Jamestown and St. Mary's are both within the segment of a circle of
comparatively small radius whose centre is at the mouth of the Chesapeake.
In this strategic region, the key of America, Raleigh chose the base from
which he would colonize the new empire; here the Jamestown experiment
succeeded, after Raleigh's head had fallen on the block; the Revolution
was fired by the eloquence of Patrick Henry, and was consummated at
Yorktown; the War of 1812 was settled by the victories of North Point and
Fort McHenry; the crisis of the Civil War occurred; and seven Presidents
of the United States were born.
ALLEN S. WILL
_The first Lord Baltimore obtains from the Crown a grant of the territory
lying between the Potomac and the 40th parallel, 1632_
_Secession of West Virginia from Virginia sustained by the Federal
Government, 1863_
_"Virginia, who had given to all the States in common five great
commonwealths of the northwest and the county of Kentucky, was now bereft
of half of what remained to her"_
June Twenty-First
What care I if Cyrus McCormick was born in Rockbridge County? These
new-fangled "contraptions" are to the old system what the little, dirty,
black steam-tug is to the three-decker, with its cloud of snowy canvas
towering to the skies--the grandest and most beautiful sight in the world.
I wouldn't give Uncle Isham's picked man, "long Billy Carter," leading the
field, with one good drink of whisky in him--I wouldn't give one swing of
his cradle and one "ketch" of his straw for all the mowers and reapers in
creation.
GEORGE W. BAGBY
_Cyrus Hall McCormick of Virginia patents his reaping machine, 1831_
June Twenty-Second
If I could dwell
Where Israfel
Hath dwelt, and he where I,
He might not sing so wildly well
A mortal melody,
While a bolder note than this might swell
From my lyre within the sky.
EDGAR ALLAN POE
_Arkansas readmitted to the Union, 1868_
June Twenty-Third
THE BROOK
It is the mountain to the sea
That makes a messenger of me:
And, lest I loiter on the way
And lose what I am sent to say,
He sets his reverie to song
And bids me sing it all day long.
JOHN B. TABB
June Twenty-Fourth
AN AMUSING COMMENTARY ON THE MAKING OF SOME HISTORIES
I have here a small volume entitled, "John Randolph, by Henry Adams." It
is one of a series called "American Statesmen," and emanates from the thin
air of Boston. The series is edited by Mr. J. T. Morse, Jr. By what law of
selection he has been governed in allotting to particular authors the
preparation of respective biographies it is impossible to divine. It is
quite clear, however, that he has not followed any rule of qualification
or congeniality hitherto recognized by men or angels. For example, a
foreigner, Dr. Von Holtz, who, in an emphatically European and un-American
treatise on the Federal Constitution, had already denounced Calhoun as a
kind of Lucifer, is appointed his biographer; Henry Clay, the father of
Protection (as it is called), is assigned to Carl Schurz, who, I
understand, is an ardent advocate of Free Trade; while John Randolph is
turned over to the tender mercies of a descendant of the first
Vice-President, and the grandson of John Quincy Adams!
Had this unique law of selection prevailed hitherto, we might have had a
biography of Luther by Leo the Tenth; a life of St. Thomas Aquinas by
Thomas Payne; while Pontius Pilate, or more likely the devil himself,
would have been selected to chronicle the divine career of Jesus Christ.
DANIEL B. LUCAS
_John Randolph dies, 1833_
June Twenty-Fifth
But far away another line is stretching dark and long,
Another flag is floating free where armed legions throng;
Another war-cry's on the air, as wakes the martial drum,
And onward still, in serried ranks, the Southern soldiers come.
GEORGE HERBERT SASS
_Beginning of Seven Days' Battle around Richmond, 1862_
June Twenty-Sixth
A PROPHECY, 1869
The close of the Civil War found the conquering States so nearly equally
divided between the Radical and Conservative parties, that if the South
should be restored to her relative might in the Union, the balance would
be thrown at once in favor of the Conservatives. The problem therefore
assumed a mathematical form, and demanded that the South should not
reinforce the Conservatives of the North. This could be prevented only in
two ways, _viz._; either by keeping the South out of the Union entirely or
by placing the political power there in the hands of a minority. To adopt
one or the other of these expedients was a party necessity. This is the
whole key to Reconstruction; and fifty years hence no man living will be
found to deny it.
JUDGE J. FAIRFAX MCLAUGHLIN
(_In the "Southern Metropolis," June 26, 1869_)
June Twenty-Seventh
The duties exacted of us by civilization and Christianity are not less
obligatory in the country of our enemy than in our own.
ROBERT E. LEE
_Lee issues his famous Chambersburg order, 1863_
_"Winnie" Davis born, 1864_
June Twenty-Eighth
COL. WILLIAM MOULTRIE; SERGEANT JASPER; "PALMETTO DAY"
The battle holds a conspicuous place in the history of the Revolution. It
was our first clear victory over the British, and won over one of
England's most distinguished naval officers.
JOHN J. DARGAN
_Defence of Fort Sullivan, (Moultrie,) 1776_
_North Carolina, South Carolina, Florida, Alabama, and Louisiana
readmitted to the Union, 1868_
June Twenty-Ninth
His trumpet-tones re-echoed like
Evangels to the free,
Where Chimborazo views the world
Mosaic'd in the sea;
And his proud form shall stand erect
In that triumphal car
Which bears to the Valhalla gates
Heroic Bolivar!
JAMES RYDER RANDALL
_Henry Clay dies, 1852_
June Thirtieth
Yes, there's a charm about the name of Mary
Which haunts me like some old enchanter's spell,
Or rather like the voice of some sweet fairy,
Singing low love-songs in a lonely dell.
It hath a music that can never weary,
A strain that seems of love and grief to tell,
The echoes of an anthem from the shrine
Of peace, and bliss, and rest, and love divine.
WILLIAM WOODSON HENDREE
_Robert E. Lee marries Mary Page Custis, great-granddaughter of Martha
Washington, 1831_
July
A SUMMER SHOWER
Meanwhile, unreluctant,
Earth like Danae lies;
Listen! is it fancy,
That beneath us sighs,
As that warm lap receives the largesse of the skies?
Jove, it is, descendeth
In those crystal rills;
And this world-wide tremor
Is a pulse that thrills
To a god's life infused through veins of velvet hills.
Wait, thou jealous sunshine,
Break not on their bliss;
Earth will blush in roses
Many a day for this,
And bend a brighter brow beneath thy burning kiss.
HENRY TIMROD
July First
A SOUTHERN SOLDIER'S TRIBUTE
To the Union commander, General George Gordon Meade, history will accord
the honor of having handled his army at Gettysburg with unquestioned
ability. The record and the results of the battle entitle him to a high
place among Union leaders. To him and to his able subordinates and heroic
men is due the credit of having successfully met and repelled the Army of
Northern Virginia in the meridian of its hope and confidence and power.
GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON
_First day at Gettysburg, 1863_
July Second
General Lee distinctly ordered Longstreet to attack early the morning of
the second day, and if he had done so, two of the largest corps of Meade's
army would not have been in the fight; but Longstreet delayed the attack
until four o'clock in the afternoon, and thus lost his opportunity of
occupying Little Round Top, the key to the position, which he might have
done in the morning without firing a shot or losing a man.
GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON
_Second day at Gettysburg, 1863_
July Third
General Lee ordered Longstreet to attack at daybreak on the morning of the
third day.... He did not attack until two or three o'clock in the
afternoon, the artillery opening at one.... Nothing that occurred at
Gettysburg, nor anything that has been written since of that battle, has
lessened the conviction that, had Lee's orders been promptly and cordially
executed, Meade's centre on the third day would have been penetrated and
the Union Army overwhelmingly defeated.
GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON
_Third day at Gettysburg, 1863_
_Joel Chandler Harris dies, 1908_
July Fourth
General Lee, according to the testimony of Colonel Walter H. Taylor,
Colonel C. S. Venable, and General A. L. Long, who were present when the
order was given, ordered Longstreet to make the attack on the last day,
with the three divisions of his corps, and two divisions of A. P. Hill's
corps, and that instead of doing so he sent fourteen thousand men to
assail Meade's army in his strong position, and heavily intrenched.
GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON
_Lee awaits the attack of Meade at Gettysburg throughout the fourth day,
1863_
_Vicksburg surrenders, 1863_
_Thomas Jefferson dies, 1826_
July Fifth
Opinion, let me alone: I am not thine.
Prim creed, with categoric point, forbear
To feature me my Lord by rule and line.
Thou canst not measure Mistress Nature's hair,
Not one sweet inch: nay, if thy sight is sharp,
Wouldst count the strings upon an angel's harp?
Forbear, forbear.
SIDNEY LANIER
July Sixth
A golden pallor of voluptuous light
Filled the warm Southern night;
The moon, clear orbed, above the sylvan scene
Moved like a stately queen,
So rife with conscious beauty all the while,
What could she do but smile
At her perfect loveliness below,
Glassed in the tranquil flow
Of crystal fountains
And unruffled streams?
PAUL HAMILTON HAYNE
_Paul Hamilton Hayne dies, 1886_
_John Marshall dies, 1835_
July Seventh
Do orioles from verdant Chesapeake,
And crested cardinal,
With linnets from the Severn, come to seek,
Obedient to thy call,
If they can give thee one new music-thought,
Who ev'ry note from ev'ry land hast caught?
E. G. LEE
(_The Mocking Bird_)
July Eighth
Sweet bird! that from yon dancing spray
Dost warble forth thy varied lay,
From early morn to close of day
Melodious changes singing,
Sure thine must be the magic art
That bids my drowsy fancy start,
While from the furrows of my heart,
Hope's fairy flowers are springing.
CHARLES WILLIAM HUBNER
(_The Mocking Bird_)
July Ninth
And to defenders and besiegers it is alike unjust to say, even though it
has been said by the highest authority, that Port Hudson surrendered only
because Vicksburg had fallen. The simple truth is that Port Hudson
surrendered because its hour had come. The garrison was literally
starving. With less than 3000 famished men in line, powerful mines beneath
the salients, and a last assault about to be delivered at 10 places, what
else was left to do?
LIEUT.-COL. RICHARD B. IRWIN, U. S. V.
_Fall of Port Hudson, 1863_
_Defeat of Lew Wallace by Early at the Monocacy, Maryland, 1864_
_Alexander Doniphan, "the Xenophon of America," born 1808_
July Tenth
MAMMY'S FIRST EXPERIENCE AT THE 'PHONE
We heard Mammy say "Hello--H'llo!
(What meks you rattle de handle so?)
Is dat _you_, Miss?--wants Main twenty-free!
(I ain't gwine to have you foolin' wid me!)
I say, Main twenty----what's ailin' you?
'_Bizzy!_' I guess I'se bizzy, too!
You gim-me dat number twenty-free,
I'se bizzier 'n you ever dared ter be!"
MARY JOHNSON BLACKBURN
July Eleventh
The Old World had its Xantippe; but----the facts have not been fully
established in the New!
"Under This Marble Tomb Lies The Body
Of The HON. JOHN CUSTIS, Esq.,
Of The City Of Williamsburg,
And Parish of Bruton,
Formerly Of Hungar's Parish, On The
Eastern Shore
Of Virginia, And County Of Northampton,
Age 71 Years, And Yet Lived But Seven,
Which Was The Space Of Time He Kept
A Bachelor's Home At Arlington,
On The Eastern Shore Of Virginia."
"This Inscription put on His Tomb was by His Own Positive Orders."
July Twelfth
Jackson's genius for war, Lee's resistless magnetism, were not vouchsafed
to Hill; but in those characteristics in which he excelled: invincible
tenacity, absolute unconsciousness of fear, a courage never to submit or
yield, no one has risen above him, not even in the annals of the Army of
Northern Virginia. He was the very "Ironsides" of the South--Cromwell in
some of his essential characteristics coming again in the person and
genius of D. H. Hill.
HENRY E. SHEPHERD
_D. H. Hill born, 1821_
July Thirteenth
Though the Grey were outnumbered, he counted no odd,
But fought like a demon and struck like a god,
Disclaiming defeat on the blood-curdled sod,
As he pledged to the South that he loved.
VIRGINIA FRAZER BOYLE
_N. B. Forrest born, 1821_
July Fourteenth
Pleasant and wonderfully fair,
Like one that knows her own domain,
Magnolia-flowers in her hair,
And orange-blossoms rare,
Let her not knock in vain!
Lift up your equal heads to her,
Of all your courts contain, co-heir,
For lo! she claims her own again!
DANIEL B. LUCAS
(_The South Shall Claim Her Own Again_)
July Fifteenth
FACT OR FICTION?
For four years the Northern States fought to keep their Southern sisters
in the Federal family; then having soundly thrashed these sisters in order
to keep them at home, they suddenly shut the door and kicked them down the
steps! The "erring sisters" are now fully restored to the family circle;
but they had a longer and more painful struggle in the effort to get back
than in the attempt to get away. More briefly, for four years the Federal
government, led by Lincoln, maintained that all of the Southern States
were in the Union and could not get out; and then for five years, under
the rule of the Radicals, it argued that some of these States were out of
the Union and could not get in!
MATTHEW PAGE ANDREWS
_Reconstruction ended and the Union restored by the readmission of
Georgia, 1870_
July Sixteenth
I shall yet live to see it an English nation.
SIR WALTER RALEIGH
_Raleigh's first colony arrives at Roanoke Island, 1584_
July Seventeenth
KIN
A visitor in the Old Chapel Graveyard, in Clarke County, Virginia, asked
the aged negro sexton if he knew the whereabouts of a certain grave,
adding that the deceased was her relative.
"Ole Mis' Anne? Why ob cose I knows whar my ole mistis is! She your
gran'ma! Jus' to think now, if you hadn't spoke we never would have knowed
we was related!"
July Eighteenth
Uncle Remus was quite a fogy in his idea of negro education. One day a
number of negro children, on their way home from school, were impudent to
the old man, and he was giving them an untempered piece of his mind, when
a gentleman apologized for them by saying: "Oh well, they are school
children. You know how they are."
"Dat's what make I say what I duz," said Uncle Remus. "Dey better be at
home pickin' up chips. What a nigger gwineter learn outen books? I kin
take a bar'l stave and fling mo' sense inter a nigger in one minnit dan
all de school houses betwixt dis en de New Nited States en Midgigin. Don't
talk, honey! wid one bar'l stave I kin fairly lif de vail er ignunce."
(Quoted by) HENRY STILES BRADLEY
July Nineteenth
What was my offense? My husband was absent--an exile. He had never been a
politician or in any way engaged in the struggle now going on, his age
preventing. The house was built by my father, a Revolutionary soldier, who
served the whole seven years for your independence.... Was it for this
that you turned me, my young daughter and little son out upon the world
without a shelter? Or was it because my husband was the grandson of the
Revolutionary patriot and "rebel," Richard Henry Lee, and the near kinsman
of the noblest of Christian warriors, the greatest of generals, Robert E.
Lee?... _Your_ name will stand on history's page as the Hunter of weak
women and innocent children; the Hunter to destroy defenseless villages
and refined and beautiful homes--to torture afresh the agonized hearts of
widows; the Hunter of Africa's poor sons and daughters, to lure them on to
ruin and death of soul and body; the Hunter with the relentless heart of a
wild beast, the face of a fiend and the form of a man.
HENRIETTA B. LEE
[Extract from letter to General Hunter, often referred to as the best
example of excoriating rebuke in American literature. Mrs. Lee's home
was burned July 19, 1864]
July Twentieth
The muffled drum's sad roll has beat
The soldier's last tattoo;
No more on life's parade shall meet
The brave and fallen few.
On Fame's eternal camping-ground
Their silent tents are spread,
And Glory guards, with solemn round,
The bivouac of the dead.
THEODORE O'HARA
[It is remarkable that the memorial inscriptions of Federal cemeteries
are taken from stanzas written by a "rebel" soldier-poet. Grand Army
Posts have also made use of "anonymous" lines by Major Wm. M. Pegram,
C. S. A., (quoted May 26th), when decorating Confederate graves. Both
uses are unconscious but eloquent tributes to the genius of Southern
expression.--Editor]
_Burial in Frankfort of Kentuckians killed in the Mexican War, 1847_
July Twenty-First
We thought they slept!--the sons who kept
The names of noble sires,
And slumbered while the darkness crept
Around their vigil fires!
But, aye, the "Golden Horseshoe" knights
Their Old Dominion keep,
Whose foes have found enchanted ground,
But not a knight asleep.
FRANCIS O. TICKNOR
_First Battle of Manassas, 1861_
July Twenty-Second
In the darksome depths of the fathomless mine
My tireless arm doth play,
Where the rocks never saw the sun's decline,
Or the dawn of the glorious day.
* * * * *
I blow the bellows, I forge the steel,
In all the shops of trade;
I hammer the ore and turn the wheel
Where my arms of strength are made;
I manage the furnace, the mill, the mint,
I carry, I spin, I weave,
And all my doings I put in print
On every Saturday eve.
GEORGE W. CUTTER
(_The Song of Steam_)
July Twenty-Third
... The rush, the tumult, and the fear
Of this our modern age
Have only widened out the poet's sphere,
Have given him a broader stage
On which to act his part.
The spiritual world of godlike aspirations,
The kingdom of the sympathetic heart,
The fair domain of high imaginations,
Lie open to the poet as of old.
Wrong still is wrong, and right is right,
* * * * *
And to declare that poetry must go,
Is to do God a wrong.
WILLIAM P. TRENT
(_The Age and the Poet_)
July Twenty-Fourth
Ante-bellum Master: "Julius, you rascal, if this happens again we'll have
to part."
"La, Marse Phil, whar you gwine?"
July Twenty-Fifth
The nights are full of love;
The stars and moon take up the golden tale
Of the sunk sun, and passionate and pale,
Mixing their fires above,
Grow eloquent thereof.
MADISON CAWEIN
July Twenty-Sixth
THE PHILOSOPHY OF MAMMY PHYLLIS
"Hush, Mary Van," commanded Willis; "you can't crow, you've got to
cackle."
"I haven't neether; I can crow just as good as you. Can't I, Mammy
Phyllis?"
"Well," solemnly answered Phyllis, "it soun' mo' ladylike ter hear er hen
cackle dan ter crow, but dem wimmen fokes whut wants ter heah dersefs crow
is got de right ter do it," shaking her head in resignation but
disapproval, "but I allus notice dat de roosters keeps mo' comp'ny wid
hens whut cackles dan dem whut crows. G'long now an' cackle like er nice
lit'le hen."
SARAH JOHNSON COCKE
July Twenty-Seventh
'Tis night! calm, lovely, silent, cloudless night!
Unnumbered stars on Heaven's blue ocean-stream,
Ships of Eternity! shed silver light,
Pure as an infant's or an angel's dream;
And still exhaustless, glorious, ever-bright,
Such as Creation's dawn beheld them beam,
In changeless orbits hold their ceaseless race
For endless ages over boundless space!
RICHARD HENRY WILDE
July Twenty-Eighth
When he first set down he 'peared to keer mighty little 'bout playin', and
wished he hadn't come. He tweedle-leedled a little on the trible, and
twoodle-oodle-oodled some on the base--just foolin' and boxin' the thing's
jaws for bein' in his way. And I says to a man settin' next to me, s'I
"what sort of fool play'n is that?... He thinks he's a doing of it; but he
ain't got no idee, no plan of nuthin'. If he'd play me up a tune of some
kind or other, I'd----"
But my neighbor says, "Heish!" very impatient....
GEORGE W. BAGBY
(_How Rubenstein Played_)
July Twenty-Ninth
... He fetcht up his right wing, he fetcht up his left wing, he fetcht up
his centre, he fetcht up his reserves. He fired by file, he fired by
platoons, by company, by regiments and by brigades. He opened his cannon,
siege guns down thar, Napoleons here, twelve-pounders yonder, big guns,
little guns, middle-size guns, round shot, shell, shrapnel, grape,
canister, mortars, mines and magazines, every livin' battery and bomb
a'goin' at the same time. The house trembled, the lights danced, the walls
shuk, the floor came up, the ceilin' come down, the sky spilt, the ground
rockt--heavens and earth, creation, sweet potatoes, Moses, nine-pences,
glory, ten-penny nails, my Mary Ann, hallelujah, Samson in a 'simmon tree,
Jeroosal'm, Tump Tompson in a tumbler-cart, roodle--oodle--oodle--oodle--
ruddle--uddle--uddle--uddle--raddle--addle--addle--addle--addle--riddle--
iddle--iddle--iddle--reetle--eetle--eetle--eetle--eetle--p-r-r-r-r-r-land!
per lang! per lang! p-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-lang! Bang!... When I come to....
GEORGE W. BAGBY
(_How Rubenstein Played_)
July Thirtieth
Let me also recall the fact that on July 30, 1619, eighteen months before
the Pilgrims set foot on American soil, the vine of liberty had so deeply
taken root in the colony of Virginia that there was assembled in the
church at Jamestown a free representative body (the first on American
soil)--the House of Burgesses--to deliberate for the welfare of the
people.
RANDOLPH H. MCKIM
_First Legislative Assembly in America meets at Jamestown, 1619_
_Battle of the Crater, near Petersburg, 1864_
July Thirty-First
It was probably the most remarkable evidence on record of the
resourcefulness of the Anglo-Saxon race, and its ability and determination
to dominate. Driven to desperation by conditions that threatened to
destroy their civilization, the citizens of the South, through this
organization, turned upon their enemies, overwhelmed them, and became
again masters of their own soil ... and its proper use must be commended
by all good men everywhere, for by it was preserved the purest Anglo-Saxon
civilization of this nation.
CAREY A. FOLK
(_The Ku Klux Klan_)
August
SUMMER
A trembling haze hangs over all the fields--
The panting cattle in the river stand
Seeking the coolness which its wave scarce yields.
It seems a Sabbath thro' the drowsy land:
So hush'd is all beneath the Summer's spell,
I pause and listen for some faint church bell.
The leaves are motionless--the song-bird's mute--
The very air seems somnolent and sick:
The spreading branches with o'er-ripened fruit
Show in the sunshine all their clusters thick,
While now and then a mellow apple falls
With a dull sound within the orchard's walls.
The sky has but one solitary cloud,
Like a dark island in a sea of light;
The parching furrows 'twixt the corn-rows plough'd
Seem fairly dancing in my dazzled sight,
While over yonder road a dusty haze
Grows reddish purple in the sultry blaze.
JAMES BARRON HOPE
August First
The Southampton Insurrection, which occurred in August, 1831, was one of
those untoward incidents which so often marked the history of slavery.
Under the leadership of one Nat Turner, a negro preacher of some
education, who felt that he had been called of God to deliver his race
from bondage, the negroes attacked the whites at night, and before the
assault could be suppressed, fifty-seven whites, principally women and
children, had been killed. This deplorable event assumed an even more
portentous aspect when it was realized that the leader was a slave to whom
the privilege of education had been accorded, and that one of his
lieutenants was a free negro. In addition, there existed a wide-spread
belief among the whites that influences and instigations from without the
State were responsible for the insurrection.
BEVERLY B. MUNFORD
August Second