The Highland weekly news. [volume] (Hillsborough [Hillsboro], Highland County, Ohio) 1853-1886, 1865-07-13
HOME FROM THE WAR.
A BEAUTIFUL PICTURE.


the Chicago journal, hangs upon the
wall of an alcove in the Department Of
Photographs. 1t is Mrs. s. NJ: Fassctt's
exquisite picture of "Home from the
War"
You look, as through window, into
q room with hero in IL, and he the
central figure. Struck by a fragment
of shetland bit of ragged iron lies
on the floor before bim-that carried
away one foot, he swung himself back
over the old threshold upon crutches,
and more of man than when he went
forth. Leaning forward, with a hand
upon his ankle, he looks up into his
fathers noble old face, upon which
grief and indignation are blended, and
is telling him the story of his wound
and of his dreadful days in the hell of
rebel prison. He wears that express
sion of strange calm, that they only
ever wear with whom the bitterness of
death is passed, and there can be no
more suffering.
At his left, where she ought to be,
and very near his heart, sits the young
wife, who waited and wept and prayed
and hoped for him, all the long years.
Her eyes are ready to overflow; she has
paused in her work as her hero talks;
the knife with which she was pairing
apples is idle in her hand; and bit of
the rind hangs over the blade like a red
ribbon. Beside her knee, stands lit.
tie girl--hers and his-her hands clasp
ed behind her, and working, as you can
see, with strange Excitement her face
with her wondering soul in it turned
full upon her father. We may here say
} that it is portrait of Flora, the artists
sweet little daughter.
Beside the grandfather stands an
= older daughter Of the soldier, her sym
pathetic nature all absorbed in the sad
story. There is far away look in her
eye, as if she saw the terrible secrets
of tho prison house, and the clash oi
the battle, and an intensity too, as if
had God made her such a man, she
would have struck telling blow for
liberty.
There is yet third child; that ami
NAL, a boy, whom, like Mrs. Stowe
"Charley," nobody seemed to know
what to do with except the artist. lie
has taken possession of one of his faith.
cr'S crutohes and has mounted it for a
@ ride; his face is rounded out with rogue.
f ry and laughter; little cares he for the
! story of camp and field. He is making
J., for his grandmother who sits turned
G from you, looking out of an open win
}, dow. A little wheel stands idly before
O her, she has just drawn her foot from
the freddie, and swung up her spectacle'
upon her forehead; she too has pauset
s to listen.
o And there you have the unbroker
10 circle of love, and they are all photo
u graphs of the living, The soldier dic
~ wear the blue and bear a dreadful
~ wound, and languish in the Tophet o
treason. AS for the rest, they wer
gathered in, like the players, to max
the little dramatic corps complete. s.
: much was the work Of the photograph
by er; the surroundings were the work o
na the artist; the sun made the one, an
't' the daughter the other, but the work o
the brush and of the beam are so har
moniously welded that thoy are ono
and you think it went upon the easel
blank breadth of canvass, and left it
- beautiful painting. The grouping {
the figures is most artistically managed
and the accessories are admirable. III
mantel, with its old-fashioned lanter
: aud its iron candle.sticks, not guiltlei
:" of tallow; the old family clock that hg
measured the lives Of hOusehold;. ii
festoons of the goddess Pomopsi IL
!. picture of Lincoln upon the wall, an
beneath it, done in chalk, by that ra
cal Of "Charley," gallows-tres ar
Davis, treasons ripest fruit, upon it au
ready to be plucked; Itbe slate, with
kot company Of soldiers and great captai
" scrawled upon it, all looking like
: many spiders rampant, betraying Il
martial ardor of the young geni
'on astride his fathers crutch; the cante'
,tn upon the floor, the broken walt
the whole scene in its details, even extsn
a.. ing to the calm summer landscape Sc
through the open window, and the G
of upon the sunny sill, was the work OF
east loving heart and a skillful hand. AS
IS. marriage of two arts, and the joint wo
able Of two hearts, it is worthy of the woI
y VIC have given it. We Do not wou(