63 THE ARMY OF THE POTOMAC. 59 a magnificent country arrayed in all the wealth (f spring vegetation. Tiie winding course of the Panmnkey through a valley in which meadows of the brightest green alternated with wooded hills, offered a perpetual scene of enchantment to our eyes. Flowers bloomed everywhere, especially on the river banks, which abounded in magnolias, Virginia jessamines, azaleas and blue lupines. Humming-birds, snakes, and strange birds of every hue, sported in the branches and about the trunks of the trees. Occasionally we passed a stately habitation which recalled the old mansions of rural France, with its large windows in the roof; around it a handsome garden, and behind it the slave-cabins. As the army was descried in the distance, the inhabitants would hang out a white Hag. One of the provost marshal’s horsemen would dismount at the door, and, reassured by his presence, the ladies in their long muslin dresses, surrounded by a troop of little negresses with frizzled hair and bare legs, would come out upon the verandah and watch the passage of the troops. They were often accompanied by old men, with strongly marked faces, long, white locks, and broad brimmed hats—never by young men. All the men capable of bearing arms had been carried off, willy-nilly, by the Government, to join in the general defence. If an officer dismounted and made his bow to the ladies, he was civilly received. The classic cup of cold water was offered to him in a gourd fixed on the end of a stick, and a melancholy sort of conversation followed. Hen and women were eager for the news. They knew nothing of what was happening; the censorship of the confederate newspapers being complete, and the little news they did publish not being often believed. Then the talk turned upon the war. The ladies naturally expressed their hopes for the success of the side on which their brothers were enlisted; but they longed, above all things, for the end of the war and of the incalculable evils it had brought upon the
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