1861.] SOUTHERN PROVINCIALISMS. 101 iron "i-ron" (two syllables), and barrel "barl." He calls car "kyah" (one syllable), cigar "se-ghah," and negro "nig-ro"-never negro, and very rarely "nigger." The latter, by the way, was a pet word with Senator Douglas. Once, while his star was in the ascendant, some one asked Mr. Seward: "Will Judge Douglas ever be President?" "No, sir," replied the New York senator. "No man will ever be President of the United States who spells negro with two g's!" These southern provincialisms are sometimes a little startling. Conversing with a young man in the senior class of a Mississippi college, I remarked that men were seldom found in any circle who had not some sympathy or affinity with it, to stimulate them to seek it. "Yes," he replied, "something to aig them on!" The forests along the river were beautiful with the brilliant green live-oak festooned with mistletoe, the dark pine, the dense cane, the spring glory of the cottonwood and maple, the drooping delicate leaves of the willow, the white-stemmed sycamore with its creamy foliage, and the great snowy blossoms of the dog-wood. With a calliope, familiarity breeds contempt. Ours became an intolerable nuisance, and induced frequent discussions about bribing the player to stop it. He was. apparently animated by the spirit of the Parisian who set a hand-organ to running by clockwork in his room, locked the apartment, went to the country for a month, and, when he returned, found that two obnoxious neighbors, whom he wished to drive away, had blown out their brains in utter despair. While I was pleasantly engaged in a whist-party in the cabin, this fragment of a conversation between two bystanders reached my ears: 102 CONFEDERATE CAPITOL AT MONTGOMERY. "A spy?" [1861 "Yes, a spy from the North, looking about to obtain information for old Lincoln; and they arrested one yesterday, too." This was a pleasing theme of reflection for the timid and contemplative mind. A passenger explained the matter, by informing me that, at one of the landings where we stopped, telegraphic intelligence was received of the arrest of two spies at Montgomery. The popular impression seemed to be, that about one person in ten was engaged in that not-very-fascinating avocation! In Indian dialect, Alabama signifies, "Here we rest ;" but, for me, it had an exactly opposite meaning. We awoke one morning to find our boat lying at Montgomery. Reaching the hotel too early for breakfast, I strolled with a traveler from Philadelphia, a pretended Secessionist, to the State House, which was at present also the Capitol of the Confederacy. Standing, like the Capitol in Washington, at the head of a broad thoroughfare, it overlooks a pleasant city of eight thousand people. The building is of stucco, and bears that melancholy suggestion of better days which seems inseparable from the Peculiar Institution. The senate chamber is a small, dingy apartment, on whose dirty walls hang portraits of Clay, Calhoun, and two or three Alabama politicians. The desks and chairs were covered with antiquated public documents, and the other débris of legislative halls. While returning to the hotel, we heard from a street loafer a terse description of some model slave: "He is just the best nigger in this town. He knows enough to work well, and he knows nothing else." We were also informed that the Virginia Convention had passed a Secession ordinance. 1861.] "COPPERAS BREECHES" vs. "BLACK BREECHES." 103 "This is capital news; is it not?" said my Philadelphia companion, with well-assumed glee. For several days, in spite of his violent assertions, I had doubted his sincerity. This was the first time he broached the subject when no one else was present. I looked steadily in his eye, and inquired: "Do you think so?" His half-quizzical expression was a satisfactory answer, even without the reply: "I want to get home to Philadelphia without being detained on the way." In the hotel office, two well-dressed southerners were discussing the omnipresent topic. One of them said: "We shall have no war." "Yes, we shall," replied the other. "The Yankees are going to fight for a while; but it will make no difference to us. We have got copperas breeches enough to carry this war through. None of the black breeches will have to shoulder muskets !" The reader should understand that the clothing of the working whites was colored with a dye in which copperas was the chief ingredient; while, of course, the upper, slaveholding classes, wore "customary suits of solemn black." This was a very pregnant sentence, conveying in a few words the belief of those Rebels who instigated and impelled the war. The morning newspapers, at our breakfast-table, detailed two interesting facts. First, that "Jasper," the * This gentleman went to Charleston openly for The Times, and constantly insisted that a candid and truthful correspondent of any northern paper could travel through the South without serious difficulty. He was daily declaring that the devil was not so black as he is painted, denying charges brought against Charlestonians by the northern press, and sometimes evidently straining a point in his own convictions to 104 A CORRESPONDENT IN DURANCE VILE. [1861. Charleston correspondent of The New York Times, had been seized and imprisoned in the Palmetto City. Second, that Gen. Bragg had arrested in his camp, and sent under guard to Montgomery, "as a prisoner of war," the correspondent of The Pensacola (Fla.) Observer. This journalist was an enthusiastic Secessionist, but had been guilty of some indiscretion in publishing facts touching the strength and designs of the Rebel army. His signature was "Nemo ;" and he now bade fair to be No One, indeed, for some time to come. say a kind word for them. But, during the storming of Sumter, he was suddenly arrested, robbed, and imprisoned in a filthy cell for several days. He was at last permitted to go; but the mob had become excited against him, and with difficulty he escaped with his life. No other correspondent was subjected to such gross indignities. "Jasper" reached Washington, having obtained a good deal of new and valuable information about South Carolina character. 1861.] EFFECT OF CAPTURING FORT SUMTER. 105 CHAPTER VIII. I reckon this always, that a man is never undone until he be hanged.- I NOW began to entertain sentiments of profound gratitude toward the young officer, at Mobile, who kept me from going to Fort Pickens. Rejecting the tempting request of my Philadelphia companion to remain one day in Montgomery, that he might introduce me to Jefferson Davis, I continued my "Journey Due North.” When we reached the cars, my baggage was missing. The omnibus agent, who was originally a New Yorker, and probably thought it precarious for a man desiring to reach Washington to be detained, even a few hours, kindly induced the conductor to detain the train for five minutes while we drove back to the Exchange Hotel and found the missing valise. The event proved that delay would have been embarrassing, if not perilous. A Georgian on the car-seat with me, while very careful not to let others overhear his remarks, freely avowed Union sentiments, and asserted that they were predominant among his neighbors. I longed to respond earnestly and sincerely, but there was the possibility of a trap, and I merely acquiesced. The country was intoxicated by the capture of Sum ter. A newspaper on the train, several days old, in its regular Associated Press report, contained the following: MONTGOMERY, Ala., Friday, April 12, 1861. An immense crowd serenaded President Davis and Mr. Walker, Secretary of War, at the Exchange Hotel to-night. The former was not |