CHAPTER XX.
DARK DAYS.
When Paul's wound had healed sufficiently to enable him to travel, hewas put into a freight car with his comrades and sent to the Rebelprison at Andersonville. The ride was long and hard, but the prisonersbore the jolting without a murmur, for they supposed they would soon beexchanged and sent North. They were doomed to bitter disappointment.
The prison was a yard enclosed by a high fence. There was a platform onthe outside where the sentinels stood on guard, and ready to shoot anyone who approached nearer than what they called "the dead line." Theprisoners had no shelter from the scorching rays of the sun through thelong summer days, nor from the sleety rains and freezing nights ofwinter. They dug holes in the ground with their hands, and made thecold, damp earth their bed. A slimy brook ran through the grounds, foulwith filth from the camps of the Rebels. There was a marsh in thecentre of the yard, full of rottenness, where the water stood in greenand stagnant pools, breeding flies, mosquitos, and vermin, where all theooze and scum and slops of the camp came to the surface, and filled theair with horrible smells. They had very little food,--nothing but ahalf-pint of coarse corn-meal, a little molasses, and a mouthful oftainted bacon and salt, during each twenty-four hours. They were herdedlike sheep. The yard was packed with them. There were more than twentythousand in a place designed for half that number.
When Paul and his comrades reached the prison, they were examined by theofficer in command, a brutal fellow named Wirz, who robbed them of whatmoney they had. The gate opened, and they passed in. When Paul beheldthe scene, his heart sank within him. He had suffered many hardships,but this was an experience beyond everything else. He was still weak. Heneeded nourishing food, but he must eat the corn-meal or starve.Everywhere he saw only sickening sights,--pale, woe-begone wretches,clothed in filthy rags, covered with vermin. Some were picking up crumbsof bread which had been swept out from the bakery. Others were suckingthe bones which had been thrown out from the cook-house. Some sat gazinginto vacancy, taking no notice of what was going on aroundthem,--dreaming of homes which they never were again to behold. Manywere stretched upon the ground, too weak to sit up, from whose heartshope had died out, and who were waiting calmly for death to come andrelieve them from their sufferings. Thousands had died. One hundred diedon the day Paul entered, and another hundred during the night. All daylong the bodies lay among the living in the sun. When the dead-cart camein, they were thrown into it like logs of wood. It was a horriblesight,--the stony eyes, the sunken cheeks, the matted hair, the ghastlycountenances, the swaying limbs, as the cart jolted along the unevenground! More than thirteen thousand soldiers starved and murdered by theRebels were thus carried out in the dead-carts.
The keepers of the prison were cruel. Paul saw a poor cripple crawltowards the fence and reach his hand over the dead line to get a bone.Crack went the rifle of the sentinel, which sent a bullet through theprisoner's brain, who tossed up his hands, gave one heart-rendingoutcry, and rolled over--dead. On a dark and stormy night some of theprisoners escaped, but ferocious dogs were put upon their track, andthey were recaptured. The hounds mangled them, and the Rebel officershad them tied up and whipped, till death put an end to their sufferings.
It was terrible to hear the coughing of those who were dying ofconsumption,--to see them crawling from place to place, searching invain to find a shelter from the driving storms,--to hear the piteouscries of those who were racked with pains, or the moans of those whogave themselves up to despair. For want of proper food the prisonerssuffered from scurvy;--their gums rotted, their teeth fell out, andtheir flesh turned to corruption; they wasted away, and died in horribleagony. It was so terrible to hear their dying cries, that Paul put hisfingers in his ears; but soon he became accustomed to the sights andsounds, and looked upon the scenes with indifference. He pitied thesufferers, but was powerless to aid them. Soon he found that his ownspirits began to droop. He roused himself, determined to brave out allthe horrors of the place. He sang songs and told stories, and got upgames to keep his fellow-prisoners in good heart. But notwithstandingall his efforts to maintain his cheerfulness and composure, he felt thathe was growing weaker. Instead of being robust, he became thin andspare. His cheeks were hollow and his eyes sunken. There was a fever inhis bones. Day by day he found himself taking shorter walks. At night,when he curled down in his burrow, he felt tired, although he had doneno work through the day. In the morning he was stiff, and sore, andlame, and although the ground was cold and damp, it was easier to liethere than to get up. His hair became matted,--his fingers were long andbony. Each day his clothes became more ragged. When he first entered theprison, he tried to keep himself clean and free from vermin, but invain. One day he went out to wash his tattered clothes, but the streamwas so dirty he sat down and waited for it to become clear. He sat hourafter hour, but it was always the same slimy, sickening stream.
The Rebels took delight in deluding the prisoners with falsehopes,--telling them that they were soon to be exchanged and sent home;but instead of release, the dead-cart went its daily rounds, bearingits ghastly burden. That was their exchange, and they looked upon theshallow trenches as the only home which they would ever reach. Hope diedout and despair set in. Some prisoners lost their reason, and becameraving maniacs, while others became only gibbering idiots. Some whostill retained their reason, who all their lives had believed that theAlmighty is a God of justice and truth, began to doubt if there be aGod. Although they had cried and begged for deliverance, there was noanswer to their prayers. Paul felt that his own faith was wavering; buthe could not let go of the instructions he had received from his mother.In the darkest hour, when he was most sorely tempted to break out intocursing, he was comforted and reassured by Uncle Peter, an oldgray-headed negro, who had been a slave all his life. Peter had beenwhipped, kicked, and cuffed many times by his hard-hearted, wickedmaster, not because he was unfaithful, but because he loved to pray, andshout, and sing. Through the long night, sitting by his pitch-knot firein his cabin, Uncle Peter had sung the songs which lifted him in spiritalmost up to heaven, whither his wife and children had gone, after cruelwhippings and scourgings by their master. It was so sweet to think ofher as having passed over the river of Jordan into the blessed land,that he could not refrain from shouting:
"O my Mary is sitting on the tree of life, To see the Jordan roll; O, roll Jordan, roll Jordan, roll Jordan, roll! I will march the angel march,-- I will march the angel march. O my soul is rising heavenward, To see where the Jordan rolls."
He had given food and shelter to some of the prisoners who escaped fromthe horrible place, and had piloted them through the woods, and for thiswas arrested and thrown into the prison.
Uncle Peter took a great liking to Paul, and, when Paul wasdown-hearted, cheered him by saying: "Never you give up. Don't let go ofde hand of de good Lord. It is mighty hard to bear such treatment, butwe colored people have borne it all our lives. But 'pears like my heartwould break when I think of my children sold down Souf." Uncle Peterwiped his eyes with his tattered coat-sleeve, and added: "But de Lord iscoming to judge de earth with righteousness, and den I reckon de Rebswill catch it."
Uncle Peter dug roots and cooked Paul's food for him, for the Rebelswould not allow them any wood, although there was a forest near theprison. Paul could not keep back the tears when he saw how kind UnclePeter was. He thought that he never should weep again, for he felt thatthe fountains of his heart were drying up. Uncle Peter sat by himthrough the long days, fanning him with his old tattered straw hat,brushing the flies from his face, moistening his lips with water, andbathing his brow. He was as black as charcoal, and had a great nose andthick lips,--but notwithstanding all that Paul loved him.
Thus the days and weeks and months went by, Uncle Peter keeping thebreath of life in Paul's body, while thousands of his comrades died.There was no change in prison affairs for the better. There was n
o hopeof release, no prospect of deliverance,--no words from home, no cheeringnews, no intelligence, except from other prisoners captured from time totime, and sent to the horrible slaughter-pen to become maniacs andidiots,--to be murdered,--to die of starvation and rottenness,--to beborne out in the dead-cart to the trenches.
Though Paul sometimes was sorely tempted to yield to despondency, therewere hours when, with clear vision, he looked beyond the horrors of theprison to the time when God would balance the scales of justice, andpermit judgment to be executed, not only upon the fiend Wirz, who hadcharge of the prison, but also upon Jeff Davis and the leaders of therebellion. And though his sufferings were terrible to bear, there wasnot a moment when he was sorry that he had enlisted to save his country.So through all the gloom and darkness his patriotism and devotion shonelike a star which never sets.
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