into the uppermost seats, as places of honor, and the rest of
the company accommodated as well as could be effected, a substantial
dinner was served, and partaken of with a gusto and appreciation only
conceivable in those to whom such an indulgence is exceptional, coming,
like the occasion, but once in a year. Upward of a hundred and fifty
persons sat down to it, exclusive of those temporarily detailed as
waiters, who presently found leisure to minister to their own appetites.
Their owner surveyed the scene with an air of gratification, in which I
could not detect a trace of his recent serious discomposure. I am well
persuaded, however, that he had not forgotten it, as that the cause of
it was known among the negroes; I thought I observed evidences of it in
their looks and deportment, even amid the general hilarity.

The ladies had returned to the house, and we were about following them,
when the clatter of a horse's hoofs was heard without, and the officious
voices of the negroes announced the arrival of a visitor or messenger
for the Colonel, who stepped forward to meet him. A young man, clad in a
coarse homespun gray uniform, scantily trimmed with red worsted, and a
French military cap, alighted, and addressed our friend in a faltering,
hesitating manner, as though communicating some disastrous intelligence.
I saw the Colonel turn pale, and put his hand to his head as if he had
received a stunning blow. Instinctively the three of us rushed toward
him.

'My God! what's the matter? what has happened, ----?' inquired the
clergyman.

'Philip! Philip! my boy's dead--shot himself by accident!' was the
answer.

A very few words explained all, The young volunteer had fallen a victim
to one of those common instances of carelessness in playing with loaded
firearms. While frolicking with a comrade, at his barracks, he had taken
up his revolver, jestingly threatening to shoot. The other, grasping the
barrel of the cocked pistol, in turning it round, had caused its
discharge, the bullet penetrating the breast of the unfortunate owner of
the weapon. Conveyed to the hospital, he had died within an hour after
his arrival.

* * * * *

Our holiday-making, of course, came to a sudden termination. Next day I
accompanied the Colonel to Charleston, to claim the body of his deceased
son, and not long afterward parted with him, on my return to the North.

FOOTNOTES:

[10] The paddle has superseded th