DARK DAYS.
So--heavier with each link--the chain of days dragged on. My room mate
soon thawed into a stolid sociability, and was quite disposed to be
communicative; but his narrative riches about matched those of the
knife-grinder, and his military experience of one year only embraced one
battle--that of Manassas. His ideas of English society were very
remarkable. The works of Mr. G. W. M. Reynolds are much favored, it
appears, by the class who believe in Mr. George F. Train's veracity and
eloquence; from these turbid fountains mine honest friend's conceptions
were drawn. I took some trouble to undeceive him, and partially
succeeded, chiefly by insisting upon the fact that--of all living
writers--the ingenious author of the "Mysteries of Everything" was
probably the man least qualified, by personal experience, to discourse
concerning the manners and customs of the upper, or even the educated,
classes. Slowly and reluctantly, the Baltimorean abandoned his cherished
ideal of the British aristocrat--a covert Caligula, with all modern
improvements--varying the monotony of orgies with interludes of murder
and rapine; the instrument of these pleasant vices being always ready in
the shape of a Frankenstein-monster, whose mission it is to tyrannize
perpetually over the guilty lordling or lady whose secret he holds;
doing a steady trade of two assassinations or abductions weekly; and
utterly inviolable by cord, shot, or steel, up to the final blue-fire
_tableau_ of the dreary drama. I believe that my mate is now prepared to
admit, that a certain amount of piety and chastity is not incompatible
with tenure of the highest dignities in the Anglican Church--that a
youth need not necessarily be a savage Sybarite, because he happens to
be heir to a dukedom--that matronly virtue may, with a struggle, be
retained even by a Countess--and that a man may possibly be a kindly
landlord, and even an honest farmer himself (that was the crowning
triumph), though born a belted Earl.
On the fourth day, I bethought myself of teaching my companion piquet
(no purely transatlantic game is in the least interesting, if the stakes
are nominal); he acquired it with the ready aptitude that seems natural
to Americans, and I soon had to drop the odds of the deal. We played
many hundred _parties_ for imaginary eagles; eventually I got a run, and
left off a good winner, which, as my opponent had not money enough to
buy tobacco, was highly satisfactory to every one concerned.
After a week's confinement to my room, I was allowed to take half an
hour's exercise daily in a narrow strip of yard just twenty-one paces
long; it was hedged in with kitchens and all sorts of disagreeable
buildings, but the additional space was not to be despised. On the first
evening after this concession, I was pacing up and down moodily (only
inmates of the same room are allowed to descend together, so that you
gain no social advantage), when just over my head, from a window on the
first story, there broke out a burst of merriment, and a
half-intelligible trill of baby-language; then a little round pink face,
under a cloud of fair hair, peered out at me through the bars. The utter
incongruity of the whole picture struck me so absurdly, that, I believe,
I did indulge in a dreary laugh. Then the child began to talk again; and
clapped its hands exultingly, as its mother caught an orange I threw up
at her, when the sentinel's back was turned. So a sort of acquaintance
began. Every day for a month, I saw that promising two-year-old (to
whose sex I cannot speak with certainty); and I never heard it fretting
or wailing. Whenever it saw me, it used to break out into a real
uproarious laugh, as if our common imprisonment was the very best joke
that had ever been presented to its infantile mind. I am ashamed to
avow, that my own sense of the ridiculous was by no means so keen. The
mother evidently pined far more than the baby; for her face grew, every
day, more white and worn. What was the offense of either against the
Government, I never heard; for no official or soldier will answer any
question, and discourse between the prisoners is strictly forbidden.
They went South, in the great exodus of the 20th of May. I contrived on
that morning, with much cunning, to cast in six or seven oranges at
their window, which, I hope, solaced those two Gentle Traytours through
the burden and heat of the day.
Till I got too sulky and savage to seek unnecessary intercourse with any
one, I found occasional amusement in chaffing the sentinels. The orders
against conversation with these were not rigidly enforced. Finding that
they rose very freely to the bait of a strained ironical politeness, I
used to beg them to tell off by sections, the victims of their red right
hands--chickens and ducks not being counted; also, I was fain to learn,
how many rebel standards and pieces of cannon each man had captured and
retained? If they took no credit for any such feats, I would by no means
believe them, imputing the denial solely to the modesty inseparable from
true courage.
Descending into the yard, one day, I found the sentry--an overgrown lad,
with broad, crimson, beardless cheeks--in a perfect paroxysm of
excitement, using great freedom of gesticulation and blasphemy. I had
had immense success in bewildering this particular warrior a few days
previously: so I went up to him at once:
"My blood-stained veteran," I said, "what has raised your apoplectic
valor?"
I think he was rather ashamed at being caught; but he grumbled out,
sulkily rough, something about--"If they don't keep their ---- heads in,
they'll get more than they ask for." I followed the direction of his
eyes, and there, on the third story, sat two of the quietest-looking
middle-aged women I ever beheld. They were evidently new arrivals, and
had not heard of the injunctions against putting heads out windows: for
they were staring down in blank astonishment, unconscious that the
blatant threats were leveled at them. Now, the ingenious juggler who
packed himself into a bottle, might possibly have succeeded in
infringing the aforesaid rule: no other human being could have got his
cranium through the bars. I suspect, it was simply an outbreak of the
plethoric sentry's irrational ferocity (he had been sweltering under a
burning sun for two hours) on the first helpless object that came across
him; for I could not make out that the women had answered or aggravated
him. I addressed to my friend many compliments on his prowess--trusting
that his soldierly zeal would be appreciated in higher quarters.
Nevertheless, I presumed to suggest that it would have been wiser to
have begun with the baby: if he could frighten that into fits, his rapid
promotion must have been insured. I believed that Brigadier Turchin
would soon want an _aide_, and who knows? &c.
In a few minutes he waxed frightfully wroth; but he had already broken
the non-conversation orders, and I would not allow him to fall back upon
these now. At last he retreated to a part of his beat where I could not
follow him, and there growled and ground his teeth till my time was up.
The corporal who was my immediate guard tried to excuse his comrade,
hinting that "he wasn't quite right in the head." Possibly this may have
been one of his "off-days." The jest of that afternoon was turned into
bloody earnest before three weeks had passed.
Not long after this I had a pleasanter incident to chronicle. As I
entered the yard one day, my guard remarked with a broad grin:
"Somethin' new up there, Colonel."
The indiscriminate appropriation of military titles here, is, of course,
proverbial, though common prudence made me very careful not to claim a
fictitious rank, after leaving Baltimore, where I was well known. I got
a brevet-step with almost every change of place or association;
disclaimers were never listened to.
Through the bars of a second story window that fronted each turn of my
tramp, I saw--this. A slight figure in the freshest summer toilette of
cool pink muslin; close braids of dark hair shading clear pale cheeks;
eyes that were made to sparkle, though the look in them then was very
sad, and the languid bowing down of the small head told of something
worse than weariness.
Truly, a pretty picture, though framed in such rude setting, but almost
as startling, at first, as the apparition of the fair witch in the
forest to Christabelle. Slightly in the background stood a mature
dame--the mother, evidently. No need to ask what their crime had been;
aid and abetment of the South suggested itself before you detected the
ensign of her faith that the demoiselle still wore undauntedly--a pearl
_solitaire_, fashioned as a single star. I may not deny that my gloomy
"constitutional" seemed, thenceforward, a shade or two less dreary; but,
though community of suffering does much abridge ceremony, it was some
days before I interchanged with the fair captives any sign beyond the
mechanical lifting of my cap when I entered and left their presence,
duly acknowledged from above. One evening I chanced to be loitering
almost under their window; a low, significant cough made me look up; I
saw the flash of a gold bracelet and the wave of a white hand, and there
fell at my feet a fragrant pearly rosebud nestling in fresh green
leaves. My thanks were, perforce, confined to a gesture and a dozen
hurried words, but I would the prison beauty could believe that fair
Jane Beaufort's rose was not more prized than hers, though the first was
a love token granted to a king, the last only a graceful gift to an
unlucky stranger. I suppose that most men, whose past is not utterly
barren of romance, are weak enough to keep some withered flowers till
they have lived memory down, and I pretend not to be wiser than my
fellows. Other fragrant messengers followed in their season, but, if
ever I "win hame to mine ain countrie," I make mine avow to enshrine
that first rosebud in my _reliquaire_, with all honor and solemnity,
there to abide till one of us shall be dust.
I heard from Lord Lyons about once a week. Though my letters were always
answered most promptly, the replies never reached me within eight days.
All correspondence, going or coming, passes the inspection of the
Provost Marshal and the Superintendent, and letters are forwarded and
delivered--sooner or later--the whole thing resolving itself into a
question of official memory or convenience. I did not doubt from the
first, that no intercession, that could properly be exercised, would be
spared. If repeated applications and strong representations could have
availed, I should have been free long ago. But many autocrats might take
a lesson from the insolent indifference of this Administration, when an
argument or a request is to be set aside; it is exactly in proportion to
the pliancy they display when confronted with demands enforced by a
substantial threat. Lord Lyons' reputation for courtesy and kindness of
heart stands too high to need any testimony of mine; but I cannot
forbear here expressing my sense of his good offices, and I am not the
less grateful, because these words are written on the fifty-sixth day of
imprisonment.
To one member of the Legation, I am indebted for far more than official
benevolence. On the second day after my committal, Percy Anderson
brought up himself to the Old Capitol, a package containing cigars,
books, newspapers, &c., which, he was told, would be transmitted to me
"right away." I trust that the contents satisfied the critical tastes of
the officer on guard; for from his clutches no fragment emerged. I never
even heard of the kind intention, till weeks had passed; and, of many
papers afterwards forwarded by the same hands, only one packet reached
me.
All this time, my reverend neighbor was pressing on in earnest his
preparations for escape. His room-mate was a young Marylander, who had
served some time on the staff of the Confederate army; he was captured
at his own home, whither he had returned for a hurried visit, and was
now detained as a "spy;" this vague and marvelously elastic charge is
always laid, when it is desirable to exclude a prisoner from the
conditions of exchange. The plan of evasion was very simple. After
passing through the floor into the attic, and thence out through the
dormer-window, they had to crawl over about eighty feet of
shingle-roof--not slippery at all, nor particularly steep--along the
ridge, except where they had to descend a little to circumvent the
chimney-stacks; this brought them to another dormer, giving admission to
a house in the same block of building, but not connected with the
prison. The parson believed this to be uninhabited; and the event proved
either that he was right, or that the inmates were friendly. After
several false starts, they decided on making the attempt on the 1st of
May.
In the twenty-four hours preceding, the reverend's excitable nerves had
been wound up to something above concert pitch. He seemed to hold the
real risk--discovery and the bullet of a sentinel--very cheap; but,
magnifying imaginary difficulties after his own peculiar fashion, he had
come to look upon the roof as a pass of peril, only to be accomplished
by preterhuman agility and steadiness of brain. His fellow-adventurer,
who from first to last bore himself with a gay recklessness good to
behold, laughed all such forebodings utterly to scorn. I tried the
gentler tone of grave argument, demonstrating that a _glissade_ on
shingles in dry weather was next to impossible, and that the ridge, once
gained, was nearly as safe traveling as an ordinary mountain-path. The
parson's armor of meek obstinacy was proof alike to reason and ridicule;
he waxed not wroth, and was thankful for any suggestion; but, when asked
to act accordingly, ever fell back on one plaintive formula--"I am no
gymnast,"--after the fashion of that exasperating child who met all the
Poet's questions and objections with the refrain of
Master, we are seven.
These visionary terrors would have been of little moment, if they had
not induced his reverence to persist in the use of certain machines,
which were more than likely to bring the whole adventure to grief. These
were a sort of sandals, studded with sharp nails, that could be fitted
either to hands or feet, and no words can describe the proud
satisfaction with which they were regarded by their simple-minded
constructor. Though I saw it was almost useless, I tried hard to
persuade him that, for any sort of climbing (where neither ice nor sharp
edges were to be feared), no engines could be so safe as bare feet and
hands; that it would be much harder to recover himself, if a slip ensued
from any strap giving way; finally, that if the contrivance answered
perfectly in every other way, there was certain risk of what was most to
be avoided--sharp, sudden noises, likely to strike strangely on the
sentinel's ear. My friend heard me out quite patiently, thanked me very
cordially, and then--took his own way.
Everything was ready by midnight; but the start was not made till three,
A. M., at which hour the moon was quite down. We could talk but little,
as it was especially important not to arouse any suspicion among the
sentries; as far as I could make out, the adventurers employed the
interval very wisely, in taking in supplies of both creature and
spiritual comforts, dividing their attention about equally between
supper and devotional exercises. At last the moment came, and they bade
us farewell; the good parson bestowing upon my unworthy self a really
pathetic benediction. If my own "God-speed" was less solemn, I know it
was not less sincere. Then I went to bed, and as another twenty minutes
passed without my hearing a sound, I began to think the fugitives were
well away. I was just dropping off to sleep, when I heard voices in the
yard speaking loud and hastily, though I could not catch the words. Then
there was a scuffle of feet above, and a scrambling fall beyond the
right hand wall. After a few minutes silence, quick steps came along the
passage, and the door of No. 22 was opened. The visitors soon went away;
but we did not know what watch might be set, so essayed no communication
with our unlucky neighbor till the morning was far advanced. The
adventure had miscarried in this wise.
When they mounted into the empty attic they found the window invitingly
open, and, after waiting a few minutes to humor the moon, the soldier
volunteered to reconnoiter. He reached the ridge without the slightest
difficulty, and crawled along till he could see his way clear to the
window they wished to attain. Then he returned undiscovered and reported
progress. Now the first mistake was making a reconnaissance at all:
_vestigia nulla retrorsum_, ought to have been the word that night, if
ever. The second and graver error was, allowing the parson to go first,
when they started in earnest. The light, lithe body of the soldier could
glide over the roof with the silent swiftness of a cat "on the rampage;"
the same animal, shod with walnut-shells, suggests itself as an apt,
though irreverent comparison for the priestly fugitive. To use the
narrator's own words--occasionally more forcible than elegant:
"You might have heard him two blocks off, squattering and spluttering
over the shingles."
Those miserable machines, when put to the proof, made more noise than
even we had imputed to them. The prisoners over whose heads the parson
passed, heard the slipping and scratching quite plainly, though the
attic floor was between them. Nevertheless he had time to reach the
desired window, to let it slip once with a resonant bang, and to slip
inside out of sight, before any alarm was raised. But the drowsy or
careless sentinel awoke to a sense of his position just as the second
fugitive turned the first chimney-stack, and challenged with a threat of
shooting. The Marylander knew that the game was up, as far as he was
concerned; if he went on and escaped the bullet, those below would have
seen at what window he entered, and the start was hopelessly short: to
persist would only have insured two recaptures. He certainly did the
wisest thing in retracing his way as speedily as possible. When the
guards came to No. 22, they found its solitary inmate in bed, sleeping
apparently the heavy, stertorous sleep of a deep drinker: an empty
whisky-bottle gave a color of probability to the picture. They could get
nothing out of him then; and, afterwards, he took the line of having
been insensibly overcome by liquor, and so prevented from accompanying
his fellow-prisoner. The authorities could scarcely have believed the
story; but perhaps they wished to keep the escape as quiet as possible;
at any rate the Marylander was not more strictly guarded or severely
treated than before. He took the mishap with wonderful pluck and
good-humor, and spoke rather humorously than wrathfully of the whole
affair. Yet, as far as he knew, he had come back to indefinite
captivity. When he went South with the rest of them on the 20th of May,
no man of the five hundred better deserved freedom.
Some days afterwards we had news of the divine--safe so far, and many
miles away. Certainly, had he possessed his soul in patience a fortnight
or so longer, he would have been forwarded to his desired destination
securely and at the expense of the enemy. Before he reaches it now, he
will have paid away a sheaf of greenbacks, and run the gauntlet of a
frontier blockade, closing in more tightly every hour. North of the
Potomac there is no rest for the sole of his foot. So, many would say,
that the escapade had far better have been deferred. Eight weeks ago I
should have been of that same opinion, but now I doubt--I--doubt. The
prospect outside ought to be very dark, and rife with peril, to induce a
man to resign himself deliberately to another decameron here.[2]
[Footnote 2: Since writing the above, I have met the parson in England.
I am bound to state that he gives rather a different account of the
escapade, and intimates that the Maryland youth's "tightness" was rather
real than shamed; that it was, in fact, the cause of his being left
behind. It is possible that I may have been too hard on his reverence's
nervousness--scarcely doing justice to his earnestness of purpose; but,
as to the aforesaid infernal machines I decline to retract one word.]
On the 15th of May, my room-fellow was told that he was to be sent South
immediately: he received the news very stolidly, and betrayed no
impatience during the interval that elapsed before the exchange-steamer
could be got ready. Truth to say, it is rather an equivocal
advantage--to be turned loose in a city where famine-prices prevail,
utterly penniless. But, if my mate did not exult in his prospects,
neither did he in any way despond. He "supposed he'd get along somehow;"
indeed, he had plenty of a very useful capital--solid, persevering
self-reliance.
There was great bustle in the yard on the morning of the 20th; all the
men who had got the order of release were mustered there before ten
o'clock. After many delays, each person passed out singly, as his name
was called, and it was high noon when the last prize was drawn; leaving
nothing but dreary--very dreary--blanks for us whose tickets were still
in the wheel. There was no uproarious merriment, or even exuberant
cheerfulness in the crowd below; the satisfaction was of the saturnine
sort, such as people feel who have waited long for their just dues, and
have extraordinarily little to be thankful for. Once more, in dumb show,
I pledged mine honest host of the White Grounds, while he responded in a
stealthy _duc-an-dhurras_; then, having furnished my mate with such
provant as was available, I wished him, too, sincerely good-speed.
I cannot say that I was sorry, at first, to find myself quite alone. I
am ashamed to confess that I had been daily growing more sullen and
unsocial; upon reflection, I think I had decidedly begun to tyrannize
over my companion; some of his harmless peculiarities, which I hardly
noticed at first, would, at times, irritate me savagely; besides every
cubic inch of vacant space has its value in a low-browed room twelve
feet by eight, when the thermometer means mounting in earnest. But, as
the dreary time dragged on, and as the leaden listlessness settled down
heavier hour by hour, I began to look back regretfully, if not
remorsefully. There were moments, not few or far between, when I would
have given much to hear the wire-drawn monotone that lately had been an
offense to me; ay, even though each slow sentence should be punctuated
by expectoration.
Among those who were exempted from the gaol delivery was an Englishman,
John Hardcastle by name, who had been arrested about a month later than
myself, on the Lower Potomac, on his way homeward through the Northern
States. He had, I believe, been employed by the Confederate Government
in carrying out some inventions and improvements in armory. There was
nothing remarkable about the little, round, ruddy man, except a
joviality which never seemed to droop in the heavy prison air; when I
wrote that an honest laugh was never heard here, I ought to have made
that one exception; he had a fair voice, too, and a large collection of
songs, which he chanted out merrily, instead of merging all tunes into
one dolorous drone. He was confined at first on the floor immediately
under me, but, on the 20th. of May, changed his quarters into one of the
large rooms in the main building, with windows opening back and front
into the yard and the avenue; these latter were without bars. All
through the evening of Sunday, the 24th, I listened, rather enviously,
to Hardcastle's noisy mirth; his voice never ceased to rattle--now
bantering a fellow-prisoner with good-natured aggravation--now shouting
out a verse of some popular song--now declaiming a sentence or so of
exaggerated mock-oratory--yet he did not give me the idea of being
uproarious with drink (I heard afterwards he was perfectly sober),
rather, he seemed possessed by an exhilaration involuntary and
irrational, like a person who has inhaled laughing-gas. It was not till
next day that the Highland word "Fey" came into my mind. I am scarcely
inclined now, wholly to deride that old superstition. Is it possible
that the foreshadow of doom does, in some mysterious way, affect certain
nervous systems, when the soul, within a few hours, must pass out free
through the rugged doors of violent death?
About eleven o'clock on the following morning I heard a rifle-shot, but
took, little heed of it, as I knew that accidental discharges from
careless handling of firelocks were not uncommon. Shortly afterwards,
the officer of the keys asked me to visit the Superintendent in his
room. It was natural that such a summons should conjure up certain faint
hopes of approaching liberation; or, at least, of the "hearing" so long
deferred. All such visions vanished instantly at the first sight of the
official's face, as he met me in the door-way; no good tidings for
anyone were written there; I knew that some grave disaster had occurred,
before my eye lighted on the table, strewn with papers, letters, and
bank-notes--all dabbled with the dull, red blots that marked the hand of
Cain.
In a very few words--spoken in a low hoarse voice, strangely changed
from its wonted boisterous loudness--the Superintendent told me why I
was wanted there. A British subject had just been shot by a sentinel for
transgressing the window-order mentioned above; as eight hundred dollars
in Confederate notes, besides other valuables, were found on his person,
it was thought well that I should assist at the inventory and attest its
correctness. It seemed that some hasty words of the Superintendent,
reflecting on the remissness of the soldiers on duty, had been the
proximate cause of the slaughter, I do believe that the death-warrant
was unwittingly spoken. The man's bearing and demeanor are rough, even
to coarseness, and his sensibilities probably blunted from having
perpetually to listen to complaints and tales of wrong-doing, which he
must perforce ignore; but I do not think his nature is harsh or cruel;
the bark of Cerberus is much worse than the bite; and he is quite
capable of benevolent actions, done in an uncouth way. The lips of the
corpse, up-stairs were scarcely whiter than those that kept working and
muttering nervously close by my shoulder, as I sat at my ghastly task. I
was right glad when all was ended, and I had escaped from the small,
close room, where the air seemed heavy with the savor of blood. All that
day, there lay upon the prison-house a weight and a gloom, that came not
from the murky, windless sky; the few faces that showed themselves in
the yard looked more dark and sullen than ever; and men, gathering in
knots instead of pacing to and fro, murmured or whispered eagerly. My
unlucky head chanced to be more troublesome than usual; altogether, I
cannot look back upon a more depressing evening.
About noon on the following day, a tawdry coffin of polished elm, beaded
and plated wherever there was room for a scrap of silvered metal, was
laid on chairs in the prison yard; and, soon, all those who had access
to that part of the building gathered round it--listening, uncovered, to
the scanty rites, which the Old Capitol concedes to prisoners released
by that Power, in presence of whose claims the _habeas corpus_ is never
suspended. A tall, lank-haired man, looking more like an undertaker than
a divine of any denomination, read straight through, without a syllable
of preface, the fifteenth chapter of the First Epistle to the
Corinthians, and then, kneeling down, began a rambling, extemporaneous
prayer, the main object of which seemed to be, to address the Deity by
as many periphrastic adjurations as possible. The orator besought "that
these melancholy circumstances might be blessed to us, the survivors;"
and rehearsed several platitudes on the uncertainty of life; but, from
first to last, there was not one single word of intercession or
commendation on behalf of the dead man's soul. I was glad when it was
over; our own simple service, read by the merest layman, would surely
have been a more fitting obsequy.
What followed was startling enough from its very suddenness. One of the
assistants stepped forward, and, with a quick, careless motion, threw
back two folding shutters, that formed the upper part of the coffin lid;
the blaze of the vertical sun, on which no living thing could have
looked unblinded, fell full on the heavy eyelids, that never shrunk or
shivered, and on the bare, upturned features, blanched to the unnatural
whiteness only found in corpses from which the life-blood has been
drained away. Since then, I have tried to recall the face as I saw it
often--round and ruddy, beaming with reckless joviality, and grotesque
humor: it will only rise as I saw it once--white, and solemn, and still.
When the crowd had satisfied their curiosity, the coffin was borne away,
and everything fell back into the old groove of monotony.
It will hardly be believed, that, though the victim had communicated
more than once with the British Legation (an envelope franked by Lord
Lyons was among the papers I examined), the Federal authorities did not
deem it necessary to give any official notice of the slaughter. Percy
Anderson was absolutely ignorant of what had happened, when he came to
me on the following day. The fact, too, is significant, that the
Washington journals, for whose net no incident is generally too small,
made no allusion to the tragedy, till the Thursday morning; I presume
silence was considered useless, when a member of our Legation must have
been made acquainted with the details.
The regrets of those who may have been interested in poor John
Hardcastle's life and death, will scarcely be lessened by the knowledge,
that he was not even in fault when he suffered. There were eight or ten
prisoners confined in the same room; and it was one of his companions
who had previously been twice warned back by the sentinel: he himself
was shot almost instantaneously after his head was thrust forth, without
a second challenge. The Washington papers stated that, when ordered to
draw back, he refused with an oath. With such chroniclers, one would not
bandy contradictions; I give this version of the facts, as I received it
from the lips of the Superintendent.
Late in the afternoon of Wednesday, the 27th, I was again summoned
below. I found Percy Anderson waiting there: he had obtained from the
War Office an order to see me alone, without limitation of time. I
understood that there was no precedent for such a concession; the
general rule being that prisoners should only receive their friends in
the presence of an officer, who is bound to watch and listen jealously,
while no interview can be extended beyond fifteen minutes. Never,
surely, was a call better timed. I was at my very worst, just then;
besides a couple of potatoes and a crust of dry bread, no solid food had
passed my lips for seventy hours. Of my personal appearance, from my own
knowledge, I can say nothing, (for my mate and I had agreed in
considering mirrors superfluous luxuries); but, from the startling
effect produced upon my visitor, I fancy that the dreary week of weeks
had made wild work with the outward as well as inward man. I know that
the kind diplomatist was more than pained at finding himself unable to
give me any foothold of certain or substantial hope; it was impossible
to hazard a reliable guess as to the termination of my confinement.
Hitherto, the unceasing efforts of the Legation had spent themselves on
the passive obstinacy of the Federal Government like bullets on a cotton
bale; of a truth it was long before those unjust judges grew aweary.
Nevertheless, the mere sight and sound of a frank English face and voice
were more effectual restoratives than all the cunning tonics and
incentives with which the prison surgeon had been striving to quicken an
imperceptible pulse, and to revive a deceased appetite. I have always
thought since, that the rest at that one conversational oasis, just
enabled me to hold on to the hither verge of Sahara.
The next eight days seem nearly blank to me now. I was past reading
anything, for I could scarcely make out the capitals with which the
journalists headed their daily bits of romance from Vicksburg and
elsewhere. It was with great difficulty that I scrawled detached
sentences at long intervals--a difficulty that, I fear, some unhappy
compositor, doomed to decipher the foregoing pages, will thoroughly
appreciate, though he may decline to sympathize with.
I had one passage of arms with the Superintendent during that week. I
have an idea that I spoke somewhat freely with regard to the
Administration that he had the honor to serve, pressing him for a
justification of its conduct in my own especial case.
The official listened quite coolly and calmly, with a twinkle of
amusement in his shrewd cynical eyes, and answered:
"Well, we've had a good bit of trouble with England and English this
year; and I reckon they think they've got a pretty fair-sized fish now,
and mean to keep him, whether or no."
"That's Republican justice, all over," I said; "to make the one that you
can catch, pay for the dozen that you can't, or that you are afraid to
grapple with."
"I don't know about justice," was the reply; "but it's d----d good
policy."
And so we parted--not a whit worse friends than before.
Delicta, majorum, immeritus lues,
if memory had not failed me, I might have quoted that line often and
appropriately enough. But every agent in the "robbery"--from the
vainglorious Virginian, my chief captor, down to the smooth Secretary,
whose velvet gripe was so loth to unclose--seemed provokingly bent on
exaggerating the importance of their prize. Perhaps the very interest
felt in my release, and the exertions unsparingly used--especially in
Baltimore--to secure it, strengthened the false impressions or pretenses
of the Federal powers. I write in the firm assurance that no Southern
friend will deem these words ungracious or ungrateful.
There is no stone, above or below ground, white enough to mark,
worthily, in my calender, the fifth day of last June. I hereby abjure,
for evermore, any superstitious prejudice against the ill luck of
Fridays. Late in the afternoon, I was pacing to and fro in the narrow
exercise-ground, speculating idly as to the delay of my dinner, which
was overdue--not that I felt any interest in the subject, but it was a
sort of break, and fresh starting-point in the monotony of hours--when I
was summoned once more into official presence. They took me to the room
on the ground-floor, where I had waited on the first day of my
imprisonment while the cell above was preparing. I found there the
lieutenant commanding the guard, and two or three more officers, one of
whom, I understood, was a deputy of the Judge-Advocate. They read out a
paper, of which the following is an exact copy, and asked if I had any
objection to sign it:
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, COUNTY OF WASHINGTON.
_Old Capital Prison, Washington, D. C._
I, ----, of ----, in England, do solemnly swear on my Parole of
Honor, that I will leave the United States of America, with as
little delay us possible, and that I will not return there during
the existing rebellion.
So help me God.
Signed, ----.
Sworn to and subscribed before me,
this fifth day of June, A. D. 1863.
JOHN A. LOVELL,
Lieut. Comdg. Guard.
Now, had I been offered a free passage South, I doubt if I should have
accepted it, then; the aspect of things within the last two mouths had
changed for me entirely. I could not hope to carry out one of my
original plans; for all available resources were nearly exhausted, and
procuring fresh supplies from home would have involved infinite
difficulty and delay. Besides, a refusal gave at once to the Federal
authorities the pretext for detention that they had sought so eagerly,
and, so far, failed to find. I know no earthly consideration, excepting
clear obligations of duty or honor, that would have persuaded me to
incur ten more prison days. If, instead of being a free agent, I had
been bound by an oath to penetrate into Secessia at all hazards, I
should have held myself at that moment amply assoilzed of my vow. So,
with the remark--"that, of all the places on this earth, the Northern
States of America was the country I most wished to leave, and least
cared to revisit"--I signed the parole, and confirmed it with an oath.
Then, it appeared that my debt to the Union was paid, so that it had no
further lien on my effects or me. The saddle-bags were soon packed; in
another half-hour, I stood outside the prison-door--realizing, with a
dull, dazed feeling of strangeness and novelty, that there was not the
shadow of bolt, bar, or wall between me and the clear sultry skies.