The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866. Various
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to urge such a claim on a community like ours. Yet we found ourselves obliged to exhaust all the persistency and tact we had. For every conceivable reason Barton refused to respond to our appeals. The minister, Mr. Ford, declared to me that the sentiment of loyalty did not exist in America. Sometimes, he said, he wished he lived under a monarchy. He envied the heartfelt cheers with which Victoria's name was met, everywhere on British ground. "But you can't get people to give to Mount Vernon. They are afraid of slavery there. They are afraid of this, that, and the other; but give they will not." He handed me a dollar, in a hopeless way, which was a four-hundredth of his income. The blacksmith's wife would not admit me at all, saying, "There has been one beggar here already this morning!" The butcher's wife gave five cents; but I had my doubts about accepting it, for while I was indignantly relating the desolate condition of the home and tomb of the Father of his Country, and something about its being a spot only fit for a wild pelican to live in, the butcher himself passed through the house, nodding his head at me, and saying loudly, "Not a cent, wife!" The plasterer, Mr. Rice, a respectable Vermonter, asked me who Washington was; and Mrs. Goodwin, the cabinet-maker's wife, said cordially to me, "There 's ten cents towards a tomb. I don't never expect to go down South myself, but maybe my son'll like to be buried there." Her son was buried down South, with many more of our brave Barton boys, little as we thought of it then!
Now, the butcher and baker, the plasterer, and all, have gone to the war. They have learned what it is to have a country to live for. They have learned to hold up the old flag through thunderings and blood, and to die for it joyfully. What a baptism and regeneration it has been! what a new creation! Behold, old things have passed away, and all has become new!
Soon after the battle of Cedar Mountain, and Banks's retreat, we had long, full letters from Robert. He wrote a separate note to me, in which he said, "Be kind to Percy." It was the very thing I had not been,—had not felt it possible to be. But, conscience-stricken, I went up to call at Colonel Lunt's, and read our letters to them. Percy walked home with me, and we talked over the prospects and reverses of the war. Of course we would not allow there were any real reverses.
We went on to my little cottage, and I asked her to come in and rest. I remember it was a very still evening, except for a sad south-wind. The breeze sighed through the pines in front of the house, like the sound of distant water. The long lingering of the sun slanted over Percy's brow, as she sat leaning her head on her hand, and looking away off, as if over thousands of miles. Her pretty pale fingers were purple with working on hospital shirts and drawers, and bloody with pricking through the slipper soles for the wounded men. She was the most untiring and energetic of all the young people; but they all worked well.
We sat there some time without speaking. I was full of thought and anxiety, and I supposed she too might feel deeply about Robert.
"Aunt Marian,—may I call you so?" said she softly, at length looking up.
"Why not, Percy? you always do."
"Only, lately, it has seemed to me you were different."
She crossed the room and sat down on a tabouret so low that she was at my feet, and took my hand with a humble sweetness that would have touched any heart less hard than mine.
"I used to love to hear him call you so!" she went on, caressing my hand, which I did not withdraw, though I should have liked well to do so, for I did not at all like this attitude we had assumed of penitent and confessor. "I can't expect you to be just to me, dear Auntie, because you don't know. But oh! do believe! I never guessed Robert's feelings for me. How could I think of it,—and I a married woman!"
"Married! Percy!" said I, astonished at her agitation and the tears that flowed down her pale face like rain.
"Yes," she answered in a voice so low that I could scarcely hear it.
"Not a widow, Percy Lunt! What do you mean?"
"I think—I believe—my husband is living. He was so a few months ago. But I cannot tell you any more without papa's permission. O, I have suffered so much! You would pity me if you knew all. But I felt as if I must tell you this: and then—you would understand how I might have been, as I was, so wholly preoccupied with my own feelings and interests as never to guess that Robert's was anything but the regard of a friend. And, indeed," she added with a sorrowful smile, "I feel so much older than Robert.—I have gone through so much, that I feel ten years older than he is. You will believe me, Aunt Marian, and forgive me?"
"It is easy to forgive, poor child!" I said, mingling my tears with hers. "I have been cruel and hard-hearted to you. But I felt only for poor Robert, and how could I guess?"
"You couldn't,—and that is why I felt that I must tell you."
"I cannot ask you anything further,—it is very strange."
While Percy kept strong rein on her feelings, her impassive manner had deceived me. Now that my sympathy with her made me more keenly alive to her distress, I saw the deep pain in her pale face, and the unnatural look of grief in one so young. She tied on her hat in her old, hopeless way, and the ivory smoothness of her face spoke of self-centred and silent suffering.
"If papa is willing, I shall come to-morrow, and tell you part, at least, of my sad story; and even if he is not willing, I think I must tell you a part of it. I owe it to you, Aunt Marian!"
"I shall be at home all day, my dear," I said, kissing the poor, pale lips with such tender pity as I had never thought to feel for Percy Lunt.
CHAPTER III
It was early in September, 1862, and on Sunday morning, the day after I had received the promise of at least a partial confidence from Percy. We were to come home together from meeting, and she was to spend the rest of the day quietly with me. Many a query passed through my mind as I walked along. I wondered at a thousand things,—at the mysteries that are directly under our feet,—at the true stories that belong to every family, and are never known but to the trusted few,—at the many that are known but to the one heart, whereon they are cut in sharp letters.
As I approached the meeting-house, I saw Mr. Ford talking earnestly with Colonel Lunt and Mr. Wilder on the porch-step, while the pews were already full, and the clock pointed to ten minutes past the usual time. I had myself been detained until late, and had walked rapidly and quite alone.
The heart of the community was on the qui vive so constantly, that any unusual sign startled and alarmed every one. A minute more, and Mr. Ford passed rapidly up the broad aisle, his face pale with excitement. Instead of the opening prayer, he said to us: "Brethren and sisters! there has been a great battle,—a terrible battle at Antietam! They have sent on to the North for aid for the wounded, who are being brought on as fast as possible to Washington. But they are brought in by thousands, and everything is needed that any of us can spare."
All of us had risen to our feet.
"I have thought we should best serve and praise our God by ministering to the sufferings of our brave boys! God knows what afflictions are in store for us; but all who can aid in this extremity I am sure will do so, and the blessing of those ready to perish will fall on them."
Mr. Ford ceased speaking. He had two boys with McClellan; and then Colonel Lunt, in a few words, stated the arrangements which had already been made by himself and Mr. Wilder, who was a deacon of the church, to convey any articles that might be contributed to the railroad station ten miles away. Whatever was gathered together should be brought to the Common at once, where it would be boxed and put into the wagons.
"Ah, then and there was hurrying to and fro!"
But one hour later saw Barton Common, an enclosed acre of ground, covered with every sort of garment that could by any possibility be useful in a hospital. Besides the incredible numbers of sheets and pillow-cases, wrappers and stockings, which every housekeeper drew forth from her stores, notwithstanding her previous belief and assertion that she "really had nothing more fit to give to the soldiers," there were countless boxes of jellies, preserves, and dried fruit. Everything palatable and transportable was brought, with streaming eyes and throbbing hearts, to the general contribution. From house to house the electric current of sympathy flowed, and by twelve o'clock Barton Common was a sight to behold. Seventeen boxes full