?" we
asked.

"Oh yes, and the Federals had it too. General Birney was there for a
while. One day, just after he came, a lot of 'em came over here. One of
my boys was lying very sick in that front chamber just then--the one
you know, the county clerk. Well, an orderly rode up to the door and
called out, 'Here, you damned old rebel, the general wants you.'--'I
don't answer to that name,' said I.--'You don't?'--'No, I
don't.'--'What! ain't you a rebel?'--' I don't answer to that name,'
said I.--'Well, consider yourself my prisoner,' says he; so I walked up
there with him. Judge Price was at head-quarters just then, and he knew
me well. It seems that the general had heard that I kept a regular
rebel commissariat, sending stores to them secretly. Well, when the
judge had told him who I was, the general wrote me a pass at once, and
then asked, 'Is there anything I can do for you?'--'General,' said I,
'my son lies very sick. I should like to see the last of him, and beg
to be permitted to retire.'--'Is that so?' said the general. 'Would you
like me to send you a doctor?' I accepted, and he sent me two. He came
up afterward, and found that his men had torn down the fences, broken
open the store and dragged out goods, set the oil and molasses running,
and done great damage--about four thousand dollars' worth, we
estimated. You see, they thought it was a rebel commissariat. When he
came into the house he asked my wife if she could give him supper.
'General,' said she, 'you have taken away my cooks: if you will send
for your own, I shall be very happy to get supper for you.' He did so,
and spent the night here, sleeping in one of the chambers while his
officers lay all over the piazzas. Next day they all rode away, quite
satisfied, I guess. There were several skirmishes about here afterward,
and we have some pieces of bombs in the house now that fell in the
yard."

[Illustration: LAKE BEDFORD.]

The judge pressed us to stay and dine, but we had arranged for a gypsy
dinner in the woods and were anxious to push on. Push on! How Barney
would smile could he hear the word! He never did anything half so
energetic as to push: he did not even pull.

So we bade farewell to our genial host and started westwardly again. We
were now upon the high land of the Ridge, the backbone of the State,
and though, perhaps, hardly ninety feet above the sea, the air had all
the exhilarating freshness of great altitudes. All through the week
which f