The Continental Monthly, Vol 3 No 3, March 1863. Various

no one. It was but another secret added to the many that had torn my heart and brain. Nor, when the body was found, stripped by camp followers, and supposed to be killed by a reconnoitring party of the enemy, did I betray myself by word or look.

      At last the war was over, and we were ordered home. I bade farewell to the blue hills of the Crimea with secret joy, and as the shore faded from my sight, the memory of all that had happened to me during the Great Siege faded from my memory like a dream.

      Upon our landing, I went as soon as possible home. How green the hedges were, how sweet the scent of the violets, how soft the grass, how grand the arching oaks and giant elms, as I journeyed along on foot. Surely I have suffered enough, I said to myself, as I passed through meadow, and copse, and lane, and over stiles, and to the old park at last. Surely I have suffered enough, I said, as I came to the lodge gate, where the keeper's wife looked curiously at my uniform and bronzed face, and the crape on my arm, and then ran into the lodge to tell her husband that here was Master Horace come back. Surely there was peace in that old house, with its pointed gables, and moss-clad turrets, and ivied walls, and little gothic windows—where the old butler grasped my hand; and the maids came peeping out; and the old dog licked my face; where poor Lucy wept upon my breast—wept for that I had come back alone; and then put her little girl into my arms, to kiss dear Uncle Horace, come home once more.

      But, when I went to bed that night, in the same glass that showed me my Enemy years before, I saw him looking at me, with his cruel smile, shining out of my own eyes.

      What more remains to be told? But little; for it was but the old story. It is enough to say that I struggled on, hoping against hope; that I cheated myself with the maddest hope of all—that she might be brought to love me; that I one day prayed her to become my wife, and that she broke from me with terror and loathing; that I fled her presence, and was once more a wanderer over the earth; that my weary feet dragged me over the snows of Siberia, where the furred noble and the chained serf worked side by side; over the burning sands, where the brown Arab careers along upon his steed, his white burnous fluttering in the hot wind; over the broad prairies of America, where the Indian prowls with his trusty rifle, waiting for the wild beast; over the paths of the trackless deep; over the still wilder deserts and still more lonely deeps of revelry and vice;—what more than that I have come back again; that many guests are here to do honor to my return; that these are the last words which I shall ever write!

      PARTING

      When 'mid the loud notes of the drum

      And fife tones shrilling on the ear,

      The music of our nation's hymns

      Rose 'neath the elm trees loud and clear;

      When on the Common's grassy plain

      The city poured her countless throng,

      And blessings fell like April rain

      On each one as he marched along;

      We parted,—hand close clasped in hand,

      Telling the thoughts tongue could not speak;

      Was it unmanly that our eyes

      O'erflowed with love upon the cheek?

      I hear thy cheery voice outspeak,

      'Courage, the months will quickly fly,

      And ere November chill and bleak

      We meet at home, Ned, you and I.'

      A livelier strain came from the band,

      'God bless you' went from each to each;

      A gazing eye, a waving hand,

      Where hearts were all too full for speech.

      He marched, obeying duty's call,

      Of noblest nature, first to hear;

      I, bound by fond domestic thrall,

      In path of duty lingered here.

      Slowly the summer months rolled on,

      October harvested the corn,

      November came with shortening days,

      Passed by in mist and rain,—was gone,—

      Yet still he came not; winter's snow

      In feathery vesture clothed the trees,

      Or, iceclad in a jewelled glow,

      They sparkled in the chilly breeze.

      Spring glowed along Potomac vales,

      While north her footsteps tardier came,

      For him the golden jasmine trails

      O'er bright azaleas all aflame;

      Still upon Yorktown's trampled fields,

      O'er grassy plain and wooded swell,

      Her sunny wealth the summer yields,

      And still the word comes, 'All is well.'

      A MERCHANT'S STORY

      'All of which I saw, and part of which I was.'

      CHAPTER XII

      In the afternoon the exercises at the meeting house were conducted by Preston, who publicly catechized the negroes very much in the manner that is practised in Northern Sunday schools. When the services were over, and the family had gathered around the supper table, I said to him:

      'I've an idea of passing the evening with Joe; he has invited me. Would it be proper for you and Mrs. Preston to go?'