ed man who had not
enrolled as a soldier, though his soul was full of sublime valor. The
bullets hissed and split the water, and the rowers tried to get out of
their reach, but all their efforts were in vain; the treacherous mud had
caught the boat, and some one must peril life and limb to shove that
boat into the water. And this man, the member of a doomed, a fated race,
who had been trodden down for ages, comprehending the danger, said,
"Some one must die to get us out of this, and it mout's well be me as
anybody; you are soldiers, and you can fight. If they kill me it is
nothing."

And with these words he arose, gave the boat a push, received a number
of bullets, and died within two days after.

Louis acquitted himself bravely, and rapidly rose in favor with his
superior officers. To him the place of danger was the post of duty. He
often received letters from Minnie, but they were always hopeful; for
she had learned to look on the bright side of everything.

She tried to beguile him with the news of the neighborhood, and to
inspire him with bright hopes for the future; that future in which they
should clasp hands again and find their duty and their pleasure in
living for the welfare and happiness of _our_ race, as Minnie would
often say.

A race upon whose brows God had poured the chrism of a new era--a race
newly anointed with freedom.

Oh, how the enthusiasm of her young soul gathered around that work! She
felt it was no mean nor common privilege to be the pioneer of a new
civilization. If he who makes two blades of grass grow where only one
flourished before is a benefactor of the human race, how much higher
and holier must his or her work be who dispenses light, instead of
darkness, knowledge, instead of ignorance, and over the ruins of the
slave-pen and auction-block erects institutions of learning.

She would say in her letters to Louis that the South will never be
rightly conquered until another army should take the field, and that
must be an army of civilizers; the army of the pen, and not the sword.
Not the destroyers of towns and cities, but the builders of machines and
factories; the organizers of peaceful industry and honorable labor; and
as soon as she possibly could she intended to join that great army.

Sometimes Louis would shake his head doubtfully, and tell her that the
South was a very sad place to live in, and would be for years, and,
while he was willing to bear toil and privation in the