Page 128 - Among the camps, or, Young people's stories of the war

and left his mother at home to take care of the plantation
and the children, That included Ancy and wee Martha ;
not Jack, of course. So far from leaving any one to take
care of Jack, he left Jack to cake care of his mother. The

morning he went away he called Jack to him and had a talk
with him. He told him he wanted him to mind his mother,
and look out for her, to heip her and save her trouble, to
take care of her and comfort her, and defend her always like
a man. jack was standing right in front of him, and when

the talk began he was fidgety, because he was in a great
hurry to go to the stable and ride his faLher’s horse Warrior
to the house ; but his father had never talked to him so
before, and as he proceeded, jack became grave, and when
his father took his hand, and, looking; him quietly in the

eyes, said, "W ill you, my son?" he burst out crying, and
Hung his arms around his father’s neck, and said, "Y e s,
father, I will.”
He did not go out of the house any more then ; he left
the horse to be brought down by Uncle Henry, the carriage-

driver, and he sat quietly by his father, and kept his eyes
on him, getting him anything he wanted ; and he waited on
his mother; and when his father went away, he kissed him,
and said all over again that he would do what he promised.
And when his mother locked herself in her room afterward,

jack sat on the front porch alone, in his father's chair, and
waited. And when she came out on the porch, with her
eyes red from weeping and her face worn, he did not say