s
for the siege to-day. Hiring a man to assist, we descended to the
wine-cellar, where the accumulated bottles told of festive hours 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 very damp. 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 provoked
a smile. There was a _hogshead_ of sugar, a barrel of sirup, ten pounds of
bacon and pease, 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 kept for sickness. The sack of
meal, he said, was a case of corruption, though a special providence to
us. There is no more for sale at any price, but, said he, "a soldier who
was hauling some of the Government sacks to the hospital offered me this
for five dollars, if I could keep a secret. When the meal is exhausted,
perhaps we can keep alive on sugar. Here are some wax candles; hoard them
like gold." He handed me a parcel containing about two pounds of candles,
and left me to arrange my treasures. It would be hard for me to picture
the memories those candles called up. The long years melted away, and I

"Trod again my childhood's track
And felt its very gladness."

In those childish days, whenever came dreams of household splendor or
festal rooms or gay illuminations, the lights in my vision were always wax
candles burning with a soft radiance that enchanted every scene.... And,
lo! here on this spring day of '63, with war raging through the land, I
was in a fine house, and had my wax candles sure enough, but, alas! they
were neither cerulean blue nor rose-tinted, but dirty brown; and when I
lighted one, it spluttered and wasted like any vulgar, tallow thing, and
lighted only a desolate scene in the vast handsome room. They were not so
good as the waxen rope we