Transcriber’s Note:

The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.

POPULAR NOVELS

BY

MRS. MARY J. HOLMES.

Tempest and Sunshine.

English Orphans.

Homestead on Hillside.

Lena Rivers.

Meadow Brook.

Dora Deane.

Cousin Maude.

Marian Grey.

Edith Lyle.

Daisy Thornton.

Chateau d’Or.

Darkness and Daylight.

Hugh Worthington.

Cameron Pride.

Rose Mather.

Ethelyn’s Mistake.

Milbank.

Edna Browning.

West Lawn.

Mildred.

Forrest House.

Madeline (New).

Queenie Hetherton (New).

“Mrs. Holmes is a peculiarly pleasant and fascinating writer. Her books are always entertaining, and she has the rare faculty of enlisting the sympathy and affections of her readers, and of holding their attention to her pages with deep and absorbing interest.”

All published uniform with this volume. Price $1.50 each. Sold everywhere, and sent free by mail on receipt of price,

BY

G. W. CARLETON & Co., Publishers,

New York.

ROSE MATHER:
A Tale.

BY

Mrs. MARY J. HOLMES,

AUTHOR OF “TEMPEST AND SUNSHINE,” “LENA RIVERS,” “THE CAMERON PRIDE,” ETC., ETC.

NEW YORK:

Carleton, Publisher, Madison Square.

LONDON: S. LOW, SON & CO.

MDCCCLXXXIII.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1868, by

DANIEL HOLMES,

in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States, for the Northern District of New York.

Trow’s

Printing and Bookbinding Co.,

205–213 East 12th St.,

NEW YORK.

To

THE SOLDIERS LIVING

AND

The Memory of the Soldiers Dead,

THIS STORY OF THE WAR

IS GRATEFULLY INSCRIBED BY

THE AUTHOR.

Brown Cottage, Brockport, N. Y.

April, 1868.

CONTENTS.

ROSE MATHER.

CHAPTER I.
THE WAR MEETING.

The long disputed point as to whether the South was in earnest or not was settled, and through the Northern States the tidings flew that Sumter had fallen and the war had commenced. With the first gun which boomed across the waters of Charleston bay, it was ushered in, and they who had cried, “Peace! peace!” found at last “there was no peace.” Then, and not till then, did the nation rise from its lethargic slumber and shake off the delusion with which it had so long been bound. Political differences were forgotten. Republicans and Democrats struck the friendly hand, pulse beat to pulse, heart throbbed to heart, and the watchword everywhere was, “The Union forever.” Throughout the length and breadth of the land were true, loyal hearts, and as at Rhoderic Dhu’s command the Highlanders sprang to view from every clump of heather on the wild moors of Scotland, so when the war-cry came up from Sumter our own Highlanders arose, a mighty host, responsive to the call; some from New England’s templed hills, with hands inured to toil, and hearts as strong and true as flint; some from the Empire, some the Keystone State, and others from the prairies of the distant West. It mattered not what place had given them birth; it mattered little whether the Green Mountains of Vermont, the granite hills of New Hampshire, or the shadowy forests of Wisconsin had sheltered their childhood’s home; united in one cause they rallied round the Stars and Stripes, and went forth to meet, not a foreign foe, but alas, to raise a brother’s arm against another brother’s arm in that most dreadful of all anarchies, a national civil war.

In the usually quiet village of Rockland the utmost interest was felt, and though there, as elsewhere, were many whose hearts beat as warmly for their Southern friends as when the sun shone on a nation at peace, all felt the necessity of action, and when at last the evening came in which the first war meeting of that place was to be held, a dense and promiscuous crowd wended its way to the old brick church, whose hallowed walls echoed to the sound of fife and drum, strange music for the house of God, but more acceptable, in that dark hour, than songs of praise sung by vain and thoughtless lips. In the centre of the church, the men were mostly congregated, while the seats nearest the door were occupied by the women,—the wives and mothers and sisters who had come with aching hearts to see their brothers, sons and husbands give their signatures to what seemed their sure death warrant. Conspicuous among these was Widow Simms, whose old-fashioned leghorn, with its faded green veil, was visible at all public gatherings, its broad frill of lace shading a pair of sharp grey eyes, and a rather peculiar face. It was very white now, and the thin lips were firmly compressed as the widow tried to look resolute and unconcerned when two of her sons went forward, their faces glowing with youthful enthusiasm, as they heard the President repeat their names, “John Simms,—Eli Simms.” The widow involuntarily said it after him, her mother’s heart whispering within her, “Isaac won’t go. He’s too young. I can’t give Isaac up,” and her eye wandered to where her youngest boy was sitting, twirling his old cloth cap, and occasionally exchanging a word with the young man next to him, William Baker, who, together with his brother, arose, to follow John and Eli Simms.

Scarcely, however, had they risen to their feet, when a woman occupying the same seat with Widow Simms, uttered a cry more like the moaning howl of some wild beast, than like a human sound.

“No, Harry, no, Bill—no, no,” and the bony arms were flung wildly toward the two young men, who, with a dogged, indignant glance at her, fell back among the crowd where they could not be seen, muttering something not very complimentary to “the old woman,” as they called her.

But the old woman did not hear it, and if she had, it would have made no difference. It mattered not to her that they had ever been the veriest pests in the whole village, the planners of every grade of mischief, the robbers of barns and plunderers of orchards,—they were her boys, and she didn’t want them shot, so she continued to moan and cry, muttering incoherently about the rich treading down the poor, and wondering why Judge Warner didn’t send his own white fingered sons, if he thought going to war was so nice.

“I wouldn’t make such a fuss, let what would happen to me,” said the Widow Simms, casting a half contemptuous glance upon the weeping woman, whom she evidently considered far beneath her, and adding, “They had ‘nough-sight better be shot than hung,’ as an aside to the young woman just behind her,—sweet Annie Graham, who was holding fast to her husband’s hand, as if she would thus keep him in spite of the speaker’s eloquent appeals, and the whispers of his companions, who were urging him to join the company forming so rapidly before the altar.

There was a terrible struggle going on in Annie Graham’s breast,—duty to her country and love for her husband waging a mighty conflict, the former telling her that if the right would triumph, somebody’s husband must go, and the wife-heart crying out, “Yes, somebody’s husband must go, I know, but not mine, not George.”

Very tenderly George Graham’s strong arm encircled the girlish form, and when he saw how fast the tears came to the great dreamy eyes of blue, and thought how frail was the wife of little more than a year, he bent down until his chin rested on her pale brown hair, and whispered softly to her,

“Don’t, Annie, darling, you know I will never go unless you think I ought, and give your free consent.”

Had George Graham wished, he could not have chosen a more powerful argument than the words, “Unless you think I ought.”

Annie repeated them to herself again and again, until consciousness of all else around her was forgotten in that one question of duty. She heard no longer the second speaker, whose burning eloquence was stirring up hitherto reluctant young men to place their names beside others already pledged to their country’s cause. Leaning forward so that her forehead rested on the railing in front, she tried to pray, but flesh and strength were weak, and the prayer ended always with the unuttered cry, “I cannot let George go,” while the fingers twined more and more closely around the broad, warm hand, which sought awhile to reassure her, and then was withdrawn from her grasp as George arose and politely offered his seat to a lady who had just arrived, and who, after glancing an instant at his coat, accepted his civility as a matter of course, but withheld the thanks she would have accorded to one whom she considered her equal.

Spreading out her wide skirt of rich blue silk so that it nearly covered poor Annie, she threw her crimson scarf across the railing in front, hitting Widow Simms, and so diverting the attention of Mrs. Baker, that the latter ceased her crying, while the widow turned with an expression half curious, half indignant. Annie, too, attracted by the heavy fringe and softly-blended colors of the scarf, a part of which had fallen upon her lap, as the widow shook it from her shoulder with a jerk, stole a glance at the new comer, in whom she recognized the bride, the beauty, the envied belle of Rockland, Rose Mather, from Boston,—and wife of the wealthy and aristocratic William Mather, who three months before had ended the strife between the Rockland ladies as to what fair hand should spend his gold, and drive his iron greys, by bringing to his elegant mansion a fairy little creature with whose exquisite beauty even the most fastidious could not find fault. Childish in proportions, and perfect in form and feature, she would have been handsome without the aid of the dancing brown eyes, and chestnut curls which shaded her girlish brow. Rose knew she was pretty,—knew she was stylish,—knew she was fascinating,—knew she was just then the rage, and as such could do and say what she pleased. Sweeping back her chestnut hair with her snowy hand, she gave one rapid glance at the sea of heads around her, and then, in a half petulant tone, exclaimed to her companion!

“I don’t believe Will is here. I can’t see him anywhere.”

“Didn’t you know he had enlisted?” asked a young man, who had made his way through the crowd, and joined her.

For an instant the bright color faded from Rose Mather’s cheek, but it quickly returned as she read in Mr. Wentworth’s eye, a contradiction of his words.

“Will enlisted!” she repeated. “Such people as Will don’t go to the war. It’s a very different class, such, for instance, as that one going up to sign. Upon my word, it’s the boy who saws our wood!” and she pointed at the youth, offering himself up that just such people as Rose Mather, radiant in silks and diamonds, and lace, might rest in peace at home, knowing nothing of war, and its attendant horrors, save what came to her through the daily prints.

Widow Simms heard the remark, and with a swelling heart turned toward the boy who sawed Rose Mather’s wood, for she knew who it was, and it did not need the loud whisper of Mrs. Baker to tell her that it was her boy, the youngest of the three, the one she loved the best, the baby, who kept the milk of human kindness from turning quite sour within her breast by his many acts of filial love, and his gentle, caressing ways. How could she give him up, her darling, her idol, the one so like his father, dead ere he was born? Who would comfort her as he had done? Who would give her the good-night kiss, timidly, stealthily, lest the older ones should see and laugh at his girlish weakness? Who would bring his weekly earnings, and empty them slily into her lap? Who would find her place in the prayer book on Sunday, and pound her clothes on Monday, long before it was light? Who would split the nice fine kindlings for the morning fire or bring the cool fresh water in the summer from the farther well, and who, when her head was aching sadly would make the cup of tea she liked so much? Homely offices, many of them, it is true, but they made up the sum of that mother’s happiness, and it is not strange that, for a moment, the iron will gave way, and the poor widow wept over her cruel bereavement, not noisily, as Mrs. Baker had done, but silently, bitterly, her body trembling nervously, and her whole attitude indicative of keen, unaffected anguish.

Rose did not know the relationship existing between the widow and the boy who sawed her wood, but her better nature was touched always at the sight of distress, and for several minutes, she did not speak except to tell Mr. Wentworth how much Brother Tom had paid for the crimson scarf, one end of which he was twirling around his wrist. To Annie it seemed an enormous sum, and a little over-awed with her close proximity to one who could sport so expensive an article of dress, she involuntarily tried to move away, and avoid, if possible, being noticed by the brilliant belle. She might have spared herself the trouble, for Rose was too much absorbed with the group of admirers gathering around her to heed the shrinking figure at her side, and, after a time, as Widow Simms recovered her composure, she resumed her gay badinage, bringing in Will with every other breath, and showing how completely her heart was bound up in her husband, notwithstanding the evident satisfaction with which she received the flattering compliments of the gentlemen who, since her arrival at Rockland, had made it a point to admire and flirt with the little Boston belle, laughing loudly at speeches which, from one less piquant and attractive, would have been pronounced decidedly silly and meaningless.

Rose was not well posted with regard to the object of that meeting. She knew that Sumter or Charleston had been fired upon, she hardly could tell which, for she was far too sleepy when Will read the news to comprehend clearly what it was all about, and she had skipped every word which Brother Tom had written about it in his last letter, the one in which he enclosed five hundred dollars for the silver tea-set she saw in Rochester, and wanted so badly. Rose was an accomplished musician, a tolerable proficient in both French and German, and had skimmed nearly all the higher branches, but like many fashionably educated young ladies, her knowledge of geography comprised a confused medley of cities, towns and villages, scattered promiscuously over the face of the earth, but which was where she could not pretend to tell; and were it not that Brother Tom had spent three winters in Charleston, leaving at last his fair-haired wife sleeping there beneath the Southern sky, she would scarcely have known whether the waters of the Atlantic or of Baffin’s Bay, washed the shore of the Palmetto State. And still Rose was not a fool in the ordinary acceptation of the term. She knew as much or more than half the petted belles of modern society, and could say smart foolish things with so pretty an air of childishness, that even those of her own sex who were at first most prejudiced against her, confessed that she was certainly very captivating, and possessed the art of making everybody like her, even if she hadn’t common sense!

On this occasion she chatted on in her usual style, provoking from George Graham more than one good-humored smile at remarks which evinced so much ignorance of the matter then agitating the entire community.

“Will wouldn’t go to the war, of course,” she said, ‘supposing there were one, which she greatly doubted. Northern men, particularly those of Rockland, were so hateful toward the South. She didn’t believe Boston people were that way at all. At least, Brother Tom was not, and he knew; he had lived in Charleston, and described them as very nice folks. Indeed, she knew they were, herself, for she always met them at Newport, and liked them so much. She didn’t credit one word of what the papers said. She presumed Mr. Anderson provoked them. Tom knew him personally.

“You have another brother besides Tom—won’t he join the army?” asked Mr. Wentworth, a smile curling the corners of his mouth.

Rose sighed involuntarily, for on the subject of that other brother she was a little sore, and the mention of him always gave her pain. He was not like Brother Tom, the eldest, the pride of the Carleton family. He was Jimmie, handsome, rollicking, mischievous Jimmie, to those who loved him best, while to the Boston people, who knew him best, he was “that young scapegrace, Jim Carleton, destined for the gallows, or some other ignominious end,” a prediction which seemed likely to be verified at the time when he nearly broke a comrade’s head for calling him a liar, and so was expelled from college, covered with disgrace. Something of this was known to Mr. Wentworth, and he asked the question he did, just to see what Rose would say. But if he thought she would attempt to conceal anything pertaining to herself, or any one else, for that matter, he was mistaken. Rose was too truthful for anything like duplicity, and she frankly answered:

“We don’t know where Jimmie is. They turned him out of college, and then he ran away. It’s more than a year since we heard from him. He was in Southern Virginia, then. Mother thinks he’s dead, or he would surely write to some of us,” and a tear glittered in Rose’s eyes, as she thought of recreant Jimmie, sleeping elsewhere than in the family vault at beautiful Mt. Auburn. Rose could not, however, be unhappy long over what was a mere speculation, and after a few moments she resumed the subject of her husband’s volunteering.

“She knew he wouldn’t, even if he did vote for Lincoln. She was not one bit concerned, for no man who loved his wife as he ought, would want to go and leave her,” and the little lady stroked her luxuriant curls coquettishly, spreading out still wider her silken robe, which now completely covered the plain shilling calico of poor Annie, whose heart for a moment beat almost to bursting as she asked herself if it were true, that no man who loved his wife as he ought, would want to go and leave her. In a moment, however, she repelled the assertion as false, for George had given too many proofs of his devotion for her to doubt him now, even though he had expressed a desire to join the army. Then she wished she was at home, where she could not hear what Rose Mather said, and she was about proposing to George that they should leave, when Mr. Mather himself appeared, and she concluded to remain. He was a haughty-looking man, very fond of his little wife, on whose shoulder he laid his hand caressingly, as he asked “what she thought of war now?”

“I just think it is horrid!” and Rose’s fat hand stole up to meet her husband’s; “Mr. Wentworth tried to make me think you had volunteered, but I knew better. The idea of your going off with such frights! Why, Will, you can’t begin to guess what a queer-looking set they are. There was our milkman, and the boy who sawed our wood, and canal-drivers, and peddlers, and mechanics, and”——

Rose did not finish the sentence, for something in her husband’s expression stopped her. He had caught the quick uplifting of Annie Graham’s head,—had noted the indignant flashing of her blue eye, the kindling spot on her cheek, and glancing at George, he saw at once how Rose’s thoughtless words must have wounded her. He had seen the disgusted expression of Widow Simms, as she flounced out into the aisle, and knowing that the “boy who sawed his wood,” was her son, he felt sorry that his wife should have been so indiscreet. Still, he could not be angry at the sparkling little creature chatting so like a parrot, but he felt impelled to say:

“You should not judge people by their dress or occupation. The boy who saws our wood has a heart larger than many who make far more pretensions.”

Rose tried to pout at what she knew to have been intended as a reprimand, but in the excitement of the jam as they passed out of the church, she forgot it entirely, only once uttering an impatient ejaculation as some one inadvertently stepped upon her sweeping skirt, and so held her for a moment, producing the sensation which nearly every woman experiences when she feels a sudden backward pull, as if skirt and waist were parting company.

With the hasty exclamation, “Who is stepping on me, I’d like to know?” she turned just in time to hear Annie Graham’s politely-spoken words of apology:

“I beg your pardon, madam; they push me so behind that I could not help it.”

“It isn’t the least bit of matter,” returned Rose, disarmed at once of all resentment, by Annie’s lady-like manner, and the expression of the face, on which traces of tears were still lingering.

“Who is that, Will?” she whispered, as they emerged into the moonlight, and George Graham’s tall form was plainly discernible, together with that of his wife.

Will told her who it was, and Rose rejoined:

“He has volunteered, I ’most know. Poor, isn’t he?”

“Not very rich, most certainly,” was Mr. Mather’s reply.

“Then I guess he’s going to the war,” was Rose’s mental comment, as if poverty were the sole accomplishment necessary for a soldier to possess, a conclusion to which older and wiser heads than hers seemed at one time to have arrived.

Annie Graham heard both question and answer, and with emotions not particularly pleasant she whispered to herself:

“Rose Mather shall see that one man at least will not go, even if he is a mechanic and poor!” and clinging closer to George’s arm, she walked on in silence, thinking bitter thoughts of the little lady, who, delighted with having Will on one side of her, and Mr. Wentworth, his partner, on the other, tripped gaily on, laughing as lightly as if on the country’s horizon there were no dark, threatening cloud, which might yet overshadow her in its gloomy folds, and leave her heart as desolate as that of the Widow Simms, or the wailing mother of Harry and Bill.

CHAPTER II.
ROSE AND ANNIE.

Rose Mather’s home was a beautiful place, containing everything which love could devise, or money purchase, and Rose was very happy there, dancing like a sunbeam through the handsome rooms of which she was the mistress, and singing as gaily as her pet canary in its gilded cage by the door. No shadow of sorrow or care had ever crossed her pathway, and the eighteen summers of her short life had come and gone like so many pleasant memories, bringing with them one successive round of joys, leaving no blight behind, and bearing with them, alas, no thanks for the good bestowed, for Rose was far too thoughtless to think that the Providence which shielded her so tenderly, might have dealt more harshly with her. But the shadow was creeping on apace, and Rose was conscious that the war meeting had awakened within her a new and uncomfortable train of thought. Like many others, she had a habit of believing that nothing very bad could happen to her, and so, let what might occur, she was sure her husband would be spared. Still, in spite of her gaiety, an undefined something haunted her all the way from the church, and even when alone with her husband in her tasteful sitting-room, with the bright gas-light falling cheerily around her, and adding a fresh lustre to the elegant furniture, she could not shake it off, nor guess what it was that ailed her. At last, however, it came to her, suggested by the sight of her husband’s evening paper, and laying her curly head upon his knee, she gave vent to her restlessness in the expression:

“I wish there wouldn’t be any war. What is it all for? Tell me, please.”

It was the first interest she had evinced in the matter. And glad to talk with any one upon the subject which was beginning to occupy so much of his own thoughts, Mr. Mather drew her into his lap, and endeavored, as far as possible, to explain to her what it all was for. Much of what he said, however, was Greek to Rose, who only gained a vague idea that the North was contending for a bit of cloth, such as she had often seen floating over the dome of the old State House in Boston, and with the remark, that men’s lives were far more valuable than all the Stars and Stripes in the world, she fell away to sleep leaving her husband in the midst of an argument not quite clear to himself, for, like his wife, he could not then see exactly what the war was for. Still, inasmuch as there was war, he would not play the coward’s part, nor shrink from the post of duty if his country should need his services. But this Rose did not know, and secure in the belief that whatever might happen, Will would never go, she soon resumed her wonted cheerfulness, and if she said anything of the war, was sure to startle her hearers with some remark quite unworthy of a New England daughter. She did wish they would stop having so many meetings, she said, or if they must have them, she wished they’d get Brother Tom to come and set them right. He had lived in Charleston. He could tell them how kind the people were to Mary, his sick wife, and were it not that ’twas beneath him to lecture, she’d surely write for him to come. Rose Mather was growing unpopular by her foolish speeches, and when at last she was asked to join with other ladies of the town in making articles of clothing for the volunteers, she added the last drop to the brimming bucket, by tossing back her chestnut tresses, and “guessing she shouldn’t blister her hands over that coarse stuff. She couldn’t sew much any way, and as for making bandages and lint, the very idea was sickening. She’d give them fifty cents if they wanted, but she positively couldn’t do more than that, for she must have a new pair of lavender kids. She had worn the old ones three or four times, and Will preached economy every day.”

With a frown of impatience, the matron who had been deputed to ask help from Rose, took the fifty cents, and with feelings anything but complimentary to the silly little lady, went back to the hall where scores of women were busily employed in behalf of the company, some of whom would never return to tell how much good even the homely housewife, with its pins and needles, and thread, had done them when far away where no mother or sister hand could reach them, nor yet how the thought that perhaps a dear one’s fingers had torn the soft linen band, or scraped the tender lint applied to some gaping wound, had helped to ease the pain, and cheer the homesick heart. It was surely a work of mercy in which our noble women were then engaged, and if from the group collected in Rockland Hall, there was much loud murmuring at Rose Mather’s want of sense or heart, it arose not so much from ill-nature, as from astonishment that she could be so callous and indifferent to an object of so much importance.

“Wait till her husband goes, and she won’t mince along so daintily, taking all that pains to show her Balmoral, when it isn’t one bit muddy,” muttered the Widow Simms, pointing out, to those near the window, the lady in question, tripping down the street in quest of lavender kids, perhaps, or more likely, bound for her husband’s office, where, now that everybody worked all day long at the Hall, she spent much of her time, it was so lonely at home, with nobody to call. “I hope he’ll be drafted and have to go, upon my word!” continued the widow, whose heart was very sore with thinking of the three seats at her fireside, so soon to be vacated by her darling boys, Eli, John, and Isaac. “Yes, I do hope he’ll be drafted, don’t you, Mrs. Graham?” and she turned toward Annie, who was rolling up bandages of linen, and weaving in with every coil a prayer that the poor soldier, whose lot it should be to need that band, might return again to the loved ones at home, or else be fitted for that better home, where war is unknown.

Annie shook her head, but made no answer. There was no bitterness now in her heart against Rose Mather. She had prayed that all away, and only hoped the anguish which had come to her, making her brain giddy, and her heart faint, might never be borne by another, if that could be. George had volunteered—was to be second lieutenant, and Annie, oh, who shall tell of the gloom which had fallen so darkly around the cottage she had called hers for one brief year. It was a neat, cozy dwelling, and to Annie it never seemed so cheerful as on that memorable night of the war meeting, when she had lighted the lamp, and sat down with George upon the chintz-covered lounge he had helped her make when first she was a bride. It is true the carpet was not of velvet, like that Rose Mather trod upon; neither was there in all the house one inch of rosewood or of marble, but there was domestic love, pure and deep as any Rose ever experienced, and there was something better far than that, a patient, trusting faith in One who can shed light upon the dreariest home, and make the heaviest trial seem like nought. It was this trusting faith which made Annie Graham the sweet, gentle being she was, shedding its influence over her whole life, and softening down a disposition which otherwise might have been haughty and resentful. Annie was naturally high-spirited and proud, and Rose’s remarks concerning volunteers in general, and George in particular, had stung her to the quick, but with the indignant mood there came another impulse, and ere the cottage had been reached, the bitter feeling had gone, leaving nothing but sorrow that it had ever been there. Like Rose, she wished there would be no war, but wishing was of no avail, and long after George Graham was asleep and dreaming, it may be, of glories won on battle-fields, Annie lay awake, questioning within herself, whether she ought, by word or deed, to prevent her husband’s going, if he felt as he seemed to feel, that it was as much his duty as that of others to join in his country’s defence. Annie was no great reasoner, logically; all her decisions were made to turn upon the simple question of right and wrong, and on this occasion she found it hard to tell, so evenly the balance seemed adjusted. More than once she stole from her pillow, and going out into the fresh night air, knelt in the moonlight, and asked for guidance to choose the right, even though that right should take her husband from her.

“If I knew he would not die, it would not be so hard to give him up,” she murmured, as sickening visions of fields strewn with the dead, and hospitals filled with the dying, came over her, and for an instant her brain reeled with the thought of George dying thus, and leaving her no hope of meeting him again, for George’s faith was not like hers.

Anon, however, something whispered to her that the God she loved was on the field of carnage, and in the camp and in the hospital, and everywhere as much as there in Rockland, that prayers innumerable would follow the brave volunteers, and that the evil she so much feared might be the means of working the great good she so desired. And thus it was that Annie came to a decision. Stealing back to her husband’s side, she bent above him as he lay sleeping, and with a heart which throbbed to its very core, though the lip uttered no sound, she gave him to his country asking, if it could be, that he might come back again, but if it were ordered otherwise—“God’s will be done.” There was no shrinking after that sacrifice was made, though when the morning came, the death-white face and the dark circle beneath the eyes, told of a weary vigil, such as many and many a woman kept both North and South, during the dark hours of the Rebellion. But save the death-white face, and heavy eyes, there was no token of the inner struggle, as with a desperate effort at self-command, Annie wound her arms around her husband’s neck, and whispered to him, “You may go,—I give my free consent,” and George, who cared far more to go than he had dared express, kissed the lips which tried so hard to smile, little dreaming what it cost his brave young wife to tell him what she had. To one of his temperament, there was no danger to be feared for himself. The bullet which might strike down a brother at his side would be turned away from him. Others would, of course, be killed, but he should escape unharmed. In the language of one speaker, whose eloquent appeal had done much to fire his youthful enthusiasm, “He was not going to be shot, but to shoot somebody!”

This was his idea, and ere the clinging arms had unclasped themselves from his neck, his imagination had leaped forward to the future, and in fancy George Graham wore, if not a Colonel’s, at least a Captain’s uniform, and the cottage on the hill, which Annie so much admired, and for the purchase of which a few hundreds were already saved, was his,—bought with the money he would earn. The deed should be drawn in her name, too, he said, and he pictured her to himself coming down the walk to meet him, with the rose-blush on her cheek, just as she looked the first time he ever saw her. Something of this he told her,—and Annie tried to smile, and think it all might be. But her heart that morning was far too heavy to be lightened by a picture of what seemed so improbable. Still, George’s hopeful confidence did much to reassure her, and when, a few days after, she started for the Hall, she purposely took a longer walk for the sake of passing the cottage on the hill, thinking, as she leaned over the low iron fence, how she would arrange the flower-beds more tastefully than they were now arranged, and teach the drooping vines to twine more gracefully around the slender columns supporting the piazza in front. She would have seats, too,—willow-twisted chairs beneath the trees, where she and George could sit at twilight, and watch the shadows creeping across the hollow where the old cottage was, and up the opposite hill, where the cupola of Rose Mather’s home was plainly visible, blazing in the April sunshine. It was a very pleasant castle which Annie built, and for a time the load of pain which, since George volunteered, had lain so heavy at her heart, was gone; but it returned again when, as she passed a turn in the road, her eye wandered down to the hollow, and that other cottage standing there so brown and small, and looking already so desolate, because she knew that ere many days were over, she should wait in vain for the loved footsteps coming down the road,—should miss the pleasant, cheery laugh, the teasing joke and words of love which made the world all sunshine. The cottage on the hill became a worthless thing as poor Annie forced back her tears, and with quickened steps hurried on to join the group of ladies busy at the Hall.

Taking her seat by the window, she commenced the light work imposed on her, that of tearing and winding bandages for those who might be wounded.

“Maybe there’ll never be no fight, but it’s well enough to be prepared,” was the soothing remark of the kind-hearted woman who gave the work to Annie, noting, as she did so, how the lip quivered and the cheek paled at the very idea.

“What if George should need them?” kept suggesting itself to her as she worked industriously on, hoping that if he did, some one of the rolls she was winding might come to him, or better yet, if he could only have the bit of soft linen she had brought herself,—a piece of her own clothing, and bearing on it her maiden name, Annie Howard. He would be sure to know it, she said, it was written so plainly with indelible ink, and it would make him feel so glad. But there might be other Annie Howards, it was not an uncommon name, was suggested next to her, as she tore the linen in strips, and quick as thought, her hand sought the pocket of her dress for the pencil which she knew was there. Glancing around to see that no one observed her, she touched the pencil to her lips and wrote after the name, “It’s your Annie, George. Try to believe I’m there. Rockland, April, 1861.”

There were big tear-drops on that bit of linen, but Annie brushed them away, and went on with her rolling, just as Widow Simms called her attention to Rose Mather, as mentioned several pages back.

Annie could not account for it to herself, but ever since Rose’s arrival at Rockland, she had felt a strange inexplicable interest in the fashionable belle; an interest prompted by something more than mere curiosity, and now that there was an opportunity of seeing her without being herself seen, she straightened up and smoothing the soft braids of her pale brown hair, waited for the entrance of the little lady, who, with her pink hat set jauntily on her chestnut curls, and her rich fur collar buttoned gracefully over her handsome cloth cloak, tripped into the room, doing much by her sunny smile and pleasant manner to disarm the ladies of their recent prejudice against her. She was nothing but a child, they reflected; a spoiled, petted child; she would improve as she grow older, and came more in contact with the sharp corners of the world, so those who had the honor of her acquaintance, received her with the familiar deference, if we may be allowed the expression, which had always marked their manner toward William Mather’s bride. Rose was too much accustomed to society to be at all disconcerted by the hundred pair of eyes turned scrutinizingly toward her. Indeed, she rather enjoyed being looked at, and she tossed the coarse garments about with a pretty playfulness, saying that “since the ladies had called upon her she had thought better of it, and made up her mind to martyr herself one afternoon at least, and benefit the soldiers. To be sure there wasn’t much she could do. She might hold yarn for somebody to wind, she supposed, but she couldn’t knit, and she didn’t want to sew on such ugly, scratchy stuff as those flannel shirts, but if somebody would thread her needle, and fix it all right, she’d try what she could do on a pair of drawers.”

For a time no one seemed inclined to volunteer her services, and Widow Simms’s shears clicked spitefully loud as they cut through the cotton flannel. At last, however, Mrs. Baker, who had more than once officiated as washerwoman at the Mather mansion, came forward and arranged some work for Rose, who, untying the strings of her pink hat, and adjusting her tiny gold thimble, labored on until she had succeeded in sewing up and joining together a long leg with one some inches shorter, which had happened to be lying near. Loud was the shout which a discovery of this mistake called forth, nor was it at all abated when Rose demurely asked if it would not answer for some soldier who should chance to have a limb shot off just below the knee.

“The little simpleton!” muttered the widow, while Mrs. Baker pointed out to the discomfited lady that one division of the drawers was right side out and the other wrong!

There was no alternative save to rip the entire thing, and with glowing cheeks, Rose began the task of undoing what she had done, incidentally letting out, as she worked, that Will might have known better than to send her there,—she shouldn’t have come at all if he had not insisted, telling her people would call her a secessionist unless she did something to benefit the soldiers. She didn’t care what they called her; she knew she was a democrat, or used to be before she was married; but now that Will was a republican, she hardly knew what she was; any way, she was not a secessionist, and she wasn’t particularly interested in the war either; why should she be?—Will was not going, nor Brother Tom, nor any of her friends.

“But somebody’s friends are going,—somebody’s Will, somebody’s Tom; as dear to them as yours are to you,” came in a rebuking tone from a straight-forward, outspoken woman, who knew from sad experience that “somebody’s Tom was going.”

“Yes, I know,” said Rose, a shadow for an instant crossing her bright face, “and it’s dreadful, too. Will says everything will be so much higher, and it will be so dull at Saratoga and Newport next summer, without the Southern people. One might as well stay at home. The war might have been avoided, too, by a little mutual forbearance from both parties, until matters could be amicably adjusted, for Brother Tom said so in his letter last night, and a heap more which I can’t remember.”

Here Rose paused quite exhausted, with the effort she had made to repeat the opinion of Brother Tom. She had read all his last letter, fully indorsing as much of it as she understood, and after a little she went on:

“Wasn’t it horrid, though, their firing into the Massachusetts boys?—and they were from right ’round Boston, too. Tom saw them when they started. They were fine looking men, he says, and Will thinks I ought to be proud that I’m a Bay State girl, and so I am, but it isn’t as if my friends had gone. Tom is a democrat, I know, but it’s quite another kind that join the army.”

Widow Simms could keep silent no longer, and brandishing her polished shears by way of adding emphasis to what she said, she began:

“And s’posin’ ’tis folks as poor as poverty struck, haint they feelin’s, I’d like to know? Haint they got bodies and souls, and mothers, and wives, and sisters? And s’posin’ ’tis democrats,—more shame for t’other side that helped get up the muss. Where be they now, them chaps that wore the big black capes, and did so much toward puttin’ Lincoln in that chair? Why don’t they help to keep him settin’ there, and not stand back with their hands tucked in their trouses’ pockets? Both my boys, Eli and John, voted t’other ticket, and Isaac would, but he wasn’t twenty-one. They’ve all jined, and I won’t say I’m sorry, for if there’s anything I hate, it’s a sneak! It makes me so mad!” and the big shears again clicked savagely, as Widow Simms resumed her work, after having thus delivered her opinion of the black republicans, besides having, in her own words, given “that puckerin Miss Mathers a piece of her mind.”

Obtuse as Rose was on many points, she saw there was some homely truth in what the widow had said, but this did not impress her so much as the fact that she had evidently given offence, and she was about trying to extricate herself from the dilemma when George Graham appeared, ostensibly to bring some trivial message to the President of the Society, but really to see if his wife were there, and speak to her some kind word of encouragement. Rose recognized him as the young man she had seen at the war meeting, and the moment he left the hall, she broke out impetuously,

“Isn’t he handsome?—so tall, so broad-shouldered, and such a splendid mark for a bullet,—I most know he will be shot?”

“Hush-sh!” came warningly from several individuals, but came too late. The mischief was done. Ere Rose could collect her thoughts a group of frightened women had gathered around poor Annie, who had fainted.

“What’s the matter? do tell!” cried Rose, standing on tiptoe and clutching at the dress of Widow Simms, who angrily retorted,

“I should s’pose you’d ask. It’s enough to make the poor critter faint clean away to hear a body talk about her husband’s being a fust rate mark for a bullet!”

With all her thoughtlessness, Rose had the kindest heart in the world; and forcing her way through the crowd, she knelt by the white-faced-Annie, and taking the drooping head in her lap, pushed back the thick braids of hair, noticing, with her quick eye for the beautiful, how soft and luxuriant they were, how pure was the complexion, how perfect were the features, how small and delicate the fingers, and how graceful was the slender neck.

“I’m so sorry! I wish I’d staid at home; I am so sorry,” she kept repeating; and when at last Annie returned to consciousness, Rose Mather’s was the first voice she heard, Rose’s the first face she saw.

With an involuntary shudder she closed her eyes wearily, while Rose anxiously asked of those about her how they should get her home. “Oh, Jake,” she suddenly exclaimed, as, towering above the female heads, she saw her colored coachman looking for her, and remembered that her husband was to call and take her out to ride, “oh, Jake, lift this lady up, careful as you can, and put her in our carriage. Is Will there? Well, no matter, he’ll just have to get out. Stand back, won’t you, and let Jake come,” she continued, authoritatively to the group of ladies who, half-amused and half-surprised at this new phase in Rose Mather’s character, made way for burly Jake, who lifted Annie’s light form as if it had been a feather’s weight, and bore it down the stairs, followed by Rose, who, with one breath, told Annie not to be a bit afraid, for Jake certainly would not drop her, and with the next asked Jake if he were positive and sure he was strong enough not to let her fall.

Lazily reclining upon the cushions of his carriage, William Mather was smoking his Havana, and admiring the sleek coat of his iron greys, when Rose appeared, and seizing him by the arm, peremptorily ordered him to alight, and help Jake lift the lady in.

“I don’t know who ’tis, but it’s somebody I made faint away with my silly talk,” she replied in answer to Mr. Mather’s question, “Who have you there?”

“You made faint away!” he repeated, as he found himself rather unceremoniously landed upon the flagging stones, his Havana rolling at his feet, and his wife preparing to follow Annie, whom Jake had placed inside.

“Yes; I talked about her husband’s being a splendid mark for a bullet, and all that, without ever thinking she was his wife. He looked so tall, and big, and nice, that I couldn’t help thinking his head would come above all the rest in a fight, but I don’t believe it will. There Jake, we are ready now, drive on,” said Rose, while poor Annie groaned afresh at this doubtful consolation.

“Drive whar?” asked Jake. “I dun know whar they lives.”

“To be sure, nor I either,” returned Rose, turning inquiringly to her husband, who gave the information, adding, as he glanced down the street,

“Mr. Graham himself is coming, I see. I think, Rose, you had best give your place to him.”

Rose, who was fond of adventures, wanted sadly to go with Annie, but George, when he came up, seemed so concerned, and asked so many questions, that she deemed it best to leave it for his wife to make the necessary explanations, merely saying, as she stepped upon the walk,

“I am so sorry, Mr. Graham; I really did not mean anything wrong in saying I knew you’d be shot, for you are so——”

“Rose, your dress is rubbing the wheel,” interrupted Mr. Mather, by way of diverting Rose from repeating the act for which she was expressing sorrow.

“No, it ain’t rubbing the wheel, either. It isn’t any where near it,” said Rose, wondering what Will could mean; while George, taking a seat by Annie, smiled at what he saw to be a ruse.

Bent upon reconciliation, Rose pressed up to the carriage, and said to Annie, “You won’t be angry at me always, will you? I shouldn’t have thought of it, only he does look so——”

“Go on, Jake,” Mr. Mather called out, cutting short Rose’s speech, and the next moment Annie was driving down the street in Rose Mather’s carriage, and behind the iron greys, an honor she had never dreamed in store for her when she saw the stylish turnout passing the door of her cottage in the Hollow.

CHAPTER III.
THE DEPARTURE.

The 13th Regiment was ordered to Elmira, and the day had arrived for the departure of the volunteers. Bright was the sun, and cloudless the sky which shone on Rockland, that spring day; but cloudless sky nor warm spring sun could comfort the hearts about to part with their treasures, some forever, and some to meet again, but when, or where, or how, none could tell save Him who holds the secrets of the future.

There were mothers who had never felt a pang so keen or a pain so sore, as when with hearts too full of anguish for the dry, red eyes to weep, they watched their sons pass from the threshold of the door, and knew that when the golden sunlight, falling so brightly around them, was purple in the west, they would look in vain for that returning step, and listen in vain for tones which were the first, perhaps, to stir the deep fountains of maternal love. Fathers, too, were there, with heads bent down to hide the tears they deemed it weak to shed, as they gave the farewell blessing to their boy, praying that God might be over and around him, both when the deafening battle roar was sounding in his ear, and when in the stilly night he wrapped his blanket about him, and laid him down to rest, sometimes with the southern star shining upon him, and sometimes with the southern rain falling on his unsheltered head, for all these vicissitudes must come to a soldier on the field. Wives and sisters, too, there were, who shuddered as they thought how the dear ones to whom they said good-bye, would miss the comforts they were leaving, miss the downy pillow, the soft, warm bed made with loving hands, and the luxuries of home never prized one half so much as now, when they were to be exchanged for a life within the camp. And there were maidens, from whose cheeks the roses faded, as they gave the parting kiss, and promised to be faithful, even though the manly form the lover bore away should come back to them all maimed and crushed and crippled with the toil of war. Far better so than not to come at all. At least so Annie Graham thought, as, winding her arms around her husband’s neck, she whispered to him:

“If the body you bring back has my George’s heart within it, I shall love you just the same as I do now,” and with her fair head lying on his bosom, Annie wept piteously.

Not till then had she realized what it was to let him go. She had become somewhat accustomed to thinking of it,—accustomed to seeing him pass in and out, dressed in his stylish uniform, which made him look so handsome, and then she had hoped the regiment would not be ordered for a long, long time, never perhaps; but now that dream was over; the dreaded hour had come, and for a moment Annie felt herself too weak to meet it. Through the livelong night she had prayed, or if perchance sleep for a moment shut the swollen lids, the lips had moved in prayer that her husband might come back to her again, or failing to do so, that he might grasp, even at the eleventh hour, the Christian’s faith, and so go to the Christian’s home, where they would meet once more. She had given him her little Bible, all pencil-marked and worn with daily usage,—the one she read when first the spirit taught her the meaning of its great mysteries,—and George had promised he would read it every day,—had said that when he went to battle he would place it next his heart, a talisman to shield him from the bullets of the foe. And Annie, smiling through her tears, pointed him again to the only One who could stand between him and death, asking that when he was far away, he would remember what she said, and pray to the God she honored.

“It’s time, now, darling,” he said, at last, as he heard in the distance the beat of the drum.

But the clinging arms refused to leave his neck, and the quivering lips pressed so constantly to his, murmured:

“Wait a little minute more. ’Tis the last, you know.”

Again the drum-beat was heard mingled with the shrill notes of the fife; the soldiers were marching down the street, and he must go, but oh, who can tell of the love, the pain, the grief, the tears mingled with that parting,—or the agony it cost poor Annie to take her arms from off his neck, to feel him putting her away, to hear him going from the room, across the threshold, down the walk, through the gate, and know that he was gone.

As a child in peril instinctively turns to the mother who it knows has never failed to succor, so Annie turned to God, and with a moaning cry for help, sank on her knees just where George had left her. Burying her face in the lounge she prayed that He who heareth even the raven’s cry, would care for her husband, and bring him home again if that could be. So absorbed was she as not to hear the gate’s sharp click, nor the footstep coming up the walk. Impelled by something he could not resist, George had paused just by the garden fence, and yielding to the impulse which said he must see Annie’s face once more, he stole softly to the open door, and stood gazing at her as she knelt, her hands clasped together, and her face hidden from his view, as she prayed for him.

“Will the kind Father keep my George from peril if it can be, but if,—oh, God, how can I say it?—if he must die, teach him the road to Heaven.”

That was what she said, and George, listening to her, felt as if it were an angel’s presence in which he stood. He could not disturb her. She was in safer hands than his, and he would rather leave her thus,—would rather think of her when far away, just as he saw her last, kneeling in her desolation and praying for him.

“It will help to make me a better man,” he said, and brushing aside the great tears swimming in his eyes, he left his angel Annie, and went on his way to battle.

Just off from Rockland’s main street, and in a cottage more humble than that of George Graham, the sun shone on another parting,—on Widow Simms giving up her boys, and straining every nerve to look composed, and keep back the maternal love throbbing so madly at her heart. Rigid as if cut in stone were the lines upon her forehead and around her mouth, as she bustled about, doing everything exactly as it should be done, and coming often to where Isaac sat trying to look unconcerned and whistling “Dixie” as he pulled on the soft, warm pair of socks she had sat up nights to knit him. Eli and John had some too, snugly tucked away in their bundle, but Isaac’s were different. She had ravelled her own lamb’s wool stockings for the material composing his, for Isaac’s feet were tender; there were marks of chilblains on them; they would become sore and swollen from the weary march, and his mother would not be there with soothing lint and ointment made from the blue poke-berries. Great pains had the widow taken with her breakfast that morning, preparing each son’s favorite dish and bringing out the six china cups and damask cloth, part of her grandmother’s bridal dower. It was a very tempting table, and John and Eli tried to eat, exchanging meaning smiles when they saw their mother put in Isaac’s cup the biggest lump of sugar, and the largest share of cream. They did not care,—for they too loved the fair-haired, smooth-faced boy sipping the yellow coffee he could not drink for the mysterious bunches rising so fast in his throat. The breakfast was over now. Isaac was trying on his socks, while Eli and John, knowing their mother would rather be alone when she said good-bye to her baby, prepared to start, talking quite loud, and keeping up stout courage till the last moment came, when both the tall, six-foot young men put their arms around the widow’s neck, and faltered a faint “Good-bye, mother, good-bye.”

There were no tears in the mother’s eyes, nor in the sons’, but in the breast of each there was a whirlpool of raging waters, hurting far more than if they had been suffered to overflow in torrents. Eli was the first to go, for John lingered a moment. There was something he would say, something which made him blush and stammer.

“Mother,” he began, “I saw Susan last night. We went to Squire Harding’s together; and,—and,—well, ’taint no use opposing it now,—Susan and I are one; and if I shouldn’t come back, be good to her, for my sake. Susan’s a nice girl, mother,” and on the brown, bearded cheek, there was a tear, wrung out by thoughts of only last night’s bride, Susan Ruggles, whose family the widow did not like, and had set herself against.

There was no help now, and a sudden start was all the widow’s answer. She was not angry, John knew; and satisfied with this, he joined his brother in the yard, where he was cutting his name upon the beech tree. Thrice the widow called them back, failing each time to remember what she wanted to say. “It was something, sure,” and the hard hands worked nervously, twisting up the gingham apron into a roll, smoothing it out again and working at the strings, until Eli and John passed from the yard, and left her standing there, watching them as they walked down the road. They were a grand-looking couple, she thought, as she saw how well they kept step. They were to march together to the depot, she knew, and nobody in town could turn out a finer span, but who would go with Isaac?—“Stub,” his brothers called him. She hoped it might be Judge Warner’s son,—it would be such an honor; and that brought her back to the fact that Isaac was waiting for her inside; that the hardest part of all was yet to come, the bidding him good-bye. He was not in the chair where she had left him sitting, but was standing by the window, and raising often to his eyes his cotton handkerchief. He heard his mother come in, and turning toward her, said, with a sobbing laugh:

“I wish the plaguy thing was over.”

She thought he meant the war, and answered that “it would be in a few months, perhaps.”

“I don’t mean that, I mean the telling you good-bye. Mother, oh, mother!” and the warm-hearted boy clasped his mother to his bosom, crying like a child; “if I’ve ever been mean to you,” he said, his voice choked with tears—“if I’ve ever been mean to you, or done a hateful thing you’ll forget it when I’m gone? I never meant to be bad and the time I made that face, and called you an old fool, when I was a little boy, you don’t know how sorry I felt, nor how long I cried in the trundle-bed after you were asleep. You’ll forget it, won’t you, when I am gone, never to come back, maybe? Will you, mother, say?”

Would she? Could she remember aught against her youngest born, save that he had ever been to her the best, the dearest, most obedient child in the world? No, she could not, and so she told him, caressing his light brown hair and showering upon it the kisses which the compressed lips could no longer restrain. The fountain of love was broken, and the widow’s tears dropped like rain on the upturned face of her boy.

Suddenly there came to their ears the same drum-beat which had sounded so like a funeral knell to Annie Graham. Isaac must go, but not till one act more was done.

“Mother,” he whispered, half hesitatingly, “it will make me a better soldier if you say the Lord’s Prayer with me just as you used to do, with your hand upon my head. I’ll kneel down, if you like,” and the boy of eighteen, wearing a soldier’s dress, did kneel down, nor felt shame as the shaky hand rested once more on his bowed head, while his mother said with him the prayer learned years ago, kneeling as he knelt now.

Surely to the angels looking on there was charge given concerning that young boy,—charge to see that no murderous bullet came near him, even though they should fall round him thick and fast as summer hail. It would seem that some such thought as this intruded itself Upon the Widow Simms, for where the swelling pain had been there came a gentle peace. God would care for Isaac. He would send him home in safety, and so the bitterness of that parting was more than half taken away.

Again the drum beat just as Annie heard it. Another pressure of the hand, another burning kiss, another “good-bye, mother, don’t fret too much about us,” and then the last of the widow’s boys was gone.

Turn we now to the shanty-like building down by the mill, where the mother of Harry and Bill rocked to and fro upon the unmade bed, and rent the air with her dismal howls, hoping thus to win at least one tender word from the two youths, voraciously devouring the breakfast she, like Widow Simms, had been at so much pains to prepare, watching even through her tears to see “if they wan’t going to leave her one atom of the steak she had spent her yesterday’s earnings to buy.”

No they didn’t. Harry took the last piece, growling angrily at Bill, who, kinder hearted than his brother, suggested that “Hal shouldn’t be a pig, but leave something for the old woman.”

“Leave it yourself,” was Harry’s gruff response, and turning to his mother, he told her “not to make a fool of herself, when she knew she was glad to be rid of them. At any rate, if she were not, the whole village were;” adding, by way of consolation, that “he should probably end his days in State Prison if he staid at home, and he had better be shot in a fair fight, as there was some credit in that.”

Around Harry Baker’s childhood there clustered no remembrance of prayers said at the mother’s knee, or of Bible stories told in the dusky twilight, and though reared in New England, within sight of the church spire, he had rarely been inside the house of God, and this it was which made the difference between that scene and the one transpiring in the house of Widow Simms. All the animal passions in Harry Baker’s case were brought to full perfection, unsubdued by any softer influence, and rising from the table, after having filled his stomach almost to bursting, he swaggered across the room, and opening his bundle began to comment upon the different articles, he having been too drunk to notice them when given to him on the previous night.

“What in thunder is this for?” he exclaimed, holding up the calico housewife, and letting buttons, scissors and thread drop upon the floor. “Plaguy pretty implements of war, these!” and he began to enumerate the articles. “Fine tooth comb, black as the ace of spades. Good enough idea that; hain’t used one since I can remember;” and he passed it through his shaggy hair, whose appearance fully verified the truth of his assertion. “Half a paper of pins. Why didn’t the stingy critters give us more? An old brass thimble, too. Here, mother, I’ll give you that to remember me by,” and he tossed it into her lap. The drawers then took his attention; the identical pair Rose Mather made, and though they were better than any he had ever worn, he laughed at them derisively. Trying them on he succeeded in making quite a long rip in one of the seams, for Rose’s stitches were none the shortest. Then, with a flourish, he kicked them off, uttering an oath as he felt a sharp scratch from the needle which Rose had broken, and failed to extricate. The woolen shirt came next, but any remarks he might have made upon that, were prevented by his catching sight of the little brown book which lay at the bottom of the bundle.

“Hurrah, Bill, if here ain’t a Testament, with ‘Harry Baker’ inside. Rich, by George! Wonder if they s’posed I’d read it. Let us see what it says. ‘Come unto me all ye that labor.’ Mother, that means you, scrubbin’ and workin’, you know. Keep the pesky thing. I enlisted to lick the Southerners, not to sing himes and psalms!” and he threw the sacred book across the floor, just as the first drum-beat sounded. “That’s the signal,” he exclaimed, and hastily rolling up the shirt and drawers, he started for the door, carelessly saying, “Come Bill take your Testament and come along. Good-bye, old lady. You needn’t wear black if I’m killed. ’Twon’t pay, I guess.”

“Oh, Harry, Harry, wait. Wait, Billy boy, do wait. Give your old marm one kiss,” and the poor woman tottered toward Harry, who savagely repulsed her, saying “he wan’t going to have her slobberin’ over him.”

“You, Billy, then, you’ll let me kiss you, won’t you?” and she turned toward Bill, who hesitated a moment, for Harry was in the way.

Bill was afraid of Harry’s jeers, and so he, too, refused, while the wailing cry rose louder.

“Oh, Billy, do just once, and I’ve been so good to you! Just once, do, Billy.”

“Shan’t do it,” was Bill’s reply, as he followed Harry, who, as a farewell parting had hurled a stone at a cow across the street, set the dog on his mother’s kitten, stepped on the old cat’s tail, and then left the yard, slamming after him the rickety gate his mother had tried in vain to have him fix before he went.

Billy, however, waited. There was something more human in his nature than in his brother’s. He had not thrown his Testament away, and the sight of it in his bundle had touched a tender chord, making him half resolve to read it. Watching his brother till he was out of sight, he went back to where his mother sat, moaning dolefully,

“Oh that I should raise sich boys!—that I should raise sich boys!”

“Mother,” he said, and Mrs. Baker’s heart fairly leaped at the sound, for there was genuine sympathy in the tone. “Mother, now that Hal has gone, I don’t mind kissin’ you, or lettin’ you kiss me, if you want to.”

The doleful moan was a perfect scream as the shrivelled arms clasped Bill, while the joyful mother kissed the rough but not ill-humored face.

“There, now, don’t screech so like an owl,” he said, releasing himself from her, and adding, as he glanced at a huge silver watch, won by gambling, “Maybe seein’ I’ve a few minutes to spare, I’ll drive a nail or so into that confounded gate, and I dun know, but while I’m about it, I’ll split you an armful of wood. I had or’to have cut up the hull on’t I s’pose, but when Hal is ’round I can’t do nothin’.”

It was strange how many little things Bill did do in these few minutes he had to spare—things which added greatly to his mother’s comfort, and saved her several shillings, beside making a soft warm spot in a heart which knew not many such. Glancing at the tall clock brought from New England, when Mrs. Baker first moved to Rockland, Bill remarked:

“The darned thing has stopped agin. I or’to have iled it, I s’pose. It would kind of been company for you, hearin’ it tick. I vum, if I hain’t a mind to give you this old turnep,” and again he drew out the silver watch. “You’ll lay abed all day without no time. Like enough I’ll nab one from some tarnal rebel,—who knows?” and with his favorite expression, “Nuff said,” Bill laid the watch upon the table, his mother moaning all the while,

“Billy boy, Billy boy, I never sot so much store by you before. How can I let you go? Stay, Billy, do, or else run away the first chance you git. Will you, Billy boy?”

“Not by a jug full!” was the emphatic response. “I ain’t none of that kind. I’ll be shot like a dog before I’ll run. The Baker name shall never be disgraced by my desertin’. It’s more like Hal to do that; but don’t howl so. I’m kinder puttin’ on the tender, you know, ‘cause I’m goin’ away. I should be ugly as ever if I’s to stay to hum. So stop your snivelin’,” and having driven the last nail into a broken chair, Bill gathered up his bundle, and with the single remark, “Nuff said,” darted through the open door, and was off ere his mother fairly comprehended it.

There was a great crowd out that morning to see the company off. Fathers, mothers, wives, and sisters,—those who had friends in the company and those who had none. The Mather carriage was there, and from its window Rose’s childish face looked out, now irradiated with smiles as its owner bowed to some acquaintance, and again shadowed with sympathy as the cries of some bereaved one were heard amid the throng.

Widow Simms, too, was there, drawn thither by a desire to see if Isaac did march with Charlie Warner, as she hoped he would, notwithstanding that he had told her he was probably too short. She didn’t believe that,—he was taller than he looked, and inasmuch as Charlie was the most aristocratic of the company, she did hope Isaac would go with him. So there she stood waiting, not far from Mrs. Baker, who had dried her eyes, and come for a last look at her boys.

Onward the soldiers came, slowly, steadily onward, the regular tread of their feet and the measured beat of the drum making solemn music as they came, and sending a chill to many a heart; for ’twas no gala day, no Fourth of July, no old-fashioned general training, they were there to celebrate. Every drum-beat was a note of war, and they who kept time to it were going forth to battle. Onward, onward still they came, George Graham’s splendid figure towering above the rest, and eliciting more than one flattering compliment from the lookers on.

There were John and Eli, side by side,—John eagerly scanning the female forms which lined the walk for a sight of last night’s bride, and Eli looking for his mother, if perchance she should be there. She was there, and what to John was better yet, she stood with her hand on Susan’s shoulder, showing that thus early she was trying to mother her.

“That’s him,—that’s John,” and Susan’s voice faltered as she pointed him out to the widow, whose heart gave one great spasm of pain as she saw him, and then grew suddenly still with wrath and indignation; for alas, her Isaac, who was to have gone with Charlie Warner, son of Rockland’s Judge, was marching with William Baker,—Bill,—who had been to the workhouse twice, to say nothing of the times he had stolen her rare-ripes and early melons! She had not looked for anything like this, and could scarcely believe her senses. Yet there they were, right before her eyes, Isaac and Bill, the former hoping his mother would not see him, and the latter trying not to see his mother, who was quite as much delighted to see him with Isaac Simms as the widow would have been had Isaac been with Charlie Warner, just in front.

Mrs. Baker had followed her sons to the hall, had heard the reasons for the captain’s decision, and she called out in a loud, exultant tone,

“Miss Simms! Miss Simms do you see your Ike with Billy? Cap’n Johnson would have put him with Charlie Warner if he hadn’t fell short two inches. Look kinder nice together, don’t they? only Ike stoops a trifle, ’pears to me.”

It didn’t “’pear” so to Widow Simms, but then her eyes wore blurred so that she could not see distinctly, for, strange to say, the sharpest pang of all was the knowing that Isaac, so pure, so gentle, so girl-like, must be a companion for reckless, swearing, gambling Bill, and for a time she could not quite forgive her youngest born that he had not been just two inches taller. Blind, ignorant Widow Simms, the hour will come when, on her bended knees, she’ll thank the over-ruling hand which kept her boy from growing just two inches taller!

Onward, still onward they moved, until they turned the corner and paused before the depot.

A little apart from the rest George Graham stood, wishing that the cars would come, and building airy-castles of what would be when he returned, covered with laurels, as he was sure to do if only opportunities were offered. He would distinguish himself, he thought, with many a brave deed, so that the papers would talk of him as a gallant hero, and when he came back to Rockland, the people would come out to meet him, a denser crowd than was assembled now. Their faces would not then be so sad, for they would come to do him honor, and in fancy he heard the stirring notes of the martial music, and saw the smile of joy steal over the weather-beaten features of the leader of the band, the man with the jammed white hat, as he fifed that welcome home. There would be carriages there, too, more than now, and maybe there would be a carriage expressly for him, and the dreamer saw the long procession moving down the street,—saw the little boys on the walk, the women at the doors, and heard the peal of the village bells. It would be grand, he thought, if he could have a crown just as the Roman victors used to do,—it would please Annie so much to see him thus triumphant. She would not come up to the depot, he knew. She would rather be alone when she met him, while he, too, would prefer that all those people should not be looking on when he kissed his little wife. Just then the train appeared, and the confusion became greater as the crowd drew nearer together, and the man with the jammed white hat who was to fife George’s welcome home, redoubled his exertions, and tried his best to drown his own emotions in the harsh sounds he made. But above the fife’s shrill scream, above the bass drum’s beat, and above the engine’s hiss, was heard the sound of wailing, as one by one the Rockland volunteers stepped aboard the train.

Bill was the last to go, for as a parting act he had fired the old cannon, which almost from time immemorial had heralded to Rockland’s sleeping citizens that twelve o’clock had struck and it was Independence day. Some said it was no good omen that the worn-out gun burst in twain from the heavy charge with which Bill had seen fit to load it, but Bill cared not for omens, and with three cheers and a tiger for Uncle Sam, he jumped upon the platform just as the final all aboard was shouted.

There was a ringing of the bell, a sudden puffing of the engine, a straining of machinery, a sweeping backward of the wreaths of smoke, and then, where so lately one hundred soldiers had been, there was nothing left save an open space of frozen ground and iron rails, as cold and as empty as the hearts of those who watched until the last curling ring of vapor died amid the eastern woods, and then went sadly back to the homes left so desolate.

CHAPTER IV.
WILL AND BROTHER TOM.

“A letter from brother Tom,—I am so glad. It’s an age since he wrote, and I’ve been dying to hear from home. Dear old Tom!” and dropping parasol in one place, gloves in another, and shawl in another, Rose Mather, who had just come in from shopping, seized the letter her husband handed her, and seating herself upon an ottoman near the window, began to read without observing that it was dated at Washington instead of Boston, as usual.

Gradually, however, there came a shadow over her face, and her husband saw the tears gathering slowly in her eyes, and dropping upon the letter she had been “dying to get.”

“What is it, Rose?” Mr. Mather asked, as a sob met his ear.

“Oh, Will,” and Rose cried outright, “I didn’t believe Tom would do that! I thought people like him never went to the war. I ’most know he’ll be killed. Oh, dear, dear. What shall I do?” and Rose hid her face in the lap of her husband, who fondly caressed her chestnut hair as he replied,

“You’ll bear it like a brave New England woman. We need just such men as your brother Tom, and I never respected him one half so much as now that he has shown how truly noble he is. He was greatly opposed to Lincoln, you know, and worked hard to defeat him; but now that our country is in danger, he, like a true patriot, has thrown aside all political feeling and gone to the rescue. I honor him for it, and may success attend him.”

“Yes,” interrupted Rose, as a new idea struck her, “but what will his Southern friends think of him? and he has got a heap of them. There are the Birneys and Franklins from New Orleans, the Richardsons in Mobile, and those nice people in Charleston,—what will they say when they hear he has taken up arms against them? and he always used to quarrel so with those stiff Abolitionists in Boston, when they said the Southerners had no right to their slaves. Tom insisted they had, and that the North was meddling with what was none of its business, and now he’s turned abolitionist, and joined too,—dear, dear.”

Mr. Mather smiled at Rose’s reasoning, and after a moment, replied, “I have no idea that Tom has changed his mind in the least with regard to the negroes, or that he loves his Southern friends one whit the less than when defending them from abuse. Negroes and Southern proclivities have nothing to do with it. A blow has been struck at the very heart of our Union, and Tom feels it his duty to resent it. It’s just like this: suppose you, in a pet, were trying to scratch your mother’s eyes out, and Tom should try to prevent it. Would you think him false to you, because he took the part of his mother? Would you not rather respect him far more than if he stood quietly by and saw you fight it out?”

“It is not very likely I should try to scratch out mother’s eyes,” said Rose, half laughing at her husband’s odd comparison, and adding, after a moment, “I don’t see how folks can fight and love each other too.”

Mr. Mather didn’t quite see it either, and without directly replying to Rose, he asked, by way of diverting her mind from the subject of her brother’s volunteering, if she noticed what Tom said about the Rockland Company in general, and George Graham and Isaac Simms in particular?

This reminded Rose of Annie, who had been ill most of the time since her husband’s departure.

“I meant to have called on Mrs. Graham right away,” she said. “The poor creature has been so sick, they say, but would not let them send for George, because it was his duty to stay where he was. I’d like to see duty or anything else make me willing to part with you. I don’t believe Mrs. Graham loves her husband as I do you, or she would never consent to be left alone,” and Rose nestled closer to her husband, who could not find courage to tell her what he meant to do when he handed her Tom’s letter. It would be too much for her to bear at once, he thought, as he saw how greatly she was pained because her brother had joined the army, and was even then in Washington.

To Rose it was some consolation that Tom was captain of his company, and that his soldiers were taken from the finest families in Boston. This was far better than if he had gone as a private, which of course he would not do. He was too proud for that, and she could never have forgiven him the disgrace. Still, viewed in any light, it was very sad, for Tom had been to Rose more like a father than a brother. He was the pride, the head of the Carleton family, upon whom herself and mother had leaned, the one since the day of her widowhood, and the other since she could remember. He it was who had petted and caressed, and spoilt her up to the very hour when, at the altar, he had given her away to Will. He it was, too, who had been the arbiter of all the childish differences which had arisen between herself and Jimmie, teasing, naughty Jimmie, wandering now no one knew where, if indeed he were alive. And at the thought of Jimmie, with his saucy eyes and handsome face, her tears flowed afresh. What if he were living and should join the army, like Tom? It would be more than she could bear, and for a long time after her husband left her, Rose sat weeping over the picture she drew of both her brothers slain on some bloody battle-field. The shadow of war was beginning to enfold her, and brought with it a new and strange sympathy for those who, like herself, had brothers in the army.

Again remembering Annie Graham, she sprang up, exclaiming to herself,

“I’ll go this very afternoon. She’ll be so glad to know what Tom thinks of George!” and ere long Rose was picking her way daintily through the narrow street which led to the cottage in the Hollow. It was superior to most of the dwellings upon that street, and Rose was struck at once with the air of neatness and thrift apparent in everything around it, from the nicely painted fence to the little garden with its plats of flowers just budding into beauty.

“They have seen better days, I am sure, or else Mrs. Graham’s social position was above her husband’s,” was Rose’s mental comment, as she lifted the gate latch and passed up the narrow walk, catching a glimpse, through the open window, of a sweet, pale face, and of a thick stout figure, flying through the opposite door, as if anxious to avoid being seen.

Poor Annie had been very sick, and more than once the physician who attended her had suggested sending for her husband, but Annie, though missing him sadly, and longing for him more than any one could guess, always opposed it, begging of Widow Simms, who of her own accord went to nurse her, not to write anything which would alarm him in the least. So George, ever hopeful, ever looking on the sunny side, thought of his blue-eyed wife as a little bit sick, and nervous it might be, but not dangerous at all, and wrote to her kind, loving, cheering letters, which did much to keep her courage from dying within her. Annie was better now,—was just in that state of convalescence when she found it very hard to lie all day long, watching Widow Simms as she bustled out and in, setting the chairs in a row with their six backs square against the wall, and their six fronts opposite the table, stand and bureau, also in a row. She was just wishing some one would come, when the swinging of the gate and the widow’s exclamation, “Oh, the land, if that stuck up thing ain’t comin’,” announced the approach of Rose Mather.

“I’ll make myself missin’, for mercy knows I don’t wan’t to hear none of your secession stuff. It fairly makes my blood bile!” was the widow’s next comment; and gathering up her knitting she hurried into the kitchen, leaving Annie to receive her visitor alone.

Not waiting for her knock to be answered, Rose entered at the open door, and advanced at once into the room where Annie was, her fair hair pushed back from her forehead, her blue eyes unusually brilliant, and her face scarcely less white than the pillow on which it lay.

Rose had an eye for the beautiful, and after the first words of greeting were over, she broke out in her impulsive way—

“Why, Mrs. Graham, how handsome you are looking! just like the apple blossoms. I wish your husband could see you now. I’m sure he wouldn’t stay there another hour. I think it’s cruel in him, don’t you?”

The tears came at once to Annie’s eyes, and her voice was very low as she replied:

“George does not know how sick I have been, neither do I wish to have him. It would only make his burden heavier to bear, and I try to care more for his comfort than my own.”

This was a phase of unselfishness wholly new to Rose, and for an instant she was silent, then remembering Tom’s letter, she seated herself upon the foot of the bed, and throwing aside her bonnet, took the letter from her pocket, telling Annie as she did so that she, too, was now interested in the war, and in every one whose friends had gone.

“I never knew how it felt before,” she said; “and I’ve made a heap of silly speeches, I know. Don’t you remember that time in the Hall, when I talked about your husband being shot? I am sorry, but I do think he’s more likely to be picked off than Tom, who is not nearly as tall. You are faint, ain’t you?” she added, as she saw how deathly pale Annie grew, while the drops of perspiration stood thickly about her lips.

“Simpleton, simpleton!” muttered Widow Simms, listening through the keyhole in the kitchen, while Annie whispered:

“Please don’t talk that way, Mrs. Mather. I know George is very tall, but unless God wills it otherwise, the bullets will pass by him as well as others.”

Rose saw she had done mischief again, by her thoughtless way of speaking, and eager to repair the wrong, she bent over Annie and said:

“I am sorry. I’m always doing something foolish. You are faint; shan’t I tell the servant to bring you some water? She’s in the kitchen, I suppose,” and ere Annie could explain, Rose had darted into the neat little kitchen where Widow Simms was stooping over the stove and kindling a fire, with which to make the evening tea.

“Girl, girl, Mrs. Graham wants some water. Hurry and bring it quick, will you?”

Rose called out a little peremptorily, for there was something rather suggestive of defiance in the square, straight back which never moved a particle in answer to the command.

“Deaf or hateful,” was Rose’s mental comment, and as it might possibly be the former, she wished she knew the girl’s name, as that would be more apt to attract her. “Most every Irish girl is Bridget,” she thought to herself, “and I guess this one is. Any way she acts like the girl that used to order mother out doors, so I’ll venture upon that name.”

“Bridget, Bridget!” and this time the voice was decidedly authoritative in its tone, but what more Rose might have added was cut short by the widow, who dropped the griddle with a bang, and turning sharply round, replied:

“There’s no Bridget here, and if it’s me you mean, I am Mrs. Joseph Simms!”

Rose had good reason for remembering Mrs. Simms, and coloring crimson, she tried to apologize:

“I beg your pardon; I did not see your face. I supposed everybody kept a girl; and your back looked like——”

“Don’t make the matter any worse,” interrupted the widow, smiling in spite of herself at Rose’s attempt to excuse her blunder. “You thought from my dress that I was a hired girl, and so I was in my younger days, and I don’t feel none the wus for it neither. Miss Graham’s faint, is she? She’s had time to get over it, I think. Here’s the water,” and filling a gourd shell she handed it to Rose, who, in her admiration of the (to her) novel drinking cup, came near forgetting Annie.

But Annie did not care, for the rencounter between the widow and Rose had done her quite as much good as the water could, and Rose found her laughing the first really hearty laugh she had enjoyed since George went away.

“It’s just like me,” Rose said, as she resumed her seat by Annie, listening intently while she told how kind the Widow Simms had been, coming every day to stay with her, and only leaving her at night because Annie insisted that she should.

“I like Mrs. Simms!” was Rose’s vehement exclamation, “and I am glad Tom said what he did about Isaac, who used to saw our wood. I did not tell you, did I? And there’s something real nice about your husband, too. I mean to call her in while I read it,” and Rose ran out to the wood-shed, where the widow was now splitting a pine board for kindling, the newspaper she at first had used, having burned entirely out.

Rose’s manner and voice were very conciliatory as she said:

“Please, Mrs. Simms, come in and listen while I read what brother Tom has written about Mr. Graham and your Isaac,—something perfectly splendid. Tom has volunteered and gone to Washington, you know.”

It was strange how those few words changed the widow’s opinion of Rose. The fact that Thomas Carleton, whom the Rockland people fancied was a Secessionist, had joined the Federal army, did much toward effecting this change, but not so much as the fact that he had actually noticed her boy, and spoken of him in a letter.

“Miss Mather ain’t so bad after all,” she thought, and striking her axe into the log, she followed Rose to the sitting-room, listening eagerly while she read the few sentences pertaining to George and Isaac. They were as follows:

“By the way, Will, I find there’s a company here from Rockland. Fine appearing fellows, too, most of them are, and under good discipline. I am especially pleased with the second lieutenant. He’s a magnificent looking man, and attracts attention wherever he goes.”

“That’s George, you know,” and Rose, quite as much pleased as Annie herself, nodded toward the latter, whose pale cheek flushed with pride at hearing her husband thus spoken of by Rose Mather’s brother.

“Yes, but Isaac,” interrupted the widow. “Whereabouts does he come in?”

“Oh, pretty soon I’ll get to him. There’s more about George yet,” answered Rose, as she resumed her reading.

“I had the pleasure of talking with him yesterday, and found him very intelligent and sensible. If we had more men like him, success would be sure and speedy. He has about him a great deal of fun and humor, which go far toward keeping up the spirits of his company, and some of the poor fellows need it sadly. There’s a young boy in the ranks, Isaac Simms, who interests me greatly.”

“Oh-h!” and the widow drew a long sigh as Rose continued:

“I wonder he was ever suffered to come, he seems so young, so girl-like and so gentle. Still he does a great deal of good, Lieut. Graham tells me, by visiting the sick and sharing with them any delicacy he happens to have. He’s rather homesick, I imagine, for when I asked him if he had a mother, his chin quivered in a moment, and I saw the tears standing in his eyes. Poor boy, I can’t account for the interest I feel in him. Heaven grant that if we come to open fight he may not fall a victim.”

“Yes, yes, my boy, my darling boy,” and burying her face in her hard hands, the widow sobbed aloud. “I thank you, Miss Mather, for reading me that,” she said, “and I thank your brother for writing it. Tell him so will you. Tell him I’m nothing but a cross, sour-grained, snappish old woman, but I have a mother’s heart, and I bless him for speaking so kindly of my boy.”

Rose’s tears fell fast as she folded up the letter, and Annie’s kept company with them. There was a bond of sympathy now between the three, as they talked together of the soldiers, Mrs. Simms and Annie devising various methods by which they might be benefited, and Rose wishing she, too, could do something for them.

“But I can’t,” she said, despairingly. “I never did anybody any real good in all my life,—only bothered them,” and Rose sighed as she thought how useless and aimless was her present mode of life.

“You’ll learn by and by,” said the widow, in a tone unusually soft for her; then, as if the sock she held in her lap had suggested the idea, she continued, “Can you knit?”

Rose shook her head.

“Nor your mother, neither?”

Again Rose shook her head, feeling quite ashamed that she should lack this accomplishment.

“Well,” the widow went on, “’taint much use to learn now. ’Twould take a year to git one stocking done, but if when winter comes, that brother of yours wants socks and mittens, or the like of that, tell him I’ll knit ’em for him.”

“Oh, you are so kind!” cried Rose, thinking to herself how she’d send Widow Simms some pineapple preserves, such as she had with dessert that day.

They grew to liking each other very fast after this, and Rose staid until the little round table was arranged for tea and rolled to Annie’s bedside. There was no plate for Rose, the widow having deemed it preposterous that she should stay, but the table looked so cosy, with its tiny black teapot, and its nicely buttered toast, that Rose invited herself, with such a pretty, patronizing way, that the widow failed to see the condescension it implied. It did not, however, escape Annie’s observation, but she could not feel angry with the little lady, touching her bone-handled knife as if she were afraid of it, and looking round in quest of the napkin she failed to find, for Widow Simms had banished napkins from the table as superfluous articles, which answered no earthly purpose, save the putting an extra four cents into the pocket of the washerwoman, Harry Baker’s mother.

It was growing late, and the sunset shadows were already creeping into the Hollow when Rose bade Annie good-bye, promising to come again ere long, and wondering, as she took her homeward way, whence came the calm, quiet peace which made Annie Graham so happy, even though her husband were far away in the midst of danger and death. Rose had heard that Annie was a Christian, and so were many others whom she knew, but they were much like herself,—good, well-meaning people, amiable, and submissive when everything went to suit them, but let their husbands once join the army and they would make quite as much fuss as she, who did not profess to be anything. And then, for the first time in her life, Rose wished she, too, could learn from Annie’s teacher, and so have something to sustain her in case her husband should go. But he wouldn’t go,—and if he did, all the religion in the world could not make her resigned,—and the tears sprang to Rose’s eyes as she hurried up the handsome walk to the piazza, where Will sat smoking his cigar in the hazy twilight. She told him where she had been, and then sitting upon his knee told him of Annie, wishing she could be like her, and asking if he did not wish so too.

Will made no direct reply. His thoughts were evidently elsewhere, and after a few minutes he said, hesitatingly:

“Would it break my darling’s heart if I should join Tom at Washington?”

There was a cry of horror, and Rose hid her face in her husband’s bosom.

“Oh, Will, Will, you shan’t, you can’t, you mustn’t and won’t! I didn’t know you ever thought of such a cruel thing. Don’t you love me any more? I’ll try to do better, I certainly will!” and Rose nestled closer to him, holding his hands just as Annie Graham had once held her husband’s.

“You could not be much better, neither could I love you more than I do now, Rosa, darling,” Mr. Mather replied, kissing her childish brow. “But, Rosa, be reasonable once, and listen while I tell you how, ever since the fall of Sumter, I have thought the time would come, when I should be needed, resolving, too, that when it came, it should not find me a second Sardanapalus!”

The sudden lifting of Rose’s head, and her look of perplexed inquiry, showed that notwithstanding the fanciful ornament styled a Diploma lying in her writing-desk, Sardanapalus had not the honor of being numbered among her acquaintances. But her heart was too full to ask an explanation, and her husband continued:

“Besides that, there was a mutual understanding between Tom and myself, that if one went the other would, and he has gone,—nobly laying aside all the party prejudice which for a time influenced his conduct. Our country needs more men.”

“Yes, yes,” gasped Rose; “but more have gone. There’s scarcely a boy left in town, and it’s just so every where.”

Mr. Mather smiled as he replied:

“I know the boys have gone,—boys whose fair, beardless faces should put to shame a strong, full-grown man like me. And another class, too, have gone, our laboring young men, leaving behind them poverty and little helpless children, whereas I have nothing of that kind for an excuse.”

“Oh, I wish I had a dozen children, if that would keep you!” cried Rose, the insane idea flashing upon her that she would at once adopt a score or more of those she had seen playing in the muddy Hollow that afternoon.

Mr. Mather smiled, and continued:

“Suppose you try and accustom yourself to the idea of living a while without me. I shall not die until my appointed time, and shall undoubtedly come back again. Don’t you see?”

No, Rose didn’t. Her heart was too full of pain to see how going to war was just as sure a method of prolonging one’s life as staying at home, and she sobbed passionately, one moment accusing her husband of not loving her as he used to, and the next begging of him to abandon his wild project.

Mr. Mather was a man of firm decision, and long before he broached the subject to his wife, his mind had been made up that his country called for him,—not for somebody else,—but for him personally; that if the rebellion were to be crushed out, men of wealth and influence must help to crush it, not alone by remaining at home and urging others on, though this were an important part, but by actually joining in the combat, and by their presence cheering and inspiring others. And Mr. Mather was going, too,—had, in fact, already made arrangements to that effect, and neither the tears nor entreaties of his young wife could avail to change his purpose. But he did not tell her so that night; he would rather come to it gradually, taking a different course from that which George Graham had pursued, for where George had left the decision wholly to his wife, Mr. Mather had taken it wholly upon himself, making it first and telling Rose afterwards. It was better so, he thought, and having said all to her that he wished to say on that occasion, he tried to divert her mind into another channel. But Rose was not to be diverted. It had come upon her like a thunderbolt,—the thing she so much dreaded,—and she wept bitterly, seeing in the future, which only a few hours before looked so bright and joyous, nothing but impenetrable gloom, for she could read her husband tolerably well, and she intuitively felt that she had lost him,—that he was going from her, never to come back, she knew. She should be a widow before she was nineteen, and the host of summer dresses she meant to buy when she went back to Boston, changed into a widow’s sombre weeds, as Rose saw herself arrayed in the habiliments of mourning. What a fright she looked to herself in the widow’s cap, with which her vivid imagination disfigured her chestnut hair, and she shuddered afresh as she thought how hideous she was in black.

Poor, simple little Rose! And yet we say again Rose was not a fool, nor yet an unnatural character. There are many, many like her, some who will recognize themselves in this story and more who will not. Gay, impulsive, pleasure-seeking creatures, whom fashionable education and too indulgent parents have done their utmost to spoil, but who still possess many traits of excellence, needing only adverse circumstances to mould and hammer them into the genuine coin of true-hearted womanhood. Such an one was Rose. Reared by a fond mother, petted by an older brother, and teased by a younger, flattered by friend and foe, and latterly caressed and worshiped by a husband, Rose had come to think far too much of her own importance as Mrs. Rose Mather,—née Miss Rose Carleton, of Boston, an acknowledged belle, and leader of the ton.

There was a wide difference between Rose and Annie Graham, for while the latter, in her sweet unselfishness, thought only of her husband’s welfare, both here and hereafter, Rose’s first impulse was a dread shrinking from being alone, and her second a terror lest the years of her youth, now spread out so invitingly before her, should be passed in secluded widowhood, with nothing from the gay world without wherewith to feed her vanity and love for admiration. Still, beneath Rose’s light exterior there was hidden a mine of tenderness and love, a heart which, when roused to action, was capable of greater, more heroic deeds, than would at first seem possible. And that heart was rousing, too,—was gradually waking into life; but not all at once, and the tears which Rose shed the whole night through were wrung out more from selfishness, perhaps, than from any higher feeling. It would be so stupid living there alone in Rockland. If she could only go to Washington with Will it would not be half so bad, but she could not, for she waked Will up from a sound sleep to ask him if she might, and he had answered “No,” falling away again to sleep, and leaving Rose to wakefulness and tears, unmingled with any prayer that the cloud gathering so fast around her might sometime break in blessings on her head.

It was scarcely light next morning when Rose, determining to prevail, redoubled her entreaties for her husband to abandon the decision be now candidly acknowledged, but she could not. He was going to the war, and going as a private. Rose almost fainted when he told her this, and for a time refused to be comforted. She might learn to bear it, she said, if he were an officer, but to go as a common soldier, like those she worked for at the Hall, was more than she could bear.

It was in vain that Mr. Mather told her how only a few could be officers, and that he was content to serve his country in any capacity, leaving the more lucrative situations to those who needed them more. He did not tell her he had declined a post of honor, for the sake of one who seemed to him more worthy of it. He would rather this should reach her from some other source, and ere the day was over it did, for in a small town like Rockland it did not take long for every other one to know that William Mather had enlisted as a private soldier, when he might have been Colonel of a regiment, had he not given place to another because that other had depending on him a bed-ridden mother, a crazy wife, and six little helpless children.

How fast William Mather rose in the estimation of those who, never having known him intimately, had looked upon him as a cold, haughty man, whose loyalty was somewhat doubtful, and how proud Rose felt, even in the midst of her tears, as she heard on every side her husband’s praise. Even the Widow Simms ventured to the Mather mansion, telling her how glad she was, and offering to do what she could for the volunteer, while Annie, unable to do anything for herself, could only pray that God would bring Mr. Mather back safely to the child-wife, who was so bowed down with grief. How Annie longed to see her,—and, if possible, impart to her some portion of the hopeful trust which kept her own soul from fainting beneath its burden of anxious uncertainty. But the days passed on, and Rose came no more to the cottage in the Hollow. Love for her husband had triumphed over every other feeling, and rousing from her state of inertness, she busied herself in doing, or rather trying to do, a thousand little things which she fancied might add to Willie’s comfort. She called him Willie now, as if that name were dearer, tenderer than Will, and the strong man, every time he heard it, felt a sore pang,—there was something so plaintive in the tone, as if she were speaking of the dead.

It was a most beautiful summer day, when at last he left her, and Rose’s heart was well nigh bursting with its load of pain. It was all in vain that she said her usual form of prayer, never more meaningless than now when her thoughts were so wholly absorbed with something else. She did not pray in faith, but because it was a habit of her childhood, a something she rarely omitted, unless in too great a hurry. No wonder then that she rose up from her devotion quite as grief-stricken as when she first knelt down. God does not often answer what is mere lip service, and Rose was yet a stranger to the prayer which stirs the heart and carries power with it. The parting was terrible, and Mr. Mather more than half repented when he saw how tightly she clung to his neck, begging him to take her with him, or at least to send for her very soon.

“What shall I do when you are gone? What can I do?” she sobbed, and her husband answered:

“You can work for me, darling,—work for all the soldiers. It will help divert your mind.”

“I can’t I can’t,” was Rose’s answer. “I don’t know how to work. Oh, Willie, Willie! I wish there wasn’t any war.

Willie wished so too, but there was no time now for regrets, for a rumbling in the distance and a rising wreath of smoke on the western plain warned him not to tarry longer if he would go that day. One more burning kiss,—one more fond pressure of the wife he loved so much,—a few more whispered words of hope, and then another Rockland volunteer had gone. Gone without daring to look backward to the little form lying just the same as he had put it from him, and yet not just the same. He had felt it quivering with anguish when he took his arms away, but the trembling, quivering motion was over now, and the form he had caressed lay motionless and still, all unconscious of the dreary pain throbbing in the heart, and all unmindful of the loud hurrah which greeted William Mather, as he stepped upon the platform of the car and waved his hat to those assembled there to see him off. Rose, who had meant at the very last to be so heroic, so brave, so worthy the wife of a soldier, had fainted.

CHAPTER V.
JIMMIE.

There were loving words being breathed into Rose’s ear, when she came back to consciousness, and there was something familiar in the touch of the hand bathing her brow, and smoothing her tangled hair, but Rose was too weak and sick to notice who it was caring for her so tenderly, until she heard the voice saying to her

“Is my daughter better?”

And then she threw herself with a wild scream of joy into the arms which had cradled her babyhood, sobbing piteously: