The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 96, October 1865

"But, dear Lizzie," he rejoined, "my deportment toward you ought to lessen that surprise, and become the apology for my words. Others may find no happiness in their neighbor's garden, but I have discovered that mine is concentrated in yours. You, dear Lizzie, are its fairest, choicest flower, which I seek to transplant into my own, there to flourish in the warmth of an affection such as I have felt for no one but yourself. Never has woman been so loved as you. Let me add fresh blessings to the day on which I first met you here, by claiming you as my wife."

Oh, how can I write all this? But memory covers every incident of the past with flowers. What I said in reply to that overwhelming declaration has all gone from me. I may have been silent,—I think I must have been,—under the crowd of conflicting sensations,—amazement, modesty, a happiness unspeakable,—which came thronging over my heart I cannot remember all, but I covered my face, and the tears came into my eyes. Still keeping my hand, he placed his arm around me, drew me yet closer to him,—my head fell upon his breast,—I think he must have kissed me.

If other evenings fled on hasty wings, how rapid was the flight of what remained of this! I cannot repeat the thoughts we uttered to each other, the confidences we exchanged, the glimpses of the happy future that broke upon me. Joy seemed to fill my cup even to overflowing; happiness danced before my bewildered mind; the longing of my womanly nature was satisfied with the knowledge that my affection was returned. Out of all the world in which he had to choose, he had preferred me.

That night was made restless by the very fulness of my happiness. At breakfast the next morning, Jane questioned me on my somewhat haggard looks, and was inquisitive to know if anything had happened. Somehow she was unusually pertinacious; but I parried her inquiries. I was unwilling that others, as yet, should become sharers of my joy. But when she left upon her usual duties, I put on my best attire, with all the little novelties in dress which we had recently been able to purchase, making my appearance as genteel as possible. For the first time in my life I did think that silk would be becoming, and was vexed with myself for being without it. I was now anxious to be found agreeable. But it really made no difference.

Presently a knock was heard at the front door; and on my mother's opening it, Mr. Logan entered, with a young lady whom he introduced as his sister. The room was so indifferently lighted that I could not at first distinguish her features, but, on her throwing up her veil, I instantly recognized in her my fellow-pupil at the sewing-school,—my "guide, philosopher, and friend," Miss Effie Logan!

"Two years, dear Lizzie, since we met!" she exclaimed, "and what a meeting now! You see I know it all. Henry has told me everything. I am half as happy as yourself!"

She took me in her arms, embraced me, kissed me with passionate tenderness, and called me "sister." What a recognition it was for me! Her beautiful face, lighted up with a new animation, appeared more lovely than ever. There was the same open-hearted manner of other days, now made doubly engaging by the warmest manifestation of genuine affection. I had never dreamed that Mr. Logan was the brother of whom this loving girl had so often spoken to me at the sewing-school, nor that the inexpressible happiness of calling her my sister was in store for me. But now I could readily discover resemblances which it was no wonder I had heretofore overlooked. If he, in sweetness of disposition, were to prove the counterpart of herself, what more could woman ask? It was not possible for a recognition to be more joyful than this.

My mother stood by, witnessing these incomprehensible proceedings, silent, yet anxious as to their meaning. Effie took her into the adjoining room,—she was far readier of speech than myself,—and there explained to her the mystery of my new position with Mr. Logan. She told me that my mother was overcome with surprise, for, dearly as she loved her children, she had been strangely dull in her apprehension of what had been so long enacting within her own domestic circle. But why should I amplify these homely details? They are daily incidents the world over, varied, it is true, by circumstances; for everywhere the human heart is substantially the same mysterious fountain of emotion.

A secret of this sort, once known, even to one's mother only, travels with miraculous rapidity, until the whole gaping neighborhood becomes confidentially intrusted with its keeping. It seems that ours had been more observant and suspicious than even my dear mother. But such eager care-takers of other people's affairs exist wherever human beings may chance to congregate. Humble life secured us no exemption.

Our pastor was one of the first to hear of the interesting event. It may be that Mr. Logan had given him some inkling of it beforehand, for he was early in his congratulations. Jane, as might be expected, declared that it was no surprise to her, and was sure that my mother would not think of having the wedding without indulging her in her long-coveted silk. Fred took to Mr. Logan with almost as much kindliness as even myself. Throughout the neighborhood the affair created an immense sensation, as it was currently believed that Mr. Logan was exceedingly rich, and that now I was likely to become a lady. While poor, I was only a strawberry-girl; but rich, I would be a lady! Who is to account for these false estimates of human life? Who is mighty enough to correct them?

Nothing had ever so melted down the rude stiffness of the Tetchy family as this wonderful revolution in my domestic prospects. They became amusingly disposed to sociability, as well as to inquisitiveness. But I was glad to see my mother stiffen up in proportion to their sudden condescension, for she would have nothing to do with them.

Who, among casuists, can account for the contagious sympathy that seems to govern the affections? I had often heard it said that one wedding generally leads the way to another. Not a fortnight after these important events, Jane gave a new surprise to the household by introducing to us a lover of her own. It appeared that everything had been arranged between them before we knew a word about it. The happy young man in this case was a junior partner in the factory; and this, as I had long suspected, was the great secret of her attraction there. How my mother could have been so blind to the signs of coming events, such as were developing around her, I could not understand. But both affairs were real surprises to her. If we had depended on her genius as a matchmaker, I fear that both Jane and myself would have had a very discouraging experience!

Thus the services of our pastor were likely to be in great request, for Jane insisted that he should officiate at her wedding, and Mr. Logan would think of no other for his own; and for myself, I thought it best, as this was the first time, not to let it be said that I had volunteered to make a difficulty by being contrary on such a point! Effie offered to be my bridesmaid, and Mr. Logan declared that Fred should be his first groomsman. It was a hazardous venture, Fred being as much a novice at such performances as myself,—who had never officiated even as bride! With a little tutoring, however, he turned out a surprising success. Lucy, no longer a little barefoot fruit-peddler, was promoted to be my waiting-maid.

The new year came, bringing with it silks and jewels, and the double wedding. If I write that I am married, I must add that I am still without a sewing-machine. To me the garden has been better than the needle.

There is a moral to be drawn from all that I have written, wherein it may be seen that the field of my choice is wide enough for many others. If I retire from market as a strawberry-girl, it must not be inferred that it is because the business has been overdone.

JOHN JORDAN,

FROM THE HEAD OF BAINE

Among the many brave men who have taken part in this war,—whose dying embers are now being trodden out by a "poor white man,"—none, perhaps, have done more service to the country, or won less glory for themselves, than the "poor whites" who have acted as scouts for the Union armies. The issue of battles, the result of campaigns, and the possession of wide districts of country, have often depended on their sagacity, or been determined by the information they have gathered; and yet they have seldom been heard of in the newspapers, and may never be read of in history.

Romantic, thrilling, and sometimes laughable adventures have attended the operations of the scouts of both sections; but more difficulty and danger have undoubtedly been encountered by the partisans of the North than of the South. Operating mostly within the circle of their own acquaintance, the latter have usually been aided and harbored by the Southern people, who, generally friendly to Secession, have themselves often acted as spies, and conveyed dispatches across districts occupied by our armies, and inaccessible to any but supposed loyal citizens.

The service rendered the South by these volunteer scouts has often been of the most important character. One stormy night, early in the war, a young woman set out from a garrisoned town to visit a sick uncle residing a short distance in the country. The sick uncle, mounting his horse at midnight, rode twenty miles in the rain to Forrest's head-quarters. The result was, the important town of Murfreesboro' and a promising Major-General fell into the hands of the Confederates; and all because the said Major-General permitted a pretty woman to pass his lines on "a mission of mercy."

At another time, a Rebel citizen, professing disgust with Secession for having the weakness to be on "its last legs," took the oath of allegiance and assumed the Union uniform. Informing himself fully of the disposition of our forces along the Nashville Railroad, he suddenly disappeared, to reappear with Basil Duke and John Morgan in a midnight raid on our slumbering outposts.

Again, a column on the march came upon a wretched woman, with a child in her arms, seated by the dying embers of a burning homestead,—burning, she said, because her sole and only friend, her uncle, (these ladies seldom have any nearer kin,) "stood up stret fur the kentry." No American soldier ever refused a "lift" to a woman in distress. This woman was soon "lifted" into an empty saddle by the side of a staff-officer, who, with many wise winks and knowing nods, was discussing the intended route of the expedition with a brother simpleton. A little farther on the woman suddenly remembered that another uncle, who did not stand up quite so "stret fur the kentry," and, consequently, had a house still standing up for him, lived "plumb up thet 'ar' hill ter the right o' the high-road." She was set down, the column moved on, and—Streight's well planned expedition miscarried. But no one wasted a thought on the forlorn woman and the sallow baby whose skinny faces were so long within earshot of the wooden-headed staff-officer.

Means quite as ingenious and quite as curious were often adopted to conceal dispatches, when the messenger was in danger of capture by an enemy. A boot with a hollow heel, a fragment of corn-pone too stale to tempt a starving man, a strip of adhesive plaster over a festering wound, or a ball of cotton-wool stuffed into the ear to keep out the west wind, often hid a message whose discovery would cost a life, and perhaps endanger an army. The writer has himself seen the hollow half-eagle which bore to Burnside's beleaguered force the welcome tidings that in thirty hours Sherman would relieve Knoxville.

The perils which even the "native" scout encountered can be estimated only by those familiar with the vigilance that surrounds an army. The casual meeting with an acquaintance, the slightest act inconsistent with his assumed character, or the smallest incongruity between his speech and that of the district to which he professed to belong, has sent many a good man to the gallows. One of the best of Rosecrans's scouts—a native of East Kentucky—lost his life because he would "bounce" (mount) his nag, "pack" (carry) his gun, eat his bread "dry so," (without butter,) and "guzzle his peck o' whiskey," in the midst of Bragg's camp, when no such things were done there, nor in the mountains of Alabama, whence he professed to come. Acquainted only with a narrow region, the poor fellow did not know that every Southern district has its own dialect, and that the travelled ear of a close observer can detect the slightest deviation from its customary phrases. But he was not alone in this ignorance. Almost every Northern writer who has undertaken to describe Southern life has fallen into the same error. Even Olmstead, who has caught the idioms wonderfully, confounds the dialects of different regions, and makes a Northern Georgian "right smart," when he had been only "powerful stupid" all his life.

The professional scout generally was a native of the South,—some illiterate and simple-minded, but brave and self-devoted "poor white man," who, if he had worn shoulder-straps, and been able to write "interesting" dispatches, might now be known as a hero half the world over. Some of these men, had they been born at the North, where free schools are open to all, would have led armies, and left a name to live after them. But they were born at the South, had their minds cramped and their souls stunted by a system which dwarfs every noble thing; and so, their humble mission over, they have gone down unknown and unhonored, amid the silence and darkness of their native woods.

I hope to rescue the memory of one of these men—John Jordan, from the head of Baine—from utter oblivion by writing this article. He is now beyond the hearing of my words; but I would record one act in his short career, that his pure patriotism may lead some of us to know better and love more the much-abused and misunderstood class to which he belonged.

Early in the war the command of an important military expedition was intrusted to the president of a Western college. Though a young man, this scholar had already achieved a "character" and a history. Beginning life a widow's son, his first sixteen years were passed between a farm, a canal, and a black-saltern. Being an intelligent, energetic lad, his friends formed the usual hopes of him; but when he apprenticed himself to a canal-boat, their faith failed, and, after the fashion of Job's friends, they comforted his mother with the assurance that her son had taken the swift train to the Devil. But, like Job, she knew in whom she believed, and the boy soon justified her confidence. An event shortly occurred which changed the current of his life, gave him a purpose, and made him a man.

One dark midnight, as the boat on which he was employed was leaving one of those long reaches of slackwater which abound in the Ohio and Pennsylvania Canal, he was called up to take his turn at the bow. Tumbling out of bed, his eyes heavy with sleep, he took his stand on the narrow platform below the bow-deck, and began uncoiling a rope to steady the boat through a lock it was approaching. Slowly and sleepily he unwound it, till it knotted, and caught in a narrow cleft in the edge of the deck. He gave it a sudden pull, but it held fast; then another and a stronger pull, and it gave way, but sent him over the bow into the water. Down he went into the dark night and the still darker river; and the boat glided on to bury him among the fishes. No human help was near. God only could save him, and He only by a miracle. So the boy thought, as he went down saying the prayer his mother had taught him. Instinctively clutching the rope, he sunk below the surface; but then it tightened in his grasp, and held firmly. Seizing it hand over hand, he drew himself up on deck, and was again a live boy among the living. Another kink had caught in another crevice, and saved him! Was it that prayer, or the love of his praying mother, which wrought this miracle? He did not know, but, long after the boat had passed the lock, he stood there, in his dripping clothes, pondering the question.

Coiling the rope, he tried to throw it again into the crevice; but it had lost the knack of kinking. Many times he tried,—six hundred, says my informant,—and then sat down and reflected. "I have thrown this rope," he thought, "six hundred times; I might throw it ten times as many without its catching. Ten times six hundred are six thousand,—so, there were six thousand chances against my life. Against such odds, Providence only could have saved it. Providence, therefore, thinks it worth saving; and if that's so, I won't throw it away on a canal-boat. I'll go home, get an education, and be a man."

He acted on this resolution, and not long afterwards stood before a little log cottage in the depths of the Ohio wilderness. It was late at night; the stars were out, and the moon was down; but by the fire-light that came through the window, he saw his mother kneeling before an open book which lay on a chair in the corner. She was reading; but her eyes were off the page, looking up to the Invisible. "Oh, turn unto me," she said, "and have mercy upon me! give Thy strength unto Thy servant, and save the son of Thine handmaid!" More she read, which sounded like a prayer, but this is all that the boy remembers. He opened the door, put his arm about her neck, and his head upon her bosom. What words he said I do not know; but there, by her side, he gave back to God the life which He had given. So the mother's prayer was answered. So sprang up the seed which in toil and tears she had planted.

The boy worked, the world rolled round, and twelve years later Governor Dennison offered him command of a regiment. He went home, opened his mother's Bible, and pondered upon the subject. He had a wife, a child, and a few thousand dollars. If he gave his life to the country, would God and the few thousand dollars provide for his wife and child? He consulted the Book about it. It seemed to answer in the affirmative; and before morning he wrote to a friend,—"I regard my life as given to the country. I am only anxious to make as much of it as possible before the mortgage on it is foreclosed."

To this man, who thus went into the war with a life not his own, was given, on the 16th of December, 1861, command of the little army which held Kentucky to her moorings in the Union.

He knew nothing of war beyond its fundamental principles,—which are, I believe, that a big boy can whip a little boy, and that one big boy can whip two little boys, if he take them singly, one after the other. He knew no more about it; yet he was called upon to solve a military problem which has puzzled the heads of the greatest generals: namely, how two small bodies of men, stationed widely apart, can unite in the presence of an enemy, and beat him, when he is of twice their united strength, and strongly posted behind intrenchments. With the help of many "good men and true," he solved this problem; and in telling how he solved it, I shall come naturally to speak of John Jordan, from the head of Baine.

Humphrey Marshall with five thousand men had invaded Kentucky. Entering it at Pound Gap, he had fortified a strong natural position near Paintville, and, with small bands, was overrunning the whole Piedmont region. This region, containing an area larger than the whole of Massachusetts, was occupied by about four thousand blacks and one hundred thousand whites,—a brave, hardy, rural population, with few schools, scarcely any churches, and only one newspaper, but with that sort of patriotism which grows among mountains and clings to its barren hillsides as if they were the greenest spots in the universe. Among this simple people Marshall was scattering firebrands. Stump-orators were blazing away at every cross-road, lighting a fire which threatened to sweep Kentucky from the Union. That done,—so early in the war,—dissolution might have followed. To the Ohio canal-boy was committed the task of extinguishing this conflagration. It was a difficult task, one which, with the means at command, would have appalled any man not made equal to it by early struggles with hardship and poverty, and entire trust in the Providence that guards his country.

The means at command were twenty-five hundred men, divided into two bodies, and separated by a hundred miles of mountain country. This country was infested with guerrillas, and occupied by a disloyal people. The sending of dispatches across it was next to impossible; but communication being opened, and the two columns set in motion, there was danger that they would be fallen on and beaten in detail before they could form a junction. This was the great danger. What remained—the beating of five thousand Rebels, posted behind intrenchments, by half their number of Yankees, operating in the open field—seemed to the young Colonel less difficult of accomplishment.

Evidently, the first thing to be done was to find a trustworthy messenger to convey dispatches between the two halves of the Union army. To this end, the Yankee commander applied to the Colonel of the Fourteenth Kentucky.

"Have you a man," he asked, "who will die, rather than fail or betray us?"

The Kentuckian reflected a moment, then answered: "I think I have,—John Jordan, from the head of Baine."[2 - The Baine is a small stream which puts into the Big Sandy, a short distance from the town of Louisa, Ky.]

Jordan was sent for. He was a tall, gaunt, sallow man of about thirty, with small gray eyes, a fine, falsetto voice, pitched in the minor key, and his speech the rude dialect of the mountains. His face had as many expressions as could be found in a regiment, and he seemed a strange combination of cunning, simplicity, undaunted courage, and undoubting faith; yet, though he might pass for a simpleton, he talked a quaint sort of wisdom which ought to have given him to history.

The young Colonel sounded him thoroughly; for the fate of the little army might depend on his fidelity. The man's soul was as clear as crystal, and in ten minutes the Yankee saw through it. His history is stereotyped in that region. Born among the hills, where the crops are stones, and sheep's noses are sharpened before they can nibble the thin grass between them, his life had been one of the hardest toil and privation. He knew nothing but what Nature, the Bible, the "Course of Time," and two or three of Shakspeare's plays had taught him; but somehow in the mountain air he had grown to be a man,—a man as civilized nations account manhood.

"Why did you come into the war?" at last asked the Colonel.

"To do my sheer fur the kentry, Gin'ral," answered the man. "And I didn't druv no barg'in wi' th' Lord. I guv Him my life squar' out; and ef He's a mind ter tuck it on this tramp, why, it's a His'n; I've nothin' ter say agin it."

"You mean that you've come into the war not expecting to get out of it?"

"That's so, Gin'ral."

"Will you die rather than let the dispatch be taken?"

"I wull."

The Colonel recalled what had passed in his own mind when poring over his mother's Bible that night at his home in Ohio; and it decided him. "Very well," he said; "I will trust you."

The dispatch was written on tissue paper, rolled into the form of a bullet, coated with warm lead, and put into the hand of the Kentuckian. He was given a carbine, a brace of revolvers, and the fleetest horse in his regiment, and, when the moon was down, started on his perilous journey. He was to ride at night, and hide in the woods or in the houses of loyal men in the day-time.

It was pitch-dark when he set out; but he knew every inch of the way, having travelled it often, driving mules to market. He had gone twenty miles by early dawn, and the house of a friend was only a few miles beyond him. The man himself was away; but his wife was at home, and she would harbor him till nightfall. He pushed on, and tethered his horse in the timber; but it was broad day when he rapped at the door, and was admitted. The good woman gave him breakfast, and showed him to the guest-chamber, where, lying down in his boots, he was soon in a deep slumber.

The house was a log cabin in the midst of a few acres of deadening,—ground from which trees have been cleared by girdling. Dense woods were all about it; but the nearest forest was a quarter of a mile distant, and should the scout be tracked, it would be hard to get away over this open space, unless he had warning of the approach of his pursuers. The woman thought of this, and sent up the road, on a mule, her whole worldly possessions, an old negro, dark as the night, but faithful as the sun in the heavens. It was high noon when the mule came back, his heels striking fire, and his rider's eyes flashing, as if ignited from the sparks the steel had emitted.