The Newtown bee., 1896-06-05

thFF Cl " AlttL tt'l4 iA+ Jot@ t1l'NNN1 SNAH N that spiritIcss, meek, fuded-out creature there: She is 8 resident here. l have seen Ter often; but she is so colorless 1 never had the curiosity to ask even her name. am sure she never had vivid emotion, never really lived in all her life"
 ''Perhaps not" laughed the writer; ''but believe she has a story. will fl d it out and tell it tn you.
 This is the story she told month later; Martin Davis did not look much like man with es1hctic sentiment in his souIa he Jeff his blow in the furrow that aften- noon in early April and drove his tired horses up the Ilue, His face WIS ,9eatb- crbcaten, his hands rough and hard, hi. clothing cheap and coarse, his high boots, into which his jeans trousers were tuck ed. cakod with mud. Bu5 he WIS young and vigorous, his eyes were bright and eager, and he felt himself a Uan to ce cnvied; for had ne not wife waiting for him at the hou<o-a bride oG d few weeks? In the band of his rusty felt hat he had 7Iipprd bunch of yellow yoiIe17.
 II knew ye liked posies, Ljzzro," he said, as he handed them tn hc~ At the kitchen door; '.ard these arc the flrsc 've seen this season, 'thout it's the Ii5t;e white wndn ,wcrs that wilt while ye'ro pickin' 'en. These yellow things are way ahead of time I've never found 'en be- fore earlier thau May; they re not com mon hcrcabouts anyhow but ! know of d spot down in the holler where thcy always il .urish.'
 When he put them in a toacup and set them on R. supper table he wondered vaguely why he had never known before that Mowers made d room lock so cheer fuI- lmost as if tho sun were shining, tho that lu1umagy had sunk behind the western hill. He did not kno " that the brightness was not of the fl overs but was the light of love ref cted from his heart and hers.
 It was but brief time that his happi- ncsa lasted. That was the spring of 'GI, and the country was even then cali E upon her loyal sons. Martin Davis turn d his horses into the pasture, left his crops for others to harvest, and went unhcsilAtirgly to answer the call. Oh, the hproi,m of the myriad5 who thus went out from home, and peace, and love, to the Dattlt field in those dreadful years What if they did not know that the nine " days would lcngth2u until no man could name the end, and that the slain would be like the leaves of the forest for numbers? What if they did go simply from & n atter-of-fact sense of duty, and with little feeling of risk and danger, or because the riotous spirit of youth yearn- ed for adventure? The fact remains the tremendous, immutabIe fact-that they went by hundreds, by thousands, by tens and hundreds of thousands, and that they offered their lives. Greater love than this hath no man; and yet we, in this frivolous later day, which knows no war-we dare sometimes speak light ly of those men and their sacrifices.
 It was a mOnOtonous and a hard life for the most part, that of a private soldier in the war for the Union. It's story has been told in fragments at home ffresides and by campfires, but never in literature as whole for the world to know. Per, baps it never will be. The veterans tell of battles and victories and of stirring events; but they do not, as 8 class, care to dwell upon their hardships and suffer- ing. The experience cut deep, and he scars are even yet too near the surface to touch upon.
 Martin Davis life was not different from the rest. There was the drill and the camp life, the picket duty, the march ing, the digging of trenches and building of breastworks, the skirmishing, the ex-. pectatiOn of encounters with the enemy all this for slow and weary months, and at last great battle.
 Lizzie, the young wife at home, waited from week to week and month to month, as women did in those days, with what show of patience and composure they could muster-a proof of courage and patriotism not less than that of going to war. The soldiers story may some time be told; but where is the historian who shall describe the agony of the women's waiting hearts, the suffering of uncertain ty and suspense? Who shall comprehend the anguish of tears? Who understand that the strain of constant dread of evil news SEom husband and brother and lover was greater than that felt by the soldier before the enemy's guns-that it left un- healed scars which aged them before