motives and high purposes are to be read between the lines by those
who knew him as legibly as if they shone out in words upon the printed
page.

During his lifetime he was frequently asked to gather into book form
these little essays which had delighted so many of the readers of his
newspaper; but to all such requests he smilingly turned a deaf ear.
His innate modesty esteemed their value at far below their real worth.
They are given here just as they were written by him and printed in
the VINDICATOR, without change or correction other than of typography.
It goes without saying that if their author might have revised them
with a view to their publication in a permanent form, there would
probably have been many changes; but it is believed that as they came
warm from heart and brain, they will serve to reproduce him most vividly
for those who knew him best and to illustrate once more for them in
all its dignity and sweetness the simple courage of his life.

It is for such friends that this book is published.

ARMISTEAD C. GORDON.
Staunton, Virginia.
October, 1904.




BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.


Henry C. Tinsley was born April 7, 1834, in Richmond, Virginia, and