A WOMAN'S TENDERNESS


Youth is never largely given to reflection, which is the gift of years;
and although my life had in a measure rendered me more thoughtful than
I might have proven under ordinary conditions, yet it is to be frankly
confessed, by one desirous of writing merely the truth, that I
generally acted more upon impulse than reason. As I stood forth in the
sunlight of that lonely mountain road, my hands securely bound behind
my back, the end of the rope held by one of my captors, while his
fellow leaned lazily upon his gun and watched us, I thought somewhat
deeply over the situation and those peculiar circumstances leading up
to it.

Under other conditions I might have felt tempted to enter into
conversation with my guards, who, as I now perceived, were far from
being the rough banditti I had at first imagined. Judging from their
faces and language they were intelligent enough young fellows, such as
I had often found in the ranks of the Federal army. But I realized they
could aid me little, if any, in the one thing I most desired to know,
and even if they could, a sense of delicacy would have caused me to
hesitate in asking those personal questions that burned upon my lips.
My deep and abiding respect for this woman whom I had so strangely met,
and with whom I had attained some degree of intimacy, would never
permit of my discussing her, even indirectly, with private soldiers
behind the back of their officer. Every sense of honor revolted at such
a thought. Not through any curiosity of mine, however justified by the
depth of my own feeling, should she be made the subject of idle gossip
about the camp-fire.