February 5th. - When Lawrence handed me my husband"s money (six hundred dollars it was) I said: "Now I am pretty sure you do not mean to go to the Yankees, for with that pile of money in your hands you must have known there was your chance." He grinned, but said nothing.
At the President"s reception Hood had a perfect ovation. General Preston navigated him through the crowd, handling him as tenderly, on his crutches, as if he were the Princess of Wales"s new-born baby that I read of to-day. It is bad for the head of an army to be so helpless. But old Blcher went to Waterloo in a carriage, wearing a bonnet on his head to shade his inflamed eyes - a heroic figure, truly; an old, red-eyed, bonneted woman, apparently, back in a landau. And yet, "Blcher to the rescue!"
Afterward at the Prestons", for we left the President"s * * *
285 at an early hour. Major von Borcke was trying to teach them his way of p.r.o.nouncing his own name, and reciting numerous travesties of it in this country, when Charles threw open the door, saying, "A gentleman has called for Major Bandbox." The Prussian major acknowledged this to be the worst he had heard yet.
Off to the Ives"s theatricals. I walked with General Breckinridge. Mrs. Clay"s Mrs. Malaprop was beyond our wildest hopes. And she was in such bitter earnest when she pinched Conny Cary"s (Lydia Languish"s) shoulder and called her "an antricate little huzzy," that Lydia showed she felt it, and next day the shoulder was black and blue. It was not that the actress had a grudge against Conny, but that she was intense.
Even the back of Mrs. Clay"s head was eloquent as she walked away. "But," said General Breckinridge, "watch Hood; he has not seen the play before and Bob Acres amazes him." When he caught my eye, General Hood nodded to me and said, "I believe that fellow Acres is a coward." "That"s better than the play," whispered Breckinridge, "but it is all good from Sir Anthony down to f.a.g."
Between the acts Mrs. Clay sent us word to applaud. She wanted encouragement; the audience was too cold. General Breckinridge responded like a man. After that she was fired by thunders of applause, following his lead. Those mighty Kentuckians turned claqueurs, were a host in themselves. Constance Cary not only acted well, but looked perfectly beautiful.
During the farce Mrs. Clay came in with all her feathers, diamonds, and fallals, and took her seat by me. Said General Breckinridge, "What a splendid head of hair you have." "And all my own," said she. Afterward she said, they could not get false hair enough, so they put a pair of black satin boots on top of her head and piled hair over them.
286 We adjourned from Mrs. Ives"s to Mrs. Ould"s, where we had the usual excellent Richmond supper. We did not get home until three. It was a clear moonlight night - almost as light as day. As we walked along I said to General Breckinridge, "You have spent a jolly evening." "I do not know," he answered. "I have asked myself more than once to-night, "Are you the same man who stood gazing down on the faces of the dead on that awful battle-field, The soldiers lying there stare at you with their eyes wide open. Is this the same world? Here and there?" "
Last night, the great Kentucky contingent came in a body. Hood brought Buck in his carriage. She said she "did not like General Hood," and spoke with a wild excitement in those soft blue eyes of hers - or, are they gray or brown? She then gave her reasons in the lowest voice, but loud and distinct enough for him to hear: "Why? He spoke so harshly to Cy, his body-servant, as we got out of the carriage. I saw how he hurt Cy"s feelings, and I tried to soothe Cy"s mortification."
"You see, Cy nearly caused me to fall by his awkwardness, and I stormed at him," said the General, vastly amused. "I hate a man who speaks roughly to those who dare not resent it," said she. The General did own himself charmed with her sentiments, but seemed to think his wrong-doing all a good joke. He and Cy understand each other.
February 9th. - This party for Johnny was the very nicest I have ever had, and I mean it to be my last. I sent word to the Carys to bring their own men. They came alone, saying, "they did not care for men." "That means a raid on ours," growled Isabella. Mr. Lamar was devoted to Constance Cary. He is a free lance; so that created no heart-burning.
Afterward, when the whole thing was over, and a success, the lights put out, etc., here trooped in the four girls, who stayed all night with me. In dressing-gowns they * * *
287 stirred up a hot fire, relit the gas, and went in for their supper; rchauff was the word, oysters, hot coffee, etc. They kept it up till daylight.
Of course, we slept very late. As they came in to breakfast, I remarked, "The church-bells have been going on like mad. I take it as a rebuke to our breaking the Sabbath. You know Sunday began at twelve o"clock last night." "It sounds to me like fire-bells," somebody said.
Soon the Infant dashed in, done up in soldier"s clothes: "The Yankees are upon us!" said he. "Don"t you hear the alarm-bells? They have been ringing day and night!" Alex Haskell came; he and Johnny went off to report to Custis Lee and to be enrolled among his "locals," who are always detailed for the defense of the city. But this time the attack on Richmond has proved a false alarm.
A new trouble at the President"s house: their trusty man, Robert, broken out with the smallpox.
We went to the Webb ball, and such a pleasant time we had. After a while the P. M. G. (Pet Major-General) took his seat in the comfortable chair next to mine, and declared his determination to hold that position. Mr. Hunter and Mr. Benjamin essayed to dislodge him. Mrs. Stanard said: "Take him in the flirtation room; there he will soon be captured and led away," but I did not know where that room was situated. Besides, my bold Texan made a most unexpected sally: "I will not go, and I will prevent her from going with any of you." Supper was near at hand, and Mr. Mallory said: "Ask him if the varioloid is not at his house. I know it is." I started as if I were shot, and I took Mr. Clay"s arm and went in to supper, leaving the P. M. G. to the girls. Venison and everything nice.
February 12th. - John Chesnut had a basket of champagne carried to my house, oysters, partridges, and other good things, for a supper after the reception. He is going back to the army to-morrow.
James Chesnut arrived on Wednesday. He has been * * *
288 giving Buck his opinion of one of her performances last night. She was here, and the General"s carriage drove up, bringing some of our girls. They told her he could not come up and he begged she would go down there for a moment. She flew down, and stood ten minutes in that snow, Cy holding the carriage-door open. "But, Colonel Chesnut, there was no harm. I was not there ten minutes. I could not get in the carriage because I did not mean to stay one minute. He did not hold my hands - that is, not half the time - Oh, you saw! - well, he did kiss my hands. Where is the harm of that?" All men worship Buck. How can they help it, she is so lovely.
Lawrence has gone back ignominiously to South Carolina. At breakfast already in some inscrutable way he had become intoxicated; he was told to move a chair, and he raised it high over his head, smashing Mrs. Grundy"s chandelier. My husband said : "Mary, do tell Lawrence to go home; I am too angry to speak to him." So Lawrence went without another word. He will soon be back, and when he comes will say, "Shoo!! I knew Mars Jeems could not do without me." And indeed he can not.
Buck, reading my journal, opened her beautiful eyes in amazement and said: "So little do people know themselves! See what you say of me!" I replied: "The girls heard him say to you, "Oh, you are so childish and so sweet!" Now, Buck, you know you are not childish. You have an abundance of strong common sense. Don"t let men adore you so - if you can help it. You are so unhappy about men who care for you, when they are killed."
Isabella says that war leads to love-making. She says these soldiers do more courting here in a day than they would do at home, without a war, in ten years.
In the pauses of conversation, we hear, "She is the n.o.blest woman G.o.d ever made!" "Goodness!" exclaims Isabella. "Which one?" The amount of courting we hear in these small rooms. Men have to go to the front, and they * * *
289 say their say desperately. I am beginning to know all about it. The girls tell me. And I overhear - I can not help it. But this style is unique, is it not? "Since I saw you - last year - standing by the turnpike gate, you know- my battle-cry has been: "G.o.d, my country, and you!" " So many are lame. Major Venable says: "It is not "the devil on two sticks," now; the farce is "Cupid on Crutches." "
General Breckinridge"s voice broke in: "They are my cousins. So I determined to kiss them good-by. Good-by nowadays is the very devil, it means forever, in all probability, you know; all the odds against us. So I advanced to the charge soberly, discreetly, and in the fear of the Lord. The girls stood in a row - four of the very prettiest I ever saw." Sam, with his eyes glued to the floor, cried: "You were afraid - you backed out." "But I did nothing of the kind. I kissed every one of them honestly, heartily."
February 13th. - My husband is writing out some resolutions for the Congress. He is very busy, too, trying to get some poor fellows reprieved. He says they are good soldiers but got into a sc.r.a.pe. Buck came in. She had on her last winter"s English hat, with the pheasant"s wing. Just then Hood entered most unexpectedly. Said the blunt soldier to the girl: "You look mighty pretty in that hat; you wore it at the turnpike gate, where I surrendered at first sight." She nodded and smiled, and flew down the steps after Mr. Chesnut, looking back to say that she meant to walk with him as far as the Executive Office.
The General walked to the window and watched until the flutter of her garment was gone. He said: "The President was finding fault with some of his officers in command, and I said: "Mr. President, why don"t you come and lead us yourself; I would follow you to the death." " "Actually, if you stay here in Richmond much longer you will grow to be a courtier. And you came a rough Texan."
290 Mrs. Davis and General McQueen came. He tells me Muscoe Garnett is dead. Then the best and the cleverest Virginian I know is gone. He was the most scholarly man they had, and his character was higher than his requirements.
To-day a terrible onslaught was made upon the President for nepotism. Burton Harrison"s and John Taylor Wood"s letters denying the charge that the President"s cotton was unburned, or that he left it to be bought by the Yankees, have enraged the opposition. How much these people in the President"s family have to bear! I have never felt so indignant.
February 16th. - Saw in Mrs. Howell"s room the little negro Mrs. Davis rescued yesterday from his brutal negro guardian. The child is an orphan. He was dressed up in little Joe"s clothes and happy as a lord. He was very anxious to show me his wounds and bruises, but I fled. There are some things in life too sickening, and cruelty is one of them.
Somebody said: "People who knew General Hood before the war said there was nothing in him. As for losing his property by the war, some say he never had any, and that West Point is a pauper"s school, after all. He has only military glory, and that he has gained since the war began."
"Now," said Burton Harrison, "only military glory! I like that! The glory and the fame he has gained during the war - that is Hood. What was Napoleon before Toulon? Hood has the impa.s.sive dignity of an Indian chief. He has always a little court around him of devoted friends. Wigfall, himself, has said he could not get within Hood"s lines."
February 17th. - Found everything in Main Street twenty per cent dearer. They say it is due to the new currency bill.
I asked my husband: "Is General Johnston ordered to reenforce Polk, They said he did not understand the order."
291 "After five days" delay," he replied. "They say Sherman is marching to Mobile.1 When they once get inside of our armies what is to molest them, unless it be women with broomsticks?" General Johnston writes that "the Governor of Georgia refuses him provisions and the use of his roads." The Governor of Georgia writes: "The roads are open to him and in capital condition. I have furnished him abundantly with provisions from time to time, as he desired them." I suppose both of these letters are placed away side by side in our archives.
February 20th. - Mrs. Preston was offended by the story of Buck"s performance at the Ive"s. General Breckinridge told her "it was the most beautifully unconscious act he ever saw." The General was leaning against the wall, Buck standing guard by him "on her two feet." The crowd surged that way, and she held out her arm to protect him from the rush. After they had all pa.s.sed she handed him his crutches, and they, too, moved slowly away. Mrs. Davis said: "Any woman in Richmond would have done the same joyfully, but few could do it so gracefully. Buck is made so conspicuous by her beauty, whatever she does can not fail to attract attention."
Johnny stayed at home only one day; then went to his plantation, got several thousand Confederate dollars, and in the afternoon drove out with Mrs. K - . At the Bee Store he spent a thousand of his money; bought us gloves and linen. Well, one can do without gloves, but linen is next to life itself.
Yesterday the President walked home from church with me. He said he was so glad to see my husband at church; had never seen him there before remarked on how well he 1. General Polk, commanding about 24,000 men scattered throughout Mississippi and Alabama, found it impossible to check the advance of Sherman at the head of some 40,000, and moved from Meridian south to protect Mobile. February 16, 1864, Sherman took possession of Meridian.
292 looked, etc. I replied that he looked so well "because you have never before seen him in the part of "the right man in the right place." " My husband has no fancy for being planted in pews, but he is utterly Christian in his creed.
February 23d. - At the President"s, where General Lee breakfasted, a man named Phelan told General Lee all he ought to do; planned a campaign for him. General Lee smiled blandly the while, though he did permit himself a mild sneer at the wise civilians in Congress who refrained from trying the battle-field in person, but from afar dictated the movements of armies. My husband said that, to his amazement, General Lee came into his room at the Executive Office to "pay his respects and have a talk." "Dear me! Goodness gracious!" said I. "That was a compliment from the head of the army, the very first man in the world, we Confederates think."
February 24th. - Friends came to make taffy and stayed the livelong day. They played cards. One man, a soldier, had only two teeth left in front and they lapped across each other. On account of the condition of his mouth, he had maintained a dignified sobriety of aspect, though he told some funny stories. Finally a story was too much for him, and he grinned from ear to ear. Maggie gazed, and then called out as the negro fiddlers call out dancing figures, "Forward two and cross over!" Fancy our faces. The hero of the two teeth, relapsing into a decorous arrangement of mouth, said: "Cavalry are the eyes of an army; they bring the news; the artillery are the boys to make a noise; but the infantry do the fighting, and a general or so gets all the glory."
February 26th. - We went to see Mrs. Breckinridge, who is here with her husband. Then we paid our respects to Mrs. Lee. Her room was like an industrial school: everybody so busy. Her daughters were all there plying their needles, with several other ladies. Mrs. Lee showed us a beautiful sword, recently sent to the General by some Marylanders, * * *
293 now in Paris. On the blade was engraved, "Aide toi et Dieu t"aidera." When we came out someone said, "Did you see how the Lees spend their time? What a rebuke to the taffy parties!"
Another maimed hero is engaged to be married. Sally Hampton has accepted John Haskell. There is a story that he reported for duty after his arm was shot off; suppose in the fury of the battle he did not feel the pain.
General Breckinridge once asked, "What"s the name of the fellow who has gone to Europe for Hood"s leg?" "Dr. Darby." "Suppose it is shipwrecked?" "No matter; half a dozen are ordered." Mrs. Preston raised her hands: "No wonder the General says they talk of him as if he were a centipede; his leg is in everybody"s mouth."
March 3d. - Hetty, the handsome, and Constance, the witty, came; the former too prudish to read Lost and Saved, by Mrs. Norton, after she had heard the plot. Conny was making a bonnet for me. Just as she was leaving the house, her friendly labors over, my husband entered, and quickly ordered his horse. "It is so near dinner," I began. "But I am going with the President. I am on duty. He goes to inspect the fortifications. The enemy, once more, are within a few miles of Richmond." Then we prepared a luncheon for him. Constance Cary remained with me.
After she left I sat down to Romola, and I was absorbed in it. How hardened we grow to war and war"s alarms! The enemy"s cannon or our own are thundering in my ears, and I was dreadfully afraid some infatuated and frightened friend would come in to cheer, to comfort, and interrupt me. Am I the same poor soul who fell on her knees and prayed, and wept, and fainted, as the first gun boomed from Fort Sumter? Once more we have repulsed the enemy. But it is humiliating, indeed, that he can come and threaten us at our very gates whenever he so pleases. If a forlorn negro had not led them astray (and they hanged him for it) on Tuesday night, unmolested, they * * *
294 would have walked into Richmond. Surely there is horrid neglect or mismanagement somewhere.
March 4th. - The enemy has been reenforced and is on us again. Met Wade Hampton, who told me my husband was to join him with some volunteer troops; so I hurried home. Such a cavalcade rode up to luncheon! Captain Smith Lee and Preston Hampton, the handsomest, the oldest and the youngest of the party. This was at the Prestons". Smith Lee walked home with me; alarm-bells ringing; hors.e.m.e.n galloping; wagons rattling. Dr. H. stopped us to say "Beast" Butler was on us with sixteen thousand men. How scared the Doctor looked! And, after all, it was only a notice to the militia to turn out and drill.
March 5th. - Tom Fergurson walked home with me. He told me of Colonel Dahlgren"s1 death and the horrid memoranda found in his pocket. He came with secret orders to destroy this devoted city, hang the President and his Cabinet, and burn the town! Fitzhugh Lee was proud that the Ninth Virginia captured him.
Found Mrs. Semmes covering her lettuces and radishes as calmly as if Yankee raiders were a myth. While "Beast" Butler holds Fortress Monroe he will make things lively for us. On the alert must we be now.
March 7th. - Shopping, and paid $30 for a pair of gloves; $50 for a pair of slippers; $24 for six spools of thread; $32 for five miserable, shabby little pocket handkerchiefs. When I came home found Mrs. Webb. At her hospital there was a man who had been taken prisoner by Dahlgren"s party. He saw the negro hanged who had misled 1. Colonel Ulric Dahlgren was a son of the noted Admiral, John H. Dahlgren, who, in July, 1863, had been placed in command of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron and conducted the naval operations against Charleston, between July 10 and September 7, 1863. Colonel Dahlgren distinguished himself at Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville and Gettysburg. The raid in which he lost his life on March 4, 1864, was planned by himself and General Kilpatrick.
295 led them, unintentionally, in all probability. He saw Dahlgren give a part of his bridle to hang him. Details are melancholy, as Emerson says. This Dahlgren had also lost a leg.
Constance Cary, in words too fine for the occasion, described the homely scene at my house; how I prepared sandwiches for my husband; and broke, with trembling hand, the last bottle of anything to drink in the house, a bottle I destined to go with the sandwiches. She called it a Hector and Andromache performance.
March 8th. - Mrs. Preston"s story. As we walked home, she told me she had just been to see a lady she had known more than twenty years before. She had met her in this wise: One of the chambermaids of the St. Charles Hotel (New Orleans) told Mrs. Preston"s nurse it was when Mary Preston was a baby - that up among the servants in the garret there was a sick lady and her children. The maid was sure she was a lady, and thought she was hiding from somebody. Mrs. Preston went up, knew the lady, had her brought down into comfortable rooms, and nursed her until she recovered from her delirium and fever. She had run away, indeed, and was hiding herself and her children from a worthless husband. Now, she has one son in a Yankee prison, one mortally wounded, and the last of them dying there under her eyes of consumption. This last had married here in Richmond, not wisely, and too soon, for he was a mere boy; his pay as a private was eleven dollars a month, and his wife"s family charged him three hundred dollars a month for her board; so he had to work double tides, do odd jobs by night and by day, and it killed him by exposure to cold in this bitter climate to which his const.i.tution was unadapted.
They had been in Vicksburg during the siege, and during the bombardment sought refuge in a cave. The roar of the cannon ceasing, they came out gladly for a breath of fresh air. At the moment when they emerged, a bomb burst * * *
296 there, among them, so to speak, struck the son already wounded, and smashed off the arm of a beautiful little grandchild not three years old. There was this poor little girl with her touchingly lovely face, and her arm gone. This mutilated little martyr, Mrs. Preston said, was really to her the crowning touch of the woman"s affliction. Mrs. Preston put up her hand, "Her baby face haunts me."
March 11th. - Letters from home, including one from my husband"s father, now over ninety, written with his own hand, and certainly his own mind still. I quote: "Bad times; worse coming. Starvation stares me in the face. Neither John"s nor James"s overseer will sell me any corn." Now, what has the government to do with the fact that on all his plantations he made corn enough to last for the whole year, and by the end of January his negroes had stolen it all, Poor old man, he has fallen on evil days, after a long life of ease and prosperity.
To-day, I read The Blithedale Romance. Blithedale leaves such an unpleasant impression. I like pleasant, kindly stories, now that we are so harrowed by real life. Tragedy is for our hours of ease.
March 12th. - An active campaign has begun everywhere. Kilpatrick still threatens us. Bragg has organized his fifteen hundred of cavalry to protect Richmond. Why can"t my husband be made colonel of that? It is a new regiment. No; he must be made a general!
"Now," says Mary Preston, "Doctor Darby is at the mercy of both Yankees and the rolling sea, and I am anxious enough; but, instead of taking my bed and worrying mamma, I am taking stock of our worldly goods and trying to arrange the wedding paraphernalia for two girls."
There is love-making and love-making in this world. What a time the sweethearts of that wretch, young Shakespeare, must have had. What experiences of life"s delights must have been his before he evolved the Romeo and Juliet business from his own internal consciousness; also that delicious * * *
297 Beatrice and Rosalind. The poor creature that he left his second best bedstead to came in second best all the time, no doubt; and she hardly deserved more. Fancy people wondering that Shakespeare and his kind leave no progeny like themselves! Shakespeare"s children would have been half his only; the other half only the second best bedstead"s. What would you expect of that commingling of materials? Goethe used his lady-loves as school-books are used: he studied them from cover to cover, got all that could be got of self-culture and knowledge of human nature from the study of them, and then threw them aside as if of no further account in his life.
Byron never could forget Lord Byron, poet and peer, and mauvais sujet, and he must have been a trying lover; like talking to a man looking in the gla.s.s at himself. Lady Byron was just as much taken up with herself. So, they struck each other, and bounded apart.
[Since I wrote this, Mrs. Stowe has taken Byron in hand. But I know a story which might have annoyed my lord more than her and Lady Byron"s imagination of wickedness - for he posed a fiend, but was tender and kind. A clerk in a country store asked my sister to lend him a book, he "wanted something to read; the days were so long." "What style of book would you prefer?" she said. "Poetry." "Any particular poet?" "Brown. I hear him much spoken of." "Browning?" "No; Brown - short - that is what they call him." "Byron, you mean." "No, I mean the poet, Brown."]
"Oh, you wish you had lived in the time of the Shakespeare creature!" He knew all the forms and phases of true love. Straight to one"s heart he goes in tragedy or comedy. He never misses fire. He has been there, in slang phrase. No doubt the man"s bare presence gave pleasure to the female world; he saw women at their best, and he effaced himself. He told no tales of his own life. Compare with him old, sad, solemn, sublime, sneering, snarling, * * *
298 fault-finding Milton, a man whose family doubtless found "les absences dlicieuses." That phrase describes a type of man at a touch; it took a Frenchwoman to do it.
"But there is an Italian picture of Milton, taken in his youth, and he was as beautiful as an angel." "No doubt. But love flies before everlasting posing and preaching - the deadly requirement of a man always to be looked up to-a domestic tyrant, grim, formal, and awfully learned. Milton was only a mere man, for he could not do without women. When he tired out the first poor thing, who did not fall down, worship, and obey him, and see G.o.d in him, and she ran away, he immediately arranged his creed so that he could take another wife; for wife he must have, a la Mohammedan creed. The deer-stealer never once thought of justifying theft simply because he loved venison and could not come by it lawfully. Shakespeare was a better man, or, may I say, a purer soul, than self-upholding, Calvinistic, Puritanic, king-killing Milton. There is no muddling of right and wrong in Shakespeare, and no pharisaical stuff of any sort."
Then George Deas joined us, fresh from Mobile, where he left peace and plenty. He went to sixteen weddings and twenty-seven tea-parties. For breakfast he had everything nice. Lily told of what she had seen the day before at the Spottswood.. She was in the small parlor, waiting for someone, and in the large drawing-room sat Hood, solitary, sad, with crutches by his chair. He could not see them. Mrs. Buckner came in and her little girl who, when she spied Hood, bounded into the next room, and sprang into his lap. Hood smoothed her little dress down and held her close to him. She clung around his neck for a while, and then, seizing him by the beard, kissed him to an illimitable extent. "Prettiest picture I ever saw," said Lily. "The soldier and the child."
John R. Thompson sent me a New York Herald only three days old. It is down on Kilpatrick for his miserable * * *
299 failure before Richmond. Also it acknowledges a defeat before Charleston and a victory for us in Florida.
General Grant is charmed with Sherman"s successful movements; says he has destroyed millions upon millions of our property in Mississippi. I hope that may not be true, and that Sherman may fail as Kilpatrick did. Now, if we still had Stonewall or Albert Sidney Johnston where Joe Johnston and Polk are, I would not give a fig for Sherman"s chances. The Yankees say that at last they have scared up a man who succeeds, and they expect him to remedy all that has gone wrong. So they have made their brutal Suwarrow, Grant, lieutenant-general.
Doctor - at the Prestons" proposed to show me a man who was not an F. F. V. Until we came here, we had never heard of our social position. We do not know how to be rude to people who call. To talk of social position seems vulgar. Down our way, that sort of thing was settled one way or another beyond a peradventure, like the earth and the sky. We never gave it a thought. We talked to whom, we pleased, and if they were not comme il faut, we were ever so much more polite to the poor things. No reflection on Virginia. Everybody comes to Richmond.
Somebody counted fourteen generals in church to-day, and suggested that less piety and more drilling of commands would suit the times better. There were Lee, Longstreet, Morgan, Hoke, Clingman, Whiting, Pegram, Elzey, Gordon, and Bragg. Now, since Dahlgren failed to carry out his orders, the Yankees disown them, disavowing all. He was not sent here to murder us all, to hang the President, and burn the town. There is the note-book, however, at the Executive Office, with orders to hang and burn.
March 15th. - Old Mrs. Chesnut is dead. A saint is gone and James Chesnut is broken-hearted. He adored his mother. I gave $375 for my mourning, which consists of a black alpaca dress and a crepe veil. With bonnet, gloves, and all * * *
300 it came to $500. Before the blockade such things as I have would not have been thought fit for a chamber-maid.
Everybody is in trouble. Mrs. Davis says paper money has depreciated so much in value that they can not live within their income; so they are going to dispense with their carriage and horses.
March 18th. - Went out to sell some of my colored dresses. What a scene it was - such piles of rubbish, and mixed up with it, such splendid Parisian silks and satins. A mulatto woman kept the shop under a roof in an out-of- the-way old house. The ci-devant rich white women sell to, and the negroes buy of, this woman.
After some whispering among us Buck said: "Sally is going to marry a man who has lost an arm, and she is proud of it. The cause glorifies such wounds." Annie said meekly, "I fear it will be my fate to marry one who has lost his head." "Tudy has her eyes on one who has lost an eye. What a glorious a.s.sortment of n.o.ble martyrs and heroes!" "The bitterness of this kind of talk is appalling."
General Lee had tears in his eyes when he spoke of his daughter-in-law just dead - that lovely little Charlotte Wickham, Mrs. Roony Lee. Roony Lee says "Beast" Butler was very kind to him while he was a prisoner. The "Beast" has sent him back his war-horse. The Lees are men enough to speak the truth of friend or enemy, fearing not the consequences.
March 19th. - A new experience: Molly and Lawrence have both gone home, and I am to be left for the first time in my life wholly at the mercy of hired servants. Mr. Chesnut, being in such deep mourning for his mother, we see no company. I have a maid of all work.
Tudy came with an account of yesterday"s trip to Petersburg. Constance Cary raved of the golden ripples in Tudy"s hair. Tudy vanished in a halo of glory, and Constance Cary gave me an account of a wedding, as it was given to her by Major von Borcke. The bridesmaids were * * *
301 dressed in black, the bride in Confederate gray, homespun. She had worn the dress all winter, but it had been washed and turned for the wedding. The female critics p.r.o.nounced it "flabby-dabby." They also said her collar was only "net," and she wore a cameo breastpin. Her bonnet was self-made.
March 24th. - Yesterday, we went to the Capitol grounds to see our returned prisoners. We walked slowly up and down until Jeff Davis was called upon to speak. There I stood, almost touching the bayonets when he left me. I looked straight into the prisoners" faces, poor fellows. They cheered with all their might, and I wept for sympathy, and enthusiasm. I was very deeply moved. These men were so forlorn, so dried up, and shrunken, with such a strange look in some of their eyes; others so restless and wild-looking; others again placidly vacant, as if they had been dead to the world for years. A poor woman was too much for me. She was searching for her son. He had been expected back. She said he was taken prisoner at Gettysburg. She kept going in and out among them with a basket of provisions she had brought for him to eat. It was too pitiful. She was utterly unconscious of the crowd. The anxious dread, expectation, hurry, and hope which led her on showed in her face.
A sister of Mrs. Lincoln is here. She brings the freshest scandals from Yankeeland. She says she rode with Lovejoy. A friend of hers commands a black regiment. Two Southern horrors - a black regiment and Lovejoy.
March 31st. - Met Preston Hampton. Constance Cary was with me. She showed her regard for him by taking his overcoat and leaving him in a drenching rain. What boyish nonsense he talked; said he was in love with Miss Dabney now, that his love was so hot within him that he was waterproof, the rain sizzed and smoked off. It did not so much as dampen his ardor or his clothes.
April 1st. - Mrs. Davis is utterly depressed. She said * * *
302 the fall of Richmond must come; she would send her children to me and Mrs. Preston. We begged her to come to us also. My husband is as depressed as I ever knew him to be. He has felt the death of that angel mother of his keenly, and now he takes his country"s woes to heart.
April 11th. - Drove with Mrs. Davis and all her infant family; wonderfully clever and precocious children, with unbroken wills. At one time there was a sudden uprising of the nursery contingent. They laughed, fought, and screamed. Bedlam broke loose. Mrs. Davis scolded, laughed, and cried. She asked me if my husband would speak to the President about the plan in South Carolina, which everybody said suited him. "No, Mrs. Davis," said I. "That is what I told Mr. Davis," said she. "Colonel Chesnut rides so high a horse. Now Browne is so much more practical. He goes forth to be general of conscripts in Georgia. His wife will stay at the Cobbs"s."
Mrs. Ould gave me a luncheon on Sat.u.r.day. I felt that this was my last sad farewell to Richmond and the people there I love so well. Mrs. Davis sent her carriage for me, and we went to the Oulds" together. Such good things were served - oranges, guava jelly, etc. The Examiner says Mr. Ould, when he goes to Fortress Monroe, replenishes his larder; why not? The Examiner has taken another fling at the President, as, "haughty and austere with his friends, affable, kind, subservient to his enemies." I wonder if the Yankees would indorse that certificate. Both sides abuse him. He can not please anybody, it seems. No doubt he is right.
My husband is now brigadier-general and is sent to South Carolina to organize and take command of the reserve troops. C. C. Clay and L. Q. C. Lamar are both spoken of to fill the vacancy made among Mr. Davis"s aides by this promotion.
To-day, Captain Smith Lee spent the morning here and gave a review of past Washington gossip. I am having * * *
303 such a busy, happy life, with so many friends, and my friends are so clever, so charming. But the change to that weary, dreary Camden! Mary Preston said: "I do think Mrs. Chesnut deserves to be canonized; she agrees to go back to Camden." The Prestons gave me a farewell dinner; my twenty-fourth wedding day, and the very pleasantest day I have spent in Richmond.