lumbus is, as I have indicated, not too easily reached by rail, and
though, as I have further indicated, walks before breakfast are not to
my taste, I am compelled to say that for both the journey and the walk I
felt repaid by the sight of some of the old houses--the Baldwin house,
the W.D. Humphries house, the J.O. Banks house, the old McLaren house,
the Kinnebrew house, the Thomas Hardy house, the J.M. Morgan house, with
its garden of lilies and roses, its giant magnolia trees and its huge
camellia bushes; and most of all, perhaps, for its Georgian beauty, the
mellow tone of its old brick, its rich tangle of southern growths, and
its associations, the venerable mansion of the late General Stephen D.
Lee, C.S.A.--now the property of the latter's only son, Mr. Blewett Lee,
general counsel of the Illinois Central Railroad, and a resident of
Chicago.

It was apropos of our visit to the Lee house that I was told of a
dramatic and touching example of the rebirth of amity between North and
South.

Stephen D. Lee it was who, as a young artillery officer attached to the
staff of General Beauregard, transmitted the actual order to fire on
Fort Sumter, the shot which began the war. Two years later, having been
promoted to the rank of lieutenant-general, the same Stephen D. Lee
participated in the defense of Vicksburg against the assaults of
Porter's gunboats from the river and of Grant's armies, which hemmed in
the hilled city on landward side, until at last, on the 4th of July,
1863, the place was surrendered, making Grant's fame secure.

Years after, when the Government of the United States accepted a statue
of General Stephen D. Lee, to be placed upon the battle ground of
Vicksburg--now a national park--it was the late General Frederick Dent
Grant, son of the capturer of the city, who journeyed thither to unveil
the memorial to his father's former foe. And by a peculiarly gracious
and fitting set of circumstances it came about that when, in April last,
the ninety-fifth anniversary of the birth of U.S. Grant was celebrated
in his native city, Galena, Illinois, it was Blewett Lee, only son of
the general taken by Grant at Vicksburg, who journeyed to Galena and
there in a memorial address, returned the earlier compliment paid to the
memory of his own father by Grant's son.

* * * * *

Columbus may perhaps appreciate the charm of its old homes, but there is
evidence to show that it did not appr