Part 7

My Life is but a leaf upon the tree-- A growth upon the stem that feedeth all. A touch of frost--and suddenly I fall, To follow where my sister-blossoms be.

The selfsame sun, the shadow, and the rain That brought the budding verdure to the bough, Shall strip the fading foliage as now, And leave the limb in nakedness again.

My life is but a leaf upon the tree; The winds of birth and death upon it blow; But whence it came and whither it shall go, Is mystery of mysteries to me. JOHN B. TABB

September First

Around me blight, where all before was bloom! And so much lost! alas! and nothing won; Save this--that I can lean on wreck and tomb, And weep--and weeping pray--Thy will be done. ABRAM J. RYAN (_The Prayer of the South_)

_General Hood evacuates Atlanta, 1864_

September Second

Sixty thousand of us witnessed the destruction of Atlanta, while our post band and that of the Thirty-third Massachusetts played martial airs and operatic selections.

CAPT. DANIEL OAKEY, U. S. A.

_Sherman enters Atlanta, 1864_

September Third

On this point, however, all parties in the South were agreed, and the vast majority of the people of the North--before the war. The Abolitionist proper was considered not so much a friend of the negro as the enemy of society. As the war went on, and the Abolitionist saw the "glory of the Lord" revealed in a way he had never hoped for, he saw at the same time, or rather ought to have seen, that the order he had lived to destroy could not have been a system of hellish wrong and fiendish cruelty; else the prophetic vision of the liberators would have been fulfilled, and the horrors of San Domingo would have polluted this fair land. For the negro race does not deserve undivided praise for its conduct during the war. Let some small part of the credit be given to the masters, not all to the finer qualities of their "brothers in black." The school in which the training was given is closed, and who wishes to open it? Its methods were old-fashioned and were sadly behind the times, but the old schoolmasters turned out scholars who, in certain branches of moral philosophy, were not inferior to the graduates of the new university.

BASIL L. GILDERSLEEVE (_On Slavery_)

September Fourth

TOAST OF MORGAN'S MEN

Unclaimed by the land that bore us, Lost in the land we find, The brave have gone before us, Cowards are left behind! Then stand to your glasses, steady, Here's health to those we prize, Here's a toast to the dead already, And here's to the next who dies.

_General John H. Morgan killed, 1864_

September Fifth

If slavery were an unutterably evil institution, with no alleviating features, how are we to account for the fact that when the Confederate soldiers were at the front fighting, as they thought, for their independence, the negroes on the plantations took care of the women and children and old people, and nothing like an act of violence was ever known among them?... Is it not perfectly evident that there was a great rebellion, but that the rebels were the Northerners and that those who defended the Constitution as it was were the Southerners; but they defended State rights and slavery, which were distinctly intrenched within the Constitution?

CHARLES E. STOWE (_A Northern view in the light of fifty years of history_)

September Sixth

In regard to Barbara Frietchie a word may be said: An old woman by that now immortal name did live in Frederick in those days, but she was 84 years of age and bed-ridden. She never saw General Jackson, and he never saw her. I was with him every minute of the time he was in Frederick, and nothing like the scene so graphically described by the poet ever happened.

HENRY KYD DOUGLAS

_Jackson enters Frederick, Md., 1862_

September Seventh

OF JAMES RUMSEY, INVENTOR OF THE FIRST STEAMBOAT

I have seen the model of Mr. Rumsey's boat, constructed to work against the stream, examined the powers upon which it acts, been the eye witness to an actual experiment in running water of some rapidity, and give it as my opinion (although I had little faith before) that he has discovered the art of working boats by mechanism and small manual assistance against rapid currents; that the discovery is of vast importance; may be of the greatest usefulness in our inland navigation, and if it succeeds (of which I have no doubt) that the value of it is greatly enhanced by the simplicity of the works; which, when seen and explained, may be executed by the most common mechanic.

Given under my hand at the Town of Bath, County of Berkeley, in the State of Virginia, this 7th day of September, 1784.

GEORGE WASHINGTON

_Sidney Lanier dies, 1881_

September Eighth

Ere Time's horizon-line was set, Somewhere in space our spirits met, Then o'er the starry parapet Came wandering here. And now, that thou art gone again Beyond the verge, I haste amain (Lost echo of a loftier strain) To greet thee there. JOHN B. TABB (_Ave: Sidney Lanier_)

_Battle of Eutaw Springs, S. C., 1781_

September Ninth

Their conduct indeed was exemplary. They had been warned that pillage and depredations would be severely dealt with, and all requisitions, even fence-rails, were paid for on the spot.

LIEUT.-COL. G. F. R. HENDERSON, C.B.

_Lee and Jackson in occupation of Frederick, Md., 1862_

September Tenth

My life is like the autumn leaf That trembles in the moon's pale ray; Its hold is frail, its date is brief, Restless, and soon to pass away! Yet ere that leaf shall fall and fade, The parent tree will mourn its shade, The winds bewail the leafless tree; But none shall breathe a sigh for me! RICHARD HENRY WILDE

_Richard Henry Wilde dies, 1847_

_Joseph Wheeler born, 1836_

September Eleventh

Long and close association with the white race had its civilizing effect upon the negroes, and it was not long before the two races became warmly attached, both alike manifesting a keen interest in the other's welfare. Thus as economic interests had fixed the system in the laws of the people, the domestication of the race fixed it in their hearts. The abolitionist was right in his position on the ethics of slavery, but more than benighted in his conception of its condition in the South.

DUNBAR ROWLAND

September Twelfth

In conclusion, the Battle of North Point saved Baltimore from a pre-determined fate; it encouraged the rest of the country; it, with Plattsburg, caused the English Ministry to suggest that the Duke of Wellington should take command in America, and it influenced the terms of the treaty of Ghent in favor of the United States.

FREDERICK M. COLSTON

_Battle of North Point, Md., 1814_

September Thirteenth

LEE'S ORDER OF INVASION, 1862

That he did not reap the full fruits of this wonderful generalship was due to one of those strange events which, so insignificant in itself, yet is fateful to decide the issues of nations....

It will be seen that Lee had no doubt whatever of the success of his undertaking. Both he and Jackson knew Harper's Ferry and the surrounding country, and his plan, so simple and yet so complete, was laid out with a precision as absolute as if formed on the ground instead of on the march in a new country. It was this order showing the dispersion of his army over twenty-odd miles of country, with a river flowing between its widely scattered parts, that by a strange fate fell in McClellan's hands.

THOMAS NELSON PAGE

September Fourteenth

On the shore dimly seen through the mists of the deep, Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes, What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep, As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses? Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam, In full glory reflected now shines on the stream; 'Tis the star-spangled banner; O long may it wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave! FRANCIS SCOTT KEY

No more sacred spot in New Orleans, a city famous for its historic memories, can be pointed out than Liberty Place, where these martyrs fell; and no more memorable day can be found in the calendar of Louisiana's history than Sept. 14, 1874.

HENRY EDWARD CHAMBERS (_Referring to the rout of General Longstreet and the Carpet-bagger police by citizens, eleven of whom were killed_)

_Francis Scott Key writes the "Star Spangled Banner," 1814_

_Battle of Boonsboro, 1862_

_Rule of the Carpet-bagger shaken, New Orleans, 1874_

September Fifteenth

General Jackson, after a brief dispatch to General Lee announcing the capitulation, rode up to Bolivar and down into Harper's Ferry. The curiosity of the Union Army to see him was so great that the soldiers lined the sides of the road. Many of them uncovered as he passed, and he invariably returned the salute. One man had an echo of response all about him when he said aloud: "Boys, he's not much for looks, but if we'd had him we wouldn't have been caught in this trap."

HENRY KYD DOUGLAS

_Capture of Harper's Ferry by Jackson, 1862_

September Sixteenth

Mr. Lincoln, sir, have you any late news from Mr. Harper's Ferry? I heard that Stone W. Jackson kept the parole for a few days, and that about fourteen thousand crossed over in twenty-four hours. He is a smart ferryman, sure. Do your folks know how to make it pay? It is a bad crossing, but I suppose it is a heap safer than Ball's Bluff or Shepherdstown.

BILL ARP (Charles H. Smith) (_Humorous "Letter to Lincoln"_)

September Seventeenth

The moon, rising above the mountains, revealed the long lines of men and guns, stretching far across hill and valley, waiting for the dawn to shoot each other down, and between the armies their dead lay in such numbers as civilised war has seldom seen. So fearful had been the carnage, and comprised within such narrow limits, that a Federal patrol, it is related, passing into the corn-field, where the fighting had been fiercest, believed that they had surprised a whole Confederate brigade. There, in the shadow of the woods, lay the skirmishers, their muskets beside them; and there, in regular ranks, lay the line of battle, sleeping, as it seemed, the profound sleep of utter exhaustion. But the first man that was touched was cold and lifeless, and the next, and the next; it was the bivouac of the dead.

LIEUT.-COL. G. F. R. HENDERSON, C.B.

_Battle of Antietam, 1862_

September Eighteenth

He's in the saddle now. Fall in, Steady the whole brigade! Hill's at the ford, cut off; we'll win His way out, ball and blade. What matter if our shoes are worn? What matter if our feet are torn? Quick step! We're with him before morn-- That's Stonewall Jackson's way. JOHN WILLIAMSON PALMER

[From lines written within the sound of Jackson's guns at Antietam, 1862. Although then a correspondent of the New York _Tribune_, Dr. Palmer was a Southerner by birth and residence.--Editor]

_Lee awaits McClellan's attack at Sharpsburg, 1862_

September Nineteenth

As a deputation from New England was one day leaving the White House, a delegate turned round and said: "Mr. President, I should much like to know what you reckon to be the number the rebels have in arms against us?"

Without a moment's hesitation Mr. Lincoln replied: "Sir, I have the best possible reason for knowing the number to be one million of men, for whenever one of our generals engages a rebel army he reports that he has encountered a force twice his strength. I know we have half a million soldiers, so I am bound to believe that the rebels have twice that number."

LIEUT.-COL. G. F. R. HENDERSON, C.B.

_Lee repulses attempted advance across the Potomac after Antietam, 1862_

_First day at Chickamauga, 1863_

September Twentieth

Judged by percentage in killed and wounded, Chickamauga nearly doubled the sanguinary records of Marengo and Austerlitz; was two and a half times heavier than that sustained by the Duke of Marlborough at Malplaquet; more than double that suffered by the army under Henry of Navarre in the terrific slaughter at Coutras; nearly three times as heavy as the percentage of loss at Solferino and Magenta; five times greater than that of Napoleon at Wagram, and about ten times as heavy as that of Marshall Saxe at Bloody Raucoux.... Or, if we take the average percentage of loss in a number of the world's great battles--Waterloo, Wagram, Valmy, Magenta, Solferino, Zurich, and Lodi--we shall find by comparison that Chickamauga's record of blood surpassed them nearly three for one.

GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON

_Second day at Chickamauga, 1863_

September Twenty-First

THE OLD TIME NEGRO

God bless the forlorn and ragged remnants of a race now passing away. God bless the old black hand that rocked our infant cradles, smoothed the pillow of our infant sleep, and fanned the fever from our cheeks. God bless the old tongue that immortalized the nursery rhyme, the old eyes that guided our truant feet, and the old heart that laughed at our childish freaks.

PETER FRANCISCO SMITH

September Twenty-Second

If I could preserve the Union without freeing any slaves, I would do it; if I could preserve the Union by freeing all the slaves, I would do it. What I do about the colored race, I do because I think it helps to save the Union.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

_President Lincoln issues an emancipation proclamation to take effect January 1, 1863, unless the Confederate States should return to the Union by that date_

September Twenty-Third

THE MOCKING-BIRD

The name thou wearest does thee grievous wrong. No mimic thou! That voice is thine alone! The poets sing but strains of Shakespeare's song; The birds, but notes of thine imperial own! HENRY JEROME STOCKARD

September Twenty-Fourth

No other man did half so much either to develop the Constitution by expounding it, or to secure for the judiciary its rightful place in the Government as the living voice of the Constitution.... The admiration and respect which he and his colleagues won for the court remain its bulwark: the traditions which were formed under him and them have continued in general to guide the action and elevate the sentiments of their successors.

JAMES BRYCE (England)

_John Marshall born, 1755_

_Zachary Taylor born, 1784_

September Twenty-Fifth

We are gathered here a feeble few Of those who wore the gray-- The larger and the better part Have mingled with the clay: Yet not so lost, but now and then Through dimming mist we see The deadly calm of Stonewall's face, The lion-front of Lee. HENRY LYNDEN FLASH

_Memoirs of the Blue and Gray read at Los Angeles, 1897_

September Twenty-Sixth

Summer is dead, ay me! Sweet summer's dead! The sunset clouds have built his funeral pyre, Through which, e'en now, runs subterranean fire: While from the East, as from a garden-bed, Mist-vined, the Dusk lifts her broad moon--like some Great golden melon--saying, "Fall has come." MADISON CAWEIN

September Twenty-Seventh

All America will soon treasure alike both Federal and Confederate exploits, in the greatest of wars, as a priceless national heritage. Then Semmes and the _Alabama_ will shine beside John Paul Jones and the _Bonhomme Richard_, Decatur and the _Philadelphia_, Lawrence and the _Chesapeake_, and be ever lauded with the victories of _Old Ironsides_, the intrepid deed of Farragut sailing over the mines in the channel of Mobile Bay, that of Dewey entering Manila Harbor, and of Hobson bringing the _Merrimac_ under the fire of the forts at Santiago.

JOHN C. REED

_Raphael Semmes born, 1809_

September Twenty-Eighth

The _Alabama_ had been built in perfect good faith by the Lairds. When she was contracted for no question had been raised as to the right of a neutral to build and sell to a belligerent such a ship. The reader has seen that the Federal Secretary of the Navy himself had endeavored not only to build an _Alabama_, but ironclads in England.

RAPHAEL SEMMES

_John Laurens born, 1754_

September Twenty-Ninth

When summer flowers are dying, August past, When Autumn's breath is sighing On the blast; When the red leaves flutter down To the sod, Then the year kneels for its crown-- Goldenrod! VIRGINIA LUCAS

September Thirtieth

Thistles send their missives white To the sky; Robins southward wing their flight, (Sad goodbye!) But where Summer, yellow-gowned, Last has trod, Thorn-torn fragments strew the ground-- Goldenrod! VIRGINIA LUCAS

October

Thy glory flames in every blade and leaf To blind the eyes of grief; Thy vineyards and thine orchards bend with fruit That sorrow may be mute;

A hectic splendor lights thy days to sleep, Ere the gray dusk may creep Sober and sad along thy dusty ways, Like a lone nun, who prays;

High and faint-heard thy passing migrant calls; Thy lazy lizard sprawls On his gray stone, and many slow winds creep About thy hedge, asleep;

The Sun swings farther toward his love, the South, To kiss her glowing mouth; And Death, who steals among thy purpling bowers, Is deeply hid in flowers. JOHN CHARLES MCNEILL

October First

Come on thy swaying feet, Wild Spirit of the Fall! With wind-blown skirts, loose hair of russet brown Crowned with bright berries of the bitter sweet. Trip a light measure with the hurrying leaf, Straining thy few late roses to thy breast: With laughter overgay, sweet eyes drooped down, That none may guess thy grief: Dare not to pause for rest Lest the slow tears should gather to their fall. DANSKE DANDRIDGE

October Second

In all our associations; in all our agreements let us never lose sight of this fundamental maxim--that all power was originally lodged in, and consequently derived from, the people. We should wear it as a breastplate, and buckle it on as our armour.

GEORGE MASON

October Third

What a brave splendour Is in the October air! How rich and clear-- How life-full, and all joyous! We must render Love to the Spring-time, with its sproutings tender, As to a child quite dear-- But autumn is a noon, prolonged, of glory-- A manhood not yet hoary. PHILIP PENDLETON COOKE

October Fourth

At morn--at noon--at twilight dim-- Maria! thou hast heard my hymn! In joy and woe--in good and ill-- Mother of God, be with me still! When the Hours flew brightly by, And not a cloud obscured the sky, My soul, lest it should truant be, Thy grace did guide to thine and thee! Now, when storms of Fate o'ercast Darkly my Present and my Past, Let my future radiant shine With sweet hopes of thee and thine! EDGAR ALLAN POE

October Fifth

Tormented sorely by the chastening rod, I muttered to myself: "There is no God!" But faithful friend, I found your soul so true, That God revealed Himself in giving you. WALTER MALONE

October Sixth

Who said "false as dreams"? Not one who saw Into the wild and wondrous world they sway; No thinker who hath read their mystic law; No Poet who hath weaved them in his lay. HENRY TIMROD

_Henry Timrod dies, 1867_

_Nathaniel Bacon dies, 1676_

October Seventh

And the fever called "Living" Is conquered at last. EDGAR ALLAN POE

_Edgar Allan Poe dies, 1849_

_Battle of King's Mountain, N. C., 1780_

October Eighth

EDGAR ALLAN POE

It is no small achievement to have sung a few imperishable songs of bereaved love and illusive beauty. It is no small achievement to have produced individual and unexcelled strains of harmony which have since so rung in the ears of brother poets that echoes of them may be detected even in the work of such original and accomplished versemen as Rossetti and Swinburne. It is no small achievement to have pursued one's ideal until one's dying day, conscious the while that, great as one's impediments have been from without, one's chief obstacle has been one's own self.

WILLIAM P. TRENT

All who possess the divine element of pity will unite in feeling that his sufferings were his expiation.

LETITIA H. WRENSHALL

October Ninth

BATTLE OF KING'S MOUNTAIN: THE FIRST REBEL YELL

And they came, these mountaineers of the South. Congress has not ordered them; it is a rally of volunteers.... They neither hesitate nor parley; they hitch their horses to the trees; like a girdle of steel they clasp the mountain; and up they go, at the enemy--rifles blazing as they advance, and the Southern yell ringing through the woods.

THOMAS E. WATSON

It was the joyful annunciation of that turn of the tide of success which terminated the Revolutionary War with the seal of our independence.

THOMAS JEFFERSON

October Tenth

Soldiers! You are about to engage in an enterprise which, to insure success, imperatively demands at your hands coolness, decision, and bravery; implicit obedience to orders without a question or cavil; and the strictest order and sobriety on the march and in bivouac. The destination and extent of this expedition had better be kept to myself than known to you. Suffice it to say, that with the hearty cooperation of officers and men I have not a doubt of its success,--a success which will reflect credit in the highest degree upon your arms.

MAJ.-GEN. J. E. B. STUART

_J. E. B. Stuart, with 1,800 men, begins his second circle around the Union Army, riding through Pennsylvania and Maryland, 1862_

October Eleventh

His firmness and perseverance yielded to nothing but impossibilities. A rigid disciplinarian, yet tender as a father to those committed to his charge; honest, disinterested, liberal, with a sound understanding and a scrupulous fidelity to truth.

THOMAS JEFFERSON

_Meriwether Lewis dies, 1809_

October Twelfth

LEE

He was a foe without hate, a friend without treachery, a soldier without cruelty, and a victim without murmuring. He was a public officer without vices, a private citizen without wrong, a neighbor without reproach, a Christian without hypocrisy, and a man without guile. He was Cæsar without his ambition, Frederick without his tyranny, Napoleon without his selfishness, and Washington without his reward. He was as obedient to authority as a true king. He was as gentle as a woman in life, pure and modest as a virgin in thought, watchful as a Roman vestal in duty, submissive to law as Socrates, and grand in battle as Achilles.

BENJAMIN H. HILL

_Robert E. Lee dies, 1870_

_Chief Justice Roger B. Taney dies, 1864_

October Thirteenth

TANEY

It was the conviction of his life that the Government under which we live was of limited powers, and that its constitution had been framed for war as well as peace. Though he died, therefore, he could not surrender that conviction at the call of the trumpet. He had plighted his troth to the liberty of the citizen and the supremacy of the laws, and no man could put them asunder.

SEVERN TEACKLE WALLIS

October Fourteenth

LEE

He sent to the suffering private in the hospitals the delicacies contributed for his personal use from the meagre stores of those who were anxious about his health. If a handful of real coffee came to him, it went in the same direction, while he cheerfully drank from his tin cup the wretched substitute made from parched corn or beans.

GEN. JOHN B. GORDON

October Fifteenth