their horses and cookin' supper. There wasn't a
soul on the place with her except old Aunt Dicey and Uncle Jake.
'Lizabeth's brother was a slave owner, and when Harrison went to the
war he sent Aunt Dicey and her husband over to 'Lizabeth's to watch
over her and keep her company.

"Well, that night 'Lizabeth said she didn't feel much like sleepin',
not knowin' but what the soldiers might come at any minute to search
the house or maybe set it on fire. But she said her prayers and was
almost fallin' off to sleep when she happened to think of some powder
that Harrison had hid over in that field. Harrison was mighty fond of
huntin', and always kept a big supply o' powder on hand, and the day
before he went to the war he carried the can over to that field and
hid it in a holler tree. 'For,' says he, 'I don't propose to be
furnishin' ammunition to the Yankees.' 'Lizabeth said her heart
stopped beatin' when she thought o' that powder and the fires all
around, and the ground covered with dry grass and leaves. And she
thought, 'Suppose the grass and leaves should catch a fire and the
fire spread to the tree,' and she got up and put on her clothes and
went to the garret again and looked out o' the window, and she could
see a fire right near where she thought the old holler tree was
standin', and her conscience says to her, 'If anybody's killed by that
powder blowin' up whose fault will it be?' She said she knew she
ought to go and git the powder, but the very thought o' that made her
shake from head to foot. And she went back to bed and tried to sleep,
but when she shut her eyes all she could see was a fire spreadin'
amongst the leaves and grass and creepin' up to an old holler tree,
and she thought how every one o' them soldiers lyin' there asleep had
a mother and maybe a wife and a sister that was prayin' for 'em. And
all at once somethin' said to her, 'Suppose it was your boy in this
sort o' danger; wouldn't you thank any woman that'd go to his help?'
And then she saw in a minute that there wasn't but one thing for her
to do: she must go and take that powder out o' the holler tree and put
it out o' the reach o' fire. So she threw an old shawl over her head
and went out to the cabin and called Uncle Jake, and asked him to go
with her across the field betwixt the house and the place where the
soldiers had their camp. The old man was no manner o' protection, for
he was so crippled up with rheumatism that he had mighty little use