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Arp’s Letter. I v.v,- Li ii. v room * us-von a g a*ta ; .'<♦ c>t ioltore. Tim mother ami cajltiran wcra in her room and the door was open, and about 9 oVbok I heard <•". nv, rniiiUß, plenso tell ■;!. a story, We know our lesson; please, mamma, toll ns ab >ut ecrtce litun: away back whou you vre:o a girl, or romothing about' the war." Weil, don’t turn that chair car. set ap straight; you will break a rock er if yon don’t mind. That is rap chair, and I want to keep it at; meg as I live, i’va rocked many a a'vikl in that chair, and seen sorrow iml aadiiCi-m in it too. li the old ami chair of a mother or grandmother could talk, what a U'g history it could tall. • ‘'But, mamma, wo don’t want any sorrow or sadness now, Eor anythiug ; bout chairs. Pka-e tell us about vhen yon run Irem ths yankees, won’t yon?’’ Oil, you worry me. You now rhat I don’t love to talk about the war nor the yaukeos. I wish hat I could forget all about both. It tenis to me that I lived twenty years in those four of the wac But lot me cell you about that chair and why I call it my war chair. It is the only hair we Raved from the wreck —ono chair and one bedstead. We found hem at a neighbor’s bouse when we came back to Romo. The yankees car - iod ever} thing else—carpets, bureaus, oedsttads and bedding, tables, china ,:r.d pictures, and I don’t kn w what. The house was fall of such things and the smoko house and pautry were fall to-ct. I had a beautiful woik-stand that cost thirty dollars, and was a pres out, and the yankee telegraph operator shipped it to his home in Indiana, and long a-tor the war was over he wrote v .. a 1, ter and said that he had it and iclt bad about it, and would return it or buy it, just as we wished. So your pi wrote him a nioe letter and thank ed him for his good intention-*, and asked him to send it back by express, but be nevei heard from him any more. He didn’t feel as bad as be thought he did. He tvas Written to again, but he played ’possum am! made out like be was dead. He had better not die it ho knows what is good for him. These yankees got lots of nice things from us and they lived high. Theio were thirty nice, fat bams in the smoke bouse and two large cans of lea,' lard and a whole barrel of soap. “Why, what made you leave all those things, mamma? Couldn’t you have gotten a wagon and taken them along?’’ Why, children, wo had no wagoa, and no time to get one. We didn’t know we had ta go until about mid night. The town and tbe 'suburbs wore full of soldiers, enough we thought to whip the whole yankee na tion. W 7 by, wo had company to sup per that night, and had lots of straw berries and cream. sVe hadn't bean to bed very long before were told to get, for Gen. Johnston was falling oack and our troops were all leaving in a hurry, and the everlasting yan iiees were coming right in. Just then the}* began to throw their singing, siz zing shells over the town to scare us op and make ns movo around lively. The shells twisted m tho air and scar ed us almost to death. I nevei thought about furniture or anything ,->[e, but getting my little children out of danger. I haTsn’t got over it yet. We got tangled up in the street among our soldiers and the artillery and we couldn’t move for two hours. By aad by the town bridge was set o Sio to k 2 ep tho yankees back until we could get across the other river and burn that bridge. Ob, it was an awful fi'ght, but we won’t talk about that, I had lather tell you how glad I was to l yet back home again after eight months of exile. Jhgbt long months of runmeg about with hail a dozen children who were about naked and ,iwavs hungry. Your pa was away i/oidip'j cci-'irt at ..V ,n, and 1 had . . !;.. j around from plate to place an i impose on kindred and friends win were sacred too. I toll you I was hap py when we got back to our horn, de .seine as k was. Wo live! herd an rotix.li tor hwhile until wn g<t on sheeting and that help us out v/omler fully. Wa sold sheeting for chair •/nil tables an 1 bedstead* and potatoes and sorghum. “Where did yen get it mamma?’ 1 Well, just before old Sherman run r.s aw-y your pa msoagod to got a bale of yu and wide a’meting; and he hid it in tho &m*ke ho*. Oonfed- r a'.e money hi and got oo bad that noboU* wanted'it. It wouldn't buy anything hardly. Salt was a g.eafc deal better than money, and so was sugar and to base ft, ami shining or avyihng to make 0',./ by cut of; sheer were , p u i id currency. Yur pa had two calf skins, and ha tanned them with ashes and rubbed about half tho hair off, and got aa old cobbler to make shies for my children, aad you saver saw such things iu your lifo, but they were a goed leal better than none. The night we ran away that bale of shaet ing was put is a wagoa that belonged to a friend, who was running away, too, and it was left several tails* away with a good woman, who set it m iu the fence corner of her room, and put a vallance over it aad a looking-glass on the top, like it was a dressing-table and so the yankees didn't find is. B it when we come home we had tbe brie hauled in, and went to trading on it for it was bettor than greenbacks, but there wasn't much to buy in all that region—no corn or flour or eattlf. Your pa went down ia Alabama ami got ten bushels of corn, and kept i bid oat ia the country, and had only half a busfaet ground at a time. “What for, mamma, was he afrii.l oi?“ Why ths deserters aad the robbers who were prowling all over tho coun try, liko buzzards after dead horses. They robbed everybody who bad any thing. One night they came in town and robbed old Llr. Q dan, and he made so ranch fuss about it that Mr Oreuborg ran there, and the rob bar shot,hi:a and killed him for com iug. They hung men up by the neelt to make theta give up their geld or their silverware. One night they hung up a little Dutchman, and as his toes juat touched the ground he scream id out: ‘sviag avay, eying avay, I tells you notting-*, but I meet* ynn in hell, all the same, and den I svings you uy.” “Did they kill him,, mamma?” No, children. He was so brave they let him go. But the funniest thing you ever saw was your pa’s store, about the close of the war. He and Robert Hargrove had the biggest store in. town, and they had $20,000 worth of goods in it. Y qu ought to have seen the stock; it was just immense.” “Why, where did they get tho goods, mamma?” " Well, there was a man in jail in Selma, and he wrote to your pa to come down and get him out, and he would give him SIO,OOO, So your pa went, and he got the mon ey, and he gave half of it for a pound of opium, and the other half for four dozen cotton cards—that Is, without handles or backs, and he brought the whole stock home in a little valise, and spread it out in the big store. Mr. Hargrove put in a half box of tobacco for $5,000 and a few bunches of factory yarn for $5,000 more, and they went to trading. You could have put the whole stock in a big wheelbarrow. They sold to the opium-eaters for $5 an ounce in gold, and the cards at S2OO a pairiti Confederate mon ey, But they bartered the most of them for chickens and potatoes and sorghum, and that’s the way we lived. “Mamma, what did you all sleep on when you first got home?” Why, we borrowed a couple of beds, and all of us spread out on the floor. We cooked in a skillet, but we had so little to cook we didn’t want a stove. We had no sugar nor coffee, nor milk, nsj flour. Your pa hoard of a now some where, and gave .13,000 fer her, Confederate money was almost as plenty as tho leaves on the trees. Everybody had a pocketful. Hun dred dollar bills were common, but they wouldn’t buy anything, hardly. So mo of the cavalry used to give one of them for a drink or mean whisky. Before the mone;, got so ba 1, your grandpa sold liis farm for $50,000 and moved away down Hie country to get out of trouble, He invested Lis money in cotton in Columbus, and Wil son’s raiders came along and burn ed it all up. Boor man! But he was like J ob. lie never lost his in tegrity nor his cheerful disposition. I never heard him complain about anything. “Tell on mamma.” Well, you must know that old Sherman wanted to make war hor rible and make the people tired of it, so lie took away all their horses and mules and cattle and hogs and corn and wheat and everything they had to live on except what they hid in the swamps. Most all the men were oIF in the army and the women and children oil the bast they could, and hid out some things until the yankees went away. Sam Jones and a few dare devils like him prowled around at night and stole horses and mules and run them off to the swamps. Sam was nothing but a boy, but they say that he stole over a hun dred,aud he gave them all away to the poor folks. You see he got a suit of old yankee blue clothes, and went about among the guards who had charge of tho extra horses and made out like he was a yankee, too, and he generally had a bottle of whisky and a deck of cards and gambled with them and got them drunk, and before morning he would have half a dozen horses and mules away oil somewhere, He was as mischievous then as he is now, though it was of a differ ent kind. He was fighting the yan kees then, and he is fighting Ihe ‘old boy’ now. and there isn’t so much difference alter all- Why, you ought to have seen our smoke house, when we got home. They had converted it into a bakery and had the finest bread troughs you ever heard of, They mad them out of ihe Presbyterian church pews, and they built a great, long stable on our lot out of the church timber. Their horse troughs were made out of the pews, and the pulpit was scattered around. We cleaned out the smoke house and dug up the dirt and boiled it down and made ! salt of it. Smoke house dirt that i has received the drippings of salted meat for years makes splendid ta ble salt when clarified. We made right good coffee out of dried sweet potatoes. I used to make hats for the boys out of the old scraps of cashmere. Your pa built a fence and a boat without a nail. He bor ed holes in the plank and pinned them on with wood-pins. The war made us powerful shifty, as Cobe says, and so we got along pretty well. The children all kept well and strong until the war -was over and the doctors came home from the army. And there Avere no law suits nor courts until the lawyers came back. • k You hays to thank the yankees for that much, don’t you, mam ma?” No, I don’t thank the yankees for they run raa and my children all over this country like j we were dogs. Your pa makes out 'like he has forgiven them, and is trying to harmonize and all that; but they have never apologized to me yet, rior shown any humility or repentance, , J Hardman. & Comp’y. rw W ■* DEALERS IN Ha-rdwarl & CutlcrY. O ur Lllo of Stoves, Tinware, Agricultural Implements, Etc., can not bs found ia better Quality and Durability, elsewhere. We also keep a good ue of guns for the Fall tra !o. Cull and examine our slock and prices. B. Consult your Interests by Buying your DRUGs AND MEDICINES FROM Wade And Sledge, ATHENS, GEORGIA. We sell at the lowest possible price, and gnrantee every article to be abso lutely Pure. Orders by Mail will receive prompt attention. Remember the name and place.—WADE & SLEDGE, Druggists and Pharmacist;-. Between Hodgson. Bros., and Talmadge Bros,, Clayton Street. 10 W. A- QuiHiaa & So> harmony Gove, DEALERS IN GENERAL MERCHANDISE And Plantation s upplies- Oar stock of Dry Goods, Clothing, Hats, Boots and Shoes can aot be sur passed in Durability and Low Prices. We keep in S'ock all that the farmer coeds. Oar Line of staple groceries are complete. We keep a full line ct Fancy groceries, notions, etc. Also Bagging, Ties and [auanos. Country Prodncepaken in exchange for goods. Call and examine oar scads. 19 Athens Music House, 114 Clayton Street, Next Door to Postoffice, Athens, Georgia. Haselton & Dozier, Proprietors. And all kinds of Musical Instruments at the very lowest prices for Cach, or on the Installment plan. Written guarantee on al! instruments sold. Special reduced rates to church es and Sunday-schools. Pictures and Picture Frames a specialty. AH sizes and styles of Frames made to order on edy>rt notice. Bjy from us and -ave agents* commiss’ons. Keeps always cn hand the oeet makes of VIOLINS AND BANJOS: