' This like a strong hand drew me
back, and I thought I must come and say good-bye for a comfort to you
all. So Louis Robert, with his great love waiting for me there, drew
himself away and kindly said, 'I will wait,'--then a mist came between
us, and I opened my eyes to see you all around me."
"Oh, Clara! how can we ever let you go?"
"Ah, my beloved ones! I only go a little before you, and if you knew how
sweet it will be to be strong, you would say, because you love me, 'I
may go.' I have many things to say--and I shall remain with you a time,
and may, I fear, weary you. I am glad Louis is strong."
It was pitiful to see the patience with which she bore her suffering.
There was no pain, she said, but it was a strange feeling not to be
alive--and she would look at her limbs and say, "Poor flesh, you are not
warm any more." We had one of her crimson-cushioned easy chairs arranged
to suit her needs, and in this she could be rolled about. She sat at the
table with us and I kept constantly near her, and tried to shield her
from any extra excitement. When on the thirteenth day of April, news
reached us of the blow which, the day before, had fallen on Sumter, we
feared to let her know it. But her spirit quickened into the clearest
perception possible, divined something, and obliged us to tell her.
She said: "I knew it would come, I have felt it for years, and when the
cruel sacrifice is finished, liberty will arise, and over the ashes of
the slain will say, 'Let the bond go free.
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