Year: 1866




Virginia may be formed from the following
extract, which we make from a letter in the
last Richmond Enquirer, giving an account
of the recent tournament at Buffalo Springs:


swell, the tournaments over. The crown
has been won and worn. Notwithstanding
the heat and dust, our good people and fair
bellies, bent seeing and being seen, were out
in full force. The knights all rode well, and,
despite the scarcity of horses, resulting from
the absorbing propensities of our 6lue-coated
attaches, were well mounted. Many bright
eyes looked eager and anxious as " the line"
fled by, and rosy lips smiled doubtfully
when thoughts would come of the possible
discontinue of their chosen knight, and the
crowned success of some rival beauty. But
all this changed When the herald read the tt
ties of the contestants in the joust Beauty
and Love gracefully gave place to Pity and
Patriotism and all were alike anxious, for
the plainly clad cavalier, whose black pen
non borethe inscription, KNIGHT OF THE I'M
PRIsoNED CHIEF" there flashed through every
heart sympathetic thrill; and when, after
close contest, this knight, so loyal to his suffer-
ing ruler, was proclaimed victor, the enthusi-
asm was universal All mere personal prefer
ence was forgotten in the one thought that so
touched every Southern heart. Fair hands
applauded, as unprecedented, but irrepressi-
BILE, cheers for Jefferson Davis filed the air.
Enthusiasm, always contagious, did not
spare even me. For 10 did but limp. bro
Ken c,.uteh in hand, to friends carriage,
where, in the silent ride homeward, reflect
ed upon the fact that when old men were
or
a seasoned crutch, they might expect to limp
off with a good supporter splintered and
kbroken.


But the day has also wakened my con-
sciousness to an accrescent- fact. Never be-
fore, even in the palmiest days of the Con-
federacy. did Mr. Davis so rule and occupy
the popular heart. All criticism is answer
ed All cayilers are hushed. The Jealous
enmity that constantly but impotently struck
at the triumphant chief magistrate is now,
in his hour of suffering shamed out of exis-
tence. The envious detractors who assailed
him with such envenomed bitterness, now
crawl into obscure corners, anxious to escape
the sight and sound they once courted.-
All records, save that of his matchless con-
stancy purity, and patriotism, are washed
away in the contrite tears of g his people"


Every display like this cuts like knife to
the heart of the Southern people. 1t is ap-
parent that people who act in this way do
not desire to return to the Union, but are
awaiting some convulsion that will lead to
war among the Northern people, in the hope
that the result may be the establishment of
so-called Southern independence.


The Union people of the South, who had
borne for years the atrocious and bloody
despotism of Jefferson Davis, had reason to
hope that when the rebellion was suppressed
they would be shielded from such insults as
the above. If the Union is TO be restored on
such basis, we tell tile President and the
Congress we do not desire it. If the Union
men, under the new order of things, " are to
crawl into obscure corners" on account of
their hatred to Confederate despotism and
their attachment to the government of their
fathers, then we say away with such a Union +!
Better to lie in cold obstruction and to rot, i"
than to have been dragged out of the Union
by traitors, tyrannized over for years by
traitors, and then dragged back by traitors,
to be marked for all time as infamous be-
cause we were not true to the Confederacy.