Page:Maud Howe - Atlanta in the South.djvu/325

 suffering and pain. All that is best, all that is worst, in humanity was brought out under the crucial test. People who might in other times have lived and died unconscious of the heroism latent in their souls figured as martyrs in the doomed community, while others who had stood high in public esteem, as in their own eyes, were branded with the shameful epithets of coward and traitor. Husbands deserted wives, and fathers children; but the records failed to show one case of a woman who betrayed the trust of husband, parent, or child. And this testimony, given by a man who passed through the terrible epidemic at Thebes, it is gratifying for a woman here to set down. In this life-and-death struggle, as in that other time of battle, the blacks were faithful to their trust; and though most of the great houses and much valuable property were left entirely in their hands, there is not one instance where the master, flying from the pestilence and leaving his goods in the hands of his servant, found just cause for complaint on his return.

The days went by, and the summer drew to its close. In a few weeks the coming of the cold weather would check the plague; but in these weeks the fever raged at its very worst, as if eager to grasp more and always more victims before the spirit of the frost should exorcise it and the broken people be at peace. The ranks