Year: 1864

nieghborhood who are now being supporte


almost entirely by the Government. Ever


ten days rations are issued to them by the brig
ade commissary. Troops of hard featured, bag
gard looking women, come from far and nea
: begging bread OF that Government whic
their natural protectors have vainly endeavor
ed to destroy. One poor creature tremblin,
with the weight of sixty years told me she hat
come twelve miles on foot Widows COM
whose: Husbands have fallen with the dagger
of treason in their hands. Wives and chill
dren come who have been left to starve by
those who should feed them, 10 order that hu-
man rights might be overthrown. Maiden,
come at whose instigation brothers and lovers
have given their lives TO the vilest of despo-
tisms. And the human and generous Govern
ment dispenses its bounty to them all and
asks in return only renunciation of past
misdeeds and future loyalty,


Looking at these poor creatures in their
faded and homespun rags, it is difficult to with
hold from them the feeling Of pity. All of
them are not the self-mRde victims Of want
and suffering. Some who have been steadfastly
opposed to the rebellion have lost their friends
by the sweeping and merciless conscriptions
Others, too weak to think for themselves have
been induced by designing knaves to give
their votes and influence to the rebellion, and
now suffer the consequences of stupidity rath-
er than crime.


But the social condition Of these people il
not less lamentable than their physical one.
Slavery has in great measure destroyed
their instincts, and annulled the restraints of
civilized society. The marriage rite and its
sacred obligations is scarcely more observed
among them than it was in France at the pc
riod of the revolution. Mixture with the
blacks is by no means uncommon. Yet here
are the ehtUalry, who have so sneeriugly
decried the Northern people for their i" free
love doctrines and amalgamatory incIiua-
tions What more than Egyptian darkness
has beshrouded the Southern mind i
Thank God, the dawn is breaking for them
Heaven hasten the coming of the MONDAY
sun.


The influence Of association is strikingly IL
lustrated in the dialect almost universal in
the South. 1t is clearly and emphaticalIy the
negro broGue. 1t is by no means eschewed
in the highest circles, though somewhat modi-
fed. But among the lower classes it is al
most precisely the phraseology of the African
But the adoption of this language is doubtless
one of the means used by Southern philan-
thropists for the elevation OF the negro.


The Wickedest and vilest of mankind has
an inalienable interest in the cause of truth
and human progress. The soldiers of the
Union are fighting, not for themselves alone, |
but for their very enemies. They are fght- |
ing civilization into the Southern heart and |
mind. They are fighting barbarism cut Of
them. They are stripping from them mana
cles more oppressive and inhuman than the |
chains Of the slave. They are enfranchising
the negro not more than they are the white
man. 1t is the Anglo Saxon of America
whom they are giving their lives and comfort
to save. They are rescuing him from his own |
insane efforts at selEdestruction. History |
will raptuousIy record how the patriots Of
1853 offered themselves up by hecatombs for
the salvation of their very foes. The glowing
muse will never weary of recounting


g How they went forth to die,


Counting themselves as the unvalued dust |
Trod by nation bearing on its trust,


Content if but their sunken graves should be /
The footprints Of the progress of the Free"


A. T. SEcHAxD.