The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1906-05-18
By.
GEORGE
CARY
EGGLESTON

A
thought:
"And when I get to Cairo-what
then? I've good university educa-
ton. but doubt that there Is ready
market for education in any busting
Missouri river town just now. I'm
graduate In law, but heaven knows l
know very little about the profession
aside from the broad underlying prin-
ciples. Besides, shall have no money
with which to open an office, and who
is going to employ a wandering and
utterly destitute stranger 10 take
charge Of his legal businessT
For the moment encouragement |
dominated the young mans MIND, put
presently there came to him reflection
that gave new birth to his courage.
I'm six feet high" he thought, "and
broad In proportion. I'm in perfect
physical health. l have muscles that
nothing has ever yet tired. Between
the Wilderness and Appomattox l have
had an extensive experience in shovel
ing earth and other hard work. I'm In
exceedingly good training, trihe I'M
derfed, perhaps, but at any rate carry
not one ounce of supertiuous fat on my
person | am perfectly equipped for
the hardest kind of physical work, and
in busy western town there is sure 10
be work enough of that kind for a
strong and willing man TO do. can nj
the very least earn enough as laborer
TO feed me better than I've been fed for
the four years of war"
Curiously enough. this prospect or
work as a day laborer greatly cheered
the young man. Instead OF depressing
his spirits it for the first time lifted
from his soul that incubus of melan-
chOlv with which every Confederate
soldier of his class was at first OPP
pressed. Ever since Grant had refused
i'm the wilderness a year before to re-
tire beyond the river after receiving
Lees tremendous blows Guilford Dun
can and all Confederates of like intel
ligence had foreseen the end and had
recognized its coming as inevitable.
Nevertheless when it came in fact,
when the Army of Northern Virginia
surrendered and when the Confederacy
ceased to be the event was scarcely
less shocking and depressing TO their
minds than if 1t had been an untore-
seen and unexpected one.
The melancholy that instantly took
possession of such minds amounted TO
scarcely less than insanity, and for
prolonged period it paralyzed energy
and made worse the ruin that war had
wrought in the south.
Fortunately Guilford Duncan, thrown
at once and absolutely upon his own
resources, thus quickly escaped from
the overshadOwing cloud.
And vet his case seemed worse than
that of most Of his comrades. They at
least had homes Of some sort TO 90 TO;
he had none. There was for them, debt
burdened as their plantations were. at
least a hope that some way out might
ultimately be found. For him there
was no inch Of ground upon which he
might rest even a hope.
Born of an old family, he had been
bred and educated as one 10 whom
abundance was TO come by inheritance,
a man destined from birth to become
i'm time the master OF a great patrimo-
NAL estate.
But that estate was honeycombed
with hereditary debt, the result OF gen
erations Of lavish living, wasteful
methods of agriculture and overgener-
Gus hospitality About the time when
I war came there came also crisis III
the affairs Of Guilford Duncan's father
' Long before the war ended the elder
4 man had surrendered everything he
e had i'm the world to his creditors. lie
had then enlisted in the army though
q he was more than sixty years old. He
0 had been killed in the trenches before
e Petersburg leaving his only son. Gull
e ford. not only without a patrimony and
i without a home but also without any
I family connection closer than some
distant half theoretical cousinships
The young mans mother had gently
g passed from earth so long ago that h'
t only dimly remembered the sweet no
5 bility Of her character, and he haC
never had either brother or sister.
He was thus absolutely alone In tn
world, and he was penniless, too, as h
: rode down the mountain sleeps. Blu
the impulse Of work had come to him
Il and he joyfully welcomed it as some
thing vastly better and worthier of hi
I! strong young manhood than any brood
= ing over misfortune could be or an.
e leading of the old aristocratic, half idl
planter life, if that had been possible.
In connection with this thought cam
e another. He had recently read Owe
:, Meredith's Lucille" and as he jour
neyed be recalled the case there dc
-" scribed Of the French nobleman VIII
for time wasted his life and neglect
l. ed his splendid opportunities In brood
. ing over the downfall of the Bourbo
/! dynasty and In an obstinate refusal
y reconcile himself to the new order o
things Duncan remembered how, aft
ter awhile, when the new France bt
came involved in the Crimean war, tn
% Frenchman saw a clearer light; how
= learned TO feel that, under one regim
= or another, it was still France that
loved and to France that his best serv
To- I,,n