hey ran toward the house to carry the news. Their mother and
Cousin Belle, however, having seen the horsemen, were waiting on the
porch as the men came through the middle gate and rode across the
field.

It was their father and his body-servant, Ralph, who had been with him
all through the war. They came slowly up the hill; the horses limping
and fagged, the riders dusty and drooping.

It seemed like a funeral. The boys were near the steps, and their
mother stood on the portico with her forehead resting against a
pillar. No word was spoken. Into the yard they rode at a walk, and up
to the porch. Then their father, who had not once looked up, put both
hands to his face, slipped from his horse, and walked up the steps,
tears running down his cheeks, and took their mother into his arms. It
_was_ a funeral--the Confederacy was dead.

A little later, their father, who had been in the house, came out on
the porch near where Ralph still stood holding the horses.

"Take off the saddles, Ralph, and turn the horses out," he said.

Ralph did so.

"Here,--here's my last dollar. You have been a faithful servant to me.
Put the saddles on the porch." It was done. "You are free," he said to
the black, and then he walked back into the house.

Ralph stood where he was for some minutes without moving a muscle. His
eyes blinked mechanically. Then he looked at the door and at the
windows above him. Suddenly he seemed to come to himself. Turning
slowly, he walked solemnly out of the yard.

CHAPTER XIX.

The boys' Uncle William came the next day. The two weeks which
followed were the hardest the boys had ever known. As yet nothing had
been heard of Hugh or the General, though the boys' father went to
Richmond to see whether they had been released.

The family lived on corn-bread and black-eyed pease. There was not a
mouthful of meat on the plantation. A few aged animals were all that
remained on the place.

The boys' mother bought a little sugar and made some cakes, and the
boys, day after day, carried them over to the depot and left them with
a man there to be sold. Such a thing had never been known before in
the history of the family.

A company of Yankees were camped very near, but they did not interfere
with the boys. They bought the cakes and paid for them in greenbacks,
which were the first new money they had at Oakland. One day the boys
were walking along the road, coming back from the camp, when they met
a litt