and varied accomplishments he devoted with his whole soul to the cause of his beloved country. And although his restricted sphere was not commensurate with his great abilities, yet in the sudden emergencies of perilous and doubtful conflict, his actual services sometimes as far transcended his rank as he was always in advance of his men when they captured a battery or pursued the flying enemy. Just before he fell at Cold Harbor, General Ewell pointed him out to his staff as he led the storming party against McClellan's strongest position, a too "shining mark" for a thousand deadly missiles.

There was one incident of that eventful day which, more than all besides, revealed the loftiness of his character and afforded to his mourning family and friends their most precious consolation. His mother had sent him some months before a little book of devotions called "Morning and Night Watches," (being brief meditations and appropriate prayers of a very elevated tone of piety and great beauty and force of language), with a request that he would read it regularly. He wrote to her that he was delighted with it, had been reading it as she desired, and would do so as long as he lived. He begged her to send a copy of it in his name to a lady friend, who had nursed him when he was wounded, and another to a lady who had in like manner befriended his younger brother, Captain John Thomas Wheat, who fell at Shiloh. Major Wheat's officers tell us that they had often seen him reading his little book, night and morning, and that he frequently asked them to listen to such passages as he thought particularly eloquent and impressive. One who slept in the tent with him says that he several times waked him up (when he had retired first) to listen to the "Night- Watch."

On the morning of the 27th, in the gray light of the early dawn, and just before the battle was begun, he called his officers about him, took the little book from his breast-pocket, where he was accustomed to carry it, and telling them what it was-that it was the gift of his mother, that the portion for that morning had been marked by her own hand, that he had just read it in his tent, and finding it peculiarly appropriate to men about to imperil their lives, he would read it; and expressed a hope that they would join him in the prayer. It was a prayer for a "Joyful Resurrection." Uncovering his head (which example they followed), he reverently and devoutly read it in his own most feeling and impressive manner. This is its conclusion: 'Lord, I commend myself to Thee. Prepare me for living, prepare me for dying. Let me live near Thee in grace now, that I may live with Thee in glory everlasting. Let me be reconciled to endure sub

missively all that Thy sovereign wisdom and love see fit to appoint, looking forward through the sorrows and tears of a weeping world to that better day-spring when I shall behold Thy face in righteousness and be satisfied when I awake in Thy likeness. And all I ask is for a Redeemer's sake. Amen."

Putting the precious volu ne into his bosom, he mounted his horse and led them into the battle which was to cost so many of them their lives. When the time, the place, and the actors in that scene are considered, no one can doubt that he was perfectly sincere in this religious act. It was a brave and manly confession of Christ before men, and one for which has not our blessed Lord promised to "confess us before His Father and the holy angels?" While Major Wheat was incapable of professing what he did not feel, and was very far from making a parade of religious feeling, yet, as the incident just related clearly shows, he had the moral courage to avouch his convictions even to irreligious men.

From his earliest childhood he scorned, not only direct lying, but all prevarication and suppression of the truth; refusing to associate with a schoolmate who got out of a difficulty by telling the teacher a falsehood. When about twelve years old, he met with an accident which confined him to the house, and his mother, in order to amuse him, and reconcile him to the unusual restraint, gave him "Thaddeus of Warsaw" to read. He soon became deeply interested in it, and at some very affecting scene he went to his mother weeping passionately as he dwelt upon the wrong done to his hero. To quiet him she said, "This is not a true story; it is just made up by the author." "Not true!" he exclaimed, while a burning indignation quickly dried his tears, "and you a Christian mother, give your child lies to read !” He flung the book from him as if it were contaminating, and never could be induced to take it up again.

Some years afterwards, when a senior in college, being obliged by a serious accident to remain indoors, he was very severe upon his sisters, who were reading the "Wandering Jew," just then coming out in weekly numbers, and who tried to interest him in it. In return for some beautiful passage of their reading, he would call out, "Put down that foolish book, and listen to this "-something from Black. stone; for he had already begun the study of law. When he was going the second time to Mexico his mother put into his valise one of Dickens' last works, thinking it might serve to while away the tedious monotony of camp life. He brought it back with the leaves uncut; said he had much more profitable reading, having procured

at New Orleans, on his way out, a goodly number of histories and biographies.

The writer of this memoir dwells with melancholy pleasure upon these recollections of a boyhood that gave the brightest promise of a distinguished future. The bread of religious training cast upon the waters of his young life was gathered after many days. The precious seed, hidden for a time from human observation under the unfriendly influences of a soldier's life, yielded nevertheless, in due time, a glorious harvest of piety and heroism, even to the sacrifice of life upon the altar of duty. He early adopted as his own his father's motto, "Astra Castra," being terminals of the distich

"Non per sylvas, sed per castra,

Nobis iter est ad astra,

and which he rather freely rendered:

Through rural quiet doth thy pathway lie?
Unending conflicts bear me to the sky.

In his letters to his mother-to whom he always showed a reverential and chivalrous devotion-he frequently assures her that " Astra Castra" is the governing principle of his life. In one, written on his way to join Garibaldi, he says: "We hope soon to be doing good service in the great cause of human liberty. Do not, dear Ma, fret about me. God will take me out of the world when He sees fit; and if He takes me while fighting for liberty, I shall feel that I have not lived in vain."

Major Wheat's request to be buried on the battlefield was made the subject of several poems which were published in various papers of the South, accompanied by eulogistic notices of his character and services on behalf of the Confederacy. The following verses interpret his request most correctly, and in perfect agreement with his known sentiments upon the subject. The subsequent interment in "Hollywood" was thought by his friends to be a virtual compliance, for all the neighborhood of Richmond was included in the battlefield.

'Bury me on the field, boys!' and away to the glorious fight;

You will come this way again, boys, in your triumph march to-night,
But when you pass this spot, boys, I would not have you sigh-

In holy cause of country, boys, who would not gladly die?

'Bury me on the field, boys,' where a soldier loves to rest,
And sweet shall be my sleep, boys, upon my country's breast;
For she is dearer far, boys, than aught this world can give,
And gladly do I die, boys, that she may proudly live.

'Bury me on the field, boys,' and away to meet the foe;
Hands that have dug a grave, boys, shall lay their legions low;
Eyes that wept this morn, boys, shall smile at close of day,

For Southern hearts shall triumph, boys, in the Northerner's dismay.

Bury me on the field, boys,' and then to make a stand,

Which will lose the tyrant's grip, boys, from our Southern sunny land, And teach the invading foe, boys, in Freedom's holy strife,

The Southern heart will sever, boys, the fondest ties of life.

'Bury me on the field, boys,' I do not die in vain ;

For Freedom's rose shall spring, boys, from out this bloody rain,
And soon the South shall rise, boys, all beautiful and fair,
With sun-light rays around her, boys, and stars upon her hair.

'Bury me on the field, boys,' this vision bright and sweet
Was surely sent to cheer me, boys, in this my own defeat ;
There, take my trembling hand, boys, I thank you for your care,
But let each soldier's heart, boys, ascend with mine in prayer.

From the battlefield of life, boys, all wretched, weary, sore,
Pray that my fainting soul, boys, may reach the heavenly shore,
And in that land of love, boys, the weary may find rest,

And the poor, repentant soldier, boys, find shelter 'mong the blest.

'Bury me on the field, boys,' my life is ebbing fast ;

One moment more of pain, boys, and then the trial's past;

I cannot see you now, boys, there's a mist before my sight;

But hark! I hear sweet music, boys: thank God! we've won the fight.

'Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori;' but sweeter far, and still more becoming, my son, to die, as thou didst, in the faith of Christ, the hope of heaven, and in charity with all the world.

J. T. W.

The Siege and Evacuation of Savannah, Georgia, in December, 1864.

An Address delivered before the Confederate Survivors' Association in Augusta, Ga., on the Occasion of its Twelfth Annual Reunion, on Memorial Day, April 26th, 1890.

By Col. CHARLes C. Jones, Jr., LL.D., President of the Association.

By the necrological record of each recurring year are we reminded, my comrades, that the mortality among those who were actively en

gaged in the military and civil service of the Confederacy is augmenting in a rapidly increasing ratio. We had scarcely departed from this hall, a twelve month ago, when we were apprised of the death near Paris, France, in absolute retirement and at a very advanced age, of the Hon. A. Dudley Mann, who, during the war, was entrusted with an important diplomatic mission.

On the 31st of last May, S. P. Moore, Surgeon-General of the Con federate States, was overtaken by that gaunt foe whose grim advances in camp, in hospital, and in bloody battle he had, during more than four years of exposure, privation and carnage, essayed to check.

On the 20th of the following month, Colonel A. C. Myers, first quartermaster-general of the Confederacy, passed quietly away; and on the 25th of September Lieutenant-General D. H. Hill-the hero of Big Bethel, conspicuous for his gallantry at Seven Pines, Malvern Hill, Boonsboro, Chickamauga and elsewhere; the founder of The Land we Love; an uncompromising defender of the impulses and acts of the South; president of the Middle Georgia Military and Agricultural College at Milledgeville; a brave soldier, capable educator and Christian gentleman-succumbed to the inroads of a protracted and painful disease.

Major-General John C. Brown, of Tennessee, a courageous and trustworthy officer, who, since the cessation of hostilities, was complimented with the chief magistracy of his State, on the 18th of August answered the final summons. Two months later, another Confederate Major-General, H. D. Clayton, of Alabama, distinguished alike as a soldier, a judge, and a college president, and BrigadierGeneral E. A. Perry, sometime governor of Florida, ended their mortal careers.

During the month of November, Colonel Alfred Rhett, whose name and valor are so intimately associated with the memorable defense of Fort Sumter; the Hon. W. N. H. Smith, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of North Carolina, and a prominent member from that State of the Confederate Congress, and Senator Dortch, who also rendered valuable aid in moulding the legislation of the Confederacy, joined the silent majority.

On the 1st of December, Collett Leventhorpe-in early life an officer of the 14th Regiment of Foot in her Majesty's service, and subsequently, for gallantry and efficient conduct, advanced to the grade of brigadier-general in the Army of Northern Virginia-peacefully closed his eyes at the home of his adoption in North Carolina.

Five days afterwards, surrounded by devoted friends, accompanied