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1884.] How soon my doubt and sorrow sped
 * Beneath his kiss!—

"It was the poppy's fault," I said,
 * "But never his!"

Author:Mary Ainge De Yere

O event in the history of our nation is of greater importance or more thrilling interest to those Americans who have reached the period of middle life than the four years spent in the struggle for the preservation of the Federal Union. The war came not unexpectedly to the major portion of the residents of the South, and from the hour that the first shot was fired upon Fort Sumter the business men and leading men of the South began active preparations for a long siege. Arrangements for the establishment of new postal routes and the issuing of a series of postage-stamps, independent of the regular issues of the United States government, were at once begun.

Certain postmasters of the cities and towns took this matter into their own hands, and arranged for the issuing of provisional stamps for their local offices months before the designs for the regular Confederate stamps were made. The result of this sudden impulse was the production of no less than half a hundred varieties of provisional stamps, the designs for which, in the main, were exceedingly crude. Many of these early Confederate stamps consisted only of type framework, and were quite similar to the common post-mark. One of the first provisional stamps to be issued was that bearing the name of Madison, a small town in Madison County, Florida. This was issued by the postmaster of that town as early as December, 1860. It was composed of a type-set frame, with the value—3 cents—in the centre, printed in bronze on blue woven foolscap paper. It is said that a five-cent stamp was also issued by the Madison postmaster. The circulation of these Confederate provisionals being so limited, few, if any, remain at the present day. Early in 1861 the postmaster at Mobile issued a set of two stamps, a two-cent stamp printed in black, and a five-cent stamp printed in blue, on heavy paper. A copy of the Mobile stamp is here represented.

About the same time there appeared from Athens, Georgia, two stamps, of the value of five and ten cents, but differing slightly in design and color of paper on which they were printed. The one was printed in purple ink, and the other in a deep brick-red. The ten-cent stamp is fairly represented by the accompanying engraving. It will be noticed that the Athens stamp differs from that of Mobile in the publication of the postmaster's name on the stamp, "J. Crawford, P.M.," in the upper circle of the design.

No sooner had these first specimens of provisional postage-stamps made their appearance than half the postmasters throughout the country south of Mason and Dixon's line changed the dating-stamps in their offices into postage-stamps. The design usually consisted of the dating-stamp of the office with the date left out and the figures of value either written or printed in its place. In certain instances the stamps were authenticated by the initials of the