onsoled Martha and hastened to the kitchen. Evidently a
shell had exploded just outside, sending three or four pieces through.
When order was restored I endeavored to impress on Martha's mind the
necessity for calmness and the uselessness of such excitement. Looking
round at the close of the lecture, there stood a group of Confederate
soldiers laughing heartily at my sermon and the promising audience I
had. They chimed in with a parting chorus:

"Yes, it's no use hollerin', old lady."

"Oh! H.," I exclaimed, as he entered soon after, "America is wounded."

"That is no news; she has been wounded by traitors long ago."

"Oh, this is real, living, little black America. I am not talking in
symbols. Here are the pieces of shell, the first bolt of the coming
siege."

"Now you see," he replied, "that this house will be but paper to
mortar-shells. You must go in the country."

The argument was long, but when a woman is obstinate and eloquent, she
generally conquers. I came off victorious, and we finished preparations
for the siege to-day. Hiring a man to assist, we descended to the
wine-cellar, where the accumulated bottles told of the "banquet-hall
deserted," the spirit and glow of the festive hours whose lights and
garlands were dead, and the last guest long since departed. To empty
this cellar was the work of many hours. Then in the safest corner a
platform was laid for our bed, and in another portion one arranged for
Martha. The dungeon, as I call it, is lighted only by a trap-door, and
is so damp it will be necessary to remove the bedding and mosquito-bars
every day. The next question was of supplies. I had nothing left but a
sack of rice-flour, and no manner of cooking I had heard or invented
contrived to make it eatable. A column of recipes for making delicious
preparations of it had been going the rounds of Confederate papers. I
tried them all; they resulted only in brick-bats or sticky paste. H.
sallied out on a hunt for provisions, and when he returned the
disproportionate quantity of the different articles obtained provoked a
smile. There was a _hogshead_ of sugar, a barrel of syrup, ten pounds of
bacon and peas, four pounds of wheat-flour, and a small sack of
corn-meal, a little vinegar, and actually some spice! The wheat-flour he
purchased for ten dollars as a special favor from the sole remaining
barrel for sale. We decided that must be left for sickness. The sack of
meal, he said, was a case of corruption,