The National tribune., 1897-04-01

she would not believe me, but seemed to think
! was only hedging to gain time to make a big
ger story, which / wasn't, for the women folk
of my family are none of them, either young
enough or old enough to want to brag of their
years. dropped the conversation as gently as
could without dimming the glory of her ac-
count of years. while my brother locked ear
nesty out of the window, never helping me
bit.
"You have good many people here to see
the battlefelds, do yon not?" asked.
Yes, all sorts" she responded. And they
mostly want things to cat and never pays for
them" @
This seemed bit personal. bnt went on as
brayely as could and conversed with her while
shegrieyed that had no news of any sickness
in Washington. She gave me a list of her ills
and medicine bottles Her main interest in
life seemed to be sickness. She wanted to
know il this had not been "a sickiy year.:
wasn't last year scky"? She said she was
not living in the old Stone House "endurin'
the war" She "liyed up the run aways,"
where she heard it "a-penty."
SO
about the battcfelds, but he began an un-
coutl. unpleasant TRADE against the Yankees
so we excused ourselves and departed for the
old Henry House. On the way we moralized
over the old woman. She was born in 1912,
when the echoes Of the great Revolutionary
war had hardly died away and we were on the
verge Of second war with old England She
had been young matron in the days of the
Mexican War, aud OH the threshold of old age
when our civil war began. How much of the
history of men had she had the opportunity to
watch! What great changes wrought in her
days. and she remained all the while the same
Indifferent bit Of humanity, nnmoved by the
great whirl of events. never stirred from her
little routine of duties her little joys aud little
fuses. She must have felt dimly the great
history of her days In her girlhood, if one
had prophecied the powers of electricity. he
would have been dubbed witless fellow; and
the locomotive was uudreamt of. Bicycles we're
no wonder to her, she simply refused to imagine
them. Old Time had clutched her Imagination
and activity Of thought. and bicycles and
bicycling seemed to be meaningless tumble of
sounds to her.
We tried to find old Mr. Henry. who, as We
battle. lie saw it all, and tells the same tale
of it over and over again to the visitors, begin.
ming again at the beginning, if he be inter.
rupted. He, too, has seen something more
than 80 Summers, and is deaf and feeble. We
knocked many times at his doors, but there was
no response. SO we wandered around his house
for awhile. looked at the monument to the
patriots of 1861, at the shells and cannon balls,
and ut the grave Of Judith Henry the old bed.
ridden woman who was killed during the
battle by the explosion of shell. The grave
was covered with the blue of myrtle bloom.
We call it myrtle; rightly it is periwinkle.
The little blue blossoms were all crowdng
through the grass. The peace of the grave,
the still afternoon, the Towering sward the
blue skies. and the lispng little run" had
but little to remind us of the fierce days of
war. and it was almost impossible to believe
that great bands of men had one day surged
back. aud forth, fighting for every inch of the
ground, reddening the little stream with their
blood, now losing, now gaining, now pushing,
now yielding, until at last the sun dropped in
the West and ended that dreadful day.
~
We journeyed Oh towards Washington, fol.
lowing the old military road and stopping at
farmhouses or the little inns for rest and food.
Along the road we saw about the houses little
mounds of she'll aud cannon balls and other
relics of the war. The pike was as miserable
as the Virginia road is apt to be, with one high,
stony road in the middle, the winter road"
and q narrow Summer road" on each side.
We crossed many little brooks and there were
fragrant musical stretches through pine forests.
We watched red bird from the Old Stone
Bridge across Bull Run. There was red-head
woodpecker there, too-a clean, fearless, busy
When Baby was sick, we gave her Castoria.