Chapter II: Part 2

Father Tabb's discernment was clear and touched by the purest fragrance of the muses. To Shelley, Coleridge, and Keats he was devoted. Poe he regarded as without a peer in modern literature, and was his uncompromising, inflexible champion.

HENRY E. SHEPHERD

_John Banister Tabb born, 1845_

March Twenty-Third

Come, Texas! send forth your brave Rangers,
The heroes of battles untold--
Accustomed to trials and dangers,
Come stand by your rights as of old;
The deeds of your chivalrous daring
Are writ on the Alamo's wall,
A record which ruin is sparing--
Come forth to your country's loud call!
V. E. W. VERNON

_Texas ratifies the Confederate Constitution, 1861_

March Twenty-Fourth

Adams, Giddings, and other Congressmen issued a public address, in March, 1843, declaring that the annexation of Texas would be "so injurious to the interests of the Northern States as not only inevitably to result in a dissolution of the Union, but fully to justify it."

HENRY A. WHITE

March Twenty-Fifth

Nor had Calvert planted English institutions in Maryland simply as he found them. He went back to a better time for freedom of action, and looked forward to a better time for freedom of thought. While as yet there was no spot in Christendom where religious belief was free, and when even the Commons of England had openly declared against toleration, he founded a community wherein no man was to be molested for his faith.

WILLIAM HAND BROWNE

_Landing of the Maryland colonists, St. Clement's Island, 1634_

March Twenty-Sixth

Dear God! what segment of the earth
Can match the region of our birth!
Though ice-beleaguered, rill on rill,
Though scorched to deserts, hill on hill--
It is our native country still.
Our native country, what a sound
To make heart, brain, and blood rebound!
JAMES RYDER RANDALL

March Twenty-Seventh

Jamestown and St. Mary's are both within the segment of a circle of comparatively small radius whose center is at the mouth of the Chesapeake. In this strategic region, the Jamestown experiment succeeded, after Raleigh's head had fallen on the block; the Revolution was fired by the eloquence of Patrick Henry, and was consummated at Yorktown; the War of 1812 was settled by the victories of North Point and McHenry; the crisis of the Civil War occurred; and seven Presidents of the United States were born.

ALLEN S. WILL

_Calvert's Colony lands at St. Mary's, 1634_

March Twenty-Eighth

Nor less resplendent is the light
Of him, old South Carolina's star,
Whose fiery soul was made by God
To blaze amid the storms of war....
ORION T. DOZIER

_Wade Hampton born, 1818_

March Twenty-Ninth

A great event of this [Tyler's] administration was the Ashburton Treaty. This settled our northeast boundary for 200 miles and warded off the long impending war with England. In most histories the whole credit for this treaty is given to Daniel Webster. Of course this great man should not be robbed of any of his well-earned laurels; but the President is entitled to a share of the honor. Webster himself said: "It proceeded from step to step under the President's own immediate eye and correction." Moreover, it may be added that at one stage in the proceedings Lord Ashburton was about to give up and return to England; but President Tyler by his courtesy and suavity, conciliated him and induced him to go on with the negotiation.

J. LESSLIE HALL

_John Tyler born, 1790_

March Thirtieth

In discussing the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, Senator Hale warned Senator Toombs that the North would fight. The Georgian answered: "I believe nobody ever doubted that any portion of the United States would fight on a proper occasion.... There are courageous and honest men enough in both sections to fight. There is no question of courage involved. The people of both sections of the Union have illustrated their courage on too many battlefields to be questioned. They have shown their fighting qualities shoulder to shoulder whenever their country has called upon them; but that they may never come in contact with each other in a fratricidal war should be the ardent wish and earnest desire of every true man and honest patriot."

PLEASANT A. STOVALL

_Texas readmitted to the Union, 1870_

March Thirty-First

CALHOUN'S NATIONALISM

At the peace of 1815 the Government was $120,000,000 in debt; its revenues were small; its credit not great, and the effort to raise money by direct taxation brought it in conflict with the States.... Mr. Calhoun came forward and devised a tariff, which not only gave large revenues to the Government, but gave great protection to manufacturers. Mr. Calhoun received unmeasured abuse for his pains from the North, where the interests were then navigation, and Daniel Webster was the great apostle of free trade.... Under Mr. Calhoun's tariff the New England manufacturers prospered rapidly.... Success stimulated cupidity, and the "black tariff" of 1828 marked the growth of abuse.... It was then that Mr. Calhoun again stepped forth. He stated that the South had cheerfully paid the enormous burden of duties on imports when Northern manufactures were young and the Government weak; the manufacturers had become rich, and the Government strong--so strong that State rights were being merged into its overshadowing power; he therefore demanded a recognition of State rights, and an amelioration of those burdens that the South had so long borne.

THOMAS PRENTICE KETTELL
(New York)

_John C. Calhoun dies, 1850_

April

The birds that sing in the leafy Spring,
With the light of love on each glancing wing,
Have lessons to last you the whole year through;
For what is "Coo! coo! te weet tu whu!"
But, properly rendered, "The wit to woo!"
A wit that brings worship and wisdom too!
Coo! coo! te weet tu whu--
The wit to woo--te weet tu whu!

The verb "to love," in the tongue of the dove,
Heard noon and night in the cedar grove,
Is very soon taught where the heart is true:
For the wit to woo, and the wisdom too,
Lie in the one sweet syllable, "Coo!"
But echo me well, and you learn to woo--
Coo! coo! te weet tu whu--
The wit to woo--te weet tu whu!
WILLIAM GILMORE SIMMS

April First

Hidden no longer
In moss-covered ledges,
Starring the wayside,
Under the hedges,
Violet, Pimpernel,
Flashing with dew,
Daisy and Asphodel
Blossom anew.

Down in the bosky dells
Everywhere,
Faintly their fairy bells
Chime in the air.
Thanks to the sunshine!
Thanks to the showers!
They come again, bloom again,
Beautiful flowers!
THEOPHILUS HUNTER HILL
(_Author of the first book published under
copyright of the Confederate Government_)

_Battle of Five Forks, Virginia, 1865_

April Second

At the critical moment A. P. Hill was always strongest. No wonder that both Lee and Jackson, when in the delirium of their last moments on earth, stood again to battle, and saw the fiery form of A. P. Hill leading his columns on.

HENRY KYD DOUGLAS

_A. P. Hill killed in front of Petersburg, 1865_

_Albert Pike dies, 1891_

April Third

THE SOUTHERN MAGNOLIA

French blood stained with glory the Lilies,
While centuries marched to their grave;
And over bold Scot and gay Irish
The Thistle and Shamrock yet wave:
Ours, ours be the noble Magnolia,
That only on Southern soil grows,
The Symbol of life everlasting:--
Dear to us as to England the Rose.
ALBERT PIKE
("_Born in Boston; but an adopted and
devoted son of Dixie_")

April Fourth

We are His witnesses; out of the dim
Dark region of Death we have risen with Him.
Back from our sepulchre rolleth the stone,
And Spring, the bright Angel, sits smiling thereon.
JOHN B. TABB
("_Easter Flowers_")

April Fifth

We are His witnesses. See, where He lay
The snow that late bound us is folded away;
And April, fair Magdalen, weeping anon,
Stands flooded with light of the new-risen Sun!
JOHN B. TABB
("_Easter Flowers_")

April Sixth

His character was lofty and pure, his presence and demeanor dignified and courteous, with the simplicity of a child; and he at once inspired the respect and gained the confidence of cultivated gentlemen and rugged frontiersmen.

GENERAL RICHARD TAYLOR

_Albert Sidney Johnston killed at Shiloh, 1862_

April Seventh

History tears down statues and monuments to attributes and deeds, unless those attributes have been devoted to some noble end, and those deeds done in a righteous cause.

COL. CHARLES MARSHALL

April Eighth

"GLORY STANDS BESIDE OUR GRIEF"

Because they fought in perfect faith, believing
The cause they fought for was the just, the true;
And had small hope of glittering gain receiving,
While following, with standard high in view,
Where led their single-hearted, dauntless chief:
Therefore doth Glory stand beside our grief!
VICTORIA ELIZABETH GITTINGS

_Louisiana admitted to the Union, 1812_

_Telegram from Secretary Seward confirming promise (March 15) as to Sumter, 1861_

April Ninth

An angel's heart, an angel's mouth,
Not Homer's, could alone for me
Hymn forth the great Confederate South,
Virginia first, then Lee.

Oh, realm of tears! But let her bear
This blazon to the end of time:
No nation rose so white and fair,
None fell so pure of crime.
P. S. WORSLEY
(England)

[From lines written on the fly-leaf of a translation of the Iliad, presented to General Lee by the Oxford scholar in 1866]

_Surrender of Lee at Appomattox, 1865_

April Tenth

Furl that Banner, for 'tis weary;
Round its staff 'tis drooping dreary;
Furl it, fold it, it is best;
For there's not a man to wave it,
And there's not a sword to save it,
And there's not one left to lave it
In the blood which heroes gave it;
And its foes now scorn and brave it;
Furl it, hide it, let it rest!

Furl that Banner! True, 'tis gory,
Yet 'tis wreathed around with glory,
And 'twill live in song and story,
Though its folds are in the dust:
For its fame on brightest pages,
Penned by poets and by sages,
Shall go sounding down the ages,--
Furl its folds though now we must.
ABRAHAM J. RYAN
(_The Conquered Banner_)

_Lee issues farewell address to his army, 1865_

_Leonidas Polk born, 1806_

April Eleventh

Man is so constituted--the immutable laws of our being are such--that to stifle the sentiment and extinguish the hallowed memories of a people is to destroy their manhood.

GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON

We had, I was satisfied, sacred principles to maintain and rights to defend for which we were in duty bound to do our best, even if we perished in the endeavor.

GENERAL ROBERT E. LEE

We must forevermore consecrate in our hearts our old battle flag of the Southern Cross--not now as a political symbol, but as the consecrated emblem of an heroic epoch. The people that forgets its heroic dead is already dying at the heart, and we believe we shall be truer and better citizens of the United States if we are true to our past.

RANDOLPH H. MCKIM

April Twelfth

From this time a clear-cut issue was formulated and presented to the States and the people. The "firing upon the flag of the nation" was made the immediate pretext for aggressive measures against the Lower South. _As so heralded_, it served to inflame the hearts of thousands who, it seems, had not noticed or who had forgotten, as it is forgotten to-day, that this was not the first firing upon the Stars and Stripes. The flag had been fired upon from the coast of South Carolina as early as January 9, 1861, for the same reason as that which provoked attack upon it on April 12.

[From introduction to "The Battle of Baltimore," _The Sun_, April 9, 1911.]

_Fort Sumter fired on by Beauregard, 1861_

_North Carolina instructs her delegates to the Continental Congress to declare for independence, 1776_

_Henry Clay born, 1777_

April Thirteenth

The history of the world presents no parallel to the manner in which he wrote himself upon his own age, and subsequent ages, with his pen. He was no teacher like Plato; he was not a professional litterateur like Voltaire; he was not a mere maker of books like Carlyle; and yet he put his stamp indelibly upon the minds and hearts of English-speaking people during his own day and for all time to come.

THOMAS E. WATSON

_Thomas Jefferson born, 1743_

April Fourteenth

The fact is, the boys around here want watching, or they'll take something. A few days ago I heard they surrounded two of our best citizens because they were named Fort and Sumter. Most of them are so hot that they fairly siz when you pour water on them, and that's the way they make up their military companies here now--when a man applies to join the volunteers they sprinkle him, and if he sizzes they take him, and if he don't they don't!

MAJOR CHARLES H. SMITH
(_Bill Arp_)

April Fifteenth

There was but one exception to the general grief too remarkable to be passed over in silence. Among the extreme Radicals in Congress, Mr. Lincoln's determined clemency and liberality towards the Southern people had made an impression so unfavorable that, though they were shocked at his murder, they did not, among themselves, conceal gratification that he was no longer in their way.

NICHOLAY AND HAY
(_Life of Lincoln_)

FORESHADOWING RECONSTRUCTION

The Union League of America was organized in Cleveland, Ohio, during the war by friends of Thaddeus Stevens, the Radical leader of Congress. Its prime object was the confiscation of the property of the South. The chief obstacle to this program was Abraham Lincoln. Hence the first work of the League was to form a conspiracy against Lincoln and prevent his renomination for a second term.

E. W. R. EWING

_Abraham Lincoln dies, 1865_

_Federal Government issues a call for 75,000 volunteers, 1861_

April Sixteenth

I have only to say that the militia will not be furnished to the powers at Washington for any such use or purpose as they have in view. Your object is to subjugate the Southern States, and a requisition made upon me for such an object--an object, in my judgment, not within the purview of the constitution or the act of 1795--will not be complied with. You have chosen to inaugurate civil war, and having done so, we will meet it in a spirit as determined as the administration has exhibited towards the South.

GOVERNOR LETCHER
(_Virginia_)

April Seventeenth

The scene [in the Virginia State Convention] is described as both solemn and affecting. One delegate, while speaking against the ordinance, broke down in incoherent sobs; another, who voted for it, wept like a child. The sentiment of the people had run ahead of their leaders.

S. C. MITCHELL

It may be safely asserted that but for the adoption by the Federal Government of the policy of coercion towards the Cotton States, Virginia would not have seceded.... She simply in the hour of danger and sacrifice held faithful to the principles which she had ofttimes declared and which have ever found sturdy defenders in every part of the Republic.

BEVERLEY B. MUNFORD

_Virginia secedes, 1861_

April Eighteenth

Tennessee will not furnish a single man for coercion, but 50,000 if necessary for the defense of our rights or those of our Southern brothers.

GOVERNOR HARRIS
(Tennessee)

I say emphatically that Kentucky will furnish no troops for the wicked purpose of subduing her sister States.

GOVERNOR MAGOFFIN
(Kentucky)

April Nineteenth

Hark to an exiled son's appeal,
Maryland!
My mother State! to thee I kneel,
Maryland!
For life and death, for woe and weal,
Thy peerless chivalry reveal,
And gird thy beauteous limbs with steel,
Maryland! My Maryland!

Thou wilt not cower in the dust,
Maryland!
Thy beaming sword shall never rust,
Maryland!
Remember Carroll's sacred trust,
Remember Howard's warlike thrust,--
And all thy slumberers with the just,
Maryland! My Maryland!
JAMES RYDER RANDALL

_Citizens of Baltimore, objecting to coercion of the seceded States, oppose the passing of the Sixth Massachusetts, their action resulting in the first bloodshed of the War, 1861_

April Twentieth

The tempting prize offered Lee in the shape of supreme command of the Army of the Union did not swerve him from his integrity for an instant. It was currently reported at the time that Gen. Winfield Scott implored him, "For God's sake, don't resign!" Every argument that power, luxury, limitless resources, and the untrammeled control of the situation could devise was brought to bear upon him.

HENRY E. SHEPHERD

_Robert E. Lee resigns his commission in the United States Army, 1861_

April Twenty-First

From the date of its settlement, Maryland became the Land of Sanctuary--the only spot in the known world where the persecuted of all lands were at liberty to worship God according to the dictates of their own hearts. Freedom of conscience was offered by Lord Baltimore to the oppressed of the Old World, thus carrying into effect the original motive of Sir George Calvert's colonization scheme when seeking a charter from King Charles I.

HESTER DORSEY RICHARDSON

_Passage of the "Act Concerning Religion" by the Maryland Assembly, 1649, endorsing the principles of religious toleration promulgated by Cecilius Calvert in 1634_

_Independence of Texas established at San Jacinto, 1836_

April Twenty-Second

The dusk of the South is tender
As the touch of a soft, soft hand;
It comes between splendor and splendor,
The sweetest of service to render,
And gathers the cares of the land.

Above it the soft sky blushes
And pales like an April rose;
Within it the South wind hushes,
And the Jessamine's heart outgushes,
And earth like an emerald glows.
JOHN P. SJOLANDER

_Capture of Plymouth, N. C., by Gen. R. D. Hoke, 1864_

April Twenty-Third

In seeds of laurel in the earth
The blossom of your fame is blown;
And somewhere, waiting for its birth,
The shaft is in the stone!
HENRY TIMROD

_Randall writes "My Maryland" at Pointe Coupee, La., 1861_

_Father Ryan dies, 1886_

April Twenty-Fourth

Apropos of this last, let me confess, Mr. President--before the praise of New England has died on my lips--that I believe the best product of her present life is the procession of 17,000 Vermont Democrats that for twenty-two years, undiminished by death, unrecruited by birth or conversion, have marched over their rugged hills, cast their Democratic ballots, and gone back home to pray for their unregenerate neighbors, and awoke to read the record of 26,000 Republican majority! May the God of the helpless and heroic help them!

HENRY W. GRADY

_Henry W. Grady born, 1851_

April Twenty-Fifth

Her lot may be hard, her skies may darken;
To Dixie's voice we'll ever hearken;
Look away, away, away down South in Dixie.
The coward may shirk, the wretch go whining,
But we'll be true till the sun stops shining,
Look away, away, away down South in Dixie.

Chorus:

I wish I was in Dixie;
Away, away;
In Dixie's land I'll take my stand,
And live and die in Dixie.
Away, away,
Away down South in Dixie.
MARIE LOUISE EVE

April Twenty-Sixth

Homes without the means of support were no longer homes. With barns and mills and implements for tilling the soil all gone, with cattle, sheep, and every animal that furnished food to the helpless inmates carried off, they were dismal abodes of hunger, of hopelessness, and of almost measureless woe.

GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON

_Joseph E. Johnston surrenders at Greensboro, N. C., 1865_

April Twenty-Seventh

The twilight hours, like birds, flew by,
As lightly and as free;
Ten thousand stars were in the sky,
Ten thousand in the sea;
For every wave, with dimpled face,
That leaped into the air,
Had caught a star in its embrace
And held it trembling there.
AMELIA B. WELBY

April Twenty-Eighth

Too much roseate nonsense has been indulged about life on the plantation or in the city in the ante-bellum days. Neither the planter nor the factor nor the lawyer led a life of idle ease and pleasure; they were workers, whose energy built up the State; they lived often rather in rude profusion than in luxury.

PIERCE BUTLER

_James Monroe born, 1758_

April Twenty-Ninth

Error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it.

THOMAS JEFFERSON

April Thirtieth

To Jefferson's initiative and farsightedness we owe it that we secured without bloodshed, for a trifling sum of money, a territory which doubled our republic, assured its expansion to the Gulf of Mexico and to the Pacific, and thus lifted us, by a stroke of genius, into a world power of the first class.

THOMAS E. WATSON

_Jefferson acquires the Louisiana territory from France, 1803_

_Washington inaugurated first President of the United States, 1789_

May

AT ARLINGTON

The dead had rest; the Dove of Peace
Brooded o'er both with equal wings;
To both had come that great surcease.
The last omnipotent release
From all the world's delirious stings.
To bugle deaf and signal-gun,
They slept, like heroes of old Greece,
Beneath the glebe at Arlington.

And in the Spring's benignant reign,
The sweet May woke her harp of pines;
Teaching her choir a thrilling strain
Of jubilee to land and main.
She danced in emerald down the lines;
Denying largesse bright to none,
She saw no difference in the signs
That told who slept at Arlington.

She gave her grasses and her showers
To all alike who dreamed in dust;
Her song-birds wove their dainty bowers
Amid the jasmine buds and flowers,
And piped with an impartial trust--
Waifs of the air and liberal sun,
Their guileless glees were kind and just
To friend and foe at Arlington.
JAMES RYDER RANDALL

May First

The linnet, the lark, and oriel
Were chanting the loves they chant so well;
It was blue all above, below all green,
With the radiant glow of noon between.
JOSEPH SALYARDS
(_Idothea_; Idyl III)

May Second

A strange fatality attended us! Jackson killed in the zenith of his successful career; Longstreet wounded when in the act of striking a blow that would have rivalled Jackson's at Chancellorsville in its results; and in each case the fire was from our own men! A blunder! Call it so; the old deacon would say that God willed it thus.

COL. WALTER H. TAYLOR

_Stonewall Jackson wounded at Chancellorsville, 1863_

_Emma Sanson directs Forrest in pursuit of Streight, 1863_

May Third

Chancellorsville, where 130,000 men were defeated by 60,000, is up to a certain point as much the tactical masterpiece of the nineteenth century as was Leuthen of the eighteenth.

LIEUT.-COL. G. F. R. HENDERSON, C.B.

General Pender, you must hold your ground, you must hold your ground.

JACKSON'S Last Command

May Fourth

The productions of nature soon became my playmates. I felt that an intimacy with them not consisting of friendship merely, but bordering on frenzy, must accompany my steps through life.

JOHN JAMES AUDUBON

_John James Audubon born, 1780_

May Fifth

Lord of Hosts, that beholds us in battle, defending
The homes of our sires 'gainst the hosts of the foe,
Send us help on the wings of thy angels descending,
And shield from his terrors and baffle his blow.
Warm the faith of our sons, till they flame as the iron,
Red glowing from the fire-forge, kindled by zeal;
Make them forward to grapple the hordes that environ,
In the storm-rush of battle, through forests of steel!
From the Charleston _Mercury_

_Battle of the Wilderness; Lee, with 60,000 men, attacks Grant with 140,000, 1864_

May Sixth

It depends on the State itself, to retain or abolish the principle of representation, because it depends on itself whether it will continue a member of the Union. To deny this right would be inconsistent with the principle on which all our political systems are founded, which is, that the people have, in all cases, a right to determine how they will be governed.

(Rawle's text-book on the Constitution, taught at West Point before
the War between the States)

JUDAH P. BENJAMIN, AMERICAN DISRAELI

Who is the man, save this one, of whom it can be said that he held conspicuous leadership at the bar of two countries?

SIR HENRY JAMES
(England)

_Tennessee and Arkansas secede, 1861_

_Judah P. Benjamin, Confederate Secretary of State, dies, 1884_

May Seventh

The slaves who ran away from their masters were set to work at once by General Butler and made to keep at it, much to their annoyance. One of these, having been put to it rather strong, said: "Golly, Massa Butler, dis nigger nebber had to work so hard befo'; dis chile gwine secede once moah."

Ohio _Statesman_, 1861

May Eighth

Having completed our repairs on May 8th, and while returning to our old anchorage, we heard heavy firing, and, going down the harbor, found the _Monitor_, with the iron-clads _Galena_, _Naugatuck_, and a number of heavy ships, shelling our batteries at Sewell's Point. We stood directly for the _Monitor_, but as we approached they all ceased firing and retreated below the forts.

COL. JOHN TAYLOR WOOD

_The "Virginia" again challenges the "Monitor" to battle, 1862_

_Battle of Palo Alto, 1846_

May Ninth

MOTHERS' DAY

Because I feel that, in the Heavens above
The angels, whispering to one another,
Can find, among their burning terms of love,
None so devotional as that of "Mother."
EDGAR ALLAN POE

May Tenth

Fearless and strong, self-dependent and ambitious, he had within him the making of a Napoleon, and yet his name is without spot or blemish.

LIEUT.-COL. G. F. R. HENDERSON, C.B.

... Ask the world--
The world has heard his story--
If all its annals can unfold
A prouder tale of glory?
If ever merely human life
Hath taught diviner moral--
If ever round a worthier brow
Was twined a purer laurel?
MARGARET J. PRESTON

_Stonewall Jackson dies, 1863_

May Eleventh

The Spanish legend tells us of the Cid,
That after death he rode erect, sedately
Along his lines, even as in life he did,
In presence yet more stately.

And thus our Stuart at this moment seems
To ride out of our dark and troubled story
Into the region of romance and dreams,
A realm of light and glory.
JOHN R. THOMPSON

_J. E. B. Stuart mortally wounded at Yellow Tavern, 1864_

May Twelfth

General Lee, you shall not lead my men in a charge!

GORDON

General Lee to the rear!--_His Soldiers._

I do wish somebody would tell me where my place is on the field of battle! Wherever I go to look after the fight, I am told, "This is no place for you; you must go away."

ROBERT E. LEE

_Lee, with 50,000 men, repulses Grant with 100,000, at Spottsylvania Court House; Lee "ordered" to the rear, 1864_

May Thirteenth

Good is the Saxon speech! clear, short, and strong,
Its clean-cut words, fit both for prayer and song;
Good is this tongue for all the needs of life;
Good for sweet words with friend, or child, or wife.

* * * * *

'Tis good for laws; for vows of youth and maid;
Good for the preacher; or shrewd folk in trade;
Good for sea-calls when loud the rush of spray;
Good for war-cries where men meet hilt to hilt,
And man's best blood like new-trod wine is spilt,--
Good for all times, and good for what thou wilt!
JAMES BARRON HOPE

_Landing at Jamestown, 1607_

_Texas troops, C. S. A., defeat Federals in last battle of the War, at Palmito Ranch, 1865, the victors learning from their prisoners that the Confederacy had fallen (Chas. Wm. Ramsdell)_

May Fourteenth

[This exploration] was undertaken at the instance of President Jefferson, and together with the voyage which Captain Gray of Boston had made to the Columbia, in 1792, gave the United States a claim to all the territory covered by the States of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho.

PHILIP ALEXANDER BRUCE

_Lewis and Clark start from St. Louis on northwestern expedition, 1804_

May Fifteenth

Throughout the events that led up to the Revolution, it seemed ordained that Massachusetts was to suffer and Virginia to sympathize. Until the outbreak of actual hostilities scarcely anything of moment occurred on the soil of Virginia to incite her sons to champion the cause of freedom. Indeed, from the beginning of the controversy between the colonies and the mother country, the British Ministry seemed to have avoided any special cause of irritation to the people of the Old Dominion. The part, therefore, which Virginia took in the events of those days must be attributed to her devotion to the principles of liberty, to her interest in the common cause of the colonies, and particularly to her sympathy with Massachusetts in the suffering which that province was called upon to endure. If we lose sight of these motives as the springs of Virginia's conduct in that struggle, we shall be unable to appreciate either the nobility of her spirit or the wisdom and energy which marked her initiative.

S. C. MITCHELL

_Virginia opposes Boston Port Bill, 1774_

May Sixteenth

I refuse to make any acknowledgments for what I have done. My blood will be as seed sown in good ground, which will produce a hundred fold.

JAMES PUGH

(_Before execution under Gov. Tryon, North Carolina, 1771_)

_Battle of Alamance Creek, 1771_

May Seventeenth

He came into military and political life like some blazing meteor, with exceeding brilliance and splendor speeding across the horizon of history. His activities in politics and war covered only a brief span of seventeen years, 1848 to 1865, and in so short a period but few men ever received more, maintained their parts better, were the recipients of greater honors, or bore themselves with nobler dignity, greater skill or more superb courage either in victory or defeat.

BENNETT H. YOUNG

_John C. Breckinridge dies, 1875_

May Eighteenth

Hushed is the roll of the rebel drum,
The sabres are sheathed and the cannon are dumb;
And Fate, with pitiless hand, has furled
The flag that once challenged the gaze of the world.
JOHN R. THOMPSON
(_From "Lee to the Rear"_)

May Nineteenth

But the fame of the Wilderness fight abides,
And down into history grandly rides
Calm and unmoved as in battle he sat,
The gray-bearded man in the black slouch hat.
JOHN R. THOMPSON
(_From "Lee to the Rear"_)

May Twentieth

You can get no troops from North Carolina.

GOV. ELLIS
(_Reply to Washington administration, April 15, 1861_)

_North Carolina secedes from the Union, 1861_

May Twenty-First

The Dixie girls wear homespun cotton,
But their winning smiles I've not forgotten;
Look away, away, away down South in Dixie.
They've won my heart and naught surpasses
My love for the bright-eyed Dixie lasses;
Look away, away, away down South in Dixie.

Chorus:

I'll give my life for Dixie;
Away, away;
In Dixie's land I'll take my stand,
And live and die for Dixie.
Away, away,
Away down South in Dixie.
MARIE LOUISE EVE

May Twenty-Second

How brilliant is the morning star;
The evening star how tender;
The light of both is in her eyes,--
Their softness and their splendor;
But for the lash that shades their sight,
They were too dazzling for the light,
And when she shuts them all is night,--
The daughter of Mendoza.
MIRABEAU B. LAMAR

May Twenty-Third

Great Chieftain of our choice,
Albeit that people's voice
No comfort speaks in thy lone granite keep;
Through those harsh iron bars
There come back from the stars
Low echoes of the prayers they nightly weep.
WILLIAM MUNFORD

_Jefferson Davis puts in irons at Fort Monroe, 1865_

May Twenty-Fourth

Yet to all Americans it must be a regrettable chapter in our history when it is remembered that this man was no common felon, but a prisoner of state, a distinguished Indian fighter, a Mexican veteran, a man who had held a seat in Congress, who had been Secretary of War of the United States, and who for four years had stood at the head of the Confederate States.

MYRTA LOCKETT AVARY
(_Davis in chains_)

May Twenty-Fifth

A rich and well-stored mind is the only true philosopher's stone, extracting pure gold from all the base material around. It can create its own beauty, wealth, power, happiness. It has no dreary solitudes. The past ages are its possession, and the long line of the illustrious dead are all its friends.

GEORGE DAVIS

May Twenty-Sixth

Cease firing! There are here no foes to fight!
Grim war is o'er and smiling peace now reigns;
Cease useless strife--no matter who was right--
True magnanimity from hate abstains.
Cease firing!
MAJOR WILLIAM MEADE PEGRAM

_The last Confederate army, under General Kirby Smith, surrenders at Baton Rouge, 1865_

May Twenty-Seventh

Representing nothing on God's earth now,
And naught in the water below it,
As a pledge of a nation that's dead and gone,
Keep it, dear Captain, and show it.
Show it to those who will lend an ear
To the tale this paper can tell
Of liberty born, of the patriot's dream,
Of a storm-cradled nation that fell.

Too poor to possess the precious ores,
And too much of a stranger to borrow,
We issued to-day our promise to pay,
And hoped to repay on the morrow.
MAJOR S. A. JONAS
(_From "Lines on the back of a
Confederate note"_)

May Twenty-Eighth

Old time negroes intuitively knew who "belonged" to them and who did not. The following incident is told of Senator Sumner's visit to friends at Gallatin, Tennessee, some years before the war; the colloquy is between the Senator and "Old Virginia Jeff:"

"Jeff, I hear you call all the white folks down here 'Marse'--'Marse Henry,' 'Marse John' or what not, isn't that true?"

"Yas, sah."

"And you always call me 'Mister Sumner.' Now, Jeff, here's a quarter. During the rest of my visit you call me Marse Charles, you hear?"

MAJOR JOHN C. WRENSHALL

_P. G. T. Beauregard born, 1818_

May Twenty-Ninth

If we wish to be free--if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending--if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained--we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms and to the God of Hosts is all that is left us!

PATRICK HENRY

_Patrick Henry born, 1736_

May Thirtieth

Those who oppose slavery in Kansas do not base their opposition upon any philanthropic principles, or any sympathy for the African race. For, in their so-called Constitution, framed at Topeka, they deem that entire race so inferior and degraded as to exclude them all forever from Kansas, whether they be bond or free.

ROBERT J. WALKER

_Kansas given territorial rights by Congress, 1854_

May Thirty-First

SONG OF THE CHATTAHOOCHEE

... All down the hills of Habersham,
All through the valleys of Hall,
The rushes cried _Abide, abide_,
The wilful waterweeds held me thrall,
The laving laurel turned my tide,
The ferns and the fondling grass said _Stay_.
The dewberry dipped for to work delay,
And the little reeds sighed _Abide, abide_,
_Here in the hills of Habersham_,
_Here in the valleys of Hall_.
SIDNEY LANIER

_British Government declared suspended in North Carolina (Mecklenburg) 1775_

June

THE SLEEPER

At midnight, in the month of June,
I stand beneath the mystic moon.
An opiate vapor, dewy, dim,
Exhales from out her golden rim,
And, softly dripping, drop by drop,
Upon the quiet mountain top,
Steals drowsily and musically
Into the universal valley.
The rosemary nods upon the grave;
The lily lolls upon the wave;
Wrapping the fog above its breast,
The ruin moulders into rest;
Looking like Lethe, see! the lake
A conscious slumber seems to take,
And would not, for the world, awake.
EDGAR ALLAN POE

June First

... The year,
And all the gentle daughters in her train,
March in our ranks, and in our service wield
Long spears of golden grain!
A yellow blossom as her fairy shield,
June flings her azure banner to the wind,
While in the order of their birth
Her sisters pass, and many an ample field
Grows white beneath their steps, till now, behold,
Its endless sheets unfold
The snow of Southern summers!
HENRY TIMROD
(_Ethnogenesis_)

_Kentucky admitted to the Union, 1792_

_Tennessee admitted to the Union, 1796_

_John H. Morgan born, 1825_

June Second

In regard to African Slavery, which has played so important a part in our political history, Randolph was an Emancipationist, as distinguished from an Abolitionist. This distinction was a very broad one; as broad as that between Algernon Sidney and Jack Cade; or between Charlemagne and Peter the Hermit--in fact, it was the difference between Reason and Fanaticism. On this subject Randolph and Clay concurred; both were Emancipationists, and both denounced the Abolitionists; as did also Webster, and all the best, wisest, and purest men of that day.

JUDGE DANIEL BEDINGER LUCAS

_John Randolph born, 1773_

June Third

Other leaders have had their triumphs. Conquerors have won crowns, and honors have been piled on the victors of earth's great battles, but never, sir, came man to more loving people.

HENRY W. GRADY

_Jefferson Davis born in Kentucky, 1808_

June Fourth

In the hallowed stillness of your bridal eve, ere the guests have all assembled, lift up to yours the pale face, love's perfect image, and you shall see that vision to which God our Father vouchsafes no equal this side the jasper throne--you shall see the ineffable eyes of innocence entrusting to you, unworthy, oh! so unworthy, her destiny through time and eternity. Inhale the perfume of her breath and hair, that puts the violets of the wood to shame; press your first kiss (for now she is all your own), your first kiss upon the trembling petals of her lips, and you shall hear, with ears you knew not that you had, the silver chiming of your wedding bells far, far up in heaven.

GEORGE W. BAGBY

June Fifth

THE WOMEN OF THE SOUTH

Instead of superficial adornments and supine action, the intellectual sympathies and interests of these women were large, and they undertook with wise and just guidance, the management of households and farms and servants, leaving the men free for war and civil government. These noble and resolute women were the mothers of the Gracchi, of the men who built up the greatness of the Union and accomplished the unexampled achievements of the Confederacy.

J. L. M. CURRY

June Sixth

To the brave all homage render,
Weep ye skies of June!
With a radiance pure and tender,
Shine, oh saddened moon!
Dead upon the field of glory,
Hero fit for song and story,
Lies our bold dragoon.
JOHN R. THOMPSON

_Turner Ashby killed in Shenandoah Valley Campaign, 1862_

_Patrick Henry dies, 1799_

June Seventh

Peace to the dead! though peace is not
In the regal dome or the pauper cot;
Peace to the dead! there's peace, we trust,
With the pale dreamers in the dust.
JAMES RYDER RANDALL

_Monument created, 1910, to the memory of Confederate officers who perished from starvation and exposure at Johnson's Island_

June Eighth

Aurora faints in the fulgent fire
Of the Monarch of Morning's bright embrace
And the summer day climbs higher and higher
Up the cerulean space;
The pearl-tints fade from the radiant grain,
And the sportive breeze of the ocean dies,
And soon in the noontide's soundless rain
The fields seem graced by a million eyes;
Each grain with a glance from its lidded fold
As bright as a gnome's in his mine of gold,
While the slumb'rous glamour of beam and heat
Glides over and under the windless wheat.
PAUL HAMILTON HAYNE

_Stonewall Jackson turns upon Fremont at Cross Keys, 1862_

June Ninth

He sleeps--what need to question now
If he were wrong or right?
He knows ere this whose cause was just
In God the Father's sight.
He wields no warlike weapons now,
Returns no foeman's thrust,--
Who but a coward would revile
An honest soldier's dust?

Roll, Shenandoah, proudly roll,
Adown thy rocky glen,
Above thee lies the grave of one
Of Stonewall Jackson's men.
MARY ASHLEY TOWNSEND

_Stonewall Jackson meets Shields at Port Republic, 1862_

June Tenth

The indomitable courage, the patient endurance of privations, the supreme devotion of the Southern soldiers, will stand on the pages of history, as engraven on a monument more enduring than brass.

MAJ. JAS. F. HUNTINGTON, U. S. A.

_United Confederate Veterans organized at New Orleans, 1889_

_Battle of Bethel, Va., the first regular engagement of the War between the States, 1861_

June Eleventh

We believed that it was most desirable that the North should win; we believed in the principle that the Union is indissoluble; but we equally believed that those who stood against us held just as sacred convictions that were the opposite of ours, and we respected them, as every man with a heart must respect those who gave all for their belief.

JUSTICE O. W. HOLMES
(Massachusetts)

June Twelfth

The band preceding the coffin smote on their ears with poignant loud lamenting, then carried its sorrow to die moaning on the night. As the shadowy cortege filed by--men bearing lanterns on either side the hearse--a horse, riderless, with boots empty in the stirrups, following--a few soldiers carrying arms reversed--a single carriage with mourners--the effect was infinitely sad. So common the spectacle during the Battle Summer, it did not occur to them to even wonder which of our martyrs was thus journeying to his last home.

MRS. BURTON HARRISON

June Thirteenth

A little bird there was once, with golden wings;
In the stars she would build her nest;
And so, with a twig in her beak, at eventide
When Hesperus sank to rest,
Away to the starry deep she flew;--for said she,
"In the Pleiades shall my nesting be!"
Ah, little bird! There are heights far, far too high
For the reach of those tiny wings!
Down here by this thicket of haw let us rest, you and I,
And list what the brooklet sings!
ALLEN KERR BOND

June Fourteenth

A flash from the edge of a hostile trench,
A puff of smoke, a roar
Whose echo shall roll from the Kenesaw Hills
To the farthermost Christian shore,
Proclaims to the world that the warrior priest
Will battle for right no more.
HENRY LYNDEN FLASH

_Gen. Leonidas Polk, the Warrior Bishop, killed at Kenesaw Mountain, 1864_

June Fifteenth

O, Art, high gift of Heaven! how oft defamed
When seeming praised! To most a craft that fits,
By dead, prescriptive Rule, the scattered bits
Of gathered knowledge; even so misnamed
By some who would invoke thee.
WASHINGTON ALLSTON

June Sixteenth

W'en banjer git ter talkin'
You better hol' yo' tongue,
Hit mek you think youse gre't an' gran'
An' rich an' strong an' young,
An' ev'rything whar scrumpshus
Right at yo' feet is flung.

Oh, my soul gits up an' humps hisse'f
An' goes outside an' walks,
W'en a picker gits ter pickin'
An' de
banjer
talks!
ANNE VIRGINIA CULBERTSON

_Winchester captured by Confederates, 1863_

June Seventeenth

GENEROUS TRIBUTE OF A BRAVE FOE AND DISTINGUISHED AMERICAN SOLDIER AND CITIZEN

Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia never sustained defeat. Finally succumbing to exhaustion, to the end they were not overthrown in fight.

CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS
(Massachusetts)

June Eighteenth

Now, Ham, de only nigger whut wuz runnin' on der packet,
Got lonesome in de barber-shop, an' c'u'dn't stan' de racket;
An' so, fur to amuse hese'f, he steamed some wood an' bent it,
An' soon he had a banjo made--de fust dat wuz invented.

De 'possum had as fine a tail as dis dat I's a-singin';
De ha'r's so long an' thick an' strong,--des fit fur banjo-stringin';
Dat nigger shaved 'em off as short as washday-dinner graces;
An' sorted ob' em by de size, f'om little E's to basses.
IRWIN RUSSELL
(_Origin of the Banjo on
Board the Ark_)

June Nineteenth

By Captain Winslow's account, the _Kearsarge_ was struck twenty-eight times; but his ship being armored, my shot and shell fell harmless into the sea. The _Alabama_ was not mortally wounded until after the _Kearsarge_ had been firing at her _an hour and ten minutes_. In the meantime, in spite of the armor of the _Kearsarge_, I lodged a rifled percussion shell near her stern post--_where there were no chains_--which failed to explode because of the defect of the cap. On so slight an incident--the defect of a percussion-cap--did the battle hinge.

RAPHAEL SEMMES

_The "Alabama" sunk by the "Kearsarge" off Cherbourg, 1864_

June Twentieth

Jamestown and St. Mary's are both within the segment of a circle of comparatively small radius whose centre is at the mouth of the Chesapeake. In this strategic region, the key of America, Raleigh chose the base from which he would colonize the new empire; here the Jamestown experiment succeeded, after Raleigh's head had fallen on the block; the Revolution was fired by the eloquence of Patrick Henry, and was consummated at Yorktown; the War of 1812 was settled by the victories of North Point and Fort McHenry; the crisis of the Civil War occurred; and seven Presidents of the United States were born.

ALLEN S. WILL

_The first Lord Baltimore obtains from the Crown a grant of the territory lying between the Potomac and the 40th parallel, 1632_

_Secession of West Virginia from Virginia sustained by the Federal Government, 1863_

_"Virginia, who had given to all the States in common five great commonwealths of the northwest and the county of Kentucky, was now bereft of half of what remained to her"_

June Twenty-First

What care I if Cyrus McCormick was born in Rockbridge County? These new-fangled "contraptions" are to the old system what the little, dirty, black steam-tug is to the three-decker, with its cloud of snowy canvas towering to the skies--the grandest and most beautiful sight in the world. I wouldn't give Uncle Isham's picked man, "long Billy Carter," leading the field, with one good drink of whisky in him--I wouldn't give one swing of his cradle and one "ketch" of his straw for all the mowers and reapers in creation.

GEORGE W. BAGBY

_Cyrus Hall McCormick of Virginia patents his reaping machine, 1831_

June Twenty-Second

If I could dwell
Where Israfel
Hath dwelt, and he where I,
He might not sing so wildly well
A mortal melody,
While a bolder note than this might swell
From my lyre within the sky.
EDGAR ALLAN POE

_Arkansas readmitted to the Union, 1868_

June Twenty-Third

THE BROOK

It is the mountain to the sea
That makes a messenger of me:
And, lest I loiter on the way
And lose what I am sent to say,
He sets his reverie to song
And bids me sing it all day long.
JOHN B. TABB

June Twenty-Fourth

AN AMUSING COMMENTARY ON THE MAKING OF SOME HISTORIES

I have here a small volume entitled, "John Randolph, by Henry Adams." It is one of a series called "American Statesmen," and emanates from the thin air of Boston. The series is edited by Mr. J. T. Morse, Jr. By what law of selection he has been governed in allotting to particular authors the preparation of respective biographies it is impossible to divine. It is quite clear, however, that he has not followed any rule of qualification or congeniality hitherto recognized by men or angels. For example, a foreigner, Dr. Von Holtz, who, in an emphatically European and un-American treatise on the Federal Constitution, had already denounced Calhoun as a kind of Lucifer, is appointed his biographer; Henry Clay, the father of Protection (as it is called), is assigned to Carl Schurz, who, I understand, is an ardent advocate of Free Trade; while John Randolph is turned over to the tender mercies of a descendant of the first Vice-President, and the grandson of John Quincy Adams!

Had this unique law of selection prevailed hitherto, we might have had a biography of Luther by Leo the Tenth; a life of St. Thomas Aquinas by Thomas Payne; while Pontius Pilate, or more likely the devil himself, would have been selected to chronicle the divine career of Jesus Christ.

DANIEL B. LUCAS

_John Randolph dies, 1833_

June Twenty-Fifth

But far away another line is stretching dark and long,
Another flag is floating free where armed legions throng;
Another war-cry's on the air, as wakes the martial drum,
And onward still, in serried ranks, the Southern soldiers come.
GEORGE HERBERT SASS

_Beginning of Seven Days' Battle around Richmond, 1862_

June Twenty-Sixth

A PROPHECY, 1869

The close of the Civil War found the conquering States so nearly equally divided between the Radical and Conservative parties, that if the South should be restored to her relative might in the Union, the balance would be thrown at once in favor of the Conservatives. The problem therefore assumed a mathematical form, and demanded that the South should not reinforce the Conservatives of the North. This could be prevented only in two ways, _viz._; either by keeping the South out of the Union entirely or by placing the political power there in the hands of a minority. To adopt one or the other of these expedients was a party necessity. This is the whole key to Reconstruction; and fifty years hence no man living will be found to deny it.

JUDGE J. FAIRFAX MCLAUGHLIN
(_In the "Southern Metropolis," June 26, 1869_)

June Twenty-Seventh

The duties exacted of us by civilization and Christianity are not less obligatory in the country of our enemy than in our own.

ROBERT E. LEE

_Lee issues his famous Chambersburg order, 1863_

_"Winnie" Davis born, 1864_

June Twenty-Eighth

COL. WILLIAM MOULTRIE; SERGEANT JASPER; "PALMETTO DAY"

The battle holds a conspicuous place in the history of the Revolution. It was our first clear victory over the British, and won over one of England's most distinguished naval officers.

JOHN J. DARGAN

_Defence of Fort Sullivan, (Moultrie,) 1776_

_North Carolina, South Carolina, Florida, Alabama, and Louisiana readmitted to the Union, 1868_

June Twenty-Ninth

His trumpet-tones re-echoed like
Evangels to the free,
Where Chimborazo views the world
Mosaic'd in the sea;
And his proud form shall stand erect
In that triumphal car
Which bears to the Valhalla gates
Heroic Bolivar!
JAMES RYDER RANDALL

_Henry Clay dies, 1852_

June Thirtieth

Yes, there's a charm about the name of Mary
Which haunts me like some old enchanter's spell,
Or rather like the voice of some sweet fairy,
Singing low love-songs in a lonely dell.
It hath a music that can never weary,
A strain that seems of love and grief to tell,
The echoes of an anthem from the shrine
Of peace, and bliss, and rest, and love divine.
WILLIAM WOODSON HENDREE

_Robert E. Lee marries Mary Page Custis, great-granddaughter of Martha Washington, 1831_

July

A SUMMER SHOWER

Meanwhile, unreluctant,
Earth like Danae lies;
Listen! is it fancy,
That beneath us sighs,
As that warm lap receives the largesse of the skies?

Jove, it is, descendeth
In those crystal rills;
And this world-wide tremor
Is a pulse that thrills
To a god's life infused through veins of velvet hills.

Wait, thou jealous sunshine,
Break not on their bliss;
Earth will blush in roses
Many a day for this,
And bend a brighter brow beneath thy burning kiss.
HENRY TIMROD

July First

A SOUTHERN SOLDIER'S TRIBUTE

To the Union commander, General George Gordon Meade, history will accord the honor of having handled his army at Gettysburg with unquestioned ability. The record and the results of the battle entitle him to a high place among Union leaders. To him and to his able subordinates and heroic men is due the credit of having successfully met and repelled the Army of Northern Virginia in the meridian of its hope and confidence and power.

GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON

_First day at Gettysburg, 1863_

July Second

General Lee distinctly ordered Longstreet to attack early the morning of the second day, and if he had done so, two of the largest corps of Meade's army would not have been in the fight; but Longstreet delayed the attack until four o'clock in the afternoon, and thus lost his opportunity of occupying Little Round Top, the key to the position, which he might have done in the morning without firing a shot or losing a man.

GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON

_Second day at Gettysburg, 1863_

July Third

General Lee ordered Longstreet to attack at daybreak on the morning of the third day.... He did not attack until two or three o'clock in the afternoon, the artillery opening at one.... Nothing that occurred at Gettysburg, nor anything that has been written since of that battle, has lessened the conviction that, had Lee's orders been promptly and cordially executed, Meade's centre on the third day would have been penetrated and the Union Army overwhelmingly defeated.

GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON

_Third day at Gettysburg, 1863_

_Joel Chandler Harris dies, 1908_

July Fourth

General Lee, according to the testimony of Colonel Walter H. Taylor, Colonel C. S. Venable, and General A. L. Long, who were present when the order was given, ordered Longstreet to make the attack on the last day, with the three divisions of his corps, and two divisions of A. P. Hill's corps, and that instead of doing so he sent fourteen thousand men to assail Meade's army in his strong position, and heavily intrenched.

GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON

_Lee awaits the attack of Meade at Gettysburg throughout the fourth day, 1863_

_Vicksburg surrenders, 1863_

_Thomas Jefferson dies, 1826_

July Fifth

Opinion, let me alone: I am not thine.
Prim creed, with categoric point, forbear
To feature me my Lord by rule and line.
Thou canst not measure Mistress Nature's hair,
Not one sweet inch: nay, if thy sight is sharp,
Wouldst count the strings upon an angel's harp?
Forbear, forbear.
SIDNEY LANIER

July Sixth