que been as
strong as his patriotism, his sword might have rivaled his pen in
reflecting honor upon his beautiful city. Even then the seeds of
consumption had developed, and he was discharged from field service.
Still wishing to remain in the service of his country, he tried the
work of war correspondent, reaching the front just after the battle of
Shiloh. Overcome by the horrors of the retreat, he returned to
Charleston, and was soon after appointed assistant editor of the
_Daily South Carolinian_, published in Columbia. He removed to the
capital, where his prospects became bright enough to permit his
marriage to Kate Goodwin, the English girl to whom his Muse pays such
glowing tribute.

In May, 1864, Simms was in Columbia, and on his return to "Woodlands"
wrote to Hayne that Timrod was in better health and spirits than for
years, saying: "He has only to prepare a couple of dwarf essays,
making a single column, and the pleasant public is satisfied. These he
does so well that they have reason to be so. Briefly, our friend is in
a fair way to fatten and be happy."

This prosperity came to an end when the capital city fell a victim to
the fires of war, and Timrod returned to the city of his birth, where
for a time the publication of the _South Carolinian_ was continued, he
writing editorials nominally for fifteen dollars a month, practically
for exercise in facile expression, as the small stipend promised was
never paid. With the paper, he soon returned to Columbia, where after
a time he secured work in the office of Governor Orr, writing to Hayne
that twice he copied papers from ten o'clock one morning till sunrise
of the next.

With the close of the session, his work ended, and in the spring he
visited Paul Hayne at Copse Hill. Hayne says: "He found me with my
family established in a crazy wooden shanty, dignified as a cottage,
near the track of the main Georgia railroad, about sixteen miles from
Augusta." To Timrod, that "crazy wooden shanty," set in immemorial
pines and made radiant by the presence of his poet friend, was finer
than a palace. On that "windy, frowzy, barren hill," as Maurice
Thompson called it, the two old friends spent together the spring days
of '67--such days as lingered in golden beauty in the memory of one of
them and have come down to us in immortal verse.

Again in August of that year he visited Copse Hill, hoping to find
health among the pines. Of these last days Paul Hayne wrote years
la