fitful fever he sleeps well;
Treason has done his worst; nor steel, nor poison,
Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing,
Can touch him further."
WILLARD'S HOTEL, WASHINGTON, April 10, 1865.
I have looked up the passage, and have written it in above. It haunts me.
CHAPTER XV
MAN OF SORROW
The train was late--very late. It was Virginia who first caught sight of
the new dome of the Capitol through the slanting rain, but she merely
pressed her lips together and said nothing. In the dingy brick station of
the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad more than one person paused to look after
them, and a kind-hearted lady who had been in the car kissed the girl
good-by.
"You think that you can find your uncle's house, my dear?" she asked,
glancing at Virginia with concern. Through all of that long journey she
had worn a look apart. "Do you think you can find your uncle's house?"
Virginia started. And then she smiled as she looked at the honest, alert,
and squarely built gentleman beside her.
"Captain Brent can, Mrs. Ware," she said. "He can find anything."
Whereupon the kind lady gave the Captain her hand. "You look as if you
could, Captain," said she. "Remember, if General Carvel is out of town,
you promised to bring her to me."
"Yes, ma'am," said Captain Lige, "and so I shall."
"Kerridge, kerridge! Right dis-a-way! No sah, dat ain't de kerridge you
wants. Dat's it, lady, you'se lookin at it. Kerridge, kerridge,
kerridge!"
Virginia tried bravely to smile, but she was very near to tears as she
stood on the uneven pavement and looked at the scrawny horses standing
patiently in the steady downpour. All sorts of people were coming and
going, army officers and navy officers and citizens of states and
territories, driving up and driving away.
And this was Washington!
She was thinking then of the multitude who came here with aching hearts,
--with heavier hearts than was hers that day. How many of the throng
hurrying by would not flee, if they could, back to the peaceful homes
they had left? But perhaps those homes were gone now. Destroyed, like her
own, by the war. Women with children at their breasts, and mothers bowed
with sorrow, had sought this city in their agony. Young men and old had
come hither, striving to keep back the thoughts of dear ones left behind,
whom they might never see again. And by the thousands and tens of
thousands they had passed from here to the place
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