rkling coverts began
to be craftily eyed by the soldiers, whose daily hunt for the provisions
of the post carried them through many dense jungles. Everywhere the
exquisite mountain azalea was abloom, its delicate, subtle fragrance
pervading the air as the appreciation of some noble virtue penetrates
and possesses the soul, so intimate, so indissoluble, so potent of
cognition. It seemed the essential element of the atmosphere one
breathed. And this atmosphere--how light--how pure! sheer existence was
a cherished privilege. And always on this fine ethereal medium came the
echo of woe; blended with the incense of the blooming wild grape seemed
the smell of blood; the rare variety of flame-tinted azaleas flaring on
some high, secluded slope showed a color reminiscent only of the burning
roof-trees and stockades of destroyed homes. Peace upon the august
mountains to the east, veiling their peaks and domes in stillness and
with diaphanous cloud; peace upon the flashing rivers, infinitely clear
and deep in their cliff-bound channels; and peace upon all the
heavily-leaved shadowy forests to the massive westward range, level of
summit, stern and military of aspect, like some gigantic rampart! But
the mind was continually preempted by the knowledge that in the south
were murder and despair, in the east were massacre and pillage, that
rapine was loosed upon the land, and that this external fixity of calm
was as unstable as the crystalline sphere of a bubble to collapse at a
touch. Every ear was strained to a whisper; the express from over the
mountain was met afar off by stragglers from the settlement, and came,
delivering by word of mouth such news as he personally possessed, before
his package was rendered up to the officers at the fort. Every heart
seemed subject to the tension of suspense except such organ as might
serve Captain Stuart for the cardiacal functions. He appeared wholly
engrossed in perfecting the details of battalion drill, and the
attention of the garrison was concentrated on these military maneuvers;
even the men of the settlement, especially the rattling single men, were
drawn into these ranks, the garrison not being strong enough to furnish
the complement desired. In their buckskin hunting-shirts and leggings,
with their muscular, keen activity, their ready practice, and their
suppleness in handling their rifles, the pioneers made what he was
pleased to call "a very pretty body of fencibles." His praise and the