VISIT TO 113TH REG. ILL. VOLUNTEERS.

299

never weep for their own suffering, overflow at the name of wife and mother, and at the pictures of wife and children. They will feel more than ever that such men must conquer, and that enough cannot be done for them." "God bless you!" "God bless you!" burst from the assembled crowd. "Three cheers for the women at home!" cried one. They were given with a will, and echoed through the rifle-pits. Hard, honest hands were grasped, and I turned away to visit other regiments.

The officer of the 8th Missouri, who accompanied me, said, “Madam, pray visit our regiment to-morrow; 'twould be worth a victory to them. You don't know what good a lady's visit to the army does. These men whom you have seen to-day, will talk of your visit for six months to come. Around the camp-fires, in the rifle-pits, in the dark night on the march, they will repeat your words, describe your looks, your voice, your size, your dress, and all agree in one respect, that you look like each man's wife or mother, and are an angel, surely." Such reverence had our soldiers for true-hearted, upright

women.

In the valley beneath, just having exchanged the front line of rifle-pits with the regiment now occupying it, encamped my son's regiment, the 113th Illinois Volunteers. Its ranks had been fearfully thinned by the terrible assaults of the 19th and 21st of May, as it had formed part of the right wing of the line of battle on those terrible days. I knew many of the men personally, and as they gathered round me, and inquired after home and friends, I could but look in sadness for familiar faces to be seen no more on

earth. I said, "Boys, I was present when your colors were presented to you by the Board of Trade. I heard your Colonel pledge himself that you would bring them home, or cover them with blood and glory. Where are they, after your many battles?" With great alacrity, the man in charge of them ran into an adjoining tent, and brought them forth, carefully wrapped in an oil-silk covering. He drew it off, and flung the folds to the breeze, on that glorious day in June. "What does this mean? so soiled and faded, and rent and tattered, I should not know them." The man who held them said, "Why, ma'am, 'twas the smoke and balls did that." "Ah! so it must have been! You have covered them with glory! How about the blood?" A painful silence followed, and then a low voice said, "Four men were shot down, holding them-two are dead and two in the hospital." "Verily, you have redeemed your pledge. Now, boys, sing while you hold them, as you alone can sing, 'Rally round the Flag.'" As the soldiers' chorus echoed through the valley, I stood in sight of the green sward, that had been dyed with the blood of those that upheld the colors. Methought angels might have paused to hear the sacred song, for it spoke of freedom to the captive, and hope to the oppressed of all nations. Since that day it seems

profane to sing it lightly.

After a tearful farewell to this noble regiment, I stepped into the ambulance that was waiting to convey me to the hospital. The brave fellows crowded around me with last messages for their friends up North. As we parted, three cheers arose for the Sanitary Commission and the women at home, and I fancied I heard them till I reached the hospital.

DEATH OF THE COLOR-BEARER, 113TH ILL. REG. 301

I walked across the tent could go with me. He

Here lay the wounded color-bearer. As I entered the tent, the surgeon met me and said: "I am so glad you have come, for R has been calling for you all day." As I took his parched hand, he said: "Oh! take me home to my wife and little ones to die." There he lay, as noble a specimen of vigorous manhood as I had ever looked upon. His deep, broad chest heaved with emotion, his dark eyes were brilliant with fever, his cheeks flushed with almost the hue of health, his rich brown hair clustering in soft curls over his massive forehead. It was difficult to realize he was entering the portals of eternity. to the doctor, and asked if he shook his head and said before midnight he would be at rest. I shrank from his eager gaze as I approached. "What does he say?" he gasped. "You can't be moved." The broad chest rose and fell; his whole frame quivered. There was a pause of a few moments. He spoke first: "Will you take my message to her?" "I will, if I go five hundred miles to do it." "Take her picture from under my pillow, and my children's also; let me see them once more." As I held them for him, he looked earnestly, and said: "Tell her not to fret about me, for we shall meet in heaven. Tell her 'twas all right that I came. I do not regret it, and she must not. Tell her to train those two little boys, that we loved so well, to go to heaven to us; and tell her to bear my loss like a soldier's wife, and a Christian." He was exhausted by the effort. I stood beside him till his consciousness was gone, repeating God's precious promises. As the sun went down that night, he slept in his Father's bosom.

CHAPTER XVIII.

Fast living in Chicago intensified at Vicksburg.-Army life at Vicksburg.-Army trains.-Dust.-Good-nature of the soldiers.—Thunder-storm.-Life in an army tent.-Bombardment of Vicksburg.— Reptiles and insects.-Climate.-Tornado.-Visit to Lutheran clergymen in the ranks.—Brave German lieutenant promoted from the ranks.-Wounded drummer-boy.-A boy-hero.

THIS is a fast age, and Chicago one of the fastest of fast cities. The rush of its busy throngs creates a whirl of excitement. Locomotives cross its main thoroughfares, fire steam-engines rush through its streets at a gallop, drawn by double teams. Express-wagons and drays run with two-forty speed. A busy tide of humanity blocks its sidewalks, and vehicles its streets, requiring, at certain points, policemen to enforce order. Broadway is reproduced, and Vanity Fair reenacted. Steamers and tugs puff up and down through its centre, on a river deep enough to float a man-of-war, and the spreading white sails of hundreds of vessels move through the heart of the city like phantom ships on the bosom of this deep, narrow stream.

All this, however, was quiet compared with Vicksburg during the siege. There, life stripped of its conventionalities, was still more intensified, with higher aims, and on a sub

INTENSE CHARACTER OF LIFE AT VICKSBURG.

303 limer scale. The competitors in that more than Olympic race, had laid aside every weight, stripped themselves of every hindrance, and kept their eyes fixed on the goal. The stakes were life or death, freedom or slavery; the spectators, the whole nation; and its gratitude, the laurel wreath to crown the victor's brow. Such mighty issues, and the sublime resolution that met them, developed the nobility of 100,000 men at the siege of Vicksburg, and furnished a startling contrast to the sordid, grasping, frivolous life of multitudes at home, crowding and jostling each other in the scramble for gold and furbelows, cast aside by these heroes to enable them to come off conquerors.

Her

At Vicksburg, the game of life was played on a great scale. Men lived and died with locomotive speed., The rattling of musketry, the crash of artillery, and the thunder of continuous trains of army wagons, miles in length, made fit music for this war-life, and pressed men forward without time or wish to look at "things behind." The elements of nature harmonized with the scenes of this great drama. rains were torrents, and left rivers and ravines in their wake. The shimmering rays of the tropical sun melted, blistered, and licked up the moisture of the valleys and hill-sides, as did Heaven's descending fire the water in the trenches of Baal's altar. Winds were tornadoes, snapping the trunks of lofty pines and cedars, as stems of pipe-clay. Animal and vegetable nature seemed to partake, in a measure, of this intense type of existence. Evergreens grew to the dignity of forest-trees; even the scathed trunks of the sylvan monarchs were robed with graceful vines and mosses, that trailed to the ground from their lofty branches. Huge pond-lilies,