8 AN IDLER ON MISSIONARY RIDGE. 



One of Ms comrades, seeing me a Northerner, 

 interrupted him more than once in a vain 

 attempt to smooth matters over. They had 

 buried the hatchet, he said ; let bygones be 

 bygones. But the first man was not to be 

 cajoled with a phrase. He spoke without 

 passion, with no raising of the voice, quite 

 simply and amicably : he too accepted the 

 result ; the thing never would be done over 

 again ; only let his position be understood, 

 — he had nothing to take back. It was im- 

 possible not to respect such conscientious- 

 ness. For my own part, at any rate, I felt 

 no prompting to argue against it, being suf- 

 ficiently " opinionated " to appreciate a diffi- 

 culty which some obstinate people experience 

 in altering; their convictions as circumstances 

 change, or accepting the failure of a cause as 

 proof of its injustice. If a man is not too 

 obstinate, to be sure, time and the course of 

 events may bring him new light ; but that 

 is another matter. Once, when the men 

 were talking among themselves, I overheard 

 one say, as he pointed down the hill, " The 

 Rebels were there, and the Union men yon- 

 der." That careless recurrence of the word 

 " Rebel " came to me as a surprise. 



