Highland recorder. (Monterey, Highland County, Va.) 1877-1972, 1906-08-24

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, lighting
for cause which was none of theirs
and which they did not ut all under
stand or try to understand. They
fought upon instinct alone. 1t had al
WAYS been the custom of tho mountain
dwellers 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. 1t was enough
for them to know that their native land
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.
Du.inn fbO ahcoucn Of fOnr VOlrS
their homes had fallen into fearful
desolatiOn. Those homes were log cab
ms, clnkcd and daubed. mostly having
earthen floors and chimneys built of
sticks thicily 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 1.-The enemy" alone who lays
waste. Such little cribs and granaries
and smOkchouSes as these poor noun
tain dwellcrs 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 horse or 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 food supply in this
his sore extremity. Therefore, instead
of crossing the range by way of any OF
the main Travelled passes, he pushed
his grass refreshed steed straight up
Mount Pleasant to its topmost heights.
There, about noon, he came upon a
lonely cabin whose owner had reached
home from the war only day or two
earlier.
There was an air of desolation and
decay about the place; but, knowing
the ways Of the mountaineers, the
young man did not despair of securing
some food there, for even when the
mountaineer is most prosperous his
fences are apt to be down. his roof out
of repair and all his surroundings to
wear, the look of abandonment and
despair.
Duncan began by asking for dinner
for himself and horse, and the re-
spouse was what he expected in that
land of poverty stricken but always
generous hospitality.
saint got much to offer you, cap'n,"
said the owner, "but SIGH as 1t is you're
welcome"
Meanwhile he had given the horse
dozen ears of corn, saying:
Reckon 'twon't hurt him. He don't
look s if he'd been a-feedin' any too
hearty, an reckon dozen ears won't
founder him."
For dinner there were a scanty piece
of bacon, boiled with wild mustard
plants for green's and some po1es OF
corn bread.
To Guilford Duncan in his starving
condition this seemed veritable feast.
The eating of it so far refreshed him
that he cheerfully answered all the
questions put to him by his shirt
sleeved host.
1t is a tradition in Virginia that no.
body can ask so many questions as
Yankee, and yet there was never
people so mistakenly given to asking
questions of a purely and impertinent-
Iy personal character as were the Nir-
ginians of anything less than the nigh
er and gentler class. They question
ed guest not so much because of any
idle curiosity concerning his affairs as
because of u friendly desire to mani
fest interest in him and in what might
concern him.
"What mout your name be, cap'n"
the host began as they sat at dinner.
"My name is GuilfOrd Duncan" re-
piled the young man. But | am not
q captain now. I'm only very poor
young man-greatly poorer than you
are, for at least you own home and a
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