“Ho! you seem to have picked up a fine acquaintance there!” said Arthur Lathrop, the eldest of the brothers.
“She is dressed in the last fashion,” said Charlotte, his sister, with a scornful look at Lucy.
“Quite the style,” joined in the other boy. “You brought your bonnet from the Paris Exposition: did you not, ma’am?”
Poor Lucy had not the least idea what the Paris Exposition was; but she knew very well that these unkind children were making fun of her, and she drew back with a hurt and angry look.
“Couldn’t you give my sisters the pattern of that lovely bonnet?” said Arthur.
“And of that outside toggery too,” said William, “whatever its name is. Not being used to such an elegant style of dress, I don’t know what to call it.”
“You ought to be ashamed to talk so,” said Bessie, indignantly. “She’s a nice, good, little girl, who tries to be a help to every one; and if her clothes are not so very pretty, she can’t help it. It is better to have good clothes and be bad, than to have bad clothes and be good,” added the little girl, saying just the opposite of what she intended.
But no one noticed her mistake. The Lathrops were all too intent on their victim, the other little ones too full of sympathy and indignation, to pay much heed to a choice of words.
“Well,” returned William, provokingly, “don’t we say she is the most stylish, fashionable young lady we have seen this long time. For me, I am struck dumb with admiration.”
“To be sure,” said Charlotte, “didn’t you say that bonnet was the latest fashion from the Exposition?”
“Or from Noah’s ark: which is it? Pray tell us, miss,” put in Arthur with a loud laugh.
“Let her be, you bad boys,” said Belle.
“She looks a great deal nicer than any of you,” said Lily, too anxious to take up Lucy’s defence to think of the exact truth of her statement.
“Oh! of course, of course,” retorted Arthur. “She is quite a model. I propose we all ask our mothers to buy us just such clothes. Don’t leave us, Miss Elegance;” and he caught hold of poor Lucy, who had turned to run away.
“Let her be,” said Lily.
“You’re very ungrateful,” said Maggie. “This morning when you called the stewardess, I saw Lucy run very quick to call her. You ought to be ashamed all of you. You’re as bad as the Elisha children in the Bible, that were eaten up.”
“Are you going to let her go?” asked Lily, with a threatening shake of her head at the young tyrant, who still held Lucy fast.
“As soon as she tells us how many hundred dollars she paid for this love of a bonnet,” said Arthur, tossing off the unlucky shaker with a jerk of his thumb and finger.
Without another word, Lily reached up her small hand, and gave the big boy a sounding slap upon his cheek. In his surprise, he loosed his hold of Lucy, who quickly snatched up her bonnet, and made good her escape.
Arthur turned fiercely upon Lily; but she stood her ground, and not exactly caring, bully though he was, to strike back at a girl so much smaller than himself, he contented himself with catching her still uplifted hand in his, and saying, —
“How dare you do that?”
“’Cause you deserved it,” said Lily, sternly.
“And I’ve a good mind to give you another,” said Belle.
“Children! Children!” said Mr. Powers, who had seen from a distance that trouble was threatening, and had come to prevent it. “What is the matter here? Quarrelling and striking?”
“I’m striking,” said Lily, rather proud of having given a blow in what she considered a just cause; “but I’m not quarrelling, sir.”
“No, papa,” said Belle. “We’re not quarrelling: it’s only those bad, mean ones;” and she pointed at the Lathrops with as much scorn in her tone and manner as they had used towards Lucy.
But these children, knowing right well that their share in the dispute was by far the worst, did not choose to face Mr. Powers’s inquiries, and now scattered in all directions.
“Striking and calling names look a good deal like quarrelling,” said Mr. Powers, smiling.
“But we had to take Lucy’s side, papa,” said Belle; and neither she nor Lily was to be persuaded that it was not right for the latter to strike a blow in Lucy’s defence. Indeed, Maggie and Bessie were rather inclined to hold the same opinion, and all four were quite excited over Lucy’s wrongs.
While Lucy was telling her father the story, they were talking it over among themselves; and knowing, in spite of their sympathy, that she presented rather a comical figure, were trying to think of some means by which they might help her to dress herself more like other children. But they did not see exactly how it was to be done, nor did Mrs. Bradford when they consulted her.
“I fear it would not do to offer Lucy clothes, my darlings,” she said: “those she wears, though odd-looking, are good and comfortable; and her father might be offended if we offered her any thing which seemed like charity, or let him know that we do not think her properly dressed.”
“Mamma,” said Bessie, gravely, “do you think a thing is comfortable when it makes a child laughed at?”
“Well, no, dear, perhaps not,” answered Mrs. Bradford, smiling, “and I am very sorry for Lucy. Mrs. Norris and I were saying this morning that we wished we might tell the poor child how to make herself look less like a little old woman, but we thought it would not do to interfere.”
“I’d wish somebody would interfere if it was me,” said Maggie. “It must be most too much to have a father who won’t talk, and who has such very bad taste.”
This was said with so much emphasis, and with such a long-drawn sigh at the end, as if the mere thought of such misfortune were almost too much for Maggie, that every one laughed.
Bessie had less to say about Lucy’s troubles than any of the others; but she thought more of them: for we know how sensitive she herself was to ridicule, and she could not bear to think that Lucy might have to undergo the same trial again.
“Mamma,” she said, coming to her mother’s side that evening, “there are Lucy and her father sitting at the head of those steps, and she is showing him those queer dressing-gown frocks of hers. Could I go and speak to them?”
Mrs. Bradford turned to see if it was a proper place for Bessie to go to, and then gave her permission, thinking that her little girl might possibly see some way to help Lucy, and trusting to her good sense and kind heart not to say any thing that might give offence.
“Maybe they’re not just the right shape,” said the engineer, as Bessie came near; “but I don’t know how you are to better them;” and he turned over and over the two frocks, just like the one Lucy had on, which lay across his knee. “Maybe Dorothy would show you.”
“I don’t like to ask her,” said Lucy; or Dorothy the stewardess, was rather sharp and short with her.
Bessie came close.
“Would you be offended if some one tried to be kind to Lucy?” she asked, seizing her opportunity.
She was quite surprised to see how pleasantly Waters smiled as he answered, —
“Not I. Those that are friends to my Lucy are friends to me.”
“Some children laughed at her,” said Bessie, wishing to put the case as gently as she could.
The engineer frowned and nodded.
“I told him,” said Lucy.
“There’s no excuse for them,” continued Bessie, looking out over the waters as if she were talking more to herself than to the man, “but perhaps they would not have done it, if – if – if Lucy’s clothes were – were a little prettier.”
“And I’ll warrant if your power was as good as your will, you’d make them prettier for her,” answered the engineer. “You’re a kind little lady. Lucy was just asking me if I could tell her how to fix up her things a bit; but I don’t know. Old Mrs. Sims, who does her washing and sewing, she bought them, and I didn’t see but they were all right; but now Lucy says they’re not, and she can’t do ’em over.”
Lucy stood listening in amazement to this unusually long speech from her father, who was very rarely so sociable with any one as he now was with Bessie.
“But you wouldn’t mind if mamma was to try and help her, would you?” Bessie asked in a coaxing voice.
“Mind!” said the engineer, “I’d be only too thankful, and so would my Lucy; but such a lady as your mamma doesn’t want to bother with a little stranger girl.”
“Oh, yes, she does!” said Bessie, eagerly, “and mamma don’t think it a bit of bother if she can do a kind thing for some one; and she said she would like to fix Lucy up, ’cause she was such a nice, tidy child. Come and show her these, Lucy;” and without waiting for more words, she snatched up one gown, and taking Lucy by the hand drew her after her, telling her to bring the other two with her.
Lucy obeyed rather timidly; but the kind manner and words of the two ladies, Mrs. Bradford and Mrs. Norris, soon put her at her ease, and she became deeply interested in the plans for putting what Bessie called “the dressing-gown” frocks into proper shape.
There were four of them, all alike, of a good but dull gingham, without the least shape or fit, save what was given by a string about the waist; very long and scant, – so scant, that the ladies decided it would take two to make one suitable frock. Lucy asked and readily obtained leave from her father for this; and Mrs. Bradford allowed the four little girls to begin the work that very night by ripping apart the seams.
She and Mrs. Norris went to work also that evening; and when the steamer came into port the following night, Lucy was made happy by having one dress made in a manner proper for a girl of her age; and knowing that the second was surely promised to her by Mrs. Bradford. Belle presented her with “the doll of moderation,” which she had brought with her, she and her young friends having concluded to keep their money for another purpose instead of buying a new one.
The day on which the vessel started on her return voyage, Mr. Bradford and Mr. Powers drove down with their little daughters and Lily Norris; and the children brought Lucy not only her own gingham frock, but also two others, of bright, simple calico, all nicely made up; and a straw hat with a blue ribbon upon it. These were all their own presents, bought with their own money, only the making having been paid for by their mammas; so that the engineer could find no fault with the kindness done to his little girl by these thoughtful young strangers.
Lucy was contented beyond measure with her new clothes; but no words could do justice to her satisfaction and pleasure in her doll. What a treasure it was! What a delight in her rather lonely little life! She talked to it, and caressed it, slept with it in her arms at night, kissed it the first thing in the morning, dressed and undressed it, and learned to use her needle in fashioning clothes for it. Her father might be too busy to attend to her; Dorothy might snub her; fretful, impatient passengers send her hither and thither till she was ready to drop from fatigue, – she had one solace and delight that repaid her for all: the recollection of that little china head, and the staring, blue eyes which lay upon the pillow in her berth, the kisses which she would run and snatch now and then, till her time was her own once more, and she could pet and nurse her little treasure to her heart’s content.
And so our four little travellers have begun their journey with a kind deed which brought pleasure and comfort, such as they did not dream of, into this poor, craving, young heart, which had had so little to feed upon; and went upon their way followed by blessings and grateful, happy memories.
IV
AN OLD ENEMY BUT NEW FRIEND
It was late at night when our travellers reached Savannah, so late and so dark that even quick-sighted, wide-awake Maggie could see nothing about her as they rode to the hotel, save the twinkling street-lamps; and she was as ready as the other children to be put to bed at once and postpone all questions and sight-seeing until the morning.
But you need not fear I am going to trouble you with a long description of the beautiful, quaint, old city, with its numberless green squares which make it so bright and airy; its broad avenues planted with three rows of trees, so tall and wide-spread that their branches have laced overhead, making lovely, leafy arches for one to pass beneath; its roses – such roses! the like of which we do not see in our colder northern climate; roses, which with us are only bushes, growing there into trees, or running into luxuriant vines which clothe the fronts and sides of the old-fashioned houses, covered with a profusion of blossoms, and filling the air with their delicious fragrance. They were just in the perfection of their glory when our friends arrived, and it would be impossible to tell the delight Bessie took in them. Her love of flowers here had full enjoyment in these her favorites. Morning, noon, and night, she was seen with her little hands filled with roses, – for the family were kept well supplied, thanks to the graceful southern fashion of sending flowers to all newcomers and strangers; they were twisted among her curls and worn in her bosom, laid beside her plate at meals, and she would even have slept with them on her pillow, if mamma would have allowed it.
She made a pretty picture as she sat upon the staircase of the – House, the day after their arrival, her lap full of red, white, and yellow roses, which she was arranging with no small taste and daintiness into bouquets for her people.
Three pair of eyes were watching her, – those of a grave-looking gentleman, who stood at the foot of the stairs; and those of Arthur and Charlotte Lathrop, who were peering at her over the banisters from above. But Bessie noticed neither until Arthur called her attention by making a sound like a snarling dog. Bessie started and looked up, then went on with her work in silence.
“I say,” said Arthur, “are you making a wreath of roses for that old Mother Hubbard you took such a fancy to on board the steamer?”
Bessie made no answer.
“Why don’t you speak when you’re spoken to?” said Arthur. “Did you give your tongue to Mother Hubbard?”
“When I’m talked to politely, I always do speak,” said the little girl.
“Oh! and we’re not polite enough to suit you, I suppose,” said Arthur, sneeringly.
“’Tis only engineers’ daughters and the like who are fit company for her,” joined in Charlotte.
“We might go and take lessons from Mother Hubbard, and then perhaps she’d like us better,” said Arthur. “I say, Miss Bradford, what school did you learn your manners in, that you don’t speak when you’re spoken to?”
Bessie remained silent again.
“Do you hear?” shouted Arthur.
“Once I heard of a school where they only paid two cents for learning manners,” said Bessie, demurely.
“What then?” asked Arthur.
“I should think that was the kind of a school you had been to,” answered Bessie.
“And why, I’d like to know?”
“’Cause I shouldn’t think they could teach much manners for two cents.”
Arthur was a clever boy with a quick sense of humor; and he was so struck with what he considered the wit and smartness of the retort, that he forgot to be angry, and, instead of making a sharp answer, broke out into a hearty laugh.
“Pretty good that!” he said. “You’ll do yet.”
“Pretty good, and pretty well deserved too, my lad,” said the gentleman, who had been standing below, coming up the stairs. “See here, Clara, here is the Queen of the Fairies, I believe,” and he turned around to a lady who ran lightly up behind him.
“Queen of the Fairies, indeed,” said the lady, with a laughing look at the little figure before her, in its white dress and shining hair, and lap covered with brilliant flowers: “or Queen of the” – What she would have said was lost, for after a pause of astonishment she exclaimed, “Why! it is – yes, it is Bessie Bradford – dear little Bessie!”
And regardless of her muslin dress with its fluted flounces and ruffles, down went the lady on the stairs before Bessie; and, greatly to her surprise, the little girl found herself held fast in the embrace of a supposed stranger.
But it was no stranger, as she found when she could free herself a little from that tight clasp, and look in the lady’s face.
“Don’t you know me, Bessie?” asked the lady.
“Why! it’s Miss Adams!” cried Bessie, in as great amazement as the new-comer herself.
“And you are a little glad to see me, are you not?” asked the lady, seeing with pleasure the smile and glow on Bessie’s face.
“Not a little, but very, Miss Adams,” she replied. “I was very interested about you, and always thought I’d like to see you again after I heard you’d” – here she hesitated for a word.
“Well,” said the lady.
“I can’t think of the word,” said Bessie. “Oh, yes! reformed, that’s it, – after you’d reformed. You know you wrote and told us about it yourself.”
At this “Miss Adams” went off into a fit of laughter, which sounded very natural to Bessie’s ears; and yet there was a difference in that and in her manner from those of the old days at Quam Beach; something softer and more gentle; “more as if she remembered to be a lady, mamma,” Bessie said afterwards.
The gentleman smiled too.
“Her words are to the point when she does find them,” he said.
“They always were,” said the lady, giving Bessie another kiss. “Bessie, this is the gentleman I found to make me ‘behave myself.’ I hope you’ll find the ‘kitchen lady’ improved under his teaching.”
Bessie colored all over face and neck.
“Oh! please don’t,” she said. “I’m so sorry I said that; but I was such a little child then, I didn’t know any better. I wouldn’t say such a saucy thing now for a great deal.”
“You need not be sorry about it, Bessie: I am not.”
“Please don’t speak about it any more, ma’am,” pleaded the child. “Couldn’t you let bygones be bygones?”
“What do you mean by ‘bygones’?” asked the gentleman.
“I thought it meant, sir,” said Bessie, modestly, “when a person had done something they were sorry for, not to say any thing more about it.”
“Very well,” said the lady, still smiling. “It shall be so, if you wish it, Bessie. And now tell me how your mamma and Maggie and all the rest are.”
“Oh! they are all very well, except mamma, and she is better, and we are travelling to do her good; and a great many things happened to us, Miss Adams, since you knew us before.”
“I don’t think it has ‘happened’ to you to grow much,” said the lady.
“Oh, yes’m!” answered Bessie. “I used to be five, and now I’m seven; and I’ve been to school too. We’ve all grown pretty old. Baby can walk and talk now.”
“And how do you like my doctor?” asked “Miss Adams,” as Bessie still called her, glancing round at the gentleman who stood beside her.
Bessie looked up at him, and he looked down at her, and when their eyes met, both smiled.
“I like him: he looks good and nice;” and the little girl, who had already twisted a rose or two into the bosom of the lady’s dress, now handed two or three to the doctor in her own graceful, gracious little way.
“What are you going to do with all those bouquets you have tied up so tastily?” asked Dr. Gordon.
Bessie told him whom they were for.
“And who is this for?” asked Mrs. Gordon, – for so she told Bessie to call her, – pointing to that which the small fingers were now arranging.
“It’s for a little girl down at the steamer, who is rather hard off, and does not have a nice time, and has extremely ugly clothes,” answered Bessie. “But then if they are the best she has, and she has no mother, no one ought to laugh at her: ought they?”
“Certainly not: who was so unkind?” asked Mrs. Gordon.
“Some children who didn’t behave half so nice as she did, ma’am.”
“Ah!” said the doctor; “and was that boy you were talking to just now one of them?”
“Why, yes, sir,” said Bessie, with some hesitation. “But how did you know it?”
“Oh! I am a good guesser,” answered Dr. Gordon.
“I don’t know if I ought to have said that to him,” said Bessie, thoughtfully. “I b’lieve I was pretty severe.”
At this Mrs. Gordon went off into another fit of laughter; and the doctor smiled as he answered, —
“It was pretty severe, it is true, Bessie; but not more so than he deserved, especially if he had been teasing some poor child who could not defend herself.”
Bessie colored, and answered, “But I’m afraid I did it more ’cause I was angry for his being impolite to me than for his teasing Lucy.”
“But tell us all about it; and did you say the child had no mother?” said Mrs. Gordon.
In reply, Bessie told all she knew about Lucy, omitting, however, to give any account of the unkindness of Arthur Lathrop and his brother and sisters to the poor child. This was noticed by both Dr. and Mrs. Gordon, but they pressed her no farther, seeing she did not wish to speak of it.
“There’s another will be glad to come,” said Mrs. Gordon, eagerly, to her husband. “That will make five. You’ll see this engineer and speak to him about it: won’t you, Aleck?”
“All in good time, dear,” he answered quietly.
Five what? Bessie wondered; and where would Lucy be glad to come? But as she supposed they would tell her if they wished her to know, she asked no questions.
But her curiosity was not gratified just then, for the doctor now said to his wife, —
“Come, Clara, we are keeping our friends waiting. You must tell little Bessie about your plans some other time.”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Gordon. “We have to go to a sick friend here in the house, Bessie; but I shall come to call on your mamma to-morrow, and then I shall see you again and ask her to let you come to me; for I have something to tell you, in which I think you will be interested.”
“Don’t you live here, ma’am?” asked Bessie.
“Here? yes, here in Savannah, but not in the hotel; and I want you to come to my house. By the way, where is Maggie? I thought you were always together.”
“Most always,” said Bessie; “but Maggie and the other children went with Mr. Powers and papa to see a cotton-press; and mamma thought I was too tired, so I told Maggie she need not mind leaving me. And now I am glad I did not go.”
“And I am sure I am glad,” said Mrs. Gordon, as she kissed Bessie for good-by, and once more told her she should be sure to see her the next day, and would arrange with her mamma the time when she and Maggie might come and spend the day with her.
Bessie was very anxious to know what Mrs. Gordon could have to tell her which was to interest her so much, and which seemed in some way to concern Lucy Waters; but she was a little doubtful regarding the prospect of spending the whole day with her old enemy “Miss Adams,” not feeling at all sure that she would like it, or that she might not fall into some trouble, in spite of the very evident and pleasing change in that lady.
Maggie was not at all doubtful, and positively declared that she would not go on any account; and she tried to persuade Bessie to join her in begging their mother to refuse Mrs. Gordon’s invitation to them.
“For Bessie,” she said, “you know a ‘bird in the hand is worth two in the bush;’ and so, even if Miss Adams is so much better than she used to be, it is wiser to stay away from her, and not give her the chance of being disagreeable if she wanted to be.”
Maggie had been much given to the use of proverbs lately, as you will have perceived; and if one could possibly be fitted to her purpose, it was made to serve, as on this occasion.
But Bessie did not feel as if they had any excuse for refusing the invitation so kindly given, nor did mamma when she was appealed to.
“You certainly need not go if you do not wish it, my darlings,” she said; “but do you think it likely, Maggie, that Mrs. Gordon would invite you to her house, and then treat you unkindly? She must be a good deal changed, it seems to me; and would it not look as if you were unforgiving, if you refuse her kindness?”
“Oh! I forgive her, mamma,” said Maggie, “though it was my own Bessie she plagued so, but then I thought her old habits might be too strong for her, and break out again.”
“You forgive, but don’t forget, eh, Maggie? Suppose you were Mrs. Gordon, how would you like Miss Adams’ faults to be treasured up against you, and allowed to stand in the way when you wished to show good-will and kindness?”
“I wouldn’t like it at all, mamma; and I suppose it’s not very Golden Ruley for me to say I won’t go; so, if she asks us, I’ll make up my mind to it.”
Mrs. Gordon came the next day, according to promise, to call on Mrs. Bradford; and invited not only Maggie and Bessie, but also Belle and Lily, to spend the whole of Friday with her, promising to call for them in the morning and bring them back at night.
But perhaps you will find it more interesting to read Maggie’s own account of this visit, which she wrote to Colonel Rush.
“Dear Uncle Horace, – Things are so very surprising in this world that you never quite know how they are going to turn out, of which the case is at present, Miss Adams or who was Miss Adams but now Mrs. Gordon and you will remember her at Quam Beach but under unpleasant circumstances to which we will not refer but forget as well as forgive as mamma reminded me. But you would be surprised to see how much she is improved and so different to what she used to be which was greatly to be desired of all her friends and a pleasure to all who wish her well. So seeing she wished to make up for past offenses we went to spend the day with her and she was very horspitable. She came in her carriage to take us to her house which is most handsome with roses and flowers of many kinds of which she brought mamma a whole lot at the same time and invited all the big people to dinner the next day. I think all this shows she repents sincerely and is not the same woman but much changed and ought to be encouraged to keep on doing well. She has a nice husband named Dr. Gordon, but sober which is not his own fault if he was born so and I pity him. And a sweet baby boy named Aleck and crows and laughs with pleasure at us. But I hope by no means you think we think him so sweet as May Bessie which he is not and May Bessie is so near to us, which also he is not and we love her far the best. Miss Adams was very kind to us all day, indeed quite fond but most of all to Bessie, and she played with us and amused us and I was glad I did not let the devil which is a word that is not best to write unless it is necessary get the upper hand and make me stay away out of revenge or being shy.
“But the most surprising and best thing of all, Uncle Horace is what she is going to do with some of her money. You know in those days of which we will not speak she had a great deal more than she knew what to do with. Well, now she has found a good use for some of it in a way well pleasing to God and men. But I am too tired to write more to-day and will finish it to-morrow – Well, to return on this day to Miss Adams and her good works which shows she has read her Bible which urges to repentance of sins and prophets by it which is a sight to make the coldest heart to rejoice. She has a house not very far from her own where she lives and she is going to have six little girls there in the care of a nice, kind lady. And these little girls are not to be happy children with mothers to take care of them, but orfuns or without mothers or teaching or training in the way they should go. For Miss Adams says she knows what it is to be without a mother or some wise person to guide her, and now that God has been so good to her she wants to give a helping hand to some little girls who would be left too much to themselves and not properly taught. She does not mean to have very poor children, and if their friends wish it they may pay a little money for them but the contrary if they do not, and prefer charity though she does not think it such and would like them to come without any pay. And here they will have a happy home and be taught to be desirable women fit for teachers or other good things and so it will be their own fault if they don’t do it. And she has chosen four girls who are to come in the fall when Miss Adams comes back from the north because things cannot be quite ready till then, as the lady has a sailor son who is to go to sea which I think a hard case for his friends to have him leave his native land. And then the house will be ready and the lady will go and the children will come and Miss Adams is going to see if Lucy Waters’ father who you know I told you about in my last will let her come too. I think if he does not he will be much wanting in sence and proper behaviour, but I think he will dont you? Miss Adams, Mrs. Gordon I mean but I always forget to put her wedding name says she feels so sorry for all little motherless girls, and I am glad of it are not you? And so is Bessie and we think the reason Miss Adams takes so much trouble for these little girls is because she is afraid that if they do not have good care they may grow up to be such women as she used to be when we knew her before but which is not to be mentioned in these pages and now she is quite ashamed of it. We cannot tell just yet if Lucy’s father will let her come, but papa and the doctor are going to the steamer this evening to ask him and when we know Bessie will write and tell you all about it. And Bessie and I have quite made up our minds to take Miss Adams for one of our friends because we find her most sencible and kind and so changed from her old ways which we will not remember if we can help it.
“And dear Uncle Horace and Aunt May we wish you were here ’cause we are having such a nice time and I wrote such a long letter I am afraid you will be tired of it but such an interesting subject my brains were quite full and I had to and you must excuse it. We send two kisses for May Bessie and four for you and hope to see you once more in the future when we come home. And we send a great deal of love from your loving
“Maggie and Bessie.”
“P. S. Savannah is such a fine city and so many trees and roses that it seems strange to me that Alexander the Great and Napoleon Bonaparte did not try to take it, being both men who never minded their own business but always trying to take what did not belong to them, speshally the latter whom in my heart I heartily despise because he never did as he would be done by.”