d at a most insultingly
short distance from the floor. "Really I must ask your name," I said.
He hesitated a moment and then said in a low tone, "De J----." "De ----
What?" I absurdly asked, thinking I was mistaken. "A---- de J----" he
repeated. I bowed slightly to express my satisfaction, said, "Anna, we
must retire," and with a good-night to my newly discovered gentleman,
went upstairs.

He is the one I heard George speak of last December when he was here,
as having been court-martialed, and shot, according to the universal
belief in the army; that was the only time I had ever heard his name,
though I was quite familiar with the cart of De J---- _pere_, as it
perambulated the streets. My first impressions are seldom erroneous.
From the first, I knew that man's respectability was derived from his
buttons. That is why he took such pride in them, and contemplated them
with such satisfaction. They lent him social backbone enough to
converse so familiarly with me; without the effulgence of that splendid
gold, which he hoped would dazzle my eye to his real position, he would
have hardly dared to "remember me when I was a wee thing, so high." Is
he the only man whose coat alone entitles him to respectability? He may
be colonel, for all I know; but still, he is A---- de J---- to me. He
talked brave enough to be general.

This morning I met him with a cordial "Good-morning, Mr. de J----,"
anxious to atone for several "snubs" I had given him, long before I
knew his name, last night; you see I could afford to be patronizing
now. But the name probably, and the fluency with which I pronounced it,
proved too much for him, and after "Good-morning, Miss Morgan," he did
not venture a word. We knew each other then; his name was no longer a
secret.

August 25th. About 12 at night.

Sleep is impossible after all that I have heard, so, after vainly
endeavoring to follow the example of the rest, and sleep like a Stoic,
I have lighted my candle and take to this to induce drowsiness.

Just after supper, when Anna and I were sitting with Mrs. Carter in her
room, I talking as usual of home, and saying I would be perfectly happy
if mother would decide to remain in Baton Rouge and brave the
occasional shellings, I heard a well-known voice take up some sentence
of mine from a dark part of the room, and with a cry of surprise, I was
hugging Miriam until she was breathless. Such a forlorn creature!--so
di