brought it on yerselves." And so led him to the Federal camp.

The afternoon grew colder, as he stood looking out of the guard-house.
Snow began to whiten through the gray. He thrust out his arm through the
wicket, his face kindling with childish pleasure, as he looked closer at
the fairy stars and crowns on his shaggy sleeve. If Floy were here! She
never had seen snow. When the flakes had melted off, he took a case out
of his pocket to look at Floy. His sister,--a little girl who had no
mother, nor father, nor lover, but Lamar. The man among his brother
officers in Richmond was coarse, arrogant, of dogged courage, keen
palate at the table, as keen eye on the turf. Sickly little Floy, down
at home, knew the way to something below all this: just as they of the
Rommany blood see below the muddy boulders of the streets the enchanted
land of Boabdil bare beneath. Lamar polished the ivory painting with his
breath, remembering that he had drunk nothing for days. A child's face,
of about twelve, delicate,--a breath of fever or cold would shatter such
weak beauty; big, dark eyes, (her mother was pure Castilian,) out of
which her little life looked irresolute into the world, uncertain what
to do there. The painter, with an unapt fancy, had clustered about the
Southern face the Southern emblem, buds of the magnolia, unstained, as
yet, as pearl. It angered Lamar, remembering how the creamy whiteness of
the full-blown flower exhaled passion of which the crimsonest rose knew
nothing,--a content, ecstasy, in animal life. Would Floy----Well, God
help them both! they needed help. Three hundred souls was a heavy weight
for those thin little hands to hold sway over,--to lead to hell or
heaven. Up North they could have worked for her, and gained only her
money. So Lamar reasoned, like a Georgian: scribbling a letter to
"My Baby" on the wrapper of a newspaper,--drawing the shapes of the
snowflakes,--telling her he had reached their grandfather's plantation,
but "have not seen our Cousin Ruth yet, of whom you may remember I have