Daisy
Yet well I knew, that having owned Christ before men, He would own
them before the angels of heaven; and what would they be in that day!
I was satisfied to be numbered with them.
I slept, as Dr. Sandford had prophesied I would that night. I awoke to
a vision of beauty.
My remembrance of those days that followed is like a summer morning,
with a diamond hanging to every blade of grass.
I awoke suddenly, that first day, and rushed to the window. The light had
broken, the sun was up; the crown of the morning was upon the heads of
the hills; here and there a light wreath of mist lay along their sides,
floating slowly off, or softly dispersing; the river lay in quiet beauty
waiting for the gilding that should come upon it. I listened--the brisk
notes of a drum and fife came to my ear, playing one after another
joyous and dancing melody. I thought that never was a place so utterly
delightsome as this place. With all speed I dressed myself, noiselessly,
so as not to waken Mrs. Sandford; and then I resolved I would go out and
see if I could not find a place where I could be by myself; for in the
house there was no chance of it. I took Mr. Dinwiddie's Bible and stole
downstairs. From the piazza where we had sat last night, a flight of
steps led down. I followed it and found another flight, and still
another. The last landed me in a gravelled path; one track went down the
steep face of the bank, on the brow of which the hotel stood; another
track crossed that and wound away to my right, with a gentle downward
slope. I went this way. The air was delicious; the woods were musical
with birds; the morning light filled my pathway and glancing from trees
or rocks ahead of me, lured me on with a promise of glory. I seemed to
gather the promise as I went, and still I was drawn farther and farther.
Glimpses of the river began to show through the trees; for all this bank
side was thickly wooded. I left walking and took to running. At last I
came out upon another gravelled walk, low down on the hillside, lying
parallel with the river and open to it. Nothing lay between but some
masses of granite rock, grey and lichened, and a soft fringe of green
underbrush and small wood in the intervals. Moreover, I presently found a
comfortable seat on a huge grey stone, where the view was uninterrupted
by any wood growth; and if I thought before that this was fairyland, I
now almost thought myself a fairy. The broad river was at my feet; the
morning light was on all the shores, sparkled from the granite rocks
below me and flashed from the polished leaves, and glittered on the
water; filling all the blue above with radiance; touching here and there
a little downy cloud; entering in and lying on my heart. I shall never
forget it. The taste of the air was as one tastes life and strength and
vigour. It all rolled in on me a great burden of joy.
It was not the worst time or place in the world to read the Bible. But
how all the voices of nature seemed to flow in and mix with the
reading, I cannot tell, no more than I can number them; the whirr of a
bird's wing, the liquid note of a wood thrush, the stir and movement
of a thousand leaves, the gurgle of rippling water, the crow's call,
and the song-sparrow's ecstasy. Once or twice the notes of a bugle
found their way down the hill, and reminded me that I was in a place
of delightful novelty. It was just a fillip to my enjoyment, as I
looked on and off my page alternately.
By and by I heard footsteps, quick yet light footsteps, sounding on
the gravel. Measured and quick they came; then two figures rounded a
point close by me. There were two, but their footfalls had sounded as
one. They were dressed alike, all in grey, like my friend in the
omnibus. As they passed me, the nearest one hastily pulled off his
cap, and I caught just a flash from a bright eye. It was the same. I
looked after them as they left my point and were soon lost behind
another; thinking that probably Preston was dressed so and had been
taught to walk so; and with renewed admiration of a place where the
inhabitants kept such an exquisite neatness in their dress and moved
like music. There was a fulness of content in my mind, as at length I
slowly went back up my winding path to the hotel, warned by the
furious sounds of a gong that breakfast was in preparation.
As I toiled up the last flight of steps I saw Dr. Sandford on the
piazza. His blue eye looked me all over and looked me through, I felt.
I was accustomed to that, both from the friend and the physician, and
rather liked it.
"What is on the other side of the house?" I asked.
"Let us go and see." And as we went, the doctor took my book from my
hand to carry it for me. He opened it, too, and looked at it. On the
other side or two sides of the house stretched away the level green
plain. At the back of it, stood houses half hidden by trees; indeed
all round two sides of the plain there was a border of buildings and
of flourishing trees as well. Down the north side, from the hotel
where we were, a road went winding: likewise under arching trees; here
and there I could see cannon and a bit of some military work. All the
centre of the plain was level and green, and empty; and from the hotel
to the library stretched a broad strip of bare ground, brown and
dusty, alongside of the road by which we had come across last night.
In the morning sun, as indeed under all other lights and at all other
hours, this scene was one of satisfying beauty. Behind the row of
houses at the western edge of the plain, the hills rose up, green and
wooded, height above height; and an old fortification stood out now
under the eastern illumination, picturesque and grey, high up among
them. As Dr. Sandford and I were silent and looking, I saw another
grey figure pass down the road.
"Who are those people that wear grey, with a black stripe down the
leg?" I asked.
"Grey?" said the doctor. "Where?"
"There is one yonder under the trees," I said, "and there was one in
the omnibus yesterday. Are those the cadets?"
"I suppose so."
"Then Preston wears that dress. I wonder how I shall find him, Dr.
Sandford?"
"Find whom?" said the doctor, waking up.
"My cousin Preston--Preston Gary. He is here."
"Here?" repeated the doctor.
"Yes--he is a cadet--didn't you know it? He has been here a long
while; he has only one more year, I believe. How can we find him, Dr.
Sandford?"
"I am ignorant, Daisy."
"But we must find him," I said, "for of course he will want to see me,
and I want to see him, very much."
The doctor was silent, and I remember an odd sense I had that he was
not pleased. I cannot tell how I got it; he neither did nor said
anything to make me think so; he did not even look anywise different
from usual; yet I felt it and was sure of it, and unspeakably
mystified at it. Could Preston have been doing anything wrong? Yet the
doctor would not know that, for he was not even aware that Preston was
in the Military Academy till I told him.
"I do not know, Daisy," he said at last; "but we can find out. I will
ask Captain Southgate or somebody else."
"Thank you," I said. "Who are those, Dr. Sandford, those others dressed
in dark frock coats, with bright bars over their shoulders?--like that
one just now going out of the gate?"
"Those are officers of the army."
"There are a good many of them. What are they here for? Are there many
soldiers here?"
"No--" said the doctor, "I believe not. I think these gentlemen are
put here to look after the grey coats--the cadets, Daisy, The cadets
are here in training, you know."
"But that officer who just went out--who is walking over the plain
now--he wore a sword, Dr. Sandford; and a red sash. They do not all
wear them. What is that for?"
"What is under discussion?" said Mrs. Sandford, coming out. "How well
Daisy looks this morning, don't she?"
"She has caught the military fever already," said the doctor. "I
brought her here for a sedative; but I find it is no such matter."
"Sedative!" said Mrs. Sandford; but at this instant my ears were
"caught" by a burst of music on the plain. Mrs. Sandford broke into a
fit of laughter. The doctor's hand touched my shoulder.
"Get your hat, Daisy," he said, "I will go with you to hear it."
I might tell of pleasure from minute to minute of that day, and of the
days following. The breath of the air, the notes of the wind instruments,
the flicker of sunlight on the gravel, all come back to me as I write,
and I taste them again. Dr. Sandford and I went down the road I have
described, leading along the edge of the plain at its northern border;
from which the view up over the river, between the hills, was very
glorious. Fine young trees shaded this road; on one side a deep hollow or
cup in the green plain excited my curiosity; on the other, lying a little
down the bank, a military work of some odd sort planted with guns. Then
one or two pyramidal heaps of cannon-balls by the side of the road,
marked this out as unlike all other roads I had ever traversed. At the
farther side of the plain we came to the row of houses I had seen from a
distance, which ran north and south, looking eastward over all the plain.
The road which skirted these houses was shaded with large old trees, and
on the edge of the greensward under the trees we found a number of iron
seats placed for the convenience of spectators. And here, among many
others, Dr. Sandford and I sat down.
There was a long line of the grey uniforms now drawn up in front of
us; at some little distance; standing still and doing nothing, that I
could see. Nearer to us and facing them stood a single grey figure; I
looked hard, but could not make out that it was Preston. Nearer still,
stood with arms folded one of those whom the doctor had said were army
officers; I thought, the very one I had seen leave the hotel; but all
like statues, motionless and fixed. Only the band seemed to have some
life in them.
"What is it, Dr. Sandford?" I whispered, after a few minutes of
intense enjoyment.
"Don't know, Daisy."
"But what are they doing?"
"I don't know, Daisy."
I nestled down into silence again, listening, almost with a doubt of
my own senses, as the notes of the instruments mingled with the summer
breeze and filled the June sunshine. The plain looked most beautiful,
edged with trees on three sides, and bounded to the east, in front of
me, by a chain of hills soft and wooded, which I afterwards found were
beyond the river. Near at hand, the order of military array, the flash
of a sword, the glitter of an epaulette, the glance of red sashes here
and there, the regularity of a perfect machine. I said nothing more to
Dr. Sandford; but I gathered drop by drop the sweetness of the time.
The statues broke into life a few minutes later, and there was a stir
of business of some sort; but I could make out nothing of what they
were doing. I took it on trust, and enjoyed everything to the full
till the show was over.
CHAPTER XIV.
YANKEES.
For several days I saw nothing of Preston. He was hardly missed.
I found that such a parade as that which pleased me the first morning
came off twice daily; and other military displays, more extended and
more interesting, were to be looked for every day at irregular times.
I failed not of one. So surely as the roll of the drum or a strain of
music announced that something of the sort was on hand, I caught up my
hat and was ready. And so was Dr. Sandford. Mrs. Sandford would often
not go; but the doctor's hat was as easily put on as mine, and as
readily; and he attended me, I used to think, as patiently as a great
Newfoundland dog. As patient, and as supreme. The evolutions of
soldiers and clangour of martial music were nothing to _him_, but he