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Dixie Book of Days

<h2>July</h2> A SUMMER SHOWER Meanwhile, unreluctant, Earth like Danae lies; Listen! is it fancy, That beneath us sighs, As that warm lap receives the largesse of the skies? Jove, it is, descendeth In those crystal rills; And this world-wide tremor Is a pulse that thrills To a god’s life infused through veins of velvet hills. Wait, thou jealous sunshine, Break not on their bliss; Earth will blush in roses Many a day for this, And bend a brighter brow beneath thy burning kiss. Henry Timrod    [Pg 150] <big>July First</big> A SOUTHERN SOLDIER’S TRIBUTE To the Union commander, General George Gordon Meade, history will accord the honor of having handled his army at Gettysburg with unquestioned ability. The record and the results of the battle entitle him to a high place among Union leaders. To him and to his able subordinates and heroic men is due the credit of having successfully met and repelled the Army of Northern Virginia in the meridian of its hope and confidence and power. General John B. Gordon   First day at Gettysburg, 1863    [Pg 151] <big>July Second</big> General Lee distinctly ordered Longstreet to attack early the morning of the second day, and if he had done so, two of the largest corps of Meade’s army would not have been in the fight; but Longstreet delayed the attack until four o’clock in the afternoon, and thus lost his opportunity of occupying Little Round Top, the key to the position, which he might have done in the morning without firing a shot or losing a man. General John B. Gordon   Second day at Gettysburg, 1863    [Pg 152] <big>July Third</big> General Lee ordered Longstreet to attack at daybreak on the morning of the third day.... He did not attack until two or three o’clock in the afternoon, the artillery opening at one.... Nothing that occurred at Gettysburg, nor anything that has been written since of that battle, has lessened the conviction that, had Lee’s orders been promptly and cordially executed, Meade’s centre on the third day would have been penetrated and the Union Army overwhelmingly defeated. General John B. Gordon   Third day at Gettysburg, 1863 Joel Chandler Harris dies, 1908    [Pg 153] <big>July Fourth</big> General Lee, according to the testimony of Colonel Walter H. Taylor, Colonel C. S. Venable, and General A. L. Long, who were present when the order was given, ordered Longstreet to make the attack on the last day, with the three divisions of his corps, and two divisions of A. P. Hill’s corps, and that instead of doing so he sent fourteen thousand men to assail Meade’s army in his strong position, and heavily intrenched. General John B. Gordon   Lee awaits the attack of Meade at Gettysburg throughout the fourth day, 1863 Vicksburg surrenders, 1863 Thomas Jefferson dies, 1826    [Pg 154] <big>July Fifth</big> Opinion, let me alone: I am not thine. Prim creed, with categoric point, forbear To feature me my Lord by rule and line. Thou canst not measure Mistress Nature’s hair, Not one sweet inch: nay, if thy sight is sharp, Wouldst count the strings upon an angel’s harp? Forbear, forbear. Sidney Lanier     <big>July Sixth</big> A golden pallor of voluptuous light Filled the warm Southern night; The moon, clear orbed, above the sylvan scene Moved like a stately queen, So rife with conscious beauty all the while, What could she do but smile At her perfect loveliness below, Glassed in the tranquil flow Of crystal fountains And unruffled streams? Paul Hamilton Hayne   Paul Hamilton Hayne dies, 1886 John Marshall dies, 1835    [Pg 155] <big>July Seventh</big> Do orioles from verdant Chesapeake, And crested cardinal, With linnets from the Severn, come to seek, Obedient to thy call, If they can give thee one new music-thought, Who ev’ry note from ev’ry land hast caught? E. G. Lee (The Mocking Bird)     <big>July Eighth</big> Sweet bird! that from yon dancing spray Dost warble forth thy varied lay, From early morn to close of day Melodious changes singing, Sure thine must be the magic art That bids my drowsy fancy start, While from the furrows of my heart, Hope’s fairy flowers are springing. Charles William Hubner (The Mocking Bird)    [Pg 156] <big>July Ninth</big> And to defenders and besiegers it is alike unjust to say, even though it has been said by the highest authority, that Port Hudson surrendered only because Vicksburg had fallen. The simple truth is that Port Hudson surrendered because its hour had come. The garrison was literally starving. With less than 3000 famished men in line, powerful mines beneath the salients, and a last assault about to be delivered at 10 places, what else was left to do? Lieut.-Col. Richard B. Irwin, U. S. V.   Fall of Port Hudson, 1863 Defeat of Lew Wallace by Early at the Monocacy, Maryland, 1864 Alexander Doniphan, “the Xenophon of America,” born 1808    [Pg 157] <big>July Tenth</big> MAMMY’S FIRST EXPERIENCE AT THE ’PHONE We heard Mammy say “Hello—H’llo! (What meks you rattle de handle so?) Is dat you, Miss?—wants Main twenty-free! (I ain’t gwine to have you foolin’ wid me!) I say, Main twenty——what’s ailin’ you? ‘Bizzy!’ I guess I’se bizzy, too! You gim-me dat number twenty-free, I’se bizzier ’n you ever dared ter be!” Mary Johnson Blackburn    [Pg 158] <big>July Eleventh</big> The Old World had its Xantippe; but——the facts have not been fully established in the New! “Under This Marble Tomb Lies The Body Of The HON. JOHN CUSTIS, Esq., Of The City Of Williamsburg, And Parish of Bruton, Formerly Of Hungar’s Parish, On The Eastern Shore Of Virginia, And County Of Northampton, Age 71 Years, And Yet Lived But Seven, Which Was The Space Of Time He Kept A Bachelor’s Home At Arlington, On The Eastern Shore Of Virginia.” “This Inscription put on His Tomb was by His Own Positive Orders.”    [Pg 159] <big>July Twelfth</big> Jackson’s genius for war, Lee’s resistless magnetism, were not vouchsafed to Hill; but in those characteristics in which he excelled: invincible tenacity, absolute unconsciousness of fear, a courage never to submit or yield, no one has risen above him, not even in the annals of the Army of Northern Virginia. He was the very “Ironsides” of the South—Cromwell in some of his essential characteristics coming again in the person and genius of D. H. Hill. Henry E. Shepherd   D. H. Hill born, 1821     <big>July Thirteenth</big> Though the Grey were outnumbered, he counted no odd, But fought like a demon and struck like a god, Disclaiming defeat on the blood-curdled sod, As he pledged to the South that he loved. Virginia Frazer Boyle   N. B. Forrest born, 1821    [Pg 160] <big>July Fourteenth</big> Pleasant and wonderfully fair, Like one that knows her own domain, Magnolia-flowers in her hair, And orange-blossoms rare, Let her not knock in vain! Lift up your equal heads to her, Of all your courts contain, co-heir, For lo! she claims her own again! Daniel B. Lucas (The South Shall Claim Her Own Again)    [Pg 161] <big>July Fifteenth</big> FACT OR FICTION? For four years the Northern States fought to keep their Southern sisters in the Federal family; then having soundly thrashed these sisters in order to keep them at home, they suddenly shut the door and kicked them down the steps! The “erring sisters” are now fully restored to the family circle; but they had a longer and more painful struggle in the effort to get back than in the attempt to get away. More briefly, for four years the Federal government, led by Lincoln, maintained that all of the Southern States were in the Union and could not get out; and then for five years, under the rule of the Radicals, it argued that some of these States were out of the Union and could not get in! Matthew Page Andrews   Reconstruction ended and the Union restored by the readmission of Georgia, 1870    [Pg 162] <big>July Sixteenth</big> I shall yet live to see it an English nation. Sir Walter Raleigh   Raleigh’s first colony arrives at Roanoke Island, 1584     <big>July Seventeenth</big> KIN A visitor in the Old Chapel Graveyard, in Clarke County, Virginia, asked the aged negro sexton if he knew the whereabouts of a certain grave, adding that the deceased was her relative. “Ole Mis’ Anne? Why ob cose I knows whar my ole mistis is! She your gran’ma! Jus’ to think now, if you hadn’t spoke we never would have knowed we was related!”    [Pg 163] <big>July Eighteenth</big> Uncle Remus was quite a fogy in his idea of negro education. One day a number of negro children, on their way home from school, were impudent to the old man, and he was giving them an untempered piece of his mind, when a gentleman apologized for them by saying: “Oh well, they are school children. You know how they are.” “Dat’s what make I say what I duz,” said Uncle Remus. “Dey better be at home pickin’ up chips. What a nigger gwineter learn outen books? I kin take a bar’l stave and fling mo’ sense inter a nigger in one minnit dan all de school houses betwixt dis en de New Nited States en Midgigin. Don’t talk, honey! wid one bar’l stave I kin fairly lif de vail er ignunce.” (Quoted by) Henry Stiles Bradley    [Pg 164] <big>July Nineteenth</big> What was my offense? My husband was absent—an exile. He had never been a politician or in any way engaged in the struggle now going on, his age preventing. The house was built by my father, a Revolutionary soldier, who served the whole seven years for your independence.... Was it for this that you turned me, my young daughter and little son out upon the world without a shelter? Or was it because my husband was the grandson of the Revolutionary patriot and “rebel,” Richard Henry Lee, and the near kinsman of the noblest of Christian warriors, the greatest of generals, Robert E. Lee?... Your name will stand on history’s page as the Hunter of weak women and innocent children; the Hunter to destroy defenseless villages and refined and beautiful homes—to torture afresh the agonized hearts of widows; the Hunter of Africa’s poor sons and daughters, to lure them on to ruin and death of soul and body; the Hunter with the relentless heart of a wild beast, the face of a fiend and the form of a man. Henrietta B. Lee [Extract from letter to General Hunter, often referred to as the best example of excoriating rebuke in American literature. Mrs. Lee’s home was burned July 19, 1864]    [Pg 165] <big>July Twentieth</big> The muffled drum’s sad roll has beat The soldier’s last tattoo; No more on life’s parade shall meet The brave and fallen few. On Fame’s eternal camping-ground Their silent tents are spread, And Glory guards, with solemn round, The bivouac of the dead. Theodore O’Hara <div class="blockquot">[It is remarkable that the memorial inscriptions of Federal cemeteries are taken from stanzas written by a “rebel” soldier-poet. Grand Army Posts have also made use of “anonymous” lines by Major Wm. M. Pegram, C. S. A., (quoted May 26th), when decorating Confederate graves. Both uses are unconscious but eloquent tributes to the genius of Southern expression.—Editor] </div>   Burial in Frankfort of Kentuckians killed in the Mexican War, 1847    [Pg 166] <big>July Twenty-First</big> We thought they slept!—the sons who kept The names of noble sires, And slumbered while the darkness crept Around their vigil fires! But, aye, the “Golden Horseshoe” knights Their Old Dominion keep, Whose foes have found enchanted ground, But not a knight asleep. Francis O. Ticknor   First Battle of Manassas, 1861    [Pg 167] <big>July Twenty-Second</big> In the darksome depths of the fathomless mine My tireless arm doth play, Where the rocks never saw the sun’s decline, Or the dawn of the glorious day. ······· I blow the bellows, I forge the steel, In all the shops of trade; I hammer the ore and turn the wheel Where my arms of strength are made; I manage the furnace, the mill, the mint, I carry, I spin, I weave, And all my doings I put in print On every Saturday eve. George W. Cutter (The Song of Steam)    [Pg 168] <big>July Twenty-Third</big> ... The rush, the tumult, and the fear Of this our modern age Have only widened out the poet’s sphere, Have given him a broader stage On which to act his part. The spiritual world of godlike aspirations, The kingdom of the sympathetic heart, The fair domain of high imaginations, Lie open to the poet as of old. Wrong still is wrong, and right is right, ······· And to declare that poetry must go, Is to do God a wrong. William P. Trent (The Age and the Poet)     <big>July Twenty-Fourth</big> Ante-bellum Master: “Julius, you rascal, if this happens again we’ll have to part.” “La, Marse Phil, whar you gwine?”    [Pg 169] <big>July Twenty-Fifth</big> The nights are full of love; The stars and moon take up the golden tale Of the sunk sun, and passionate and pale, Mixing their fires above, Grow eloquent thereof. Madison Cawein     <big>July Twenty-Sixth</big> THE PHILOSOPHY OF MAMMY PHYLLIS “Hush, Mary Van,” commanded Willis; “you can’t crow, you’ve got to cackle.” “I haven’t neether; I can crow just as good as you. Can’t I, Mammy Phyllis?” “Well,” solemnly answered Phyllis, “it soun’ mo’ ladylike ter hear er hen cackle dan ter crow, but dem wimmen fokes whut wants ter heah dersefs crow is got de right ter do it,” shaking her head in resignation but disapproval, “but I allus notice dat de roosters keeps mo’ comp’ny wid hens whut cackles dan dem whut crows. G’long now an’ cackle like er nice lit’le hen.” Sarah Johnson Cocke    [Pg 170] <big>July Twenty-Seventh</big> ’Tis night! calm, lovely, silent, cloudless night! Unnumbered stars on Heaven’s blue ocean-stream, Ships of Eternity! shed silver light, Pure as an infant’s or an angel’s dream; And still exhaustless, glorious, ever-bright, Such as Creation’s dawn beheld them beam, In changeless orbits hold their ceaseless race For endless ages over boundless space! Richard Henry Wilde     <big>July Twenty-Eighth</big> When he first set down he ’peared to keer mighty little ’bout playin’, and wished he hadn’t come. He tweedle-leedled a little on the trible, and twoodle-oodle-oodled some on the base—just foolin’ and boxin’ the thing’s jaws for bein’ in his way. And I says to a man settin’ next to me, s’I “what sort of fool play’n is that?... He thinks he’s a doing of it; but he ain’t got no idee, no plan of nuthin’. If he’d play me up a tune of some kind or other, I’d——” But my neighbor says, “Heish!” very impatient.... George W. Bagby (How Rubenstein Played)    [Pg 171] <big>July Twenty-Ninth</big> ... He fetcht up his right wing, he fetcht up his left wing, he fetcht up his centre, he fetcht up his reserves. He fired by file, he fired by platoons, by company, by regiments and by brigades. He opened his cannon, siege guns down thar, Napoleons here, twelve-pounders yonder, big guns, little guns, middle-size guns, round shot, shell, shrapnel, grape, canister, mortars, mines and magazines, every livin’ battery and bomb a’goin’ at the same time. The house trembled, the lights danced, the walls shuk, the floor came up, the ceilin’ come down, the sky spilt, the ground rockt—heavens and earth, creation, sweet potatoes, Moses, nine-pences, glory, ten-penny nails, my Mary Ann, hallelujah, Samson in a ’simmon tree, Jeroosal’m, Tump Tompson in a tumbler-cart, roodle—oodle—oodle—oodle—ruddle—uddle—uddle—uddle—raddle—addle—addle—addle—addle—riddle—iddle—iddle—iddle—reetle—eetle—eetle—eetle—eetle—p-r-r-r-r-r-land! per lang! per lang! p-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-lang! Bang!... When I come to.... George W. Bagby (How Rubenstein Played)    [Pg 172] <big>July Thirtieth</big> Let me also recall the fact that on July 30, 1619, eighteen months before the Pilgrims set foot on American soil, the vine of liberty had so deeply taken root in the colony of Virginia that there was assembled in the church at Jamestown a free representative body (the first on American soil)—the House of Burgesses—to deliberate for the welfare of the people. Randolph H. McKim   First Legislative Assembly in America meets at Jamestown, 1619 Battle of the Crater, near Petersburg, 1864    [Pg 173] <big>July Thirty-First</big> It was probably the most remarkable evidence on record of the resourcefulness of the Anglo-Saxon race, and its ability and determination to dominate. Driven to desperation by conditions that threatened to destroy their civilization, the citizens of the South, through this organization, turned upon their enemies, overwhelmed them, and became again masters of their own soil ... and its proper use must be commended by all good men everywhere, for by it was preserved the purest Anglo-Saxon civilization of this nation. Carey A. Folk (The Ku Klux Klan) [Pg 174]     <hr style="width: 50%;" /> [Pg 175] <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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