camp; but two days' acquaintance with the Judge, who declared "such brandy contraband of war," had reduced its contents to a low ebb. Still, there was enough to do that poor girl a world of good. She shortly revived, and sitting up, her head against the sentinel's shoulder, told us her story. She was a white woman, and served as nursery-maid in a family that lived hard by. All of its male members being away with the array, she had been sent out at that late hour to procure medicine for a sick child, and, waylaid by a gang of black fiends, had been gagged and outraged in the very heart of Richmond! And this is Southern civilization under Jefferson I.!
At the end of a long hour, I returned to the hotel. The sentry was pacing to and fro before it, and, seating myself on the door-step, I drew him into conversation.
"Do such things often happen in Richmond?" I asked him.
"Often! Ye's strange yere, I reckon," he replied.
"No,—I've been here forty times, but not lately. Things must be in a bad way here, now."
"Wai, they is! Thar' 's nary night but thair' 's lots o' sech doin's. Ye see, thar' ha'n't more 'n a corporal's-guard o' white men in the hull place, so the nigs they hes the'r own way, and ye'd better b'lieve they raise the Devil, and break things, ginerally."
"I've seen no other able-bodied soldier about town; how is it that you are here?"
"I ha'n't able-bodied," he replied, holding up the stump of his left arm, from which the sleeve was dangling. "I lost thet more 'n a y'ar ago. I b'long ter the calvary,—Fust Alabama,—and bein' as I carn't manage a nag now, they 's detailed me fur provost-duty."
"First Alabama? I know Captains Webb and Finnan of that regiment."
"Ye does? What! old man Webb, as lives down on Coosa?"
"Yes, at Gadsden, in Cherokee County. Streight burnt his house, and both of his mills', on his big raid, and the old man has lost both of his sons in the war. It has wellnigh done him up."
"I reckon. Stands ter natur' it sh'u'd. The Yankees is all-fired fiends. The old man use' ter hate 'em loike ———. I reckon he hates 'em wuss 'n ever now."
"No, he don't. His troubles seem to have softened him. When he told me of them, he cried like a child. He reckoned the Lord had brought them on him because he'd fought against the Union."
"Wal, I doan't know. This war's a bad business, anyhow. When d'ye see old Webb last?"
"About a year ago,—down in Tennessee, nigh to Tullahoma."
"Was he 'long o' the rigiment?"
That was a home question, for I had met Captain Webb while he was a prisoner, in the Court-House at Murfreesboro'. However, I promptly replied,—
"No,—he'd just left it."
"Wal, I doan't blame him. Pears loike, ef sech things sh'u'd come onter me, I'd let the war and the kentry go ter the Devil tergether."
My acquaintance with Captain Webb naturally won me the confidence of the soldier; and for nearly an hour, almost unquestioned, he poured into my ear information that would have been of incalculable value to our generals. Two days later I would have given my right hand for liberty to whisper to General Grant some things that he said; but honor and honesty forbade it.
A neighboring clock struck four when I rose to go. As I did so, I said to the sentinel,—
"I saw no other sentry in the streets; why are you guarding this hotel?"
"Wal, ye knows old Brown's a-raisin' Cain down thar' in Georgy. Two o' his men bes come up yere ter see Jeff, and things ha'n't quite satisfactory, so we's orders ter keep 'em tighter 'n a bull's-eye in fly-time."
So, not content with placing a guard in our very bedchamber, the oily-tongued despot over the way had fastened a pad-
