The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1899-07-23

My wife, Mrs. Arp, hadn't been away
from home for two years. 1t is said
that setting hen never gets fat, but
these human hens do, and so the girls
thought their mother ought to rouse up
and go somewhere and take rest. 1t
was Il great undertaking to get her off.
1t took Il whole week to get her apparel
in trst-class condition for she waSn
raised on common clothes and won't
wear them now especially when she goes
abroad or to church. We finally got her
off though the train liked to have left
: her while she was saying g0Odby and
kissing all the little grandchildren. One
of the girls went with her, but | was to
scatter around at home. Two weeks
was the time she gave herself, for she
says that is as long as anybody ought
to stay anywhere on Il visit. for some
times folks wear out their welcome and
don't know it. In fact one week is the
safest She went to Rome, where our
Oldest boy and his family live and where
she lived for twenty seven years. Some
of her early friends are still there and
they came to see her, of course, and talk
ed about the dear old times until their
eyes got teary and they drew their chairs
little closer and were merry and sad
by turns as they talked of the living and
the dead. On Sunday she went to our
same old church and sat in the same old
pew and drank in music from the same
old organ but the preacher and the
choir were changed. After service she
was forced to hold a reception in the
vestibule, where old friends and their
children and grandchildren gathered
around her, the friends to greet her and
their children to look upon their matron
of the olden time of whom they had
heard. Yes this wonderful woman who
so gently dominated her lord and master
and kept him so sweetly subdued that
he liked the subjugation.
She spent delightful week and the
programme for another was already ar
ranged when on Saturday some bird OF
the air told her that | was sick and she
could hardly wait for the evening train.
had been sick, very sick, but the crisis
had passed and for fear she might hear
it and cut short her stay | wrote her
that | was getting well and to finish her
rest. She is not that kind of woman
or wife. and sure enough about u D. m.
| happened to look out of the window
and saw her coming up the lawn like
she feared | would die before she got
here. Then / had to tell her as how l
was taken down on Wednesday for my
same old kidneys got belllgerent again
and wrestled with me and threw me and
/ had vertigo and lumbago and embargo,
and my elegalls ached and how the doc
tor treated me heroically and scandalous-
ly and dosed me with something every
two hours-all different-and nobody
can tell what cured me.
But all's well that ends well, and now
| am in for another lease. OF course an
old wagon will break down ever and
anon and has to be patched up and kept
creased, or it can't go. BY and by it will
all collapse and turn to dust like the
One-hoss shay.
And now here comes The Philadelphia
Record just to disturb my tranquility
and aggravate me into using more lam
guage on those yankee editors. l have
already used up all my adJectves on
Boston and never dreamed l would need
any for the Quaker City. The Record
pretends to be Democratic paper, but
it has got whole column about the An
derSonville prison and its horrors. which
it says have created sentiment that
will last as long as time. and how the
poor creatures were shot down like dogs
and starved, and had to dig wells TWEEN
ty-five feet deep with their hands and
scraps of shells in Il vain effort to get
water to drink. etc. Well, it is awful
to read, but | would like to know where
those shells came from-must have fed
the boys on oysters.
Yes. Blaine charged all those horrors
upon us in terrible speech. and Ben
Hill replied to him in one of the great
est speeches of his life and refuted every
charge and did it from the war records
and proved to the world that Grant ana
Stanton and Lincoln were responsible
for every death and all the distress that
occurred at Andersonville. They utterly
refused to exchange prisoners with us
when importuncd to do SO for the sake
of humanity. for Grant said that our
men Inv northern prisons would go back
to fighting again. We begged them to
send us rations and medicine for their
men and told them that both might be
distributed by their own officers and sur
eoons. They refused this and of course
their men died like sheep. for we had
no medicines and our own rations were
corn meal and salt pork. But those pris-
oners had just what their guards had.
Ask the guards who still live. Ask Cap
tain Hudson, of Marietta. Ga, one of the
best of men, and he will tell you that the
prisoners had everything that he did ana
there was no inhumMlity. but pity and
sorrow for them and Indignation at the
heartlessness of their government. Read
Percy Gregg's chapter on this Anderson
vile and you will wonder that such III
difference to the misery of their own sol
diers could be found in any government
upon earth Mr.. Gregg declares that If
the great powers of Europe had have
known it they would have been horror
str1ck-that the authorities at Washing
ton were really the murderers of their
own soldiers and they had to appease
the kindred of these soldiers by making
scape goat of poor Writ and hanging
him after Il mock trial.
And yet man who signs himself an
Atlanta Yankee writes me an insulting
letter and tells me to hold up awhile and
let the yankees alone. for the war is
over. We'll, then, let him call off his