Remember, dear Rose, this sweet message is for you as well as for us.
Your loving sister,
May Allison."
Rose, who had been clinging about her husband's neck and hiding her face on his shoulder, vainly striving to suppress her sobs during the reading, now burst into a fit of hysterical weeping.
"Oh Freddie, Freddie, my little brother! my darling brother, how can I bear to think I shall never, never see you again in this world! Oh Horace, he was always so bright and sweet, the very sunshine of the house."
"Yes, dearest, but remember his dying message; think of his perfect happiness now. He is free from all sin and sorrow, done with the weary marchings and fightings, the hunger and thirst, cold and heat and fatigue of war; no longer in danger from shot or bursting shell, or of lying wounded and suffering on the battle-field, or languishing in hospital or prison."
"Yes," she sighed, "I should rather mourn for poor wounded Ritchie, for Harold and Edward, still exposed to the horrors of war. Oh, when will it end?—this dreadful, dreadful war!"
All were weeping; for all had known and loved the bright, frank, noble-hearted, genial young man.
But Rose presently became more composed, and Mr. Travilla proceeded with the distribution of the remaining letters.
"From Adelaide, doubtless, and I presume containing the same sad news," Mr. Dinsmore said, breaking the seal of another black edged epistle, directed to him. "Yes, and more," he added, with a groan, as he ran his eye down the page. "Dick Percival was killed in a skirmish last May; and Enna is a widow. Poor fellow, I fear he was ill prepared to go."
Mr. Travilla had taken up a newspaper. "Here is an account of that Ball's Bluff affair, which seems to have been very badly managed on the part of the Federals. Shall I read it aloud?"
"Oh, yes, yes, if you please," sobbed Rose; "let us know all."
"Badly managed, indeed," was Mr. Dinsmore's comment at the conclusion, "it looks very like the work of treason."
"And my two dear brothers were part of the dreadful sacrifice," moaned Rose.
"But oh! how brave, noble, and unselfish they, and many others, showed themselves in that awful hour," said Elsie amid her sobs and tears. "Dear mamma, doesn't that comfort you a little?"
"Yes, dear child. Freddie's sweet message still more, Oh, I need not mourn for him!"
Chapter Twenty-Fifth
"Liberty! Freedom! tyranny is dead!
—Run hence, proclaim, cry it about the streets."
—SHAKESPEARE'S JULIUS CÆSAR.
The winter of 1861-'62 wore wearily away, the Great Republic still convulsed with all the horrors of the civil war; and the opening spring witnessed no abatement of the fearful strife.
Daring all these months nothing unusual had occurred in the family of our friends at Naples; but one lovely morning in April a sweet floweret blossomed among them; bringing joy and gladness to all hearts.
"Our little violet," Elsie said, smiling up at the happy face of her husband, as he bent over her and the babe. "She has come to us just as her namesakes in America are lifting their pretty heads among the grass."
"Thank you, darling," he answered, softly touching his lips to her cheek; "yes, we will give her my mother's name, and may she inherit her lovely disposition also."
"I should be so glad, dear mother's was as lovely a character as I ever knew."
"Our responsibilities are growing, love: three precious little ones now to train up for usefulness here and glory hereafter."
"Yes," she said, with grave yet happy face; "and who is sufficient for these things?"
"Our sufficiency is of God!"
"And He has promised wisdom to those who ask it. What a comfort. I should like to show this pretty one to Walter. Where is he now, I wonder, poor fellow?"
Ah, though she knew it not, he was then lying cold in death upon the bloody field of Shiloh.
There had been news now and then from their Northern friends and relatives. Richard Allison had recovered from his wound, and was again in the field. Edward was with the army also; Harold, too, and Philip Ross.
Lucy was, like many others who had strong ties in both sections and their armies, well-nigh distracted with grief and fear.
From their relatives in the South the last news received had been that of the death of Dick Percival, nor did any further news reach there until the next November. Then they heard that Enna had been married again to another Confederate officer, about a year after her first husband's death; that Walter had fallen at Shiloh, that Arthur was killed in the battle of Luka, and that his mother, hearing of it just as she was convalescing from an attack of fever, had a relapse and died a few days after.
Great was the grief of all for Walter; Mr. Dinsmore mourned very much for his father also, left thus almost alone in his declining years. No particulars were given in regard to the deaths of the two young men.
"Oh," cried Elsie, as she wept over Walter's loss, "what would I not give to know that he was ready for death! But surely we may rejoice in the hope that he was; since we have offered so much united prayer for him."
"Yes," returned her father, "for 'If two of you shall agree on earth, as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven'; and God's promises are all 'yea and amen in Christ Jesus.'"
"Papa," said Horace, "how can it be that good Christian men are fighting and killing each other?"
"It is a very strange thing, my son; yet undoubtedly true that there are many true Christians on both sides. They do not see alike, and each is defending what he believes a righteous cause."
"Listen all," said Mrs. Dinsmore, who was reading a letter from Daisy, her youngest sister.
"Richard is ill in the hospital at Washington, and May has gone on to nurse him. Dr. King, of Lansdale, Ohio, is there acting as volunteer surgeon, and has Lottie with him. She will be company for our May. Don't worry about Ritchie; May writes that he is getting better fast."
Rose smiled as she read the last sentence.
"What is it, mamma?" asked Elsie.
"Nothing much; only I was thinking how greatly Ritchie seemed to admire Miss King at the time of the wedding."
"Well, if he loses his heart I hope he will get another in exchange."
"Why, Sister Elsie, how could Uncle Ritchie lose his heart? did they shoot a hole so it might drop out?" queried Rosebud in wide-eyed wonder. "I hope the doctors will sew up the place quick 'fore it does fall out," she added, with a look of deep concern. "Poor, dear Uncle Wal is killed," she sobbed; "and Uncle Art too, and I don't want all my uncles to die or to
