on both sides in the
dreadful battle. Strangely enough, as the war progressed, Barlow
concluded not to die; Providence decreed that he should live. He
recovered and rejoined his command; and just one year after that, Barlow
saw that I was killed in another battle. The explanation is perfectly
simple. A cousin of mine, with the same initials, General J. B. Gordon,
of North Carolina, was killed in a battle near Richmond. Barlow, who, as
I say, had recovered and rejoined his command--although I knew he was
dead, or thought I did--picked up a newspaper and read this item in it:
"General J. B. Gordon of the Confederate army was killed to-day in
battle." Calling his staff around him, Barlow read that item and said to
them, "I am very sorry to see this; you will remember that General J. B.
Gordon was the officer who picked me up on the battlefield at
Gettysburg, and sent my wife through his lines to me at night. I am very
sorry."

Fifteen years passed. Now, I wish the audience to remember that during
all those fifteen years which intervened, Barlow was dead to me, and for
fourteen of them I was dead to Barlow. In the meantime, the partiality
of the people of Georgia had placed me in the United States senate.
Clarkson Potter was a member of Congress from New York. He invited me to
dine with him to meet his friend, General Barlow. Now came my time to
think. "Barlow," I said, "Barlow? That is the same name, but it can't be
my Barlow, for I left him dead at Gettysburg." And I endeavored to
understand what it meant, and thought I had made the discovery. I was
told, as I made the inquiry, that there were two Barlows in the United
States army. That satisfied me at once. I concluded, as a matter of
course, that it was the other fellow I was going to meet; that Clarkson
Potter had invited me to dine with the living Barlow and not with the
dead one. Barlow had a similar reflection about the Gordon he was to
dine with. He supposed that I was the other Gordon. We met at Clarkson
Potter's table. I sat just opposite to Barlow; and in the lull of the
conversation I asked him, "General, are you related to the Barlow who
was killed at Gettysburg?" He replied: "I am the man, sir." "Are you
related," he asked, "to the Gordon who killed me?" "Well," I said, "I am
the man, sir." The scene which followed beggars all description. No
language could describe that scene at Clarkson Potter's table in
Washington, fifteen years after the war was over. Tru