berries and huckleberries" for the
soldiers, and how she was now drying peaches for Willard Buxton--once
their hired man. These she should tie up in a salt bag, and put in the
next box sent by the society of which she seemed to be head and front,
"kind of fust directress," she said, and Bell was interested at once,
for among the soldiers down by the Potomac was one who carried with him
the whole of Bell Cameron's heart; and who for a few days had tarried at
just such a dwelling as the farmhouse, writing back to her such pleasant
descriptions of it, with its fresh grass and shadowy trees, that she had
longed to be there too. So it was through this page of romance and love
that Bell looked at the farmhouse and its occupants, preferring good
Aunt Betsy because she seemed the most interested in the soldiers,
working as soon as breakfast was over upon the peaches, and kindly
furnishing her best check apron, together with pan and knife for Bell,
who offered her assistance, notwithstanding Wilford's warning that the
fruit would stain her hands, and his advice that she had better be
putting up her things for going home.

"She was not going that day," she said, point-blank, and as Katy too
had asked to stay a little longer, Wilford was compelled to yield, and
taking his hat sauntered off toward Linwood; while Katy went listlessly
into the kitchen, where Bell Cameron sat, her tongue moving much faster
than her hands, which pared so slowly and cut away so much of the juicy
pulp, besides making so frequent journeys to her mouth, that Aunt Betsy
looked in alarm at the rapidly disappearing fruit, wishing to herself
that "Miss Cameron had not listed."

But Miss Cameron had enlisted, and so had Bob, or rather he had gone to
do his duty, and as she worked, she repeated to Helen the particulars of
his going, telling how, when the war first broke out, and Sumter was
bombarded, Rob, who, from long association with Southern men at West
Point, had imbibed many of their ideas, was very sympathetic with the
rebelling States, gaining the cognomen of a secessionist, and once
actually thinking of casting in his lot with that side rather than the
other. But the remembrance of a little incident saved him, she said. The
remembrance of a queer old lady whom he met in the cars, and who, at
parting, held her wrinkled hand above his head in benediction, charging
him not to go against the flag, and promising her prayers for his safety
if found on the si