Page:Memorials of a Southern Planter.djvu/204

 196 the Vice-Presidency a few years before. It would be impossible to exaggerate the beauty of bis person or the grace and courtesy of his bearing. His face was one of classic beauty, and his figure worthy in its proportions to bear the massive head, so superbly set upon the shoulders; but to see him mounted on his warhorse, riding as if he and the charger were one, the long black plumes of his hat nodding with every movement, his eyes fired with enthusiasm, this was the most impressive picture that had met our eyes. As we stood on the porch the next morning watching the receding cavalcade, they waved their hats and saluted till the bend in the road shut them from our view.

The Burleigh family had cause to remember the second siege of Vicksburg. One of the daughters, Sophy, lay halting between life and death. Her physician informed the family that any excitement would probably be fatal, and on no account must the impending siege of Vicksburg be alluded to in the sick-room. We had heard every gun of the first siege, and this one was expected to begin every hour.

Presently a dull, booming sound was heard; it announced that the siege had opened. The watchers hoped that the patient slept. A moment more and another and another gun broke the stillness.

"What is that?" she asked.

"Isn't it thunder?" somebody suggested.

"Thunder does not sound at regular intervals. The siege of Vicksburg has begun."

But it did not excite her, as we had feared it would, and though every shot seemed to go through the loud-beating hearts of the father and sisters during those long days of suspense, she did not seem to attend, and got well as fast as if there had been no siege of Vicksburg.

The plantation life went on as usual. The servants went about their duties, we thought, more conscientiously than before. They seemed to do better when there was trouble in the white family, and they knew that there was trouble enough when all the young men in the family were off at the war. They sewed on the