"When I think of the horrors of Libby and Andersonville and look at these poor sufferers I not only want to invoke the vengeance of a just God but I want to take a hand in it myself. Quarter should be shown to none; every man, woman and child of this accursed Southern race should be bound to their own slaves for a specified length of time, that they, too, might know the curse of serfdom. Their lands should be confiscated and given to those whom they have so long and so cruelly wronged."
As he in detail related the story of the scanty allowance of the prisoners, the filth and darkness of their cells, I longed to stand and plead for my people, and tell how they, too, were without soap, food or clothes; that we had no medicines, even, except what were smuggled through the lines, and that our own poor soldiers were barefooted and starving, and that all the suffering of prisoners on both sides could have been avoided by carrying out the terms proposed by the Confederate Government. If I had only dared to raise the veil and reveal the truth perhaps sympathy might have tempered their bitterness, the flame of divine kinship smouldering in their veins, hidden as in a tomb, might have miraged over the gulf of wrongs a bridge of holier feelings.
Yet the memory of the woman whose son had been killed on the field of Gettysburg and whose lily, now browned and withered with the years, I cherish with such tender care, softened the words that were like blows to my ear and heart. Thus the power of one pure heart radiating its love upon the world as an odorous flower diffuses fragrance on the surrounding atmosphere, uplifts the sorrowing spirit and strengthens it to withstand the rude assaults of a vindictive world.
I had no stateroom in the Lake Champlain steamer, and my little sick baby and its poor tired mother were very thankful when, after the long, dreary night, they welcomed the dawn of day which counted them many miles nearer to their Mecca.
I have forgotten the name of the place from which we took the train for Montreal after leaving the steamer, but I remember a fact of more consequence concerning it--that it was the wrong place.
On reaching the Canada side the passengers were summoned to the custom-house office to have their baggage examined, and I, with my carpet-bag, basket and baby, followed my fellow travelers. When my turn came I handed the officer my keys and checks, which, after a glance, he gave back to me, saying with haste and indifference, as if it might have been the most trivial of matters: