Miss Sylvy,” asked Joe, rather solemnly, “would you be so kin’ as ter tell me whar you hail from?”
“Do you mean where I was born?” Joe nodded. “Well, I’m very sorry, but I can’t tell you,” and the colour surged perceptibly under her dark skin.
“H’m,” said Joe, pressing his lower lip over the upper one, as he had a habit of doing when he considered any matter required careful thought. Then after a pause, “Well, your las’ name, Miss Sylvy, will you tell me dat? I don’ rightly remember eber to have heard it.”
“Sylvester, Joe, but it’s a name I chose for myself. I do not know what name I was born to.”
“Why, however, Miss Sylvy, did dat happen?” and Joe showed such deep and tender interest that Sylvia, who cared to talk on the subject with very few, gladly entered into a full explanation. She told him, as she had 065told Courage that summer night so many years before on Larry’s lighter, how she had found herself landed in the orphan asylum, with no name as far as any one knew, excepting just Sylvia, and how she had named herself Sylvester after one of the ladies who came to the asylum to teach. And then she continued, giving a brief outline of her life since that time, all of which proved most absorbing to Joe, because with the telling of Sylvia’s story he learnt so much of interest about Miss Courage as well.
“But, Honey,” he asked at the end of the story, with a sigh as of one who has listened with an intentness bordering upon fatigue, “who put you in dat ’sylum?”
“Some one just left me at the asylum at night, with a card pinned on to my dress with ‘Sylvia’ written on it, and saying that I had neither father nor mother, and then ran away in the darkness, but I don’t believe any one related to me would have treated me like that. I would rather you would not say anything about all this, Joe. It is only because you are one of my own people and seem so kind and interested that I have told you.”
“Thank you bery much for de confidence, Miss Sylvy, for my ole heart went right out to you from de day you done come walkin’ up de 066path at Little Homespun, but I’ll keep it safe, Miss Sylvy, never you fear.”
Joe and Sylvia had been busy washing dishes and clearing up after the luncheon, and it was when their work was finished and they were waiting under the chestnut tree for the others to come back, that they had had their little talk. It reached its natural conclusion just as Colonel Anderson came strolling up from the river, blowing a shrill whistle between two fingers, the signal previously agreed upon to call the children together.
“Now, do you know,” he said, when the little company had bestowed itself in much the same fashion as in the morning, “I have an idea that you will have to let Joe and me do all the talking now. We have only a short afternoon before us, and there is a great deal to tell.”
No one looked as though that would be the least hardship, and Joe explained that he himself would rather listen than talk, “less’n de. Colonel disremembered somethin’ very important.”
“Likely as not I shall, Joe, but it seems the point at which to commence this afternoon is with General Lee. At the time that he married Miss Mollie Custis he was a lieutenant in the United States Army, but he had gradu067ated at the head of his class at West Point only two years before. After he was married, as you know, he made his home at Arlington, but he had to be away from it much of the time because of his duties in the army. He was a fine fellow, I can tell you, and held one responsible position after another. He was right in the thick of our war with Mexico, and won rapid promotion for his courage and daring. After a brilliant charge at Chapultepec, when he was severely wounded, he was made a brevet-colonel by General Scott. It seemed after that as though he was everywhere where a brave, fearless man was needed. He was in command in Texas when the Indians were attacking the settlers there; and was in many a bloody engagement. Later on, he was the commanding officer when the house was charged at Harper’s Ferry, where John Brown had taken refuge. I wish there was time, children, to stop and tell you about John Brown. You know the old song about ‘John Brown’s body lies a mouldering in the grave, but his soul goes marching on.’ Get Joe here to sing it for you some day, if you don’t. Well, you see by all this that General Lee had done a great deal for his country; but there came a day when he felt it his duty to turn against it, that is, to take up arms against the 068United States. You all know how the great civil war finally came about; how the Northern States thought the Southern States should not hold slaves, and how the Southern States thought they had the right to decide whether they should or not without any interference from the North, and so banded themselves together and said they would secede from the United States and form a confederacy of their own. This Virginia, whose air we are breathing this minute, was one of those states, and was General Lee’s native state as well; and when the time came to choose between his state and his country, he decided to side with the Confederacy. Then, of course, there was nothing for him to do but to resign from the United States Army. He sent his letter of resignation to General Scott on the twenty-second of April, 1861, and then at once left Arlington with his wife and children, for it was quite too near to Washington for him to stay now that he had taken a stand against the Government, and the very next day he was made commander-in-chief of the army in Virginia. A few days before this, that is, on the fifteenth of April, President Lincoln had called for seventy-five thousand volunteers, and three days after the Lees had left, the great army of the North came pouring into Washington and all the 069country round about. Camp-fires crackled among the oaks at Arlington, and the house itself was taken possession of by the officers, When the troops first arrived at Arlington they tramped through the deserted rooms, remaining just as the Lees had left them, and concluding that ‘all’s fair in love and war,’ they simply helped themselves to the forsaken treasures.
“Oh, but dose were drefful days!” said Joe, as though he must give vent to the thoughts Colonel Anderson’s words had stirred: “I neber can forgive dose union soldiers, neber. Seems as dough dey might done have respect for a gentleman’s place, but not a bit of it. Seemed as dough dey could not be spiteful ‘nuff ’gainst de General. Des fancy seein’ things dat had belonged to Washington himself carried out of de house, and sol’ in de streets up dere in de city of Washington, and some of de negroes—shame on ’em!—ran away with things an’ sol’ ’em for more money dan dey themselves would have sol’ for ’fo’ de wah. Oh, it was pitiful to see the flower beds and lawns tramped over, as dough dey had been so much rubbish, and it wa’n’t long befo’ de smooth green terraces were just ragged mud-banks. You’d have thought I’d have gone away, wouldn’t you? But I couldn’t bring my070self to leave de ole place, until I ’listed an’ went down to Alabama wid a coloured regiment. Dere, Colonel, I done interrupt you, didn’t I? But really, I was des thinkin’ aloud more dan talkin’, for I des can’t keep my thoughts to myself, when I grows ’stracted over de troublousness of dose times.”
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