Jasper County Democrat, Volume 19, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 May 1916 — KINDLY ACT OF SOUTHERN GIRL [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

KINDLY ACT OF SOUTHERN GIRL

Christmas Day Happening That Has Lingered for Many Years in Soldiers’ Mind. WE ARE sometimes visited by a tall, grizzled, squareshouldered man, with leonine eyes that send forth kindly gleams from under brushy brows. He is one of our soldier friends. A man who has made a success of living because he has kept the flower of romance alive in his heart. Although he has many interests, and is, at seventy odd, greatly alive to present day affairs, he finds time to dwell longingly on the memorable events of the days when he was devoting himself to his country's service. His talk, however, is not all of conflicts on the battlefields. When last lie sat at our fireside, his reminiscence took on the glow of romance. Looking into the depth of the dying embers, he said: “The day before Christmas, 1563, we were encamped near a small town In •.Mississippi.- The order was given in camp that there would be no fighting on Christmas day. Early Christmas morning most of us went into the town of M— ——, on pleasure bent. • “My chum, a neighbor boy from Ne»v York state, was in about the same state of homesickness that f

was. We didn’t say much, but I knew he was thinking, as I was, about the family back at home, and the warm little farmhouse folded in among the snowy hills. “ ‘What's the use of Christmas without snow?’ he asked me, glumly, as we strode along. “ ‘Mothers can jnake Christmas out of any sort of pihce,’ I told him. ‘lt’s mother I miss today.’ “We walked along the business street, with its roofed sidewalks. It was unusually wide, and as we came out into the > residence section there were double rows of live oaks, their gray moss draping the red clay driveway.’

“The houses were set far back from the sidewalk, within tall iron fences or brick walls, and guarded by heavy gateways. Box hedges flanked the walks to the portico. Roses vined and bloomed about the doorways, orange trees gave forth their fragrance and mocking birds sang in the satinleaved japonicas. “From the gateway of the handsomest of these homes, a girl of probably sixteen approached us. Behind her came a colored man, carrying a tray with pitcher and glasses. The girl spoke to me, probably because I was taller and older than my chum. “She said, and it seemed to me I

had never heard anything to compare with the music of her voice: " 'Merry Christmas, Mistah Soldjah; my father presents his compliments and begs you to accept a glass of eggnog.' “I’d have drunk blue vitriol if she had offered it, but the eggnog was as velvety as her sweet voice, and we drank heartily, raising our soldier caps and feeling too shy for many words of thanks. “I was nineteen at the time, and I surely wished I could linger with that girl. I hadn't set my eyes on anything feminine for months, and then to come face to face with such grace and beauty was almost too intoxicating, I can see her tonight as she stood before the high, fanciful iron gates of her father’s house, gracioiisly and unaffectedly offering his Christmas good cheer to men who tomorrow would resume the fight against his cause. “She was a dark-eyed, dark-haired little thing, with high color. I remember how dainty her feet looked in black slippers, strapped across white stockings. Her hair hung in loose curls and she wore a wideskirted dress of some bright silk. I don't remember the color. I looked at. her a$ long as I dared, I assure you. “Back at camp, the Christmas day over, the weary vigil of battle once more renewed, I hhd a new fight on. It was with the brightest vision that had ever crossed my gray countryboy's existence. I wmnted to know the name of that girl, to come back sometime to woo her and to win her. “But I was a poor boy, as yet without the education which I meant to gain after the war, and because of the war, the training for my lifework was to be belated. “What had I to offer this bright creature who had apparently known only luxury. I had to reason myself out of that girl, and it was more of a struggle than the siege of Vicksburg. ■I might easily have found out her name, for we were encamped near M- some time, and I could have gotten leave to go there again. But I was afraid if I did know it, I couldn't keep from writing to her, and persecuting her or myself, as the case might be. “Boy that I was, I saw the need of nipping this passion in the bud, so I never went again to M , nor heard the name of my dark-eyed southern beauty.”

Behind Her Came a Colored Man.