The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1906-09-27

A4AoS q k'A4AON VI LID OClOuAS, O1CN luc
saddle blanket over his shoulders to
keep out the night chill, loosened his
belt and straightway fell asleep.
Before doing so, however, faint with
hunger as he was and weary to the
verge of collapse, he had little cere-
mony to perform, and he performed it
in answer to a sentimental fancy. With
the point of his sword he found an
earth bank free of rock and dug a
trench there. In it he placed his sword
in its scabbard and with it's belt and
sword knot attached. Then, drawing
the earth over it and stamping it down,
be said:
"That ends the soldier chapter of my
life. I must turn to the work of peace
now. have no fireplace over which to
hang the trusty blade. It is better to
bury it here in the mountains, in the
midst of desolation, and forever to for
get all that it suggests
When he walked in the morning a
soaking, persistent, pitiless rain was
falling. The young mans clothing was
so completely saturated that as he
stood erect the water streamed from
his elbows, and he felt it trickling
down his body and his legs.
This is pretty good substitute for
bath, y he thought as he removed his
garments and with strong, nervous
hands wrung the water out Of them as
laundresses do with linen.
He had no means of kindling a fire,
and there was no time for that at any
rate. Guilford Duncan had begun to
feel the pangs not of mere hunger, but
of actual starvation-the pains that
mean collapse and speedy death. He
knew that he must find food for him
self, and that quickly. Otherwise he
must die there, helpless and alone, on
the desolate mountain side.
he might, indeed, kill his horse and
live for few days upon it's flesh until
it should spoil. But such relief would
be only a postponing Of the end, and
without the horse he doubted that he
could travel far toward that western
land which he had half unwittingly
fixed upon as his goal.
He was we'll up in the mountains
now and near the crest of the great
range. The valley lay beyond, and he
we'll knew that he would find no food
supplies in that region when he should
come to cross it. Sheridan had done a
perfect work Of war there, so devas-
tating one of the most fruitful regions
on all Gods earth that in picturesque
words he had said, ''The crow that flies
over the valley of Virginia must car
~ his rations with him."
In the high mountains matters were
not much better. There had been no
battling up there in the land of the
sky, but the scars and the desolation
Of war were manifest even upon noun
tain sides and mountain tops.
For four years the men who dwelt
in the rude log cabins of that frost bit
ten and sterile region had been serv-
ing as volunteers in the army, fighting
for cause which was none of theirs
and which they did not at all under
stand or try to understand. They
fought upon instinct alone It had al
ways been the custom of the mountain
jewellers to shoulder their guns and go
into the thick of every fray which
seemed to them in any way to threaten
their native land. They went blindly,
they fought desperately, and they en-
dured manfully. Ignorant, illiterate,
abjectly poor, Injured to hardship
through generations, they asked no
questions the answers to which they
could not understand. It was enough
for Thorn fn fhot %ho;u L. 4
was invaded by an armed foe. When
ever that occurred they were ready to
meet force with force and to do their
humble mightiest to drive that foe
away or to destroy him without asking
even who he was.
During the absence of four wears
their homes had fallen into fearful
desolation. Those homes were log cab
ms, clinked and daubed, mostly having
earthen floors and chimneys built of
sticks thickly plastered with mud. But,
humble as they were, they were homes,
and they held the wives and children
whom these men loved.
The little mountain homesteads had
been spared devastation. But in war it
is not ''the enemy" alone who lays
waste. Such little cribs and granaries
and smokehouses as these poor noun
tain jewellers owned had been despoil-
ed of their stores to feed the armies in
the field. Their boys, even those as
young as fourteen, had been drawn
into the army. Their hogs, their sheep,
the few milk COWS they possessed, had
been taken away from them. Their
scanty oxen had been converted into
army beef, and those of them who
owned a horse or a mule had been
compelled to surrender the animal for
military use, receiving in return only
Confederate treasury notes, now worth
no more than so much Of waste paper.
Nevertheless Guilford Duncan per-
fectly understood that he must look to
the impoverished people Of the high
mountains for a food supply in this
his sore extremity. Therefore, instead
OF crossing the range by way of any Of
inc main Travelled passes, he pushed