Part 21 (2/2)

”Then, as he held my hands closer, he turned his face more fully toward me, and said: 'My mother taught me to pray when I was a very little boy, and I never forgot it. I have always said my prayers every day, and tried not to be bad. Do you think G.o.d heard me always?'

”'Yes, most a.s.suredly. Did he not promise, in his good Book, from which your mother taught you, that he would always hear the prayers of his children? Ask, and ye shall receive. Don't you remember this? One of the worst things we can do is to doubt G.o.d's truth. He has promised, and he will fulfil. Don't you feel so, Frankie?'

”He hesitated a moment, and then answered, slowly: 'Yes, I do believe it. I am not afraid to die, but I want somebody to love me.'

”The old cry for love, the strong yearning for the sympathy of kindred hearts. It would not be put down.

”'Frankie, I love you. Poor boy! you shall not be left alone.

Is not this some comfort to you?'

”'Do you love me? Will you stay with me, and not leave me?'

”'I will not leave you. Be comforted, I will stay as long as you wish.'

”I kissed the pale forehead as if it had been that of my own child. A glad light flashed over his face.

”'O, kiss me again; that was given like my sister. Mrs.

S----, won't you kiss me, too? I don't think it will be so hard to die, if you will both love me.'

”It did not last long. With his face nestled against mine, and his large blue eyes fixed in perfect composure upon me to the last moment, he breathed out his life.”

So he died for his country. He sleeps on the banks of the beautiful Ohio. Men labor hard for riches, honor, and fame, but few, when life is over, will leave a n.o.bler record than this young Christian patriot.

CHAPTER XII.

FROM FORT PILLOW TO MEMPHIS.

On the 6th of May, 1861, the Legislature of Tennessee, in secret session, voted that the State should secede from the Union. The next day, Governor Harris appointed three Commissioners to meet Mr. Hilliard, of Alabama, who had been sent by Jefferson Davis to make a league with the State. These Commissioners agreed that all the troops of the State should be under the control of the President of the Confederacy. All of the public property and naval stores and munitions of war were also turned over to the Confederacy. The people had nothing to do about it.

The conspirators did not dare to trust the matter to them, for a great many persons in East Tennessee were ardently attached to the Union. In Western Tennessee, along the Mississippi, nearly all of the people, on the other hand, were in favor of secession.

At Memphis they were very wild and fierce. Union men were mobbed, tarred and feathered, ridden on rails, had their heads shaved, were robbed, knocked down, and warned to leave the place or be hung. One man was headed up in a hogshead, and rolled into the river, because he stood up for the Union! Memphis was a hotbed of secessionists; it was almost as bad as Charleston.

A Memphis newspaper, of the 6th of May, said:--

”Tennessee is disenthralled at last. Freedom has again crowned her with a fresh and fadeless wreath. She will do her entire duty. Great sacrifices are demanded of her, and they will be cheerfully made. Her blood and treasure are offered without stint at the shrine of Southern freedom. She counts not the cost at which independence may be bought. The gallant volunteer State of the South, her brave sons, now rus.h.i.+ng to the standard of the Southern Confederacy, will sustain, by their unflinching valor and deathless devotion, her ancient renown achieved on so many battle-fields.

”In fact, our entire people--men, women, and children--have engaged in this fight, and are animated by the single heroic and indomitable resolve to perish rather than submit to the despicable invader now threatening us with subjugation. They will ratify the ordinance of secession amid the smoke and carnage of battle; they will write out their indors.e.m.e.nt of it with the blood of their foe; they will enforce it at the point of the bayonet and sword.

”Welcome, thrice welcome, glorious Tennessee, to the thriving family of Southern Confederate States!”[27]

[Footnote 27: Memphis Avalanche.]

On the same day the citizens of Memphis tore down the Stars and Stripes from its staff upon the Court-House, formed a procession, and with a band of music bore the flag, like a corpse, to a pit, and buried it in mock solemnity. They went into the public square, where stands the statue of General Jackson, and chiselled from its pedestal his memorable words: ”The Federal Union,--it must be preserved.” They went to the river-bank, and seized all the steamboats they could lay their hands upon belonging to Northern men.

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