph. The first battle of the Great War was over, and seventy-two men, after a bombardment of two days, were capturedby twelve thousand! In a moment church and steamboat bells rang out their notes of triumph, and cannon belched forth their deep-mouthed exultation. A public meeting was extemporized in the street, and enthusiastic speeches were made. Mindful of my morning experience, I did not leave the boat, but tried to read the momentous Future. I thought I could see, in its early pages, the death-warrant of Slavery; but all else was inscrutable.
There was a steam calliope attached to the "St. Charles." That evening, when the last bell had rung, and the last cable was taken in, she left the Mobile landing, and plowed slowly up the river to the shrill notes of "Dixie's Land."6
The Alabama is the "most monotonously beautiful of rivers." In the evening twilight, its sinuous sweep afforded a fine view of both shores, timbered down to the water's edge. Dense foliage, decked in the blended and intermingled hues of summer, gave them the appearance of two soft, smooth cushions of variegated velvet.
After dark, we met the descending mail-boat. Our calliope saluted her with lively music, and the passengers assembled on the guards, greeting each other with the usual huzzas and waving of hats and handkerchiefs.
On Sunday morning, the inevitable calliope awoke us—this time, with sacred music. At many river landings there was only a single well-shaded farm-house on the bank, with ladies sitting upon the piazzas, and white and negro children playing under the magnificent live-oaks. At others, a solitary warehouse stood upon the high, perpendicular bluff, with an inclined-plane railway for the conveyance of freight to the water. At some points the country was open, and a great cotton-field extended to the river-bank, with a weather-beaten cotton-press in the midst of it, like an old northern cider-mill.
A Terpsichorean Young Negro.
Planters, returning from New Orleans and Mobile, were met at the landings by their negroes. The slaves appeared glad to see them, and were greeted with hearty hand-shakings. At one landing the calliope struck up a lively strain, and a young darkey on the bank, with the Terpsichorean proclivity of his race, began to dance as if for dear life, throwing his arms and legs in ludicrous and extravagant fashion. His master attempted to cuff his ears, but the little fellow ducked his head and danced away, to the great merriment of the lookers-on. The negro nurses on the boat fondled and kissed the little white children in their charge most ardently.
I saw no instance of unkind treatment to slaves; but a young planter on board mentioned to me, as a noteworthy circumstance, that he had not permitted a negro to be struck upon his plantation for a year.
A Texian on board the boat was very bitter against Governor Houston, and, with the usual extreme language of the Rebels, declared he would be hanged if he persisted in opposing the Disunionists. An old citizen of Louisiana, too, became so indignant at me for remarking I had always supposed Douglas to sympathize with the South, that I made haste to qualify the assertion.
Leading Characteristics of Southerners.
Our passengers were excellent specimens of the better class of southerners. Aside from his negrophobia, the southerngentlemanis an agreeable companion. He is genial, frank, cordial, profoundly deferential to women, and carries his heart in his hand. His social qualities are his weak point. To a northerner, passing through his country during these disjointed times, I would have said:
"Your best protection is to be 'hail fellow, well met;' spend money freely, tell good stories, be liberal of your private brandy-flask, and your after-dinner cigars. If you do this, and your manners are, in his thinking, gentlemanly, he can by no means imagine you a Yankee in the offensive sense. He pictures all Yankees as puritanic, rigid, fanatical, and talking through the nose. 'What the world wants,' says George William Curtis, 'is not honesty, but acquiescence.' That is profoundly true here. Acquiesce gracefully, not intemperately, in the prevailing sentiment. Don't hail from the State of Massachusetts; don't 'guess,' or use other northern provincialisms; don't make yourself conspicuous—and, if you know human nature, you may pass without serious trouble."
Our southerner has little humanity—he feels little sympathy for a man,asa man—as a mere human being—but he has abundant warmth toward his own social class. Not a very high specimen himself, he yet lays infinite stress upon being "a gentleman." If you have the misfortune to be poor, and without credentials, but possess the manners of education and good society, he will give you kinder reception than you are likely to obtain in the bustling, restless, crowded North.
Southern Provincialisms.
He affects long hair, dresses in unqualified black, and wears kid gloves continually. He pronouncesiron "i-ron" (two syllables), and barrel "barl." He calls car "kyah" (one syllable), cigar "se-ghah," and negro "nig-ro"—never negro, and very rarely "nigger." The latter, by the way, was a pet word with Senator Douglas. Once, while his star was in the ascendant, some one asked Mr. Seward:
"Will Judge Douglas ever be President?"
"No, sir," replied the New York senator. "No man will ever be President of the United States who spells negro with two g's!"
These southern provincialisms are sometimes a little startling. Conversing with a young man in the senior class of a Mississippi college, I remarked that men were seldom found in any circle who had not some sympathy or affinity with it, to stimulate them to seek it. "Yes," he replied, "something toaig them on!"
The forests along the river were beautiful with the brilliant green live-oak festooned with mistletoe, the dark pine, the dense cane, the spring glory of the cottonwood and maple, the drooping delicate leaves of the willow, the white-stemmed sycamore with its creamy foliage, and the great snowy blossoms of the dog-wood.
With a calliope, familiarity breeds contempt. Ours became an intolerable nuisance, and induced frequent discussions about bribing the player to stop it. He was apparently animated by the spirit of the Parisian who set a hand-organ to running by clockwork in his room, locked the apartment, went to the country for a month, and, when he returned, found that two obnoxious neighbors, whom he wished to drive away, had blown out their brains in utter despair.
While I was pleasantly engaged in a whist-party in the cabin, this fragment of a conversation between two bystanders reached my ears:
"A spy?"
"Yes, a spy from the North, looking about to obtain information for old Lincoln; and they arrested one yesterday, too."
Confederate Capitol at Montgomery.
This was a pleasing theme of reflection for the timid and contemplative mind. A passenger explained the matter, by informing me that, at one of the landings where we stopped, telegraphic intelligence was received of the arrest of two spies at Montgomery. The popular impression seemed to be, that about one person in ten was engaged in that not-very-fascinating avocation!
In Indian dialect, Alabama signifies, "Here we rest;" but, for me, it had an exactly opposite meaning. We awoke one morning to find our boat lying at Montgomery. Reaching the hotel too early for breakfast, I strolled with a traveler from Philadelphia, a pretended Secessionist, to the State House, which was at present also the Capitol of the Confederacy.
Standing, like the Capitol in Washington, at the head of a broad thoroughfare, it overlooks a pleasant city of eight thousand people. The building is of stucco, and bears that melancholy suggestion of better days which seems inseparable from the Peculiar Institution.
The senate chamber is a small, dingy apartment, on whose dirty walls hang portraits of Clay, Calhoun, and two or three Alabama politicians. The desks and chairs were covered with antiquated public documents, and the otherdébrisof legislative halls. While returning to the hotel, we heard from a street loafer a terse description of some model slave:
"He is just the best nigger in this town. He knows enough to work well, and he knows nothing else."
We were also informed that the Virginia Convention had passed a Secession ordinance.
"This is capital news; is it not?" said my Philadelphia companion, with well-assumed glee.
For several days, in spite of his violent assertions, I had doubted his sincerity. This was the first time he broached the subject when no one else was present. I looked steadily in his eye, and inquired:
"Do you think so?"
His half-quizzical expression was a satisfactory answer, even without the reply:
"I want to get home to Philadelphia without being detained on the way."
"Copperas Breeches" vs. "Black Breeches."
In the hotel office, two well-dressed southerners were discussing the omnipresent topic. One of them said:
"We shall have no war."
"Yes, we shall," replied the other. "The Yankees are going to fight for a while; but it will make no difference to us. We have got copperas breeches enough to carry this war through. None of the black breeches will have to shoulder muskets!"
The reader should understand that the clothing of the working whites was colored with a dye in which copperas was the chief ingredient; while, of course, the upper, slaveholding classes, wore "customary suits of solemn black." This was a very pregnant sentence, conveying in a few words the belief of those Rebels who instigated and impelled the war.
A Correspondent in Durance Vile.
The morning newspapers, at our breakfast-table, detailed two interesting facts. First, that "Jasper,"7theCharleston correspondent ofThe New York Times, had been seized and imprisoned in the Palmetto City. Second, that Gen. Bragg had arrested in his camp, and sent under guard to Montgomery, "as a prisoner of war," the correspondent ofThe Pensacola(Fla.)Observer. This journalist was an enthusiastic Secessionist, but had been guilty of some indiscretion in publishing facts touching the strength and designs of the Rebel army. His signature was "Nemo;" and he now bade fair to be No One, indeed, for some time to come.
I reckon this always, that a man is never undone until he be hanged.Two Gentlemen of Verona.
I reckon this always, that a man is never undone until he be hanged.Two Gentlemen of Verona.
I reckon this always, that a man is never undone until he be hanged.
Two Gentlemen of Verona.
I now began to entertain sentiments of profound gratitude toward the young officer, at Mobile, who kept me from going to Fort Pickens. Rejecting the tempting request of my Philadelphia companion to remain one day in Montgomery, that he might introduce me to Jefferson Davis, I continued my "Journey Due North."
Effect of Capturing Fort Sumter.
When we reached the cars, my baggage was missing. The omnibus agent, who was originally a New Yorker, and probably thought it precarious for a man desiring to reach Washington to be detained, even a few hours, kindly induced the conductor to detain the train for five minutes while we drove back to the Exchange Hotel and found the missing valise. The event proved that delay would have been embarrassing, if not perilous.
A Georgian on the car-seat with me, while very careful not to let others overhear his remarks, freely avowed Union sentiments, and asserted that they were predominant among his neighbors. I longed to respond earnestly and sincerely, but there was the possibility of a trap, and I merely acquiesced.
The country was intoxicated by the capture of Sumter. A newspaper on the train, several days old, in its regular Associated Press report, contained the following:
Washington to be Captured.
Montgomery, Ala., Friday,April 12, 1861.
An immense crowd serenaded President Davis and Mr. Walker, Secretary of War, at the Exchange Hotel to-night. The former was notwell, and did not appear. Secretary Walker, in a few words of electrical eloquence, told the news from Fort Sumter, declaring, in conclusion, that before many hours the flag of the Confederacy would float over that fortress. No man, he said, could tell where the war this day commenced would end, but he would prophesy that the flag which here streams to the breeze would float over the dome of the old Capitol at Washington before the first of May. Let them test Southern courage and resources, and it might float eventually over Faneuil Hall itself.
An officer from General Bragg's camp informed me that all preparations for capturing Fort Pickens were made, the United States sentinels on duty upon a certain night being bribed; but that "Nemo's" intimation of the intended attack frustrated it, a copy of his letter having found its way into the post, and forewarned and forearmed the commander.
Everybody was looking anxiously for news from the North. The predictions of certain New York papers, that the northern people would inaugurate war at home if the Government attempted "coercion," were received with entire credulity, and frequently quoted.
There was much admiration of Major Anderson's defense of Sumter; but the opinion was general, that only a military sense of honor dictated his conduct; that now, relieved from a soldier's responsibility, he would resign and join the Rebels. "He is too brave a man to remain with the Yankees," was the common remark. Far in the interior of Georgia, I saw fragments of his flag-staff exhibited, and highly prized as relics.
We dined at the little hamlet of West Point, on the line between Alabama and Georgia, and stopped for two evening hours at the bustling city of Atlanta. Our stay was enlivened by a fresh conversation in the car about northern spies and reporters, who were declared to be infesting the country, and worthy of hanging wherever found.
Apprehension about Arming the Negroes.
We spent the night in pursuit of sleep under difficulties, upon a rough Georgia railway. The next morning, the scantiness of the disappearing foliage indicated that we were going northward. In Augusta, we passed through broad, pleasant shaded streets, and then crossed the Savannah river into South Carolina. Companies of troops, bound for Charleston, began to come on board the train, and were greeted with cheering at all the stations. A young Carolinian, taking me for a southerner, remarked:
"The only thing we fear in this war is that the Yankees will arm our slaves and turn them against us."
This was the first statement of the kind I heard. Persons had said many times in my presence that they were perfectly sure of the slaves—who would all fight for their masters. In the last article of faith they proved as deluded as those sanguine northerners who believed that slave insurrections would everywhere immediately result from hostilities.
At Lee's Station we met the morning train from Charleston. Within two yards of my window, I saw a dark object disappear under the cow-catcher; and a moment after, a woman, wringing her hands, shrieked:
"My God! My God! Mr. Lee killed!"
Lying on the track was a shapeless, gory mass, which only the clothing showed to be the remains of a human being. The station-keeper, attempting to cross the road just in advance of the train, was struck down and run over. His little son was standing beside him at the very moment, and two of his daughters looking on from the door of his residence, a few yards away. In the first bewilderment of terror, they now stood wildly beating their foreheads, and gasping for breath. In strange contrast with this scene, a martial band wasdiscoursing lively music, and people were loudly cheering the soldiers. Buoyant Life and grim Death stood side by side and walked hand in hand.
Our train plunged into deep pine woods, and wended through large plantations, whose cool frame houses were shaded by palmetto-trees. The negro men and women, who stood in the fields persuading themselves that they were working, handled their hoes with indescribable awkwardness. A sketch of their exact positions would look ridiculously unnatural. They were in striking contrast with the zeal and activity of the northern laborer, who moves under the stimulus of freedom.
Looking at the Captured Fortress.
In the afternoon, we passed through the Magnolia Cemetery, and in view of the State Arsenal, with the palmetto flag waving over it. The Mills' House, in Charleston, was crowded with guests and citizens, half of them in uniform. After I registered my name, a brawny fellow, with a "plug-ugly" countenance, looked over my shoulder at the book, and then regarded me with a long, impudent, scrutinizing stare, which I endeavored to return with interest. In a few seconds his eyes dropped, and he went back to his seat.
I strolled down the narrow streets, with their antiquated houses, to the pleasant Battery, where several columbiads, with pyramidal piles of solid shot between them, pointed at Fort Sumter. Down the harbor, among a few snow-white sails, stood the already historic fortress. The line of broken roof, visible above the walls, was torn and ragged from Rebel shots. At the distance of two miles, it was impossible, with the naked eye, to identify the two flags above it. A bystander told me that they were the colors of South Carolina and of the Confederacy.
The devices of treason flaunting in the breeze wherethe Stars and Stripes, after being insulted for months, were so lately lowered in dishonor, were not a pleasant spectacle, and I turned slowly and sadly back to the hotel. In its reading-room, among the four or five papers on file, was a copy ofThe Tribune, whose familiar face was like the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.
A Short Stay in Charleston.
The city reeled with excitement. In the evening martial music and huzzas came floating up to my window from a meeting at the Charleston Hotel, where the young Virginian Hotspur, Roger A. Pryor, was one of the prominent speakers. Publicly and privately, the Charlestonians were boasting over their late Cadmean victory. They had not heard from the North.
I hoped to remain several days, but the public frenzy had grown so uncontrollable, that every stranger was subjected to espionage. One could hardly pick up a newspaper without seeing, or stand ten minutes in a public place without hearing, of the arrest of some northerner, charged with being a spy. While the lines of retreat were yet open, it was judicious to flee from the wrath to come.
Designing to stop for a while in North Carolina, whose Rip Van Winkle sleep seemed proof against any possible convulsion, I took the midnight train northward. A number of Baltimoreans on board were returning home, after assisting at the capture of Sumter. They were voluble and boisterous Rebels, declaring in good set terms that Maryland would shortly be revolutionized, Governor Hicks and Henry Winter Davis hanged, and President Lincoln driven out of Washington. They averred with great vehemence and iteration that the Yankees were all cowards, and could easily be "whipped out;" but when one, whose denunciations had been peculiarly bitter, was asked:
The Country on Fire.
"Are you going home through Washington?"
"Not I," was the reply."Old Abe might have us nabbed!'"
We were soon on the clayey soil of the Old North State, which, to the eye, closely resembles those regions of Ohio near Lake Erie. Hour after hour, we rode through the deep forests of tall pines, from which the bark had been stripped for making rosin and turpentine.
My anticipations of quiet proved altogether delusive. President Lincoln's Proclamation, calling for seventy-five thousand soldiers, had just arrived by telegraph, and the country was on fire. It was the first flush of excitement here, and the feeling was more intense and demonstrative than in those States which had become accustomed to the Revolution. Forts were being seized, negroes and white men impressed to labor upon them, military companies forming, clergymen taking up the musket, and women encouraging the determination to fight the "Abolitionists." All Union sentiment was awed into utter silence.
While the train was stopping at Wilmington, a telegram, announcing that Virginia had passed a Secession ordinance, was received with yells of applause. Sitting alone at one end of the car, I observed three fellow-passengers, with whom I had formed a traveling acquaintance, conferring earnestly. Their frequent glances toward me indicated the subject of the conversation. As I had said nothing to define my political position, I resolved to set myself right at once, should they put me to the test. One of them approached me, and remarked:
"We just have news that Virginia has seceded."
I replied, with considerable emphasis: "Good! That will give us all the border States."
Apparently satisfied, he returned to his friends, andthey said no more to me upon the all-absorbing question.
Submitting to Rebel Scrutiny.
A fragment of conversation which occurred near me, will illustrate the general tone of remark. A young man observed to a gentleman beside him:
"We shall have possession of Washington before the first of June."
"Do you think so? Lincoln is going to call out an army of one hundred and fifty thousand men."
"Oh, well, we can whip them out any morning before breakfast. Throw three or four shells among those blue-bellied Yankees and they will scatter like a flock of sheep!"
Up to this day I had earnestly hoped that a bloody conflict between the two sections might be averted; but these remarks were so frequent—the opinion that northerners were unmitigated cowards seemed so universal,8that I began to look with a great deal of complacency upon the prospect which the South enjoyed of testing this faith. It was time to ascertain, once for all, whether these gentlemen of the cotton and the canebrake were indeed a superior race, destined to wield the scepter, or whether their pretensions were mere arrogance and swagger.
It seemed impossible for the southern mind to comprehend that he who never blusters, or flourishes thebowie-knife, who will endure a great deal before fighting, who would rather suffer a wrong than do a wrong, is, when roused, the most dangerous of adversaries—a fact so universal, that it has given us the proverb, "Beware the fury of a patient man."
The North Heard From.
New York papers, issued after receiving intelligence of the fall of Sumter, now reached us, and both in their news and editorial columns indicated how suddenly that event had aroused the whole North. The voice of every journal was for war.The Herald, which one morning spoke bitterly against coercion, received a visit during the day from several thousand tumultuous citizens, who left it the alternative of running up the American flag or having its office torn down. By the presence of the police, and the intercession of leading Union men, its property was saved from destruction. In next morning's paper appeared one of its periodical and constitutional somersaults. Its four editorial articles all cried "War to the knife!"
The Rebels were greatly surprised, half appalled, and doubly exasperated at the unexpected change of all the northern papers which they had counted friendly to them; but they also shouted "War!" even louder than before.
At Goldsboro, where we stopped for supper, a small slab of marble, standing upon the mantel in the hotel office, had these words upon it:
"Sacred to the memory of A. Lincoln, who died of a broken neck, at Newburn, April 16, 1861."
"Sacred to the memory of A. Lincoln, who died of a broken neck, at Newburn, April 16, 1861."
An Inebriated Patriot.
Before the train started again, a young patriot, whose articulation was impeded by whisky, passed through it, asking:
"S'thr any --- ---- Yankee onth'strain? F'thr's a --- ---- Union man board these cars, Ic'nwhip him by ---. H'rahfr Jeff. Davis nth'southrncnfdrcy!" He afterwardamused himself by firing his revolver from the car door. At the next station he stepped out upon the platform, and repeated:
"H'rah fr Jeff. Davis n'th'Southrn Confdrcy!" Another patriot among the bystanders at the station promptly responded:
"Good. Hurra for Jeff. Davis!"
"Yre th'man fr me," responded our passenger; "Come 'n' takeadrink. All fr Jeff. Davis here, ain't you?"
"Yes, sir."
"Thatsallrightth'n. But what d'you elect that ---- ---- Abolitionist, Murphy, t'th' Leg'slature for?"
"I'mMurphy," replied the patriot, who had been standing in the group, but now sprang forward belligerently. "Who callsmean Abolitionist?"
"Beg y'r padon sr. Reck'n you ain't the man. But whoisthat Abolitionist you 'lected here? 's name's Brown, 'sn't it? Yes, that's it. ---- ---- Brown; y'ought t'hanghim!"
Just then the whistle shrieked and the train moved on, amid shouts of laughter.
At six o'clock next morning, we reached Richmond. Here, also, I had hoped to stop, but the caldron was seething too hotly. Rebel flags were everywhere flying, the newspapers all exulted over the passage of the Secession ordinance, and some of them warned northerners and Union men to leave the country forthwith. The tone of conversation, too, was very bitter. The farther I went, the intenser the frenzy; and, beginning to wonder whether there was any safe haven south of Philadelphia or New York, I continued northward without a moment's unnecessary delay.
The railway accommodations grew better in exactratio to our approach to Mason and Dixon's line, and northern physiognomies were numerous on the train. At Ashland, a few miles north of Richmond, the first palatable meal since leaving the Alabama River was set before us. All the intervening distance, to the epicurean eye, stretched out in a dreary perspective of bacon and corn bread.
The Old Dominion in a Frenzy.
Half the passengers were soldiers. Every village bristled with bayonets. At Fredericksburgh, one of the polished F. F. V.'s on the platform presented his face at our window, and asked what the unmentionable-to-ears-polite all these people were going north for? As the passengers maintained an "heroic reticence," he exploded a fresh oath, and went to the next car to pursue his investigations.
A citizen of Richmond, who occupied the seat with me, satisfied that I was sound on the Secession question, assured me that it had been very difficult to get the ordinance through the Convention; that trouble was anticipated from Union men in Western Virginia; that business in Richmond was utterly suspended, New York exchange commanding a premium of fifteen per cent.
"We are fearful," he added, "of difficulty with our free negroes. There are several thousand in Richmond, many of whom are intelligent, and some wealthy. They show signs of turbulence, and we are perfecting an organization to hold them in check. I sent the money to New York this morning for a quantity of Sharp's rifles, ordering them to be forwarded in dry-goods boxes, that they might not excite suspicion."
He added, that Ben McCulloch was in Virginia, and had perfected a plan by which, at the head of Rebel troops, he was about to capture Washington. As weprogressed northward, the noisy Secession element grew small by degrees, and beautifully less. At Acquia Creek, we left the cars and took a steamer up the Potomac.
The Old Flag Once More.
A quiet gentleman, who had come on board at Richmond, impressed me, through that mysterious freemasonry which exists among journalists—indeed, between members of all professions—as a representative of the Fourth Estate. In reply to inquiries, he informed me that he had been reporting the Virginia Convention forThe Richmond Enquirer, but, being a New Yorker, had concluded, like Jerry Blossom, he wanted "to go home." He described the Convention, which at first had an emphatic majority for the Government; but in time, one Union man after another was dragooned into the ranks, until a bare Secession majority was obtained.
The ordinance explicitly provided that it should not take effect until submitted to the popular vote; but the State authorities immediately assumed that it would be ratified. Senator Mason wrote a public letter, warning all Union men to leave the State; and before the time for voting arrived, the Secessionists succeeded in inaugurating a bloody conflict upon the soil, and bringing in armies from the Gulf States. It was then ratified by a large majority.
We steamed up the Potomac, passed the quiet tomb at Mount Vernon, which was soon to hear the clangor of contending armies, and early in the afternoon came in sight of Washington. There, at last, thank God! was the old Starry Banner, flying in triumph over the Capitol, the White House, the departments, and hundreds of dwellings. Albeit unused to the melting mood, my heart was full, and my eyelids quivered as I saw it. Until that hour, I never knew how I loved the old flag!
Walking down Pennsylvania avenue, I encounteredtroops of old friends, and constantly wondered that I had been able to spend ten weeks in the South, without meeting more than two or three familiar acquaintances.
An Hour with President Lincoln.
A body-guard for the President, made up entirely of citizens of Kansas, armed with Sharp's rifles, was on duty every night at the White House. It contained two United States Senators, three members and ex-members of Congress, the Chief-Justice of the Supreme Court, and several editors and other prominent citizens of that patriotic young State.
With two friends, I spent an hour at the White House. The President, though overwhelmed with business, received us kindly, and economized time by taking a cup of tea while conversing with us, and inquiring very minutely about affairs in the seceding States.
"Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown,"
"Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown,"
though the crown be only the chaplet of a Republic.
This man had filled the measure of American ambition, but the remembered brightness of his face was in strange contrast with the weary, haggard look it now wore, and his blushing honors seemed pallid and ashen. There was the same honest, kindly tone—the same fund of humorous anecdote—the same genuineness; but the old, free, lingering laugh was gone.
"Mr. Douglas," remarked the President, "spent three hours with me this afternoon. For several days he has been too unwell for business, and has devoted his time to studying war-matters, until he understands the military position better, perhaps, than any one of the Cabinet. By the way," continued Mr. Lincoln, with his peculiar twinkle of the eye, "the conversation turned upon the rendition of slaves. 'You know,' said Douglas, 'that I am entirely sound on the Fugitive SlaveLaw. I am for enforcing it in all cases within its true intent and meaning; but, after examining it carefully, I have concluded that a negro insurrection is a case to which it does not apply.'"
Panic in Washington.
I had not come north a moment too early. The train which brought me from Richmond to Acquia Creek was the last which the Rebel authorities permitted to pass without interruption, and the steamer, on reaching Washington, was seized by our own Government, and made no more regular trips. Before I had been an hour in the Capital, the telegraph wires were cut, and railway tracks in Maryland torn up. Intelligence of the murderous attack of a Baltimore mob on the Sixth Massachusetts regiment,en routefor Washington, startled the town from its propriety.
Chaos had come again. Washington was the seat of an intense panic. An attack from the Rebels was hourly expected, and hundreds of families fled from the city in terror. During the next two days, twenty-five hundred well-officered, resolute men could undoubtedly have captured the city. The air was filled with extravagant and startling rumors. From Virginia, Union refugees were hourly arriving, often after narrow escapes from the frenzied populace.
Massachusetts soldiers, who had safely run the Baltimore gantlet of death, were quartered in the United States Senate Chamber. They had mustered with characteristic promptness. At 5 o'clock one evening, a telegram reached Boston asking for troops for the defense of the imperiled Capital. At 9 o'clock the next morning, the first company, having come twenty-five miles from the country, stacked arms in Faneuil Hall. At 5 o'clock that night the Sixth Regiment, with full ranks, started for Washington. They were fine-lookingfellows, but greatly embittered by their Baltimore experience. In a very quiet, undemonstrative way, they manifested an earnest desire for immediate and active service.
"Came Out to Fight!"
The bewilderment and terror which had so long rested like a nightmare on the National authorities—which for months had left almost every leading Republican statesman timid and undecided—was at last over. The echoes of the Charleston guns broke the spell! The masses had been heard from! Then, as at later periods of the war, the popular instinct was clearer and truer than all the wisdom of the politicians.
During the three days I spent in Washington, the city was virtually blockaded, receiving neither mails, telegrams, nor re-enforcements. Martial law, though not declared, was sadly needed. Most of the Secessionists had left, but enough remained to serve as spies for the Virginia Revolutionists.
I left for New York, by an evening train crowded with fleeing families. Most of them went west from the Relay House, deterred from passing through Baltimore by the reign of terror which the Rebels had inaugurated. The most zealous Union papers advocated Secession as their only means of personal and pecuniary safety. The State and city authorities, though professedly loyal, bowed helpless before the storm. Governor Sprague, with his Rhode Island volunteers, had started for Washington. Mayor Brown telegraphed him, requesting that they should not come through Baltimore, as it would exasperate the people.
"The Rhode Island regiment," was Sprague's epigrammatic response, "came out to fight, and may just as well fight in Maryland as in Virginia." It passed unmolested!
Baltimore under Rebel Rule.
We found Baltimore in a frenzy. The whole city seemed under arms. The Union men were utterly silenced, and many had fled. The only person I heard express undisguised loyalty was a young lady from Boston, and only her sex protected her. Several persons had been arrested as spies during the day, including two supposed correspondents of New York papers.
Baltimore, for the time, was worse than any thing I had seen in Charleston, New Orleans, or Mobile. Through the evening Barnum's hotel was filled with soldiers. Stepping into the office to make arrangements for going to Philadelphia, I encountered an old acquaintance from Cincinnati, now commanding a Baltimore company under arms:
"If Lincoln persists in attempting to send troops through Maryland," said he, "we are bound to have his head!"
Another Baltimorean came up and began to question me, but my acquaintance promptly vouched for me as "a true southern man," and I escaped annoyance. The same belief was expressed here which prevailed throughout the whole South, that northern men were cowards; and persons actually alluded to the attack upon the unarmed Massachusetts troops as an act of bravery.
Leaving Baltimore, I took a carriage for the nearest northern railway point. The roads were crowded with families leaving the city, and infested by Rebel scouts and patrols. Union citizens were helpless. One of them said to us:
"For God's sake, beg the Administration and the North not to let us be crushed out!"
We hoped to take the Philadelphia cars, twenty-six miles out, but a detachment of Baltimore soldiers that very morning had passed up the railroad, destroyingevery bridge; smoke was still rising from their ruins. We were compelled to press on and on, until, in the evening, after a ride of forty-six miles, we reached York, Pennsylvania.