passage of the quiet seasons, and where a
strange carriage or a single horseman coming down the big road was
an event in life, was turned into a depot of war-supplies, and the
neighborhood became a parade-ground. The old Colonel, not a colonel yet,
nor even a captain, except by brevet, was on his horse by daybreak and
off on his rounds through the plantations and the pines enlisting his
company. The office in the yard, heretofore one in name only, became one
now in reality, and a table was set out piled with papers, pens,
ink, books of tactics and regulation, at which men were accepted and
enrolled. Soldiers seemed to spring from the ground, as they did from
the sowing of the dragon's teeth in the days of Cadmus. Men came up the
high road or down the paths across the fields, sometimes singly, but
oftener in little parties of two or three, and, asking for the Captain,
entered the office as private citizens and came out soldiers enlisted
for the war. There was nothing heard of on the plantation except
fighting; white and black, all were at work, and all were eager; the
servants contended for the honor of going with their master; the women
flocked to the house to assist in the work of preparation, cutting
out and making under-clothes, knitting socks, picking lint, preparing
bandages, and sewing on uniforms; for many of the men who had enlisted
were of the poorest class, far too poor to furnish anything themselves,
and their equipment had to be contributed mainly by wealthier neighbors.
The work was carried on at night as well as by day, for the occasion
was urgent. Meantime the men were being drilled by the Captain and his
lieutenants, who had been militia officers of old. We were carried to
see the drill at the cross-roads, and a brave sight it seemed to us:
the lines marching and countermarching in the field, with the horses
galloping as they wheeled amid clouds of dust, at the hoarse commands
of the excited officers, and the roadside lined with spectators of every
age and condition. I recall the arrival of the messenger one night, with
the telegraphic order to the Captain to report with his company at "Camp
Lee" immediately; the hush in the parlor that attended its reading;
then the forced beginning of the conversation afterwards in a somewhat
strained and unnatural key, and the Captain's quick and decisive
outlining of his plans.

Within the hour a dozen messengers were on their way in various
directions to notify the