Morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven [Conn.]) 1848-1894, 1886-07-30

the heavy guns, which would have laid
Chatham in the dust. With smile he re.
fused, and asking me to walk with him, we
withdrew a short distance. He then mo-
toned me to sit by him on the trunk of a
| large tree.
"Looking across at Chatham through his
field glass he said, Major, 1 never permit
the unnecessary effusion of blood War is
terrible enough at its best to Christian
man; hope yet to see you and your dear
family happy in your old home. Do you
know I love Chatham better than any place
in the world except Arlington? I courted
and won my dear wife under the shade OF
those trees. By the way not long since
was riding out with my staff, and observing
how your grand old trees had been cut down
by those people, I saw that magnificent
tulip poplar at the head of the ravine north
of the house was still standing, and with
somewhat of your rhetoric I said to Venable
and TAYLOR: ''There is nothing in vegetable
nature grand as a tree. Graphing with
its roots the granite foundations of the ever
lasting hills, it reaches its sturdy and
gnarled trunk on high, spreads its branches
to the heavens, casts its shadow on the
sward and the birds build their nests and
sing amid its outrageous foliage. Behold
the monarch stripped of attendants and
guards awes the vandal by the simple majes-
ty of his sublime isolation" Pocketing my
feld-glass and riding on [ heard mingled
tlemen that I would bring my glass to bear
once more on the monarch of the forest. /
looked and even while I had been talking
the axe of the vernal was laid to the root
and the monarch had fallen.
''Then, moved by emotion unusual to his
calm and equable nature, he continued, I
had three hundred acres of woodland at Ar
lington. Serving the United States govern
ment for many years the frontier, l
marked with my own hand each tree that
was to be used for timber fuel. They tell
me all my trees are gone-yours are all gone;
then rising from the log with a fire and a
passion rarely witnessed in him, and with all
the majesty of his sublime presence, he said:
Major, they have our trees; they shall never
have the land!'
''Three years after the close of the war l
was visitor at the home of General Lee,
then president of Washington and Lee uni
versity After dinner the general retired
and I was invited to see Mrs. Lee in her
chamber She was great sufferer and con-
firmed invalid, incapable of motion save in
a roller chair, which it was the chief delight
of him who had so long directed great ar
mics to move from room to room, bending
over her with the grace of Sidney and the
devotion of youthful lover. [ told Mrs.
Lee the story which I have so imperfectly at
tempted to reproduce. Need tell any wo-
man who reads these pages that tears
streamed down that patient, furrowed face,
or that light and joy from beyond the stars
beamed through those tears, as she knew
that the thoughts of her great husband wan
dered far away from the clash of arms to the
memories of their youthful love and court
ship under the shade of her ancestral oaks,
for Chatham was originally the property of
near relative. AS concluded the sentence,
They shall never have the land,' hearing
slight noise, turned and saw the general,
who had silently entered, in dressing gown
and slippers. The great buckshot drops
slowly rolled down that face, whose calm
was never broken by the earthquake shock
of battle. Slowly and silently he retired,
and could but feel the deepest compunc
ton that words of mine should have sent
another pang through that great heart"