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 LETTERS 
 
 OF 
 
 WILLIAM WHEELER 
 
 OF THE CLASS OF 1855, Y. C. 
 
 My heart leaps up when I behold 
 
 A rainbow in the sky ; 
 So was it when my life began ; 
 So is it now I am a man ; 
 So be it when I shall grow old, 
 Or let me die. 
 
 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 The childhood shows the man 
 As morning shows the day. 
 
 MILTON, Paradise Regained. 
 
 PRINTED FOR PRIVATE DISTRIBUTION 
 1875
 
 RIVERSIDE, CAMBRIDGE: 
 PRINTED BY H. O. HOUOHTON AND COMPANY.
 
 1/55 
 
 TO THOSE IN THE CLASS OF '55 
 
 WHO LOVED MY SON, 
 AND WHO CHERISH HIS MEMORY, 
 
 THIS VOLUME 
 IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED, 
 
 BY fffS MOTHER.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 THOSE for whom these letters are especially compiled will 
 not need an apology if some brief sketch of the early life of 
 the writer is prefixed to them. 
 
 William Wheeler was born in the city of New York, August 
 14, 1836. He was very attractive as a little child, and early 
 manifested those qualities which made him a great favorite 
 with his friends and companions. 
 
 His love of knowledge, exhibited at a very early age, led 
 him to learn to read, and then he gratified this love without 
 restraint. He was very happy, when four years old, to sit 
 by his mother's side, with the Family Bible, and entertain 
 himself by the hour, with the stories which it contained. 
 He became a diligent student of the Bible, and attendance 
 at the Sabbath-school was to him a pleasure, as well as a 
 duty. 
 
 He did not go to school till he was eight years of age, 
 when he was ready to take his place with those considerably 
 older than himself. His teacher had a remarkable faculty 
 of inspiring his pupils with a love of study, and William 
 was not slow in responding to the influence. He loved 
 play as well as study, and when released from school, he 
 and his friend, Robert Edwards, who was a near neighbor, 
 found, in a lot which had been inclosed next his home, as 
 a play-ground, unfailing means of amusement, where inven-
 
 iv PREFACE. 
 
 tion could be allowed full play without interfering with the 
 rights and pleasures of others. 
 
 When between eight and nine years of age, he would col 
 lect his boy playmates on some door-step in his neighborhood, 
 and entertain them with stories of his own imagining, which 
 would be continued from evening to evening, a youthful 
 Improvisatore. 
 
 His father being unable to use his eyes except for the 
 necessary duties of his profession, William spent his winter 
 evenings in reading to him such books as Prescott's " Mexico," 
 Shakespeare, Alison's ''History of Europe," etc. 
 
 The next day he would entertain himself in arranging his 
 toy soldiers in the order of the battles of the Great Captain, 
 which impressed them very forcibly upon his mind. He was 
 also instructed by his father in the game of chess, for which 
 he had ever a great fondness, and in which he was much 
 skilled. When ten years of age he was sent to boarding- 
 school at Stamford, where he made much progress in some 
 branches of study. 
 
 In the spring of 1847 his parents removed to Brooklyn, 
 and in the fall of that year, after the death of his father, in 
 August, William was placed at the school of Rev. B. W. 
 Dwight, where he continued until he entered college in 
 September, 1851. At this school he advanced in his vari 
 ous studies with great rapidity and delight, varying them with 
 sports favorable both to physical and mental development. 
 He here formed friendships which were a source of happiness 
 during his life. His friend, Robert Edwards, having removed 
 to Brooklyn shortly before him, the childish friendship was 
 here continued (R. being also at Mr. D.'s school), and formed 
 one element of his future enjoyment, sadly ended for this life 
 by Robert's death at the taking of Fort Wagner.
 
 PREFACE, V 
 
 Those who knew William at College do not need to be 
 informed of his character or acquirements, as they had better 
 opportunities of judging of him, in both respects, than those 
 whose relationship might lead them to look upon him with 
 partial eyes. 
 
 He was not without faults, being of an excitable tempera 
 ment, and was led sometimes to exhibitions of passion ; but 
 he was generous in acknowledging when he had wronged any 
 one \ he was unselfish, giving up his own pleasure for the 
 gratification of others, a loving son, a devoted and tender 
 brother and friend. 
 
 His course in College was pursued, not so much to take 
 the first honors of his Class, as to acquire such stores of 
 knowledge, on various subjects, as would fit him to enjoy and 
 appreciate learning. Of science he was not very fond, nor 
 was the character of his mind such as to make high attain 
 ment in it practicable. 
 
 His letters will show what his course was after leaving 
 College, and their perusal is submitted to the kindly regard 
 of those who have urged their preparation for the press.
 
 I. 
 
 LETTERS OF THE WOODS, AND 
 COLLEGE DAYS. 
 
 1850-56.
 
 I. 
 
 LETTERS OF THE WOODS, AND COLLEGE 
 DAYS. 
 
 HUNTER, August 14, 1850. 
 In the Catskill Mountains. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, .... I am now fourteen years old, and 
 yet I seem the same person that I was six years ago. Time ; 
 how it flies !....! would like to give you a little account 
 of an expedition which we made a week ago. Last Wednes 
 day, Ogden, Robby, a young man named Jonas Mann, and 
 myself, started off early in the morning for the Stony Cove, in 
 an old wagon, with fishing-lines and a basketful of prov 
 ender. We went on as far as it was possible for a wagon to 
 go, and then Ogden unharnessed the horse and went over to 
 Olive, while we three commenced the ascent of a high moun 
 tain, on the other side of which was the brook in which we 
 were to fish. After a tiresome journey over the mountain on 
 foot we came to the brook down which, that is towards the 
 mouth of which, we were going to fish till we should come to 
 the shanty where we were to pass the night and meet Ogden, 
 at the mouth of the brook. We fished and fished, sat down 
 and ate our dinner, and then fished on, but no shanty ap 
 peared. At length a most terrific thunder storm came on. 
 Situated in a deep valley between two mountains, the thunder 
 was echoed from cliff to cliff most awfully, the ground seemed 
 to shake under us, the sky was one blaze of lightning, while 
 torrents of rain poured down on our unprotected heads. Not
 
 4 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 a single fish could we catch during this shower, which lasted 
 several hours. We toiled on through rain, and fallen logs, 
 and brushwood, expecting every moment to see the shanty 
 where we were to get our supper and spend the night. But 
 seeing nothing but the brook with its thick woods on each 
 side, we were almost ready to give up in despair ; when we 
 saw a path leading up to the woods we followed it, got lost 
 in the woods (all this time the rain pouring down in torrents), 
 wandered about for a long time, and at length we got out of 
 the woods into a clearing where we saw a house. We got our 
 supper and stayed all night ; went off the next morning with 
 out breakfast expecting to get it at the place where we were 
 going to meet Ogden. We travelled on, but no house ap 
 peared till in the evening, about 7 P. M., we came to a house 
 where we got some supper and spent the night. The next day 
 we hired a wagon to go home, being completely wearied out 
 with the exertions of the preceding day, in which we had 
 walked fifteen or twenty miles. We reached home well tired 
 with our two days' expedition, and with two hundred trout. Of 
 these my share was seventy-two, being the number that I had 
 caught. Blackberries are becoming very plenteous. I went 
 out this evening before supper time and picked four quarts 
 in a very short time. Somebody rides on horseback every 
 day at the Colonel's, and I have become quite a horseman. 
 
 NEW HAVEN, February 23, 1852. 
 
 While reckoning up the time this morning, I found that it 
 was three weeks since I had written to you. I was very much 
 surprised to discover that time had passed so rapidly. Indeed 
 this whole term has seemed like a short dream of a day, so 
 incessantly have I been occupied. My love for college life 
 is continually increasing, and I think that Ike Marvel has done 
 well in setting it down as the most pleasant part of the life 
 of man .... Here is the place to form friendships for life, 
 which shall be unending till death. Our class is a remark 
 ably still, quiet, well behaved one, and has performed so far 
 but very little mischief. I have seen here at college but very
 
 THE WOODS, AND COLLEGE DAYS. 5 
 
 little of that spreeing which is laid so heavily to the charge 
 of institutions of this kind. It is chiefly confined to the 
 upper classes, Freshmen having better things to do than to 
 carry on. 
 
 So you have rented the house ! It really makes me feel 
 very bad to think of leaving it so long. You give up a great 
 deal for me, dear mother, and I will strive to repay you by my 
 heart's affection, and by becoming worthy of such a sacrifice. 
 But I doubt not that before long you will become as much 
 attached to New Haven as to Brooklyn, if not more. For my 
 part nothing can diminish my affection for the Empire State. 
 The prizes for Greek translation were not read off this even 
 ing after all ; if I take a first prize I will send you a telegraphic 
 dispatch. But it is growing late, and I must get up early 
 to-morrow morning to study. Wishing you all good that an 
 affectionate son can, I am yours, lovingly, WILLIE. 
 
 P. S. Please gently hint to Aunt E. that for some more of 
 those snaps she will receive most hearty thanks. 
 
 NEW HAVEN, March 13, 1852. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, On going to the Post Office Tuesday even 
 ing I found your long-expected letter. I also, at the same 
 time, received a long and very interesting letter from B. W. 
 D. It was from beginning to end full of his go-ahead spirit. 
 I think he is the most consistent man in carrying out his 
 professed principles that I know of .... Tutor D. told 
 W. that our class was a very moral one, and that it exerted a 
 very good influence. Some are surprised to see so many 
 "blue fellows," as they call them here, but. I must say that I 
 have always had a very high opinion of those " blue fellows," 
 ever since I have been in college. But the bell rang some 
 time ago, and I must go to dinner, so good-by. 
 
 Monday, March 15. I would have completed my letter on 
 Saturday, but I was interrupted. We have just completed five 
 books of Euclid, which is more than any class before us has ever 
 done. The fifth book was in my humble opinion very tough. I 
 had to study on it pretty hard, as we had no _diagrams to
 
 6 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 assist us. In Homer's Odyssey we have nearly completed 
 the tenth book, and in Livy are laboring away towards the 
 end of the twenty-second. There was quite a time here yester 
 day on account of four students, two Sophs and two Juniors, 
 who were caught in the interesting occupation of cementing 
 up the bell. Five tutors besieged them in the belfry, and 
 caught these four, while several more escaped. The delin 
 quents will be either suspended or rusticated; that is, they 
 will have the benefit of country air for a term or two. You 
 need not fear that I will embroil myself in any of these 
 scrapes. I am improving in speaking and reciting in my Secret 
 Society, which I would uphold did the -Faculty condemn 
 them never so much. They bring one into connection and 
 intercourse with some of the best scholars and finest fel 
 lows in the class. It cherishes that social feeling which 
 is so necessary to the student, and makes him feel as if 
 his society fellows were his brothers. I look forward with 
 much pleasure to the time when I shall be gobbling poor 
 Freshmen for the Brothers'. I shall have a very fine op 
 portunity for so doing, as I shall have all vacation as well as 
 at Commencement ... I should like to have a little time 
 during vacation to solve the prize mathematical problems, 
 which will at that time be given out. 
 
 From a letter written when alone at 
 
 NEW HAVEN, January 24, 1854. 
 
 I am very lonely here all by myself. I give a German les 
 son three times a week, which affords me an opportunity of 
 seeing other specimens of humanity, besides our two domestics 
 and the old gray cat. I seriously contemplate getting a house 
 keeper who won't charge wages, and presenting mother when 
 she returns with a second edition of " Mrs. Wheeler." It is 
 most stupendously cold here. The fire itself froze the other 
 morning. I would send you a piece, but for fear it would 
 melt and burn a hole in the paper. The thermometer stood 
 last night at one below zero in the shade ! Ah ! you can't com 
 prehend how peculiarly adapted is this season of the year for
 
 THE WOODS, AND COLLEGE DAYS. 7 
 
 going out to prayers at 6| A. M. The delightful sensation of 
 finding the water frozen in the bowl, and the morning so dark 
 that it would take a Drummond light to brighten it up. Then 
 the pleasure, of tumbling down a half dozen times or more in 
 running up to chapel, the unmitigated hardness of the seats, 
 the sudden change to an over-heated recitation-room, all ren 
 der "sleeping over morning prayers," "a consummation de 
 voutly to be wished." 
 
 NEW HAVEN, May 24, 1854. 
 
 .... I do not dare to write " as funny as I can," for 
 I should then be obliged to send you several grosses of but 
 tons, and hooks and eyes, to repair the damages which my irre 
 sistible humor had caused. ... I feel dreadfully sentimental 
 this morning. Primo, because it is one of the fairest days that 
 ever shook the dew from her " saffron robe ; " secundo, be 
 cause I passed close by Miss 's house this morning ; ter- 
 
 tio, because we are going to have a whaling big eclipse, and 
 the Junior class are dismissed from recitation to look at it. 
 We don't have it annular here ; it is going to look like a mod 
 erate-sized cheese-paring ! 
 
 YALE COLLEGE, September 18, 1854. 
 
 The long vacation is over, and we students have got back 
 again to our books, universally recruited in health and spirits. 
 You are most probably aware of the important and interest 
 ing fact that I have arrived at the dignity of Senior ! And 
 what dignity ! Could you behold the ineffable majesty with 
 which I pace the streets, ogle the ladies, and cut my friends 
 in the lower classes, you would be impressed with a vast 
 idea of mental and moral grandeur. It is indeed hard work 
 for me to maintain my Senior dignity, and in fact during the 
 vacation, I thought of summoning to my aid a pair of whis 
 kers ! With this in view I began assiduously to cultivate said; 
 whiskers ; but finding that their powers of increasing were ex 
 actly the opposite of Jack's bean-stalk, and that in all human 
 probability I should be Woliged to wait many months before 
 they would become distinctly visible,, I seized a razor and
 
 8 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 with one fell swoop detached them from my countenance. 
 Alas ! humanity weeps over such wholesale destruction, and I 
 draw the veil over the heart-rending recital. 
 
 NEW HAVEN, February 20, 1855. 
 
 .... Speaking of Commencement reminds me that my 
 course here is almost completed ; already we have begun to 
 make preparation for Presentation Day, the day on which we 
 are " presented " for graduation. In the morning of this day, 
 after the ceremony of presentation is completed, we have the 
 Class Valedictory Oration, and Poem ; these are not appoint 
 ments for scholarship, but elected by the class. On the after 
 noon of this day we have a grand pow-wow on the college 
 green. We have a circle of seats constructed on which the 
 class sit, and in the hollow space within is the orchestra, which 
 is composed entirely of members of the class. 
 
 We are going to have a very good orchestra. The air is to 
 be supported by about four flutes, and by two flageolets ; the 
 second, by four flutes ; the tenor, by five violins and two gui 
 tars ; the bass by the violoncello and sax-horn. Besides this, 
 we are to have a piano, a triangle, the bones, and drum. 
 
 We practice every Wednesday afternoon, and are coming 
 along very finely. Perhaps you have been surprised at hear 
 ing me say " we " all along here, and perchance are already 
 inquiring, " Pray, what instrument does my tuneful cousin 
 play ? " Be it known unto you then, oh most scornful and satir 
 ical of females, that actuated by a desire to help the class 
 along in their laudable endeavors after good music, I have 
 taken hold of Jack's sax-horn and am learning with the most 
 astounding rapidity. 
 
 Occasionally I amuse myself by throwing North College 
 into an uproar by a few well-timed blasts, which bring Pro 
 fessor Hadley to my door with the injunction of " a little 
 less noise in study-hours." We do our practicing in the 
 new hall of the Brothers' Society, and after we get through, 
 we have dancing of all sorts, wishing, moreover, that ladies of 
 our acquaintance were present. I wish you could be here at
 
 THE WOODS, AND COLLEGE DAYS. 9 
 
 Presentation Day, for the exercises are much more interesting 
 than those of commencement. It is the last time we all meet 
 together as a class, before breaking up, never to meet again, 
 as in all human probability some will die before our meeting 
 in 1858. It is a very strange circumstance that not one of all 
 our class has died during the college course, and we are so 
 nearly through 
 
 NEW HAVEN, March 23, 1855. 
 
 DEAR M., .... This term hath flown away literally on 
 eagle wings ; it seems scarcely yesterday that I came from 
 New York, where I had such a delightful vacation, and pre 
 pared to " bone down " to study again. And it makes me feel 
 sad enough to see the end of this term approaching, and now so 
 near, and to think that in a few short weeks our class, who 
 have stood together for four long but pleasant years, must 
 now separate, and go away to the four winds of heaven, 
 never, perhaps, to meet again, and never, surely, to meet 
 again with their young thoughts, and hopes, and aspirations. 
 Perhaps, when a lessening band of time-worn and world- 
 battered old men, we, the class of Fifty-five, may once more 
 gather in sadness around the hearth-stone of our Alma 
 Mater, and relight the torches of our hearts at the ceaseless 
 flame which ever burns there, from the sources of science and 
 of truth, But stop, I appear to be falling into a sermon, or 
 rather a funeral discourse ; but in good truth, dear coz, the 
 thoughts of parting make me so sad that it is hard to be 
 still, for you know that " out of the abundance of the heart 
 the mouth speaketh." 
 
 NEW HAVEN, April 7, 1855. 
 
 .... The principal circumstance which has made me so 
 busy lately, is the fact that I am entering into competition for 
 the Berkeley Scholarship, as perhaps I told you in my last 
 letter. The examination is upon Homer's Iliad, Greek 
 Testament, Xenophon's Cyropsedia, Tacitus, Horace, and 
 Cicero's Tusculan Disputations. I have read eight books of
 
 IO LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Homer's Iliad, and felt very glad that we did not have it in 
 Freshman year, when we could not appreciate it one half so 
 well, and when we would have studied it upon compulsion. 
 It is a vast field of beauty and power, where a student may 
 roam for hours and days, and yet be perpetually culling 
 fresh flowers of noble thought it is a perennial stream 
 where he can for a lifetime satisfy his thirst for the sublime 
 and the beautiful I do indeed, agree with you, in lov 
 ing best "the happy summer time;" and through all pleas 
 ures of gayety in winter, and the capricious fancies of spring, 
 I am ever looking forward to the time when 
 
 "From brightening fields of ether fair disclosed, 
 Child of the Sun, refulgent Summer comes." 
 
 I am keeping my "Isaak Walton," which your dear father 
 gave me, to read then, lying under a shady tree, or perhaps 
 with a fishing-rod in my hand, upon the bank of some good 
 trout-stream. I have only dipped into it (the book, not the 
 trout-stream), but I came across one exquisite passage which 
 I must give you : 
 
 " The lark when she means to rejoice, to cheer herself and 
 those that hear her, she then quits the earth and sings as she 
 ascends higher into the air ; and having ended her heavenly 
 employment, grows then mute and sad to think she must de 
 scend to the dull earth which she would not touch but for 
 necessity." 
 
 Is it not a sweet thing ? 
 
 NEW HAVEN, September 26, 1855. 
 
 I spent a quiet, but very pleasant week at Tarrytown, and 
 then left for Pennsylvania. After a two clays' journey, in the 
 evening glow of a charming day, I saw from the top of a 
 lofty hill 
 
 " On Susquehanna's banks fair Wyoming." 
 
 The vast champaign, falling in gentle declivities down to 
 the banks of the river on the one hand, and cultivated to the 
 very summits of the hills on the other, the rich fertility of the 
 soil, the beautiful river, which at seasons overflows, and fer-
 
 THE WOODS, AND COLLEGE DAYS. II 
 
 tilizes all around, causes it to seem not strange to us that the 
 Indians should regard with the eye of hatred, and massacre, 
 with the hand of midnight murder, the pale faces who would 
 deprive them of this beautiful spot, which their own poetic na 
 tion cherished by the name of Wyoming, or the Lovely Valley. 
 .... I went down a coal-shaft and entered a coal-mine, 
 which was a scene as new to me as very well could be. The 
 sooty miners looked like fiends, were it not for the star-like 
 lamps in their caps, which made one think of the Irish fairy 
 tales of the fairies who had stars in their foreheads. The 
 walls were black, the roof was black ; it looked like some 
 vast funeral vault draped for a burial. The polyglot swear 
 ing of the miners, who assaulted us on all sides, for " back- 
 sheesh," soon removed the delusion. I was glad enough to 
 see the light again, yet the miners who spend their lives here 
 assert that it is both pleasant and healthy. " Chacun d son 
 gofit" And that is n't my " gout." 
 
 NEW HAVEN, February z, 1856. 
 
 .... Imagine that it is now the beginning of December, 
 instead of the beginning of February ; that it is now two 
 weeks and not two months, since I received your good, long 
 letter ; and also imagine that you received a note from me on 
 New Year's Day, and not I one from you ; in fact, imagine 
 such a train of circumstances as shall make me a decent 
 young man, and not such a good-for-nothing, dilatory pro- 
 crastinator as I really am ; for, I am sure, I need all the as 
 sistance which I can so obtain to avert from my guilty head 
 your most righteous execrations. Still, I must have a hear 
 ing. We will have the case, in our imaginary court, Daven 
 port against Wheeler; and your justice and good sense 
 shall be the jury, your resentment and terrible ferocity 
 shall be the counsel for the plaintiff, and a sort of lingering 
 kindness, which I hope you still have for me, shall be the 
 counsel for the defendant. And shall not the verdict be 
 " Guilty, but recommended to mercy." Be so good as to rec 
 ollect that I am the secretary of the class, and consequently
 
 12 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 have no less than ninety correspondents, or thereabouts, and 
 after I have finished a batch of letters, I feel so disgusted 
 with letter-writing that I do not pen another epistle for 
 months. With regard to yourself it is different ; I enjoy 
 writing to you immensely, but then, you know, there must be a 
 beginning, and that is hard to make. 
 
 You don't seem to me to be enjoying boarding-school as 
 much as you might. Ah, how I did groan, when I heard you 
 were not coming to spend the winter in New Haven. What 
 pleasant times we would have had ; I am sure that both you 
 and I would not have neglected our studies, and when play 
 time came, would we not have improved it jollily ? The rides 
 in October and November, with air pleasantly warm yet brac 
 ing, with skies as clear and pure as if not a single mist inter 
 vened between us and the heavenly blue of the divine dome 
 above ; the sleigh-rides, in January and February, over the 
 crisping snow, through our amphitheatre of hills, with East 
 and West Rocks, like ermine-clad giants looking down upon 
 us ; and, oh, the walks in the pleasant, lovely days of Indian 
 Summer, through woods painted in all their tree leaves by un 
 earthly artists, in earth-surpassing colors, hills, whose every 
 rock was covered with most delicate shades of green and pur 
 ple mosses ; penetrating to spots before unknown, save to the 
 squirrel and partridge, often repeating these pleasant strolls, 
 until our feet knew, 
 
 " Each lane and every alley green 
 Dingle or bushy dell of the wild-wood 
 And every bosky bourn from side to side." 
 
 NEW HAVEN, July 18, 1856. 
 
 DEAR M., .... I have been for nearly three weeks ab 
 sent from New Haven on a trip to the Northern Adirondacks, 
 in New York State, in Franklin and Essex counties, and 
 on the Saranac Lakes and the Racquette River. We slept 
 eight nights in the woods, partly in a tent, and partly with 
 no covering but the blue heaven, around the cheerful camp- 
 fire. There are wondrous charms about such a life ; the free-
 
 THE WOODS, AND COLLEGE DAYS. 13 
 
 dom from all restraint, the consciousness of perfect indepen 
 dence, the invigorating effects of the labors of the hunt, the 
 evening trophies, whether a deer, a string of noble trout, a 
 score of pigeons or ducks, or occasionally a brace of par 
 tridges ; and then, last of all, sweet sleep, which is only the 
 companion of health and hard labor. And in the depth of the 
 woods my thoughts often reverted to you, and it was an amus 
 ing idea to think in what widely different scenes our daily life 
 was laid ; yours in the centre of life, in the midst of breathing 
 millions, and surrounded by the art-works of ages ; mine, in 
 the depths of the pathless forest, many miles from human 
 habitation, with no signs of life around me save my compan 
 ions, and the mute denizens of wood and wave Ameri 
 can politics form a theme of great interest to almost every 
 one in this country, especially to the young men, who are 
 peculiarly enthusiastic either on one side or the other, but 
 especially on the side of Fremont, and I assure you that 
 / do not fail to partake of the general rage. Whatever a 
 young and feeble voice and a weak influence can do shall be 
 given to the cause of the Republican party. Hurrah for Free 
 dom and Fremont ! Do you hear anything said in England 
 about American internal politics ; anything about the Presi 
 dential election, or the Brooks outrage ? I am too sensitive 
 and passionate and nervous ever to become a politician or 
 a wire-puller, but so long as I have a voice to raise and a 
 vote to cast, the one shall be raised and the other cast in 
 behalf of intelligence and Freedom. 
 
 From a letter written 
 
 NEW HAVEN, March 17, 1857. 
 
 .... Very neglectful have I been of you for a good 
 while past, but this time it has not been on account of sick 
 ness as it was last Fall, but of real good, honest, downright 
 work. I have at last learned what it is to study in earnest ; 
 that is, not merely con over one book or one set of books, but 
 dash out into a wide sea of general reading and learning. 
 Would to heaven that the day was forty-eight hours long in-
 
 14 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 stead of twenty-four ! I divide my time now somewhat as 
 follows : Law school Studies and recitations, eight hours ; 
 exercise and meals, three hours ; general studies, eight hours ; 
 arms of Murphy, five hours. This last I consider time 
 thrown away, and do frequently lament that mankind was not 
 so constituted as to do without it.
 
 II. 
 
 LETTERS OF FOREIGN TRAVEL 
 AND ART. 
 
 1857-58.
 
 II. 
 
 LETTERS OF FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 
 
 SHIP AUSTRALIA, Off Sandy Hook, 
 Saturday, i p. M., May 9, 1857. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, We 're off! Hauled off from the dock 
 at about 10 A. M., and were towed down the bay by the tug S. 
 A. Stevens. This note I shall send back by her. 
 
 My grief after I left you was checked in its violence by 
 the carriage stopping at the jail and taking in two men, 
 one, the sheriff, very drunk ; the other, an insane man, very fool 
 ish. This latter poor man's miseries somewhat diverted my 
 mind from my own, and I did all I could to make him com 
 fortable. On board the boat he was badly deserted by the 
 sheriff. The poor man was doubly unfortunate ; he was crazy, 
 and could speak no English, so I had an opportunity of con 
 veying consolation to him in German. The crew of the ship 
 amount to fourteen, and are, most of them, Yankees from 
 Salem. About an hour ago they hoisted the anchor to the 
 " Yeo heave yeo, and the heave away, 
 And the sighing seaman's cheer." 
 
 Monotonous it was, and a deep grunt at every " long pull, and 
 strong pull, and pull all together," served as basso prof undo. 
 There is a delightful long swell, and pitch of the ship, which 
 in good time will doubtless produce upon me a stomach-stir 
 ring, if not a spirit-stirring effect. The Ericsson steamer is 
 coming after us, and I must go on deck and see her. Love to 
 J. ; hope he did not come down, as it would have been too 
 late to see me. Love to all. Yours on the deep. 
 
 2
 
 1 8 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 SHIP AUSTRALIA, May 17, 1857. 
 Lat. 40 N., 52 39' W. Long. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, My feelings, and a sufficient amount 
 of steadiness in the vessel, at length permit me to use pen 
 and ink without danger of involving myself in any very dread 
 or dirty catastrophe ; this letter may be sent by ship, but prob 
 ably will be obliged to wait until we arrive at Marseilles. I 
 suppose I must not tell you how often I have longed to be at 
 home and regretted that I had ever left it, nor how often 
 Harry and I have talked about it together ; and, having made 
 all due allowance for difference of time, have wondered what 
 you were all doing at home just then, and if you were think 
 ing of us as intently as we were of you at both homes. No, 
 mother, I never was made for a traveller; the thought of 
 " Home, sweet Home," as the end and crown of all travel, 
 will ever be to me an incitement to press hastily on, and re 
 join that home circle which is incomplete without me, and 
 without which I feel myself so incomplete such a fraction. 
 Even on this beautiful Sabbath afternoon, with the gorgeous 
 sea foaming in majesty around, and the fresh breeze urging 
 on our ship at eight knots an hour, even now, I would give 
 all this beauty and grandeur, all these dark waves, with their 
 sapphire crests and tracks of foam, to be transported to our 
 pew in church where you are now sitting, and to walk home 
 with you under the budding elms on this sweet May Sabbath 
 afternoon. Not that we have not had a sermon; at five bells 
 (2\ P. M.) the crew was mustered on the main deck, and H. 
 went through the motions of a regular Orthodox service. The 
 hymns were rather a fizzle ; as H. and I were not disposed to 
 exhibit ourselves in a grand duet, he was compelled merely to 
 read them. The sermon also was a poor affair, being one 
 which he read from a volume of Sermons, or rather Moral 
 Essays, which the captain had on board. The prayers, how 
 ever, were delivered with much unction, and the whole service 
 was as interesting as it was novel, having never been per 
 formed on the vessel before. H. intends to prepare himself to 
 speak extempore next Sunday, so that he will not be obliged
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 19 
 
 to resort to any such miserable stuff again. You probably 
 feel an interest in knowing how seasick I was. The moment 
 dreaded by all landlubbers arrived on Saturday evening, soon 
 after the departure of the pilot-boat. For about two hours I 
 steadfastly held my head over the bulwark and contemplated 
 the dark rolling wave, et voila le tout ! 
 
 The next day I was out of bed, brisk enough, and I have 
 not been sick since ; and as far as I am concerned, I don't 
 think seasickness is what it is bragged up to be. I rather en 
 tertain a decided contempt for it. My two fellow sufferers, 
 however, would tell a different tale. H. and Mr. D. have been 
 more or less sick ever since we started, and their disappear 
 ances from the festive board have frequently been both sud 
 den and amusing. The seats nearest the door were voted to 
 them by acclamation. Captain K. is a right nice fellow, main 
 tains his dignity like a gentleman, and seldom or never swears 
 at the men. He is, I imagine, a very favorable specimen of 
 the captains of merchant vessels. "The monotony of sea 
 life," dryly remarked the Captain, " is varied by two incidents, 
 sometimes you see a ship, and sometimes you ship a sea." 
 So the other morning, at four bells (6 A. M.), we all tumbled 
 out of bed and up on deck, to see a large ship which was 
 passing near us ; we hailed her, and there came back from 
 her deck the following delicate and poetical query : " How 's 
 freights ? " They were requested to report the ship Australia, 
 so perhaps you will soon hear of us through the newspapers. 
 On Friday we had a regular storm ; every particle of sail was 
 taken in, and for a day and a half we plunged around amid 
 driving rain and roaring winds and mountain waves, not see 
 ing sun, moon, or stars, and having a most indistinct idea of 
 where we were. Victor Cousin, I think it is, who says that how 
 ever grand a scene may be, if the sensation of fear intrude, 
 the latter destroys all idea of grandeur, and usurps its place. 
 Had he said, the sensation of seasickness, I think he would 
 have been nearer right ; but I cannot believe that the sensa 
 tion of fear, in relation to what is grand, can fail to give it a 
 more sublime and lofty bearing of power ; and surely the fear 
 I felt, lest our ship should never emerge from the mountain
 
 2O LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 billows into which she plunged, did but serve to make me 
 more conscious of my own littleness in comparison with this 
 greatest of God's works, this 
 
 " Mighty mirror, where the Almighty's form 
 Glasses itself in tempests." 
 
 May 31, Lat. 37 48' N., Long. 15 42' W. 
 
 We spend the day on board ship somewhat as follows : at 
 7 A. M., the captain begins his rousing exertions upon the 
 three passengers ; by 7^ his exertions are crowned with suc 
 cess and we get up. At 8 A. M., we breakfast and then gen 
 erally walk the deck for half an hour or more, if promenading 
 be practicable, then we are to be seen stretched out at full 
 length on the quarter-deck. Here we read or sleep as taste 
 of the individual inclines, and also amuse ourselves with 
 watching the captain at his observations, and the making and 
 taking in of sail. The throwing of the log occurs every two 
 hours, but our vessel though advertised as " The fast sailing 
 clipper Australia" does not give a very good account of her 
 self at the log, her speed being seldom over eight and never 
 over nine miles an hour. Punctually at i o'clock our sable 
 Ganymede announces dinner, at which we sit for nearly an 
 hour. In the afternoon we copy the pursuits of the morning 
 and again assemble at table at 6 P. M. The evening, if pleas 
 ant, is spent on deck in climbing, jumping, playing chess, 
 checkers, or dominoes, and in talking under the moonlight 
 which so sweetly spreads over this vast expanse of ocean. 
 Nothing could be more lovely than the last two or three 
 nights ; the ocean, calm and quiet, scarcely moved by any 
 wave save the long swell and heave which ever lives in its 
 bosom ; the moon, turning into gold and diamonds the silent 
 sea on which it sleeps, a flood of glory as far as the eye can 
 reach ; the ship herself with every sail of snowy canvas set, 
 looking like some great and beautiful bird asleep upon this 
 fairy lake, poised on white wings and gently swaying with the 
 " swell of the long waves." Nor when the moon has gone 
 down, does this scene of beauty cease ; in the white foam of 
 the ship's wake are seen thousands of marine animals, which
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 21 
 
 emit a phosphorescent light, and as they shine from the foam 
 look like stars rolled out of the folds of an angel's snowy man 
 tle. Beautiful, beautiful exceedingly, is a night at sea ; and 
 thanks to the holy eyes of the watch stars which transport 
 us to the dear ones at home, who are perhaps even then gaz 
 ing on them and praying them to be propitious to the wan 
 derers at sea. Bright and electric sparks of love are they 
 whose sphere of influence extends o'er sea and shore, and 
 sheds the light of memory and home upon ocean-track and 
 mountain path alike. 
 
 You will see from this division of the day, that the circum 
 stances of most importance are the three meals, oases in the 
 desert of daily life ; cities of refuge to us pursued by the mur 
 derous hand of ennui; epochs up to which to date the events 
 of the day. " Up to which," I say, not from which ; in other 
 words, we are influenced by hope rather than by memory, and 
 we count forward to the prospective meal as did the Romans 
 to their Kalends, Ides, and Nones. As for our fare, it is good 
 enough, and thanks to sundry goodies brought by each of us 
 from home, shows home comforts and nice things more than 
 you would expect in a rough merchant vessel. The ginger- 
 snaps are yet a few of them in existence; although unani 
 mously applauded by both captain and passengers, and eaten 
 when brought out with a remarkable relish, I have thought fit 
 to keep them in a very miserly way, and dole them out as 
 a great favor, for I look upon them as the last link that binds 
 me to home. Many, many thanks to my dear aunt for her 
 kindness ; little though the act of love, it was the seed of 
 much pleasant thought and thankfulness. 
 
 We are in the midst of a calm just now, and although the 
 weather is perfect, we do not get on at all, and shall be a long 
 time in accomplishing the four hundred and eighty miles be 
 tween us and Gibraltar. Up to this time we have had a very 
 good run, and unless this calm continues, we shall reach Gib 
 raltar in three days. Calm weather is very good for writing 
 letters, but not for much else. 
 
 Good-by for to-day.
 
 22 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 OFF THE BALEARIC ISLES, 
 Lat. 39 16', Long. i 2' E., June 16. 
 
 I laid down my pen two weeks ago on the Atlantic, ex 
 pecting soon to resume it, but the soft enervating climate in 
 which we were enveloped after passing the Azores threw its 
 balmy fetters even on the powers of thought and converted 
 the quarter deck into a real " Castle of Indolence." 
 
 The ship, too, seemed affected by these drowsy influences, 
 and for a 'week we lay within one hundred and fifty miles of 
 Gibraltar, but making little progress through the becalmed 
 ocean. But at length on the 8th, as I was sitting in the cabin, 
 land was announced ! Up I started, throwing maps, gram 
 mars, and hand-books in wild confusion, and in a moment 
 stood on the deck. There was the land, the land which for 
 a month I had longed for, hoped for, looked for, more than 
 all save home and friends ; there it lay, a mere blue line to 
 be sure, but still the land; not Europe, the object of my 
 pilgrimage, but dark, wild, mysterious Africa, the home of 
 fetichism, the mystic parent of the more mystic sources of Nile 
 and Niger, the fountain head of dark debasing slavery. 
 
 The next day we passed the Strait of Gibraltar, and there, 
 between the pillars of Hercules, I thought of the solemn " Ne 
 Plus Ultra," which for so many years kept back the timid 
 ancients on their voyages, and of which motto we ourselves 
 were so convincing a contradiction ; and then I thought of Don 
 Roderick and Cava, and how, to revenge his private wrong, 
 Count Julian brought ruin on his country, and infamy on him 
 self, when the Moors at his instigation crossed the narrow 
 strait and quenched the Christian altar fires with the blood of 
 the "Last of the Goths." And in more modern times 
 the gallant defense of Elliott, when human valor and skill 
 seemed unavailing against an overwhelming force, has made 
 his name a part of that fortress, whose title is a synonym for 
 strength. And still later how these regions must have echoed 
 to the cannonades of Trafalgar, on that day when the last 
 maritime force of France and Spain vanished before Nelson's 
 mighty genius and impetuous valor, like mists before the sun-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 2$ 
 
 beam. And so we sail into the Mediterranean Sea, most 
 classic of all ages, washing the shores of all lands of ancient 
 story, furrowed by the keels of the ships of Ulysses, ^Eneas, 
 and Hercules, and strewed with the wrecks of Persian, Gre 
 cian, Carthaginian, and Roman fleets. So then it is rather a 
 fall from the heights of romantic history, when I think that on 
 this sea, the scene of knightly valor and Turkish desperation, 
 swept now by Corsair Sultans, and now by Emperors, I should 
 now be sailing not to rescue the Holy Sepulchre from the Infi 
 dels, not to succor the glorious Knights of St. John in their rock- 
 bound Malta, not to strike a blow for Grecian or Italian inde 
 pendence, but bound for Marseilles, in the merchant ship Aus 
 tralia consigned to Rabaud Brothers & Co., and, oh ! horror, 
 laden with alcohol (I smell it now), stores, wheat, and bacon. 
 But all the alcohol and bacon in the world would not suffice 
 to quench the enthusiasm that I felt, when as beating along 
 the shore of Africa, we came in sight of the coast of Granada, 
 and saw the snow-covered mountain tops, 
 
 " Where bleak Nevada's summits tower 
 Above the beauty at their feet." 
 
 Granada! it was like a trumpet note, in whose echoes 
 throng the histories of the olden times, resounding with tecbir 
 and gong, and kettle-drum, and clarion note, and cries of God 
 and our Lady, St. lago for Spain, defiantly answered by the 
 Allah il Allah, of the fanatic Mohammedan. 
 
 There among yonder mountains the heavy armed, unedu 
 cated Goth contended with the polished, brave, and learned 
 Saracen for the Alhambra, that delight and glory of the earth. 
 Alas for Spain ! the soldier has passed away, but the mark 
 remains. 
 
 " Fair, fair but fallen Spain, 't is with a swelling heart 
 
 I think on all thou might'st have been, and look at what thou art. 
 
 But the strife is over now, and all the good and brave 
 
 That would have raised thee up, are gone to exile or the grave. 
 
 Thy fleeces are for monks, thy grapes for the convent feast, 
 
 And the wealth of all thy harvest fields for the pampered lord and priest." 
 
 Yet, perhaps, in the progress of the ages, a better future is
 
 24 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 in store even for Spain. Surely such energy as they displayed 
 in past times is not entirely dead, and could the right impulse 
 be given and the dread spell of priest-craft be exorcised, Spain 
 might yet send forth new Cids, new Cervantes, new Lope de 
 Vegas, men worthy of a land so fair. 
 
 We have just come in sight of the Balearic and Pityusae 
 Islands, Majorca and Ivic.a, uncelebrated in ancient story that 
 I can recall, save that their inhabitants were distinguished 
 archers, having been trained bowmen and slingers from child 
 hood, and when young, dependent for their breakfast on their 
 skill, since it was fastened to the tops of tall trees, and they 
 were obliged to bring it down with their bows or slings, be 
 fore they could eat it. Imagine the dilapidated condition of 
 the breakfast upon reaching the ground ! A most peculiar 
 way of teaching the young idea how to shoot. 
 
 MARSEILLES, June 24. 
 
 Here we are at last, on shore in Europe. After a tedious 
 voyage of just forty-five days from Sandy Hook, we find our 
 selves once more on terra firma, and that too the land of my 
 hopes, thoughts, expectations. I was the first to leap ashore, 
 and such was my state of excitement that I could scarcely re 
 frain from kissing the ground and crying " France, I salute 
 thee." From what seemed a long and troubled dream of sea 
 life, I have awaked to find myself in another dream in which 
 the actors are most new, strange, and fantastic. Everything 
 we see does but go to remind us that we are far, far away from 
 home, and it is a great relief to glance from the swarthy faces 
 and dark, suspicious-looking eyes to the frank, manly counte 
 nance of Captain K. On reaching shore, we got a cab and 
 made a bee-line for Rabaud & Brothers, and were there just 
 in time before the shutting up. Letters were handed to the 
 captain, H., and D.,but none to me. I felt as though my heart 
 would burst, and had it not been for the by-standers, I should 
 have given way to all the bitterness of disappointment ; but a 
 moment's further search brought to light my letters. Can you 
 imagine how eagerly I tore them open, and with what avidity 
 the contents were devoured.
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 25 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 SHIP AUSTRALIA, June 21, 1857. 
 Mediterranean, Lat. 40 52', Lon. 2 42' E. 
 
 .... This is our forty-third day at sea ; think of it, my 
 dear friend, and commiserate me. We are distant from Mar 
 seilles less than two hundred miles, and yet have been for the 
 last week so pestered with calms and head winds, that our ar 
 riving at the end of our voyage seems to be rather a subject 
 for conjecture than for hope. Had not the weather been per 
 fectly charming, this protracted imprisonment would have been 
 perfectly unendurable, but such air and such a sky ! For the 
 past four weeks we have had but one unpleasant day ; and 
 even that cleared off, and ended with a most gorgeous sunset ; 
 lovely troops of gold and silver-robed clouds attended 
 
 " The bridal of the sea and sky," 
 
 which lay " like lovers after a quarrel, embraced in one an 
 other's smile." 
 
 For thirty days we saw nothing around except the sea, and 
 occasionally the white sail of a vessel ; but on the afternoon 
 of the thirtieth, signs of approaching land began to be per 
 ceived. Small tropic birds of weak wing flew around the ship, 
 and two turtle-doves settled upon the mast. Our first mate, 
 probably having never read Coleridge, shot one of them with 
 his pistol ; I have been expecting ever since to see him visited 
 with some condign punishment by the spirit 
 
 " That loved the bird that loved the man 
 That shot him with his " revolver. 
 
 Surely our first mate went to greater lengths than the "Ancient 
 Mariner," for I do not think that we read that that unfortunate 
 person fricasseed the albatross. While yet a hundred miles 
 from shore the land breeze brought to us a sweet scent of the 
 shore, and of trees and flowers, of the bursting buds of the 
 balsam-tree, and the rich perfume of orange groves. The top 
 gallant cross-trees were often sought, to get a glimpse of the 
 shore, and at length a blue misty line lay faint in the dim dis 
 tance, but still no mist, no cloud, no, the land, the land ! I
 
 26 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 think that I can safely say that the vexed question whether 
 two men can give three cheers was finally settled by the howl 
 which C. and I set up on the occasion. As evening advanced, 
 a levanter sprang up, and the sea was fairly whitened with the 
 sails of a fleet of vessels of all sizes issuing from the Straits. 
 Towards night the wind changed, and by day-dawn we were 
 sailing bravely along past Tangiers, Tarifa, Centa, and Gibral 
 tar, past the sunny vine-clad slopes of Andalusia, and the 
 rugged hill-sides of Morocco, into the classic Mediterranean, 
 dear to the artist, to the adventurer, to the scholar. Truly it 
 is no great hardship to sail upon the sea where Bacchus, 
 Theseus, and Ulysses sailed ; to cross the track of Hercules 
 and of those intrepid voyagers who scorned the mandate " ne 
 plus ultra ,'' and found the Orkneys; to gaze upon the water 
 from which Venus rose and into which Sappho sprang ; and, 
 underneath a kindred sky, and breathing a kindred air, to 
 muse upon those stars, " Gods, or the home of Gods," and 
 upon those mystic transformations of antiquity, Ariadne with 
 her crown, the sword of Orion, and the hair of Berenice. And 
 when not long ago we had a storm, and Eurusque Notusque 
 were rushing around in the giddy mazes of a rotary storm 
 (see Olmsted's Nat. Phil., Redfield's theory), I almost ex 
 pected to see the venerable head of old Nep. rising from the 
 waves and stilling the vagabond winds with his fragmentary 
 but highly suggestive ' Quos ego.' (There is a large and very 
 unclassical-looking shark playing around the vessel ; I think 
 of Jonah, and shudder at the idea of being nipped off at the 
 knees.) Our great want on board ship is space to exercise 
 in ; climbing ropes and pacing the deck become quite stale 
 after the first month. I would like to try a little boxiana, but 
 my two fellow-passengers, C. and a young Massachusetts man, 
 are so pusillanimous that I cannot arouse them even by offer 
 ing to take them both together. Ah, boy, if I only had you 
 here, I would at the same time amuse myself and improve 
 my digestion by giving you one of those scientific dressings 
 down of the olden time, which used to conduce so highly both 
 to your physical and moral condition. For thus runs the ar-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 2/ 
 
 gument ; if when I was sick, and thin, and weak, I used occa 
 sionally to sit on you and hold a pugilistic inquest, much more 
 so now when I am improved in weight, health, and toughness. 
 .... Our captain is to be married as soon as he returns from 
 this voyage, and consequently is in rather a Benedictine state 
 of mind ; so every Saturday night out comes the bottle and 
 Bayard Taylor's poems, and he invites us, in the words of 
 
 that poet, 
 
 " To drink to sweethearts and to wives, 
 On Saturday night at sea." 
 
 I, though destitute of both these precious articles, especially 
 the sweetheart " in esse" do gravely top off my whiskey with my 
 mental optic fixed on my lady-love " in posse" my spouse in 
 futuro, my bride prospective, my wife in the " dim shadowy." 
 (See Crosby.) 
 
 " Tuesday, June 23^. Gulf of Lyons. Since writing the 
 above, we have experienced a youthful tempest, and the 
 " stormy Gulf of Lyons " has preserved its reputation. Unable 
 to sleep on Sunday night, I dressed myself at 3^ A. M., and 
 went on deck, where I witnessed a scene both outre and mag 
 nificent. A heavy gale was blowing, and our vessel was 
 plunging wildly around with an occasional sea dashing over 
 the bulwarks, but the sky was cloudless, and in the east a few 
 faint pencils of light heralded the coming day. The sunrise 
 which followed I am unable to describe ; but can scarcely 
 imagine a more remarkable union of the Beautiful and the 
 Sublime than a clear sunrise during a storm at sea. The best 
 conception one can have, without actually seeing it, would be 
 to cpmbine in one picture Everett's description of the May 
 flower's passage in 1620 with his most poetical account of a 
 sunrise in his speech at the Dudley Observatory Inauguration. 
 Every rose, however, has its thorn. As I was sitting out on 
 the bowsprit-bitts, enjoying this scene, my eyes were suddenly 
 blinded by a shower of spray ; I clung fast to the nearest 
 ropes, and found myself enjoying a sea-bath ; when I opened 
 my eyes again, I saw a perfect flood washing across the bows, 
 and carrying away sundry unlashed articles into the sea. The
 
 28 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 captain was soon advertised of my slightly adventurous posi 
 tion, and I was ordered down. The uneasy motion of the 
 vessel brought on my fellow-passengers a return of seasick 
 ness, and I barely escaped. But to-day the weather is glo 
 rious, the coast of La Belle France in full sight, and by to-night 
 or to-morrow morning we hope to be in the city of the ancient 
 Phocsans, and of the brawny wretches who led the massacres 
 of the French Revolution with the thrilling Marseillaise. . . . 
 Hoping to meet you before long in the " old country," I am 
 yours in bonds never to be broken. 
 
 PARIS, HOTEL MEURICE, June 28, 1857. 
 
 Marseilles conveyed to my mind a most vivid conception of 
 that slightly warm place which no gentleman will allow him 
 self to mention ; but still we spent one pleasant evening 
 when it was comparatively cool, in visiting the Chapelle of 
 Notre Dame de la Garde. This is perched upon the very tip 
 top of a high and steep hill, commanding an admirable view 
 of both the harbor and the city. Here is a most enormous 
 bell, weighing more than 22,000 pounds, and requiring eight 
 men to ring it. A large church is to be built here, and lot 
 teries are held to assist in the erection. The notices of these 
 lotteries are attached to the very doors of the Chapelle. The 
 interior of the building is most interesting ; the walls are lit 
 erally covered with small "ex votos" pictures representing 
 persons in every style of danger and disease, both by land and 
 sea ; especially sick beds and apparently inevitable ship 
 wrecks ; everywhere the Virgin with the Child in her arms 
 appears, and the disease is arrested, or the storm calmed. 
 One very remarkable ex voto is a piece of stone which was 
 taken from the bottom of a ship. She had run upon a rock 
 and dashed a hole in her bottom, but a piece of the rock 
 broke off, and, remaining in the hole, had preserved the ship 
 from sinking. This seemingly apocryphal fact is not impos 
 sible, since a similar accident and preservation happened to 
 the celebrated clipper ship Flying Cloud in one of her voyages 
 to New York. The next day we left for Avignon, where we
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 29 
 
 made arrangements to go to Vaucluse, and then strolled out 
 to see the Cathedral and Palace of the Popes. This latter 
 was very interesting ; we saw the very oubliette in which 
 Nicholas di Rienzi was confined ; rightly called oubliettes, for 
 shut up thus, one must have seemed forgotten by both God 
 and man. The torture-rooms of the Holy Office of the In 
 quisition were then showed to us. The furnace in which per 
 sons suffered the dreadful torture by burning sulphur ; the 
 rooms of the Strappado and the Rack, and the large stone bath 
 into which a man was put, and then it was heated red-hot! 
 This was called the first torture ; I should think that it would 
 have been likely to be also the last. The next morning we 
 got up very early, and started by half past five for Vaucluse, 
 with a nice carriage and driver. A very pleasant ride of three 
 or four hours brought us to that lovely place which Nature has 
 clothed in her fairest garments, and around which Romance 
 and Poetry have woven their most bewitching spells. The 
 Fountain of Vaucluse and the Home of Petrarch ! The first, 
 is an altar at which the lover of the strange and wild in Na 
 ture delights to bow ; the last, a shrine of love and poetry 
 well worth a scholar's pilgrimage. Dark blue, like the sea, is 
 the fountain ; of immeasurable profundity, and has been 
 supposed to have a communication with the Lake of Geneva. 
 After its first appearance in perfect quietude at the foot of 
 the tremendous precipice, it disappears under ground for a 
 few rods, and then bursts forth again in three bright, spark 
 ling springs, whose united volume forms at once a river, 
 whose clear, sky-blue course can be traced far off through 
 the fertile fields of the broad champaign of Provence. In 
 this calm, quiet place of repose, rightly called Vaucluse, or 
 the Close Valley, so completely is it shut in by the high hills, 
 it is pleasant to imagine Petrarch as living, engaged in the 
 culture of his garden and his orchard, and in writing those 
 lovely pastoral letters which shew the stamp of the poet, more 
 than those sickly groanings and repinings at the virtuous cru 
 elty of one who was the wife of another man. No, let the 
 thought of Laura and of worldly passions be absent from this
 
 3O LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 secluded place, which should only be the home of pure and 
 holy thoughts. We stood in Petrarch's house, sat under his 
 laurel tree, and drank from the little stream which murmured 
 through his garden just as it does now, and on whose brink he 
 used to sit and feed his fishes and meditate. But the Yankee 
 spirit never satisfies itself with thinking and musing it 
 must have work, so we set out to climb the precipice above 
 the fountain. After an arduous climb, through narrow clefts 
 and up abrupt ascents, where our only hold was on the pre 
 carious support of an old tree, we reached the top, from which 
 we had a glorious view of the whole level country of Prov 
 ence, the land of chivalry and song, of the troubadour's 
 lute and the herald's coat. Here reigned good King Rene, 
 the father of the imperious Margaret of England, and around 
 him were gathered the poets, the painters, and the beaux 
 esprits of the day, at a time when the gentle and beautiful 
 arts were, in other lands, neglected for civil and foreign war, 
 and the heavy sword and ponderous lance crushed out of 
 sight the brush, the chisel, and the lute. The land is now de 
 graded and inferior ; even the soil has lost much of its exu 
 berance and fertility, but yet a ray of light is left upon it, and 
 one still hears the sweet Provencal tongue, and still sees the 
 tasteful caps and kirtles covering graceful forms and raven 
 hair; *and everywhere the dark-brown cheeks and flashing 
 eyes, which he had seen in imagination long before. The 
 Durance and Vaucluse rivers are plainly seen, but how differ 
 ent ! The former, dingy and muddy, the latter, clear and 
 blue, and accompanied in all its course by a fresher and 
 greener verdure than can be seen elsewhere in the Cham 
 paign. 
 
 HOTEL MEURICE, PARIS, July 12, 1857. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, .... I cannot tell you a tithe of 
 all I have seen in Paris ; in fact, I have been so nearly be 
 wildered, ever since I have been here, that the attempt at 
 recounting sights seen, sounds heard, and smells endured, 
 would prove a failure. It is but just to say, that from the last 
 mentioned attraction, that of bad smells, Paris is remarkably
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 31 
 
 free ; but in some of our rambles in the Faubourgs, in passes 
 and cul-de-sacs, I have had that delicate organ, the nose, 
 grievously offended. It is said that Paris is the most beauti 
 ful city in Europe, and I can easily believe this to be the case ; 
 wherever you turn, something new to the eyes and grand or 
 beautiful meets the sight ; here an obelisk, there a palace, and 
 a little farther off a magnificent arch. The Place de la Con 
 corde strikes me as the most surpassingly beautiful out-of- 
 doors object in Paris. On account of the light-colored 
 asphalt pavement, and many marble statues, it looks too 
 glaring in the daytime, but at night, when the moon shines 
 through the ever-falling fountains, and the glittering lights of 
 the Champs Elyse'es and the Rue de Rivoli stretch away end 
 lessly in brilliant avenues, and across the Seine the beautiful 
 dome of the Invalides looks solemnly on ; when we remem 
 ber what has been done and what suffered upon this spot ; 
 that here rose the awful guillotine, and here fell the unhappy 
 Marie Antoinette and the heroic Charlotte Corday ; that here 
 the glorious Girondists sang the birth-song of freedom for 
 their own death song, and here that song died gradually 
 away until the thrilling tones of Vergniaud were left alone to 
 
 sing 
 
 " Amour sacre de la patrie," 
 
 these combined attractions of sad memory of the past and of 
 beautiful nature and art in the present, have given me more 
 pleasure than almost anything here. In fact, I am very sus 
 ceptible of what is historically interesting, and I am truly 
 thankful that my life has been spent so much among books, 
 and that I have thus stored up information of the olden time 
 which comes out with most pleasant distinctness, when I am 
 in the presence of the places and relics of that same olden 
 time. 
 
 We take great tramps all over the city and outside of it ; 
 and are practicing the pedestrian art, so that when we go to 
 Switzerland we may have muscles well prepared and toughened, 
 to take journeys of twenty, thirty, or forty miles per day. We 
 walked out on the Fourth of July to Vincennes, since there
 
 32 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 was no celebration of the day among the 'Americans here. 
 No ! the eagle drooped his beak and lowered his majestic tail, 
 and nobody took interest enough to gather together the scat 
 tered tribes, and to sing his praises in the Declaration of In 
 dependence, or in Hail Columbia. So we went out to Vin- 
 cennes, a good stout tramp of five or six miles each way, but 
 it was a delight to escape from the bewildering tumult of this 
 ever active and noisy city. We walked down the Rue de 
 Rivoli, past the Louvre and the Hotel de Ville, stopped for a 
 few minutes to examine the Column of July, which stands 
 upon the very spot formerly occupied by the gloomy Bastile, 
 which was captured in 1789, and destroyed in 1790. It was 
 constructed, says the inscription, " To the Glory of the 
 French Citizens who armed themselves and fought in defense 
 of the public liberties in the memorable days of 27th, 28th, 
 and 29th of July." The sides of the column are filled with the 
 names of five hundred and four patriots, who were killed in 
 1830, and many also of those who were slain at the barricade of 
 1848, are buried here, with the heroes of eighteen years pre 
 vious. Here also the throne of the Orleans Dynasty was burned, 
 in February, 1848. Thence down through the Rue du Faubourg 
 St. Antoine, that fruitful nest of Republicanism and rebel 
 lion in all times, to the Barriere du Trone, which is one of the 
 limits of the city. Passing between the pillars, with their 
 colossal statues of St. Louis and Philip the Fair, we are in the 
 country, and soon at Vincennes. Most of the fortifications 
 and barracks are recent, but the Donjon has remained intact 
 since 1333, and bids fair to rear in defiance its massive walls 
 for five hundred years more. It is a chubby, chunky-looking 
 affair, and until one attempts to climb to the top, he cannot 
 have a realizing sense of its height. How inseparable is 
 Walter Scott from a donjon tower or keep ; I also thought 
 of Mrs. Browning's rhyme, and considered the Duchess May 
 as decidedly a strong-minded woman, if she had such a taste 
 for riding the castle wall. In the little chapel of the Bar 
 racks, not in plain sight, but in a side chapel, is the 
 monument of the unhappy, murdered Due D'Enghein. He
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 33 
 
 is represented as being supported by Religion, and wept over 
 by France, while Vengeance, or, as the guide politely said, 
 Discord, holds a blazing torch. This is one of the very few 
 Bourbon reminiscences still remaining in Paris which are 
 capable of being removed to gratify the present dynasty. I 
 asked the guide to show me the spot where the Due was shot, 
 but he peremptorily refused, and not even the magic sheen of 
 a piece of silver could soften his obduracy ; he seemed to have 
 had decisive orders to the contrary. It is thus that the 
 nephew strives to cover over the crimes and blunders of his 
 uncle, but Napoleon the First is as great, with all his faults un- 
 excused, as he could be even if Napoleon the Third should 
 spend his life in his vindication. He has always been my 
 idol from my boyish days ; his genius, his wondrous destiny, 
 his dreadful fall and sad death, have ever had a charm for me, 
 which nothing could lessen or destroy, and my youthful sym 
 pathies were so strongly enlisted for him, that his enemies 
 were my enemies. I hated Wellington ; and were it possible 
 to hate a sailor, I should have hated Nelson, and I must con 
 fess that never have I been filled with emotions of such deep 
 and heartfelt worship, as when I stood before that little coffin, 
 surmounted by the cocked hat and gray coat, in the Hotel des 
 Invalides, while, from the gloomy panelings of the chapel, 
 the mighty names of Marengo, Jena, Austerlitz, and Wagram 
 look down like guardian giants of the fame of him who now 
 sleeps there so peacefully. Below the flooring of the church, 
 but open above, so that it can be seen from the pavement, is 
 the pavilion which contains the grand sarcophagus ; this is 
 surmounted and covered by a gigantic slab of porphyry, 
 weighing 135,000 pounds. Every Monday this is removed, 
 and the coffin is placed in the chapel, which I have above- 
 mentioned, and where it can be easily seen by all. The pave 
 ment of this lower crypt, containing the sarcophagus, is splen 
 didly inlaid in mosaic, and inwrought with the names of 
 several of Napoleon's most brilliant and important victories. 
 Around the sarcophagus stand twelve colossal figures, cary 
 atides in white marble, representing War, Legislation, the Arts 
 3
 
 34 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 and Sciences. In fine, the entire furniture of this subterra 
 nean crypt is most imposing and magnificent, and its cost can 
 be reckoned only by millions ; but never can it be as touching 
 as that little cocked hat and sword, nor can any epitaph be 
 written, which will more endear him to the French, than those 
 last words of his which are his fitting epitaph : " Je desire 
 que mes cendres reposent sur les bords de la Seine, au milieu 
 de ce peuple Frangais que j'ai tant aime." Everywhere here, 
 in galleries and in offices, is seen his noble head, with that 
 brow of almost superhuman thought, and those eyes which 
 seem more divine than those of any sculptured hero or demi 
 god of antiquity. 
 
 The nephew's head shows a most decided contrast ; I 
 should scarcely think that he would like to place his bust be 
 side that of his uncle, when he must know that his subjects, 
 however loyal, cannot fail to draw comparisons unfavorable to 
 him. 
 
 Last night we walked out to the Bois de Boulogne, and on 
 our way stopped at the Chapel of St. Ferdinand, which was 
 erected on the very spot where the Due d'Orleans, the oldest 
 son of Louis Phillippe, was thrown from his carriage and 
 killed, on July i3th, 1842. The picture of his death is most 
 touching, his noble and manly face being without expression 
 either of feeling or pain, as he was unconscious during the four 
 hours which intervened. At his feet bends the unhappy king 
 in the deepest grief, the Prince utterly forgotten in the Father. 
 On his tomb, his drooping figure is supported by a beautiful 
 angelic being, which his own sister Marie of Orleans had 
 executed, little thinking that it would be for her own brother's 
 tomb. One clock points ever to the hour when he fell from 
 the carriage, ten minutes before twelve, another to the mo 
 ment when he died, ten minutes past four. There also are 
 some of the instruments of exercise and amusement which 
 once were his ; and what interested me more than all, his 
 little boat, an Indian canoe, with its flag and rudder, in which 
 he used to row himself on the Seine. As I looked at these, 
 I forgot that he was the heir of a vast kingdom, and thought
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 35 
 
 of him only as a dear young man, who was the truest of friends, 
 and the kindest of brothers. We walked some distance from 
 the chapel before our sadness was sufficiently dispelled to 
 speak to each other ; it cast a shade of melancholy over the 
 whole evening. This Bois de Boulogne is as beautiful as 
 anything so completely artificial can be ; woods, dark groves, 
 rural lanes, lakes, streams, water-falls, grottos, and rustic 
 bridges, all constructed by the hand of man, strive to rival 
 the beauties of God's own forests ; but in my opinion they 
 " can't come it." A herd of red and fallow deer went bound 
 ing along near the road, and for a moment my blood thrilled 
 with recollections of Adirondack ; but the next instant I re 
 jected any comparison between these puny creatures and the 
 swift-footed wild deer of America. The last amusement of 
 the evening was a row, which we took on one of the artificial 
 rivers, in a nice little boat about the length of the Una, but 
 much broader, the crack boat in fact of the stream. I first 
 astonished the boatman by a description of the proportions of 
 the Una, and endeavored to convey to his mind some faint 
 conception of the way in which she could be sent through the 
 water, and I then excited his loud approbation by the manner 
 in which I handled my oars. My arms were rather weak 
 from inactivity on board ship, but I put in all the " fancy 
 touches," and rowed rather with regard to elegance than to 
 strength. I suppose I should have told this to J. rather than 
 you ; just make this part of the letter over to him, and pardon 
 me for troubling you with so much of my boating slang. 
 
 We have been very agreeably disappointed in the preaching 
 here ; on Sunday morning we go to a Wesleyan Chapel near 
 the Madelaine, where a Mr. G. reads the Episcopal service, 
 but preaches sermons which in practicality and fervor are 
 almost equal to those of Dr. C. himself. At 3 P. M. we go 
 to the American, or rather the French Chapel, which is at 
 present occupied by the Americans during part of the day, 
 until their own, now being erected in Rue de Berri, shall be 
 completed. We had an excellent sermon there last Sunday 
 from Dr. Kirk on the Life of Paul.
 
 36 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 The Americans, and more especially the English, keep the 
 Sabbath at Paris, but the city otherwise is " wholly given to 
 idolatry." On Sunday evening the streets are filled with car 
 riages and pedestrians, all the shows are open, and the open 
 air concerts, which are bad enough on work -days, are embel 
 lished on Sundays with additional attractions (?). We have 
 seen the most absurd and indecent dancing and buffoonery on 
 Sunday evening. I am sorxy to say that the Americans on 
 the continent have not nearly so good a reputation for church 
 going as the English, who have a chapel in almost every place 
 which is much frequented by strangers. So H. and I have 
 provided ourselves with an English-prayer book, that we may 
 do all things decently and in order. 
 
 GHENT, Julyzo< 1857. 
 
 MY DEAR JACK, We have just arrived in this queer old 
 place, and have been refreshing ourselves, after the dusty 
 railroad ride from Brussels, with a cup of excellent tea. I 
 take this opportunity of being in Belgium, and in Ghent, 
 which are familiar to you from the pages of Prescott, and in 
 themselves intensely interesting, to write you a long letter. 
 We have taken this detour into Belgium and Holland, at the 
 advice of T. D., who has been with us in Paris for a couple 
 of weeks, and who had recently taken it himself. I expect 
 we shall enjoy it very much, judging from what we have seen 
 of Belgium thus far. 
 
 Our three weeks' stay in Paris was quiet, and, but for the 
 heat, would have been extremely pleasant. We spent one 
 delightful day in the pleasant walks and excellent museums 
 of the Garden of Plants. This is a most admirably collected 
 and conducted institution, affording to the common people, 
 who are all admitted free to the Gardens and lectures, a 
 grand opportunity to become completely familiar with the 
 most interesting and valuable parts of Natural History and 
 the other sciences. I cannot imagine a better place for study 
 ing the sciences than Paris ; I met a young Swede at Water 
 loo, with whom I had a grand talk in German. He had been
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 37 
 
 studying Mathematics and Astronomy in Paris for some time, 
 and was very loud in his praises of the Observatory, in which 
 Lalande, La Place, and Bailly wrought: of the Garden of 
 Plants, and of the Botanical Gardens of the Luxembourg ; in 
 this last we ourselves saw many students busily employed, 
 with their large books, in gathering and classifying flowers 
 and plants. It seems difficult to reconcile these three qualities 
 which seem so prominent in the French character, namely, 
 their fondness for the exact sciences, their romantic love of 
 glory, and their total want of all true poetry. Their taste 
 seems to be for the showy and tawdry ; their greatest ambition 
 is to get a medal or a cross. I went to the Opera twice in 
 Paris, and heard William Tell and Trovatore. The scenery 
 and all the accessories were splendid enough, but the singing 
 was pretty poor, as all the best singers have gone into the 
 country. I was greatly disgusted with the claque, and had 
 a great mind to pitch into some dough-faced fellows near me, 
 who, without a spark of enthusiasm or capacity to enjoy good 
 music, clapped away whenever their leader gave the signal. 
 I doubt not that any demonstrations which I might have 
 chosen to make would have been supported by the gentlemen 
 around me, for they looked as disgusted as I felt. What a 
 glorious enterprise, the crusade against the Claque ! From 
 one of the salesmen at Galignani's I obtained a complete list 
 of nice and cheap hotels on our whole route, many of them 
 of a class which are not mentioned in the otherwise invaluable 
 Murray. 
 
 We have a very nice room fronting on the Kauter or Place 
 d'Armes ; and as it is the eve of a fete, namely the Anniversary 
 of the Accession of Leopold I., King of the Belgians, we have 
 been having grand doings out in front, and this letter has 
 been several times interrupted, for me to run to the window 
 to listen to most exquisite music, both vocal and instru 
 mental. 
 
 July 22, Since the first part of this letter was written we 
 have been to Bruges and returned. It would be difficult to 
 say which of the two cities, Bruges or Ghent, possesses the
 
 38 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 most historic interest. Bruges being the residence of the 
 Counts of Flanders, has more souvenirs of the nobles, but 
 Ghent is renowned for its grand republican burgher spirit, 
 which found such a noble exponent in Jacques and Phillip 
 Van Artevelde. We had not intended at first to go to Bruges, 
 but finding that it had for ages been celebrated for its pretty 
 girls, of course it would not do for two such connoisseurs as 
 H. and myself to neglect it. There is a sad, deserted air 
 about this city of Bruges, which was in 1250 one of the most 
 splendid cities in Europe. The town seems asleep ; no 
 vehicles in the streets, no vessels in the canals, no faces at the 
 windows of the principal houses. In the suburbs, on the 
 contrary, swarms a filthy population, and they, too, seem totally 
 devoid of all energy and enterprise. 
 
 We saw a great number of paintings by artists of the early 
 Flemish school, some of them of very great delicacy and 
 beauty. Minuteness of detail also seemed much striven after. 
 I have been especially pleased with the works of the brothers 
 Van Oost and John Van Eyck. I think that Rembrandt's rep 
 utation has been vastly overrated. 
 
 In the church of Notre Dame, I saw the monuments of 
 Charles the Bold and his daughter Mary of Burgundy. The 
 interest I take in this part of the country is greatly increased 
 by my remembrance of the vivid descriptions in Quentin Dur- 
 ward, which are remarkable, seeing that Scott drew upon his 
 imagination for his facts. We also climbed the " Belfry of 
 Bruges," and having surmounted its 402 steps, had a fine view 
 of the flat country round, even as far as Ostend and the sea. 
 They have here a chime which is played by very costly and 
 intricate machinery, and is said to be the finest in Europe, but 
 I do not like it nearly so well as the one at Ghent, which is 
 continually playing the jolliest tunes. We see everywhere 
 here in Belgium memorials of Alva, Charles V., Philip II., 
 and the Counts of Egmont and Horn. At Brussels, in front 
 of the Hotel de Ville, is a venerable building called the Brad- 
 huis, in which the two counts spent the night previous to their 
 execution, and from the windows of which Alva is said to have
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 39 
 
 looked while the execution was going on. The prison is now 
 standing on the site of the Hotel de Luxembourg, in which 
 the confederates held their meetings, and from the balcony of 
 which the leaders presented themselves with the beggar's staff 
 and wallet, and gave to the movement the name of the Insur 
 rection of the Gueux. Alva out of revenge had the. unoffend 
 ing building leveled with the ground. One of the oddest and 
 most remarkable things I have seen is what is called the Beg- 
 uinage. It is a convent in this city, which is a little city itself, 
 comprising streets, rows of houses and canals, all the buildings 
 being occupied solely by the nuns. They number about seven 
 hundred ; they do not bind themselves to a perpetual seclusion 
 by taking the vows, but are allowed to return to the world 
 again if they don't like it. Those whom we saw about the 
 streets, dressed in the faille, or large black cloak with a hood, 
 did not have the appearance of having spent their valuable 
 time in fasting and macerating, or, if they had, it certainly 
 agreed with them most remarkably. I could easily imagine 
 all the younger sisters up some night on a spree of somewhat 
 the same nature with those that are described as taking place 
 at B. 
 
 THE HAGUE, July 25, 1857. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, We have just arrived here from Rotter 
 dam after a delightful ride in the treck-schuyt or canal-boat) 
 and are now comfortably settled in the best room of that very 
 respectable hotel, the Bull's Eye, and have just washed down 
 an excellent beefsteak with some excellent tea. My mind is 
 now at rest for a couple of days, and freed from cares touching 
 hotel bills and francs, centimes, guilders, and stivers, so I can 
 write to you who are never out of my mind. 
 
 I think of you day and night, and long most truly for the 
 time which will bring me back to the house roof and to you. 
 We arrived at Antwerp having crossed the Scheldt from the 
 Tte de Flandre, which is noted as being the place where 
 the people of Antwerp cut through the dyke and inundated 
 the country that the provision ships from Zealand might sail 
 across the land and relieve the city from the strict blockade
 
 40 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 which the Duke of Parma had been carrying on. Had 
 this measure been taken sooner, the city would have been 
 saved. 
 
 The next day we employed in studying Rubens at the Mu 
 seum and in the Cathedral. The pictures in the Museum 
 greatly disappointed me. The two principal ones are the 
 " Crucifixion," and the " Adoration of the Magi." In the for 
 mer of these, the moment is selected when the soldier pierces 
 the Saviour's side, while others are breaking the legs of the 
 two thieves : it is certainly a picture of wonderful power, and 
 would appear to the most advantage if viewed at a distance of 
 something under an eighth of a mile ; the figure of the thief 
 who railed, and who in his agony has forced one of his legs 
 loose from the cross, is a miracle of expressive force and cor 
 rectness of drawing ; but upon a near examination the faces 
 have a blotched and unfinished look like that of Murillo's 
 pictures, but without that grand spirituality which makes one 
 forget all faults in Murillo. The " Adoration of the Magi " 
 struck me as rather comic than grand ; the principal figure, 
 one of the Magian Kings, has an expression on his face in 
 which I could not read any holy awe, but rather a feeling of 
 disappointment that he had come so far to see so little. But 
 a pleasing disappointment was reserved for me at the Cathe 
 dral : here I saw Rubens' great master-piece, called " The 
 Descent from the Cross," and am now ready to acknowledge 
 him as a truly great master, but not one to my heart. I should 
 think, however, that the drawings, the position of the figures, 
 and most especially the drooped form of Christ, are wonders 
 of art. In the opposite transept of this Cathedral is a very 
 good painting, the "Elevation of the Cross," also by Rubens. 
 In this he has introduced a most admirable dog and horse, to 
 exhibit his power of representing animals. But however fine 
 may be the coloring of Rubens, and however powerful his 
 groupings, I can now say with certainty that he is not the 
 painter for my worship, since form is his object rather than 
 expression. 
 
 I have been much pleased with the pictures of the Flemish
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 4! 
 
 school, which are so devoted to minuteness of detail and deli 
 cacy of finish, especially of Hans Hemling and the two broth 
 ers Van Eyck, the inventors of oil painting. Their pictures, 
 425 years old, are as bright and clear as the first day they were 
 painted, and preserve wonderfully their original beauties. I 
 will speak only of the master-piece of this school, which is in 
 the Cathedral of St. Bavon at Ghent. It is called the " Ado 
 ration of the Spotless Lamb," and is by the two Van Eycks. 
 Not more than three feet wide and four feet high, it still con 
 tains more than three hundred faces, some of them portraits, 
 and all of the highest excellence. Above is the Father, with 
 St. John the Baptist on the one hand, and the Virgin on the 
 other. The face of the latter combines with the beauty and 
 softness almost of a miniature, an expression of spirituality un 
 surpassed by any of Raphael's Madonnas that I have yet seen. 
 Below is the Lamb upon the Altar. He is approached by four 
 groups of worshipers, from four opposite directions ; first the 
 prophets, next the apostles and New Testament saints, thirdly 
 the virgins and female saints, and fourthly the bishops and 
 founders of monasteries. In this last group the painters have 
 introduced their own portraits. Yet with all this delicacy and 
 completeness of finish, the pictures of this school say nothing 
 to the heart and soul ; they are rather to be carefully examined 
 with the microscope than to be gazed at with full eyes and a 
 swelling heart. 
 
 AMSTERDAM, July 25. 
 
 Since I began this letter I have changed my place of abode, 
 and three days have intervened. We left the Hague yesterday 
 afternoon, and were very sorry to leave it, for, besides the fact 
 that we had most comfortable quarters, the city is a lovely one, 
 and everywhere reigns that sense of order and cleanliness and 
 freedom from show, which reminded me most powerfully of my 
 New England home. And here let me put in a word for the 
 Dutch. I had a long-standing prejudice that they were a 
 coarse, stupid people, as broad as they were long, drinking and 
 smoking all the time, and totally devoid of those qualities that 
 interest and endear. But I was most agreeably disappointed
 
 42 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 when I came to see them. The men are in general a fine and 
 intelligent looking class ; one. meets with many a manly figure 
 and sensible face to remind him that he is among the descend 
 ants and fellow-countrymen of the De Witts and Van Tromps, 
 of the Prince of Orange and the Counts of Egmont. Their 
 faces are generally free from the stupidity of the Belgians, and 
 the mean frivolousness of the French. Among the women I 
 have, within the last four days, seen more beauty than in the 
 four weeks previous. True it has been of rather a solid, sub 
 stantial kind, and wanting that face lighted by the fires of the 
 soul which we have at home, but yet a good, honest look? 
 which makes one think of a quiet home, and well swept house, 
 and a crowd of chubby children around the neat hearthstone. 
 
 Our ride from Delft to the Hague, in the treck-schuyt or 
 canal-boat, was one of great pleasure and beauty. The ordi 
 narily unpoetic canal was completely embosomed in verdure, 
 and its sides were lined with charming little country-seats, 
 upon whose gates the owner had inscribed some sentiment 
 indicative of his intense satisfaction and contentment, such as 
 "Lust en Rust," /. e. Pleasure and Ease ; " Bosch Lust," Wood 
 Pleasure ; " Pax Intrantibus," Peace to the comers in ; " Meer 
 Lust," Sea Delights, etc. 
 
 Along the sides of the grand canal were stately rows of fine 
 trees, which gave an exclusive and aristocratic air to our 
 humble highway, and gave to it the dignity of an avenue. 
 Everywhere there was the richest green ; everywhere the most 
 flourishing prosperity. I doubt if there be a country on the 
 face of the earth where the people are so well off and so uni 
 versally prosperous, or where property is so equally distribu 
 ted among all classes. One sees here no beggars, of whom 
 there are a plenty in Belgium : in fact, they form there a large 
 part of the population. In Bruges alone there are over 15,000. 
 But in this country, conquered from the sea, and in which 
 there is a continual contest going on between land and water, 
 with a dingy sky and rainy climate, it would seem as if the 
 very exertion to support existence, and preserve life from the 
 angry waves, had also kept alive in the natives a spirit of free-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 43 
 
 dom and independence which is unknown to the other Conti 
 nental nations. The habit of demanding a fee for every tri 
 fling device is not practiced here. For example, this afternoon 
 H. dropped his cane into the canal and had given it up for 
 lost, when it was picked up by a canal-boatman and returned. 
 I threw him a piece of money, which he took only after many 
 remonstrances. I like the Dutch extremely, and were I not an 
 American, and were it not for the Dutch language, I would be 
 willing to be a Dutchman. This Dutch language is odd 
 enough, but has certain strong resemblances both to the Eng 
 lish and German, and by a judicious shingling of these I 
 manage to get along capitally with the lower order of persons, 
 who speak neither French, English, nor German. But if I 
 should ever come abroad again, I should previously prepare 
 myself in every language which there was any probability of 
 my using. Lord Bacon most truly says, " He that travelleth 
 into a country before he hath some entrance into the language 
 goeth to school and not to travel." 
 
 We have visited, to-day, Broek, which is celebrated as being 
 the cleanest village in the world. All visitors are obliged to 
 take off their shoes upon entering a house, or at least to wipe 
 them extremely clean. A weekly scrubbing of the most radi 
 cal character takes place. The houses are very often painted 
 to keep them looking handsome, and even the cows' tails are 
 held up by a rope running over a pulley, with a weight at the 
 further end, that they may not dangle in the muck and get 
 dirty. The bricks are laid out in figures similar to those which 
 form mosaics, and the gardens are clipped into forms both 
 regular and fantastic. 
 
 One room of the house is sacred, and is not shown to visi 
 tors. This the housewife enters once a week, dusts it and re 
 turns, locking the door and leaving it to solitude until the next 
 week shall come round. Good manners also seem to .receive 
 much attention. Every child we met greeted us with an un 
 couth salutation, and some of them even made abortive at 
 tempts at saying, " Monsieur, guten Tag ? " This was very 
 pleasant, and I wish I could see more of this true courtesy,
 
 44 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 which is really from the heart. This expedition we did on 
 foot, and on our way back we were sprinkled with sundry and 
 various showers. One of them was so heavy that we were 
 forced to take refuge under a hay-stack, where we lay for some 
 time moralizing on the oddness of our condition. We have 
 'an extremely independent way of getting along. We speak to 
 no English, unless they speak to us first, and even then we 
 make them no advances ; but we converse as much as possi 
 ble with the natives wherever we go, take things as they come, 
 grumble at nothing, and consequently enjoy ourselves as much 
 as it is possible for two such home bodies to do away from 
 home. 
 
 HEIDELBERG, August 7, 1857. 
 
 DEAR J., At last the long looked for, wished for, sickened 
 for letters are in my possession, and I am in a state more 
 nearly approaching to happiness than I have been since I got 
 ashore and obtained my letters at Marseilles. After reading 
 them, my heart was so full of joy that I seemed ready to suffo 
 cate, and I was obliged to spend a couple of hours in the open 
 air, and around the old castle, before I could sufficiently com 
 mand myself to sit down and answer yours. Your news, all so 
 good and pleasant, and mindful of everything that would 
 please me most, every item, however apparently trivial to one 
 at home, was most eagerly devoured, and every well-remem 
 bered and dearly cherished name of a friend went right to my 
 heart, giving full assurance that absence from home does but 
 endear it more completely to one ; or, to speak mathematically, 
 the home feeling increases directly as the square of the absence. 
 
 What a glorious time you must have had this summer ; pic 
 nics, parties, and, above all, boat rides ; you aggravate me ter 
 ribly by painting such a picture of New Haven life, and cause 
 me to wish myself at home more heartily than I am in the 
 habit of doing about three times a day. However, you have 
 not enjoyed these pleasures alone. I have been very fre 
 quently present, both in sleeping visions and in wakeful day 
 dreams I have walked up Hillhouse Avenue, and laid down 
 on the oars of the Una. You give me a lively idea of the
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 45 
 
 gayety of N. H., and an idea that could only be given by an 
 actor in the gay scene. Alas ! and has thy young nature been 
 drawn into the fatal maelstrom of society ? 
 
 I suppose you would like to hear where I have been for the 
 last week or two, since I wrote from Ghent and Amsterdam. 
 Cologne disappointed my high-strung expectations in the smell 
 line. I sniffed everywhere, without discovering the 
 
 " four and twenty stenches 
 All well defined and separate stinks ; " 
 
 nor did I regret them, especially as the city was disagreeable 
 enough, with heat and dust, to satisfy any one, without the 
 least argument addressed to the nose. On Friday afternoon 
 we were off " up the Rhine." For quite a long time the scen 
 ery was of the most uninteresting nature ; but as we ap 
 proached Bonn, the beautiful blue range of the Siebengebirge 
 loomed up one after another, looking much like the Catskills 
 to one viewing them from down the river, although not equal 
 ing the Catskills in height and grandeur, yet making a most 
 agreeable change from the flat lands of Holland and Bel 
 gium. 
 
 We spent the night at Bonn, and heard the students yelling 
 and singing around the streets, which sounded very natural 
 and home-like, and my heart warmed towards the noisy fel 
 lows. Students are students all the world over, and there is a 
 sort of freemasonry about them all which gives them a kindly 
 feeling for one another, and draws a line between them and 
 the outer world. The next morning we began our foot tramp 
 ing, and ended it also the same day. We made what we sup 
 posed the necessary arrangements for having our luggage sent 
 to Coblentz, where we were intending to pass the Sabbath, and 
 each with a good stout stick in his hand, jogged sturdily 
 along the post road. 
 
 Passing the old ruined castle of Godesberg, built by the 
 warlike Archbishops of Cologne, we held on through the village 
 to the ferry, which takes one across the river to Konigswinter 
 and Drachenfels. When we reached the water's edge, the 
 ferry-boat was some little distance from the shore, and still
 
 46 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 receding ; but as I did not wish to wait an hour for the next 
 boat, I waded out into the shallow water and got on board, an 
 example which H. was obliged to follow. At the village of 
 Konigswinter we began the ascent of the far-famed Drachen- 
 fels, and if ever the sun fell hot on my back and head, it was 
 then. " Feen wedder for de grubs " (fine weather for the 
 crops), as an English-speaking German said to me ; but not 
 fine weather for attempting the ascent of such a perpendicular 
 heart-breaking hill as Drachenfels. Several times did we sit 
 down, almost in despair, and wish that we had not so scorn 
 fully rejected the offers of the boys who stood at the foot of 
 the hill with such tempting looking donkeys. Finally we 
 gained the summit of this most picturesque of crags, and sat 
 down among the crumbling ruins of that ancient castle, where 
 Siegfried of the Niebelungen Lied slew the dragon, and gained 
 himself an immortal name, and where his successors lived and 
 so oppressed the peasants and un warlike vassals, that they 
 soon wished the Dragon back again instead. 
 
 The view is not equal to that at Rolandseck, across the 
 river, which is also the scene of one of the most romantic and 
 truly touching of all the Rhine legends. There, upon the beau 
 tiful island of Nonnenwerth at our feet, once stood the convent 
 into which the fair Hildegard, the betrothed of Roland, entered 
 when she was falsely persuaded that he had fallen at Ronces- 
 valles; and here, at this gateway, the true knight sat, day 
 after day, for two years, ever gazing upon the convent win 
 dows, if perchance he might see her face appearing there, or 
 might hear her voice mingling in the vesper hymn. And here 
 he was one day found sitting, dead, with his face still turned 
 towards the convent window. 
 
 This little story Schiller has embodied, with some changes 
 of name and place, in one of his most exquisite ballads. Read 
 Ritter Toggenberg, and think of me as on the spot where 
 
 " Gazing upward to the convent 
 
 Hour on hour he passed, 
 Watching still his lady's lattice 
 Till it oped at last.
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 47 
 
 " Till that face looked forth so lovely, 
 
 Till the sweet face smiled 
 Down into the lonely valley, 
 Peaceful, angel-mild." 
 
 But to return to our walk ; we tramped along by the side of 
 the river, examining the fine specimens of prismatic basalt 
 which lie around everywhere, and which is used for fences, 
 steps, and posts. 
 
 In the church of Apollinaris, a beautiful Gothic gem just 
 above the town, we made an odd acquaintance, nothing more 
 nor less than a young German artist from Dusseldorf, who 
 was copying frescoes and paintings. We agreed to go to Cob- 
 lentz together, and on the boat had a very jolly time talking 
 about student and artist life, German and American universi 
 ties and dwellings. We joined in singing Gaudeamus, Lauri- 
 ger Horatius, and Edite Bibete. 
 
 BADEN BADEN, August 10, 1857. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, It is now nearly two weeks since I wrote 
 to you, and they have been filled with interest and variety, so 
 that it seems impossible that it can be so short a time. We 
 have seen Cologne, and the long windings of the Rhine, as 
 far as Mayence, including Bonn, Coblentz, and Bingen, with 
 transient views of many a rock-girt ruin, which time would 
 fail me to enumerate. Indeed, my dear mother, I do not wish 
 to fill my letters with descriptions of pictures, cities, and 
 views ; far rather would I talk simply and quietly, as when I 
 was at home ; but I find that my experiences and surround 
 ings give a peculiar tinge to my mind, just as the red wine- 
 cup, in which I drank some Niersteiner at Cologne, gave to 
 the wine within it the ruby brightness of the sparkling As- 
 mannshaiiser, king of the red Rhine wines. So you must ex 
 pect to know something of what I have seen ; and first of all 
 the Cathedral of Cologne. As we rode in the cars towards 
 the city, while yet a long distance off, I saw a strange unfin 
 ished pile, which my heart at once told me was the world re 
 nowned cathedral. You know there is an old tradition that
 
 48 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 it was built by the Devil. Now I can easily imagine the 
 presence of the Devil's handiwork in the heavy pillars of the 
 Madeleine, which looks more like a heathen temple than a 
 church of the Christian's God, or in the gaudy marbles of St. 
 James at Antwerp. But he never could have touched those 
 graceful, airy reeds, which shoot up ever heavenward, leaving 
 behind in upward flight all ideas of the gross and material. 
 Here one does not feel crushed and confined, as in many 
 Gothic and most Grecian churches. In that wondrous choir, 
 one hundred and sixty-one feet in height, one seems to see a 
 direct avenue to the sky, and the vault is so far remote that 
 one may easily be pardoned for supposing that he sees the 
 blue dome of heaven itself. .1 can easily pardon the rustic 
 ignorance which is enthralled by such architecture ; its effect 
 must be dangerous upon the sensitive minds even of the 
 highly cultivated order ; and when you add to all these glori 
 ous pillars and sculptured saints, and relics well-nigh vying 
 with the church itself in antiquity, the golden light streaming 
 through painted windows, and the answering voices of the 
 choristers, while above all peals the solemn organ, I am not 
 the person to blame the weak mind that sinks down by my 
 side and exclaims, " Sancta Maria, ora pro nobis." For my 
 self, these rites and ceremonies, which I would not call mum 
 meries, and cannot call worship, have only the effect to make 
 me long more sincerely than ever for the simple service of our 
 church at home, which I have not heard since I came away, 
 and which I shall learn to appreciate more thoroughly when I 
 return. Cologne well deserves to be called the "town of 
 Monks and Bones." Two churches are entirely devoted to 
 the reception of the osseous remains of two separate sets of 
 martyrs ; one, of those of St. Ursula and her eleven thousand 
 Virgins, and the other of the Theban Legion of St. Gereon, 
 who were slain in one of the persecutions under Diocletian, 
 though how they got up here from Thebes I am unable to re 
 late. I was not well at Cologne, and did not go around 
 much. On the second day we took the boat for Bonn and 
 embarked on Father Rhine, who is extremely uninteresting
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 49 
 
 until the Seven Mountains heave in sight, and his real beau 
 ties do not begin until you leave Coblentz. I shall long re 
 member that most delightful sail. The banks were high and 
 richly cultivated, and upon their summits perched many a 
 crumbling and ancient castle, with whose names were identi 
 fied legends of the olden time, breathing of love and defiance, 
 of rapine and war, of knightly generosity and undying love. 
 I was much pleased with that which is connected with the 
 Castles of Liebenstein and Sternberg, which stand side by 
 side upon two crags, and were inhabited by two brothers, who 
 were both deeply in love with a fair young girl, a ward of their 
 father. The elder, perceiving that she preferred his brother, 
 nobly retired and gave the young lady up to him. The 
 younger one, instead of profiting by his brother's generosity, 
 went off to the crusades, and left his affianced bride in the 
 charge of his elder brother ; he was still faithful to his noble 
 character, and treated her like a sister. After a time the 
 younger brother returned, bringing with him a Grecian wife 
 from the East ; whereat the elder sent him a fierce defiance, 
 and a bloody conflict would have taken place, had it not been 
 for the entreaties of the ill-used lady, who had entered into a 
 convent. The false younger brother was punished by the 
 perfidy of his Grecian bride, who ran away from him. Ever 
 after the two brothers lived happily together, and never saw 
 again the unhappy fair one for whom they had striven. As if 
 for an emblem of their legend, a white convent lies at the foot 
 of the two rival castle crags. Also the rock of the water- 
 nixie Loreley or Lurley, and the seven sisters who were turned 
 into stone by her, for their coldness and capaciousness. The 
 magnificent ruin of Rheinfels is redolent with stirring war 
 tales, both of the Middle Ages and of modern times. 
 
 In the Castle of the Cat or Katzeneln bogen lived the noble 
 family whom Irving has made famous to Americans by his 
 tale of the " Spectre Bridegroom." Just above Boppart is a 
 sharp turn in the river, and before reaching it one seems sail 
 ing upon a beautiful lake, so completely closed up do both en 
 trance and exit appear. At this point the echoes from the 
 4
 
 5<D LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 rock of Lurley can be heard repeated fifteen times, but I am 
 inclined to think this an exaggeration ; at least, such was not 
 our experience. And so we go gliding on between the vine- 
 clad banks, beholding 
 
 " The negligently grand, the fruitful bloom 
 Of coming ripeness, the while city's sheen, 
 The rolling stream, the precipice's gloom, 
 The forest's growth, and gothic walls between 
 The wild rocks shaped as they had forests been, 
 In mockery of man's art " 
 
 until we reach Bingen, famed by song as " calm Bingen on 
 the Rhine." And indeed, not only did we find it calm, but 
 also very slow. However, we were very nicely settled, with a 
 fine room overlooking the Rhine, and commanding a good 
 view of the Niederwald, upon which we gazed with a longing 
 eye, impatient to get at it. The next day we were satisfied. 
 Early in the morning we got a boat and rowed out into the 
 river. From this point we surveyed three independent States, 
 the Dukedom of Nassau, the Electorate of Hesse in which 
 Bingen stands, and the Kingdom of Prussia. We passed 
 through the Bingen loch, a place obstructed by rocks, which 
 caused a whirling similar to that at Hell Gate. 
 
 We had a good look at the Mouse Tower, celebrated as 
 being the residence of Bishop Hatto, about whom a legend is 
 told ; how, when the grain was scarce and the people clamor 
 ous for bread, he invited them to come to his barns and get 
 corn ; and when a goodly number were gathered there, he 
 shut the doors and burned them all to death. Soon after this 
 he was attacked in his palace by the rats, and obliged to flee 
 to this tower, in the centre of the river ; but even there the 
 rats found him out, and completely devoured him, picking his 
 bones uncommonly clean. We then landed and climbed up 
 to the Castle of Rheinstein, one of the oldest castles on the 
 river, which is inhabited by the Prince of Prussia, who has 
 restored it to the condition of a castle of the Middle Ages, 
 and has filled its walls with old furniture, odd suits of armor, 
 and the windows are provided with stained glass of great an-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART, 51 
 
 tiquity. The walls are covered with antique weapons, and 
 many interesting relics ; among them, the iron hand of Goetz 
 of Berlichingen, autographs, and an ale mug of Luther's, 
 which latter showed the great Reformer to have been a de 
 cided opponent of the Maine Law. This castle is a place to 
 live and die in ; and I had a strong desire to request the head 
 servant who showed us around, and who bears the antique 
 title of Schlossvogt, to propose to the Prince Frederick, who 
 was in the room above us, to take me in for a few weeks to 
 board. How the venerable fragment would have opened his 
 eyes. The rock upon which the castle stands is falling to 
 pieces, and it is found necessary to bind it together with iron 
 chains. 
 
 We returned to our boat and crossed the river to Assmanns- 
 hausen, where we commenced our ascent to the Niederwald ; 
 the top being gained, we refreshed ourselves at the hunting 
 castle of the Duke of Nassau, and went into the wood. Here 
 we found ourselves once more in the presence of nature, not 
 Dutch or French nature, clipped into straight or curved lines, 
 but wild and willful nature, unrestrained, and indulging in a 
 thousand fantastic forms, with gnarled roots and uncouth 
 branches. We came first to the Magic Cave, a strange bower, 
 completely surrounded by trees, through which three vistas 
 of great length have been cut, and there, at the end of them, 
 some three or four miles off, we see the opposite side of the 
 Rhine, set, as it were, in a beautiful framework of leaves, and 
 producing an effect both magical and beautiful. A little fur 
 ther on is an artificial ruin, upon the very pitch of the rock. 
 From this we can see the three rivers which here unite, and 
 can easily distinguish them from each other by their color, 
 the Nahe being brown, the Main, reddish, and the Rhine 
 clear green. They do not mix, it is said, until they meet in 
 the deep pool of Lurley, several miles below. Still further 
 on, is the Temple, a small building erected upon the most 
 suitable spot for enjoying the finest view on the Rhine, which 
 Bulwer calls, "one of the noblest landscapes upon earth," 
 and it would be difficult to imagine a more beautiful pano-
 
 52 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 rama than this, which takes in all that lovely district known 
 as the Rheingau or Bacchanalian Paradise, and extends far off 
 towards the fair Heidelberg Bergstrasse, and the dark masses 
 of the Odenwald. But I cannot give you any idea of the scene 
 in words ; it would be as easy to convey in language a smell 
 or a sound ; enough for me to say, that upon this spot alone, 
 was I willing to justify the extravagant encomiums that have 
 been bestowed upon the Rhine, or to give it a place among 
 rivers, beside that majestic stream near whose banks I was 
 brought up, and which wants nothing but historic names to 
 make it superior in every respect, in beauty, majesty, and fer 
 tility, to any river in the world. We continued, on that day, 
 the ascent of the river to Mayence ; but we had seen already 
 the beauties of the Rhine, and nothing more of interest was 
 to be seen, except the hills which produce the Johannisberger, 
 the Marcobrunner, and the Steinberger; the three most de 
 licious and expensive wines in the world. 
 
 The cathedral tower of Mayence at length announced to us 
 the end of our journey for that day. This very ancient build 
 ing we viewed with much interest. The oldest part dates 
 from 978. In it are the tombs of the powerful archbishops of 
 Mayence ; also that of Henry Frauenlob, or Praise the Ladies. 
 He was a canon of Mayence, and did so exalt the female sex 
 in his songs, that when he died he was borne to the grave by 
 eight ladies, who poured into his grave libations both of tears 
 and wine, and has ever since borne the title of the Ladies' 
 Minstrel. 
 
 Frankfort pleased me much ; and, as soon as I got there, I 
 walked out to see the house in which the great author of 
 " Faust " and " Wilhelm Meister " was born. It is a house of 
 ordinary exterior, but now forever marked out from those which 
 stand around it. A very fine colossal statue of Goethe also 
 stands in the square, before the theatre, the pedestal of which 
 is covered with bas-reliefs taken from the subjects of his works. 
 On one side Mephistopheles leans sneering over the shoulder 
 of Faust, and Iphigenia is led to the altar of sacrifice. Behind 
 we have scenes from " Egmont " and " Tasso," while the third
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 53 
 
 side is occupied with " Wilhelm Meister," and in the corner 
 the grave of Werther. 
 
 The environs of Frankfort are quite beautiful. The former 
 ramparts have been laid out in gardens, with walks and foun 
 tains. But the great art beauty of Frankfort is Dannecker's 
 lovely statue of Ariadne and the Panther. This is sur 
 rounded by curtains so arranged as to throw a rosy light upon 
 the marble, and give it a flesh-like appearance. 
 
 This does not show the Ariadne as deserted by Theseus, 
 and gazing ever after the lessening sails of his vessel, but 
 rather the Ariadne consoled by Bacchus, and therefore she is 
 crowned with the vine leaf and the ivy, and seated upon one 
 of the wine god's chariot-drawing panthers. The position 
 is remarkably easy, a reclining one, with one foot drawn 
 up under her with one hand. The face is pleasantly, but not 
 severely, Grecian, and indicates a sort of dreamy repose ; the 
 panther, on the contrary, is all life and action. 
 
 In one day more we were in Heidelberg, the most charming 
 spot in which I ever set my foot, and rendered doubly dear 
 by being the place where I found my letters from home. I 
 felt as though I could stay there a month, but was obliged to 
 be satisfied with three days, a large part of which time was 
 delightfully spent in roaming through the woods and over the 
 old castle, which we visited about three times a day. This is 
 the noblest of all ruined German castles, and gives one some 
 idea of what must have been the power and magnificence of 
 the Elector Palatine, by whom it was built and occupied. In 
 1764 a dreadful conflagration destroyed all the interior of the 
 palace which war and pillage had hitherto spared, and its 
 noble courts and halls, which once echoed to the laughter of 
 high-born ladies and the rattle of knightly spurs, now lies 
 silent and deserted. 
 
 One of the interior fa9ades is very beautiful ; its graceful 
 Italian architecture and slim pilasters are the work of Michael 
 Angelo, and are in strong contrast to the heavier and more 
 Romanesque style of the front adjoining. 
 
 To the garden one passes through a fine gate, resting upon
 
 54 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 pillars richly carved, and entwined with ivy leaves. It was 
 erected in one night, by the Elector Frederick V., as a surprise 
 to his bride Elizabeth, the daughter of James the First. To 
 this day it is called the Elizabethan Gate. The handiwork of 
 the ferocious Count Tilly, the perpetrator of the massacre of 
 Magdeburg, is here to be seen. The massive tower at the 
 right extremity was blown up by him, while the rest of the 
 tower looms up like a grand torso. He, too, it was who lit 
 tered his horses in the elector's splendid library, and, when 
 straw was scarce, tore up valuable old manuscripts for the ani 
 mals to rest upon. Along the front runs the enormous bal 
 cony, large enough for a hundred people to dance upon. It 
 is grand to lean over the parapet and see the town below, 
 and the silver Neckar and the vineyards on the other side. 
 Upon this balcony is shown a large and deep foot-mark, said 
 to have been made by the foot of a lady, who was pursued by 
 a ruffian, and sprang from the highest window of the castle. 
 In the vaults of the castle is shown the enormous cask called 
 the Heidelberg Tun, which holds eight hundred hogsheads. 
 Very naturally by the side of it is placed a statue of the court 
 jester, who never used to go to bed without drinking fifteen 
 to eighteen bottles of the wine. Homer lamented that the 
 arms of men were not as strong as they were wont to be. I 
 think we have degenerated in strength of stomach, and we 
 might search far and near without finding the man who could 
 drink fifteen bottles of wine nowadays. 
 
 We met a number of friends here, four Yale men and six or 
 seven from theological seminaries. They were all very kind 
 to us, and we had a right jolly walk with them. 
 
 Tuesday, August n. We are just in the very den of that 
 great giant whom Bunyan does not mention, but who carries 
 off victims bodily, as well as either Pope or Pagan. It does 
 seem hard that every healing spring must have a poison foun 
 tain by its side, and that the sick cannot come to cure their 
 bodies without putting soul and substance in peril by the con 
 tagious influence of the gaming table. It had been my inten 
 tion to risk a few francs at rouge et noir, just to try the ex-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 55 
 
 periment ; but, when I saw the poor people seated round the 
 green board, some with ill-affected looks of unconcern, others 
 with their very eyes protruding with excitement, but all fas 
 cinated there, as it were, by a snake's eye, I felt all the blood 
 tingling in my veins to play high, and ride upon the highest 
 wave of passion and fever-heat ; and I tore myself away al 
 most by main force, knowing well that I should never stop 
 while I had a sou left. I breathed freer when I found myself 
 in safety in the open air. But truly these gaming houses are 
 a disgrace to the sovereigns by whom they are licensed, and 
 who derive from them the greater part of their revenues. 
 Their argument is that gambling will go on, and it is better 
 that they should license and regulate it ; but I think that this 
 merely shows their weakness and cupidity, in that they are 
 not able to cut them up root and branch. The water in the 
 springs is intensely warm, varying from 212 to 144. It is 
 much more abundant than is needed for medicinal purposes, 
 and some of the springs are used by the country people for 
 scalding pigs and poultry. In taste the water resembles 
 chicken broth. 
 
 The Black Forest begins here behind the town, and 
 stretches its gloomy length over eighty miles to Schaffhausen. 
 We should have liked to walk through it, but our intended 
 trip to Strasburg will make it out of the question. 
 
 FRIEBURG IN BADEN, August 12. 
 
 We had a most delightful journey yesterday. On the French 
 border we came near being sent back because we had not the 
 vise of the Baden police to enter France, but, by dint of very 
 considerable soft sawder and politeness to the head gens- 
 d'arme, he finally consented to keep our passports at the 
 guard-house until we should return. So we jogged into France 
 in a way quite jolly, but very irregular. Our gaze was of 
 course immediately directed towards the splendid minster, 
 which looms up grandly, and can be seen from a long dis 
 tance, and naturally, since it is the highest building in the 
 world, four hundred and eight feet in height, or twenty-four
 
 56 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 feet higher than the great pyramid. Like Cologne cathe 
 dral, this glorious pile is unfinished, the other lofty tower 
 being necessary to complete it and to fill it out symmetrically. 
 The exterior is very light and chaste, and the spire is wholly 
 made of beautiful open-work, so fine and delicate that it rather 
 seems like iron than stone. But within how different ! The 
 pillars are perfectly enormous, and the roof, which is not very 
 high, is vaulted in a style rather Romanesque than Gothic. 
 The change from the round to the pointed style can here be 
 read, the choir being a fine specimen of the heavy round 
 style, while the rest is a sort of cross between round and 
 pointed. Nowhere is seen that airy and spiritual-pointed arch 
 which so captivates the senses and touches the heart at Co 
 logne. You might imagine that it was an underground palace 
 built by the gnomes for their king, or the court where the stern 
 Minos and Rhadamanthus give their eternal decrees, rather 
 than a glorious temple of the living and beneficent Deity. The 
 south transept is supported by a single beautiful pillar, sur 
 rounded by three rows of figures, the lowest of saints, the 
 next of the angels of praise, and the highest, the angels of 
 love. The statue of the architect, Erwin von Steinbach, is 
 seen leaning from a small Gothic gallery, with his eye con 
 stantly fixed upon this pillar, which was one of his favorite 
 pieces. When he died the building of the cathedral was car 
 ried on by his daughter Sabina. 
 
 We walked back to Kehl, and had a very pleasant ride to 
 this place in the third-class cars, a place which we had not as 
 yet explored. There are decided advantages about the third- 
 class cars ; in the first place, one is sure to avoid the Eng 
 lish ; then it is more open and airy, thus giving a better view 
 of the country ; and, finally, it is much the best place to see 
 the people of the country. Here all are at their ease, and talk 
 together as if they had known each other for years. The 
 Germans whom I have seen much of, and with whom I have 
 taken occasion to converse, strike one soon as being very full 
 of a spirit of humanity and kindness, although at first their 
 slow and phlegmatic temperament may lead one to consider
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 57 
 
 them indifferent and regardless of the comforts of others ; but 
 this is not so. Their politeness is always aroused by the wants 
 of any person, and this is based upon true courtesy and good 
 ness of heart. One thing has troubled me ever since I came 
 to Europe, and that is the immense amount of labor performed 
 by the female sex. Cows and women work in the fields with 
 oxen and men. This is sorely prejudicial to female beauty, 
 and thus blowsed and burnt by wind and sun, the fairest face 
 soon becomes moderately frightful ; consequently a pretty face 
 is almost a wonder in the agricultural districts. Our ride was 
 a very pleasant one, lying as it did all along the edge of the 
 Black Forest Mountains, which gave a continual variety of 
 surface, with an occasional castle or old tower. 
 
 SCHAFFHAUSEN, August 12. 
 
 At last I am in Switzerland, and from this first Swiss town 
 this letter shall be mailed, I am determined. Our ride through 
 the Black Forest has been perfectly splendid. Soon after 
 leaving Frieburg, the wildness of the scenery began. We 
 ascended a hill called Heaven, and thence descended into a 
 dark and narrow dell which goes by the name of the Valley 
 of Hell. At the Gate are two very picturesque and frowning 
 rock pillars. This is called the Stag's Leap, from an old 
 tradition, that a stag, hard pressed, sprang across the chasm 
 from one rock to the other. He must have taken a very long 
 run to it. The scenery is much like that of the Catskills, only 
 hardly so wild and new, but these magnificent forests of pine, 
 fir, and hemlock, are unequaled by any woods that I have ever 
 seen. In walking through them the foot sinks into the soil 
 as into a cushioned carpet, and everywhere is that delightful 
 woody smell that I love so much. 
 
 When about half way to Schaffhausen I saw what looked 
 like clouds, and yet did not move like clouds ; they were the 
 sky-piercing snow-clad summits of the Alps, but so over 
 whelming was their height that I could scarcely believe my 
 eyes. What must they be near at hand ! We crossed the 
 frontier by passing over a little brook ; and I threw my hat in the
 
 58 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 air to think that I was in a free land, and no more subject to 
 police or custom-house. Day after to-morrow we shall proba 
 bly shoulder our knapsacks to walk. It strikes me as a 
 strange coincidence ; and perhaps also as an omen, that on 
 the same day I begin my independent travel, I also take my 
 first steps upon the road of life as a man. Perhaps the toil 
 some walk will be only emblematic of a life of toil and suffer 
 ing. Be it so ! I have a strong faith in what Carlyle says in 
 " Sartor Resartus," about the worship of Sorrow. But I hope 
 at least that walking will do us both good. You must forgive 
 everything in these fragmentary letters ; were my body settled, 
 my ideas would be more so. 
 
 ZURICH, August 20, 1857. 
 
 We arrived in this place last night after a week's tramping, 
 and found our letters from home. I mailed my last letter 
 to you at Schaffhausen. We put our carpet-bags into the Post 
 restante, directed to ourselves at Zurich, and having all cares 
 of luggage off our minds, we left our knapsacks at the hotel, 
 and tramped off to see the celebrated Falls of the Rhine, 
 which have the reputation of being the finest water-fall in 
 Europe. This claim has been contested, however. I have 
 never seen Niagara, you know, and consequently was the better 
 able to appreciate this very beautiful cascade, for it scarcely 
 deserves the name of a great water-fall. Its characteristics 
 are rather fairy-like beauty, than grand sublimity. It excites 
 delight rather than awe. For myself I was charmed with it, 
 so far did it surpass any fall which I had ever seen. With 
 such violence does the water dash down upon the rocks, that 
 it is separated into millions of diamond spray drops, from 
 which arises a column of white mist which is visible in the 
 night-time at a long distance. A castle has been built by 
 an artist on the rock, beside the fall, and permission is given 
 to travellers to go out on a platform at the foot of the castle, 
 which is directly under the fall. This is the finest spot to see 
 the shoot, which passes directly over one's head, and seems 
 continually about to rush in and overwhelm the spectator. 
 Occasionally a larger burst than common invades the plat-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 59 
 
 form, and gives every one on it a right good soaking. We 
 put on some India-rubber coats, and presented ourselves in 
 the very teeth of the cataract. Breath, sight, and hearing were 
 quickly taken away, but it was a grand sensation to feel the 
 cataract all around me, and to imagine myself one with the 
 roaring and rushing flood. The rainbow on the spray is 
 lovely, and with a gentle wave-like motion it rises and falls 
 with the undulations of the mist, now mounting to the very 
 summit of the spray crest, now resting below on the seething 
 bosom of the basin. Nothing can be more beautiful than the 
 snow-white foam garment in which the Rhine Undine has ar 
 rayed her favorite cascade. It makes me think of a snow-drift 
 blown at once onwards and yet in rolling columns. 
 
 We returned to the hotel, girded up our loins, fastened on 
 our knapsacks, with our good canes in hand, and tramped on 
 the road to Constance, intending to walk seventeen miles to 
 Steckborn, as we had already walked four miles to and from 
 the Rhine fall, and at Steckborn to take the evening boat for 
 Constance, since thirty-three miles was rather too long a walk 
 for the first day. Of our first exercise in walking what shall I 
 say ? How we walked seven miles, and stopped to dine at a 
 small inn, where we were astonished at the cheapness of our 
 fare. How beautifully looked the clear green Rhine, how 
 pleasantly the wind blew down from the hills and through the 
 valley, cooling us when heated, and removing the fatigue we 
 deserved for not starting off earlier ; and how, when about a 
 mile from the town of Steckborn, after we had just arisen from 
 a pleasant rest by a brook, we saw the steamboat for Con 
 stance, which we had been told would not come till an hour 
 later, rushing along past us, and how for a little while we tried 
 youthful spunk against steam in a race, but finally were 
 obliged to give in dead beat, and reconcile our minds to 
 spending the night at Steckborn. Here we had a grand 
 bath, and with limbs all fresh and reinvigorated made our 
 entry into Steckborn, and were soon devouring a tremen 
 dous supper of bread and milk and honey, at the Lion. And 
 here let me tell you what care we are obliged to take of our
 
 60 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 feet. Every night, before going to bed, they are carefully 
 rubbed with tallow and brandy, mixed in the palm of the hand, 
 to strengthen and keep them soft. In the morning the stock 
 ings (thick, woolen ones), are soaped on the inside, then all 
 sores or blisters, especially on the shoulders where the knap 
 sack straps come, have to be treated with arnica and brandy, 
 and all lameness removed with good rubbings and bathings. 
 Our hours of rising and lying down are very primitive ; in 
 stead of going to bed at four and getting up at eight, as I 
 sometimes did at home, I now go to bed at eight and rise at 
 four, that is to say, when pedestrianizing. These early hours 
 are beginning to lose their horrors for me, and I think that 
 upon the whole my constitution will survive the shock. To 
 return to Steckborn, I passed the last night of my minority 
 in a furious battle with numerous fleas past and present, the 
 former having already left their itching mementoes upon me, 
 and the latter being desirous to imitate their example. Al 
 though dreadfully tired, I could not sleep. It struck me as 
 being perhaps a kind of initiation into manhood. As the 
 aspirants to the honor of knighthood in the good days of 
 chivalry were bound to wake the night before and protect 
 their armor, so I, who have been for many years an anxious 
 aspirant for manly honors, was obliged to lie awake and pro 
 tect my armor. Finally I devised a plan for treeing the in 
 sects, a plan which I flattered myself was ingenious, original, 
 and poetical. It was this. The moonlight was streaming 
 in at the window, and lay on the bed in a broad band of silver 
 light, cutting off the pillow and a little more from the rest of 
 the bed. Upon the pillow I curled myself up and watched 
 intently to see if any unlucky insect would dare to set foot on 
 the sacred stream ; had any done so he would have " died a 
 flea's death " ; but no one made his appearance, and behind 
 this Diana's shield, I was safe. Sleep at length overcame 
 the sentinel, but it was undisturbed, and I awoke in the morn 
 ing slightly cramped, but jubilantly victorious, and twenty- 
 one years old. This levity may seem out of place in one who 
 has a right to style himself a man, but I feel so jolly at receiv 
 ing letters that my spirits find an outlet in every direction.
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 6 1 
 
 We left early for Constance, and at the entrance saw the 
 meadow in which John Huss and Jerome of Prague were 
 burned. The hole is still shown in which the fatal stake was 
 set. This is one of the spots of holy ground, where the Prot 
 estant breathes a blessing on the noble martyrs whose ashes 
 have whitened the soil, and whose blood has soaked the sod. 
 In this decayed old city we also saw the large Guild Hall, 
 where the grand council was held which condemned Huss to 
 death, and in the minster is shown the stone upon which he 
 stood when his sentence was pronounced. They say that this 
 stone always remains dry when the stones around are wet. 
 The city, in fact, is redolent of Huss ; they show the house 
 where he was captured, and the castle where he was confined. 
 In fact, the martyrdom of John Huss is the stock in trade of 
 Constance, now that most travellers are Protestants, and all 
 pilgrims passing through must see the places associated with 
 the history of the " Bohemian Goose," from whose wing Luther 
 plucked the quill with which he wrote his thesis. 
 
 The Lake of Constance, or Bodensee, as it is called, is one 
 of the largest, but not the most picturesque, of the Swiss lakes. 
 On it we took boat and sailed for Rorschach, which is an ex- , 
 tensive corn market, on the southern shore, and at the end of 
 the road leading to St. Gall. The scenery on the lake was 
 quite flat and tame at first, but as we approached the south 
 eastern side, the rugged and lofty mountains of Appenzell 
 made their appearance, and towering above them all, the 
 snow-covered Sends, of which more anon. We were too tired 
 and sleepy to enjoy anything very much, and dropped into a 
 quiet nap, which lasted until we found ourselves near Rors 
 chach, when we rubbed our eyes and prepared to go ashore. 
 As we approached the pretty and flourishing city of St. Gall, 
 we met the younger portion of the population out for an even 
 ing walk. We saluted them all, high and low, with the regular 
 German address " Guten Abend." 
 
 The inn in which we slept was of an humble exterior, but 
 very good ; the room was hung round with cards filled with 
 extremely practical and straightforward Scripture texts, show-
 
 62 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 ing that our hosts were reformed to the backbone. Rising 
 very early the next morning, we proceeded towards the canton 
 of Appenzell, celebrated as being the land of the great original 
 " Ranz des Vaches," and also for its wild and picturesque 
 scenery. It has also the advantage of being rather out of the 
 ordinary course of travel, and is not overrun in every direction 
 by the English. 
 
 It is divided into two sections, Outer and Inner Rhoden, 
 which are most singularly opposed to each other in religious 
 matters, for two parts of one canton. Outer Rhoden contains 
 42,746 Protestants to 875 Catholics, while Inper Rhoden has 
 11,230 Catholics to 42 Protestants. The difference is soon 
 perceived on passing from one to the other. Outer Rhoden 
 has all the signs of life and prosperity. It is principally en 
 gaged in farming and manufactures. Inner Rhoden, on the 
 contrary, a people of shepherds and graziers, is characterized 
 by that happy moral and physical soil, compounded of dirt, 
 vice, and laziness, in which Catholicism seems so readily to 
 take root. 
 
 The capital, Appenzell, is branded by the guide books as a 
 dirty and decayed place ; so we satisfied ourselves with re 
 garding it from the top of the highest hill, and then went on 
 to a small place two or three miles further on the mountain 
 side, called Weissbad. The nucleus of the place is a large 
 hotel, called Molken Kur, or milk cure. Many Swiss and 
 Germans come here to restore their health by drinking goats' 
 milk, and breathing the mountain air, and many come for no 
 particular reason at all. This was Saturday. We engaged a 
 guide to take us over the great Mt. Sentis on Monday morn 
 ing, and resigned ourselves to passing Sunday in a place where 
 not a soul spoke English but ourselves, and in a canton where, 
 as I have said, there were only forty-two Protestants. We of 
 course made forty-four. The houses and barns of Weissbad 
 are very prettily scattered over the gentle slopes which lead 
 up to the frowning rocky range beyond, and several foaming 
 brooks flow through the little valleys. 
 
 From the tops of the surrounding hills we heard in the
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 63 
 
 evening the " Ranz des Vaches." It is not, as I had sup 
 posed, any regular air or set of airs, but is, as Sam Weller re 
 marks, according to the taste and fancy of the singer. The 
 airs are very rude and simple, and derive pretty much all their 
 charm from the echoes of the hills, and the peculiarly romantic 
 nature of the accompanying scenery. On the Meglis Alp I 
 heard a singer, or yodler as they call them, whose voice and 
 song were remarkably sweet. This, I am inclined to believe, 
 is an exception to the general rule. 
 
 On Sunday it rained, and I was dreadfully homesick, a 
 complaint which I had' thought completely cured. My want 
 of occupation threw me back upon memories of the past, and 
 there of course the home-light was most conspicuous. 
 
 This Zurich is a very pretty place, although there is no wild 
 scenery about it. The Lake of Zurich empties itself here by 
 the river Limmat, whose water is so clear that one can see the 
 bottom all the way across. We are delightfully situated at the 
 Stork Hotel, on the Limmat. Just in front is the great min 
 ster, in which the dauntless and gallant Zwingle preached the 
 real Reformation. His name is peculiarly honored here, and 
 the house is shown in which he passed the last six years of 
 his life. 
 
 I send you a sweet little sprig of " Vergiss mein nicht," 
 from the foot of old Sends, not because I am afraid that you 
 will forget me, but the sweet little flowers blooming close by 
 the snow were just like those we have at home. 
 
 I shall always be your own boy. 
 
 RIGHI KULM, August 25, 1857. 
 
 MY DEAR AUNT, The "rabies scribendi" has attacked 
 me in full force here, 5,550 German feet above the sea, and as 
 I cannot in decency attack mother or John again, having dis 
 patched a rather lengthy letter from Zurich, you see you are 
 the victim. It has seemed to me that it would perhaps be a 
 pleasure to you to recall to your mind some of the delightful 
 scenes through which you passed six years ago, and which are 
 undoubtedly sweeter in the recollection than in the actual en-
 
 64 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 joyment. For my part I can easily imagine that when I shall 
 once more be seated by the family fireside, I can enjoy these 
 scenes in memory without that eternal longing for the home- 
 roof which now mingles with all I see or do. Then, too, the 
 point of view from which I regard matters and things must be 
 so different from that in which they appeared to you, that they 
 will have a certain aspect of novelty. We left Zurich last 
 Friday afternoon, and began our tramp over the Albis range 
 towards Zug ; the ascent of the Albis is not at all difficult, es 
 pecially for youths who had just overcome the difficulties of 
 the Sentis Pass in the canton of Appenzell, which is one of the 
 hardest and wildest in Switzerland. Over our shoulders we 
 saw as we ascended, " the margin of fair Zurich's waters " 
 peeping out in separate spots, which looked like a long line of 
 isolated little lakes, and when we reached the top, the lake of 
 Zug looked up with its figure 8 of a bed ; this, however, we 
 could not trace till later. 
 
 There was one object of interest by the roadside near 
 Cappel, which had the effect of exciting my enthusiasm pow 
 erfully ; it was the monumental stone of Ulric Zwingle. He 
 always was a hero of mine. His noble boldness, and true en 
 thusiasm for the great cause in which he was engaged, ever 
 stood, to my mind, in strong contrast with the comparative 
 timidity and scholastic quiet of Luther. Then, as a reformer, 
 he was so much more thorough and decided than Luther ; 
 in him was no clinging to old forms, no adherence to Mother 
 Church, no undue reverence for old corruptions simply because 
 they were old. The results of the labors of these two reform 
 ers, are not equal at the present day ; while the weak Luther- 
 anism of modern Germany is yielding on all sides to the 
 attacks made upon it, to Roman Catholicism on the one 
 side, and to skepticism and indifference on the other, the 
 Protestantism of the reformed cantons is still nourished in 
 life and strength ; and not uselessly, for it brings with it pros 
 perity and self-respect, witness the activity and power of 
 Berne and Zurich, the first cantons in Switzerland. Then to 
 the end of all things Death how different ; one scarcely
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 6$ 
 
 knows how Luther died, but we all have heard of Zwingle's 
 martyr death how on the battlefield of Cappel, when the 
 " sword of the Lord and of Gideon " had fallen from his nerve 
 less hand, an enemy found him lying, and ran him through 
 with his lance, how he gasped out, " You can kill the body but 
 not the soul," and died. I was much pleased with the sim 
 plicity of the memorial which was raised just upon the place 
 where he fell. It is a huge, shapeless mass of stone, into the 
 middle of which is let a plate with the inscription. At Zug 
 we crossed the Lake of Immensee, and continued our tramp 
 towards Luzerne. Near Kussnacht we came suddenly upon 
 Tell's Chapel, amid the wooded height from which he winged 
 the fatal arrow, and followed it with the bitter taunt, " Thou 
 knowest the shorter, look not for another ?' There are sev 
 eral things about the story of Tell which are so confused and 
 contradictory, that I scarcely know what to believe. There 
 is the best reason, to suppose that he was not entirely a 
 myth, for, besides the old and numerous country traditions, 
 we have an account of the dedication of Tell's Platte, on 
 the spot where he sprang ashore from the boat of Gessler, 
 at which, thirty-one years after the death of Tell, one hun 
 dred and thirteen persons were present who knew him per 
 sonally, and assisted in the ceremonies. I dislike, extremely, 
 the ordinary portrait that is drawn of him, viz.: that of a 
 spouting patriot, into whose mouth are put all sorts of flat 
 sentiments about Liberty and Fatherland. Now it is cer 
 tain that Tell was not one of the conspirators at Rutli, from 
 which place he would never have absented himself had he 
 been such a character as he is described to be. How much 
 more satisfactory is the man whom Schiller shows us ; a char 
 acter said to have been originally suggested by Goethe; the 
 swift mountaineer with an intense love for his family and his 
 home, and an intense enjoyment of the free blue sky, but 
 happily untainted by those modern ideas of abstract liberty 
 in which it is the fashion to clothe every hero of the past. 
 His nature is made up of sweet domestic traits, that noble 
 simplicity which is the foundation of all that touches and in- 
 5
 
 66 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 terests, even when finally he draws the fatal bow-string, with 
 such words as these : 
 
 " Till now the father never went from home, 
 
 But joy, sweet joy awaited his return 
 . He always brought back something for the children, 
 Some Alpine flower, rare bird, or precious fossil, 
 Such as the wanderer finds by stream or mountain. 
 Alas ! how different his employment now ! 
 He sits by the wild way with thoughts of death, 
 'T is his foe's life for which he lies in wait, 
 And yet, dear children, he but thinks of you, 
 Even now 't is to preserve your lives, 't is to 
 Save your sweet innocence from wrong and danger 
 He now sends forth his bolt at the destroyer." 
 
 So pure and beautiful are the traits of his nature that we 
 revolt from his shooting Gessler from behind a bank, assassin- 
 like, even to protect his children from the evil to come. Still 
 his whole life, as drawn by Schiller, makes, to the mind's eye 
 a charming home picture, fit to be cherished in the heart. 
 
 Leaving the chapel and the ruined castle of Gessler behind 
 us, we soon came in sight of the beautiful Lake of the Four 
 Cantons, had a delightful stroll along its pleasant banks, till, 
 from a little eminence, we saw Lucerne. What a lovely place 
 it is ; everything in the background so wild and rugged, Pilatus 
 frowning above all, and in the foreground all so peaceful and 
 picturesque the old city walls with its towers, the crystal 
 stream of the Reuss, and the fair lake sleeping so quietly in 
 the sunlight. I was perfectly charmed with Luzerne, and had 
 time suffered would have stayed there several days and at 
 tempted the ascent of Mount Pilatus, which would have been 
 right spicy and interesting from the danger which attends it. 
 How were you pleased with the Lion of Luzerne, erected as a 
 memorial of the Swiss Guards who were massacred at the 
 Tuilleries in 1792 ? For myself, I could only regard it as a 
 work of art ; as such it has a power and simplicity which are 
 remarkable, and serve as an additional proof of the vast genius 
 of Thorwaldsen, who could thus desert the beaten track, and 
 hew from the very bosom of the rock an image which is won-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 67 
 
 derful, both from its colossal proportions and life-like attitude 
 and expression. But I cannot blend with this any glow of 
 admiration or enthusiasm for the men whose fidelity it was 
 erected to commemorate; their motives were mercenary and 
 mean ; had they beaten off the mob, probably they expected 
 that their pay would have been doubled, as it was, their 
 blood was bought for gold, and at the service of the master 
 who could pour it out where and when he would. How much 
 more honorable the trophies of Swiss bravery to be seen in 
 the Arsenal there, and which were won by deeds of antique 
 bravery, upon fields whose names are now like a trumpet call 
 Sempach, Morgarten, Morat. The signet-ring of Charles 
 le Temeraire, taken from his finger as he lay stretched on the 
 field of Morat; the ducal robe of Austria worn at Sempach, 
 when Arnold von Winkelried offered up his heroic life and 
 " Death made way for Liberty ; '"' the heavy iron collars in 
 which the Austrian noble intended to confine the free necks of 
 the Swiss these are trophies well worth fighting for, and 
 proudly pointing to when won. . . . 
 
 These glorious Alps, how they satisfy my longings after wild 
 free nature ! 
 
 In Belgium, Holland, and France, I wandered among pal 
 aces which dazzled and picture galleries which bewildered my 
 mind, ignorant of art, and through scenery where the hand of 
 man had robbed Nature of her glorious forest crown, and had 
 placed upon her brow, instead, the tinsel ornaments of parks 
 and vineyards. I stood in churches and cathedrals where 
 religious architects had done their best, but I could not com 
 prehend, in a full degree, the language spoken by slender 
 pillars and pointed arches, purpled pinnacles and painted win 
 dows ; but here nature's vast book is wide open, and a child 
 like myself, who has always loved her, can easily read the 
 pages upon which the gigantic characters are snow capped 
 mountains and rushing streams and deep blue lakes. I wish 
 for no other cathedral than the great forest dome, and for no 
 fairer pictures than the sun paints at noon in the waveless lake, 
 and at evening in the rosy clouds. Of course, as time passes
 
 68 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 I hope that I may come to have a more complete and intelli 
 gent appreciation of art, but for some time yet I desire to be 
 Nature's alone. The glaciers I am looking forward to with 
 great anticipations of delight, and am afraid I shall be half 
 crazy when I get into the Bernese Oberland, and the region of 
 Mont Blanc. 
 
 GRINDELWALD, September i, 1857. 
 
 MY DEAR J., During the past week I have had my fill of 
 mountain climbing : we have been over the Pass of the St. 
 Gothard, crossed the mountain range which separates this 
 canton of Tessin from Italy, crossed back over the Cries 
 Glacier to Switzerland, over the Grimsel to Meiringen, and to 
 day have climbed the great Scheideck to this place. To-mor 
 row we cross the Wengern Alp, which has the reputation of 
 being one of the hardest mountains in Switzerland to ascend. 
 All the natural laziness in me trembles at the idea of the 
 scramble which we shall probably enjoy. 
 
 I wrote a letter to Aunt E. from the Righi, but as I finished 
 it in the evening I had no chance to describe the magnificent 
 sunrise which we had the next morning. At a very early hour 
 the whole population of the Culm were aroused by a stunning 
 racket in the entries, which reminded me more of college than 
 anything else, and in about three quarters of an hour, some 
 hundred or more shivering persons were assembled on the 
 summit, many of them scantily clad, and some wearing around 
 them for shawls, the bed blankets which they had carried off 
 in spite of the prohibitory notice stuck up in all the rooms. I, 
 arrayed in my heavy overcoat, could afford to laugh compas 
 sionately at my miserable fellow beings. Long before the sun 
 rose, faint streaks of light came streaming up, heralds of the 
 glory to come. As the light grew bright, the few clouds in the 
 heavens were illuminated and the distant glaciers of the Ber 
 nese Oberland were overspread with a most beautiful rosy 
 light. Beneath our feet all was cloud and mist, through which 
 not a glimpse of the habitable world was to be obtained, while 
 around and above the glorious day had already begun ; it was 
 as if we were separated from the world by a thick veil and the
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 69 
 
 sun was rising for us alone. As the sun rose to plain sight, 
 over the mountain top, a shepherd blew on his horn the wel 
 come to the sun, and there was very speedily a scattering to 
 the breakfast-table. We were soon through breakfast and off 
 with our new compagnons de voyage E. N. W. and B. L. 
 
 I have been installed paymaster, linguist, and commander- 
 in-chief of the party, a post which my previous experience in 
 money and hotel slang, together with total disregard of the 
 wrath of landlords and waiters, render me peculiarly fitted 
 for. We came down from the Righi to Gersau, and crossed 
 the Lake of the four-wood cantons to Fluelen, and thence 
 to Altorf, where we took dinner, with the scenes of Tell's 
 great exploit on every side of us. We stopped at the Hotel 
 de William Tell ; just above us was a fountain where the 
 father stood, with his cross bow ; just below, another fountain 
 occupying the spot where was once the linden tree, under 
 which the boy stood, with the apple on his head. On the 
 hills just beside the town, stands the little village in which 
 Tell was born. I hope by this time you will see what a tell 
 tale place it must have been. We reached Amstag that night, 
 and left right early in the morning, since H. C, who is an 
 early bird, started us all up by 4 A. M. 
 
 With the frowning mass of the Bristenstock above us, we 
 left the extremely picturesque village of Amstag, and came 
 ever, as we ascended higher and higher, into wilder and wilder 
 regions, the scraggy mountains above, and the roaring, foam 
 ing Reuss below. Beauty was abundantly added by the many 
 fountains which were seen on every side, pouring from a great 
 height, in one pure, foamy stream, or else, in an almost 
 endless succession of little laughing and jumping cataracts. 
 
 The road was an admirable one ; built of heavy masonry, 
 in places where the streams would be liable to wash it, span 
 ning the gulf of the Reuss with numerous bridges, which in 
 any other place would be thought most picturesque, and pro 
 tected in some spots by long stone galleries, from the destruc 
 tive effects of the winter avalanches. One of the bridges 
 crosses a cleft of very great depth, though not more than
 
 70 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 eighteen or twenty feet wide ; tradition says, that once a monk 
 leaped across this chasm, with a damsel in his arms, and thus 
 preserved her from some ruffians, who were pursuing her ; 
 he must have been a more clean-limbed and springy fellow 
 than most of the monks I have seen, to have got across the 
 cleft alone, to say nothing of the slightly cumbersome addi 
 tional weight which he carried. The story is rather a stretch 
 both for the monk's legs and my imagination. 
 
 Further on, the scenery grows still wilder, and the name of 
 the Teufel is frequently used in describing prominent objects. 
 The Teufel's Stone is an immense block of rough rock, which 
 Mr. Teufel was said to have been seen by a peasant, carrying 
 on his shoulder, and upon the peasant's making a pious ejacu 
 lation, Old Clooty dropped his burden and put for the Styx 
 instead of the Reuss. Might it not have been that the peas 
 ant was deceived by some spectral illusion, like that of the 
 Brocken Spectre, caused by the reflection of his own shadow, 
 upon a bank of mist, greatly magnified? But the most tre 
 mendously wild and weird thing in the valley, is the Teufel's- 
 briicke, or Devil's Bridge. There are two, both spanning the 
 immense and roaring gorge with a single leap. The older 
 one was built by the Devil's permission, as described in the 
 Golden Legend, and the other, finer, but less picturesque, 
 built in 1830, by the canton ; taken together, they produce a 
 very strange effect, especially as the lower one is all over 
 grown with moss and grass. The rock rises immediately 
 behind the bridge, in a most strikingly savage manner, and 
 on every side are seen precipices so steep, cliffs so jagged, 
 streams so headlong, vegetation so scanty and desolate, with 
 the mocking wind sweeping in great blasts through the nar 
 row defile, that to me, it surpassed all that I ever had imagined 
 of savage grandeur. 
 
 But even the horrors of this tremendous valley must have 
 been increased, when, in 1799, the French and Austrians fought 
 here a most bloody battle, partly upon the very bridge itself, 
 and when they, being obliged to retreat, blew up the bridge, 
 or rather a part of it, and plunged friend and foe together
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. Jl 
 
 into the abyss below. The fall of the Reuss is here very 
 considerable, and peculiarly noticeable for its tremendous fury ; 
 a beautiful rainbow stood on it when we saw it. But I must 
 bid you good-by, for the present, as we are going out to look 
 at the glacier which seems almost to come in at my window. 
 
 Sept. 2. We did not go to the Wengern Alp to-day, 
 after all. At 3^ A. M. we were waked according to order, 
 but it was raining hard, and all ideas of climbing the arduous 
 mountain are out of the question ? We accordingly may 
 on to Interlaken to-day, and from that place I will finish this 
 letter. 
 
 Sept. 2, Afternoon, Interlaken. What a glorious batch of 
 letters I have just received here, and how perfectly happy I 
 am ! .... The news of which you spoke was news in 
 deed to me, as for some time past we have been roaming in 
 a wild and desolate country, which has no papers of its own, 
 let alone " Galignani," the " London Times," or the " New York 
 Herald ;" and I am as totally ignorant of anything which has 
 been going on in the civilized world, as if I had been living 
 in the planet Jupiter. Last Saturday, my dear Jack, was your 
 birthday, and I remembered you most affectionately, as I rose 
 to see the sunlight of the 29th of August, in the Val Formazza 
 and to hear the roar of the magnificent fall of the Tosa, which 
 leaps over the precipices in an immediate fall of four hundred 
 feet, and falls a thousand feet in a short distance. To my taste, 
 it was superior to the fall of Schaffhausen, although I think 
 many would prefer the vast volume and graceful beauty of the 
 latter, to the wild grandeur and terrific height of the Tosa Fall. 
 I shouted to the echoes here, " Many happy returns to you, 
 dear Jack ! " and the echoes most faithfully repeated, " You, 
 dear Jack ! " I would have written you a letter here on that 
 day, but the first two thirds were occupied in a most tremen 
 dous climb, over the steep and precipitous mountain range 
 which separates Sardinia from Switzerland, a walk across 
 the Gries Glacier, and a very long descending walk to the 
 town Obergestelen, which we reached by about 2 p. M. This 
 trip is described in the guide books as a very tough day's
 
 /2 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 work, but we did it in less than seven hours, and could, if 
 necessary, have done fifteen miles more before bedtime. As 
 it was, we were all fatigued enough to eat a good dinner and 
 go to bed very early, and so I was obliged to give up my 
 cherished plan of wishing you many happy returns upon the 
 day itself. 
 
 I am now a man, my dear brother, as well as yourself. We 
 stand together now, shoulder to shoulder, in the battle-field of 
 life; and from this reconnoitering post of August, 1857, would 
 it not be well to look down and survey the field of the future, 
 and think of some general plan for the campaign of the world. 
 For myself, it does not seem as if I should ever be married, 
 and should prefer to live with you and mother in the old style, 
 until something inexorable shall occur to drive our barks into 
 
 separate seas I now feel anxious for difficulties to 
 
 appear, in order that I may meet and vanquish them ; it is 
 hard to persuade a man who has surmounted the steepness 
 of the Alps, that there is any difficulty which can detain, or 
 danger which can daunt him. 
 
 I was prepared to be disappointed in the glaciers. I think 
 it requires a sort of preliminary education before one gets to 
 really appreciate what wondrous things they are, and how vast 
 the phenomena must have been from which they had their 
 origin. I have now come to consider them as they should be 
 considered, the miracles of the mountains. 
 
 The first specimen of which we had a view was not a very 
 favorable one ; it was the Gries Glacier, lying between two 
 lofty peaks of the Nufenen range, and though of considerable 
 extent, yet it wants that wonderful depth and beautiful azure 
 tinge which make so many of the other glaciers so attractive. 
 We crossed it completely, and that after the time (loi A. M.) 
 when it is safe to cross. By n or 12 M. the snow melts the 
 ice, which is formed during the night, over the clefts and 
 cracks. The whole surface was quite soft and slushy, and it 
 seemed as if we were in danger of falling in every minute, but 
 when we came to a crack the deep, thick ice walls assured us 
 that we were walking on a floor nearly as solid as the earth it-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 73 
 
 self. In fact our less practiced companions often thought 
 that we were walking on the ground, from the heaps of stones 
 and heavy dirt through which not a particle of ice could be 
 seen, but every now and then a deep cleft or the sound of 
 gurgling water underneath assured them of their mistake. 
 
 The great Glacier of the Rhone we passed, and, although 
 we did not go very near it, we had a fine opportunity to ob 
 serve its remarkable shape, and the purity and clearness of its 
 ice. Its shape is much that of a heavy glove, and from this 
 similarity Longfellow has drawn one of his most admirable 
 comparisons. He calls it a gauntlet which the old. Winter 
 King has thrown down to Summer, and which every year the 
 Sun, the champion of Summer, strives in vain to raise upon 
 the point of his glittering sunbeam-spear. From a deep cav 
 ern within the glacier rises the noble river Rhone, which is 
 certainly more interesting in its youth, among the mountains 
 of Switzerland, than in its turbid and turbulent old age on the 
 plains of southern France. 
 
 But the most beautiful glacier that I have yet seen has been 
 the Glacier of Rosenlaui, which we visited last Tuesday. It is 
 small in size, and lies imbedded between the craggy peaks of 
 the Wellhorn and the Engelhorn. On account of the freedom 
 of the surrounding rocks from marl and the softer beds, the 
 virgin whiteness of the ice is not deformed by masses of dirt 
 and impurity, as is the case with many glaciers, but its hills 
 and bergs shine in crystal purity, and in all the clefts the 
 separated sides of the ice are of the most beautiful blue imag 
 inable, as lovely as a summer sky. By a series of rather slip 
 pery and dangerous steps we climbed up on to the glacier, 
 and examined these blue ice-holes, which go stretching down 
 ward like the clear ocean on a calm day, but with a purer 
 and more heavenly azure than even the ocean depths. The 
 rough rocks, and the whole gap above the glacier, have in 
 their outline a resemblance to a human face, and they say that 
 it is the Mountain Spirit who thus watches over the beautiful 
 treasure which lies so cold and icy on his rocky breast, and 
 have given it the name of the " Watcher of the Glacier."
 
 74 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 INTERLAKEN, September 2, 1857. 
 
 .... Can't you meet me at or near Geneva, on or be 
 fore the ist of October, and travel with me for about a month 
 and a half in Italy ? C. expects to go home at the end of our 
 Swiss tour, which will probably terminate in about three and 
 a half weeks, bringing us to Geneva by the 25th of September. 
 Near that time you can come on ; and right glad shall I be to 
 shake you by the hand on the shore of this Old World. We 
 could have a classical tour of the most delightful description ; 
 you shall do the classical allusions, and I will do the art, since 
 I have studied it somewhat in the last two months. . . . 
 I should be delighted if you would join us at Martigny, which 
 we shall reach in about ten days. These Alps are perfectly 
 glorious, and I know you would enjoy them immensely. They 
 freshen a man up, and give him new soul-life to go back to 
 society and art, and to enjoy them with a new zest. . . . What 
 do you want to spend a month in Heidelberg for ? Certainly 
 not to learn German ; that is the greatest farce in the world, 
 to say nothing of the fact that pretty poor German is spoken 
 in Baden. The students of German there don't seem to learn 
 enough in a year to ask decently for their daily bread and but 
 ter. You could gain far more profit by drinking at the grand 
 old Italian fount of learning and inspiration, and treading 
 those fields which have been so often trodden by the lords of 
 the world. Greece, too, is not impossible to men once in 
 Italy. ... By the way, there was no name at the bottom of 
 your letter, but, from sundry touches, I suspected the writer ; 
 safer to sign the name, however, unless you have got married 
 and taken your wife's name, as is the custom in some nation I 
 have read about. 
 
 INTERLAKEN, September 3, 1857. 
 
 I have been for a week past in regions wild and desolate, 
 else I should have written to you sooner. I am enjoying in 
 tensely my trip through Switzerland, which is now about one 
 half completed ; and I am looking forward with great eager-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 75 
 
 ness to the solemn glories of Chamounix and Mont Blanc. 
 Oh, how beautiful is this Bernese Obefland ! The grand chain, 
 of which the Jungfrau, the Monk, and the Finster Aarhorn 
 are such prominent members, stand like a band of sentinels 
 around these lovely valleys, their summits clad in eternal 
 snow, and on their shoulders resting the mighty glaciers, those 
 monstrous rivers "upon which Winter has breathed, and they 
 are still." But perhaps you would like to know how I got 
 here. I bade farewell to Aunt E. on Mont Righi, and, with 
 J., I have gone along the road in the valley of the Reuss as 
 far as the Devil's Bridge, and now I will travel the rest of the 
 way with . you. We passed through the broad, green, silent 
 meadow of Andermatt, which is very remarkable as being per 
 fectly flat and even, while all 'around it tower lofty mountains 
 of the most rugged and precipitous nature. Just above the 
 village church is a very remarkable wood, which is shaped like 
 a wedge, with the point up the hill, and is of great service in 
 protecting the village from avalanches, which split in two upon 
 the sharp point of the wood, and rush off to the two sides, 
 thus passing beyond the village and doing no injury. Of 
 course no one is allowed to cut down any trees in this wood, 
 but they are guarded with the most jealous care. From An 
 dermatt our course lay up the magnificent road of the St. 
 Gothard, which is obliged to be carried across and back, in 
 numerous zigzags, in order to avoid a too abrupt ascent, which 
 would be very hard on the draught-horses used in the Italian 
 trade. So very winding is the road that sometimes one sees 
 it just forty or fifty feet above his head, but distant half a mile 
 if he follow all its windings. Fortunately for foot-travellers 
 there are a great many cross-cuts which are easily accom 
 plished by those willing to put forth a little exertion, and 
 strike the road most wonderfully, so that we could easily beat 
 a horse and wagon, although going at a good speed. As 
 evening approached we had ascended high above the sea, 
 and the cool air began to blow down from the glaciers, so 
 that we were glad to button up our coats and walk at a rapid 
 rate, keeping a sharp look-out for the Hospice on the sum-
 
 /6 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 mit, where we were to pass the night. At length a building 
 loomed up on the very top ridge of the pass, and a large St. 
 Bernard dog came bounding down towards us, reminding me 
 most forcibly of the dog stories I used to read and how these 
 noble animals rescued travellers from the snow, imparting to 
 them their own warmth. In the interior of the Hospice I saw 
 some rude pictures representing scenes of this description, and 
 in all the dog of St. Bernard figured as a conspicuous char 
 acter. One of these dogs, who had died after greatly distin 
 guishing himself, I observed standing in a niche on one of the 
 staircases, nicely stuffed and preserved. The accommodations 
 were plain but good. Travellers are charged nothing for what 
 they have, but are expected to put into the box a sum equiva 
 lent to what they would pay for the same at an inn ; poor per 
 sons pay nothing. 
 
 The next morning we started to descend this pass in the 
 grand old range of the St. Gothard which gives rise within 
 a small distance to four large and celebrated rivers, which 
 flow to all four points of the compass ; the Reuss to the North, 
 the Rhine to the East, the Ticino to the South, and the Rhone 
 to the West. It has justly been called the cradle of mighty 
 streams. The road descends by a most remarkable series of 
 zigzags, similar to those upon the northern side ; but previously 
 to its construction a most bloody battle was fought here in 
 1799, between the French Republicans and the Russians under 
 Suwarrow, upon paths which had hitherto been known only to 
 hunters and shepherds. Upon one of the rocks is inscribed 
 in large letters, " SUWARROW VICTOR," in honor of his 
 driving the French from the pass, which he did by a very 
 curious piece of clap-trap ; his soldiers being thrown into dis~ 
 order by the fire of the French rifle-men, and beginning to flee, 
 he ordered a grave to be dug, and then lay down in it, saying 
 that he would die on the spot where " his children " had dis 
 graced themselves ; the effect of this demonstration was 
 wonderful, and upon Suwarrow's getting out and putting him 
 self at their head, they charged most impetuously, and drove 
 the French from their position.
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. // 
 
 The valley into which we descended is known by the name 
 of the Val Tremola, on account of the great danger of the 
 avalanches, which fall here continually in winter, and one has 
 reason to tremble indeed when he reads of the numerous sad 
 life-destroying accidents which occur here from year to year, 
 a single one of which destroyed three hundred persons. 
 However, as it was summer we went through it with great 
 equanimity, and arrived at Airolo, when I had to put in 
 practice my very small amount of Italian, but to my great 
 surprise found myself able to make myself understood, which 
 I could scarcely have expected, not having studied Italian at 
 all since I left home. And best of all, I met an old man on 
 the road who had a brother at St. Louis, and with him I had 
 quite an animated conversation on the subject of America, to 
 which my companions listened with respectful admiration. 
 Indeed I am beginning to believe that I have quite a taste 
 for language-learning, and do reap the full benefit of my old 
 fondness for philology by my ability now to talk with the 
 people of a country in their own language, which is the only- 
 way to really study their character. 
 
 We passed though the Val Bedretto, which is as miserable 
 a country as you could easily imagine. Bedretto, the valley 
 capital, is a petty and filthy little place, not so large as one 
 of our Irish suburbs, and equally respectable. But our great 
 adventure was getting lost among the mountains while trying 
 to cross them to the Val Formazza. Through some care 
 lessness, we lost the path, and wandered about the whole 
 afternoon, seeking it again, but without success until we were 
 half tired to death, and the shades of evening were beginning 
 to draw on ; and we were making up our minds to pass the 
 night in the nearest wood, striving to keep up a fire that we 
 might not get frozen, when we made one last desperate at 
 tempt, and by crossing right over the top of a high mountain, 
 succeeded in reaching a path which led into the neighboring 
 valley. It was quite dark when we arrived at the village 
 where we had proposed to spend the night. When arrived 
 there, imagine our vexation at finding it almost totally un-
 
 78 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 inhabited, the shepherds who usually dwell in it being all 
 otherwise engaged with their flocks upon the mountain pasture. 
 They spend the winter months at this wretched place, which 
 is called Kehrbachi and is the highest winter residence any 
 where around. After hunting around for a long time, I found 
 an Italian who could not understand me, nor I him ; but he 
 scared up a German, whom I persuaded to admit us into an 
 empty house and let us have a place to sleep. I never in my 
 life saw anything eatable like the black bread which he got 
 for us ; it was as hard as the nether millstone and evidently 
 had been lying in the house ever since the inhabitants left it 
 on the departure of winter. Eating it was out of the question, 
 so nibbling became the order of the day. This German also 
 managed to concoct for us a large bowl of rice soup, which he 
 placed smoking upon the table, with four large ladles, one for 
 each man, and all were requested to go in miscellaneously. 
 More execrable stuff I have scarcely tasted since we embraced 
 Homoeopathy. An attic with most suspicious beds, where 
 sleep was difficult, not to say impossible, and another meal 
 of rice soup, were poor preparations for the hard day's work 
 which we were about to undertake, the passage over the 
 Gries Glacier, and so through the Eginen Thai to Obergeste- 
 len, where we were obliged to pass the Sabbath. The ascent 
 of the mountain to the glacier was extremely arduous, but a 
 good part of the descent was a lovely woodland walk, and, at 
 one turn, we suddenly came in full sight of the grand moun 
 tains of the Bernese Oberland, at which we all gave one shout 
 of joy. At Obergestelen we passed the Sabbath very pleas 
 antly ; we had a little service together, which E. W. con 
 ducted, and in the evening we walked out by the banks of the 
 Rhone, and sang hymns, which were probably rather new to 
 the inhabitants of this extreme Catholic place. 
 
 INTERLAKEN, September 5. 
 
 .... Well, I suppose you would like to know something 
 more about my wanderings. I think you left me at Oberges 
 telen, where we passed the Sabbath, and had a service in our
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 79 
 
 rooms. In the afternoon we visited the churchyard, and in a 
 small chapel, which was perfectly open, we saw a large pile of 
 human bones, heads and arms, being the sad remains of 
 eighty-four persons who perished here at one time in an aval 
 anche. This seems still more melancholy when one reflects 
 that one half of all the population of the place must have been 
 swept away by this tremendous calamity, and not a family left 
 unscathed. The next morning we rose blithe as larks, after 
 our day of rest, and set off very early, without any breakfast, 
 to try the pass over the Grimsel, on an empty stomach, and 
 without a guide, which is our regular plan. A guide is a great 
 nuisance, to say nothing of the expense and disgrace. By a 
 careful observation of the pass, and continually using the com 
 pass, in connection with our excellent Swiss map, we suc 
 ceeded in reaching the top, where we came out in the midst 
 of the wildest scenery, and were now at length really within 
 the Bernese Oberland. The beautiful Rhone glacier was on 
 our right hand, and in front, what was far more beautiful to 
 hungry men, the Hospice. I improved the occasion to inform 
 the crowd that the next time they took a fancy to walk on an 
 empty stomach it should n't be on mine, which was never 
 fitted either by nature or education for such a performance. 
 Close by the Hospice is a lake which bears the agreeable 
 title of the Dead Sea, so called, some say, because no fish will 
 live in it, but really for a much more interesting and tragical 
 reason. In 1799 the Grimsel was held by the Austrians, and 
 the position was considered both by themselves and their ene 
 mies, the French, as inexpugnable ; and General Gudin, the 
 French commander, might have wasted his forces in vain at 
 tempts, notwithstanding he had positive orders from Massena 
 to capture the pass. In this dilemma a native offered, for a 
 high reward, to lead some troops round by the peaks above 
 and behind the Austrians, and thus surround them on every 
 side. A body of troops was intrusted to him ; but when they 
 were within an hour of the summit, the horrors of the way so 
 terrified them, that they believed the guide to intend treachery, 
 and threatened him with instant death if he did not lead them
 
 8O LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 back to their camp. It required all the exertions of the offi 
 cers to make them advance. At length by paths known only 
 to chamois hunters, they reached the Austrian rear, and, while 
 General Gudin made an impetuous attack in front, they as 
 sailed the Austrians from behind. These latter looked upon 
 them as dropped from the clouds, and, becoming panic- 
 stricken, fled in all directions. Those who remained, in sul 
 len despair dashed their muskets and sabres to pieces on the 
 rocks, and perished almost to a man. The far larger number 
 of the slain perished by falling from the precipices than by 
 the hands of the French. The dead were buried in the lake, 
 and thence its name. Even to the present day swords and 
 muskets* are found, and occasionally a skeleton in a mould 
 ering white uniform. How horrible the position of the Aus 
 trians must have been, so surrounded by deadly foes, and 
 that in the midst of such a savage country ! 
 
 A stout walk of two hours brought us to the falls of the 
 Aar at Handeck ; this is a most magnificent fall, ranked 
 never lower than the third in Switzerland, and considered 
 by some as the finest of all. It comes thundering down from 
 its source in the glacier of the Aar, and here falls in an 
 undivided body of water for two hundred feet ; such is the 
 fury with which it dashes upon the rocks below that a vast 
 volume of spray rises up, and by hiding the actual depths of 
 the abyss, suggests to the imagination the idea that it is 
 almost bottomless. The water of the Aar is not very pure, 
 as it flows over marly rocks ; but as if in an intentional con 
 trast, the river Aerlinbach pours its lovely crystal stream over 
 the same precipice with equal fury, and mingles its snowy 
 spray with the dingy foam-cloud of the Aar, heightening the 
 effect by this strange contrast, as well as greatly increasing 
 the volume of water. We spent an hour very pleasantly 
 here, mostly on a platform built right over the abyss, amidst 
 the spray-mist, and should have enjoyed a longer stay, but 
 an English party were coming down the hill, so we consid 
 ered discretion the better part of valor, and hastily took our 
 flight, not wishing to hear the beautiful fall characterized
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 8 1 
 
 by the young ladies as " very nice," nor by the young men as 
 " beastly." We had agreed to spend the night at Meirin- 
 gen, thus making a day's march of about twenty-eight miles, 
 and when we supposed ourselves within a few miles of the 
 place, L. and I walked ahead to reach it before the others, 
 and secure good rooms at the "Bear" Inn. Now the valley 
 of Meiringen is celebrated for its beauty, and when, there 
 fore, we emerged from the narrow gorge into a lovely vale, 
 we supposed of course that this was our destination, and in 
 quired of some men where the den of "The Bear" was situ 
 ated ? they pointed us up the road, having misunderstood the 
 question, and off we tramped, looking in every direction for 
 the inn, and, in fact, for the town, which seemed to us very 
 small for such a large place as Meiringen. However, as 
 Meiringen is spoken of in " Hyperion " as " embowered in 
 cherry-trees," we supposed that the trees hid the town from 
 sight, and so tramped on. But as we went further and 
 further, the country grew wilder, and we thought it prudent to 
 turn back ; when we got to the point from which we started, 
 we found there our friends C. and W., quietly drinking beer 
 under a piazza, and laughing at our mistake, for to our horror 
 we were told that this was not Meyringen, but Imhof, a 
 place three miles before it. We acknowledged the error, and 
 started fiercely off, determined to find Meiringen or perish 
 in the attempt. The first damper to our enthusiasm was 
 the lofty dam, six hundred and fifty feet high, through a 
 narrow cleft in which the Aar bursts its way. It would 
 seem as if the whole valley had at one time been a lake, 
 until it had been able to empty itself through this wall 
 of rock. The road over the dam runs in a very wind 
 ing zigzag, which was peculiarly annoying to us who were 
 in such a hurry to get over it, and this annoyance was by 
 no means decreased by the troops of little boys and girls who 
 assailed us, some with Alpine songs and flowers, and some 
 with out-and-out begging. It was rather amusing, though, to 
 see a little imp perched on a rock on the watch for travellers ; 
 as soon as we appeared, he uttered a shrill cry, and, like 
 6
 
 82 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Roderick Dhu's soldiers, a band of little imps started out 
 from unseen crevices, and, arranging themselves along the 
 road-side, began to perform a doleful imitation of the "Ranz 
 des Vaches ; " but in vain, for to such appeals I am always 
 obdurate and stony-hearted. At the summit of the dam, 
 Meiringen appeared to our eyes, and L. and I thought that 
 all our mistakes and troubles were over, but we were most 
 grievously deceived. On entering the town, a beautiful vil 
 lage embowered in trees, in the heart of a really Alpine val 
 ley, we inquired for the " Bear," and were most maliciously 
 and abominably directed wrong again, and, arriving at the inn 
 door to which we were sent, we asked if that was the " Bear." 
 " Oh, yes," was the reply so we engaged two double-bedded 
 rooms, and supper for four, and then sat quietly down to 
 await the arrival of W. and C., who were only about a half 
 a mile behind us. Long and anxiously we waited, but they 
 came not, while the desire for supper grew ever stronger ; at 
 length it occurred to me that this might perhaps not be the 
 "Bear" after all, and this indeed I found to be the case. 
 Of course I was quite furious, but it did n't do any good, and 
 after supper, I was obliged to drag my weary body, guided by 
 a boy, to the real " Bear," where I found our friends hard at 
 work feeding, and after arranging a plan for meeting and 
 going away the next morning, I dragged myself back, having 
 thus added to my long day's tramp an additional walk of at 
 least a mile and a half. Indeed, it was a day full of mistakes, 
 and yet all unavoidable ones, since they all arose from the 
 stupidity and mendacity of these Bernese peasants. My first 
 impressions of this great Protestant canton were not very 
 favorable. 
 
 We had agreed the next morning to rendezvous on a cer 
 tain bridge at 5^ A. M. I was the first one there, and while 
 waiting, had an ample opportunity to observe and admire the 
 beauties of the Hasli-Thal, of which Meiringen is the capi 
 tal. A great addition to the attractiveness of the scenery is 
 the number of magnificent water-falls, which plunge down 
 from the mountains on both sides ; on the south the cele-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 83 
 
 brated Reichenbach Falls, and on the north the three foun 
 tains which form the Alpbach. This latter stream is governed 
 by a most mischievous mud-nymph, who often rushes forth 
 from the Hasliberg, and covers whole fields with a thick flood 
 of clay and water, which completely spoils the soil for agri 
 culture ; in 1762 a mud-stream of this description destroyed 
 half the village. 
 
 The others soon came up, and we began the ascent of the 
 pass which leads over the Greater Scheideck to Grindelwald. 
 It was on this march that we had an opportunity to visit the 
 beautiful Glacier of Rosenlaui, of which I think I spoke in my 
 last. 
 
 Of our march to Grindelwald I will say nothing, except that 
 it was dreadfully fatiguing, and more especially so for us who 
 had worked so hard the day before. The view from the 
 Scheideck of the great Eiger 12,800 feet high, and of other 
 snow-covered giants, was astonishingly fine. There is one 
 thing on this route of which I must speak, and which I had 
 nearly forgotten. On the descent to Grindelwald is a most 
 magnificent echo, which repeats several times from the tower 
 ing crags of the Wetterhorn, and the sound of the Alpine 
 horn blown here produces a most remarkable effect; in it 
 self it is an instrument of the most disagreeable tone, the 
 sack -horn is nothing to it for ear-splitting; but just as in the 
 kaleidoscope, a few rough pieces of glass become beautiful 
 by reflections and combinations, so these harsh tones, when 
 reflected and multiplied from the rocks around, lose their 
 original character, and are changed to chords of wonderful 
 sweetness. At first the notes are heard sharp, clear, and dis 
 tinct from the mountain, a faithful repetition, only more 
 chorded, but before this ceases, the sound is heard again 
 farther off, but now with a soft solemnity which breathes of 
 some vast wood-chapel with chanting Druid priests and an 
 organ from some " fountain-lighted " cave ; and even this 
 chant is interrupted by a wild, far-off strain, from the recesses 
 where the mountain-spirits still remain, and sing sad laments 
 for the happy hillsides from which the foot of man has driven
 
 84 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER '. 
 
 them. Nor is this all. From the highest peaks music still 
 mounts aloft, and now in that sweet murmur from mid-sky, 
 one hears no Druid priests, no organ tones, no Dryad wail- 
 ings, but an angel band with ^Eolian harps, who receive the 
 aspiring sound, and take it to its heavenly home. This is by 
 no means an exaggeration; I have often heard an Alpine 
 horn in connection with an echo, but never anything like this 
 wonderful music and variety of sound which one enjoys at the 
 foot of the frowning Wetterhorn. 
 
 We took our supper at Grindelwald, and then walked out to 
 examine the glaciers. The upper glacier is much purer and 
 freer from mud than the lower one, but the latter was much 
 more accessible, coming in, as it seemed, at our bed-room 
 window, although in reality it was three quarters of a mile 
 distant. In the side of the ice a long, circular hole had been 
 cut, large enough to admit us standing, and extending quite a 
 distance back into the glacier ; here we sang " Home, Sweet 
 Home," and the notes, especially the rich key-note of the bass, 
 were finely lengthened out by the reverberations of the cave. 
 By means of some ladders we then ascended into the ice, and 
 walked for some distance on the glacier, until we came to an 
 enormous crack large enough to take in a coach and six, when 
 we thought it prudent to return, especially as it was growing 
 dark. On our return we again entered the ice-cavern, which 
 was now illuminated with torches, which an old man and two 
 boys waved at intervals under the ice-dome. The effect of 
 the bright light reflected from the glassy walls was very 
 beautiful, and reminded me of the "most magnificent and 
 mighty freak " of the " imperial mistress of the fur-clad 
 Russ," which Cowper so elegantly describes : 
 
 "A watery light 
 
 Gleamed through the clear transparency, that seem'd 
 Another moon new risen, or meteor fallen, 
 From Heaven to Earth of lambent flame serene." 
 
 We were greatly delighted, and caused the illumination to 
 be repeated several times with fresh lights. 
 
 The next day we marched to Interlaken, the sick and
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 85 
 
 wounded, viz., L. and C., by carriage, and the main body, 
 W. and myself, on foot. I am rather disappointed in Inter- 
 laken ; my expectations had been raised to too high a pitch, 
 and I was astonished not to find a little village consisting al 
 most entirely of hotels, an earthly paradise. Still it is a very 
 lovely place, and the view obtained of the Jungfrau through 
 a series of gaps in the valleys, is superb, considering the dis 
 tance, and affords a fine opportunity to persons who cannot 
 climb passes, to see this most beautiful mountain from a com 
 fortable situation. The lakes, too, are charming ; that is to 
 say, the Lake of Brientz is, and that of Thun also, judging 
 from a glimpse that I have had of it. 
 
 BATHS OF LEUK, CANTON VALAIS, September n, 1857. 
 
 MY DEAR COUSIN, .... You know yourself, no one better, 
 the affectionate interest with which you all at Albany are 
 regarded by all the family circle, and most especially by our 
 little circle at New Haven. Even now I look in hope and 
 fancy forward, through many months of time, and across many 
 leagues of space, to some future Christmas week, which I shall 
 spend by your fireside as in the happy days gone by, and join 
 in everything with that same boyish pleasure which was my 
 wont, and which I hope may never leave me, although I am 
 now nominally a man. I feel with Wordsworth, 
 
 " My heart leaps up when I behold 
 A rainbow in the sky ; 
 So was it when I was a boy, 
 So is it now I am a man, 
 So shall it be when I am old, 
 Or let me die." 
 
 It strikes me that there is among young men, a tendency to 
 drop into an aged state when they begin to enter upon the 
 duties of life, and the sweet and fragrant flowers of boyish en 
 thusiasm and frankness are withered by the chilling breath 
 of that strange, stern formality called Dignity. If it be possi 
 ble, such shall never be the case with me, and if it ever is, 
 from that moment the sight of sky and stars, and the enjoy-
 
 86 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 ment of life will not be what it was before. But stop ; I am 
 prosing when I should be praising and setting before your 
 mental optics in exalted terms the beauties of these glorious 
 Alps ; don't blame me if in a heedless moment I should 
 splurge somewhat, for when a mind accustomed to ordinary 
 life, and ordinary terms, comes among scenes of inspiring 
 sublimity and beauty, the natural tendency is to use a lan 
 guage which is more elevated, and expressions more extrava 
 gant. A dinner may be good, but a snow-capped mountain is 
 grand ; a book may.be interesting, but an avalanche is awful ; 
 so I shall not entirely repress this natural tendency, for I have 
 been encouraged in it by a remark of Rev. Dr. Skinner's 
 which I recently heard : " If a young man is flowery in his 
 youth, there is hope that he may get over it in manhood, and 
 bear fruit ; but if he is dry when young, what will he be when 
 he is old ? " And first you shall have a daguerreotype of 
 the animal known as W. W., somewhat different from that 
 taken during the second week of May, 1857, and also sketches 
 of his three companions ; he representing the genus Pedes 
 trian, and they the different individuals known as C., L., and 
 W. A strong flannel shirt much like that worn by the 
 boating clubs, with a small collar of the same material, which 
 decreases the undress and barbarous appearance, and renders 
 a linen collar unnecessary, except on great occasions, a pair 
 of extremely heavy pantaloons, a vest buttoning up to the 
 throat like a minister's, and serving as an over-coat except 
 in very severe weather, a stout coat with numerous pockets 
 within and without, a broad-brimmed hat of a most peculiar 
 drab color, but admirably adapted for keeping off the rain, 
 and last but not least, an enormous pair of boots whose mam 
 moth soles would shock all my lady acquaintance, complete 
 my costume when en grande tenue for a long tramp. Add to 
 these, the heavy knapsack on my back, weighing some fifteen 
 pounds, and my trusty alpenstock in my hand, and I stand 
 before you fully prepared to walk thirty miles and enjoy it 
 grandly, and to eat a tremendous supper when evening comes 
 on. Somewhat similarly appareled are the rest ; C., six feet
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 8/ 
 
 high, black beard, and tremendous stride; W., the shortest 
 man in the party, yellow mustache and goatee, of the class 
 before me in college, and just graduated from the Union The 
 ological Seminary; L., a fine, handsome fellow, twenty-four 
 
 years old, son of the Bishop of , and just beginning the 
 
 medical practice ; such is our party, a most harmonious and 
 pleasant one, which has travelled now for two weeks together, 
 with the greatest satisfaction. But these three humbugs are 
 insisting that I stop writing and prepare to accompany them 
 down the Valley of the Rhone, so good-by." 
 
 SIERRE, VALLEY OF THE RHONE, September n, 1857. 
 
 .... I cannot tell you a tithe of all I have seen and 
 enjoyed. So I will take up my wondrous tale (like the 
 moon), from the point of my leaving Interlaken. If you 
 have ever seen a picture of Interlaken, you must have no 
 ticed a long row of poplar trees introduced as prominent 
 characters, and occupying the foreground ; in fact my idea 
 of the place was a strong sensation of windows peeping out 
 from among " the tall popular-trees " (" Villikins and his 
 Dinah ") ; but although I was at Interlaken nearly a week 
 and actively engaged for a large part of the time in searching 
 for said trees, it was never my fortune to find more than one, 
 or two at the most ; the windows I saw, as the town is princi 
 pally made up of staring boarding-houses, but the trees were 
 most decidedly not. Imagine then my triumph and satisfac 
 tion, when getting well out into the Lake of Thun, and go 
 ing in the opposite direction, to see upon looking back, the 
 poplar-trees there sure enough, and looking just like the pic 
 ture ; where they started from, or whether they are not actual, 
 but merely an imaginary part of the landscape, it " passed my 
 persimmon " to say. 
 
 A pleasant sail of an hour brought us in sight of Thun, 
 where we landed and spent the rest of the day. A more 
 enchantingly lovely place, it was never my fortune to behold ; 
 in fact no town I have ever seen has come into the most re 
 mote comparison with it in those qualities of calm repose,
 
 88 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 exquisite mingling of land and water, hill, mountain, and level 
 champaign, and above all that gentle lustre of sunlight which 
 streams over all, and in which inanimate nature seems to 
 bask and be perfectly happy. Other spots are eminent in love 
 liness, but Thun excelleth them all. Heidelberg is charming, 
 with its long, straight Bergstrasse, its glorious old castle that 
 wonder of the Middle Ages, and its shining Neckar ; Lu 
 cerne is wonderfully picturesque from its situation on the Lake 
 of the Four Cantons, at the foot of Mount Pilatus, and from 
 its ancient city wall embellished with frequent towers ; but 
 Thun with neither forest lake, grand feudal tower, nor city 
 wall, possesses beauties of its own that are unsurpassed. 
 Through the middle of the city flows the bright blue Aar, em 
 bracing in his arms, most lovingly, many an island, while the 
 city on the hill-side looks down with a perpetual smile, as if 
 to thank the river for the zone of heavenly blue which he had 
 bound around her waist. To the east lies the broad Lake of 
 Thun, surrounded by craggy and lofty mountains, while to the 
 west and north no high mountains are seen, but a pleasant 
 rolling land of hills, so that Thun seemed to me a lovely 
 herald, placed upon the borders of that rugged mountain land, 
 to silently proclaim, by its peaceful beauty, an entry into a land 
 no longer bleak and desolate, but a sunlit fruitful land, where 
 no avalanche ever comes to astonish or destroy. In a place 
 of so much beauty I felt an interest in visiting that quiet 
 dwelling-place, so appropriately called by the Germans k< God's 
 Field," or the " Court of Peace," and I found much in it to 
 delay me there. I always like to walk in a Sleeping Place, 
 for so means the word cemetery ; and be very silent and rev 
 erent, for fear of disturbing those spirits who may be revisiting 
 the scenes which they loved so well. It was so sad to think 
 that the enchanting view from the church-yard wall was noth 
 ing to those that slumbered there ; perhaps their eyes had 
 opened on scenes of calm repose of which this was but a faint 
 type. Very sad too, it was to see the English graves, so remote 
 from their island-home, and to think that they had died here 
 in a strange land ; although perhaps there were kind hands to
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 89 
 
 fold the arms across the breast and to plant the bright red 
 roses thickly on the stranger's grave. And saddest of all is 
 the tomb of a bridal party, thirteen in number, who were 
 drowned in crossing the Aar and were buried here side by side. 
 Their weather-worn tombstone tells that it was more than an 
 hundred years ago, but still, thanks to those never-failing foun 
 tains of sympathy in the human heart, their sad fate is mourn 
 fully mentioned, and strangers kneel to trace on the crumbling 
 stone the names of the unhappy party. 
 
 .... But now I must be off immediately on the top of a 
 diligence, or to speak classically, sitmmA diligentia, to Berne, 
 that fine old city of the bears, who from time immemorial, 
 ever since one of them had the good luck to be killed on the 
 side of the city by Duke Berchtold of Zahringen, have been, 
 in a Protestant way, the patron saints of the city and canton. 
 A very respectable family of bruin's race are still maintained 
 at the public expense in a large trench outside the city, and 
 crowds of enthusiastic citizens are at all times to be seen at 
 tending at the den of the favorites. I could not help reflect 
 ing that the bear is a caricature of the more slow and heavy, 
 but very reliable, portions of the Swiss, just as the monkey is 
 a slight exaggeration of the volatile character of the mob that 
 every day surrounds his cage at the Jardin des Plantes at 
 Paris. I have quite a fondness for seeing thus resemblances 
 between a people and the animal to which they are most 
 attracted. The English are like their own bull-dogs, the Ger 
 mans, like their quiet and peaceful poodles ; while I think that 
 the American can be compared to no actual creature, but 
 rather to that strange chimera known as being made up of 
 " half man, half alligator, and half steam-boat." But to return 
 to our bears and to Berne, which, by the way means a bear 
 itself, and is what the French call an " Armoire Parlante," or 
 name corresponding in significance with the coat of arms. 
 The favorite animal looms out on every side. Here he stands 
 in full armor on a fountain, supporting in one paw the old city 
 banner, and in the other a sword. On another fountain he acts 
 as squire of the body to some ancient Bernese hero; and
 
 90 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 when the clock over one of the city gates indicates the hour, a 
 long procession of bears march out of the towers, and pass 
 solemnly along before a seated figure in oriental dress, bowing 
 as they pass, while a bear on his left hand strikes the number 
 of the hour on a bell. The view of the Bernese Alps from the 
 Palace Terrace here is perfectly superb. A long stretch of 
 the grandest snow-capped mountains the Virgin " veiled to 
 all eternity," as the Germans call her, the Monk by her side, 
 the sharp peak of the Finster Aarhorn, and near by, the 
 Schreckhorn or Peak of Terror, whose precipitous sides have 
 never been trodden by the foot of human being. This was the 
 grand old chain under whose shadow we had been wandering 
 for the two weeks previous, and whose craggy ridges and bold 
 outlines looked to us like the face of a friend inviting us back 
 again, and we all felt an answering sentiment of longing to 
 be among them ; so the next day we were on our way back 
 to Thun, and the next day up the valley of the Kander to 
 Kandersteg, where we took a rest of half a day in reposing our 
 wearied limbs, bathing our sore feet, and exploring the region 
 round about for water-falls, in which last point we were emin 
 ently successful. We discovered no less than five very beauti 
 ful ones, none of them less than eighty to a hundred feet in 
 height, and one so high that its small body of water was re 
 solved into a fine cloud of dust-spray, like the celebrated 
 Staubbach in the valley of Lauterbrunnen. From Kandersteg 
 we started very early in the morning to go through the Pass of 
 the Gemmi to the Baths of Leuk before the sun had become 
 too hot. Five o'clock saw us well off and toiling up an ascent 
 which was rather steeper than anything we had yet attempted ; 
 although the morning was very cool, the perspiration poured 
 down from every available inch, and we were not sorry when 
 we stood upon the summit of the pass, more than eight thou 
 sand feet above the sea, and looked far down the rugged rocks 
 to the distant valley, where lay the place of our destination. 
 The descent here is extremely remarkable, as it is down the 
 side of a precipice, which, when viewed from below, seems 
 perfectly insurmountable, and it is difficult to believe it pos-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 91 
 
 sible that a good broad path winds up its side. This path is 
 a miracle of daring engineering; in frequent zigzags it pro 
 ceeds along a narrow ledge, and thus accomplishes by gradual 
 steps what could never be done by a straight road ; in many 
 places a plumb line dropped from the edge of the path would 
 fall upon that immediately below, and in some cases one can 
 look sheer down the rock and see nothing of the path, which 
 pursues its way in a gallery directly under his feet : thus, for 
 example, we heard a party of ladies talking and laughing very 
 near under us, but we could see nobody at all by looking over, 
 and it was not until we had turned a point in the road that we 
 met the fair donkeyestrians toiling up the rock-side ; a task 
 which I would not be hired to undertake, as it is far steeper 
 here than on the side to the north. In one place the precipice 
 falls off in a perpendicular line for over sixteen hundred feet, 
 and, as if to add to the horror of the cliff, its top projects some 
 twenty feet, so that anything falling from the brink would take 
 nearly ten seconds to reach the bottom, without taking into 
 consideration the resistance of the atmosphere, which would 
 probably about double the time. The idea made me sick and 
 dizzy, and I was careful to withdraw myself quickly from the 
 edge, to avoid the bad consequences of both an accidental fall 
 and a morbid impulse ; this latter I always feel very powerfully, 
 and am obliged to guard against whenever I look over a very 
 lofty precipice. This Pass of the Gemmi is not a splendid 
 carriage road, like those of the St. Gothard, the Simplon, and 
 the Splugen, but on account of its wonderful descent down 
 the precipitous rock, is more grand and picturesque than them 
 all, unless it be a part of the Splugen called the " Via mala, " 
 which I have not yet seen. We reached the Baths of Leuk in 
 four and a half hours from Kandersteg, a remarkably rapid 
 walk, as the guide-books allow seven and three-quarters hours 
 for it, but we take a great deal of satisfaction in abbreviating 
 the times in the guide-books : in fact we have discovered that 
 we walk a German hour in about forty-five minutes. The 
 Baths at Leuk are both hot and medicinal, and the time spent 
 in the water is the longest I ever heard of, being about five
 
 92 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 hours in the morning and three in the afternoon ; and in order 
 to dispel the ennui which must necessarily arise, the bathers, 
 mostly French, bathe together in large baths which hold from 
 fifteen to thirty persons of all sexes, sizes, ages, and ranks, and 
 many have floating before them on the water little tables on 
 which are books, newspapers, flowers, and contrivances of all 
 descriptions, to while away the weary hours which the invalids 
 must spend in the water in order to make a cure effective. 
 These baths are open to the public view at all times, and any 
 one can amuse himself by looking at the bathers, provided he 
 will take off his hat and shut the door after him. Some of 
 the rules for the behavior of the bathers are very amusing ; as 
 all excitement is injurious to that placid frame of mind and 
 body so requisite for recovery, it is stated that all manner of 
 discussion on the subject of religion is absolutely forbidden ; 
 a very wise regulation, since probably nearly every creed in 
 Europe is at times represented here. Near these odd baths is 
 something still more strange ; it is a village standing on the 
 edge of the precipice which overhangs the baths, and the ap 
 proach to which can only be made by a series of eight ladders 
 fastened against the perpendicular rocks. Up and down these 
 ladders the inhabitants pass at all hours of the day and night, 
 but it is rather dangerous for persons to go up who are not 
 accustomed to ladder-climbing, and extremely perilous to come 
 down. We did not succeed in visiting these, although we kept 
 a sharp lookout for them. What an odd idea, going down a 
 straight face of rock to go to a party, and then going up again 
 to go to bed ! Still, I imagine that to them their airy home is 
 very dear, and that they love their rocky nests as well as the 
 birds do theirs. 
 
 MARTIGNY, Sept. 12. This letter, you see, is destined to 
 be finished at odds and ends of time, for I find it very diffi 
 cult to command any number of solid hours. I can't say, my 
 dear coz, that I dreamed of you last night after writing the 
 above to you, since I slept scarcely at all, and was right glad 
 this morning to take things easily, and be contented with a 
 saunter of nine miles before dinner, and a ride of twenty miles
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 93 
 
 in the omnibus after dinner, which brought us to this place ; 
 we did not ride because we were lazy, but because the road 
 was flat and uninteresting. Our morning's walk lay through 
 vineyards which were laden with magnificent bunches of white 
 and purple grapes, which fairly made our mouths water \ so, 
 having reached a village which was pretty .well embowered in 
 vines, we repaired to a house and sent the woman for a quan 
 tity. She soon returned with a basketful, coyly peeping out 
 from among leaves, and such immense bunches ! There was 
 a dead silence for some minutes in the party, interrupted only 
 by an occasional murmur of satisfaction. You may form some 
 idea of the size of the bunches when I tell you that I devoured 
 one large one and two small ones, and then was obliged sadly 
 to desist, for I could do no more ; W. got through about 
 two thirds of a very large bunch, and was obliged to raise the 
 siege and lay down the remainder. We got here by 6 p. M., 
 and I was much disappointed not to find letters from home as 
 I had expected. Now, my dear coz, I suppose I have bored 
 you with talking guide-book so much, and interfering so with 
 the province of those who write " Tours in Europe ; " and it 
 would be far more pleasant to me to chat with you about old 
 times, were it not that public opinion expects that a traveller 
 should give some account of what he has seen. 
 
 CHALETS DU MOTTET, FOOT OF Mr. BLANC, 
 September 16, 1857. 
 
 DEAR J., Having written a letter to A., describing my 
 course from Interlaken down into the Valley of the Rhone, 
 and as I have a great dislike of rehashes, I will simply trace 
 out our daily course until we arrived at Martigny. On Sep 
 tember ist, L. and W. having letters at Berne, took the earliest 
 boat, while H. and I followed at the more dignified hour of 
 noon 
 
 We took the diligence to Berne ; found our companions at 
 the Stork. The inn was very crowded, and we had four beds 
 put up in one room, and slept like boarding-school boys in a 
 dormitory.
 
 94 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 The next day was of course devoted to doing Berne. There 
 is not a great deal in it worth seeing, except, of course, the 
 bears, animate and inanimate ; unearthly representations of 
 the latter kind surmount innumerable fountains, gates, and 
 doorways, and do their best to maintain the long supremacy 
 which Bruin has exercised over the town. 
 
 The Bundespalast, or Palace of the Union, in which the Na 
 tional Assembly of Switzerland meets once in three times, its 
 rivals being Luzerne and Zurich, is a very splendid new build 
 ing, of a light stone, with a terrace in front, from which is com 
 manded a most unequaled view of the distant Bernese Alps. 
 
 The next morning we returned to Thun. In the evening we 
 resumed our knapsacks, which 'had now been neglected for 
 four days, and walked about thirteen miles up the Kienthal to 
 Miihlinen, passing on our way the Niesen, which is remarkable 
 for being, from top to bottom, on the north side, of a regular 
 pyramidal shape. We rose early in the morning to put in ex 
 ecution a plan of mine for crossing the Diindengrat, a very 
 difficult and dangerous pass, and then through the Oeschinen 
 Thai to Kandersteg, a path abounding in most magnificent 
 scenery, and running just at the foot of the grand snow moun 
 tain called the Frau (not the Jungfrau). But most unfortu 
 nately there was no guide at Kienthal, and as we could not go 
 without one, we were reduced to the disgusting expedient of 
 retracing our steps to Miihlinen, and of there taking the public 
 road. By this detour we walked some nine miles out of our 
 way, and as the sun was high, we suffered greatly before arriv 
 ing at Kandersteg. Here we spent the night, and the next 
 morning passed the Gemmi, which was the highest and most 
 striking pass which we had as yet seen. Sloping up quite 
 gradually on the northern side, it falls off to the south in steep 
 precipices down which the road winds in zigzags, some of 
 which are directly over others, and are astonishing pieces of 
 engineering. 
 
 We dined at the Baths of Leuk, of which I have no room to 
 speak at present, and pushed on down into the valley of the 
 Rhone to Sierre, on the Simplon road, where we dried up f
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART, 95 
 
 having done a very good day's work, thirty-one miles, and more 
 than half of it over a very steep and difficult pass. The next 
 day we walked about ten miles on the great road to Sion, and 
 having stopped on the way at St. Leonard, a place perfectly 
 embowered in vineyards, and eaten grapes enough to make an 
 army feel uncomfortable, we took the diligence at Sion, very 
 glad to get so rapidly over a road so uninteresting. 
 
 We spent a very pleasant Sunday at Martigny, and met 
 some nice English people, among them the minister, who offi 
 ciated twice in a small room to a congregation of about twenty. 
 We left early in the morning for the Great St. Bernard, and 
 had a cool walk for several hours up into the mountains. At 
 a place called St. Pierre we stopped to dinner. Soon after we 
 left it we had quite a little adventure. L. and I were abstract 
 ing some half-ripe currants from a bush, and two char-a-bancs 
 were coming up the road, when suddenly we heard a crash 
 followed by the howls of the two drivers, and upon looking 
 round saw one of the char-a-bancs upset and broken. I 
 dropped my Alpstock and ran like a deer, thinking of course 
 of Doctor Antonio and Lucy. I got there just in time to see a 
 very pleasant English gentleman whom we had seen at Mar 
 tigny emerge looking very much worried, and then hand out 
 his daughter. Fortunately no bones were broken, and the 
 char having been mended we repeated our condolings and 
 offers of service and plodded along. As we mounted higher, 
 all became bleaker and wilder, and finally we passed into a 
 cloud of mist, and arrived at the Hospice cold and tired. 
 Nothing could exceed the politeness and true courtesy with 
 which we were received by the Brethren. Our wet clothes 
 were dried, and we took the opportunity, before it was yet dark, 
 to go and see the Morgue, where the bodies of those lost in 
 the snow are kept until recognized and claimed. The coldness 
 of the air preserves them to a great degree from putrefaction, 
 but still a more shocking sight I never saw. Some were still 
 standing erect, some leaning over, and some had slid down so 
 as to be all in a heap. As I looked through the grating, and my 
 eyes became accustomed to the darkness, I could even distin-
 
 96 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 guish the expressions of the features. In one corner was lean 
 ing a mother who had perished with a child in her arms, and 
 even at this time they are not separated. I thought, perhaps, 
 she had once been beautiful, but the features are now fearfully 
 distorted, and, from the dark recesses, those dead eyes stand 
 out in a horrible stare, that haunted me all night. The ladies, 
 and the gentlemen with them, took their supper in the salle-a- 
 manger, where they were entertained by the Superior. But all 
 of us single gentlemen took supper with the monks in the re 
 fectory, an arrangement which pleased me very much, as I 
 wished to see as much as possible of these noble-hearted and 
 devoted men. 
 
 We sat along a great table with a Brother opposite to each 
 guest, and what with the monks' good dinner, their sober and 
 pleasant conversation, and their wine which they helped out lib 
 erally, the evening meal passed most pleasantly, after which 
 we were right glad to get to bed and escape the cold. This, 
 at nearly 8,400 feet above the sea, the highest dwelling in Eu 
 rope, is always very severe. At 5 A. M., all were aroused by 
 the ringing of the bell, and at 6 we attended service in the 
 chapel. It was a remarkable scene ; the chapel was splendidly 
 decorated, in this respect contrasting with the extreme plain 
 ness of the Hospice. The cold was so intense as quickly to 
 condense every particle of breath ; upon the floor were kneel 
 ing in extreme devotion some twenty peasants ; all wore an as 
 pect of great dreariness, when suddenly the monks began the 
 service, and the fine organ rolled out a resounding chant, 
 which seemed a song of victory and triumph over the horrors 
 of the weather and the trials of the frost. To me there was 
 something most sublime in the chanting of men who were so 
 near to heaven in their piety as well as their habitation, and 
 whose self-sacrificing devotion is so unparalleled, in these self 
 ish days ; the rigor of the climate soon kills them, and even 
 those who outlive the term of their vow, seven years, seek a 
 warmer climate with broken constitutions. 
 
 A thick mist hung around the Hospice, and it seemed as if 
 there was about to be a heavy rain. Notwithstanding, we set
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 97 
 
 out, with our guide, to descend to warmer and clearer regions 
 with our guide, I said, and such a guide ! We got him at 
 Martigny to take us through what is called the tour of Mont 
 Blanc ; that is, from Martigny to St. Bernard, thence to Cour- 
 mayer, and from there over several passes to Chamouni. Hav 
 ing a thorough contempt for guides, we went up to St. Bernard 
 without him, trusting he would make his appearance before 
 morning, which indeed he did. As we discovered that he had 
 a penchant for going slow, we adopted the rather novel ex 
 pedient of keeping half a mile ahead of him and then blun 
 dering upon the right path with a precision which was to be 
 acquired only by extensive Alpine scrambling. At St. Remy 
 we entered Sardinia, and underwent a polite overhauling at 
 the custom-house, our guide taking the opportunity to engage 
 a guide there to guide him over the Col de Serena, the pass 
 which interposed between us and Courmayer. I feared it 
 would be something like the blind leading the blind ; but as 
 there was a well-defined path and we led the way, the two un 
 happy guides succeeded in getting along safely. At a shep 
 herd's chalet near the summit of the Col, which we entered, 
 the shepherd brought us a pailfull of clear cream, and another 
 of milk to dilute it with. We discovered a large cake of corn 
 bread. I took so much of this, with clear cream, as to make 
 me decidedly sick. We finally reached the high-road and had 
 a walk upon it which seemed interminable, but all our toils 
 and troubles were fully recompensed by our first view of Mont 
 Blanc. 
 
 Without doubt this is the grandest feature in all Switzer 
 land, and should always be reserved for the last, since thus 
 the emotions can be, as it were, educated, and rise in a grad 
 ual scale of intensity, until finally the climax is reached on 
 seeing this most sublime work of God's hands. 
 
 They say that just the point from which we saw it, when ap 
 proaching from Courmayer, is just the place par excellence ; 
 from behind a peak itself lofty, suddenly a solemn, snow-clad 
 mass came looming forth, very distinct, but still overtopping 
 all the nearer peaks, and seeming to hang right over us ; the 
 7
 
 98 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 first emotion was that of half-terrified awe ; the rest of most 
 unmingled joy and admiration. 
 
 The sun was approaching its setting, and clad the whole 
 mountain with a flood of light ; around his waist was the glo 
 rious cincture of golden and silver clouds, while his head 
 stood proudly forth in the undiminished splendor of stainless 
 snow. It must have been from this point, and at a moment 
 like this, that the poet describes him, 
 
 " Mont Blanc is the monarch of mountains, 
 They crowned him long ago 
 On a throne of rocks, in a robe of cloud, 
 With a diadem of snow." 
 
 Would that I had time and space to tell you of our three 
 days' march around his base, and among his frozen rivers ; 
 but we are now at Chamouni, and the next two days must 
 be devoted to the wonders which lie so thickly around this 
 strange and beautiful valley. I have written this letter in 
 sundry times and in divers places ; wherever we rested I have 
 taken a book upon my lap and scribbled as much as possible. 
 
 CHAMOUNI, September 20, 1857. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, After a week of hard work, sweetened 
 by wondrous pleasure, the day of rest has arrived, been well 
 and pleasantly spent, and now on this lovely Sabbath even 
 ing I sit by the window in the twilight, just bright enough to 
 see to write, and talk with you before the candles are brought, 
 just as we used to talk on Sunday evenings at home. 
 
 The setting sun has tinged all the mountains with a rosy 
 light, and at the foot of Mont Blanc the glaciers shine with 
 a subdued and softened color far more beautiful than the 
 sun-glare, forming a scene which one might suppose reserved 
 for dreams and the imaginings of fancy. But, gloriously 
 fair as it is, there is something about that little word " home " 
 which throws a shade of sadness over it all ; and it is pecu 
 liarly at such moments that I wish J. and yourself at my side 
 to make complete my enjoyment. If I. think of you and all 
 the dear ones at home on one day more than another, it is
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 99 
 
 on Sunday that day so sacred to me from both habit and 
 education. But whom do you think I saw this morning upon 
 entering church ? Close by the door loomed up the majestic 
 figure of Hon. I. A. R., and upon proceeding a little further I 
 saw the long wavy locks of our old friend A. P. I touched 
 him on the shoulder, and we had a good handshake and a 
 few whispered words between the pauses of the service. Af 
 ter church was over we had quite a jubilant time together ; 
 and he informed us that they had been following us every 
 where, till at Thun they had seen our names for the last 
 time. 
 
 He saw L. P. at Heidelberg, and cheered him somewhat, 
 as P. had just arrived. He had already written me two letters, 
 which showed very evidently that he had begun to appreciate 
 the sadness and desolation of being a stranger in a foreign 
 land. For myself I am happy to be able to say that while 
 still retaining my love of home, I have lost the cat-in-a-strange- 
 garret feeling to a sufficient degree to be able to enjoy myself 
 immensely in these wild mountains whose endless variety sat 
 isfies without satiating. I tried in my letter to J. to say some 
 thing about our tour around the base of Mont Blanc, but 
 there was so much previous, that my letter filled up before I 
 was aware of it ; and, as it was one of our most difficult as 
 well as most pleasant trips, I must e'en trouble you with a 
 melange of snow-capped mountains, lofty passes, Alpstocks, 
 glaciers, and hungry young men. We left Courmayer bright 
 and early, our guide having aroused himself from the semi- 
 dormant state in which he had been the day before, a'nd which 
 he attributed to the hard bed at the Hospice of St. Bernard ; 
 but now his foot was on his native heather, and he knew the 
 way, every foot of it. Our confidence in his acquaintance 
 with the country was greatly restored by seehig him shake 
 hands with numerous friends on the road, to say nothing of 
 the compliments which he bestowed very lavishly upon many 
 a sun-burned representative of the fair sex. Our course lay 
 for a long distance through a narrow valley known as the 
 Alice Blanche, which runs along in a deep gorge at the very
 
 1OO LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 foot of Mont Blanc. The peak of the great mountain itself 
 was here not so prominent as some others which were nearer 
 and more imminent. The Col du Geant is a most magnificent 
 snow mountain, the path over which is extremely difficult ; 
 still it was passed by some ladies some years ago, but only 
 with great labor and the assistance of eight or ten guides. Our 
 course proceeded by the side of an immense moraine, brought 
 down by the Glacier de Miage. The piled-up rocks, stones, 
 and dirt gave the appearance of a small mountain, and sug 
 gested the vast length of time, and violence of natural causes, 
 which must have been in operation in order to transport such 
 enormous masses. In some places the glacier was so con 
 cealed by the debris that it was almost impossible to believe 
 that it was anything but a mud plain. The morning was ex 
 ceedingly pleasant, and we walked six hours steadily without 
 noticing how time passed, and climbed a very high pass called 
 the Col de la Seigne, upon whose top we found new-fallen 
 snow, and had quite a jolly snow-ball fight. When arrived at 
 the summit, we saw in the valley far below the Chalet du 
 Mottet, where we expected to dine. Upon sight of this, our 
 guide set up an unearthly howling and yelling, in which we 
 could recognize no articulate words ; but still it seemed to 
 have a meaning, since when we reached the chalet we found 
 the dinner ready and waiting for us. Our guide's yoclling 
 evidently had the effect of a spell, and conjured up some good 
 cutlets, etc., which suddenly disappeared, with two bottles of 
 wine, and left us almost as hungry as before. After the usual 
 halt for a couple of hours after dinner, we left the hospitable 
 chalet, and stretched our legs towards pass number two, 
 which was decidedly the hardest one we had been over. On 
 reaching the top of a lofty hill we supposed it to be the sum 
 mit of the Col des Fours, but to our dismay the guide in 
 formed us that it was still three-quarters of an hour to the top. 
 And such a three quarters of an hour! Right up perpendic 
 ularly almost, over beds of slate. We were soon above all 
 traces of vegetable life, even of the coniferous trees and 
 hardy mountain grasses, rock on every side being all that
 
 FOREIGN' TRAVEL AND ART. IOI 
 
 could be seen, and even this rendered more dreary by dark 
 patches of dirty snow, which lay on the rifted crags. Upon 
 a tall peak sat, in solitary state, the vulture of the Alps, 
 while near him were perched two crows, probably his satellites, 
 the only living things that could be seen anywhere. The steep 
 ascent was almost too much for all of us. When arrived at 
 the top we were at a height of more than nine thousand feet 
 above the sea, by far the highest point which we had yet at 
 tained. The other slope, where we were to go down, was 
 covered with snow, and we had a little coasting party, using 
 the seat of our pantaloons instead of sleds. Here we de 
 scended, and crossed a great plain called the Plaine des 
 Dames, because, a long time ago, a lady of high rank perished 
 there, with her whole train, in one of those dreadful snow 
 whirlwinds called " tour mentes," for which this spot has rather 
 an unpleasant reputation. A cairn of stones has been piled 
 upon the fatal spot, to which the guides request travellers to 
 add a stone in remembrance of the tragedy. 
 
 After a walk of eleven hours, the hardest day's work which 
 we had ever done, we saw, beaming before us, a small light, 
 which the guide informed us was in the hamlet where we 
 were to pass the night, and before long the whole party were 
 peacefully snoring, with the exception of myself, who was not 
 so much knocked up as the rest, so I sat up to write a letter 
 to J., which will account for the stupidity with which it is redo 
 lent. Sleep was a wonderful restorative, and the entire used- 
 up crowd made their appearance in the morning quite fresh 
 and blooming, and walked over the Col de Voza to the Val 
 ley of Chamouni, where we are now snugly ensconced in the 
 Hotel de 1'Universe, with a magnificent view of Mont Blanc 
 and the Glacier des Bossons, from our bedroom window. 
 
 R. has come in, and, as the fellows wish to sing, I must 
 give up all attempts at writing on this to-night, so good 
 night. To morrow we intend to go over the Tete Noire, back 
 to Martigny. I expect to revel in the letters which I hope 
 to find there. R. accompanies us on foot ; his father and 
 mother go on mules.
 
 IO2 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 GENEVA, September 26, 1857. 
 
 MY DEAR BOY, I have just now got time and breath 
 enough to answer your very reasonable, but not at all friendly 
 or enthusiastic letter, which I received at Martigny, just be 
 fore commencing the tour of Mont Blanc, and, although I 
 could not deny any of your well-stated premises, was much 
 disgusted with the inevitable conclusion. I shall probably be 
 obliged to visit Italy alone this autumn, as C. expects to 
 leave me in a day or two, and I am not the man to go with 
 anybody, Tom, Dick, or Harry, to that wonderfully rich old 
 land. To one who had as yet done no travelling, the plan 
 you lay out would afford very great attractions, but you must 
 know that I " did " both Frankfort and the Rhine very thor 
 oughly last summer, and am not inclined at present to go over 
 the same ground again especially as I was much disap 
 pointed in the " exulting and abounding river," with the ex 
 ception of the range of the Siebengebirge and the Rheingau, 
 between Coblentz and Bingen. And, by the way, as I am an 
 old hand along there, let me give you a word or two of ad 
 vice which may save you some money and trouble. If you 
 expect to stay in Frankfort a couple of days, as I suppose 
 you will, and desire to go to a hotel where you will have to 
 talk German, the Landsberger Hof is very comfortable, and 
 during the two days that C. and I were there we did not see 
 a single Anglo-Saxon. Then take a third-class ticket on the 
 Rhine boats ; you can get one at Mannheim or Mayence, 
 which will last you all the way to Cologne, and allow you to 
 get off and climb castles and steal grapes as often as you 
 wish. There is no earthly difference between the second and 
 third class except the price, and the bow of the boat is always 
 more pleasant than the stern for looking out. You will of 
 course stop at Bingen, "dear Bingen on the Rhine;" if 
 either you or S. have a penchant for good Rhine wine, you can 
 get, at the " White Horse," such Assmannshausen as you 
 never tasted before, and probably never will again ; it grows
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 103 
 
 on the hill behind the hotel, and can be relied upon as 
 genuine. 
 
 I hope that while at Bingen you will make an excursion to 
 the splendid castle of Rheinstein, and to the Niederwald ; it 
 will do your heart good to get into a fine, wild, untrimmed 
 forest: once more ; besides, the view from the temple on the 
 brow of the hill is called by Bulwer <J one of the noblest land 
 scapes upon earth," and at the Tauberhohle is a vista cut 
 through the trees, which shows the opposite side of the river 
 as in a frame, and with the effect of a diorama. We did not 
 stop at St. Goar, but wish we had, as it lies in the very midst 
 of the most beautiful scenery, and from it you can so easily 
 get up to that immense old ruin of Rheinfels. Then from Cob- 
 lentz you can visit the castle of Stolzenfels, and the splendid 
 fortress of Ehrenbreitstein ; the view from the top of the 
 latter is very fine, and will repay your trouble, even if you 
 don't care for the fortifications. Of course you will visit per 
 sonally the ruins of Rolandseck and Drachenfels, which are so 
 fairly teeming with old historic and traditional interest ; and 
 by the way, it would be a good idea for you to buy, at Jiigel's, 
 in Frankfort, a little book called " Lays and Legends of the 
 Rhine ; " most of the poetry is rather raspy, but the legends 
 are well given, and you need something of the sort to really 
 enjoy the Rhine. Schiller's ballad on the story of Roland 
 seck, the sweetest legend on all the Rhine, always pleased 
 me extremely, and you will find a respectable translation of 
 it in the book mentioned above. Near Remagen, which is a 
 short distance above Rolandseck, stands the beautiful little 
 modern church of St. Apollinaris ; if you get any opportunity 
 to visit it you will be repaid by the fine frescoes on the walls. 
 I should like above all things to stand with you in the Frank 
 fort Museum, before those fine pictures of Lessing's, and 
 once more to gaze upon the lovely Ariadne of Dannecker ; 
 and to whisper to you in the Rossmarkt, before that grand 
 statue of Goethe, the secret admiration which I have always 
 entertained for him ; to drink Rhine wine with you at Bingen, 
 and to climb together the steep sides of Drachenfels, and
 
 IO4 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 then to stand by your side under the heaven-aspiring arches 
 of Cologne Minster, that angelic architecture. But so it 
 moughten't be ; my lessening hours warn me to make the 
 most of my time and see North Italy this fall j God willing, 
 we will meet in Berlin in the month of November, and touch 
 hands once more. 
 
 GENEVA, September 28, 1857. 
 
 .... Our most glorious stay at Chamouni was filled with 
 scenes so grandly beautiful, that I have scarcely language to 
 express what I felt and still feel in connection with that spot. 
 
 " Where with God's own majesty 
 Are touched the features of the earth. " BRYANT. 
 
 I think that I have already told you of how we made the 
 tour of Mont Blanc, and of our day's walk across the Col de 
 la Seigne and the Col des Fours. This last was really too 
 much for any one, however practiced and hardened to moun 
 tain climbing, and pretty well used up all the party except 
 myself. I believe that we all arrived at Chamouni with a sort 
 of indistinct hope that here we were to be allowed to rest a 
 little, and digest all that we had seen ; but never was any one 
 more grievously disappointed. It was no more like rest than 
 going into a fierce battle after a long march can be called rest. 
 Oh no, our time was too short and precious, and there was too 
 much at Chamouni to be seen, to allow of any wasting of 
 time in rest. The valley of Chamouni, considered by itself, is 
 not entitled to any great reputation for beauty. It is devoid 
 of those innumerable chalets, those leaping fountains, and 
 that rich green of fertility, which give the Lauterbriinnen 
 such a loveliness ; and at the same time its position is not 
 sufficiently elevated to destroy all verdure, or to give it that 
 magnificently wild and scathed aspect, which is so very im 
 pressive in many high passes. But it has what is far better 
 than all, and that is the glorious snow-mass of Mont Blanc, 
 and the gorgeous immensity of the Dome du Goute, to say 
 nothing of the sky-piercing Aiguilles, which arise on every 
 side. But really to know the wonders which belong to 
 Chamouni, one must have the enterprise to visit and explore
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 105 
 
 mountains, rocks, and glaciers, and nowhere more than here 
 is seen the truth of that old proverb, that there is nothing 
 good or beautiful to be obtained without hard work. So by 
 half-past five, H. roused up the other two capable men of the 
 party, and off we started to the Flegere. We had reengaged 
 our guide to conduct us around Chamouni, and then take us 
 back to Martigny, and the night before he had been profuse 
 in his promises to be on hand to go with us to Flegere ; but 
 at starting time he was nowhere to be seen, and, as we did not 
 want the trouble of waking him up and dressing him, we were 
 e'en glad to get off without him, a guide being unnecessary, 
 and rather a piece of borous ceremony than anything else. 
 We had a very easy climb of what most people consider 
 pretty tough, and the only trouble which I had was about half 
 way up, and that of a rather amusing character than other 
 wise ; as we passed through a flock of goats, the two gentle 
 men of the flock, the Gulielmi Capricornici, or to speak vul 
 garly, Billy-goats, were having a fight together. One of them 
 being quite small and the other a very patriarchal William, I 
 thought it my duty to approach and back up the little one as 
 much as possible, considering the fearful odds against which 
 he was contending; but to my intense disgust, they both 
 made common cause, and came up the rocks after me in a 
 manner which I did not like, nor Dr. L. either, if one can 
 judge by the alacrity with which he devolved the post of 
 honor and danger upon me. I held my Alpstock in rest to 
 defend my own rear as well as that of the party, and caused 
 the animals to desist. At the Pavilion, upon what is called 
 the Summit, the view is very fine, and almost everybody sat 
 isfies themselves with that ; but the innkeeper told us that 
 from the Needles, about an hour and a half from the house, 
 was a point of view to which scarcely anybody ever went, 
 which was very much superior to that from the Pavilion. So 
 H. and I left L. hard at work sketching, and stretched 
 our legs toward the real summit. The landlord's " hour and 
 a half" proved a fifty minutes' climb for us, all extremely 
 steep, and, finally, right up the almost perpendicular, rocky
 
 IO6 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 ridge, until we found a place large enough to sit down on 
 without being sure to tumble off, and we received a most royal 
 reward for our pains. From this height one can really see 
 and appreciate the immense height of Mont Blanc's summit, a 
 thing which cannot be done from below, since the Dome du 
 Goute stands forth as the principal object, and on account 
 of its comparative nearness, looks far higher and larger than 
 that distant, rounded peak. But here the grand old mountain 
 is seen rising above the rest, like Saul, by a head a king con 
 fessed, although his lofty attendant princes form a bright and 
 brilliant throng. What a solemn court ! For thousands of 
 years they have stood thus, silent before that great white 
 throne, and silently have they listened to the commands of 
 their matchless mountain monarch, who speaks only in his 
 avalanches, and who can see nowhere upon his portion of the 
 earth's curve, anything equal or even second to himself. In 
 deed, this mass of whiteness was so awful in its immensity, 
 that all individuality seemed gone, and the snow-mountain 
 seemed the only object before me. But soon the spell began 
 to be broken, and I saw that besides Mont Blanc there was a 
 vast and varied field of vision ; the noble glaciers which 
 stream down from his feet the Glacier des Bossons dis 
 tinguished for beauty, and the Mer de Glace for vastness, the 
 double moraines of the latter appearing with great distinct 
 ness to a great distance back into the heart of the moun 
 tains ; those strange, sharp peaks, so well named the Aiguilles 
 Rouges et Vertes, which in their angular acuteness bear such 
 a striking contrast to the smooth, well-rounded tops of the ad 
 joining snow mountains ; and what was most unexpected of 
 all, we could look right over the Col de Balme into the Valley 
 of the Rhorie, and distinguish there the precipitous pass of 
 the Gemmi ; and beyond this our dear old friends the Ber 
 nese Alps, with their well-known outlines, the Blumlis Alp, the 
 Schreckhorn, and the Jungfrau ; we recognized them all, 
 called them all by name to bid a last farewell, and thought of 
 the two jolly weeks which we had spent at their feet, or wan 
 dering among their romantic and picturesque passes. So de-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 
 
 lighted were we with this unexpected pleasure, that we could 
 scarcely tear ourselves away, and when we did descend from 
 our dangerous position, it was only to encounter another se 
 rious delay, as we found a splendid field of whortleberries, 
 which it was impossible to neglect ; so I found a good place, 
 where the berries were thick, and "sank down among them, 
 with my face ever turned toward the mountain, that I might 
 enjoy both Mont Blanc and whortleberries at the same time, 
 and experience together the two sensations of lofty sub 
 limity and lazy satisfaction. We had a grand run down the 
 steep side of the mountain for nearly an hour, steady jump 
 ing and dodging all the time. We took dinner, and, as we 
 intended to go in the afternoon to the Glacier des Bossons, 
 we sent for our guide, who soon appeared, and that in a most 
 jubilant and happy state. As he marched along in front of 
 us, I observed that his colossus-like legs frequently crossed 
 each other, and that his general course described a line much 
 resembling that of a Virginia rail-fence. I questioned him, 
 and discovered that he had been drinking two bottles of 
 champagne with one of the hotel-keepers, and was conse 
 quently " a few points in the wind ; " but as he solemnly re 
 marked, " he was as good a guide when he was drunk as 
 when he was sober, and a great deal happier into the bargain ; " 
 so I let him go on, thinking that a fall into a crevasse would 
 sober him, if it did n't finish him entirely. But I soon saw how 
 mistaken I was in the idea that any amount of water would 
 sober him. As we came to one of the 
 
 " Five wild torrents fiercely glad," 
 
 he was afraid to trust himself to the narrow bridge, but waded 
 through instead, and declared that he must have some Cognac 
 to keep out the cold. This was the climax, and now the an 
 gles of the zigzag became constantly more and more acute, so 
 that I was almost afraid to let him go on the glaciers ; but 
 there was a kind of method in his madness, and I observed 
 that in spite of little knocks and falls, he took very good care 
 of his carcass ; so when we reached the glacier, he sat com 
 fortably down on a dry spot in the middle of it, while we
 
 IOS LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 cruised all over, partly to examine the glacier, and partly to 
 accustom ourselves more to ice-walking, as we were to spend 
 a good part of the coming day upon the Mer de Glace. This 
 Glacier des Bossons is a perfect gem of an ice-field, both on 
 account of its perfect purity, in which no other can remotely 
 compare with it, and also for the fantastic but picturesque 
 manner in which the ice is thrown up into waves, pinnacles, 
 and bergs, principally at its lower extremity, which runs far 
 down into the valley, and is consequently a very prominent 
 and attractive object on first seeing the vale from the sur 
 rounding ridges. It is across the upper end of this glacier 
 that the road lies by which a few fools every year ascend Mont 
 Blanc. The two young Americans, of whom you have heard, 
 went up on this road and spent the night at the Grands Mu 
 lcts, a miserable chalet, and then employed the second day in 
 going to the top and returning to Grands Mulcts, the third in 
 coming back to Chamouni ; so that it is altogether only one 
 hard day and two easy ones for a hardened climber, and not 
 by any means the dreadful thing that it is bragged up to be. 
 Our guide informed us that it was no more dangerous than the 
 road to the Jardin, to which we went the next day, as I shall tell 
 you. The view is seldom fine on account of the clouds below, 
 and even when it is, the rarefied air and the extreme cold do 
 not allow one to remain on the summit more than ten or 
 twenty minutes, so that the only earthly reason for going up 
 is to be able to say that you have been. Even those who 
 have been up themselves frankly acknowledge that it is not 
 worth the expense, and is altogether a foolish business. The 
 greatest danger, I am inclined to believe, arises to the health 
 from breathing the rarefied air ; the firing of cannon, and all 
 that, is merely a dodge to throw a halo of eclat around an ex 
 pedition rather uninteresting. The morning we went to the 
 Jardin, we were all up and dressed 4 A. M., breakfasted at 4^, 
 and shortly before 5 were well started on our way across the 
 valley, and up the hills to Montanvert, our guide carrying on 
 his back a huge knapsack stuffed with those three great stand 
 by's of human existence, bread, meat, and wine. A more glo-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 109 
 
 rious morning I never saw. All was still, save now and then 
 the distant thunder of an avalanche ; not a cloud was in the 
 sky, and on the mountain's brow hung in silvery lustre the 
 morning star, which did not seem to sink and disappear as we 
 approached the mountain's base, but to be fixed there as a 
 perpetual jewel, and I fully understood the opening lines of 
 Coleridge's sublime hymn. Indeed, there is not a word in it 
 all which I did not feel in my heart most fully " before sunrise 
 in the vale of Chamouni." The pleasure, too, was of an un 
 mixed nature ; so perfect was the stillness, that there was 
 nothing to interrupt the still small voice of praise, which is 
 continually going up to the Creator everywhere in the fresh 
 dawn ; and here, where all is so magnificent, this voice is very 
 loud, and audible by human hearts, if they listen aright. How 
 grand were the mountains in their gray twilight robes; how 
 beautifully calm the glaciers, untouched by the sun glare, while 
 the angry air raged on as ever, regardless of the holy quiet. 
 But we must hasten on, for Mont Blanc has caught the sun 
 beams on his crown of snow, and we must finish our climb to 
 Montanvert before the " glorious orb " gets over into the val 
 ley and on to our backs, which will make us sweat like day- 
 laborers ; so up we go at our best speed in the usual order, I 
 first, H. close after me, and Dr. L., whose legs are unfortu 
 nately not so long as ours, some little distance in the rear ; 
 the guide's position was very variable, sometimes half a mile 
 ahead, and then a mile behind, but in every case equally use 
 less. We reached the inn on the Montanvert in an hour and 
 forty minutes, at least I did ; it usually takes two hours nnd a 
 half. This Montanvert is a steep mountain shoulder, about as 
 high as the Flegere, thrust forward into the Mer de Glace, and 
 consequently commanding a fine view of the pinnacles and 
 icebergs of the lower end, which is called the Glacier des 
 Bois, but a very confined and limited one of the vast plains 
 and ocean-like waves of the real Mer de Glace, its immense 
 crevasses, and its mountainous moraines. 
 
 People go up to Montanvert as a day's job, and when they 
 have stared about them a little, and have gone down and
 
 IIO LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 walked on the ice a few steps, in a place provided with arti 
 ficial stairs chopped out, perfectly nice and comfortable, they 
 go back and say that they have seen it and walked over it. 
 This reminds me of Chicken Little's declaration that the sky 
 was falling, and that part of it fell on her tail, when it was only 
 a rose-leaf. But this is quite absurd : for the view, although 
 very fine, is rather of the Glacier des Bois than of the Mer de 
 Glace, and I would not waste my time and breath to obtain a 
 view of the Mer de Glace, which is inferior to that seen from 
 the Flegere. No ; really to see and understand this Sea of 
 Glass which lies at the foot of the great White Throne, a vis 
 ible type of the invisible, one should penetrate into the very 
 heart of those snow-clad mountains, and stand at the junc 
 tion of those three ice streams, whose confluence produces the 
 Mer de Glace. We had to go through many places, difficult, 
 and some dangerous, but at length we got down to the level of 
 the glacier, and began climbing the moraines to get upon its 
 surface. This moraine climbing is an extremely ticklish busi 
 ness, for so loosely does the mass hold together, that the fore 
 most one is forced to be continually rolling down large piles 
 of stone and dirt, which the lower ones have to be careful to 
 dodge. How I escaped spraining my ankle a hundred times 
 I don't know, but attribute it to an overruling Providence, and. 
 the stoutness of my boots, for I received many a blow, which 
 would have cut an ordinary pair all to pieces. When once on 
 the glacier, the walking was much easier, and from this cause, 
 and also the novelty of the situation, the time passed away 
 very rapidly. Besides its vast extent, the Mer de Glace pre 
 sents phenomena which are either peculiar to itself, or at least 
 are far more fully developed and striking than in any other 
 glaciers. The most noticeable of these are its double line of 
 moraines, and its immense stones on icy pedestals, the sup 
 porting stem of ice having been shaded from the sun by the 
 flat stone above. Of these latter we saw many fine specimens, 
 and many others which seemed very recently to have lost their 
 centre of gravity, and to have toppled over. The ice of the 
 Mer de Glace is purely white, and instead of showing a deep
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. Ill 
 
 azure in its crevasses, as is the case with many other glaciers, 
 there is little else besides perhaps a tinge of green. Crystals 
 are found in great numbers among the rubbish of the moraines, 
 and here one sees a superb mineralogical cabinet collected 
 from all rocks and strata, and arranged together by the mere 
 force of water. We had not time to stop and collect any speci 
 mens. On crossing to the other side, our rascally guide at 
 tempted to take us to the Jardin by a cross cut, over a very 
 steep crag, for, as it afterward turned out, the glacier had 
 changed so much that he did not know the way by the path, 
 and consequently made tracks for the unchanging hills. So 
 up we went after him, in momentary danger of breaking our 
 necks, up a crag almost perpendicular, with nothing to take 
 hold of except weak roots and tufts of grass, and all this with 
 the uncomfortable feeling, that if our guide, who was not over 
 active, should fall upon us with his weight of over two hundred 
 pounds, he would inevitably sweep us away. We were all very 
 indignant at being thus wantonly brought into danger, but as 
 I happened to look up, I forgot my wrath, for from a hole in 
 Jean Michel's breeches fluttered out what seemed and what 
 undoubtedly was, the extremity of his chemise ; I could n't re 
 sist the temptation of pointing it out to the fellows, and com- 
 . paring it to the white plume of Henry IV., at the battle of 
 Ivry. 
 
 " Press, where ye see that white rag wave, all up the dangerous hill ; 
 And be your oriflamme to-day, the shirt-tail of Michael." 
 
 So we all held on tight, and had a good laugh, which was 
 grimly echoed by the guide up the cliff, who always considered 
 it his duty to laugh when we did. After six hours of steady 
 hard work, we crossed the Glacier de Talefre, and arrived at 
 the Jardin, a rather extravagant name for a field of short 
 grass, upon which a few miserable goats pick up a living ; but 
 perhaps deserved by the astonishing contrast, which its dingy 
 green verdure bears to the dazzling white of the glaciers 
 which surround it on every side. But how glorious to be 
 right in the heart of all the snow and ice, and white-robed 
 
 O * 
 
 mountains,
 
 112 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 " The palaces of Nature, whose vast walls 
 Have pinnacled in clouds their snowy scalps, 
 And through eternity, in icy halls, 
 In cold sublimity, where forms and falls 
 The avalanche, the thunderbolt of snow ! " 
 
 From immense heights the three mighty glaciers of Talefre, 
 Lechaud, and the Giant, come sweeping down in glittering 
 Mississippis of ice, and form the Mer de Glace, which is 
 scarcely vaster or grander, than the three streams which are 
 its feeders. Notwithstanding the vast quantities of ice and 
 snow all around us, the sun was very hot, and we made a tent 
 of shawls, under which we lay and feasted, and drank bump 
 ers in sparkling Aste wine, which had been nicely cooled by 
 leaving it in a crevice of the glacier. The unanimous opinion 
 was, that as Mont Blanc was the crown of our Swiss tour, 
 so the Jardin was the finest view around Mont Blanc, and we 
 praised ourselves as smart fellows for having kept the best 
 for the last. On going back, the sun was very glaring on the 
 ice, and H. and I proved the good qualities of some colored 
 spectacles which we had bought in Paris for the very purpose, 
 and which relieved our eyes very pleasantly. We reached 
 Chamouni, not very tired, and having done in one day, with 
 ease, what takes most people two days' hard work. So 
 ended our Alpine experience, if I except the passage over the 
 Tete Noire ; and now, farewell to Alpstock and knapsack, to 
 fatiguing walk, rude appetite, and heavy sleep ; I must now 
 plunge into the sea of Art, and be a hard student during the 
 coming month in Italy. I read the papers here and am very 
 enthusiastic about the English troubles in India ; would that 
 an American legion might be formed to fight beside their 
 English cousins, and that I might have the privilege of 
 striking a blow for decency and civilization ; all the dislike I 
 have borne for the English is turned into pure sympathy, es 
 pecially when the prayers are read on Sunday, " for the 
 suffering countrymen in the East," and I see old ladies wiping 
 sad tears from their eyes, for friends and relatives there.
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 113 
 
 MILAN, October 6, 1857. 
 
 .... There is one point in your letter which I wish to 
 notice, and am sorry that I did not speak of before, as it 
 might, perhaps, have saved you a great deal of anxiety ; it is 
 with regard to my going into danger, and running risks. Now 
 let me assure you once for all, dear mother, that I am past 
 that youthful folly which might once have prompted me to go 
 into danger simply for the sake of saying so ; and I hope you 
 think more highly of my good sense than to suppose, for a 
 moment, that I would uselessly risk a life which is happy and 
 might be useful. But I believe that every young man has in 
 him a consciousness of what he can do, and so far he is fully 
 justified in going. Surely it would be the part of cowardice 
 to turn back from a little danger, which good nerves are cer 
 tain to overcome. Besides, I am getting over that tendency 
 to giddiness with which I was wont to be troubled, and can now 
 look down a precipice, if necessary, as well as any other man. 
 Indeed, I often think of you at home, and of the sorrow which 
 you would feel if anything should happen to me ; and this 
 thought has cleared my eye and steadied my nerves many a 
 time, and I have whispered to myself, " It won't do to fall on 
 any account." I must, however, recognize in some cases a 
 Protecting Hand which saved me, not perhaps from killing 
 myself, but from leg-breakings and ankle-sprainings innumer 
 able ; indeed, as I recall our expedition to the Jardin, I can 
 scarcely see how I escaped some severe injury to my limbs, 
 from the dangerous nature of the moraines, over which we 
 walked so much. But I think I have bored you enough al 
 ready with the Jardin, and I also recollect that my stories 
 about Chamouni completely expelled all account of my im 
 pressions of the city of Geneva, where I remained no less than 
 ten days, and got heartily sick of it. All the city of the lake 
 is new, and its fine quays and stately hotels present a very 
 imposing appearance to one coming down the lake. When I 
 say " imposing " I mean to use the word in its bad sense ; for 
 although it looks, from the lake, like a splendid city, it is 
 really very ordinary when one gets into it, and, with the ex- 
 8
 
 114 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER, 
 
 ception of three or four, the streets are narrow and dirty. Cal 
 vin and J. J. Rousseau are the two guardian genii of the place, 
 and each has left traces of his influence behind him, although 
 this influence takes different ways of showing itself. Thus 
 Rousseau's name is carefully preserved and honored ; the 
 street in which he was born is called after him, and a beauti 
 ful little island in the lake, close by the bridge which joins 
 the old and new town, and on which is a public promenade, 
 also bears his name, and is adorned with a fine bronze statue 
 of him. Calvin's name, on the contrary, is extinct as far as 
 physical signs would show ; the house in which he lived no 
 longer stands. I searched for it, but a new one occupies the 
 spot ; his very grave is deserted, for he was buried, at his own 
 desire, without monumental stone, and now even the grave 
 yard has been given up to other purposes. But his influence 
 still survives among the descendants of those whom he kept 
 in such strict order, and undoubtedly it would do his grim 
 shade good to see the Calvinists of the nineteenth century, 
 setting their faces as firmly against the opera and theatre, as 
 did the Calvinists of the sixteenth. Some of the strict rules 
 of his time, however, have been repealed or have fallen into 
 disuse, and plush breeches are no longer hunted down with 
 an unrelenting fury. I think that some of the laws which 
 were enacted under Calvin's popedom are to be equaled in 
 absurdity only by the most ridiculous of our Connecticut Blue 
 Laws. Geneva bears in some respects a very strong resem 
 blance to Paris, especially around the quays and on the 
 banks of the river, and one sees the washerwomen plying 
 their daily labor on rafts fastened to the shore, just as it is on 
 the Seine. Far be it from me, however, to compare the Seine 
 to the Rhone, the mud and dirt of the former with the crys 
 tal azure of the latter, as it darts from the lake in " arrowy 
 rushings." It was quite nice to see the Rhone for once of a 
 decent appearance, for in his babyhood among the Grimsel 
 Mountains and his native glaciers, in his youth, flowing 
 through the valley which bears his name, and in his old age 
 as he rushes desperately to the sea through the level south of
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 115 
 
 France, he 's as dirty as one could wish to see ; it is only 
 here, after a good washing in the indigo tub of Lake Geneva, 
 and before he meets the muddy Arve, that he assumes an ap 
 pearance of decency ; thus he goes, muddy for some hundreds 
 of miles, clean for some hundreds of feet. The environs of 
 Geneva are said to be very beautiful, but I was seized with 
 such a feeling of despair when H. went away that I walked 
 about very little. I met J. C. the other day, and we had a 
 very 'pleasant walk together to an eminence called Grand 
 Jaconnex, outside the city ; the air was very clear and the 
 sky cloudless, so we had a most superb view of Mont Blanc 
 and his companions ; the whole range is perhaps better seen 
 and appreciated in its entire extent from this point than from 
 any other. I hung on at Geneva with the faint hope that B., 
 of my class, who is travelling in these parts, might come along 
 and bear me company into Italy ; but he did n't appear. Mrs. 
 C. wanted me to wait until her husband returned from Paris, 
 and then travel to Milan with them ; and this I should have 
 been almost tempted to do, had not the day of his return 
 been very uncertain. So I bade good-by to all the pleasant 
 people at the Pension Boret, and took the boat across the lake 
 again towards Villeneuve, thus exactly retracing my steps, a 
 proceeding which is at any time distasteful to me, but was 
 particularly so then, as I had no companion to assist me in 
 whiling away the weary hours. Instead, however, of going 
 directly to Villeneuve, I landed at Montreux, and walked to 
 the Castle of Chillon, which I did most incontinently, not 
 because I cared to go over it, but simply to tell people who 
 might ask that I had been there. To any person who is not 
 a very great admirer of Byron, this must always be the reason 
 for going ; people go there to see the place where Byron lo 
 cated his " Prisoner of Chillon," and not to view the spot 
 made holy by the imprisonment of Bonnivard, for the sake of 
 liberty and conscience ; indeed, when Byron wrote his rather 
 poor poem, he had never heard of Bonnivard, and conse 
 quently his thrilling picture sinks immediately to a fancy 
 sketch. I rather admired the building, however, and the
 
 Il6 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 vault in which Bonnivard was imprisoned, and where he wore 
 a hollow by his incessant pacing, is a fine old piece of archi 
 tecture, with heavy pillars and rounding arches. I then 
 walked on to Villeneuve, took the evening train to Bex, and 
 joined a young fellow in getting a carriage to go on to Mar- 
 tigny, which we reached about 8 p. M. The diligence was full, 
 and I was obliged to resort to the more expensive mode of 
 posting, and joined interests with the young fellow mentioned 
 above ; he had travelled a great deal, and was then on his 
 way to the East, having with him a Greek courier, who spoke 
 all modern languages quite indifferently. We came up the 
 valley of the Rhone to Brieg, a most tedious journey, and 
 then crossed by the Simplon Pass to Lake Maggiore. This 
 magnificent work was built by Napoleon for the purpose of 
 transporting his cannon into Italy, his previous passage over 
 the St. Bernard having given him enough of bad mountain 
 roads. The Swiss side presents but little that is remarkably 
 fine except one fine view of the Bernese Alps. I bade those 
 good old friends a last adieu from this point. Almost at the 
 very summit is the Hospice, a dreary great building inhabited 
 by a detachment of monks from the Great St. Bernard. Here, 
 as well as at the town of Simplon, a little further on, the win 
 ter lasts eight months ; indeed, I saw much fresh snow lying 
 on mountain tops not very high above the pass. The descent 
 on the Italian side is magnificently picturesque ; it surpassed 
 in beauty, and equaled at least in wildness, all the passes we 
 had been over. The Gemmi is perhaps more striking in its 
 steepness, but that is a mere mule-path, and dangerous at 
 that, while the Simplon is a splendid carriage road over which 
 six horses can go finely at ten miles an hour. In many places 
 it has been necessary to protect the road from avalanches by 
 means of long galleries, some built over and some hewed out 
 of the solid rock. Notwithstanding all their precautions, the 
 road was destroyed twice between 1830 and 1840, and put the 
 Swiss republic to a vast expense in mending their share. The 
 Italian government has taken the less honorable but more 
 convenient course of not mending their side at all. Perhaps
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. II 7 
 
 the most striking of all these galleries is the one called the 
 Gallery of Gondo, cut for six hundred and eighty-three feet 
 through the solid rock. Immediately on emerging from the 
 darkness of this gallery, a large body of water seems to rush 
 right down upon you, forming a beautiful waterfall ; the sur 
 rounding walls of rock here tower up two thousand feet above 
 the road in shear, unbroken precipices, which in some spots 
 even jut out and overhang, producing a most unpleasant sen 
 sation in the person passing underneath. Add to this a long 
 vista up the valley, including waterfalls and numerous pictur 
 esquely-arching bridges, and you have a scene which is said 
 to surpass even the celebrated Via Mala on the Splugen 
 Pass. 
 
 MUNICH, October 25, 1857. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, It had been my intention to delay writ 
 ing this until I reached Berlin, where I should find and be 
 able to answer home letters that I should probably receive, 
 but as I have been delayed on my journey, I dispatch a short 
 letter to let you know that I have come thus far safely, and 
 that you may be relieved from all anxiety. I have just at 
 tended divine service for the first time in four weeks ; during 
 three weeks I have been travelling in Austrian Italy, where it 
 is quite difficult to get permission to establish a Protestant 
 church ; consequently in several large cities, which swarm with 
 English and Americans, there is no chapel or service of the 
 English Church, and as it has not entered into my calculation 
 to go to the Romanist Church, I do not go at all. Far, far 
 more pleasant was it when our party was travelling together in 
 Switzerland, and when we were in a manner independent of 
 English chapels, and could spend Sunday most delightfully by 
 ourselves, in reading, singing, and strolling under the shadow 
 of the mountains, engaged in conversations which were as 
 profitable as they were pleasant. 
 
 I hope that hereafter I shall always manage to make any 
 Sunday stoppages at civilized places, and have made a firm 
 resolve never to travel alone again ; for my recent experience 
 has taught me that nothing can be more dreary. Oh, how fre-
 
 Il8 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 quently during the last month I have longed for the dear and 
 quiet delights of home. I sigh for rest and the sound of home 
 voices, the music of home songs, the light of loved eyes and 
 faces, and instead, I am whirled along in the activity of sight 
 seeing, and hear nothing but a harsh foreign tongue, see none 
 but unpleasant foreign faces, until it seems to be all some hor 
 rid dream, and that if I could only thoroughly wake up, I 
 should find myself in my own room at home, and should hear 
 your voice calling me to get up. I have almost wished that 
 the present state of money affairs might affect us to a sufficient 
 extent to make it necessary for me to return home. I feel 
 quite defiant sometimes when I feel the young life and health 
 bounding in my veins, and I should be so proud if I could do 
 something with my strong young arms for you, to repay all the 
 love and kindness that you have lavished upon me for twenty- 
 one years. It shall be the object of my future life, to repay 
 you with love, at least, and a devotion which has always been 
 latent in my heart, but of whose intensity I have never been 
 aware until the cruelty of circumstances removed me a soli 
 tary exile, transplanted me to the unkindly soil of Europe, 
 where I can never thrive, and from which I shall most joyfully 
 
 remove to the much loved shadow of our home 
 
 I saw at the table to-day a pretty fair development of the 
 German system of morals, as regards the observance of Sun- 
 da)'. When dinner was about over, and most of the guests 
 had left, four Germans and French sitting together began to 
 throw dice to see who should pay for the champagne which 
 they were to drink in the evening. Positively the rattle of the 
 dice-box made me sick, and my indignation was not dimin 
 ished when I was told that it was their regular practice. I seem 
 to be on a little island in the boundless ocean ; everywhere 
 there is the same restless, unruled life, regardless of all that 
 I have been taught to hold most sacred, and among these 
 unholy waves it is most difficult to maintain a footing on the 
 sure ground. English and Americans, as well as others, seem 
 to have a travelling set of morals, and a conscience of a dif 
 ferent texture from that which regulates their home conduct ;
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 119 
 
 the guiding motto is no longer : " Do what you believe to be 
 right," but, " When in Rome do as the Romans do." For my 
 self, I can't understand it. 
 
 I hope that in Berlin Messrs. D., P., S., and I will be able 
 to make a little society, in which all spare time may be pleas 
 antly spent. 
 
 You will be glad to learn that here in Munich I have suc 
 ceeded in rinding some one to talk English to, a young man 
 named F., from Hartford, who had seen that I was an Ameri 
 can student, and offered kindly to assist me in any way. As 
 he is an art student, he has been able to be of much service to 
 me in this city, which fairly teems with art. 
 
 I am very anxious to reach Berlin, and settle down for the 
 winter, as the weather is growing quite chilly and unpleasant 
 for travelling. 
 
 Munich is a very unhealthy place, from its being so very 
 flat ; there are always numerous marshes which exhale fever 
 miasmata ; few foreigners live here long without catching what 
 is called the slime fever. I will tell you where I have been, 
 and what I have seen when I reach Berlin. 
 
 Tell J. that on this day, the 25th, I wished a certain fair 
 friend of ours many happy returns of her birthday. 
 
 BERLIN, November 2, 1857. 
 
 Here I am at last, settled in my own winter home, having 
 arrived here on Friday, the 3oth October. Met P., D., S., and 
 T. D., and most glorious of all, received a perfect flood of let 
 ters, upon which I have been feasting ever since. Just " phansy 
 my pheelinx," as Chawles Yellowplush says ! In fact, the 
 accumulations of more than a month were gathered in that 
 blessed poste restante, fully compensating me for my lonely 
 Italian pilgrimage, when I was companionless, letterless, and 
 generally miserable. If anything sweetens a journey, heighten 
 ing its pleasures and alleviating its troubles, it is a packet of 
 dear, warm-hearted letters, breathing of home and loved ones. 
 The non-reception of letters when I was at Milan, Venice, and 
 Munich, was perhaps even a greater drawback than the want
 
 I2O LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 of a companion. Notwithstanding, however, I enjoyed myself 
 most fully in Italy, keeping my eyes pretty wide open for mat 
 ters and things in general. I must tell you a little something 
 about my return from Venice to Milan, which was very pleas 
 ant, and also of my last day or two at Venice. On Thursday, 
 October i5th, I had everything ready packed for departure, 
 when I discovered that in my hunting after pictures, palaces, 
 and churches I had omitted to visit the Arsenal, and very will 
 ing was I to delay another day on any pretext whatever ; for 
 the quiet charm of the grand, old amphibious city was gradually 
 stealing over me, and, with a friend, I should have been most 
 happy to have spent a month there, among scenes which I be 
 lieve to be unequaled of their kind, and like the poet, I can say, 
 
 " I loved her from my boyhood ; she, to me, 
 Was like a fairy city of the heart." 
 
 But to the Arsenal : we sailed down the Grand Canal, past 
 the Ducal Palace and the Bridge of Sighs, and turning up into 
 a smaller canal, I soon stood before the two splendid ancient 
 marble lions, which in years gone by stood on the Piraeus of 
 Athens. They could not easily have surveyed a fairer scene 
 there than here, but yet their new masters have become as low 
 and slavish as the Athenians, and the glorious name of Lepanto 
 has, like that of Salamis, been veiled with a cloud of subsequent 
 disgrace. Venice is no longer a queen, with an unequaled 
 dower, but, alas ! a crushed and cowering slave, her years of 
 empire forgotten, her children corrupt and enervate, and a for 
 eign master lords it over them ; speaking, too, the same lan 
 guage with that proud Emperor Barbarossa, who in this 
 very city humbled his haughty neck beneath the foot of the 
 insulted pontiff. Within the Arsenal Museum are many ob 
 jects of interest; prominent among them hangs the great 
 Standard of the Turkish Admiral, taken at the battle of Le 
 panto, where the Christians struck a mighty blow for the Cross, 
 and the Crescent went down for the first time in a sea of blood. 
 But the most interesting thing of all was the sword of old blind 
 Henry Dandolo, who, when ninety years old, stormed the walls 
 of Constantinople at the head of the crusaders, and then re-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 121 
 
 fused the crown which he had so bravely won, preferring to 
 remain Doge of Venice rather than become the Emperor of the 
 East. Here also is kept the model of the famous Bucentaur, 
 the galley from which the Doge every year, on Ascension Day, 
 espoused the Adriatic. A right gorgeous vessel she must 
 have been, with her banks of oars rising in ranks above each 
 other, and the whole exterior richly gilded. The original vessel 
 was burned in 1824, and this model is now the only memorial 
 of her. In the afternoon I took my last row on the Grand 
 Canal, and took my fill of gazing at the old decayed palaces, 
 which tell of a splendor vanished, far beyond what is seen in 
 modern times, and not only remarkable as the homes of mer 
 chant princes, but also for their intrinsic architectural beauty 
 and richness, 
 
 " Glowing with the richest hues of art, 
 As though the wealth within them had run o'er." 
 
 The next morning I took an early train for Padua, and you can 
 easily imagine that it was with deep regret that I left this en 
 chanting city, and for the last time 
 
 " Looked to the winged lions' marble piles, 
 Where Venice sits in state, throned on her hundred isles." 
 
 A ride of some two hours brought me to Padua ; this fine old 
 city presents quite an imposing appearance, at a short distance, 
 as it is built very compactly in a solid mass, from above which 
 arise the domes of several very noble churches, and also the 
 lofty roof of the Municipal Palace, about which is told quite a 
 strange and interesting story. An Augustine friar, Era Giovanni 
 by name, had travelled very extensively, for the purpose of col 
 lecting architectural drawings and models. One of these was 
 of a palace in India, which had an immense unsupported roof; 
 with this the Paduans were so much pleased that they ordered 
 him to arrange the roof of their Town Hall in a similar manner ; 
 it is said to be the largest roof in the world unsupported by 
 pillars. The interior of the hall is decorated with strange 
 great frescoes, mostly emblematical and founded upon the sci 
 ence of astrology, for which Padua was once greatly celebrated. 
 Among other objects of interest in this hall, including the
 
 122 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 monument of my old Freshman friend Titus Livy, what inter 
 ested me considerably was the bust of Belzoni, a native of the 
 place, between two Egyptian statues which he presented to the 
 city. It is pleasant thus to see genius and enterprise honored 
 even after death, although the great man may have been shame 
 fully neglected while living. 
 
 A large opefi square or parade ground has received the name 
 of the Piazza of the Statues, from its being surrounded by a 
 double row, seventy-eight in all, of statues of the distinguished 
 men who have at any time been connected with the history of 
 Padua ; unfortunately their stock of great men ran out before 
 their space was covered, and they were consequently obliged 
 to appropriate quite a number of foreign names, whose con 
 nection with Padua was of the most dim and undefined nature, 
 such as Petrarch, Tasso, and Gustavus Adolphus. 
 
 But by far the most interesting feature connected with Padua 
 is the chapel of Maria dell' Arena, whose walls are covered 
 with very old and fine frescoes by Giotto, which have at the 
 same time doubled his reputation, and have also served to 
 show the condition of the art of painting, when it had passed 
 the earliest age of stiffness and angularity, and although with a 
 certain sweetness and beauty of their own, are yet far behind 
 the school of Raphael, which followed two centuries afterwards. 
 
 The subjects of the frescoes are entirely illustrations of 
 sacred history, and it gives a deep additional interest to know 
 that Dante lived in the same house with the painter, and doubt 
 less by his deep spiritual advice did much to influence the 
 character of the young artist. I have not space here to tell 
 you what I thought of all these tender and pious works of me 
 diaeval art, but will mention two or three to give you an idea 
 of the wonderful beauty and grace that was attained even by 
 the pre-Raphaelites. The Raising of Lazarus was peculiarly 
 powerful ; the newly-raised body stands on end, but still motion 
 less, being swathed with the burial garments, but in the face 
 appears a remarkable struggle between life and death, the eyes 
 being just faintly raised, as if the vital element had not yet 
 spread fully over the body. The Marriage in Cana of Galilee,
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 123 
 
 was full of graceful female forms, while in the Burial of Christ 
 were united many qualities seeming quite remarkable in a 
 painter of that period ; to the accuracy and minuteness which 
 are so observable in the old painters was added a graceful pose 
 of the figures, and a sweet expression of devotion in the faces, 
 such as the old painters tried hard to attain, but produced 
 only clumsy parodies of upturned eyes and distorted features. 
 So that here we see a long stride in advance of the past, and 
 towards that high ideal which was riot realized until more than 
 two centuries later, in the masterpieces of Leonardo da Vinci 
 and Raphael. To me it is peculiarly pleasant to think of Dante 
 as standing by Giotto's side, and explaining to him the deep 
 and hidden meaning of Scripture allegory and metaphysical 
 law, thus demonstrating that the rules which govern in the art 
 of poesy are none the less valuable when that poesy is made 
 tangible, and spread in colors on the canvas or the wall. 
 
 But I perceive that I am getting slightly borous. I am, 
 moreover, growing very sleepy, so give me a kiss, and good 
 night, dearest mother. 
 
 November 3. I have just finished the first breakfast that 
 I have taken alone, as P. left yesterday. 
 
 Our way of life is arranged in a very pleasant manner, and 
 one calculated to allow abundant opportunities for study, and 
 yet bringing us together in a social party two. or three times 
 during the day. It is after this fashion : we rise in the morn 
 ing, and each one takes his coffee in his own room ; then gen 
 erally come lectures, or studies, which are carried on according 
 to the taste or fancy of the particular student; at I-P. M..we 
 meet and take a good sharp walk for one hour, after which we 
 all, five in number, take dinner together at .the Hotel Bellevue. 
 After dinner come perhaps more walks, or we disperse, each to 
 his own room, and work until 8 P..M., when we all meet again 
 in Mr. D.'s room to take tea. On this occasion no English is 
 allowed to be spoken, or even read. Last night, Mr. D. and 
 I had pretty much all the conversation to ourselves. I, how 
 ever, broke the rule by sundry sly and surreptitious glances at 
 the "New York Weekly Times," for October lyth, in which
 
 124 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 were many items of interest, not only as touching the money 
 crisis, but also concerning the recent election in Kansas. I 
 shall look with much impatience for the next mail, to see 
 whether the Free State men have nobly triumphed, or whether 
 they have been jockeyed out of their victory by the frauds and 
 ballot-stuffing of Leavenworth County border ruffians. To 
 return, I think that these evening meetings of ours will be not 
 only profitable but also pleasant. 
 
 I must tell you something more of Italy. Retracing my 
 steps towards Milan, I spent the night at Verona, and went, 
 early the next morning, to Brescia, where I spent a most de 
 lightful half day, in wandering among its fine churches and 
 antique ruins. A Roman temple was dug up here, and many 
 beautiful antiques discovered, among them a bronze winged 
 statue of Victory, which struck me at once by its wonderful 
 elegance, seeming to stand right out from everything else 
 around it. It seems indeed strange that the old Greeks and 
 Romans, with nothing but a Pagan religion and Pagan devo 
 tion to inspire them, should have succeeded in giving to their 
 works of art a beauty and power which it is the highest ambi 
 tion of the moderns faintly to approach. I speak of sculpture 
 rather than painting, for the latter was undoubtedly a flower 
 which blossomed much later, and received its highest nutri 
 ment from the gentle dew of Christian devotion. 
 
 In Brescia, too, I could dream over some of my old dreams 
 of the time of Chivalry, inseparably connected as it is with the 
 names of two of my favorite heroes, Gaston de Foix, and Bay 
 ard, the " chevalier sans peur et sans reproche." Gaston de 
 Foix, I am sorry to say, acted like a rapscallion, as he stormed 
 the city and then led his soldiers, the flower of chivalry, into pil 
 lage and slaughter, which lasted for seven days, and in which 
 46,000 of the inhabitants perished. In the midst of all these 
 horrors the gentle Bayard shone like a bright, mist-dispelling 
 star. I have not space to tell the whole story, how when 
 grievously wounded and carried into a house, he forgot his 
 own pain to care for the safety of his hostess and her daugh 
 ters ; how for many weeks he lay there nigh unto death, but
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 125 
 
 ever kind and courteous, thinking less of himself than of 
 others ; and how, when he went away, he refused all ransom, 
 and with such sweet and gentle speeches (much, by the way, 
 like those of dear old Don Quixote), that it really warms one's 
 heart to read them. Oh, to see in those dark times a character 
 like this, as brave, high-spirited, and able as any, but more 
 gentle, devout, and generous than all, reminds me of Cogia 
 Alhabdal's diamond, in the " Arabian Nights," which shone 
 brightest when all the lights were extinguished, and every 
 thing else was dark. 
 
 In the afternoon I went to Bergamo, which is a most pictur 
 esque city, the most wealthy portions of the inhabitants living 
 on a lofty hill with very steep sides, thus literally the "upper 
 ten," while the larger portion of the town lies at the base of 
 the rock. Most of the fine churches and public buildings are 
 in the Citta, or upper part, and look splendidly, from their 
 being at a great height, and consequently visible at a long 
 distance. The view from the Castello of Bergamo I thought 
 even superior to that from the top of the Cathedral of Milan. 
 To the north are seen the Alps, to the west the cathedral 
 spires of Milan and Monza, and the region watered by the 
 Adda, while to the south the fertile plain of Lombardy, the 
 valley of the Po, stretching far off to the Appenines, sprinkled 
 thickly with noble towns and cities, and glowing, as I saw it, 
 with the rich hues of a superb Italian sunset. I could scarcely 
 refrain from crying aloud, 
 
 " Where 's the coward would not dare 
 To fight for such a land." 
 
 But, alas ! the times must produce a new race of men be 
 fore Italy shall shake off the Austrian yoke, or even gain for 
 herself her ancient feudal privileges, which were wont to be 
 the substitute for freedom. 
 
 The day after I was at Milan, across the Lake of Como, and 
 by night-fall, over the Spliigen Pass to Chur, in the Canton of 
 the Grisons. The Lake of Como, of which Bulwer gives such 
 a rapturous description in his " Lady of Lyons," I had expected 
 to be disappointed in, but was not at all. I had intended to
 
 126 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 tell you about my ride over the Spliigen, but as I wish to an 
 swer grandpapa's by this mail, I must hand it over to J. 
 
 Your loving son. 
 
 BERLIN, November 3, 1857. 
 
 MY DEAR J., One letter at a time from you has hitherto 
 been sufficient to inspire me with the most joyful emotions, 
 but my demonstrations slightly passed the bounds of decency, 
 when in the bundle of letters handed to me with a benevolent 
 smile by the postmaster, I discovered that there were two 
 from you. I repaired to P.'s room, and having opened all 
 my letters, twelve in number, upon the table, I performed a 
 war dance .over them, in;total uncertainty as to which I should 
 open first, and it. is no exaggeration to say that it was two 
 days before I had completed the perusal of them all. I have 
 just read your two letters over for the third time. Your sec 
 ond letter was peculiarly interesting to me, from the many 
 items it contained :it really seemed as if you were sitting in 
 
 my :study at home and telling it all to me face to face 
 
 Wednesday, November, 4. r^t is very cold this morning, and 
 all the exposed wood-work is covered with a coating of frost ; 
 I shall .have >a fire this afternoon in my big porcelain stove, 
 and. shall rejoice that -I '"am 'riot now crossing the Spliigen Pass, 
 as I was doing ; twp weeks ago last Monday, for it was cold 
 enough there then to satisfy any" one. We had at first some 
 very bad weather, and I feared that the beauties of the cel 
 ebrated Via Mala . would be spoiled for me, as during our 
 ascent there was a fierce and continual storm of mingled snow 
 and rain. But at .the village of Spliigen, where we stopped to 
 take dinner and. warm. up, -the clouds cleared off, and down 
 towards the -Swiss !side everthing looked bright, and sunlit, and 
 beautiful. I got the conductor to let me sit with him in his 
 seat on top, and.so had-almost as good a view of the scenery 
 as if I: had proceeded :on foot. Indeed it was a shame to ride 
 over .this -pass,' but ,T. had more baggage than I could carry on 
 my back, arid was rbesides pressed for time, and was therefore 
 compelled ; to adopt that: method of progression, which is most
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 1 27 
 
 disagreeable to me. The scenery, in most parts of this pass 
 not very remarkable, was, in one district about a mile and a 
 half long, extremely wild and picturesque. Imagine walls of 
 rock, rising above you on either hand to a height of some 
 1600 feet, in perfectly smooth precipices, while below a vast 
 chasm stretches away to an immense depth, and at its bottom 
 flows the stream of the here youthful Rhine, or rather his 
 lower branch, the upper one coming from the St. Gothard 
 range. You can form some idea of the extreme narrowness 
 of these clefts, through which the road passes and the river 
 flows, when I tell you that in one place a short bridge carries 
 the road over the abyss which is not more than six or eight 
 feet wide ; a cleft through which, in long forgotten times of 
 the Pass, the Rhine has broken his way from the mountain- 
 glaciers to the plains below. The bridge itself was so narrow 
 that the diligence had not more than two feet to spare on 
 either side, and as the top projected considerably over the 
 wheels, I could look straight down into the chasm, whose two 
 sides seemed to have been split apart quite recently, so near 
 were they to each other, and so well did the opposite sides fit. 
 But, with the exception of this short pass, the Spliigen road is 
 rather ordinary than otherwise, and not such a remarkable ex 
 hibition of grandeur and wildness as I had been led to expect. 
 The Simplon I think superior to it in every respect ; besides 
 being one of the finest roads I ever saw, it passes through 
 nobler snow mountains, is overhung by more imposing gla 
 ciers, the walls of rock which close it are higher and grander, 
 and above all the magnificent coup d'ceil which one gets in 
 looking backward, while going down the Italian slope, sur 
 passes anything on the Spliigen. Of all the mountain passes 
 which I have been over, including (besides the four great ones, 
 the St. Gothard, the St. Bernard, the Simplon, and the Splii 
 gen) some fifteen passes of lesser note, the Simplon is the 
 one over which I should most enjoy going again. 
 
 At Reichenau, where we stopped to change horses, I had 
 an opportunity of seeing the union of the upper and lower 
 branches of the Rhine, who from this time becomes quite a
 
 128 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 respectable river, and in springtime I should imagine a rather 
 dangerous one, as his banks are very low, and are lined on each 
 side by " moraines," so to speak, of stones which he brought 
 down when swelled by the spring floods. I think that by this 
 time I ought to be acquainted with old Father Rhine, having 
 seen him in all his phases : a glacier torrent roaring through 
 the Splugen, a little river flowing muddy into Lake Constance, 
 but flowing out " clear as diamond spark," and furrowed by 
 the keels of steamboats as far as Schaffhausen ; there plung 
 ing down in rapids and cataracts and on to Strasburg, where 
 it is a fierce, unnavigable stream, and rushes through the 
 bridge piers with great rapidity. At Mayence we saw him 
 again, and from thence to Cologne, in the quiet and tranquil 
 lity of his manhood, with his robe and crown of orchards and 
 vineyards : once more at Leyden, sinking away and losing 
 himself in the sands of ocean. We spent the night at Chur, 
 the capital of the Grisons. This is a very strange canton, 
 the largest in Switzerland, and the least thickly settled. In 
 its mountains there is said to be still capital sport of chamois 
 shooting ; in fact I dined for two days on chamois venison, 
 which is rather poor stuff, and not comparable to the rich 
 meat which we shot for ourselves last year in the Adirondacks. 
 But the most remarkable thing about this canton is the language 
 which they speak. It is called the Romaic dialect, and is a 
 heterogeneous mixture of Latin, German, French, and Italian, 
 the Latin and Italian predominating. But still the language 
 as I heard it spoken has very little of Italian softness. The 
 language spoken in several valleys is said to bear a very 
 strong resemblance to the Latin of the Roman peasants, as 
 described by Livy. I went the next day to Lake Constance, 
 which I crossed to Lindau, where I was anxious to meet the 
 train to Augsburg. When I arrived I found that I had only 
 fifteen minutes to get to the depot, and, to add to my trouble, 
 I was attacked by both the police and custom-house officers, as 
 I was now passing from Switzerland into Bavaria. Discretion 
 was the better part of valor, so I seized my traps and bolted 
 for the depot, which fortunately was close at hand, shouting
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 1 29 
 
 out to the astonished officials that it was all O. K , and man 
 aged to get to the cars just in time. My journey from Lindau 
 to Augsburg, and from thence to Munich, was very uninterest 
 ing. However, I spent a very pleasant half day at Augsburg, 
 which is a very fine old city. The inn at which I put up is 
 one of the oldest in Europe, dating from the fourteenth cen 
 tury. It is called Die drei Mohren, and is now kept in the 
 finest house in Augsburg, formerly the palace of the Fugger 
 family, who were for so many generations so celebrated for 
 their wealth. I saw the room in which Anthony Fugger 
 burned the three million florins I. O. U. which he held against 
 Charles V., on the occasion of that Emperor spending some 
 time in the house. The cellar of the Drei Mohren contains 
 the most celebrated collection of wines which is known any 
 where in these parts, and it is said that one is sure of getting 
 them pure and genuine here, though he pays a pretty good 
 price for them. Among these are the Immortal Massic and 
 the Falernian of the Romans, from Palestine the Dew of Car- 
 mel, and Hill of Bethlehem wine, and also one from Ithaca 
 called Schloss-Ulysses. This last rather took me down. 
 
 I was much interested in several things in Augsburg, es 
 pecially the water-works and the room where the " Augsburg 
 Confession " was publicly read to Charles V. This room has 
 been entirely modernized, as was to be expected from a Cath 
 olic sovereign, who would efface with pleasure all that could 
 remind one of the Reformation ; but still I determined to see 
 it, that I might be able to tell mother that I had been upon 
 the very spot where Melancthon's celebrated paper was pub 
 lished, which produced such great results both for good and 
 evil. The room was very uninteresting in its appearance, 
 and the places where the distinguished persons stood are not 
 known, but it is very easy to see where the throne must have 
 stood, and also to define the spot where Bayer, the Chancellor 
 of Saxony, stood, who when requested by the Emperor to read 
 the Confession in Latin, replied, " Your Majesty surely does 
 not desire it to be read in a tongue which the people do 
 not understand ; " and then proceeded to read in such a loud 
 9
 
 I3O LEXERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 tone of voice that it was not only heard in the apartment but 
 even by the crowd without. Augsburg is now about two fifths 
 Protestant to three fifths Catholic, and I was informed that 
 they get along very peaceably together. 
 
 I perceive that I shall not have space enough to tell you 
 what were my impressions of the Munich Gallery, and conse 
 quently will not touch upon it. 
 
 But I must give you an account of a glimpse of student- 
 life, especially as here in Berlin there appears to be very little 
 student life at all, the fellows being older, and not so much 
 attached to beer and duels as at Bonn, Heidelberg, and Mu 
 nich. 
 
 A young artist from Hartford named F. was very kind to 
 me, and, after taking me to the Pinacothek and Glyptothek, 
 and also to some galleries to which no unintroduced person 
 can be admitted, offered to take me to the Student's Kneipe 
 the night before I came away. I gladly accepted, as I was 
 anxious to see how they did these things down here in Ba 
 varia ; I was also urged to go by a German member of the 
 Chor or society, named Farmbecker, who had been F.'s teacher 
 in German, and with whom I had had some very pleasant 
 talks about our mutual friend. I do not wonder that T. liked 
 him, for he had a very quiet, gentlemanly manner, and struck 
 me as being a German translation of Doc. M. About 8 p. 
 M. we dropped into the house in which the Chor of the " Isa- 
 rians " holds its meetings, and entered a small room, very 
 plain and decorated with little else than shields, upon which 
 were painted the colors of the club green, blue, and white ; 
 green being the color of the river Isar, from which they take 
 their name, and blue and white the colors of Bavaria. Around 
 a long table were seated some dozen or fifteen fellows, busily 
 engaged in drinking and smoking, wearing caps decorated 
 with the same colors as above, the body being green with a 
 blue and white rim underneath. These colors are carried out 
 very completely in watch ribbons and pipe decorations. 
 
 Some of them wore what is called the Festmiitse or Feast 
 cap, which is a very small smoking-cap without any tassel,
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 131 
 
 which is placed upon the top of the head, and gives a highly 
 rakish and jolly appearance. 
 
 I was received with true student cordiality, and placed op 
 posite to a tall fellow, who, I was informed, was the best 
 schlager, or fighter, in the university ; and, although he had 
 fought very often, had received scarcely a single scratch. 
 This is the highest praise which they could possibly bestow 
 upon a fellow student, and could not be increased if he had 
 the learning of Erasmus and the eloquence of Abelard. A 
 jolly student song then followed, not a compound of yells and 
 howls such as go to make up the students' chorals at Yale, 
 but a really sweet, well-executed song, which deserved the 
 name of a lay. Some of the voices seemed very good, and 
 all were harmonious. The song over, a vigorous beer-drink- 
 ing set in ; large mugs of beer, containing nearly a quart, were 
 drunk on every side. I began a conversation with the huge 
 swordsman opposite me, and, after a few words, he suddenly 
 challenged me to " drink out," that is, to empty my mug at 
 one pull, without breathing. A quart is a pretty good mouth 
 ful for a man whose drinking days had been over for two 
 years, but it would n't do to hesitate, so we clinked our mugs 
 together, there was a short pause, then not a drop fell from 
 the inverted mugs which we brought down upon the table with 
 a simultaneous clang. From that moment I was looked upon 
 as a jolly fellow, and was overwhelmed with attentions. The 
 fighting Junior, whose name was Schenk, drew me a picture 
 of a duel, which I was assured was exactly correct, and which 
 I enclose to you, only requesting that you will preserve it 
 carefully, as it is quite nicely done, though dashed off in a mo 
 ment. I should also like to keep it as a remembrance of my 
 meeting with the Munich students. 
 
 Schenk was very anxious that I should stay and study in 
 Munich, and take lessons from him in fighting. He offered 
 to be my second in all my fights, and parry all the bad blows, 
 " so that the cuts you get will be merely ornamental," said he. 
 I was obliged to refuse his tempting offer. Students are the 
 same the world over, and it was most delightful for me to get
 
 132 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 another glimpse of student life, at once similar to and so dif 
 ferent from my old life at Yale. 
 
 BERLIN, November 8. 
 
 For really severe study the opportunities and inducements 
 at this place are very numerous and valuable, and the dis 
 tractions, especially for a stranger, are extremely few. The 
 Library of the King contains the respectable number of five 
 hundred thousand volumes, besides several thousand manu 
 scripts ; upon these a student ought to be able to browse to 
 his heart's content, and have no need to complain that his ac 
 quaintance in the city is confined to three or four male friends. 
 And as hereafter I shall have positively nothing to write about, 
 save the dry and uninteresting details of a quiet, studious life, 
 I take this opportunity to speak once more of the interesting 
 objects which I have seen in coming to this place, for I 
 would by no means have you suppose that my visits to Mu 
 nich and Nuremberg were not filled with enjoyment and ad 
 miration of the ancient and the artistic. In Munich there 
 were some things which pleased me, and others which deci 
 dedly did not. I did not like at all the uniform appearance 
 of almost all the new buildings, which, with their spick and 
 span aspect, made them look as if they had all been built in 
 blocks by contract, or else turned out of some Yankee machine 
 for manufacturing houses, some great public-building turning- 
 lathe. This is especially noticeable in the magnificent Lud- 
 wigstrasse, where the uniformity is most dreary. The unfilled 
 appearance of many of the finest streets is mentioned by some 
 as a defect ; but to me it seemed rather an ornament than 
 otherwise, as the vacant spaces left between the houses were 
 occupied with gardens or little clumps of shrubbery, which 
 imparted a charm to the stiffness of the city, and reminded me 
 very forcibly of some of the prettiest parts of New Haven 
 or Norwich. In fact, the Briennerstrasse, through which I 
 walked about every day, was very much like Temple Street, 
 although, of course, it had no such glorious elms, whose 
 equals I have as yet seen nowhere in Europe. 
 
 You can imagine that I reveled in the treasures of the
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 133 
 
 Pinacothek. This is said to be one of the very best arranged, 
 lighted, and managed picture galleries in Europe, and al 
 though there is nothing in it which in any very peculiar de 
 gree excited my emotion, yet it was a place where I could 
 have spent a good deal of time most pleasantly and profitably. 
 The collection is peculiarly rich in the old German masters, 
 from the very earliest times, when the Byzantine was dominant 
 in Germany, and William of Cologne at the head of it, down 
 to later times, when the German artists had begun to make 
 pilgrimages to the Italian cities, and to sit at the feet of those 
 great masters who so beautifully united the tender with the 
 majestic. There are also many fine specimens of the early 
 Flemish school, in which such rapid steps were made onward ; 
 among them the Jan Van Eyck was of course the finest, al 
 though there was nothing in the Pinacothek equal to his great 
 picture of the " Adoration of the Spotless Lamb/' which I 
 enjoyed so much at Ghent, which is immeasurably the master 
 piece of that early school. 
 
 The great room, however, is the hall of Rubens, in which 
 are collected no less than ninety-five of the works of this jolly 
 man, whose free rich life seemed to find an appropriate type 
 and perpetuation in the gorgeous coloring and unfettered mo 
 tion which he lavished on his paintings. 
 
 I cannot, however, in my own feelings, accord to Rubens 
 that position which many give him, nor can I assent to all that 
 Sir Joshua Reynolds, at once his critic and his panegyrist, 
 chose to say. In some styles of painting, not generally the 
 highest, he is perhaps the most able and successful painter that 
 ever lived. But it appears to me, that when he takes up sub 
 jects of a more high and holy nature, he fails, or at least meets 
 with inferior success. He was, however, unfortunate in his 
 models, and as a man can produce only what is within and 
 around him, it is scarcely to be expected that his characters 
 should possess an elevated beauty such as he had never inti 
 mately studied, or be spiritualized by an expression of love and 
 devotion such as he had never felt. He was a gloriously 
 gifted man, and painted in the most gorgeous colors known in
 
 134 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 the art, the most beautiful women, the noblest men, and the 
 wildest animals, which he knew, and grouped all together with 
 the originality and power of a wonderful imagination. For all 
 this we can give him the highest praise and admiration, but 
 cannot go further and acknowledge his magic as strong enough 
 to touch the heart or bow the knee. 
 
 What pleased me most of all in this gallery were those charm 
 ing pictures of Murillo, representing scenes from the lowest 
 classes of the Spanish. Nothing could be more natural and 
 beautiful than those two boys eating fruit one a bunch of 
 grapes, and the other a melon, with a melon seed already 
 sticking to his cheek. Spite of rags and poverty, they are in 
 the full enjoyment of the " dolce far niente," and the humor 
 which glitters and sparkles in their eyes is of that keen and racy 
 kind which lights up so cheerfully the pages of Cervantes. 
 
 But enough of art, although I have still a great deal more 
 to say of Albert Diirer, and Teniers, and Gerard Dow, and of 
 the rich landscapes of Claude Lorraine, Both, and Ruysdael, 
 to which my attention was particularly directed by my com 
 panion, a young artist from Hartford, who is studying land 
 scape painting in Munich. 
 
 This is my dear mother's birthday, and I wish for her many 
 returns of the day, all happy with that health and quiet pleas 
 ure which it shall be my aim to increase, my warmest love 
 to her from her absent son. Tell her I have thought much of 
 her to-day, and most of all when we met in Mr. D.'s room this 
 evening, and sung those old hymns and tunes, which never 
 fail to bring back to my mind the place where, and the lips 
 from which I first learned them. 
 
 To H. N. C. 
 
 BERLIN, November 13, 1857. 
 
 .... Were not your first few days after reaching home 
 perfectly rich with happiness ? days to be remembered through 
 a lifetime, for the peculiar charm in which they were clothed ? 
 When you answer this, I want you to particularize about the 
 little minutiae of your own return home, at least as far as you
 
 ' FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 135 
 
 think fit, and also to tell me every word spoken and every look 
 given when you first met my mother and brother. I don't care 
 if you don't say much else, or even if you omit a disquisition 
 on the money crisis, with which I have been bored for two 
 weeks past, if you will only, in addition to a full detail of your 
 own voyage and experiences, tell me everything you noticed in 
 my home-circle. A man more lonely and miserable than my 
 self after you left would have been a difficult thing to find. . . . 
 In Venice I spent a week, and had you been with me, we 
 should doubtless have squandered there a fortnight of our 
 valuable time. For her palaces and pictures, her canals and 
 churches, her rich blue sky and oriental bearing, over all which 
 blows the fresh sea breeze from the Adriatic, form a glorious 
 combination of the gorgeous, the beautiful, and the strange, 
 which not only delighted and astonished me, but gave me new 
 ideas of beauty and excellence, and taught me that, however 
 wonderful art may be, the power of the human mind in seizing 
 
 and enjoying it is still more wonderful At Munich I also 
 
 attended a German Kneipe, or society meeting, and had a very 
 jolly time, being as it were transported back to the dear old days 
 
 of whist and whiskey-punch in 's and 's rooms. I will 
 
 tell you all about it when I see you, for it is probably the only 
 sight of student social life which I shall get, as they have pos 
 itively no student-life at this University of Berlin, which is 
 a kind of extra-nice, advanced, finishing-off establishment, 
 where the object is rather study and profit than fun ; the stu 
 dents are older, more earnest and sober, and consequently 
 frown down, rather, all attempts at societies, beer-drinking, and 
 duelling, which appear to be the chief end of man at Heidel 
 berg, Bonn, and Munich. From Munich I went up to Nurem 
 berg, which is the finest old Gothic city in Europe ; every house 
 is just as it was three hundred years ago, and in the good old 
 times when Albert Diirer painted, Peter Vischer and Adam 
 Krafft carved, and the cobbler Hans Sachs poured forth his 
 inspiriting war songs. The appearance of antiquity about the 
 houses is much greater and more general than in Ghent or 
 Bruges ; in fact, there is scarcely anything modern about the
 
 
 136 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 whole town to remind one that he is in the nineteenth century, 
 and thus call off the dreamer's mind from the past. I was de 
 lighted with the city, and would have willingly given up Milan, 
 cathedral and all, if necessary, in order to visit it." 
 
 To THE SAME. 
 
 BERLIN, January 10, 1858. 
 
 An ulcer in my leg, in which I caught cold, gave me con 
 siderable pain, and reduced me to the humiliating necessity of 
 calling in a German doctor ; fortunately for me he understood 
 English, and I did not have such a ludicrous time in relating 
 my symptoms as " My Uncle " did in " Up the Rhine." The 
 Herr Doctor however made one pretty bad bull, though it was 
 rather in a professional line : I asked him if I might eat apples, 
 whereupon he replied that he " had no injections to it." The 
 Partingtonism was too much for the politeness of the crowd 
 who had come in to hear whether I was in immediate danger 
 or not, and we all collapsed in a most hearty laugh, in which 
 the jolly doctor joined ; and then my landlady's little girl was 
 sent out for a fabulous quantity of apples, which, with the help 
 of my sympathizing friends, disappeared with astonishing 
 rapidity. . . . During my lonely days upon my sofa, I read 
 again and again your letter, both alone and in connection with 
 one I received from home nearly at the same time ; it is so 
 pleasant to view the home circle from different points, and the 
 little sketch which you gave me was such a charming one, and 
 seemed to bring those dear ones so clearly before my mental 
 eye, that I cannot sufficiently thank you for it. No one can 
 better appreciate my feelings than a devoted lover of home life 
 like yourself, so you may fill out yourself the state of feeling in 
 which I was by imagining how you would like it if you had re 
 mained in Europe, and I had written you from America a jolly 
 little account of two evenings spent by me in the light of that 
 
 Tarrytown fireside I never was celebrated for my faith 
 
 in doctors, nor for my obedience to their prescriptions. This 
 doctor the other day, after looking very owlish, and writing out 
 a long list of medicines to be swallowed inside and rubbed out-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART, 137 
 
 side, informed me that I was to eat no meat ! You cannot 
 thoroughly appreciate the full horror of this command, for at 
 the large hotels which you and I frequented, the bill of fare had 
 been much influenced by English travel, and consequently we 
 did not see German cookery rampant, nor have you any idea 
 of the vile weeds which are brought on to the table under the 
 name of vegetables. Cut off thus from meats, a vast desert of 
 Kraut, an endless Sahara of Kohl, stretched out before my 
 disgusted eye. I tried the no meat system for one day, and then 
 made up my mind that if I ate meat, I might die of an ulcer, but 
 that if I did not eat meat I should certainly die of starvation. 
 So I adopted the rule of self-preservation and defied the doctor, 
 whom I now believe to be the secret emissary of some seller of 
 vegetables. 
 
 BERLIN, November 18, 1857. 
 
 .... I now sit down to answer the last letters from home, 
 and hope that you will not wholly despise my letters, which 
 will henceforth want the enthusiastic interest of the traveller, 
 but which will rather be replete with the dull reflections and 
 observations of the student. The ordinary events of common 
 place life, in an unpicturesque city, will be henceforth the 
 subject of my story, and they will want to you that charm 
 which all your home matters have to me, namely, a previous 
 interest in them, which becomes ever stronger the further and 
 the longer I am removed from them. . . . 
 
 The Italian readings which I hold with Mr. D., the tea- 
 drinkings in his room, and our walks together before dinner, 
 are the pleasantest episodes in my daily life ; but at other 
 times he is fearfully busy with lectures and hard study, so that 
 I do not feel myself justified in disturbing him. After a few 
 trials of talking German at our evening tea-drinkings, in 
 which Mr. D. and I were pretty much sole interlocutors, we 
 gave it up and have since eaten our evening meal in peace. . . . 
 
 It is peculiarly disagreeable to have people turn round and 
 stare at you in the street, simply because they hear you speak 
 ing English. I don't think I shall be thoroughly well settled 
 till I have thrashed a couple of these broad-faced, stupid
 
 138 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Berliners for their impolite way of fixing their fishy eyes upon 
 every one whom they take to be a foreigner ; there are several 
 who sit near me at the dinner-table, with whom I should like 
 to begin. I am afraid that the German dishes are not good for 
 me ; at any rate they make me extremely choleric towards the 
 unhappy specimens whom I see every day feeding on them. 
 
 But I feel quarrelsome and abusive this afternoon, so I will 
 leave off writing until I can get into what you would call " a 
 better frame of mind," that is to say, one less complaining 
 and grouty, but I feel dreadfully blue and melancholy just 
 now. 
 
 ii p. M. ! have been to supper, and after a quite pleas 
 ant talk in T. D.'s room, I have come back quite humanized 
 and soothed down, although I feel just about as remorseful 
 as ever. 
 
 When I get into one of these states of mind, after sighing 
 in vain for that home which I was so foolish as to leave, I 
 begin to look back with regret upon the pleasant passages of 
 travel over which I have recently been, and during which the 
 continual occupation drove away, in a great measure, melan 
 choly thoughts. Among these passages, the last and most 
 delightful was Nuremberg, which I visited just before coming 
 on here, which I would by no means have you suppose that 
 I passed over or neglected. 
 
 I left Munich on Tuesday, October 27, and spent the night 
 at Augsburg, from which I took the early morning train, and 
 so jogged along northward, through Bavaria, at the slow pace 
 of a German train. At Donauworth I had the pleasure of 
 gazing for a few moments upon the Danube, which I can truly 
 believe to be a noble and glorious stream, far superior to the 
 Rhine ; for although here one does not hear its torrent's 
 thunder shock, nor does it seem magnificently rude, as 
 Campbell describes it, yet even at that distance from its 
 mouth it is navigable by steamers, and a large bridge is neces 
 sary to span its rushing waters. I have a sort of hanker 
 ing to sail down its yet unhackneyed stream, and to view its 
 scenes of wild grandeur,
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 139 
 
 " Imperial Danube's rich domain," 
 
 but one can't see everything, and I ought to be thankful for 
 having even got a partial glimpse of the noble old River 
 King. Near the place where we crossed the Danube lies 
 the little village of Blenheim, celebrated in song by Dr. 
 Southey, who informs us, through the medium of Wilhel- 
 mina, Peterkin, and their Grandfather, that there was a famous 
 victory. So on to Nuremberg. On entering the gates of 
 this grand old relic, one is immediately carried back three 
 centuries, and sees around him the same streets, the same 
 houses, the same city, which the noble and pious artists, 
 Albert Diirer, Peter Vischer, and Adam Krafft saw at the end 
 of the fifteenth century. Long rows of strangely-built, richly- 
 ornamented houses, with high-peaked roofs, in which are sev 
 eral tiers of windows, looking like the cannon port-holes in the 
 sides of a man-of-war ; fountains of all kinds, from the gro 
 tesque old German style to the elegant tracery of Gothic open 
 work, noble medieval churches of the truest and purest style of 
 Gothic, with the pointed arch, the style of Cologne Cathedral, 
 and the unvarying antiquity of the appearance of the streets, 
 in which seldom can be seen anything in the least degree 
 modern, produce the effect almost of a spell of glamour ; 
 like the enchanted castle in the " Sleeping Beauty," where 
 everything had been laid to sleep by a charm, and so pre 
 served for a hundred years, so the Genius of the Middle Ages 
 has laid his spell, and has preserved to himself this city, 
 whole and entire, saying to the wild waves of progressive 
 modernism, " Thus far shall ye come and no farther, for here 
 I have set up my last tower of strength ; into this have I re 
 tired as into my last citadel, and here shall ye not place your 
 profaning foot ; but here let the student and the mystic come 
 as from the glaring heat of a summer's day, into the soft 
 coolness of a church aisle ; and here I will show him old pic 
 tures in the chapel aisles, mellowed by the light of the past 
 and ages long gone, from Frederic Barbarossa to Wallenstein, 
 and will sing him old songs which were made in the infancy 
 of mediasval poetry, and have since come echoing down
 
 140 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 through the corridors of time ; and he shall go forth with 
 quiet pleasure from his communion with the spirit of the 
 olden days." 
 
 This was what the spirit said to me at least, and I was 
 right glad that I could understand it, and could enter with a 
 feeling of intense enjoyment into the contemplation of the 
 particular beauties of art with which the old city is replete. 
 The churches, pictures, and images, which were set up and 
 adored by the Catholics, still remain in great perfection, for 
 notwithstanding the strong Protestant tendencies of the city 
 for several hundred years, the change produced by the Ref 
 ormation was a quiet and gentle one, and not disgraced by 
 outbursts of iconoclastic fury ; they have been rather inclined 
 to divert to their own use the religious apparatus of the Ro 
 manists, though with a nobler faith and purer devotion. 
 
 The awakening of inventive thought, as well as of religious 
 reform, also made its appearance near the beginning of the 
 sixteenth century in Nuremberg ; its citizens were the Yankees 
 of their time, and among their inventions may be reckoned 
 the watch, the air gun, the paper mill, and the first cast can 
 non, besides sundry musical instruments and ornamental arts, 
 the latter mostly imported from Italy. But the most inter 
 esting view which can be taken of Nuremberg at that active 
 and wide-awake period, is that which regards its artists, wood 
 carvers, bronze casters, sculptors, and painters, of whom a 
 large number of remarkable ability were engaged in various 
 works in the city at just the same time. Preeminent in the 
 bronze-casting and sculpture department stands old Peter 
 Vischer, with whose great work, the shrine of St. Sebald, I 
 was much charmed. It is the most elaborate piece of cast 
 ing I ever saw ; it consists of five hundred separate pieces, all 
 worked up in the richest Gothic style, and employed the art 
 ist thirteen years of hard labor to finish it. But it is some 
 thing more than a mere work of elaborate art ; in the calm, 
 sweet faces of the twelve apostles, which surround the shrine 
 and are the most prominent figures, in their noble forms and 
 gracefully-flowing garments, can be observed the influence of
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 141 
 
 that beautiful spiritual Italian school which had recently been 
 making rapid strides in Germany, and showed its effects even 
 in such rough material as bronze. For this seems to be a 
 step above most ordinary castings, whose highest aim seems 
 to be to give a correct imitation, or at most a very rough or 
 gross expression, but in this extraordinary piece of work 
 everything is finished with the beauty and nicety of the chisel, 
 not a fault nor sign of bad taste being visible throughout the 
 whole. Very different in its general style is a lofty stone 
 spire in the St. Lawrence Church, of Gothic open-work, called 
 the Sacrament House, and intended to receive the conse 
 crated wafer. Although the service of the church is now 
 Lutheran, this beautiful monument has liberally been allowed 
 to stand for the admiration of every sect. It is of stone, sixty 
 feet high, tapering from the floor of the church almost to the 
 top of the choir, and then it turns over in a graceful curve, 
 and thus forms the appearance of a vast shepherd's crook. 
 Within it are several groups, on different platforms or stories, 
 representing, as they rise, the various scenes of our Lord's 
 passion. Thus, the Resurrection is at the summit, where the 
 eye just begins to lose sight of the coarser outlines of the 
 form, a most appropriate position. The whole structure is 
 supported on the shoulders of three stooping figures, which 
 are the fac-similes of the pious artist Adam Krafft and his 
 two assistants, and serve to remind one of their long, inces 
 sant labor for five years, and of the miserable pittance of a 
 little over three hundred dollars, which they received for this 
 astonishing work. But the name of all others which is insep 
 arably connected with Nuremberg, and which must ever throw 
 about it a tender and gentle memory, making it a fit spot 
 to be visited by the enthusiast as well as the artist, is that 
 of Albert Diirer, a man of wonderful and varied abilities, su 
 perior in intellectual perfections, probably, to every man of 
 his time, and yet bearing in his bosom one of the noblest 
 and truest hearts that ever beat. 
 
 I think that Shakespeare is the only character whom I can 
 call more myriad-minded. In every art of imitation or orna-
 
 142 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 ment, and in many of the more abstruse sciences, he led the 
 world. That you may have an idea of his personal appear 
 ance, I will tell you a little bit of my own experience. In the 
 picture gallery at Munich I stopped with admiration before 
 the portrait of a person. Long golden curls which fell down 
 upon the shoulders, an oval face of noble contour, and deep, 
 unfathomable brown eyes, which beamed with angelic sweet 
 ness. I said to myself, that is the most pleasing likeness of 
 the Saviour that I ever saw, and looked in the catalogue to 
 discover the artist, when I found that it was the portrait of 
 Albert Diirer, painted by himself. He planned churches and 
 carved statues, painted wonderful pictures and wrote books 
 on mathematics; and the mighty fortifications around the city, 
 which stood the long siege of Wallenstein during the Thirty 
 Years' War, testify to his skill as an engineer. What a pity 
 that such a man could not spend his life in peace ! He was 
 hunted to his grave by a termagant wife. I stood in the cem 
 etery, by his simple slab, and was almost inclined to take a 
 resolution against marriage, for fear of meeting with a similar 
 fate. 
 
 Mr. D. has just come in, attired in a long cloak, and look 
 ing much like an Italian bandit, and, in accordance with his 
 appearance, wants me to go and read Italian with him. As 
 my paper is about out, I think that I shall accept his offer. 
 
 BERLIN, December 3, 1857. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, I sit down to write my weekly letter 
 home in a much more cheerful, not to say jolly, frame of mind 
 than usual. To this state your last brief but dear letter has 
 much contributed, as it released me from some very anxious 
 thoughts about J. ; but now the news that he is well again, 
 and that all is right at home, has filled me with joy, and I fee 
 much like executing some of those ape-like gambols of my 
 youthful days, on which you were wont vainly to attempt to 
 frown. 
 
 So you had got that grouty, wormy, miserable, melancholic 
 letter which I sent from Munich. I almost wished that I had
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 143 
 
 not written it, but I was afraid that if I did not write at all, 
 you might be anxious ; so with a head-stopping, eye-blinding, 
 idea-clogging influenza, I sat down on an unpleasant Sunday 
 afternoon in that most disagreeable city, and you have ob 
 tained the result. You see how slavishly I am influenced by 
 mere outward circumstances and objects, and you must not 
 be anxious or sorrowful, even if I write letters as blue as 
 indigo or as doleful as Niobe. To-day, on the contrary, what 
 spirits I have had ! A bright, warm sun, which unfortunately 
 set at about 3 P. M., a delightful bracing air and clear sky, 
 have made me feel as if I could do nothing but shout and 
 sing all day long ; and although I have had a good tough 
 spell of horseback riding, and after it two hours more of walk 
 ing and jumping, which latter amusement has made me some 
 what lame, I still feel as light and airy as a bird. Is it a 
 misfortune to have a nature so susceptible to impressions, so 
 easily filled with enthusiasm and bounding hope and spirits, 
 and as easily depressed and darkened with sadness and mel 
 ancholy ? Many perhaps would think it so ; but for myself, 
 I would rather live a year of time enlivened by the changing 
 emotions of intense pain and lofty pleasure, than drag out a 
 dozen years in the dead-and-alive existence of phlegmatic in 
 sensibility. One of my professors has been lecturing on 
 Human Temperaments, and has classified and arranged them 
 in a very clear and perspicuous manner, so that I have taken 
 much interest in the subject, and we have had considerable 
 talk about it in our little circle. I am composed chiefly of 
 the sanguine and melancholic, with a pretty fair sprinkling of 
 the choleric and a total absence of the phlegmatic. I think a 
 little dose of the latter temperament would not be a bad thing 
 to settle and quiet my other more rampant qualities. 
 
 My life here in Berlin contains but little of thrilling interest, 
 as I am in my room much of the time. Although I cannot 
 accuse myself of any very severe study, yet with law and Greek 
 studies, Italian reading, German speaking, and general litera 
 ture, my time is very fully occupied, and these short days slip 
 by almost before I am aware of it. I am improving quite dil-
 
 144 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 igently my opportunities of becoming acquainted with the old 
 Civil or Roman Law, the study of which is much pursued on 
 the Continent, because its rules and principles lie at the bottom 
 of almost all their codes, showing traces even at this remote 
 age of the universality of the Roman Empire, and afterwards 
 of the feudal system. But as England always, from the earliest 
 times, regarded with suspicion the Civil Law, as being of Rom 
 ish and papal origin, and as opposed to their much cherished 
 Common Law, consequently both for English and Americans, 
 the study of the Civil Law is not so much a necessary or im 
 portant pursuit, as it is one of scholarship, and one which con 
 tributes, by the excellence of its maxims and the depths of its 
 erudition, to the more complete and symmetrical formation of 
 an elegant legal education. Still it is the foster child of tyranny, 
 shaped and managed to suit the will of a single despotic indi 
 vidual, while the English Common Law, which is the founda 
 tion of almost all of our State codes, and which is in many of 
 the States adopted bodily, this glorious English Common Law is 
 the eldest-born of Anglo-Saxon freedom, and has grown quietly 
 up from the mass of the people, perpetuating their customs and 
 expressing their wants. But I will turn to a more congenial 
 topic : you told me about a Sunday at home ; I will give you 
 some idea of my last Sunday in Berlin. At ten o'clock, A. M., 
 I sallied forth in company with S., and we took our way through 
 the Linden (all the shops in which were closed), to the Dome 
 Church, where the royal family attend, and where is performed 
 the finest religious music in Berlin. It was totally beyond my 
 conception of how nobly simple psalms could be made to 
 sound. The pieces which are generally performed are Men 
 delssohn's Psalms, and the choir consists principally of young 
 boys, who carry the soprano and the alto, while the bass and 
 tenor are executed by very superior adult voices. The effect 
 is neither strained nor operatic ; the voices are too natural 
 to admit of the former, and too numerous to admit any idea 
 of individual display. On the contrary, the several clear sil 
 very voices of the boys, supported and strengthened by those 
 of the powerful basses and tenors, produced a pure and de-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 145 
 
 votional effect, such as I think I never heard in church music. 
 After the music was over we left the Dome Church, and took 
 our way to the English Chapel, where I attend regularly every 
 Sunday, not from any remarkable attractions in the preaching, 
 but because I must hear at least one sermon in the vernacular. 
 Going solely to the German churches may be good enough 
 practice for learning German, but for myself it don't seem to 
 me like going to church, unless the exercises are in English ; 
 not because I do not understand German sermons well enough, 
 but because they suggest nothing to me of religious education, 
 or of the worship at home. So to the English Chapel we went. 
 It is a very comfortable little room, nicely arranged, with good 
 seats, an organ, and all the paraphernalia of the English 
 church. 
 
 Although there are about forty or fifty Americans in Berlin, 
 they don't come here much to church, or anywhere else I 
 imagine, and the audience is mostly composed of English. 
 Governor Wright, the American Minister, much superior in 
 his moral to his social and intellectual qualities, sets his 
 countrymen a good example in this respect, and is generally 
 to be seen in his pew, with several of his attaches. 
 
 The music is led here, also, by a squad of small boys from 
 the minister's, Mr. Belson's, charity school. He, his wife 
 and daughter, have collected quite a number of wild German 
 urchins together, clothed them decently, and taught them 
 English, and the way they should go ; they sing old, well- 
 known chants, and I am delighted to be able to shout away 
 on " Venite exultemus " and the " Te Deum" which are sung 
 every Sunday. The long service being completed, the pastor 
 ascends the pulpit and announces his text. But it is pre 
 cious little of his sermons that I hear, for while my eyes are 
 fixed upon the preacher, my mind goes wandering off to New 
 Haven, and sits with you, and listens to Dr. C., as learnedly 
 and powerfully he discusses a favorite text, with a good screed 
 of orthodox Calvinism, a slight sprinkling of poetical quota 
 tion, and a moving appeal at the close. How different they 
 used to be from the inanities of that man in a black bag, who 
 10 

 
 146 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 has at last concluded his mighty discourse. And so from the 
 church to the hotel, and our Sunday dinner ; the hallowing 
 influences of the day may be seen translated into Berlin 
 German in the carefully trimmed moustache of the porter, 
 the stiff standing collar and pure white vest of the head 
 waiter, and the nice pudding which forms our dessert on this 
 occasion. I do not doubt that even in Protestant Prussia 
 the Sabbath has, to most, but little more significance than is 
 shown in these trifling matters. Dinner over, the afternoon 
 soon slipped away, and P. and I went to the Dome Church 
 to hear a German sermon. After two hymns, one of them 
 ten verses long, in which the congregation joined with a uni 
 versality and unction which would have gladdened the heart 
 of H. W. Beecher, the minister, the Rev. Mr. Strauss, the 
 chief Court Preacher, made his appearance and realized to 
 my mind the idea of a court preacher, his eyes continually 
 smiling, and a manner most soft and insinuating, he seemed 
 to my mind just the man to smooth the way to Heaven for a 
 royal family, allowing no unpleasant truths to clog the paths, 
 and no briers of self-denial to scratch the royal flesh. And 
 his sermon did not bely his outward appearance. His text 
 was Rom. xiii. 12, 13. " The night is far spent," etc. From 
 this he drew a moral which translated into English would 
 read, " You had better be good, you had better be good." Not 
 withstanding the bad effects of the formality and spiritless 
 morality of the Lutheran Church, it is far, far above the 
 Roman Catholic. The thoughts of the people, though chilled 
 by forms, are in no slavery to confessional and Pope. Still the 
 baneful effects of a too close union between church and state 
 are very perceptible here, and it is difficult to think very 
 highly of a conversion and confirmation which is necessary 
 for admittance to the lowest office, and for license to practice 
 the simplest trade. 
 
 BERLIN, December 13, 1857. 
 
 MY DEAR COUSIN Really I must get away from 
 
 Berlin in imagination, if not in reality, or else the ink in my 
 pen will freeze under its chilly atmosphere ; so let us talk
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 147 
 
 together of a region where the airs are softer and the skies 
 bluer than in this Hyperborean city. To Venice ! Ah, that 
 lovely place is now for me as well as for you a child of mem 
 ory, and the tales of its river streets, its merchant palaces, its 
 gliding gondolas and rich relics of Oriental wealth and power, 
 can no longer fill my mind with vague, ill-defined ideas, nor 
 send my imagination off in aimless flights after its as yet unseen 
 beauties, as they used to do in days that are past. Instead 
 of this, I have now, stored up in one of memory's sweetest 
 nooks, a charming recollection which can " never pass into 
 nothingness," but which will always remain in my mind, en 
 riching it with its indefinable charm, and enlarging it with 
 sensations of a beauty at once rich and rare, which it had 
 never before experienced. In seeing Venice, the dreams of 
 my school-boy days were more completely realized than if I 
 had seen even Rome itself; in fact, the city of Sallust and 
 Caesar, Livy and Horace, always reminded me powerfully of 
 long Latin lessons, and of being kept in after school for not 
 learning them ; and Corinne's eternal noise and nonsense 
 gave the coup-de-grace to all my youthful interest in the Seven 
 Hilled city. But of Venice all my early impressions were 
 bright and pleasant ; she, to me, " was as a fairy city of the 
 heart ; " and then what thronging associations the genius of 
 many ages has gathered about her, by the aid of both prose 
 and poetry. I think that Schiller's " Ghost-Seer " struck me 
 as perhaps the piece of literature which was most thoroughly 
 imbued with the spirit of the place ; and often when I paced 
 the great Piazza di San Marco late into the night, when the 
 noise of the crowd and the blaze of gas-lights had given place 
 to the silence of the night and the friendly beam of the stars, 
 I would be seized with a kind of superstitious dread, or 
 rather, nervousness, and at such times I would look around^ 
 expecting every moment to see the mysterious Armenian 
 watching me intently, or to feel the heavy hand of the still 
 
 more mysterious Russian laid upon my shoulder If I 
 
 considei Venice aright it is neither the pictures of Titian or 
 Tintoretto, the palaces of San Michele, nor the churches of
 
 148 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Palladio that make it what it is, but the city itself, with the 
 wonderful peculiarities which separate it from every other city 
 in the world. I think that I should have had almost as good 
 an idea of Venice if I had not seen a single picture or entered 
 a single church while there. Not that I did not very fully 
 enjoy the beautiful pictures of Titian. I think that I have as 
 yet seen no paintings which have given me such complete and 
 unmixed pleasure as they did. My two favorites were that 
 gorgeous " Assumption of the Virgin," in the Academy, and 
 that charming votive offering of the Pesaro family, which stands 
 almost opposite to the painter's own monument in the church 
 of Santa Maria Gloriosa. The celebrated ' ' Peter Martyr " I 
 was unable to appreciate very highly, although it is easy to 
 see that it is painted with wonderful skill ; but, as I told J. at 
 the time, I had no patience with the situation of the figures, 
 wherein one rather " scaly "-looking assassin is represented 
 as rushing upon Peter and his companion, both of them 
 sturdy and muscular men, and killing Peter, while his com 
 panion ignominiously takes to flight. Such a state of affairs 
 my own pugnacious disposition is totally unable to compre 
 hend, for from a comparison of the muscular developments 
 of Peter and the assassin, I should think that the saint ought 
 
 to give the sinner a tremendous thrashing I had a 
 
 most delightful week in Venice, although at times I was 
 rather lonely for want of a companion. I left her with much 
 regret, and went on to Padua and Verona. After passing 
 through some most charming scenery, I reached Brescia, and 
 spent several very pleasant hours there, most of the time in 
 vestigating the old Roman remains which were discovered in 
 
 the temple exhumed there, not a great while ago After 
 
 going through the churches and picture-galleries of Brescia, 
 I went on to Bergamo. I had, that afternoon, from the top 
 of the old Castello, a view of the country round, which sur 
 passed in beauty almost everything that I have seen out of 
 Switzerland. The broad, fertile plains of Lombardy lay 
 before me ; in the far west could be faintly traced the outline 
 of the stately Cathedral of Milan, a conspicuous object at the
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 149 
 
 distance of thirty-five miles. Off to the north, the landscape 
 was shut in by the Alps, which enclose and hold in their laps 
 the lovely lakes of Como and Maggiore. To the south ap 
 peared in the dim distance the Apennines with cities at their 
 base, while off in the far northwest loomed up the mountains 
 of the St. Gothard, and still further off, Monte Rosa itself, 
 whose name was fully explained by the soft purple and red 
 light which tinged not only it, but the whole range, with the 
 lovely hues of an October sunset, and poured over the whole 
 valley a wealth of autumn glory, such as I had scarcely hoped 
 to see out of our own dear land of the west, the sunset's bright 
 est and fairest home. And I thought to myself, " Give me 
 that western home, with its active manly life, blessed by 
 honesty and upheld by self-respect, and remove far away the 
 pests and plague-spots of this rotten European system ; and 
 if Art cannot flourish under the tree of Liberty, then let Art 
 die " . . . .1 spent a week at Munich, fairly reveling in 
 Art. What an admirable historical collection the Pinacothek 
 is, for the old German and Italian schools !....! could 
 talk about these things without ceasing, almost, were it not for 
 two important considerations, first, that I am boring the un 
 happy victim, and next, the more I say about these things the 
 more I display my ignorance of art, and undoubtedly expose 
 myself to what old ^Eschylus would called " infinite laughter." 
 But perhaps, after all, my simple impressions won't hurt any 
 body, and if they interest you, or recall to you pleasant 
 memories of the past year they will fulfill their mission well 
 
 enough 
 
 December 19, 1857. 
 
 .... We had a great excitement at the American Lega 
 tion last Tuesday, all the Americans in town having been in 
 vited there to a dejettner, at which they were to meet that 
 great man, Alexander Von Humboldt. There were so many 
 points of great interest, and also of peculiar ludicrousness, 
 mingling in this affair, that I must give you an account of it. 
 
 For myself, I should not have wasted the time to go there, 
 for I had wished to make a separate call on Humboldt, had it 

 
 150 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 not been that Gov. W. had made great promises about sundry 
 buckwheat cakes, mince pies, Indian Johnny-cake, tomato, 
 and many other old friends among the edibles, which, with 
 the help of the ladies, he was going to bring into a state of 
 proper redness. So then I, unable from this Pisgah of expec 
 tation to resist this Canaan prospect of American grub, threw 
 down my Gaius, Justinian, and Montesquieu, put on my tail 
 coat, finished my letter to grandpapa, and pretty punctually at 
 12 M. presented myself at the Legation, which is in a very nice 
 house, but, alas ! up four pair of stairs, which it is a weariness 
 to climb. Considering how lazy most of these Continentals 
 are, it is strange that these four pair do not cause a rupture 
 of diplomatic relations between them and the United States. 
 
 In the parlor I found about forty Americans, of whom three 
 were ladies. Of the gentlemen present I need say nothing, 
 except that they looked much as might have been expected. 
 I was not at all ashamed of the New England representation, 
 there being no less than seven graduates of old Yale. 
 
 At \z\ precisely, the announcement was made that " Hum- 
 boldt was coming," and Gov. W., with the assistance of two 
 of his attaches, who acted as aides-de-camp under this trying 
 emergency, arranged his forces to meet the advancing Lion. 
 The disposition of the troops was most admirable ; in front he 
 placed the ladies, on either side frowned the dark array of 
 black coats, ready to rush to the rescue if the van should 
 falter. The arrangement reminded me of Napoleon's echelon 
 battles, the artillery in front and in the centre, while the in 
 fantry and cavalry supported the flank and reserve. Having 
 thus posted us, the Gov. retired, and soon returned again with 
 all his attaches, and also with the venerable object of interest 
 which we had assembled to stare at. The Governors remarks 
 were very brief, therefore that was soon over. 
 
 The old gentleman responded in a few polite common 
 places, which showed that he was much pleased with his re 
 ception. Upon being requested to take the big arm-chair, he 
 refused, until the ladies were seated, and then he sat down and 
 began to talk, in a right cheerful and lively way, with the
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 151 
 
 ladies and gentlemen as they were introduced to him, and as 
 they stood or sat around his chair, so I had a capital oppor 
 tunity to observe him. He wears his years, nearly ninety, 
 with a wonderful life and spirit. He is below the medium 
 height, a frame which seems once to have been compact and 
 strong enough, but which stoops, though not excessively, and 
 seems still to retain strength and vitality. From his eye there 
 still shine remnants of that searching glance which has seen 
 and observed so much more than is allotted to the share of 
 ordinary men, and from his lips still pour the utterances of 
 that wisdom which brought forth " Cosmos," the almost infi 
 nite source of universal learning ; and upon the ruins of his 
 failing body his soul sits throned, like Lear in the hovel, worn 
 and battered by travel, and tempest, and the flight of years, 
 and labor unending, but yet a kingly soul, before which no 
 living human intellect can refuse to bow in reverential homage, 
 as to a mighty master, who for nearly three generations has 
 lived in close and sweet communion with Nature, and has 
 learned from her secrets which have been hidden from minds 
 less vast and universal. But to return from the spiritual to 
 the material. He was dressed in a button-up over-coat, evi 
 dently for the protection of his frame against the winter air, 
 and around his neck an enormous white handkerchief, which 
 reached up to the top of his head behind, and half enveloped 
 his face, so that his utterances seemed to proceed from a white 
 cloud. He talked on all sorts of subjects, principally Ameri 
 can affairs at the present day, upon which he was probably as 
 well, if not better informed than any American present. He 
 discussed the Mormon question, and gave it as his opinion, that 
 the troubles which arise in our political world were chiefly ow 
 ing to our allowing foreigners to vote. The opinion which he 
 expressed upon this subject was such as would gain for him the 
 unanimous nomination and support of the Know-Nothing 
 party, for any office, from President down. He led the con 
 versation in a very graceful and easy manner, and talked more 
 than any one else. He seemed very kindly disposed towards 
 our people, and considering that we were titleless and order-
 
 152 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 less, he complimented us by not wearing a single one of the 
 numberless titles and orders which have been heaped upon 
 him by many princely hands. He expressed great pleasure, 
 upon leaving, at having met so many Americans. I was so 
 much pleased that I did n't care, although the great American 
 breakfast had turned out a failure. I have thought since, what 
 a grand and noble thing it would be to be such a man, and 
 yet, when I examine myself, I find that my ambition is so 
 wild and foolish, that it would not be satisfied with any 
 thing else. 
 
 To make a high and clear mark in the world, to leave a 
 name at the sound of which in after days, hearts might thrill 
 and eyes brighten, to do something great, whether in literature, 
 in law, or in active life, something that will live after me, for 
 all this I have deep and restless longings, which, alas, cannot 
 see their way even to a partial fulfillment 
 
 Among the many benefits which I enjoyed by being matric 
 ulated into the University, the greatest is that I have nothing 
 to do with the police, and so when I want to leave Berlin for 
 Dresden, instead of being obliged to get my passport from the 
 police office, and have it vis6d t I simply procured a " permit of 
 travel " from the University Court, in which it is stated that 
 the "Herr law student, William Wheeler, 5 feet 5! inches in 
 height, light hair and beard, free forehead, blue gray eyes, reg 
 ular nose and mouth, oval chin, healthy complexion, has re 
 ceived permission to travel to Dresden and back, the object 
 of the journey being ' For Pleasure.' " This will save me some 
 trouble, for the police at Dresden are said to be very strict, 
 and to conjure with a man's passport abominably, for which 
 conjuring they charge a good fee. 
 
 Although Berlin is rather a humdrum and common-place city, 
 yet it has its peculiarities and oddities, and you can easily im 
 agine that I am always on the bright lookout for any such to 
 produce a little laughable excitement. One standing joke, 
 which affords a good deal of amusement, is to observe the 
 manners and customs of the droschky drivers, the droschky 
 being the counterpart of our hack, but the droschky driver 
 has no counterpart in any place that I ever visited.
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 153 
 
 Very stout in person, somewhat like Old Tony Weller, and 
 protected from wind and rain alike by water-proof hats and 
 enormous overcoats, they sit on the boxes of their carriages, 
 totally regardless of fares or any other sublunary considera 
 tions, especially as they generally are wrapt in roseate slumbers. 
 If I were a draughtsman, I could quickly produce a series of 
 " strolls past a droschky stand," which would rival Cruikshank 
 in comicality, and make John Leach hide his diminished 
 head 
 
 It is rather late in the month to wish you a merry Christ 
 mas and a Happy New Year ; may you all be preserved in 
 health and happiness through the coming year, and as the 
 year '57 has been for us one of sad parting, may the year '58 
 behold one joyful meeting ; accept this, dearest mother, as my 
 greeting for the New Year. 
 
 BERLIN, December 21, 1857. 
 
 DEAR AUNTY, I received your kind and interesting letter 
 last Saturday, and you shall have an answer to it immediately? 
 if you will be satisfied with a short one. But I scarcely feel 
 able to write you a letter of sufficient interest to repay you for 
 yours. Since my life has been that of a quiet student, and 
 engaged rather in dry law than in pleasing art, I could give 
 you an accurate account of the laws of the old Roman Re 
 public, or of the Constitution of Sulla, with much more con 
 fidence than I could discourse on the frescoes of Kaulbach, the 
 statues of Rauch, or the pictures of Van Eyck or Correggio, 
 although I have by no means neglected art, and the Gallery, 
 which is open free at all times, has been one of my favorite 
 loafing places. It pleased me so much to read your opinions on 
 art and to see that, in a great measure, they corresponded with 
 my own, and I must acknowledge that I was far more im 
 pressed with the interior of the Milan Cathedral than I allowed 
 at the time ; but the fact is I had just then grown so in love 
 with Nature's fairest works, that I was scarcely in a fit state to 
 look with proper awe and admiration upon the solemn tem 
 ples which man had piled in honor of Nature's God. But as 
 I recall in memory its vast dim aisles and glorious pillars, and
 
 154 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 windows blazing with wealth of art, I can think of nothing 
 which surpasses it but that incomparable building, the Dome 
 of Cologne. May I live to make another pilgrimage to Europe, 
 some twenty or thirty years hence, and see that wondrous 
 structure in a state of completion. But the only one of your 
 criticisms to which I cannot respond, is that upon Titian, 
 " that he is ' of the earth earthy.' " Now I will give up, with 
 perfect willingness, Old Rubens, throw Tintoretto and Gior- 
 gione overboard, call them earthy if you will, but I can't hear 
 Titian condemned in such a wholesale manner without sticking 
 up for him a little. Far be it from me to place him above, or 
 on an equality with, the spiritual Raphael, who has won my 
 whole heart already by the few specimens I have seen of him, 
 for Raphael's art was surely something divine. But let Titian 
 have a place not much below him, and far above the imitators 
 of Raphael, who, like Icarus, soared too high for their waxen 
 wings, and tumbled headlong. The successful painter of the 
 natural surely ought to stand above the unsuccessful repre- 
 senter of the supernatural. 
 
 The pictures of Titian's which I enjoyed the most were the 
 lovely " Vanity " in the Louvre, about which I think I have 
 bored you already ; a splendid " Woman taken in Adultery " 
 at Brescia ; and two or three at Venice, especially the " Assump 
 tion of the Virgin " and the votive offerings he painted for the 
 chapel of the Pesaro family. To these I can add that charm 
 ing portrait of his daughter Lavinia, which is in the gallery 
 here, and before which I spend some time at every visit. I ex 
 pect a great treat when we go to Dresden, among other treasures 
 of art, in seeing his " Christ with the Tribute Money," which 
 is said to be the finest and most perfect among the works of 
 his earlier period. I have been studying up somewhat upon 
 the history of Italian art, for which this gallery affords admir 
 able opportunities. There is scarcely any so rich in specimens 
 of those old pre-Raphael masters such as Filippo Lippi, Viva- 
 rinis, Cima da Conegliano, Carpaccio, Andrea Mantegna, 
 Morone, Perugino, Francia, etc., with which formidable array 
 I am beginning to have a dim kind of friendship and acquaint-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 155 
 
 ance. In fact, the only way really to enjoy a gallery is to 
 have plenty of time to study it, and let the beauties come upon 
 you gradually. 
 
 But enough of art. We received by the Atlantic the welcome 
 news that Fernando Wood had been defeated. It was announced 
 by Mr. D., who came in late to dinner with the newspaper in 
 his hand, and the enthusiastic delight of the whole party, 
 Democrats and all, was so great that we immediately had some 
 champagne and drank the health of D. F. Tieman and Pelatiah 
 Perit and the Police Commissioners. It does really seem as if 
 that unfortunate city was now to have a respite from its riots 
 and murders, and was about to lose its reputation of being 
 the most miserably governed city in the world. 
 
 December 22. What an odd day for Pilgrim's day! A 
 mild temperature, drizzling rain, and candles almost all the 
 day long. They don't seem capable of getting up a decent 
 storm here everything is a mere drizzle, drozzle, and nothing 
 like the weather in which 
 
 " The breaking waves dashed high, 
 On a stern and rock-bound coast." 
 
 The only notice which our crowd took of the day has been to 
 read Bryant's pretty little poem on the subject together, and to 
 wish ourselves at. home with unusual fervency. . . . 
 With love, your affectionate nephew. 
 
 BERLIN, January 19, 1858. 
 
 .... During the interval that has elapsed since I wrote, 
 my life has flowed on in such a regular and quiet channel that 
 if I had tried to write before this, I should have been reduced 
 to mere metaphysical discussion or poetical revery, in order to 
 fill up my pages. I am becoming convinced, more and more, 
 that letter-writing cannot be in a high degree conversational. 
 I think that the reason of this is, that a person in a foreign 
 land especially imagines it necessary to have his letters always 
 full of something new and strange and beautiful, and he cannot 
 rid himself of the idea that quiet daily life is a rather poor 
 subject to talk about, after he has been describing pictures,
 
 156 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 churches, and mountains, and imparting his impressions of the 
 manners of various people. Of this idea I am endeavoring to 
 free myself, but still it is hard for me to think that you can take 
 as much interest in my student experience here in Berlin as I do 
 in the relation of what goes on at home, even down to the most 
 trifling detail and particular 
 
 The marriage of young Prince Frederic William and young 
 Princess Victoria of England is of course all the talk here now ; 
 the city is to be illuminated, there is to be a procession of the 
 trades, etc., and a band of the thirty fairest maidens in Berlin 
 are to receive the princess at the city gates. I do not see 
 where they are going to scare up so many pretty girls as that, 
 for neither in concert, opera, or church, in street or carriage, 
 have I seen a single female who, in our favored land, would be 
 called very pretty. However, notwithstanding all her beautiful 
 portraits in the shop windows, the princess is said to be rather 
 homely, so that there would be a sort of impropriety in her be 
 ing received by any very charming bevy of beauties. 
 
 I have been reading with much interest the proceedings 
 which have recently transpired in the United States Senate 
 with reference to the President's message, and especially the 
 treatment of the Kansas question. Such a piece of flagrant 
 injustice was never heard of, I think, as to force a Constitution 
 upon the people, without giving them the liberty of saying 
 whether they would accept it or not. Especially pointed and full 
 of matter have been the speeches of Douglas ; still I am very 
 sorry to see this affair taken up by the leaders of the Demo 
 cratic party, for I believe that the Free State men will now 
 content themselves with only half-way justice. It would be 
 better to wait longer and struggle more, that in the end the 
 advantages obtained might be more complete and satisfactory. 
 I always look with suspicion upon any change for the better 
 in the conduct and principles of the Democratic leaders ; it is 
 almost too much like the conversion of " Reynard the Fox " in 
 the German story, and the subsequent pilgrimage which he 
 undertook. 
 . At the present time, the advantages to be gained by Douglas,
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 157 
 
 in rallying round himself the opposition to the administration, 
 are so great, that they might easily cause the motives and 
 honesty of a much better man to be suspected. His sudden 
 defection seemed to make a great sensation in the administra 
 tion camp, and Mr. Bigler made a very poor business of it in 
 trying to respond to the little Illinoisian. The poor man 
 seemed as much frightened as the master of a menagerie might 
 be if a lion, whom he had always supposed to be tame and 
 manageable, should suddenly show his teeth and rush at him. . . 
 
 In the last number of the " Weekly Times " there was 
 quite a long sketch of Florence Nightingale, by Mary Cow- 
 den Clarke. I was very glad to get hold of something of the 
 sort, as my ideas of that admirable woman had always been 
 of a rather dim and ill-defined nature. Such a charming and 
 noble character, such active benevolence, with so little 
 show and pretense; so intensely energetic, and yet so re 
 tiring ; so deeply devoted to one great aim, and yet always so 
 ready to afford sympathy and assistance to any and all of the 
 great needs that touch and move the human heart ! To read 
 of such a woman gives a higher and nobler idea of the capaci 
 ties and powers of woman as woman. I defy any man to rise 
 from that reading without a greater esteem of, and more 
 hearty respect for, the other sex. Another more practical 
 effect of the consideration of such a character must be, I 
 think, to fill many a young man with a lofty emulation to use 
 his powers too those energetic capabilities, which are the 
 gift of man as gentle sympathy and strong affections are those 
 of woman for doing good to his kind, and helping, for his 
 part, to bear the burdens of others, which have been laid too 
 heavily on them by adverse fate or unhappy circumstances. 
 
 Do you think that the profession of the law is one which 
 allows very many opportunities for doing good ? Such, at 
 any rate, is not the generally received opinion ; but I hope I 
 may not find, in my own case, that the lawyer necessarily ex 
 cludes the man of tender and benevolent feelings. 
 
 A party of nine of us, all Americans, paid a visit, last Sat 
 urday, to the Royal Schloss or Palace. It is an immense
 
 I$8 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 building, in the shape of a quadrangle, and equal to a city 
 square at home. The top is crowned by a vast dome, about 
 the largest one I ever saw, the top of it being made to re 
 semble the Prussian crown. Some of the rooms within are 
 quite splendid, especially one called the White Hall, which 
 has been newly fitted up within a few years, at an expense of 
 $600,000, quite a sum to expend upon a single apartment. 
 The whole arrangement of the rooms did not please me nearly 
 so much as that of the palace at Munich, which was built and 
 decorated by a king who had more taste and art in his head 
 than have existed in the thick skulls of the whole Prussian 
 dynasty together, from the Electors of Brandenburg down to 
 the present most gracious king. But nowhere have I seen a 
 palace which looked as if it was built to be lived in, nor have 
 I been in one in which I would be willing to take up my 
 abode for life. I hear that the English palaces are much 
 more inhabitable. Is it then really the case that " comfort " 
 exists, neither in word nor in fact, anywhere save in the Anglo- 
 Saxon nations ? 
 
 I have driven work at a very good rate since I came back 
 from Dresden, and have managed to accomplish something. 
 I find that keeping constantly busy is an admirable remedy 
 against homesickness, and that azure demon has great diffi 
 culty in making an entry. Still there are unoccupied mo 
 ments, when he gets at me, and seems to make up for lost 
 time by the violence with which he attacks. I am reading, 
 with much interest, Montesquieu's "Spirit of Laws" in the 
 original, to stir up my French somewhat. It is an admirable 
 book, and characterized by great liberality and learning. I 
 should like to arrive at just such scholarly attainments in the 
 law, and to be filled with just such generous and liberal sen 
 timents, as to be able to write such a book. 
 
 My principal amusement at present is in attending the con 
 certs of instrumental music, which occur every Tuesday and 
 Friday afternoons. The bulk of the performance consists of 
 symphonies of the great masters, and they are executed as 
 tonishingly well. I take my book along and read during the
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 159 
 
 intervals and the performance of pieces in which I take little 
 interest. These concerts cost only twelve and a half cents 
 apiece ; and for a subscriber like myself, who buys a large 
 number of the tickets at a time, only six and a quarter cents. 
 My great want just now is that of female society. With the 
 exception of my busy landlady, with whom I hold discourses 
 every morning, as she squats on the floor and makes the fire, 
 
 1 have not spoken to a female for over a month. 
 
 To A. W. D. 
 
 BERLIN, Jan. 28, 1858. 
 
 The weather is too important a topic not to be discussed, 
 for it makes a most amazing difference in my whole frame of 
 mind, whether it is a fine day or not. To-day, after a strug 
 gle with the clouds, the sun has succeeded in making his 
 appearance, and his beams, covering a large patch of my 
 floor, are extremely grateful. He manages to get up now to 
 a pretty good height above the horizon, and makes a much 
 longer day of it than he did a month ago, when we dined at 
 
 2 P. M. by gas-light, and had only about five or six hours of 
 real day. To-day is a sharp, bright January day, one of the 
 coldest that we have had. The snow lies about two inches 
 deep on the roofs, but pretty well worn away in the streets. 
 The broad dirty gutters are frozen up and thus prevented for 
 a time from sending forth their usual rich odors, for which 
 Berlin is famous. The frost has melted off my window, so 
 that I can look out and scrutinize my surroundings, which are 
 not without some interest, although No. 27 Mittelstrasse 
 could not exactly be said to be situated in the most lively 
 part of Berlin. Everybody is walking fast to get out of the 
 cold as soon as possible. An American would be struck by 
 the peculiar head-dresses worn by the German women of the 
 lower classes, for they don't wear, any at all, but have their 
 hair very neatly and often very beautifully arranged, and so 
 go bare-headed in the severest weather ; otherwise, however, 
 they are generally much more warmly clad than persons of 
 the same class at home. A milk-cart, attached to two large
 
 I6O LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 dogs, stands nearly opposite my window. This is one of the 
 regular institutions of Berlin, and dog-carts are to be seen 
 everywhere. The driver of the dog-cart now in front of my 
 window has gone away, and the two poor canine steeds have 
 lain down upon the frozen ground and have gone to sleep. 
 Probably they are now oblivious of their miseries, and have 
 forgotten hunger, cold, and kicks. Doubtless they are gnaw 
 ing phantom bones in canine dreamlands. An innumerable 
 squad of little children, just returned from school, are busily 
 engaged in hunting up a smooth place in the gutter to slide 
 on, and they make the scene quite lively, with their merry 
 laughter and pretty faces ; for German children are pretty, 
 although they get bravely over every tendency of that de 
 scription before they grow up to manhood and womanhood. 
 Scores of little sparrows are hopping about in the sun, pick 
 ing up every vestige of food which they can find, and looking 
 as though they considered themselves very spunky in coming 
 out in such cold weather. When the wind blows hard they 
 all sit in a long row, sometimes as many as fifty or sixty to 
 gether, on the ledge which projects above the windows of a 
 house, and thus find a shelter ; but if anything is thrown out 
 into the street which can possibly be eaten, they pop down, 
 just like boys diving off a wharf, one after another, in a very 
 comical way, and the grub is soon disposed of by their busy 
 little bills. Three butchers come out of their shop, laughing 
 very jollily and rubbing their hands ; how can they jest so 
 when they have just been depriving a fellow-being of life, for 
 did I not see, a little while ago, a highly-reluctant pig dragged 
 in there, and, doubtless having a presentiment of his fate, fill 
 ing the air with piercing yells ? Oh, ye butchers ; what have 
 ye done with that innocent pig ? They pass by without an 
 swering, and I fear that they do not duly appreciate the enor 
 mity of what they have done : probably they were more con 
 cerned about the enormity of the pig. A student passes by, 
 with a Chor or secret-society cap upon his head ; the colors 
 are black, white, and pink, which shows that he belongs to 
 the Chor known as the Prussians. If he is thinking at all, his
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 161 
 
 mind is probably divided between the number of mugs of 
 beer which he drank last night and the duel which he is going 
 to fight to-morrow ; the lives of these society or chor men 
 being made up chiefly, not of "victuals and drink," like " the 
 old woman that lived under the hill," of Mother Goose celeb 
 rity, but rather of " duels and drink ; " the ambition of the 
 student duellist being to cut his adversary dreadfully with his 
 sword, and his fame measured by the number of needles' 
 lengths which the doctor has had to use to sew up his antag 
 onist's wounds ; thus, "five needles" would be a good long 
 cut, reaching from the forehead to the chin, and laying open 
 the whole face. 
 
 But hark ! from a neighboring court-yard comes a sound 
 which is familiar enough to both of us the mellifluous 
 sounds of a hand-organ. Now in America I should be in 
 clined to go out and send him away as a nuisance, but here 
 I do not feel so, for probably that poor organ-grinder is an 
 old invalid soldier, who has seen great battles, and whose 
 heart, perhaps, would throb if I should speak to him of Leip- 
 sic, Dresden, Lutzen, or Waterloo. It makes me sad to see 
 them, men who fought like heroes in the " War of Libera 
 tion," and gave Germany once more an independent name, 
 when she had been trodden under foot by the French in 
 vaders; men who, on the New Year's night of 1814, march 
 ing to join Wellington, arrived upon the banks of the great 
 German river, whose waters had been saved to Germany by 
 their exertions, and, with one unanimous cry, rushed forward, 
 and in an ecstacy of successful patriotism shouted, " The 
 Rhine ! the Rhine ! " Then who, under the generalship of 
 Bliicher, arrived upon the bloody field of Waterloo just in 
 time to save the day, and to overthrow the greatest man of 
 the world, is it fit that such men should go about half like 
 beggars, with a hand-organ on their shoulders, and thus ob 
 tain from charity that support which they so richly deserve 
 from a rescued country? After this don't let anybody tell 
 me that republics are ungrateful. Just compare this arrange 
 ment with our own. We give the veteran soldier a tract of 
 ii
 
 1 62 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 noble land in the West, where he can sit down and spend his 
 life as an independent land-owner, and with the prospect of 
 leaving his children improved property, which will enrich 
 them. Here the old soldier, perhaps blind or lame, receives 
 permission to grind a hand-organ, and for this valuable license 
 he pays a large fee. It sometimes makes me feel quite en 
 raged, as do many other of the peculiar monarchical dodges 
 
 which they get up here 
 
 But now the sounds of the hand-organ are growing fainter 
 and fainter, and as the sun has got behind the roof of one of 
 the houses opposite, I must retire to the other corner of my 
 room, and establish self and portfolio within the genial atmos 
 phere which surrounds my stove for a distance of about three 
 feet on every side. Odd-looking things these porcelain stoves 
 are, and as they stand in the corner of the room, looking so 
 ghastly, they sometimes make me think that probably several 
 years ago there must have been an iron stove there, but it 
 died, and now its favorite place is haunted by its ghost, all 
 in white, sending out also a very ghostly and impalpable kind 
 of heat ; I really believe that if we should have any very cold 
 weather I should be found some frosty morning stark and 
 stiff, embracing my abominable German stove, as if to prevail 
 upon it to be merciful and to recall a little of the heat which 
 it used to have when it was alive and a respectable iron stove. 
 .... At the risk of repeating what you have very possibly 
 heard before, I must give you an account of our German 
 music here, especially of a series of concerts which come off 
 every Tuesday and Friday, and which I attend quite regularly. 
 In a hall of very large dimensions, without any fixed seats, 
 but filled with small movable tables, with chairs around them, 
 sit a large and highly-respectable audience, the ladies with 
 their knitting or embroidery, the gentlemen with their beer, 
 while upon a raised platform a most admirable orchestra, in 
 ferior only to that of the opera, performs beautifully the most 
 classical German music. The programme generally contains 
 two symphonies, three overtures, and one or two andantes 
 and fantasias, and the names of at least three of the six great
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 163 
 
 masters, Mozart, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Weber, Haydn, and 
 Handel, secure good music enough to satisfy any one. Be 
 sides these there are generally a couple of admirable pieces 
 by men of less note, such as Liszt, Berlioz, Cherubini, and 
 Schubert. I enjoy these concerts so much that I can scarcely 
 avoid wasting an afternoon every time one of them comes off. 
 They are so free and unrestrained one can do what he pleases, 
 and I sometimes take a book along and study during the per 
 formance of borous pieces. 
 
 But my favorite way is to fling my head down on my arms 
 on the table, and, shutting out the glaring lights and the 
 well-dressed people, to listen undisturbed to the sweet music, 
 now so sad, and now so powerful. To me it is beginning to 
 have a deep meaning, such as I was never able to discover in 
 music before. Hark ! it is a pastoral symphony of Beetho 
 ven. How fresh and clear the sounds rise up, bringing before 
 the mind the pure air and the immeasurable blue sky. That 
 delicate flute-passage reminds of the running brooks and their 
 flower-clad banks, while the soft summer wind gently murmurs 
 in the tree-tops throughout the grand old forest. Now, in 
 merry chorus and with clanging horns, the hunt breaks in upon 
 the solitude, and then departs, fading sweetly* softly away in 
 the distance. 
 
 " Oh, sweet and far, from cliff and scaur 
 The horns of elf-land faintly blowing." 
 
 And now, the jocund harvest home, the dance after toil, and 
 the song of even-tide, while the sun sinks sadly in the west, 
 and solemn night comes on, heralded by the evening star. 
 How glorious and lovely is Nature ! How superior to all Art, 
 since the highest triumph of the latter is to successfully imitate 
 the former. 
 
 Or perhaps the piece is an andante by Mozart, and, what 
 is more, a religious andante. Cathedral aisles, with vaulted 
 Gothic roofs and pointed windows, through which streams the 
 richly-tinted light, are the proper places in which to hear such 
 stately music, and the solemn organ should add its voice of 
 power to the noble tones. 

 
 164 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Ignorant as I am of the technicalities of music, it seems to 
 me that the first German masters have the power of managing 
 the minor passages beyond all others. Those passages, which 
 when treated by some, are so often harsh, and even discordant, 
 become the gems of German music. Ideas and sentiments 
 are produced by their sad, wild tones which seem beyond the 
 sphere of the major key, and which touch with wonderful 
 gentleness a chord which exists in every human heart the 
 chord of melancholy. I am afraid that I have not succeeded 
 in expressing my ideas upon this subject very distinctly, but I 
 shall be perfectly satisfied if you understand me, though I am 
 rather afraid that you will laugh at my crude impressions of 
 music 
 
 I will not bore you with an account of my studies; suffice 
 it to say that my attention is considerably occupied by the in 
 teresting writings of a certain gentleman, named Justinian, who 
 lived about 540 A. D. Those highly interesting books of his, 
 the Institutes and the Pandects, I have dipped into somewhat, 
 but as I am opposed to light literature, I have not yet taken 
 up his "Novella." French Law, German Art, and Italian 
 Poetry, manage to give the coup de grace to the remainder of 
 my day. 
 
 Sunday Afternoon, Jan. 31. Since I wrote the previous 
 part of this letter, I have been quite gay : Friday night I went 
 to the opera and heard " Der Freischiitz " by Weber, and last 
 night I saw Schiller's " Maria Stuart " performed at the theatre. 
 There are many fine gems in " Der Freischiitz/' especially the 
 overture, about which Jack used to rave greatly, a most charm 
 ing little evening hymn, which I had often heard sung in 
 church at home, without having any idea where it came from, 
 and the Bridesmaid's Song, " A rosy crown," etc. The cele 
 brated incantation scene was very fine, but somehow I could 
 not help comparing it with the witch scene in Shakespeare's 
 " Macbeth " (which I have also seen here as an opera), and re 
 flecting how much the great poet beat the German on his own 
 ground, although the latter had all the celebrated horrors of 
 the Black Forest to back him. " Maria Stuart" was capitally
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 165 
 
 performed, and gave me a better idea of the customs and cos 
 tumes of the time, and also of that particularly romantic piece 
 of history, than I had ever had before. The scene in which 
 Mary walks in the garden after having been shut up in the 
 close castle, her enjoyment of liberty to breathe the fresh air, 
 the wishes which she breathed to the clouds sailing southward 
 towards France, and then the following scene with Elizabeth, 
 were admirably done, and the young actress who performed 
 Mary Stuart was received with enthusiastic applause. This I 
 think is one of Schiller's first plays, equal to " William Tell " 
 and " Don Carlos," and only inferior to the " Maid of Orleans " 
 and the " Robbers." I was never so much aggravated by the 
 immorality of the Germans as yesterday. I had been longing 
 all winter to see Meyerbeer's " Prophete " at the opera. Im 
 agine my disgust at seeing it advertised for to-night ; of course 
 I did not for a moment think of going, for ever since I came 
 abroad, I have kept Sunday very strictly and scrupulously, as 
 a kind of memento of home ; but I can assure you that it was 
 a great disappointment. However my misery was made more 
 tolerable by seeing all my friends in the same condition, and 
 hearing their wrathful growls. It looks odd enough here, to 
 see every one go to church in the morning very devoutly, and 
 then, in the afternoon, to see them out on the skating-ground, 
 or driving round town in their carriages, while, in the evening, 
 a first-rate set of performances is brought out at the theatre 
 and opera. I wonder how the Germans understand the fourth 
 section of the Decalogue. I suppose, however, that this sys 
 tematic breaking of Sunday is rather political than religious ; 
 the government finds it necessary to give the people amuse 
 ments on their day of leisure, in order to keep them out of 
 mischief ; music, public shows, illuminations, etc., divert their 
 minds from politics, and destroy in a great measure their 
 self-respect, and that is just what the rulers want to bring 
 about. 
 
 BERLIN, February i, 1858. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, Notwithstanding the promise con 
 tained in J.'s last, that I should get a letter by Saturday's or
 
 1 66 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Wednesday's mail, I began to fear that I was not going to 
 get any after all, for Monday passed by without bringing me 
 anything, and Wednesday, when the mail of January i3th was 
 to arrive, seemed to intend to treat me in the same manner. 
 All the others announced letters from home, when we met at 
 dinner, but S. and myself, the two most homesick and letter- 
 hungry men in the whole crowd. Imagine my surprise and 
 pleasure, on coming to my room about IIP. M., to see a small 
 white object lying on my table, which I was sure was not there 
 when I went out. You can picture to yourself the haste with 
 which I lit my lamp, and the eagerness with which I tore open 
 the packet, to see who the letters were from, and what was the 
 
 state of affairs at home There was something extremely 
 
 pleasant in receiving such kind letters so late in the evening, 
 and a great relief to my mind when it feared it was about to be 
 disappointed. You will not be surprised to hear that I had a 
 most distinct dream that night, the scene of which was laid in 
 New Haven. It was a lovely summer evening, and I was 
 walking in Hillhouse Avenue ; every tree and house seemed so 
 familiar, and when I got up near No. 10 I could see them 
 through the open window at supper. I hurried by, for fear 
 that they might see me, and make me come in there first, when 
 I wished my first welcome to proceed from you. I turned the 
 corner ; our house looked charming in the summer twilight ; in 
 a moment I was on the front step ; both of the hall doors were 
 open, and you were all walking up and down the hall and out 
 into the back piazza. A. was there with J., and you had one 
 of the children on each side of you. No one saw me, and I 
 was just starting forward to utter a well-known cry, when at 
 the very instant that my foot touched the threshold, I woke up 
 and found that I had kicked off the superincumbent feather 
 bed, and was in a frigid condition, the very reverse of summer. 
 Was it not provoking that I could not dream just a few minutes 
 longer ? . . . . Letters are the only voices we have left us 
 to call up affection's echoes, and to prevent the absent from 
 continually hovering in an atmosphere of doubt and anxiety. 
 I shall be very glad when the time shall come for us to
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 167 
 
 speak no more through silent letters, but audibly and face to 
 face. 
 
 Well, the great transaction is finally done, and England and 
 Prussia are now united by the closest of ties. You will of 
 course read all about it in the quotations from English news 
 papers. In my next I shall be able to give you an account of 
 the performances and festivities which greeted the royal couple 
 on their entry into Berlin, which is to take place next Monday, 
 February 8th. The English ambassador illuminated his house, 
 on the night of the wedding, with a variety of crowns, eagles, 
 and similar monarchical devices ; and prominent above all, that 
 highly sensible motto, " Honi soit qui mal y pense." Extensive 
 preparations are going on for illuminations which are to come 
 off next Monday, especially around the equestrian statue of 
 Frederic the Great, which stands in the finest part of the Lin 
 den, nearly opposite the University. But I must close for the 
 present. 
 
 February 2. What a day this is ! Boreas is out in pon 
 tificals, howling through the streets, and now is blowing be 
 fore him a blinding snow-storm. As I was going to lecture 
 this morning I saw a grand hat chase. The unhappy Teuton 
 pursued for about an eighth of a mile his fugitive beaver, 
 which now trundled on its brim, and now flopped over from 
 side to side ; at length he trod on it, and succeeded in recover 
 ing it, though in a sadly dilapidated condition. 
 
 I await with considerable impatience your answer to my 
 letter in which I asked your opinion with regard to my going 
 to Italy. I recognize the value of the journey more than ever 
 now, since I have more of an idea of the artistic attractions of 
 that fair land, from the histories of art which I have been cram 
 ming somewhat. The idea of possibly going to Greece, with 
 such a companion as Mr. D., is almost too charming to be ful 
 filled. I am in hopes that it may come about, and I take it for 
 granted that you will approve of what will give me so much 
 pleasure and perhaps great profit.
 
 1 68 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 BERLIN, February 14, 1858. 
 
 DEAR J., .... I was glad to hear that you took an in 
 terest in what I wrote about the Dresden Gallery. I should 
 have said something more about it in my last, if my space 
 had not been mostly taken up with discussing another sub 
 ject. It is such a perfect treasure-house of art that it would 
 be unjust for any one to suppose that its fame rests wholly 
 upon the few great chef-d'oeuvres of Raphael, Holbein, and 
 Correggio, which it contains. These form, it is true, its first 
 and highest class, but there is besides these a large number of 
 very beautiful specimens of the best masters, less impressive, 
 perhaps, than the above, but almost equally interesting, al 
 though in a less intense degree. The Venetian school is 
 quite well represented, although I scarcely think that its 
 greatest master is seen here to the best advantage. The cele 
 brated tribute-money picture of the Saviour did not please me 
 very much, though doubtless, in mere mechanism and artistic 
 workmanship, it is a masterpiece. The face of the Saviour 
 struck me as unmeaning and soft, the expression being rather 
 an unpleasant one. 
 
 The principal Venus, too, has been so severely cleaned that 
 the look of the flesh is anything but natural, and the face has 
 rather an insipid mien, which I have seen in several of Titian's 
 pretty women. Palma Vecchio, a contemporary of Titian, 
 has contributed two or three gems to this collection ; a Holy 
 Family, much after Titian's manner, which displays a strange 
 mixture of the rich coloring and brilliant effects of the Vene 
 tian school, with a sweet simplicity and a pervading religious 
 feeling such as is found only in the older masters of the 
 school ; in the more modern ones, as Tintoretto and Paul 
 Veronese, the religious sentiment is either neglected for, or 
 obscured by, the splendid pageants, rich garments, and grace 
 ful animals which appear so universally in their pictures. 
 Paul Veronese's anachronisms amuse me very much. The 
 best of his works at Dresden is that of Faith, Hope, and 
 Love conducting a prominent Venetian family before the
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 169 
 
 Virgin's throne. The whole getting up of the picture, dogs 
 and garments included, is splendid, and the faces of the three 
 angelic virtues are very lovely. In another fine painting of 
 his, the " Finding of Moses among the Bulrushes," Pharaoh's 
 daughter and her maid-servants are all dressed in what I sup 
 pose to be the height of Venetian fashion about the year 
 1575, A. D. In the Pre-raphaelite works of the Roman and 
 Florentine schools, the Dresden Gallery is sadly deficient, and 
 it does not possess a single specimen of the works of Giotto, 
 Fra Angelico, Ghirlandajo, Filippo Lippi, Leonardo da Vinci, 
 or Michael Angelo, except in copies ; and Andrea del Sarto, 
 " the faultless painter," does not appear to much advantage. 
 On the other hand, the collection is very rich in specimens 
 of the Bolognese or Eclectic school, the Caracci, Guido Reni, 
 Francesco Albani, with his charming groups of dancing 
 cupids, Domenichino, Guercino, whose paintings are so soft 
 and sweet. But, although I have a delightful recollection of 
 them all, yet as I took no notes when at Dresden, my account 
 of them would have to be too general to be interesting. But 
 there is one class of painters which I cannot, in justice to my 
 own feelings, pass over unnoticed, and that is the school of 
 the Netherlands, the cabinet pictures of the two Teniers, es 
 pecially the younger Adrian Brouwer, Van Ostade, Metzu, 
 Mieris, Hondekoeter, and Gerard Dow. The first and last 
 of this list, viz., David Teniers the younger, and Gerard Dow, 
 are my most especial favorites. The feelings aroused by 
 these pictures might be said to be exactly the opposite of those 
 excited by the great works of the religious painters, and decid 
 edly of a lower order ; but then it is impossible, or at least pain 
 ful and unnatural, always to keep one's emotions up to the 
 correct pitch of howling enthusiasm ; and it was a great relief 
 to me, after gazing for some time at the Madonna di San Sisto, 
 or those beautiful Correggios, to go into the smaller rooms and 
 exercise the muscles of my diaphragm by having a good laugh 
 at one of Brouwer's horridly vulgar pictures, representing two 
 drunken peasants knocking each other over the head with 
 their beer jugs ; or perhaps some subject still more at vari-
 
 1 70 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 ance with decency and high art. The subjects represented 
 here are nothing more nor less then the mere simple scenes of 
 every-day Dutch life, and are pervaded thoroughly by that 
 humor, which an unprejudiced by-stander, with keen percep 
 tions of the ludicrous, can find in almost every observation of 
 his fellow-men when gathered in a social way. In this class 
 there are very different styles : Brouwer and Van Ostade give 
 us caricatures ; their peasants are inexpressibly coarse and 
 ugly, the combats extravagantly violent, and their subjects 
 abominably vulgar, Teniers, on the contrary, takes the same 
 class of persons, and gives us in a few bold and yet soft 
 touches a most lively and pleasing picture of Dutch life. A 
 capital specimen of Teniers is in the Museum here at Berlin, 
 the "Temptation of St. Anthony," a favorite subject with the 
 Dutch painters, and which is founded on the old church 
 legend. The saint sits at a table in a desert place, with a 
 large book open before him, but from the perusal of which he 
 is somewhat hindered by the delicate attentions paid him by 
 a legion of devils of all sizes and shapes, among whom are 
 portraits of his mother-in-law and his wife, who show the 
 cloven hoof just peeping out from under their dresses. The 
 latter offers him a goblet of wine, which he puts aside with a 
 deprecatory look. The devils display in their number and 
 great variety the inexhaustible genius of the painter. Almost 
 every time that I look at this picture, I discover some new 
 and untried devil, when I thought that I had previously hunted 
 up every one. The greatest charm of all the paintings of 
 Teniers consists in the perfect acquaintance which they show 
 with the phenomena of social life. Perhaps none but artists 
 can tell how such wonderful effects are produced by so few 
 apparently careless touches upon a few inches of canvas, but 
 there is a something in their general result which cannot fail 
 to attract us, although we cannot explain why, for " one touch 
 of nature makes the whole world kin." I think that the life 
 like humorousness of Teniers bears the same relation to the 
 inspired beauty of Raphael, or the graceful fancy of Correggio, 
 that Shakespeare's comedies do to Milton's " Penseroso," or Sir
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 171 
 
 Philip Sydney's sonnets. I suppose that Hondekoeter is the 
 most celebrated painter of live birds that ever lived. One of 
 his best is a grand bird-concert, of which a venerable owl is 
 the Max Maretzek, and beats the time with one foot in a most 
 impressive manner. However, there. is one small rooster, by 
 Metzu, which beats anything of Hondekoeter's, or any one's 
 else that I ever saw in that line. The scene is at the stall of a 
 game-seller, and the proprietor holds out in his hands towards 
 a young woman this ideal rooster, who sits with a demure air, 
 as if to say, "You see I am obliged; to submit to circum 
 stances, but should n't I like .to peck ?" It seems to me per 
 fectly astonishing that anything so spirited and natural could 
 be represented in so very small a space. ... . . ,You will be 
 
 pleased to have heard that I have given .up my blue ideas 
 which I had about going to Italy, and also hope to realize 
 a long-cherished day-dream of mine by seeing Athens and 
 Greece. 
 
 BERLIN, February 18, 1858. 
 
 DEAR M., .... I have .had, for the past three weeks, a 
 very bad cold in the head, to which has been added a cough 
 and sore throat. The former was aggravated, and the latter 
 brought on, by the coldness of the weather on -February 8th, 
 when the young Prince William and his bride, Victoria of 
 England, made their triumphal entry info Berlin. Monday 
 morning opened very fine, and when P. and I sauntered .out 
 into the Linden, it was odd to see what a crowd of people had 
 already gathered there. As early as 10 A. M., the ^companies 
 of the trades were in motion to take their places ; ;for, by an 
 ancient custom, the procession which receives a newly married 
 pair into Berlin is almost wholly civil in its character, conse 
 quently the trades, many of them very ancient and venerable, 
 were out in strong force. After some forty postilions, came 
 the Guild of the Butchers and Merchants; the former, accord 
 ing to an ancient custom, performing the part of civil escort, 
 while a couple of troops of dragoons formed the military one. 
 After these had passed, followed the court carriages, drawn 
 each by six horses, containing those interesting developments
 
 L7TJ?S Of WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 of human nature known as lords of the bed-chamber, gentle 
 men-ushers, ladies-in-waiting, maids-of-honor, etc., who find 
 honor and glory in being the domestics of a king, and carry 
 ing the lap dogs of a princess. Then, in a splendid gilded 
 coach drawn by eight horses, escorted by the governor of the 
 city and the president of police, came the newly married 
 pair. .... But I let the royal carriage pass by, and observe 
 some of the trades and guilds which follow in an immense 
 body 25,000 strong. The first is the Shooters' Guild. Their 
 privileges date from 1548 A. ix They were followed by the 
 miners in their strange dress, as weird as the gnomes and 
 kobolds whose treasures they are employed in plundering. 
 The Guild of Tinners were led by two knights of the olden 
 time, covered, horses and all, with a splendid imitation of the 
 gold and silver plate mail It seemed to me to symbolize the 
 difference between the present age and the age of chivalry ; 
 for the solid iron and steel of those times we have substituted 
 a sort of tin imitation, which can neither stand the thrust of 
 spear nor the blow of sword, but it glitters and that satisfies 
 us. The Fishers' Guild, two hundred and fifty years old, had 
 a very picturesque uniform, and carried a large seine to which 
 bells and other musical instruments were fastened, so that 
 when the net was shaken it produced a most silvery and 
 delightful chime. The Turners exhibited a beautiful set of 
 mammoth chessmen which excited my cupidity. The banner 
 carried by the Goldsmiths, was said to have cost 10.000 
 thalers. That despised class of men, the Tailors, turned out 
 strong. They are a most venerable body, dating from 1288. 
 How strange it is ! empires rise into being and sink into 
 nothingness, a Hapsborg succeeds to Hohenstaufen, and a 
 Stuart to a Tudor, revolutions shake thrones and then are 
 quenched in blood, but meanwhile the Tailors' Guild pursues 
 the even tenor of its way, and now, in the year of grace 1858, 
 turns out in such numbers as assures a plentiful supply of 
 galligaskins to the good city of Berlin for at least a genera 
 tion to come. 
 
 The processioQ dosed with the machine-shop men to the
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 173 
 
 number of eight thousand, locomotive and steamboat build 
 ers, car manufacturers, and makers of all the outirejr. 
 and engines and accessories which mighty steam, the 
 of the nineteenth century, brings in his train. They are the 
 representatives of the present age, as the old Trades and 
 Guilds, with their ancient privileges, were of the past. 
 
 In the evening the city was brilliantly illuminated. C., P., 
 S., and I went out, and, formed in solid phalanx in the crush 
 ing crowd for mutual offense and defense, we had the pleasure 
 of picking up and rescuing an old lady, who fell down in one 
 very bad rush, and stood a pretty good chance of being tram 
 pled under foot I had never seen an illumination before, and 
 so I gave myself up to a kind of childish delight at the 
 swarming crowds, the bright lights, and the happy faces. The 
 torch-light procession, about which there had been so much 
 excitement and bother, did not come off then, but was trans 
 ferred to Saturday evening, and was a capital affair. .... At 
 the palace the committee went in to present the homage of the 
 students to the prince and princess. They gave three cheers ; 
 not the glorious Anglo-Saxon hurrah! but a mean-spirited 
 hoch or high, which does n't ring out worth a snap. The 
 most interesting scene of all was the breaking-up place, where 
 they put out their torches and sang '* Gaudeamus."' I was 
 pleased to see how they do such things here, and I "itifird 
 myself that although their paraphernalia and gettings-up were 
 much better than with us, they did not have half the spunk 
 and spirit of our jolly American stud* IWA. .... 
 
 February 19. . . . The homage I rendered to the picture 
 of the ** Sistine Madonna " was withal to tfa> *^f^f picture, 
 nor to the personages which it rrprcirMs, bat to the f*^"^m 
 human mind which called it into being. I hare, and hope 
 that I may always have, a utJiliJt admiration for whatever 
 is good and noble in the world, whether in the empire of sra- 
 
 _. _- : .: ::" : -::-:.: -:-.- : - jf brave ar j manlj -.- 
 
 tioos. The enthusiasm which I feel upon gazing at a mas 
 terpiece of painting, no more deserves to be called 
 the sensations which owe t i'* | ^ | ^Ty on
 
 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 the genius of Shakespeare, the gallantry or bravery of Tancred 
 and Bayard, or the virtue of Washington. No, instead of 
 being troubled by this, you ought, on the contrary, to rejoice 
 at anything which tends to develop the reverent sentiments, 
 and to bring the hollow on the top of my head, where the 
 bump of veneration ought to be, up to the level of my other 
 phrenological developments. You know that I am rather 
 given to exaggerate, and I must ask you to make allowances 
 for all that 1 may hereafter say, in the heat of enthusiasm, 
 and believe that the sight of new lands, new governments, and 
 new modes of thinking, have only served to make me prize 
 more highly than ever my own land and the ideas in which I 
 was brought up/. ... 
 
 . ... . . TRIESTE, March 7, 1858. 
 
 : DEAR M., At last we- have got in motion again, and after 
 a painful journey of six days, I have once more reached the 
 shores of .the Adriatic, and expect to-morrow to be in Italy, I 
 hope, if; not to enjoy myself, at least to get warm; for the 
 history of the past trip down here has been one in which the 
 demon of cold has played a prominent part, and even in this 
 latitude ;it is bleak and chilly, while the dreadful Boro of the 
 Adriatic sweeps through the city with great fury. On getting 
 up this morning, I heard a confused hubbub, and looking out 
 of the- window that faced a large square, saw a most motley 
 crowd. of persons of all ranks, ages, and nations, with their 
 varied costumes, making the dreary market-place quite gay. 
 There were Greeks with their white camises, Turks with long 
 cloaks and red fez, dark-eyed and haired nondescripts, whom 
 I took to be Albanians, villainous-looking Italians, while here 
 and there a sun-browned face with brown hair and beard, spoke 
 of .the Anglo-Saxon or the Dane. Most of them were sailors, 
 dressed in the odd- habiliments which the sons of Neptune get 
 themselves up in when ashore. They lounged around with a 
 rolling gaitj and a knowing swagger, which reminded me of 
 my old friends of the Australia. On Monday last, March ist, 
 after the mails had disappointed us all by coming in without 
 any letters for any of us, we packed our trunks, paid our last
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 175 
 
 bill to our landlord, and made our last farewell to our land 
 lady and children, and tore ourselves away from the friendly 
 hand-grasps of J. C. and T. D., and took the train for Dres 
 den. We went to our old quarters, the " Golden Angel." In 
 the morning we sallied out, and made a bee-line of the straight- 
 est description for the picture-gallery. We spent an hour in 
 looking at engravings on the ground floor, and I enjoyed very 
 much observing the progress of the child of Painting from its 
 earliest infancy to the present time. It is quite remarkable 
 that, in these old times, the art of the engraver was not an ab 
 sorbing one, but was rather a companion or adjunct to those 
 of sculpture and painting, so that we find almost all the ear 
 liest engravers of any note, such as Wohlgemuth, Marc Antony, 
 Albert Diirer, and Rembrandt, to have been also first-rate 
 painters. We then went up that splendid, wide staircase, to 
 that picture-gallery which, while it falls below the united col 
 lections of both Rome and Florence, claims for itself the proud 
 title of being more than a match for either the Pitti or Uffizi 
 alone, or even Vatican. I greeted the two lovely Madonnas 
 of Raphael and Holbein, the beautiful Correggios, thec harm 
 ing Vandykes, and many others, as dear old friends. It was 
 so pleasant to see again those master-pieces that had so de 
 lighted me at first, and which, during the two intervening 
 months, had always been capable of bringing up in my mind 
 fair, and good, and noble thoughts. I think that I regarded the 
 Sistine Madonna with increased admiration, but with less ex 
 citement and enthusiasm, than when I first saw it in the win 
 ter ; but I must, once for all, disclaim the slightest feeling of 
 adoration, either then or now. But for that serene and sweet 
 Madonna of Holbein, I felt, more than ever before, a sort of 
 tender regard and love. The whole scene was such a family 
 one, and so home-like, that it seems impossible to believe that 
 it was a superhuman being who was standing in that room, 
 but rather a noble and powerful woman, who had come to the 
 house of sickness to give her aid, and to fill it with the sweet 
 and holy light. I shall always remember that picture as long 
 as I live, for to comprehend and enjoy it, one needs only to be
 
 176 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 a devoted lover of his own mother and his home, which is a 
 quality I am inclined to think that I possess in pretty fair 
 measure. I spent nearly all day in taking a last look of all 
 my favorites, and discovered several new ones with which I 
 
 was not particularly acquainted 
 
 We left Dresden Tuesday, at midnight, having fortified our 
 selves with all the hot things which the restaurant at Dresden 
 could afford. More cheerless, not to say dangerously cold, 
 affairs, than these German cars, it would be difficult to con 
 ceive of; and there is not a particle of fire to counteract the 
 cold. What wonder if the unhappy passenger gets gradually 
 stiffened with the frost. After a regular purgatorial ride of 
 three hours we reached Badenbach, the Austrian frontier, 
 where we bade farewell to our old friend, the thaler, who had 
 so long been our stay and support in Berlin, and now shook 
 hands with the Austrian florin, a rather scaly coin, who is con 
 siderably larger than his Dutch and Bavarian cousins. By 
 means of packing ourselves together in one carriage, so that 
 we bore a striking resemblance to Cerberus, one body with 
 three heads, we managed to keep decently comfortable during 
 the following four hours before reaching Prague. Just a little 
 while before we reached Prague, the sun rose gloriously, and 
 by dint of scratching a hole through the thick frost which had 
 collected on the car window. I managed to see it very nicely. 
 We arrived in P. chilled through, and it took a hot stove and 
 a good hot breakfast to restore circulation, and to bring back 
 the idea that life was still extant in our stiffened bodies. In 
 the expectations which I had formed of the picturesqueness of 
 Prague, I was not disappointed. It lies in a low basin, sur 
 rounded by lofty hills, some of them quite precipitous, and 
 crowned on the west side by the imposing mass of the Hrad- 
 schin, the palace of the old Bohemian kings, while through 
 this hollow flows the noble Moldau, a broad and majestic 
 river, and, I should think, a rapid one. When I saw it, it 
 was motionless. You can form some idea of the appearance 
 of Prague by supposing a city, full of oriental and splendid 
 buildings, to be surrounded on all sides by a ring of hills
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 
 
 higher, and almost as steep, as East Rock, with a broad river 
 flowing through it, crossed by three bridges one celebrated 
 for its size and antiquity, another a beautiful suspension 
 bridge. The first church we entered contained the tomb of 
 Professor Olmsted's old friend and fellow-laborer in the star 
 gazing department, Tycho Brahe. It is made of a slab of red 
 marble, and contains his effigy, and above, his motto, which is 
 certainly a very noble one, similar to that on John Dixwell's 
 grave behind Centre Church, Esse potius quam haberi To 
 be, rather than to be esteemed. Opposite to the church 
 stands the town hall, which retains somewhat of its former 
 Gothic beauty. This building, and the place before it, stand 
 as memorials of the fearful excesses committed, under the 
 guise of religious zeal, by both Hussites and Catholics. It 
 was from the windows of the Rathhaus that the Hussite mob, 
 in 1419, ejected the magistrates who had excited their dis 
 pleasure, and it was in the square in front of it that the Prot 
 estant leaders were executed, after the battle of the White Hill 
 had given the Catholics the unexpected preponderance. The 
 old bridge is the longest in Germany, and is 500 years old. 
 It is decorated at regular intervals with the statues of saints, 
 but the great lion of all is St. John Nepomuk, who was 
 drowned here for his religious opinions, and has, from this 
 circumstance, become the patron saint of bridges all over 
 Germany. The Hradschin is the most immense pile I ever 
 saw, and inclosing in its vast quadrangle a cathedral, chapels, 
 public halls, public offices, seems like a small city, complete 
 in itself. We ascended to the top of the cathedral and en 
 joyed a view of the city lying beneath us, beyond, the broad 
 plains of Bohemia, while to the west, lay the White Hill, 
 where Frederic yielded to Ferdinand, and the light of Protes 
 tantism in Bohemia and South Germany was put out in tor 
 rents of blood. One of the oddest things in Prague is the 
 Jews' quarter, which is said without doubt to. have existed 
 since the founding of the city. Everywhere appeared ancient 
 Abraham, who looked anxious to do a little business with me. 
 Every window was tenanted by some worthy Sarah, or Re- 
 12
 
 1/8 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 bekah, while in the doorways and middle of the street rolled 
 scores of dirty urchins, whose bird-like probosces left not the 
 shadow of doubt that they were sprigs and cuttings of the vine 
 that was brought out of Egypt. The house of Huss stands in 
 the Jews' quarter, and I took considerable interest in observ 
 ing the dwelling-place of the great early reformer, although I 
 must confess myself dreadfully ignorant of his more minute 
 history, except that he was called the Great Goose of Bohemia, 
 that he cackled loud and to some purpose, that he was roasted 
 in a meadow near the good city of Constance, which meadow 
 I saw, and finally, that it was with a quill from the tail of this 
 goose that Luther wrote his renowned thesis. I was highly 
 delighted with all I saw of the good city of Prague, and wished 
 the weather would have permitted me to walk out of town, to 
 get acquainted with the whole situation of the place. I left 
 that evening at 7, and in that long nocturnal ride of twelve 
 hours, was in a state of torpid suffering which lasted till I 
 reached Vienna. That night seemed to be equal to several 
 long days, and even now the remembrance of it makes me 
 
 shudder all over 
 
 FLORENCE, March 18, 1858. 
 
 DEAR BROTHER, Of my doleful ride to Prague, my visit 
 there, and the still more miserable vigil on that freezing night, 
 for twelve hours from Prague to Vienna, I have fully informed 
 mother. I should like to suggest to the Germans, as a suitable 
 motive for a new revolution, the coldness of the night trains in 
 winter. A Magna Gharta might be extorted from the sov 
 ereign, .with the privilege of having the cars warmed with the 
 waste steam, or at least having vessels of warm water for the 
 feet. The Prussians gained less than this by the revolution of 
 '49, the only permanent benefit they acquired by that bloody 
 contest being the permission to smoke in the streets of Berlin. 
 Thursday, March 4th, was devoted to seeing what there was 
 to be seen. My eye was first caught by a Gothic spire, of the 
 richest style of work, towering above everything around. I 
 traced my way to it, and was soon standing beside the Cathe 
 dral of St. Stephen, one of the purest and finest buildings of
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 179 
 
 the Germanic style, my own favorite class of architecture. 
 The south tower, which is the only one completed, is a most 
 magnificent specimen of its kind ; covered with rich ornaments, 
 trefoils and pinnacles on every side, yet not so as to prevent 
 it from diminishing gradually and regularly as it rises. It 
 mounts to the height of 444 feet, showing in all its course the 
 perfect grace and beauty of the Gothic style, which consists, 
 perhaps as much as anything, in the subordination of the 
 infinitude of small ornaments and highly-wrought, minute de 
 vices (which the eye notices with pleasure as it passes, while 
 it is not arrested by them) to a grand and symmetrical 
 whole ; a gradual lessening and lessening in size, until the 
 cross at the top seems almost to pierce the sky, such is the 
 spire of St. Stephen's. We had a long, weary climb up that 
 beautiful south tower, but finally reached the summit and were 
 amply repaid for our exertions. We sat down and enjoyed 
 the view, just where, almost two hundred years ago, the brave 
 Count Starhemberg had sat and watched, almost hopelessly, 
 the vast army of the Turks, which was, day after day, drawing 
 closer and closer around the beleaguered city. And from this 
 spot he saw the approaching banners of the brave John 
 Sobieski of Poland, who speedily joined battle with the infidels, 
 and did for Germany, at Vienna, what Charles Martel did at 
 Tours for France. The tide of Islamism has, since then, 
 rather set in the opposite direction. The fire watch lives near 
 the top of the cathedral tower, and has capital arrangements 
 for discovering the exact situation of a fire. The watchman 
 was very polite in explaining his telegraph to us, and when he 
 found out that we were Americans, he insisted upon our coming 
 into his room and sitting down. I found out that he had fought 
 against the Italian patriots in 1849, and likewise against Kos- 
 suth in the same year. He wanted to know how Kossuth was 
 received in America. He was full of enthusiasm for his own 
 country and the Emperor, and decidedly down upon Kossuth. 
 It seemed so odd to meet one who had fought for Austria, and 
 to hear the other side as it were. .... 
 
 I was much disappointed at the specimens of Albert Diirer
 
 ISO LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 which I saw at Vienna, for I had been led to suppose that his 
 genius shone with peculiar brightness in the galleries there. 
 As yet I have seen nothing of this master which justifies the 
 high and apparently overweening rank which has been accorded 
 to him in German art. . . . We bade good-by to Vienna at an 
 early hour, and soon the spire of St. Stephen's faded away be 
 hind us to the northwest. At first the cold condensed the 
 vapor on the windows, and made it difficult to see anything, 
 but soon the warm sun melted off the frost, and we had a fine 
 chance to survey the scenery and the snow mountains through 
 which this railroad pursues its course. It was difficult to know 
 which to admire most, the lofty mountains clad with snow, the 
 precipices, the deep defiles, the tremendous forests, or the 
 wondrous skill and engineering enterprise with which so fine 
 a railway .had been conducted through them. At a place 
 called Gloggnitzthe railroad runs, by a series of curved gradi 
 ents, right up the side of what might almost be termed a 
 precipice. Some time after leaving Gloggnitz, having passed 
 over several viaducts and through one or two tunnels, we found 
 ourselves again almost exactly over the same town, but now at 
 a height of 700 feet above it. The effect produced by such a 
 climbing of our ferruginous steed was strange enough. . . . We 
 dined at Gratz, a fine place which I should have liked to visit 
 further. We saw a ruined castle remarkable for astronomical 
 observations made in it by Tycho Brahe. We crossed the 
 Drave at Marburg, and got to Laibach in the evening. I will 
 say nothing about it except to quote from the hand-book a tra 
 dition of the place, which appears to me rather beats Banagher. 
 They say that Jason and the Argonauts, fleeing from Colchis, 
 after they had gobbled the golden fleece, sailed across the 
 Black Sea, then up the Danube, and up the Drave to where 
 Laibach now stands. This town they founded, and then went 
 down to the Adriatic, and there embarked for Greece. As the 
 Argonauts could not very easily have dragged their ship over 
 land to Trieste, perhaps a search at Laibach, by some of those 
 grubbing German antiquaries like Lepsius, might bring to light 
 some fragments of that renowned tub the Argo. We got into
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. l8l 
 
 Trieste late ; and now permit me to pass with a great leap 
 from Trieste to Parma, where I arrived Thursday evening, 
 March nth. I had a good full day at Parma, which I en 
 joyed more than I have any one day for a long time. There 
 is scarcely a city I have seen that presents more art charms 
 than this old nest of the Farnese family. It has a noble cathe 
 dral, its cupola being adorned with the celebrated frescoes of 
 Correggio, said to be the finest work of his genius in exist 
 ence. The Academy of Fine Arts is not deficient in works 
 of other artists, while in those of Correggio it can easily bid 
 defiance to the rest of the world. The antiquarian would 
 find a splendid library, noted for its oriental treasures, and a 
 museum of antiques which is very interesting. 
 
 FLORENCE, March 22, 1858. 
 
 Just think of it, only four months more, and I shall, 
 D. V., be again at home among you all, and then my absence 
 of fourteen months (how fearfully long it will have been !) will 
 seem like a half-forgotten dream, partly pleasant and partly 
 disagreeable, although I hope that the rougher features will 
 be mellowed down by distance and time, and that I shall be 
 able to look back upon my European experiences with more 
 pleasurable sensations than can be felt while actually passing 
 through them. But I can assure you that it is pretty hard 
 work to be obliged incessantly, day in and day out, to visit 
 treasure-houses and masterpieces of art, and so often to pass 
 by spots renowned in history, or hallowed by memories of 
 great and noble men. This sort of thing keeps the emotions 
 too incessantly upon the stretch, and at last one almost wishes 
 to run away to some quiet place, and let the works of art re 
 main without a single glance of admiration or criticism, the 
 interesting spots without a single rapture or sigh. ... I wish 
 that I could have time to digest all that I saw, and that after 
 a week of " doing " I might retire into some quiet country 
 place, to read and study and work up what I had seen with 
 my own ideas, making the memory of it my own property, and 
 not dependent for half my recollections upon guide-books and 

 
 1 82 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 works on art. But this it is impossible to do, for almost every 
 respectable city has its picture-gallery and its museum of an 
 tiquities ; so, for example, Bologna, where we spent Sunday 
 and Monday of last week, the i4th and i5th of March, pos 
 sesses a very fine gallery of paintings, which . of" course we 
 had to see, for it would have been sacrilege to have passed 
 through the city without visiting the fine works of the cele 
 brated Bolognese or Eclectic school, who believed in choosing 
 from each master his best quality, and uniting them all in one 
 picture ; so they proposed to add to the majesty of Michael 
 Angelo and the feeling of Raphael the coloring of Titian and 
 the grace of Correggio. They succeeded better than might 
 have been expected from such a patchwork sort of theory, as 
 the names of the Caracci, Guercino, Guido Reni, Albani, and 
 Domenichino amply prove. Bologna is, as might be sup 
 posed, a capital place to study these great masters ; but I will 
 not bore you with any further account of my visit to the gal 
 lery (as I have enough of such stuff to tell you besides), 
 except to say that I enjoyed them all very well, but liked 
 
 Raphael's beautiful St. Cecilia more than any of them 
 
 On Tuesday morning, at 4 A. M., we left Bologna by diligence 
 for Florence, and of course for the first couple of hours sat in 
 mortal terror of being suddenly attacked by a fierce gang of 
 banditti ; for these robbers of the Apennines are an odd, lazy 
 set ; they have their holes in Bologna, and an hour or so 
 before the diligence starts they leave the city and go up the 
 mountains a few miles, to wait until it comes along ; they 
 then strip it, and its passengers, and go back to Bologna to 
 finish their morning's nap, or to eat their breakfast, for which 
 they will have acquired an appetite by this little stroke of 
 business : consequently the worst part of this worst of Italian 
 roads is at the distance of about an hour or two from the city, 
 and when we passed through it, the light, just beginning to 
 grow gray with the dawn, was exactly the right kind for a 
 robbery. The road looked fit for an ambuscade ; and once, 
 when I saw three men in the middle of the road, I felt sure 
 that they must be the scouts of the gang, and expected every
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 183 
 
 instant to hear a whistle and to see black-bearded ruffians 
 start from every bush, like Roderick Dhu's men in the " Lady 
 of the Lake." I now reflected upon my unhappy opera, " The 
 Bandits of the Apennines." How little, when I wrote it, did 
 I think that I should ever be so near the haunts of those 
 much slandered gentlemen, or stand such a good chance of 
 sharing the unhappy fate of my two heroes, Mr. Brown and 
 Mr. Jones ! I now perceived the difference subsisting be 
 tween quietly writing a work in the study and going through 
 the actual experience in real life. However, they would n't 
 have got much cash out of our party, for we were as poor as 
 pilgrims, and I, the treasurer and financier of the crowd, had 
 only one solitary napoleon. For that lonely piece of gold I 
 was prepared to resist to the death ; and I have no doubt but 
 that our crowd would have made the only good resistance of 
 the whole party, our escort included, which consisted of four 
 rascally gens d'armes, who rode after the diligence in an old 
 wagon, looking very fierce and valiant, but whose first warlike 
 act, I strongly suspect, would have been to rat over to the 
 enemy with their arms and ammunition, and then come in for 
 the lion's share of the booty. At any rate, notwithstanding 
 our perilous condition, we passed the dangerous spot with our 
 throats uncut and our pockets unemptied, and that napoleon 
 survived to buy me a black vest in the good city of Florence. 
 I had occasion, in quite an odd way, to bring all my philo 
 logical acquirements into play in quite a short time. Our 
 whole party dismounted from the diligence to walk up hill. 
 When we reached the steepest place in the Apennines, and as 
 we were walking past another party of gentlemen, one of them 
 accosted P. and S. in French ; but they passed by in silence, 
 and I was obliged, in order to remove any thought of dis 
 courtesy, to pitch wildly in upon " the universal language," 
 although during my stay in Berlin my German had driven 
 almost all my French out of my head. However, I got along 
 pretty well, and tickled the Parisian gentleman hugely with 
 some well-aimed praises of Paris. From the other fellow, 
 who was an Italian, I picked up some information about the
 
 184 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 state of Lombardy which interested me. They were greatly 
 puzzled to know what countryman I was. Englishman ? No. 
 German ? Nein. Russian ? No. Italian ? No. Swede or 
 Dane ? No. " Well," exclaimed the Frenchman, " you must 
 come from some other world ! " "I do," said I. (Here their 
 eyes opened widely.) " I come from the New World." Where 
 upon they fell into a train of thought which led them to the 
 correct conclusion that I was an American. Upon returning 
 to my seat in the diligence I found by my side a fat and jolly 
 old fellow, who attacked me quite fiercely in Italian, and I 
 managed to pay him back pretty well ; for I have a great fac 
 ulty of going right in on a language, and making the greatest 
 possible use of what I know. This is of course the best way to 
 improve my practice, and already I have got on quite famously 
 in the sweet tongue of Tasso. Well, I mustered up enough Ital 
 ian to give him a tremendous idea of the grandeur of the Amer 
 ican eagle, our free institutions, and the facility with which a 
 man can there acquire land, and raise himself from the posi 
 tion of a laborer to that of a proprietor. Indeed, this last is 
 what interests foreigners more than anything else about our 
 country. Our freedom they think very good, but scarcely un 
 derstand it ; our universal franchise they cannot comprehend, 
 but the fact that either by squatting, or buying at a very low 
 price, a man can acquire a property in the soil, and work it for 
 his own use, and not as a tenant, seems to have a peculiar 
 charm for them, and probably there is nothing which contrib 
 utes more to form the idea prevalent among many persons 
 here, that America is a sort of Canaan, in which all persons 
 become instantly rich and happy, as soon as they have crossed 
 the Jordan of the Atlantic. My old friend had travelled a 
 great deal in the Orient on business, and told me some very 
 interesting stories of his voyages, and also of two or three 
 shipwrecks, from one of which he escaped with nothing but 
 his life and night-shirt, leaving behind his " best suit of clothes 
 and his cargo worth 80,000 florins." 
 
 Happening to hear P. address S. in German, he inquired if 
 I spoke it, and appeared perfectly delighted when I told him
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 185 
 
 I did. He was a Swiss from St. Gall, and we had a good talk 
 together about the scenery of that region, with which I was 
 well acquainted, having been through it last August with H. 
 C. So then for a good part of the rest of the way to Florence 
 we kept it up steadily in German, politics, travels, railroads, 
 etc., being the chief topics. As we approached Florence, we 
 went back to the Italian tongue again, and I amused the driver 
 and postilions with sundry delectable anecdotes of the Amer 
 ican turf; Trustee's great feat of trotting twenty miles in fifty- 
 seven minutes and a fraction quite astonished them, and I fear 
 that I laid myself open to the reproach of having drawn the 
 long bow. Our scenery all the way was really magnificent, for 
 almost all the innumerable peaks of the Apennines were cov 
 ered with pure white snow, much of which had probably fallen 
 within a week. We came across at just the right time, for 
 while it was warm enough to be comfortable, there had not 
 been a sufficiently long succession of warm days to melt the 
 snow, and thus both destroy the beauty of the scenery, and 
 make the roads bad. We reached Florence at about 8 p. M., 
 and were soon comfortably settled in the fine Hotel de New 
 York, which commands about the best view, and is in the best 
 situation of any hotel in Florence, even if its name and low 
 prices were not a sufficient recommendation. We made a very 
 nice arrangement, and got capital rooms, looking right out on 
 the Arno. What shall I say, my dearest mother, of the pleas 
 ure, the delight, which I have experienced since I came to 
 this place ; from the cold regions north of the Apennines with 
 their snow and chilly atmosphere, from the bleak, dreary plains 
 of Berlin, and the cheerless hills of Prague, to a city where 
 Spring has already taken up her abode, and already begun to 
 scatter flowers over the face of the earth. The warm, balmy 
 air, the bright sun, the blue sky, the green earth, and the busy, 
 jolly city, all make simple existence here most pleasant, while 
 the snow clad summits of the Apennines loom up in the 
 northeast, to remind us of what we have been through. I have 
 always before my eyes the stream of the Arno, rendered pic 
 turesque by its four fine bridges ; beyond this the beautiful
 
 1 86 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 hills of Bellosguardo and Arcetri, covered to their summits 
 with fine villas ; and the latter (Arcetri) made interesting as 
 well as beautiful by the Tower of Galileo, from which he took 
 his most important observations, and in which he extended to 
 Milton a friendly hospitality, when the latter was on his travels. 
 The meeting of two such men, so surpassingly great in worlds 
 of thought, so different yet equally majestic, the contemplation 
 of the actual and the ideal heaven, would be a worthy subject, 
 I should think, either for pencil or pen. Never did two men 
 come together who had done more for the progress of thought 
 and the enfranchisement of the human mind from slavery, 
 whether political, physical, or religious. How noble must 
 have been their conversation ! What glorious thoughts must 
 have flowed forth in calm and dignified utterances ! What a 
 boon to have seen them seated together: Milton, with his long, 
 flowing locks, and face of solemn beauty ; Galileo, with that 
 massive forehead, and firm-set mouth, which said, " But it does 
 move." They might be taken as representatives of Poetry and 
 Science, while upon both a still nobler name can be bestowed, 
 for are they not both Apostles of Human Freedom? There 
 are many interesting memories in Florence, but none which 
 interested me as much as this. As regards the endless treas- 
 sures of art in this city, what shall I say ? The bounds of a 
 short letter like this are scarcely equal to the enterprise, and I 
 will try to tell you something about them at length in the first 
 letterl write you from Rome. 
 
 March 24. I paid a very pleasant visit yesterday to Mr. 
 Powers' studio here, and took P. with me ; having been previ 
 ously fortified with a letter of introduction to Mr. Powers from J. 
 Ci, we had the pleasure of seeing him in person, were received 
 by him very cordially, and invited to his house this evening. 
 His family is said to be a very pleasant one, and we expect to 
 have quite a nice time. We then spent an hour or so in the 
 studio, admiring the statues, some of which are very beautiful. 
 I liked his "California " best of all ; it is the property of Mr. 
 Wm. Astor of New York, and will go there as soon as it is 
 completely finished. She stands with the divining-rod (which
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 1 87 
 
 reminded me of Dousterswivel, in the " Antiquary ") in her 
 hand, and at her feet a large mass of quartz crystals, as indica 
 tive of the home of the gold ; her whole form and contour was 
 very suggestive of richness and wealth. Allegorical representa 
 tives of countries are often far-fetched and hard to understand, 
 but I think that in this statue the idea of the "Golden State" 
 was admirably hit. I was also very much delighted with a 
 " Fisher Boy," listening to the sound of a sea-shell which he 
 holds to his ear ; and a " Proserpina," beautifully sculptured, 
 and adorned with acanthus leaves. To say nothing of Mr. 
 Powers' many other excellences, I think the shape of his heads 
 is more classic, and the arrangement of the hair more grace 
 ful than I have ever seen them in any other. 
 
 ROME, April 2, 1858. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, Here I am at last in Rome, and here 
 I have been for nearly a week, but have scarcely yet come to be 
 lieve that such is the case. It seems so unreal to be for the 
 first time in a place of which I have thought, heard, and read 
 so much, and whose very name is so suggestive of a thousand 
 bewildering and yet most important and interesting memories, 
 that for a while there must be a strange confusion of thoughts 
 and objects in the mind, and, in a great measure, an incapacity 
 to enjoy or appreciate any one thing as it ought to be enjoyed 
 and appreciated. I suppose that the true pleasure derived 
 from the monuments of the past, especially of Rome, consists 
 rather in the remembrance of them in the future than the con 
 templation of them in the present Perhaps it would 
 
 be a good idea for me to give a day at Florence, that you may 
 know how I spent my day, and also what pleased and im 
 pressed me most in that fair city, which is so full of noble art 
 and interesting memories. As we must make a long day of 
 it, it will be better to be up early in the morning, and off 
 before the throng of sight-seers shall fill every place, like the 
 frogs of Pharaoh, driving away by their presence the Genius 
 of the Past, who likes best to linger in lonely places, and to be 
 sought by few though fervent worshippers. In this church
 
 1 88 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 which we now enter he is to be found, if anywhere, for along 
 its noble aisles are placed monuments adorned with sculptured 
 wreaths, carved with high-sounding inscriptions, supported by 
 marble mourners. It would seem as though a line of illustri 
 ous kings had been gathered to their dust, and we are not 
 mistaken, for these are indeed kings, monarchs of thought, 
 powerful to sway opinions and feelings and emotions, worthy 
 of admiration from all nations and all ages. Michael An- 
 gelo, Galileo, Alfieri, Dante, and Machiavelli, the highes t 
 names which Florence can boast in the several departments 
 of Art, Science, Prose, Poetry, and Politics. Dante's tomb, it 
 is true, is but a cenotaph, for his ashes repose on the shores 
 of the Adriatic, at Ravenna, where he died. If you will take 
 my arm we will pick our way to another church, some distance 
 off, St. Mark's by name. The church we will not enter, but 
 will turn aside and go into the cloister connected with it. 
 Passing now from cell to cell through passage, refectory, and 
 chapter-house, we enjoy an exhibition of the finest specimens 
 in existence of the early Pre-raphaelite art, for it was in these 
 cells that Fra Angelico spent twenty years of his life, and, an 
 artist wholly self taught, surpassed in feeling, spirituality, and 
 sentiment, the first masters of the day. The defect of his style, 
 belonging to what is called the Byzantine school of painting, 
 is more than compensated by the deep sentiment of devotion, 
 the singleness of heart and soul, which fills every pious face 
 
 of saint, and angel, and adoring mortal A gentle grace, 
 
 peculiar to this painter, pervades every form, and every face is 
 lit up with a sweet light of love and absorbed devotion. 
 
 For some reason, I am much more delighted with expression 
 and beauty of sentiment, than either majesty of form or broad 
 ness of coloring. I can leave to sculpture and its friends all 
 the charms of sensuous form and marble reality, give me 
 the truthful tender thoughts which painting alone can express. 
 I have not time to say much about the cathedral. It is quite 
 imposing, but homely enough, after the Gothic pile of St. Ste 
 phen's at Vienna. The dome is the largest in the world, sur 
 passing in size that of St. Peter's. Passing by the cathedral,
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 189 
 
 we arrive at the Church of San Lorenzo, embracing in its clois 
 ters and quadrangle the Sacristy, the Medician Chapel, and 
 the Laurentian Library. In the Sacristy are the monuments 
 of Lorenzo and Julian de Medici. The latter is adorned with 
 two figures by Michael Angelo, representing Day and Night. 
 The Night sinks back in an attitude of perfect repose, and 
 yet it would be impossible to mistake her sleep for that of 
 death. The following, one of the many praises pronounced 
 upon it, I must translate for you. " The Night whom thou 
 seest sleeping in so sweet an attitude, was sculptured by an 
 angel in this stone, and while she sleeps has life, wake her, 
 if thou believest me not, and she will speak to thee." To this 
 Michael Angelo replied, putting his words into the mouth of 
 his master-piece : " Pleasant to me is my sleep, and still more 
 my existence in the marble stone, for not to see, not to feel in 
 jury and sad disgrace, is my great happiness. Therefore, wake 
 me not ; oh, speak low ! " . . - . . 
 
 We will turn now to the chambers of the Laurentian Li 
 brary, this glorious collection of precious manuscripts, 
 the most important, if not the most extensive, in Europe, a 
 proof of what enlightened patronage can accomplish, when it 
 exerts itself in the proper channels, and works for the future 
 as well as for the present. Among the manuscripts are sev 
 eral extremely interesting ones the earliest manuscript of 
 Virgil, a " Divina Commedia " of Dante ; a Horace, with notes 
 by Petrarch ; and what had the greatest interest to me, as an 
 incipient lawyer, the earliest MSS. of the Pandects of Jus 
 tinian, brought from Amalfi in the twelfth century, the discov 
 ery of which led to most important results, as it introduced 
 the study of the Roman law, and the general practice of that 
 style of jurisprudence, all over Europe, except in England and 
 the Scandinavian nations. It is said that, when first brought 
 to Florence, honors were paid to it as to a holy relic ; tapers 
 were lighted before it, and magistrates stood bare-headed in 
 its presence. I have my doubts whether the same reverence 
 would be paid to any legal treasure in the present day. I 
 think it highly improbable that the printer's devils stood bare-
 
 igO LETTERS OF .WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 headed before the first edition of even " Blackstone's Com 
 mentaries." I should enjoy spending a winter in Florence, 
 with a permit to use this library, and disport myself among the 
 old MSS. as much as I liked. 
 
 April 6 Early on Thursday morning, March 25, 
 
 we set off on the cars for Sienna, the railway being finished 
 to that city. Rode through a beautiful and fertile country, 
 watered by the Arno, until we changed cars at Empoli, where 
 the road branches off for Pisa. From this point we. missed 
 both Arno and fertility, and the remainder of our ride to 
 Sienna was uninteresting enough. The arrangement which 
 I had made with the diligence office at Florence proved very 
 convenient. We found a man at the depot, ready to carry 
 our baggage. While walking from the gate of the city to our 
 hotel we passed the diligence office. The coach from Rome 
 had just arrived. The passengers were scattered about out 
 side, and directly my eye fell, upon a face, and an old cap, 
 which I recollected to have seen occasionally last summer in 
 Switzerland, and after making a desperate rush forward I 
 found that I had made no mistake, and that it was B. L. E. 
 W., of course, was not far off. They were going immediately 
 to Florence ; but as the train did not leave till 4^ P..M., we had 
 a good talk together, as touching the passes of Switzerland, 
 the Jungfrau, Interlachen, and our Michel. I believe that 
 W. expressed the sentiments of L. and C., and I know that he 
 expressed mine, when he said those four weeks in Switzerland 
 were the happiest time of his life. We sallied out and did 
 several of the notabilities of the place. The Cathedral is a 
 very large and handsome church, and of very decent antiquity, 
 as it was finished some time in 1200, and has several objects 
 of curiosity. The pavement is inlaid with large mosaics of 
 Bible stories, which are funny enough, consisting of gray 
 marble inlaid upon white. A single subject is sometimes 
 oddly represented in two parts, on opposite sides of the church, 
 with another entirely different subject between. Thus, on one 
 sidej the youthful David has just let drive from his sling a 
 certain smooth pebble from the Brook Kishon. After passing
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 191 
 
 over considerable space, in which are several other groups, 
 we see the aforementioned lump quietly travelling through 
 the air, and, a little further on, our old friend Goliath of Gath, 
 who, though not yet hit, has a large hole in his forehead, 
 where the deadly missile is about to strike him, thus prov 
 ing the truth of that well-known remark, that coming events 
 cast their shadows before. The frieze of the cathedral is the 
 oddest one I ever saw. It is adorned with heads of the popes 
 down to the time of Alexander III. They are fearfully ugly, 
 and are all alike. Pope Joan, the only female who ever oc 
 cupied in person the pontifical throne, used to be in the col 
 lection, but she has been taken away, and one called Pope 
 Zacharias was substituted in her place. I was obliged to view 
 everything very hastily, as the time was so limited, which was 
 quite a disappointment to me, as I had begun to take some 
 interest in the history of early art, and the school of Sienna 
 bears a very prominent place, as being that in which the 
 school of Italy first had an independent existence, apart from 
 the instruction, although not as yet from the influence, of 
 Byzantine artists. The preeminent claims of Sienna above 
 Florence, as the mother of Italian painting, rest upon the 
 works of one Guido of Sienna, who lived some forty or fifty 
 years before Cimabue, and about a hundred before Giotto. 
 His finest, nay, I believe his only work, which I saw in the 
 Church of St. Dominick at Sienna, a rather colossal Ma 
 donna and child, -is somewhat stiff, but decidedly free for 
 that time; and, considering the age of the picture, the poor 
 light in which it was placed, and other disadvantages, I can 
 but consider it as a very remarkable work of art. It bears 
 date 1 22 1 A. D., so that it must be 637 years old. It is won 
 derful that it has been preserved at all in a condition capable 
 of being understood. 
 
 We strayed around town with our friends, exchanged ex 
 periences, discussed all the news of the past year, from the 
 
 Lecompton Constitution to 's engagement, and finally 
 
 saw them off for Florence. My next labor was to go to the 
 stables of the diligence company and engage a carriage in
 
 IQ2 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER, 
 
 which to make our descent upon Rome. I pitched upon a 
 very nice light one, and we had nothing to do but to wait the 
 arrival of the fourth member. In due time he arrived ; and I 
 had better give you a description of him at once. Tall and 
 stout, chunky face, chunky nose (both red), chunky English 
 whiskers, twinkling eyes, a good-natured mouth. He was an 
 Irishman, English chaplain at Nice, but full of good humor, 
 bulls, quotations from Horace, and Irish songs, so that close 
 upon each other followed " Video ut alta stet nive candidum 
 Soracte " and " Bryan O'Flynn had no breeches to wear." 
 Imagine us, then, rolling grandly out of the city of Sienna by 
 the Porta Romana, and the passengers busily engaged in 
 smoke-compelling, with the solitary exception of your vir 
 tuous brother, who has remained as pure of tobacco as he was 
 when he first went forth, an innocent child, from the threshold 
 
 of the A. H., to wander in this wicked world Our 
 
 horses carried us splendidly over the ground, and on the first 
 day we accomplished seventy-five English miles. We got that 
 evening to a place called Bolsena, situated on a lake of the 
 same name, a beautiful sheet of water, but as dangerous as it 
 is beautiful, for its shores are desolated by the most fearful 
 form of malaria. You may believe that we felt uneasy about 
 spending the night in such a place. However, I was very 
 careful to shut my window before making my entry into a very 
 suspicious-looking bed; but I was so very tired that neither 
 dread of malaria nor the attacks of fleas could suffice to keep 
 me awake. The next morning we were up bright and early, 
 to enable us to get to Rome before the diligence should arrive 
 there with its load of passengers to occupy all the vacant 
 rooms in the _ hotels. I was .nearly dressed, when I heard a 
 great rattling in the road, and, looking out of the window, saw 
 the diligence tear by with seven horses and full of people. 
 We had our horses put to while we took a hasty breakfast, 
 and then off at a good rate, the postilion inspired with hopes 
 of enormous drink-money before his enraptured eyes. We 
 got ahead with jolly good speed, and, on driving into the third 
 post town, Viterbo by name (celebrated for its handsome
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 193 
 
 fountains and pretty women), imagine our satisfaction at see 
 ing the diligence standing in the road empty and horseless. 
 We got fresh horses, and were soon far ahead. We had 
 passed the last post-station, but were several miles from our 
 place of destination, when, upon reaching the top of an emi 
 nence, the postilion rose in his saddle, and, pointing to the 
 southwest with his whip, exclaimed, " Roma ! " It was a 
 magical word enough, and ought to have aroused in a young 
 student like myself, not wholly devoid of enthusiasm, strong 
 and pleasant emotions ; but, whether I had been disgusted 
 with Byron's nonsense about the Niobe of nations, I did not 
 feel any more moved by my first view of the Eternal City than 
 if it had been Berlin. The thought that occupied me most 
 was one of anxiety lest we should find all the rooms at the 
 hotels occupied, and have trouble. I feel thoroughly ashamed 
 that such should have been my frame of mind. 
 
 We spent a couple of hours in looking for rooms without 
 success, till we happened to come across J. C., and we set off 
 together, and succeeded in getting the rooms that had been 
 occupied by T. D. and his party a year ago. They are on the 
 Pincian Hill, right opposite to the Church of the Capuchins, 
 and rendered interesting to me by the story of " The Impro- 
 visatore." We are very comfortably situated, and our remote 
 ness from the central parts of the city is compensated by the 
 healthiness and quiet of our district 
 
 ROME, April 14, 1858. 
 
 MY DEAR COUSIN, I can assure you that a letter should 
 have been upon the stocks for you long ere this, had it not 
 been for a peculiar combination of circumstances which pre 
 vented it This afternoon I have been out of doors for 
 
 the first time in three days and a half, and you can easily 
 imagine that my spirits are in a condition of most enviable 
 jollity. It is a most lovely evening. Rain has been pouring 
 down steadily all the morning, but now it has cleared off to 
 display a sky of the tenderest blue, strewed here and there 
 with light clouds, which promise to reflect beautifully the 
 13
 
 194 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 gorgeous tints of the approaching sunset. The bell of the 
 Capuchin Church is tolling mellowly to vespers just across 
 the street, and the bare-footed friars go slowly in to prayer, 
 many of them aged and infirm, destined soon to lie, cowled 
 and hooded skeletons, with their brethren in the strange 
 burial vault of the Capuchin Church. The rays of the declin 
 ing sun light up the roof of the French barracks, and on, 
 beyond, the imposing mass of the Barberini Palace. I can 
 never look upon those walls without thinking of a certain por 
 trait which they contain, and of the melancholy fate that casts 
 so sad and yet so winning an expression over that sweet 
 young face. I have an American friend who thinks, rather 
 profanely, that the face of Beatrice Cenci, as painted by 
 Guido, is more beautiful than that of the Sistine Madonna ! 
 At the rear of the house, looking through the entry which con 
 nects our magnificent suite of apartments, I- see my two 
 friends and compagnons de voyage busily engaged in smok 
 ing, and hurling an occasional bajocco at sundry cats who 
 have taken advantage of the fine evening to disport them 
 selves in the courtyard. Everywhere there is the pleasant 
 influence of the evening, and now, as the sun has sunk be 
 neath the horizon, and the fleecy clouds are all bright with 
 his last beams, I feel that this is really the "Bella Italia," 
 an appellation which I had for some time hesitated to give to 
 the snow-covered hills of Lombardy and Tuscany. Excuse 
 this digression into the beauties of nature, but I thought that 
 you would enjoy such a little aquarelle painted from my own 
 window, and giving you some idea of my surroundings in 
 Rome. I wanted to catch it with the rain drops and the sun 
 set glow upon it before it grew too dark to write, otherwise 
 I should not have said a word before thanking you for your 
 
 kind letter of last January I am glad to hear that you 
 
 are getting better contented with New York as a dwelling- 
 place, and allow that there is some good existing out of 
 Europe. For myself, I am rather liable to go to the other 
 extreme, and see a peculiar charm in everything American, 
 simply because it savors of home. Undoubtedly the true
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 195 
 
 course lies between these two extremes, the nobleness and 
 truth of our free institutions, adorned with the charms of 
 European art, and the higher civilization, in matters of taste, 
 which exists on this side of the water, would, it appears to me, 
 realize the dreams of statesmen, a more beautiful republic 
 than even the Greek mind of Plato ever imagined 
 
 The union of the kingdom of Venetian Lombardy with the 
 Austrian possessions proper had to be effected at any cost ; 
 and, as the railroad is now completed to Trieste, the once 
 proud cities of Venice and Milan lie eternally at the feet of 
 
 Vienna and of the stupid autocrat who reigns there 
 
 I have enjoyed Rome beyond my fondest expectations. The 
 Baths of Caracalla, the Forum, and the Coliseum, would alone 
 
 be worth a passage across the Atlantic I have bought 
 
 for you the panoramic pictures of the clergy which you de 
 sired, also a' set of similar pictures of the monastic orders ; 
 the old monks are very leathery, but funny, especially the 
 Capuchins. With much love to all, I am ever your affec 
 tionate cousin. 
 
 ROME, April 16, 1858. 
 
 .... I have been in Rome now nearly three weeks, and 
 am beginning to enjoy it to the full. The old ruins, the stately 
 churches and palaces, the works of art in the galleries, all be 
 gin to wear a familiar aspect, and I know now just what my 
 favorites are, and can go right to them without delay. As my 
 letters to you were shortened by my attendance on the cere 
 monies of Holy Week, perhaps it would be only just for me to 
 tell you something about them. The phenomena of the 
 Romish Church have an interest to a philosophical mind, as 
 showing to what splendid emptinesses and absurdities the 
 souls of any people can be brought to yield their homage and 
 adoration. The first religious spectacle was the procession to 
 St. Peter's on Palm Sunday, and the blessing of the palms in 
 that church. I saw little, and understood less. The cardi 
 nals bobbed to the Pope, and the Pope to the cardinals, 
 they kissed his toe, and he patted their heads, then the 
 palms were consecrated and blessed, and sprinkled and mum-
 
 196 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 bled over, and carried from the high altar to the Pope's 
 throne, and from the Pope's throne to the high altar, and 
 then distributed to the happy recipients. On Wednesday, 
 having fortified myself with that most necessary article of 
 clothing in Holy Week, my old tail-coat, I went up to the 
 Sistine Chapel to hear the first " Miserere." The corridor of 
 the Vatican was separated from the Chapel by three long 
 flights of stairs. I put in practice my old habit of going up 
 two stairs at a time, and got ahead finely, so that I entered 
 the Chapel among the first. As the service did not begin 
 until 4 P. M., and the " Miserere " until about 6, I had time to 
 gaze at the products of Michael Angelo's genius upon the 
 walls, and at the end of the chapel, the gigantic Sybils and 
 Prophets on the triangular spaces between the windows. They 
 struck me as being wonderful creations of inspired majesty 
 and grace, and the subsequent visits I have made them has 
 fully confirmed this opinion. 
 
 But to the performances. About 4 P. M., the violet- 
 coated cardinals, with their capes of ermine, began to enter, 
 their trains carried by clergy of tire lower orders, who, 
 after they had arranged the trains all right, sat down at the 
 feet of their superiors with an appearance of great humility. 
 At length Pope Pius arrived and took his throne, when began 
 the chanting of the penitential psalms, with lessons inter 
 spersed. At the right of the altar stood a tall candelabra, 
 containing fifteen candles. At the end of every psalm a candle 
 was extinguished. The chanting was very loud and boister 
 ous. Once or twice a very beautiful passage was inserted, as 
 if to give a foretaste of what was to come. The series of per 
 formances was kept up a very long time, and every one who 
 had to stand was very tired and uneasy. The Pope's guard 
 chattered together, the English around me talked and laughed 
 quite loudly, and I heard of an American family producing 
 a basket of provender, and going into sundry sandwiches. 
 Nothing could have seemed less like a religious service which 
 was being performed on a festival of the most solemn nature, 
 and it was impossible to feel impressed, either by the chapel
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 197 
 
 itself, or the rite which was going on in it. When the candles 
 were reduced to one, the choir broke forth with the " Miserere," 
 the remaining candle was taken down and carried under 
 the altar, to typify Christ's descending into the earth. Finer 
 music I scarcely ever heard, but it seemed so operatic, and got 
 up, that I was totally unable to connect it in any way with the 
 mysteries of religion. The levity of every one around, the 
 universal sense that it was a mere show, and, more than all, 
 my extreme fatigue, were sufficient to drive away every feeling 
 of devotion, and leave no higher sentiment than that of mere 
 critical admiration, just such as we accord to a successful 
 singer at a concert. The performance closed with a strange, 
 loud knocking of a stick, said to indicate the descent of Christ 
 into purgatory, and the release of those imprisoned there. On 
 Good Friday I went to St. Peter's, and heard the " Miserere " 
 there. It was a much finer one than that of Wednesday, and 
 far more expressive of religious sentiment, although not as 
 well performed artistically, as by the choristers of the Papal 
 Chapel. The grandest ceremonies of all were those of Easter 
 
 Sunday 
 
 The procession came in all the grandeur and pomp of regal 
 splendor. The Pope was dressed in a long robe of gold and 
 silver, with a tiara on his head that flashed back the light of 
 jewels. He proceeded up that glorious nave, seated himself 
 upon his throne, then service began. The music was splen 
 did, and one of the best parts of it was the mass, chanted by 
 the Pope himself, the choir giving the responses. The con 
 clusion of the service was the music representing the visit of 
 the Marys to the sepulchre, their inquiries of the angels, and 
 then, after a dead pause, the glad annunciation that " The 
 Lord had risen indeed." This last sounded with thrilling and 
 startling effect from a band of silver trumpets. More inspir 
 ing or beautiful music I have seldom or never heard. With 
 magnificence even greater than before, the procession swept 
 out of the church. From the balcony in front the Pope gave 
 the threefold benediction to the vast multitude outside, and the 
 letters of indulgence, on which the benediction is written, were
 
 198 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 thrown down for the people to scramble for. The guns of the 
 Castle of St. Angelo pealed forth, and nothing now remains 
 except the illumination Sunday night, and the fire-works Mon 
 day night on the Pincian Hill. The most ordinary effect pro 
 duced by these spectacles seems to be a contempt for all 
 religion, when, in the capital of the Christian world, the Chris 
 tian religion is made such a farce. It is now April 2oth 
 
 I have spent days at the Forum, and have made myself famil 
 iar with that most interesting collection of ruins, the Arches of 
 Severus, Titus, and Constantine, the beautiful temples, and the 
 palace of the Caesars, displaying the ruins of the most magnif 
 icent dwelling that emperor ever lived in. I have seen the 
 Coliseum by sun-light, moon-light, star-light, and no light at 
 all, up stairs and down, and have risked my neck in scram 
 bling after flowers that grew in its ruined arches. I have spent 
 hours in the Baths of Caracalla, hunting up the localities of 
 that stupendous building, admiring the rich mosaic pavement, 
 which preserves its color to this day as when it was first laid 
 down, going to the vast swimming hall, now to the vapor baths 
 then to the cold baths, observing the library and other rooms 
 for study and luxury with which the Romans surrounded their 
 bathing halls, a style of institution which does not exist at the 
 present day. I was most intensely interested in the Pantheon. 
 There is a combination of circumstances in it which make it, 
 to me, perfectly irresistible. First, the grand Grecian portico, 
 with its glorious perfect columns, then, the dome within, ris 
 ing, as it were, from the very ground, and lighted only from 
 above by the aperture through which streams in the sunlight. 
 When first I entered, the sunlight was streaming upon a slab 
 in a side chapel, and upon that slab was inscribed a name 
 dear to every heart not dead to all that is wonderful in art. 
 It was the grave of Raphael. 
 
 AUSTRIAN STEAMER " DALMATIA," AMONG THE 
 IONIAN ISLANDS, OFF LEUCADIA, May 4. 
 
 Once more I am for a season a traveller on the sea 
 
 The long swell of the Ionian Sea jogs our little steam-tug up
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 199 
 
 and down in such a peculiar way that, if this letter ever is 
 finished, you must attribute it to a series of fortunate rolls and 
 heaves of the vessel, rather than to any active volition on my 
 own part; but I cannot resist the temptation of .writing to you 
 from the deck rather than the close cabin, in the hope that I 
 may give you some idea, taken from an actual view of nature, 
 of the light-blue seas, the soft skies, the balmy air, and the 
 craggy but picturesque islands, redolent of classic fame, with 
 
 which we are now surrounded I spent the Sunday 
 
 after leaving Rome at Leghorn, and the next Monday was 
 devoted to a visit to Pisa. We visited those four celebrated 
 buildings, the Cathedral, Baptistry, Campo Santo, and the 
 Leaning Tower. The Leaning Tower, one of my oldest 
 friends and acquaintances, I felt considerable satisfaction in, 
 first, in recognizing it as my old friend, and second, in per 
 ceiving that it did actually lean, in a manner obvious to the 
 naked eye of an ordinary traveller, without the aid of a guide 
 book. I took much interest in examining the old Cathedral, 
 which has so long been a bone of contention among the 
 critics, which is nearly a century ahead of its time. In the 
 Campo Santo I was especially pleased with the series of Old 
 Testament histories ; the grace and charming naturalness 
 with which those Oriental stories are told, struck me as being 
 decidedly wonderful for that early age of painting, while the 
 numerous portraits and Middle Age dresses introduced, 
 stamped with great distinctness the strange custom of that 
 period, in mingling their own friends with the patriarchs of 
 old, and every-day occurrences with Bible history. The Bap 
 tistry is a very beautiful building, and contains a most re 
 markable ancient pulpit, and exquisitely - carved baptismal 
 font of Greek workmanship. We went back in the afternoon 
 to Leghorn, and were forced to exchange our large Neapoli 
 tan steamer for a very small boat, called the Eden ; but, 
 alas, its accommodations savored of anything rather than 
 Paradise. In this small tub, with the seductive appellation, 
 we embarked for Genoa. The sea was rough and the weather 
 rainy, and we were tossed around fearfully, making almost
 
 2OO LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 every one deadly sick. P. and I stood on our dignity as old 
 sailors, and succeeded in escaping the demon of sea-sickness. 
 As evening was beginning to fall on the Ligurian Hills, the 
 fair white palaces of Genoa the Proud appeared, lining the 
 hill-side. With this delightful but unsatisfactory view of the 
 grand old city of the Dorias I was obliged to rest content, as, if 
 we expected to be in Trieste by Friday, it would be necessary 
 to take the earliest morning train for Milan, deferring my 
 view of Genoa until my return from Greece by way of Naples. 
 Our ride through Sardinia was delightful. We took third 
 class tickets, and found the wooden seats and open cars very 
 pleasant for a warm day. The lower classes too, with whom 
 we came in contact, seemed to be far more comfortable in 
 circumstances than I had seen them in any other part of Italy. 
 It was perfectly refreshing, after spending a month in wretched, 
 slavish Rome, to find myself once more in a country where 
 the people were not wholly destitute of self-respect, where 
 manufactures seemed flourishing, and where the press was 
 free. As evening came on, I had the pleasure of pointing out 
 to L. the white pinnacles, bright with the setting sun, of glori 
 ous Milan Cathedral, and by eight o'clock we were comfort 
 ably settled in the fine old Lombard city ; and, as the moon 
 rose about nine, you may be sure that we did not miss the 
 opportunity of seeing the cathedral by moonlight. It really 
 seemed like a spectacle of fairy-land, the almost endless 
 forest of pure white pinnacles, slenderly projecting up into the 
 blue ether, looked like a luxuriant forest of aquatic but grace 
 ful lilies with white stalks, while below spread an expanse of 
 glittering marbles, carved into windows the most quaint, can 
 opies the most rich, borders and ornaments the most exquisite, 
 while from their pedestals and pinnacles looked down many 
 hundreds of statues of saints of the olden time, once perse 
 cuted and tortured and put to shame and death, but now 
 gazing down from their marble effigies, clad in white robes 
 and with palms in their hands, as calm and quiet and beauti 
 ful as the moonlight which lights them all with her silver 
 glory. I spent a good part of the day I was at Milan in
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 2OI 
 
 studying its exterior, both below and above, wondering over 
 its immense roof, and sitting, half awe-struck, half-entranced 
 with delight, at the foot of the pillars which overarch its glori 
 ous nave and aisles. We left Milan in time to catch the 
 boat for Trieste. We entered the harbor about i P. M., and 
 one of the first objects that we descried on shore was the 
 venerable form of T. D., with a most outlandish cap on his 
 head, frantically waving his hands to us, and a few moments 
 more and we were in each other's arms, united again after a 
 separation of just two months. We spent that afternoon in 
 talking, writing letters, drawing money, seeing about pass 
 ports, etc. Early the next morning we went to the rooms of 
 the Austrian Lloyds, and took passage for the Piraeus, and 
 by Saturday afternoon we were off in the Vulcan. 
 
 May 6. Gulf of Corinth, just off Phocis and Mount Par 
 nassus. Again I take up my pen to continue this letter, and 
 to tell you how thoroughly paid I feel already for the voyage 
 I have undertaken, by the beautiful and classic scenes which 
 I have seen, the noble natural landscapes which have sur 
 rounded me by sea and land, and, more than all, by the fresh 
 and buoyant enthusiasm which, even before we have reached 
 Athens or passed Corinth, fills my pulse with bounding blood, 
 and makes my veins thrill, as we sail through these lovely seas, 
 with ancient cities on one hand and venerable mountains on 
 the other. I have trod the shore and soil of classic Greece, 
 and have had a foretaste of the pleasures of both eye and soul 
 that await me on the classic hills and plains of Attica. But, 
 before I loose wholly the rein of my joyous delight, permit me 
 to sketch my sea-path hither, and give a short log of our voy 
 age. We left Trieste in the Vulcan, one of the best steamers 
 of the Austrian Lloyds Co., and soon that trading town of the 
 Adriatic faded from sight, and we ran down the Illyrian shore 
 in the teeth of a stiff breeze, which soon freshened into a fierce 
 gale. We sat down to an excellent dinner with about a dozen 
 gentlemen, Greeks. Of all that party, only five, including L. 
 and myself, appeared at breakfast the next morning, our 
 venerable mentor, T. D., being among the slain. I never
 
 202 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 knew a Sunday pass with so little suggestion of its being Sun 
 day. As we could n't go to church ourselves, we sneaked off 
 to the stern of the vessel, near the wheel, and indulged in a 
 quiet hymn or two. The next day we crossed the Adriatic, 
 towards Albani, and ran along beside the Acroceraunian 
 Mountains. True to their old classical reputation, the fam 
 ous Thunder Peaks got us up a highly respectable storm. 
 A tremendous sirocco blew from the south, having on its 
 wings the parched air of Lybian deserts, raising the waves to 
 lofty surges, before which our good vessel pitched and tossed 
 for several hours without making any headway. But our 
 steamer was very new and strong, and we could in safety 
 laugh the mad waves to scorn, indeed I should have en 
 joyed it extremely, had it not been for two untoward circum 
 stances. First, Mr. D. lay in his berth, most pale and miser 
 able ; and, secondly, we had an unfortunate contretemps at 
 breakfast which deserves to be mentioned. At the dejeuner a 
 la fourchette, which occurs at 10^ A. M., we were seated some 
 five ravenous individuals, the unterrified ones, who made up 
 by their rapacity for the absence of the rest. We had had 
 several severe lurches, which had made the glasses rattle ; 
 but I, filled with a serene confidence, had just helped myself 
 to some very nice chicken curry, when suddenly a crash on 
 deck was heard, as if a whole sea had fallen upon it, and this 
 was instantly followed by a tremendous roll to larboard, which 
 sent every movable flying in all directions. Those on the 
 starboard side found themselves deprived in a moment of 
 every necessary of life, while we on the larboard were covered 
 with the edible mercies which flowed in from every side. I 
 was perhaps more favored than any other individual, and 
 received in my lap one bottle of wine, two cups of tea, a large 
 amount of chicken-curry, a couple of oranges, and three knives. 
 I met, on the whole, with no injury but such as the steward's 
 wet cloth soon repaired. We on the larboard side repaired 
 to the safer situation of the starboard, and got through our 
 breakfast without further calamity. The storm moderated in 
 the afternoon, and we reached Corfu, but we were deprived of
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 203 
 
 a view of it, as it was 9 P. M., and we were to leave at mid 
 night. Here we left our noble steamer for a much smaller 
 one, Dalmatia by name, whose course lay through the Gulf 
 of Corinth to the Isthmus, giving us a better view of the 
 countries of Greece than if we had gone around Cape Mata- 
 pan. As the factotum of the crowd, I had the extreme 
 pleasure of going on shore at Corfu at about 10 p. M., to see 
 that our transfer from one steamer to another was properly 
 noted on our tickets. I did the business, and congratulated 
 myself in getting out of that den of vile soldiers and sailors 
 without having my throat cut or my pocket picked. We got 
 off at midnight, and, when we woke in the morning, we found 
 ourselves off the Albanian coast, called in old times Epirus, 
 and soon entered the Gulf of Arta, now the Bay of Previsa, 
 and had about an hour to recall our recollections of that tre 
 mendous sea-fight, of which the world was the prize, the 
 contest of Roman with Roman, until Cleopatra fled and An 
 tony followed her, traitorous to his own manhood, choosing 
 for himself an ignominious death, and leaving to his rival the 
 vast empire of the Roman world. 
 
 When I commenced writing this letter, we were just passing 
 the fatal rock from which the unhappy Sappho sprang for the 
 purpose of at once putting an end to her life and misery. I 
 should have enjoyed immensely having a few days to roam on 
 foot over Ulysses's rocky island, and identify the localities 
 with those of the Odyssey. It is said that Homer lived some 
 time in Ithaca, and his topography, always correct, is in this 
 island wonderfully accurate. We touched at the principal 
 town of Zante, entered the Gulf of Corinth, touched at Mis- 
 solonghi, name thrilling to the heart for its glorious de 
 fense. We arrived by noon at Patras, and went ashore, and 
 here our feet first touched the soil of Greece in the old dis 
 trict of Achaia. 
 
 ATHENS, May 9, 1858. 
 
 DEAR J., . . . . 10 p. M. I have just returned from 
 a very pleasant visit at Dr. King's, where we were all invited 
 to tea. We called there for the first time last evening, where
 
 2O4 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 we were very cordially received by the good Doctor, who is 
 truly one of nature's noblemen, and a thorough American to 
 the backbone. Nor did he confine his hospitality to a simple 
 greeting, but immediately invited us to stay to tea that same 
 evening, and, as we were elsewhere engaged, he insisted upon 
 our coming this evening to take tea with the family. This 
 evening he asked us to come to tea to-morrow evening, to 
 meet a few friends. This kindly behavior on his part is not, 
 I believe, unusual. He seems to combine most admirably all 
 the qualities of a patriotic consul and a Christian missionary. 
 His family also is very pleasant, although he himself is the 
 principal attraction. The daughters have been educated in 
 America, and are very pleasing 
 
 I am so sorry that I wrote such unsatisfactory letters from 
 Rome, but the truth is, that I did my best under the cir 
 cumstances Some few visits that I made to the stu 
 dios of artists gave me a glimpse into that life, a mixture of 
 aesthetic delight with frequent physical suffering, full of 
 beautiful ideas, but too poor to buy the paint with which to 
 lay them on the canvas, or the marble from which to hew them 
 into visible form. Mr. Paul Akers, who sculped Uncle B.'s 
 bust, has a work about completed in the clay. It is called " The 
 Drowned Pearl Fisher," a great attempt, and it was painful 
 to see the excessive interest which he took in it, as it ap 
 proached completion. I made a call at the studio of John 
 Gibson, who is the greatest English sculptor living. He was 
 engaged on a statue of " Bacchus." The figure had a lyre in 
 its hand. I asked Mr. G. why he had put the attribute of 
 Apollo into the hands of Bacchus, whereupon he regaled me 
 with an interesting account (from Pausanias, I think) of Bac 
 chus with a lyre, by Praxiteles ; and he also mentioned that he 
 had seen a fine old gem which presented a similar subject. 
 Notwithstanding his reputation, I do not think him equal to 
 Powers. 
 
 May 12. The excursions of the past two days, yesterday 
 to Marathon, and to-day to Eleusis and Salamis, have so 
 fatigued me that I should resign my pen and go straight to bed,
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 2O5 
 
 were I not so brimful of Greek enthusiasm, and anxious to 
 converse with you as much as possible while I am still a 
 breather of the inspiring Attic air, this most pellucid ether, as 
 Euripides has it. On our sail up the Gulf of Corinth, we 
 looked out for Parnassus with peculiar eagerness, and I was 
 afraid lest, like too many of the classic eminences, it might 
 turn out a half ant hill, but it was not the case. As we ap 
 proached Salona and the fated plain of Cirrha, grand and im 
 posing did the venerable mountain lift up his lofty head, and 
 superbly clad, on head and shoulders, with an ermine cloak of 
 snow, with a dark cincture of woods about his waist, I was con 
 tent to admire the grand old mountain from a distance without 
 desiring to climb its sacred sides, with the possibility of being 
 frozen, or the probability of having my throat cut or my nose 
 cut off. We went to the Isthmus of Corinth, and then to the 
 city of Corinth. I must tell you about it. Rising about 5 A. M. 
 we went on shore from the steamer, and made the acquaint 
 ance of the vehicle which was to convey us to Corinth, and it 
 needed only a single glance at the four-wheeled abomination 
 to fill us with the most unfeigned horror and disgust. Upon 
 an ox-cart of the roughest description, imagine placed a crate, 
 wide at the top, narrow at the bottom, sans back, sans sides, 
 sans seat, sans cushion, sans everything. The worst lumber- 
 wagon I ever saw would be a princely chariot in comparison. 
 Into this locomotive nightmare we tumbled, and curled our sad 
 carcasses upon what might be called bags or pillows, but which 
 I should denominate emigrant packets for transporting, from 
 one part of the country to another, crowds of Corinthian fleas. 
 Future experience justified this appellation. There we sat for 
 two mortal hours, P. making himself rather comfortable by 
 smoking ; T. D. sat perfectly still in speechless agony, but 
 preserving that dignity which was proper for an ex-tutor with 
 two of his quondam Freshmen ; while I gave vent to my suffer 
 ings in frequent and long-drawn howls which seemed to win 
 our driver's heart. At all events we had lots of fun, and 
 amused ourselves by imagining the sensation we should create 
 by driving the turn-out of the isthmus up Chapel Street or Hill-
 
 2O6 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 house Avenue, and loud were our shouts of laughter when a 
 peculiarly horrible jolt brought us all together into that 
 state of mixed-up-ed-ness in which Prof. Dana says that the 
 Coral Polyp always exists. The destruction of Corinth by an 
 earthquake, an account of which you must have seen in the 
 papers, has knocked it so thoroughly endways that I doubt if 
 Paul himself would know it, notwithstanding his eighteen 
 months' residence there. The Temple of Minerva, consisting 
 of seven columns with entablatures, is almost the only build 
 ing that has remained unaffected in some way by the shocks. 
 We had a tough walk up to the Citadel, or Aero-Corinth, a 
 height which commands a glorious view of both gulfs and the 
 country round. You look off to the southwest among the rug 
 ged mountains of Arcadia, and to the northeast among the 
 ditto of Attica. 
 
 We had a gorgeous sail to the Piraeus, with Salamis on the 
 left, Egina on the right, behind the old city of Megara, which 
 still has a very imposing aspect. At 5 P. M. we neared the 
 Piraeus, and saw before us the mountains Hymettus and Pen- 
 telicus, and, more than all, the Acropolis, crowned by the 
 stately Parthenon. There are a few moments in a man's life 
 which are invested with a peculiar interest to him, and which 
 will never lose their place in his memory, nor cease to have a 
 freshness and vividness of outline no matter how many years 
 pass away. Such a time was that afternoon and evening, to be 
 marked with a white stone. I wish that you could have been 
 by my side, to share what I might call an overwhelming en 
 thusiasm of feeling, which was owing not merely to the sight 
 of the Parthenon, and also of the Theseum, close by which most 
 perfect monument of Doric art we passed on our ride up, but 
 rather to a combination of these, with many other sights and 
 sounds. We crossed the bed of the whispering Ilissus, we drove 
 through streets whose names were classic, and passed shops 
 whose signs looked like Felton's Greek Grammar. The time 
 table at the hotel pointed out the day (May 8) as AIFPIAIOS 
 25, this being according to old style which still prevails here. 
 The first half hour, nay, the first few minutes alone, after my ar-
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 2O/ 
 
 rival here, would have been sufficient to repay me for all the 
 time and expense of having come here. With regard to the 
 remains of art in Athens, in my present sleepy state you cannot 
 expect me to say anything particularly bright or original. The 
 Parthenon has been called the finest building on the finest site 
 in the world. I could sit for hours looking at the silent grand 
 eur of these marble columns, the heavy masses of the en 
 tablature above them, and their perfect fitness to each other, 
 and to an ideal beauty, although actually so mighty and mas 
 sive. Whether standing alone, or simply crowned by an en 
 tablature or under a complete and symmetrical pediment, they 
 are still, for some inexplicable reason, beyond all praise, and 
 greatly beyond all imitation. I must confess that the glories 
 of the New Haven State House pale before them. 
 
 The Temple of Theseus, which is almost as perfect as when 
 Cimon first raised it over the recovered bones of Attica's fa 
 vorite hero, is a better example from which to draw a full and 
 correct idea of the arrangements of a temple of the best pe 
 riod. Next to the Parthenon and Temple of Theseus I was 
 most struck with the Propylea, or vast triumphal arch, com 
 prising in itself a succession of vast porticoes and temples, 
 through which the solemn processions used to pass on the 
 occasion of the Panathenaic festivals. I wish I could express 
 in adequate language my admiration for these chef d'oeuvres of 
 antiquity. Rome, with all her massive ruins, has nothing to 
 compare with them in majesty, beauty, and grace. 
 
 ATHENS, May 18. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, .... I cannot express to you in 
 too warm terms the pleasure which I have enjoyed during my 
 stay here. About every thing ancient, there has been a charm 
 of most delightful familiarity, as it were, and where everything 
 modern is something so strange or new, the contrast is most 
 strange and pleasing ; and while I can never weary of wan 
 dering among the ruins of the ancient city, and the wonders of 
 the Acropolis, the modern city is not without an interest of its 
 own in the strange medley of costumes and nationalities which
 
 2O8 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 the streets afford. Greeks in their national dress, with the 
 tall fez, the richly embroidered jacket, the flowing folds of the 
 white camise, the red leggings, which always remind one of 
 the leg armor of ancient times ; the Turk, with his stolid face 
 and loose trovvsers, turban or tarbouche on head, and pipe in 
 hand ; fierce-looking Albanians from the mountains ; an occa 
 sional Bavarian soldier of the king ; in addition to all these, 
 a motley crowd in Frank dress, strangers in Athens, Jews and 
 proselytes, Cretes and Arabians. I find that even the little I 
 read of Homer, of Thucydides, of Demosthenes, and of the 
 Tragic Poets, suffices to throw a most ineffable charm over 
 every scene and antique monument ; but there has been one 
 spot which we have visited which is invested with an interest 
 something more than merely classic, a something which ap 
 peals not only to the classical scholar, but to every human 
 heart which can thrill at high and noble deeds, it is the 
 Plain of Marathon. I must tell you somewhat about our ex 
 cursion there. Some previous preparations were necessary, as 
 it is quite an expedition ; and as we could go only half the 
 distance in a carriage, we had to send horses forward the day 
 before to this half-way station, to meet us there. Our party was 
 
 increased by the addition of a young American Well, 
 
 at 5 A. M. we were off, well supplied with grub and wine, and 
 rejoicing in a guide named Miltiades, a most fit person with 
 whom to visit this memorable battle-field. We left Athens, 
 over which the rising sun was just beginning to throw a rosy 
 light, and rode for two hours or more in our carriage, to a vil 
 lage called Caphissia. Here we found the horses waiting for 
 us, and most extraordinary looking creatures they were. A 
 gaunt sorrel specimen fell to my lot, and sorely did I repent, 
 before long, that I had ever got astride of him. We dashed 
 out of Caphissia at a gallant rate, for our horses, as we soon 
 found out, though rum ones to look at, were devils to go. Our 
 path wound round the southwestern foot of Pentelicus, through 
 dense shrubbery, and over waste patches that reminded us 
 distinctly of some parts of Connecticut. But what gave a 
 peculiar charm to the whole affair was, that the region through
 
 FOREIGN TKAVEL AND ART. 20Q 
 
 which we were passing was one of the worst dens of the rob 
 bers in all Attica, and as our ears had been regaled at Dr. 
 King's with some choice stories of the course of sprouts which 
 they caused their prisoners to go through, such as roasting 
 before a slow fire, cutting the nose and ears, you can easily 
 imagine that we felt a little nervous when riding through a 
 place that seemed made for an ambush, and where it would 
 be equally impossible to escape, to defend ourselves, or ever 
 to be found of those who might be sent to rescue us. It is in 
 circumstances like these, that a man feels the true and legiti 
 mate value of a revolver, it is a friend in need. One reason, 
 perhaps, why we saw nothing of them was, that only one week 
 or two before, the chief of the robbers in this region, with 
 two or three of his followers, had been killed, and a certain 
 salutary degree of terror had been struck into the rest. Thus 
 through rough woods and scrubby brushwood, and over rocky 
 ridges, we rode for some three hours, now going at a hand 
 gallop down the smoother slopes and through the level val 
 leys, and then painfully climbing up a steep ascent, where our 
 horses could never have kept their footing, had they not had 
 almost the agility of cats. At length our guide, who was some 
 distance ahead, shouted, " From the top of the next ridge you 
 will see Marathon," and put his little black pony to the top of 
 his speed, we all following to the best of our abilities, though 
 at the risk of broken necks. First appeared the mountains of 
 Eubcea across the channel, next the ocean, and then, in all the 
 calm sweetness of a lovely spring day, the noble plain itself. 
 The scene of this wonderful battle the most glorious, perhaps, 
 in all the world's history lay there at our feet, and we could, 
 almost at a glance, perceive every familiar locality, the ocean 
 beach in the distance, where the invading army landed, and 
 drew up their formidable array ; the two marshes could be 
 seen, one on each side of the plain, by means of which the 
 Greeks prevented the Persians from surrounding them, and 
 into which they drove them when the tide of battle had turned ; 
 and from this very slope upon which we stood did that noble 
 little band of Athenians rush down upon the plain, with their 
 14
 
 210 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER, 
 
 thrilling war shout, which they were so soon to change into the 
 paean of victory. Thus it appeared to the bodily eye, and it 
 required no very great stretch of imagination to people the 
 silent plain with the memories of the Past, to place upon the 
 stage the actors in that glorious drama. Through this plain 
 we had a good ride to the sea beach. Our horses, excited by 
 the fresh sea air, completely ran away with us, and did not stop 
 until they reached the top of a small mountain close by the 
 water. We were on the Tumulus of the Athenians, the brave 
 men who fell in the battle, and who were afterwards almost 
 deified by their countrymen : for when Demosthenes wished 
 to implore the Athenians to be true to their ancient freedom, 
 the most forcible adjuration he could use was by the two hun 
 dred that fell at Marathon. 
 
 It was on the tomb of Miltiades that we rested our horses, 
 and as we felt hot and dusty after our long ride, we could not 
 resist the tempting look of the sea, which really seemed to in 
 vite us to a bath. So, galloping right down to the beach, we 
 stopped and went in, a most dangerous proceeding, as we 
 afterwards discovered. Such an indulgence so early in the 
 season is extremely likely to be followed by an instant attack 
 of the Greek fever. It was very providential that we were 
 none of us attacked, for soon after, by the ignorance of our 
 guide, we got into a mess which was just the thing to develop 
 the beginning of fever. Supposing one of the marshes to be 
 dry, we attempted to cross it. We had got about half way 
 through when suddenly we found ourselves among deep and 
 dangerous mud-holes, into which our horses sank almost up to 
 their shoulders. T. D. had a sure-footed horse which man 
 aged to keep on his legs, but B., our companion, and myself, 
 were thrown violently off several times by the struggles of our 
 horses, indeed, I almost feared that we might be doomed 
 to share the fate of the left wing of the Persians. My own 
 horse, in particular, was very troublesome. Every time he 
 got into the mud he would kick and plunge frightfully, thus 
 sinking himself continually deeper. The last time he fell he 
 sank almost up to his neck, and in his frantic endeavors to get 

 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 211 
 
 out, threw himself on me, covering me with mud. After that, 
 I thought it prudent to lead him the rest of the way. At 
 length we emerged, horses and fellows cased in mud. We 
 took our luncheon at the village of Vrana. After dinner we 
 had a trial of skill in throwing stones at the wine bottle. I 
 hit it, and made a decided impression, both on the bottle and 
 the native population. We went home over Pentelicus, up 
 break-neck paths, where we had to lead our horses. Our 
 views of the plains of Marathon and Attica were superb. Ex 
 amined with much interest the marble quarries ; they look 
 very rich. We finally reached Caphissia, where we had left 
 our carriage, almost too tired to get into it. We had had 
 nine hours in the saddle, the toughest work I ever did in 
 my life, too tired even to sleep. To-day we all move about 
 with a gait resembling a lame duck. Aside from these little 
 troubles, I scarcely ever enjoyed an expedition so much in 
 my life. To-morrow I must be off for Naples. I will try to 
 finish this to have it in readiness to mail when I reach that 
 place. 
 
 Thursday, May 20. I am sitting by my open window 
 looking off over the sunlit Bay of Naples to Vesuvius, after 
 a voyage of four days from the Piraeus. Of course my first 
 visit was to Rogers's, the banker, where I found a jolly good 
 pile of letters. The time is very nearly approaching when I 
 shall once more fill my place at the table and the fireside, 
 and shall be no more a wanderer. How gladly shall I give 
 up this nomadic life and return to the calm and quiet delights 
 of home and study. Yes, from this old, wicked, worn-out 
 Europe, I am coming home to my country. Every step is 
 now Westward ho! towards dear America, and dearer New 
 England. 
 
 Naples is delightful now, the air is not very hot, and seems 
 quite cool after the fierce sun of Athens. I feel without 
 energy, which is chiefly owing to the fact of being entirely 
 alone, but I shall gird up my loins and try to make some 
 excursions to Pompeii, Vesuvius, and Capri. On Sunday 
 afternoon, May 16, we came in sight of Sicily, and the long,
 
 212 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 sloping sides of Mount Etna. Had I had plenty of time and 
 a good companion, I think that I should have run down to 
 Catania, and attempted the ascent of that famous old moun 
 tain of the Cyclops ; but, as I had neither, I was obliged to 
 satisfy myself with a distant glance. We got to Messina 
 Sunday evening, and left there at 2 p. M. Monday ; passed up 
 through the Lipari Islands and quite near Stromboli. This 
 just fulfilled my idea of a volcano, rising abruptly from the 
 water's edge in a vast round cone, with no land at its base to 
 destroy the effect. When I woke up in the morning, we were 
 gliding just between Capri and the promontory of Sorrento 
 into the Bay of Naples. Everything was perfect ; the air was 
 most invigorating; the city of Naples most fair ; and the land 
 scape, all around, of a charming variety, from the high, pre 
 cipitous shores of Capri and Ischia, and the steep hill-sides of 
 Posilippo and Castellamare, to the smiling beauty of Sorrento 
 and the peaceful scenery of Baiae. Above all these old 
 Vesuvius calmly raised his mighty head, himself the most 
 picturesque and striking object in the scenery, but rolling 
 from his summit a long, gray pillar of smoke, to warn that 
 terror was mingled with all this beauty, that under this fair 
 and exuberant life was ever slumbering a strange and awful 
 death. An expedition to Vesuvius was planned, which was 
 interrupted by a pouring rain just as we were starting for 
 Resina, so I and two English artists whom I had met with 
 went to Herculaneum, and then I came home. I started by 
 myself to go to Baiae, and here I met with two Americans, 
 with whom I had a pleasant talk, and they asked me to call on 
 
 them I received an invitation from them to join their 
 
 party for a three days' trip to Pompeii, Amain", Paestum, 
 Capri, and Sorrento. It was too valuable a chance to lose. 
 
 On Monday morning we set out on our tour into the en 
 chanting environs of Naples. My capacity for speaking 
 Italian felt rather insulted by the presence of a valet de place ; 
 but my companions had engaged him, and there was nothing 
 for it but to keep a sharp lookout, and see that he did not 
 cheat us any more than was necessary and proper. A ride of
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 
 
 half an hour brought us to the station of Pompeii. How it 
 would have astonished the ancient Pompeians if they could 
 have suddenly seen a locomotive with a train of cars come 
 puffing up to their city. They probably would have con 
 cluded that the old fables of classic story were being acted 
 over, and that a new fire-breathing Chimera had come upon 
 the earth. A short walk brought us to the gate of the buried 
 town, " The City of the Dead." We entered the Street of the 
 Merchants, and found everything in the shops as it had been 
 left. The temples of Fortune, of Venus, of Isis, of Jupiter, 
 stood there in various states of perfection, but without their 
 attendant priests. The restaurants and resorts of pleasure 
 still preserve the traces of inventive luxury ; but their walls no 
 longer ring with the Bacchanalian songs of the most corrupt 
 period of the world. The houses of the wealthy and tasteful 
 are still rich with marble columns and curious mosaics and 
 frescoes, whose colors still shine with a brilliancy not to be 
 equaled. Their chambers are silent now ; no fountain plays 
 in the impluvium ; no voices sound in the atrium. In the 
 remains of that city we probably see in miniature the remains 
 of the highest civilization the world knew until the genius of 
 Christianity had fully developed itself, had extended its 
 influence from simple morals to the improving of the entire 
 life. 
 
 The houses of Pompeii are mostly small, one-story affairs, 
 containing bedrooms in which it would be almost impossible 
 to lie down, much more to swing a cat, provided the Pom 
 peians indulged in that cruel pastime. A hole to sleep in, 
 and a hall in which to give banquets, seem to have been all 
 that was absolutely necessary for a housekeeper. The house 
 of Diomede was almost the only exception to the one-story, 
 and that is one of the most splendid mansions in Pompeii. 
 We left Pompeii by the Street of the Tombs, which is a vol 
 ume of interest in itself. But I must hasten on the account of 
 our trip. We took a carriage at La Cava, and drove along 
 the sea-shore from Vietri to Amalfi, one of the most pictur 
 esque and remarkable roads I ever saw. The villages were
 
 214 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 built right on the sides of precipices, the houses being stuck 
 into every imaginable fissure, and the cultivated spots were all 
 made by the most indefatigable terracing. Sometimes as 
 many as a dozen monstrous terraces were made in the side of 
 a single hill, and on these the orange, the vine, and the olive 
 flourished to more advantage than they could possibly have 
 done on a level. We visited Amalfi and its cathedral. I 
 never saw a town more full of rascals, that is to say, inhabi 
 tants ; of these a swarm surrounded the carriage, clamorous 
 for alms, whether possessed of the necessary qualifications of 
 blindness or deformity or not. I never sustained such a siege 
 in my life. Luckily an organ-grinder with a monkey came 
 along just then, which effectually diverted from us the public 
 admiration. We spent the night at Salerno. I came home 
 from Sorrento to-day, and expect to go to Vesuvius to-morrow. 
 .... I have not time to tell you about my ascent to Vesuvius, 
 which I accomplished, notwithstanding an eruption had 
 broken out that morning, and had filled the path with hot 
 lava. The view from my window, with the red streams run 
 ning down its sides in two places, and with a wide red field of 
 flame in the plain where the lava had rested, was most mag 
 nificent. I left Naples yesterday afternoon, and came to this 
 place (Civita Vecchia). We shall lie here till afternoon, and 
 
 then go to Leghorn. 
 
 FLORENCE, June i, 1858. 
 
 DEAR J., .... The expedition to Posilipo, Pozzuoli, 
 Lake Avernus, Baiae, etc., I made alone. I did not succeed 
 in getting up much enthusiastic steam at Virgil's tomb at Posi 
 lipo. The truth is, that I had read so little of the great 
 Mantuan since I left school, that his beauties had almost 
 slipped from my mind. The chief associations with which his 
 name was connected were rulers, copy-books, Leverett's Lexi 
 con, etc., so I cut the classical associations, and satisfied my 
 self with admiring the magnificent view of the bay, where 
 " Murmuring Naples, spire overtopping spire, 
 Lies on the slope beyond where Virgil-sleeps." 
 
 Passing through the Tunnel, or, as it is called with more
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 21$ 
 
 poetry than truth, the Grotto of Posilipo, I had a delightful 
 ride through a narrow country lane, almost overgrown with 
 most luxuriant vegetation, to the lake on whose banks is the 
 famous Grotto del Cane. On my approach, a man came out 
 of a house with the key of the cave, which is a little hole like 
 a cellar above ground. In a couple of minutes a woman made 
 her appearance, dragging along the reluctant Cane. A com 
 bination of the motives of humanity and economy, caused me 
 to forego the Cane. I saw the effect of the exhalation, well 
 enough, upon a powerfully burning torch, which went out in 
 stantly. I realized it more fully by putting down my head, 
 taking the vapors in my face, until I had just consciousness 
 enough left to stagger off into the air. I went back to my 
 carriage, accompanied by the reprieved Cane, who jumped 
 around me as if he appreciated that I had saved him from the 
 pangs of death and the pleasures of resuscitation. I have not 
 time to tell you of all that I saw that day, the Lucrine Lake, 
 once famed for its oysters, of Lake Avernus, little resembling 
 the entrance to the infernal regions, as the poets imagined it, 
 of the ruins of the ancient Cumse, of the Bay of Baiae, and 
 the Roman ruins and temples that line its shores, of all 
 these things, any of them interesting enough to merit partic 
 ular descriptions, I cannot speak as I should like to. I will 
 only tell you a little about what interested me far the most of 
 anything I saw that day, which was the Temple of Jupiter Se- 
 rapis at Pozzuoli. I had often heard of it before, in the geo 
 logical lectures and in other reading, but I had not noticed 
 where it was situated, but had placed it in the East some 
 where, not far from the ruins of Baalbec. Imagine, then, my 
 delight at learning that it was really within my ken and reach, 
 and my pleasure on entering the water-covered inclosure, and 
 seeing those remarkable pillars, forming in themselves a book 
 of geological history. I suppose that nowhere is the chron 
 icle of successive geological changes, elevations and depres 
 sions of the earth's surface, written in such clear and unmis 
 takable characters as there, the long smooth space, from the 
 pedestal to a height of twelve feet, indicating a depression
 
 2l6 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 which took place when the column was surrounded to that 
 height by rubbish, or perhaps scoriae from some volcanic erup 
 tion, thus protected from the action of the sea and the boring 
 of marine animals, then, high in the air above this, nine 
 feet completely honey-combed by the industrious piercing of 
 numberless lithotomites, worn and fretted by the incessant 
 dashing of the waves, doubtless for hundreds of years ; above 
 this the smooth portion of the column, which had as yet suf 
 fered no wear and tear save that of the atmosphere and time. 
 The mosaic pavement of the temple is covered with water to 
 the depth of several inches, and this will grow deeper as the 
 subsiding movement, which is still in operation, goes on. The 
 day's excursion to Baiae was a most delightful one. I visited 
 the temples there, saw the Tarantella danced, went down to 
 Misenum, came back to Pozzuoli in a sail-boat, following the 
 same route taken by Pliny when he started out in '79 A. D., on 
 that expedition to see Vesuvius which cost him his life. This 
 sail across the Bay of Baiae may be called the climax of my 
 day's enjoyment. 
 
 I made the ascent of Vesuvius with a gentleman from New 
 York, and I will rush, in medias res, into an account of this 
 expedition, before the very vivid impression which it pro 
 duced has worn away from my mind. You may imagine it 
 was not feeble, when I tell you that quite a fierce eruption 
 was in full fuss and fury when we were upon the moun 
 tain. On Thursday morning, May 27, Mr. Y. and I left 
 Naples in a carriage, for the burning mountain. A thick cloud 
 shrouded the top of the mountain, and seemed to portend a 
 shower of rain, but we did not know what had happened in 
 the night, nor what was the nature of the cloud that hung 
 there, almost the only one in a beautifully clear sky. At 
 Resina we engaged a guide, and also a horse for Mr. Y., both 
 to meet us at the Hermitage, a building situated something 
 more than half way up, where travellers leave their carriages, 
 and proceed on horseback, or on foot, to the base of the Cone 
 itself. When we got to the Hermitage, we found the guide 
 and horse awaiting us, and then learned from him that there
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 2 1/ 
 
 had been a sharp earthquake in the night, and that several 
 new craters had opened in the side of the Cone, and, more 
 over, that it would be impossible to ascend to the summit of 
 the mountain, as a small crater had opened in the very path, 
 and had sent out a storm of lava which had just filled it up. He 
 proposed that we should go to see the new craters, without 
 going to the top. I, who had made a vow to look down the 
 great crater, if it cost me. my hat and boots, was of course tre 
 mendously disappointed, and had a shrewd suspicion that our 
 guide wanted to save his old bones the bother of climbing up 
 the Cone, and yet to pocket the fare all the same. However, 
 we met an Italian gentleman coming down, and, thanks to my 
 Italian lessons, I understood him to say that he had been to 
 the top. I suggested this fact to the guide, and pointed to 
 wards the foot of the Cone. Then we began our scramble, the 
 guide first, I at his heels, Mr. Y. some few yards behind, a 
 man with a basket of provisions to eat at the top, and two 
 sturdy fellows with straps, with which they proposed to help 
 the signer up the mountain. Upon our first appearance they 
 spotted him, and I tried to send them away. They informed 
 me that the signer was " motto grosso" and that he would have 
 to resort to them sooner or later. Their prediction was cor 
 rect, and he was obliged to put himself under the boosting 
 and pushing regimen, much as his better nature rebelled 
 against it. For' myself, I got along capitally. Our course 
 lay, for some distance, right over the fresh lava of that very 
 morning, which was still almost too hot to walk upon, while 
 half-way up the ascent, in the side of the Cone, the crater 
 which had sent it forth was still smoking away, like Doc Mul- 
 ford, causing us to feel rather nervous. We reached the crater, 
 which was a little affair only a few feet across. Very near us, 
 but separated from our sight by a ridge, every few moments 
 we could hear a loud roar and swash, as of a heavy surf break 
 ing upon the sea-shore, announcing that a new stream of lava 
 had been cast out. After an hour of pretty tough scrambling, 
 we reached the platform at the top, and could see the crater 
 and the small cone casting out an immense volume of smoke 
 mingled with flame.
 
 21 8 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 We set one of the men to cook some eggs in a ravine, while 
 we ourselves went with the guide and one of the bearers to see 
 the great crater. Our crossing of the platform was neither 
 safe nor pleasant. The earthquake of the night before had 
 rent great chasms, large enough to fall into, and a few feet 
 down we could see and feel the red-hot stream of flowing lava. 
 But what was worst of all was that, from these crevices, came 
 up strong exhalations and thick clouds of sulphur, through 
 which we were obliged to walk, until I was nearly choked, and 
 eyes, nose, and mouth rilled with these horrid fumes. I was 
 in continual danger of putting my foot into a crack, and get 
 ting it burnt off. I then wished most devoutly that I had 
 your practice in the laboratory, and could breathe those smells 
 as comfortably as my native air. At length we reached the 
 edge of the crater. From the round edge projected a thin 
 shell of incrustations ; upon this the bearer got down. The 
 guide refused to, as it was only two or three inches thick. I 
 followed the bearer, and while he held me by the arm, looked 
 down into that fearful abyss. I do not exaggerate in the least 
 when I say that the sight fairly unmanned me. A deep, dull 
 red sea of fire, covered with a cloud of smoke, but tossing in 
 restless agitation, and sending forth a sound like that of the 
 sea when a storm is out, and the winds and waves pout to 
 gether. Besides the occasional explosion of gases, there was 
 a deep, solemn waving and heaving of the entire mass. Add 
 to this the rolling sulphur clouds, the fierce, bright flashes of 
 flame from the top of the cone, and the ghastly exhalations 
 arising on every side, and you have a scene which it is not in 
 human nature to behold unmoved. For myself, all my strength 
 left me, I became much oppressed, and even terrified, and had 
 scarcely the power to cross the sulphur fields again. I shall 
 never see anything like that again. It was like standing on 
 the burning Sinai. We rested awhile, ate our eggs, cooked 
 by volcanic heat, and salted with volcanic salt. We then made 
 the descent, not over the large scoriae, where we had come up, 
 but in another place. The ascent which it had required an 
 hour to make, I descended in three minutes. We descended
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 2 19 
 
 to the ancient crater, which was left when Pompeii and Her- 
 culaneum were destroyed. From here we had a fine chance 
 to see the eruption from the new craters. No less than five 
 craters, side by side, were hard at work, especially the one 
 in the centre, in throwing red-hot rocks and molten lava. 
 The stream of fire which proceeded from them was, when I 
 saw it, about twenty feet wide by five to ten feet high. We 
 went right in front of it ; as it rolled slowly on we put our 
 staves into the red-hot mass. The guide twisted out portions, 
 and buried coins in it before it cooled. This was as grandly 
 beautiful a sight as the one on the summit was terrible. 
 Just think of a river of fire thirty feet wide ! and by the next 
 evening I saw it from my window in Naples, widened to a 
 hundred feet, and coming down the mountain slope in a man 
 ner rather alarming to Resina. I place my day at Vesuvius 
 side by side with that of the Jardin, near Mont Blanc, the 
 two grandest scenes I ever saw or ever shall see, the one 
 all ice, the other all fire. 
 
 I spent a delightful evening yesterday at the house of H. 
 Powers, the great sculptor, the greatest living sculptor, I be 
 lieve. He is the perfect incarnation of hospitality. My rec 
 ollections of Florence will always be necessarily connected 
 with his family. 
 
 LONDON, June 17. 
 
 .... I have been very busy in travelling and sight-see 
 ing. I am really ashamed to send such a miserably short 
 affair as this must be, in answer to your nice long ones ; but as 
 I shall come myself, as a sort of P. S. to my letter, I think 
 that you will pardon me. You will find that all my improve 
 ments and advantages, if so be I have acquired any, which I 
 consider as very dubious, lie under the surface, and are of a 
 spiritual rather than fleshly order, for I have grown into as 
 unprepossessing a young man as you would wish to see. The 
 sun has tanned me to a dirty whitey-brown color, which con 
 trasts badly enough with my light eyes, and my capillary ar 
 rangements in general are in a highly scrubby condition, so I 
 recommend you to look not on the outward appearance.
 
 220 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 NEW HAVEN, July 10, 1858. 
 
 MY DEAR COUSIN, Your very kind and thoughtful letter 
 came in this morning, and pleased me with the thought that 
 you took so strong an interest in my arrival. Well, Europe is 
 with the past, and nothing now remains save to carve out a 
 happy and noble future in America, our own dear native land, 
 to find as high and true a pleasure in action here as we 
 have done in travel and art-study and observation there. But 
 I scarely think at all of Europe just now. I am all absorbed 
 in the perfect happiness of getting home, and of taking rest, 
 not among strangers, but in the midst of those who are to me 
 the dearest ones in the world. You can easily imagine that 
 last Tuesday evening was a pleasant one to me ; they were 
 all on the tip-toe of expectation, and I did n't surprise them 
 much when I dashed in. Mother met me at the gate 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 HYDE PARK ON THE HUDSON, 
 August 1 6, 1858. 
 
 MY DEAR FRIEND, T. D. handed me your letter just as I 
 was entering into the full whirl of business which naturally 
 comes upon a man in New Haven during commencement week, 
 and especially when that man is Class Secretary, and has a 
 thousand things to look after and provide. That season of toil 
 and turmoil has passed, and I have now some leisure and 
 quiet wherein to consider your very kind and interesting let 
 ter, to read it over once more with renewed pleasure, and 
 finally to settle myself peacefully down to frame a reply. I 
 was rejoiced at a number of facts stated in your letter, must 
 of all that you were hoping to walk unscathed through the 
 fiery furnace of Kohl (no pun intended here), and likewise 
 that you had steeled your gentle heart against the seduc 
 tive advances of Wurst in all its witching forms. Somewhat 
 counterbalancing and depreciating my joy, was your confes 
 sion and acknowledgment of the soft impeachment of Bier. 
 Alas ! sweet Pinckney, 1 I see thee with a prophetic eye pre- 
 1 A sort of " pet name," used only by him and his brother.
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 221 
 
 maturely swelling to those gigantic proportions to which the 
 friends of "Tony Weller" 1 have always looked forward with 
 fear and trembling, and thy otherwise delicate members all 
 distended into symmetrical magnitude. All the kindlier feel 
 ings of my nature shudder as I think of you dragging your 
 self up the Righi, or picture you, like Falstaff, "larding the 
 lean earth " as you walk along some hot and dusty road. 
 Would I could be with you to give you an occasional lift for 
 " Auld lang syne." I cannot exactly analyze, my dear fellow, 
 the nature of my sentiments towards you, but perhaps the 
 best way after all will be to take it on faith, and to consider 
 your friendship as a permanent and well-founded fact, without 
 wondering why it is that we fight so much while together, and 
 like each other so well when separated. When we get past 
 the " squirtish " period of young manhood, probably we shall 
 get along better, and be willing to take each other's opinions 
 and sentiments at par, or even at a premium. 
 
 You ask about my return home with interest, and speak of 
 my being " a lion," " a centre," and other bad names. Per 
 haps I had better proceed at once to inform you of the im 
 mense stir which my arrival created. At about 9^ p. M., on 
 Tuesday evening, July 6, we rode together from the station 
 through the elm-lined streets, it being too dark for us to be 
 recognized, but not too much so to see that the city was look 
 ing unusually lovely. At the corner of College and Wall 
 Streets I dropped " the Relic," 2 and with some trembling and 
 anxiety continued out through College Street, crossed the 
 railroad, and was soon landed at the door of the "Ash-Heap." 8 
 Of the welcome home I received I can give you no adequate 
 description : you will find out what it is yourself before many 
 months are over. Suffice it to say that all home-sickness and 
 absence and longings were fully repaid when I found myself 
 once more sitting by my mother's side. I can send you no 
 kinder wish than that you may be as happy in your return 
 
 1 A similar phrase. 
 
 2 A name for the friend with whom he returned. 
 8 So he jokingly called his home.
 
 222 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 home as I was in mine. For a week I basked lazily in the 
 smiles of home faces, carefully avoiding any meetings with 
 
 any of my former friends 
 
 NEW HAVEN, August 20. The woodchuck - shooting, 
 whereof I spake in my last sheet, turned out disastrously to 
 myself and triumphantly to those innocent animals, as I came 
 in woodchuckless, and with a sprained ankle, caused by jump 
 ing on a stone hidden among some leaves. I spent the 
 remainder of my visit at Hyde Park upon the sofa, and have 
 
 now come home to try the same kind of exercise here 
 
 By the way, my young friend, let me remind you that I have 
 emerged from the degraded age of twenty-one, and am now a 
 venerable patriarch of twenty-two years. Infant, where are 
 you now ? Don't you wish you were twenty-two ? But you 
 can't come it ; you are still very verdant and youthful, and I 
 am sorry that the brief space of this letter will not permit me 
 to give you a screed of good advice. But don't despair ; 
 cherish hope, and perhaps one of these days you may become 
 twenty-two likewise, although I cannot by any means promise 
 you that you will ever catch up with me ; still, there 's no know 
 ing what may be done by active exertion. 1 A birthday is 
 generally a day of plans and resolutions, a day of looking on 
 the ground left behind, and gazing onward to the future. For 
 myself, my past was too unsatisfactory to me to receive much 
 attention ; but I rather settled my plans for the next year or 
 two to come. As you expressed a desire to hear what they 
 were, I will tell you as nearly as I can. I expect to spend a 
 good part of the coming year at home, working on the class 
 report, studying generally, and doing something at the law, 
 probably in a lawyer's office. Next year I shall enter Har 
 vard Law School, and take from that college my degree. If 
 anything favorable then " turns up " at the East, I shall take 
 to that, but if not, then *' Westward Ho ! " for a life of misery 
 among the stumps of Iowa or Minnesota I seem to 
 
 1 There was an interval of eight days between his birth and mine. He 
 scarcely ever failed, when that week came round, to remind me of it as 
 above.
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 22 3 
 
 find myself considerably changed since I came home from 
 Europe. I am aware of no actual benefit derived from my 
 absence from home, and indeed I doubt whether I derived 
 any ; while on the other hand all my ideas have undergone 
 a process of unsettling which makes me very restless and 
 thoughtful, and at times even despairing of the future, so that 
 I am often disposed almost to wish that I had never tasted of 
 the tree of European knowledge, or spent one pleasant year 
 in aimless wanderings over the Continent. On the whole, I 
 am inclined to think that the ultimate effect of travel upon my 
 own mind has been anything but good, without taking into 
 account the wasted year, which might have been well-im 
 proved if I had only been content to stay at home. But I 
 won't bother you with any further Jeremiad on this subject ; 
 I only hope that you may reap more satisfaction and profit 
 from your residence abroad than I have done. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 NEW HAVEN, December 2, 1858. 
 
 MY DEAR PINCKNEY, My constitution has not yet thor 
 oughly recovered from the shock which it underwent upon the 
 receipt of a letter from you, when, as you well and ably ob 
 serve, I was myself in debt to you. Is Pinckney also among 
 the letterwriters ? Can it be possible that that amiable youth 
 has relinquished his favorite doctrine of non-interference, and 
 has finally given in his adherence to those principles of com 
 mon decency in correspondence which are generally accepted 
 by the human race ? " Representative of two hemispheres, 
 welcome to our shores ! " I do hereby extend my full and 
 free forgiveness to you for writing out of your time. If I 
 shall succeed in filling these four pages, it will certainly be a 
 very remarkable feat, and the longest letter I have written 
 since I wrote to you last, my epistles for the last four 
 months having consisted of a few brief and pointed remarks, 
 chiefly of an interrogatory character. Indeed, I shall congrat 
 ulate myself if I get safely through without asking you when 
 you were born, and whether you are married, and, if so, when,
 
 224 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 and how many babies you have at this present. May your 
 good genius, my friend, always defend you from being made a 
 class secretary, or any similar animal, with a penalty attached 
 of hard labor and solitary confinement for a portion of each 
 day for the space of several months. 
 
 You speak of your achievements in Hebrew with a certain 
 degree of discouragement. It would be very strange if you 
 did not feel so, for it is a language whose greatest difficulties 
 (always provided that you are only striving after ordinary 
 proficiency in it, and not after thorough scholarship) lie at the 
 very portal. When you have once made yourself familiar 
 with the letters and the vowel points, the conjugations of the 
 verb, and the declensions of the noun, you float along bravely 
 on the ocean of translation, with no subjunctive modes, no 
 ablatives absolute or genitives of cause, no datives of likeness 
 to make you afraid. From the moment that you have mas 
 tered the " Bireshith bara Elohim," you feel possessed of a 
 patent right to go it loose and criticise the construers of the 
 Bible, from St. Jerome to Mr. Sawyer and Chevalier Bunsen. 
 . . . . I am deeply interested in Plato's " Phaedon," more than 
 I could have thought I ever should be when some nine years 
 ago I was wont to hurl my Sophocles' Greek Grammar against 
 the wall of my study in boyish rage. When you come to read 
 this great story (and when you do, don't fail to read it in the 
 original Greek), you will be delighted more than I can tell you. 
 I am pushing Goethe somewhat ; have read " Gotz von Ber- 
 lichingen," " Die Geschwister," " Hermann " and " Dorothea," 
 and a number of his smaller pieces, and have been greatly 
 pleased. But, notwithstanding I derive so much pleasure from 
 these pursuits, they rather hinder than help me in my general 
 professional work. Law is covered over and hidden by these 
 numerous Tmpepya, and I see the problem of making my living 
 as far from a solution as it was three years and three months 
 ago, when I took off my tail-coat on Commencement night. 
 I am looking forward to my next spring and summer at Har 
 vard, when I hope to accomplish something more tangible 
 than I have yet done. But probably it will not amount to
 
 FOREIGN TRAVEL AND ART. 22$ 
 
 much, and if it should, to what end? I am tempted at times 
 almost to despair when I think that I should experience no satis 
 faction even I if should succeed in my highest ambition most 
 perfectly. Now, don't moralize over this. I will promise be 
 forehand to imagine exactly all you would say. John's dog waxes 
 in girth, and his paws are more mammoth than ever, while his 
 futile gambols defy description. The relations between his 
 dogship and the goodly fellowship of cats are of a somewhat 
 disturbed nature : he worries them all with the exception of 
 the sable ancestress of the family, the old 7r-cat, who 
 scratches his nose gorgeously, and makes him howl peccavi. 
 He has better luck with the kittens ; and it was only yester 
 day that, after a brief tempest of bitings, scratchings, bark 
 ings, and spittings, I found a bunch of fur in his mouth which 
 had a strange resemblance to that growing on the back of our 
 promising young cat named Fanny, who, with a very disgusted 
 expression of face, was sitting upon the highest shelf of the 
 dresser, " inhabiting," as Euripides says under similar circum 
 stances, " mansions impregnable by misfortune." 
 
 I have written you a very absurd letter, and rather non 
 sensically long, but I hope that you will respond with an 
 epistle of at least equal length. Talk about anything, and, 
 above all, of yourself. I doubt not that J. would send his 
 love to you if I should wake him up now (2.05 A. M.) and 
 ask him ; but the experiment might be hazardous.
 
 III. 
 
 LETTERS OF HOME, AND PROFES 
 SIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 
 
 1859-61.
 
 III. 
 
 LETTERS OF HOME, AND PROFESSIONAL 
 STUDY AND LIFE. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 NEW HAVEN, February 13, 1859. 
 
 .... MY conscience has for some time been pricking me 
 about writing to you, and when your kind letter arrived, it 
 nearly took all the hair off the top of my head, being a coal of 
 the first magnitude. I began to put my Report in press about 
 February ist, and have already got thirty-two pages printed, 
 which is nearly half of the whole concern ; but an unpleasant 
 accident occurred last Thursday evening, which will have the 
 effect of delaying me considerably ; the attic where Morehouse 
 stores his paper, etc., formerly A. 2. $. hall, when you and I 
 belonged to that institution, took fire and burned partly up, 
 destroying some $500 worth of paper, and the whole impres 
 sion (500 copies) of the first two forms of my Report. Rather 
 disgusting, nit ? However, I hope to drive up rapidly and get 
 the thing sufficiently under way to allow me to get off to Cam 
 bridge by March 4. 
 
 Hebrew languishes rather : we have only four recitations 
 per week now, instead of six as we had last term. We are 
 reading in the Psalms, and find them considerably more diffi 
 cult than Genesis, which in fact was a little too easy. We 
 have been tackling the Messianic Psalms, the 26. and i6th ; 
 what is your opinion of the meaning of ViSt? and nrttt? ? I 
 perpetrated an essay on the true pronunciation of the word
 
 230 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Jehovah some month or so ago, wherein I indorsed McWhor- 
 ter, and spread myself generally. How jolly it is to take some 
 good meaty subject, and go into the library and claw over au 
 thorities ! I wish that I had the prospect before me of being 
 able to do more of it. 
 
 I enjoyed the "Autocrat" immensely; it made the some 
 what borous ride from P. to N. Y. pass away imperceptibly. 
 I think that the " Allegory of Old Age," the professor's paper, 
 is the gem of the work. The " Chambered Nautilus " also is 
 a real bit of poetry. It is quite easy to see how often and how 
 much Dr. H. has profited by the existence of the " Noctes ; " 
 not so much in filching ideas, as in the general management 
 of his talks. In that part on trees, I rather noticed a " skin." 
 The poem on " ^Estivation " also tickled my midriff consider 
 ably ; the " Parson's Legacy " is rather a failure after the 
 " One Hoss Shay." Have just read Kingsley's " Two Years 
 Ago ; " tastes rather flat in comparison with " Amyas Leigh ; " 
 but I think Tom Thumall a very attractive character, don't 
 you ? a regular creation of the present age. 
 
 Y. and I finished the " Phasdo " of Plato yesterday ; the clos 
 ing passages were full of simple sublimity I was in 
 vited to Mrs. Dana's last night to meet Professor L. Agassiz ; 
 it was a delightful occasion ; he seems to be one of the kind 
 est and jolliest of men, and talks on all subjects with equal 
 facility. How small it does make me feel to talk face to face 
 with one whose knowledge is so immense, and whose acquire 
 ments so valuable ; it seemed to me as if I did wrong in talking 
 to him, and keeping him from thinking or working. Science, 
 of course, was rampant that evening, and the conversation was 
 generally rather steep for me 
 
 I do rather like you upon the whole, and am always yours. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, March 7, 1859. 
 
 I have at last got fixed here, and before I compose my weary 
 carcass for its first slumber under my own vine and fig-tree, 
 I will endeavor to scribble you a few hasty lines. I reached 
 " Bosting " at midnight, and went to the United States Hotel,
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 
 
 just across the street from the depot. After breakfast, I devoted 
 myself to finding L. C. He was not in his office, so I went to 
 Cambridge and had a confab with the Janitor of the Law 
 School, obtained what information I needed, paddled back to 
 Boston, found L., took him to dinner with me, and he. and I 
 came back here together and commenced a vigorous hunt for 
 rooms. Success at last crowned our efforts, and we lit upon 
 the house where I now am. The house, which looks as if it 
 might have been built by some of the earliest of the Puritans, 
 is situated upon an open space which rejoices in the appella 
 tion of Winthrop Square. It is two minutes' walk from the 
 Law Building. My room will be delightful in summer, as it 
 is open on three sides, and a couple of fine horse-chestnut 
 trees reach their branches up to the window. After we had 
 struck the bargain for the room, we went to the Law School, 
 and L. introduced me to Professor Washburn and Professor 
 Parker, and I entered my name in the book. I shall enter, as 
 I had thought, at the middle of the middle year, but in order 
 to do this, I must have a certificate from the professors of the 
 Yale Law School, that I attended there from September, 1856, 
 to May, 1857. I wish J. to get this for me. 
 
 To H. N. C. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, March 8, 1859. 
 
 You see that I have at last set out on the voyage of life for 
 myself, having deserted the family ark at New Haven. It 
 makes me sad to think of it ; the idea of going away for good 
 and all, and always hereafter being at home only as a visitor. 
 Indeed, mother said it made her feel much worse than my go 
 ing to Europe did ; but I could hardly agree with her in that, 
 for then I was going away to something entirely new and un 
 tried, whereas here I have merely been transplanted from one 
 scene of student-life to another, and among students I always 
 feel myself more or less at home. Still I feel sure that I shall 
 be homesick on some of these long afternoons and evenings, 
 when I have studied myself tired, and long for something 
 home-like to talk to and smile at. . .
 
 232 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 My landladies had never taken lodgers before, and expressed 
 their great delight at finding their first one of such an orderly 
 and quiet (?) disposition. I wonder what they will say when 
 Linus comes over and spends an evening with me. Cambridge 
 is the most disagreeable place at this season of the year that 
 you can well imagine. Mud and snow lie everywhere, in deep 
 sloughs of despond, which the rays of the sun open to un- 
 fathomed depths ; everybody, from the gray-haired man down 
 to the infant in arms, wears india-rubber boots. Indeed, I 
 should think that the first question propounded by the medical 
 examiner of a Cambridge life insurance office would be, " Do 
 you wear india rubber boots ? " and at the close of the insur 
 ance policy might be inserted some such clause as this, " and 
 this policy to become void in case the holder thereof goes out 
 without I. R. boots." I hope to work hard here, and to recover 
 my habits of study, which I have almost lost by two years of 
 idleness, travelling, and half-work. Law shall have eight hours, 
 at least, per diem, and that is time enough for any one study. 
 What an astonishing difference there is with regard to control 
 of time, between being at home and being away from home. 
 I considered myself fortunate at home if I could find six hours 
 for undisturbed study ; here I have no trouble in finding four 
 teen. New Haven was socially very pleasant before I came 
 away, too pleasant to allow me to do anything. I enjoyed Y.'s 
 
 society very much We read Plato's " Phaedo" together 
 
 last winter, and enjoyed it extremely, rather for the picture 
 it gives of the character and life of Socrates than for the in 
 trinsic value of the arguments, which seemed to me frequency 
 to depend on wire-drawn distinctions, and to contain a great 
 deal of solemn trifling. If I had time, I should like to ex 
 pand at length upon what I thought of Socrates, but I must 
 come to a close. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, March 14, 1859. 
 
 DEAR BROTHER, .... I have been surprised to see 
 how heterodox the fellows are on the subject of getting up 
 early in the morning ; they are even so base as to approve of 
 7 A. M. as a proper hour for breakfast, and dilate on the
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND ART. 233 
 
 amount of time gained by such a barbarous custom. I can 
 safely say that I never heard such sentiments before from the 
 lips of young students, and I fear that all my attempts at ex 
 citing an eight o'clock breakfast rebellion will 'prove futile. 
 There is really a great deal of earnestness among the law stu 
 dents, although some of it is simply the result of the first shine 
 of vacation good resolutions ; already I have perceived a let 
 ting down of these lofty determinations, less love for Dane 
 Hall, and more for Boston, and an increased tenderness of 
 feeling for whist and billiards, which were at first spurned with 
 as virtuous indignation as were the spirits by St. Anthony. I 
 believe that there is a great possibility of overdoing hard work 
 and making it distasteful. I intend to avoid this by a careful 
 and philosophical division of my time. 
 
 After a couple of hours of hard study at Cruise or Greenleaf, 
 I can take up a Noctes, or Charles Lamb, or Philidor, or 
 spend a half hour at the newspapers in the reading room, and 
 return to work with a redoubled zest. I intend to give about 
 ten hours a day to law, including lectures, and to scatter through 
 these my four hours of relaxation of all descriptions. I shall 
 write letters when I can find time for them, and sometimes 
 shall make time for them, as on this occasion, when I ought to 
 be getting myself up on " hearsay evidence," so as to be able to 
 appreciate Professor Parsons' lectures on that subject. 
 
 I have no space in this letter to give you any impressions of 
 the professors, or their mode of lecturing ; suffice it to say, 
 that I have not changed my old opinion about the compara 
 tive value of recitations and lectures, when employed for ele 
 mentary instruction, nor do I see any reason to believe that 
 the latter can ever be so useful as the former. So I have man 
 aged to combine the advantages of the two, and after taking 
 as full notes as possible, I hunt up all the references, and 
 then Joe J., and a man from New York named T., and my 
 self, have a sort of recitation together, in which one takes the 
 note-books and examines the others upon the substance of the 
 lectures. We are also examining Greenleaf 's edition of 
 " Cruise on Real Property," and reciting it in the same way.
 
 234 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 It will, I think, prove extremely useful, as everything which is 
 not thoroughly understood is discussed in a colloquial style, 
 until we have not only mastered it, but can talk it off of our 
 selves. T. is very sober and dignified, and knows a great deal 
 of law ; besides, he keeps us from cutting up and wasting 
 time. I shall envy you your meeting in Brush's room. You 
 must not fail to tell me all about it, and if this reaches you 
 before the meeting, remember me most kindly to each and 
 every one of the fellows. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, March 17, 1859. 
 
 Well, here I am once more, in a "furrin" land, /. e., in Yankee 
 land, where codfish holds his sway, " every inch a fish," and 
 where the abomination of " shillings," /. e., i6| cents, still 
 is preserved in the manners and customs of an enlightened but 
 degraded population. That you may distinctly locate me in 
 your imagination, suppose, upon one corner of a small street, 
 and facing upon a diminutive plot of ground dignified by the 
 name of Winthrop Square (?), a most venerable house, which 
 was doubtless of a respectable antiquity when Annapolis was 
 just beginning to cut her first teeth. If I were an artist, I 
 would try to send you a drawing of my present abode, though 
 I doubt if I ever could learn to draw badly enough to do jus 
 tice to its extremely tumble-down aspect. My room is "in one 
 of the wings (for this venerable architectural bird has two 
 wings and a tail, and will probably fly away if it ever gets 
 through moulting, which it seems to be doing at present) ; and 
 being thus in a somewhat isolated situation, has windows to 
 the north, east, and west, promising charming ventilation in 
 summer, and even now admitting freely the pleasant rays of 
 both the morning and the evening sun ; and last night the 
 moonlight streamed in at my east window, in a way which af 
 fected me with an odd mixture of pleasure and pain a sense 
 of independence saddened down by a touch of homesickness. 
 The ceiling is low, and across it, in about the middle of the 
 room, runs a heavy projecting beam, which comes down to 
 within a few inches of my head when I stand. An old-fash 
 ioned fire-place, a pre-Adamite wardrobe and bureau to match,
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 235 
 
 the very two old brass candlesticks, by whose light Noah 
 and his three sons played whist in the Ark, these, and sun 
 dry other relics of a by-gone age, make up the principal items 
 of notice in my den. Indeed, with the exception of an upstart 
 table and a pair of parvenu chairs, I am pretty much the only 
 piece of furniture that is not bashful about telling its age 
 
 LOWELL, April 3, 1859. 
 
 DEAR BROTHER, In order to save you exclamations of 
 surprise at the above direction, I will immediately inform you 
 that I have not become disgusted with the Law, and retired into 
 a cotton factory, but L. having kindly invited me to come home 
 with him and spend Sunday, I very gladly accepted, and hav 
 ing added B. to our number, we sallied forth from the " wener- 
 able" city of "Bosting,"and after a ride of an hour in a baggage 
 car, narrowly watched by the baggage-man to prevent our rob 
 bing the mails, which hung around in tempting rows, we ar 
 rived at this celebrated place, and met with a very cordial 
 reception from L.'s family. So, after having listened to two 
 sermons, and having eaten a capital dinner, I sit down to an 
 swer your two most acceptable letters. I should have written 
 you last week, but I was very busy getting up a case for the 
 Moot Court Club, to which I belong. Ordinarily an appointee 
 is allowed two weeks to get up his case in, but both the regu 
 lar counsel had backed out, and although it was hardly fair for 
 one so inexperienced, the clerk insisted upon my filling one of 
 the vacant places, leaving me to fill the other as best I could. 
 Luckily I managed to get the young man named T., of whom 
 you have heard me speak, to go in with me. I was very glad 
 to get an antagonist as green as myself, rather than some ex 
 perienced old un, who was up to all sorts of legal snuff. We 
 managed to get up a pretty mild case an action on a prom 
 issory note. Our trial of it comes off in the Coke Club to 
 morrow night, when I hope that we shall not disgrace ourselves 
 in the eyes of our seniors, and I have a faint private expecta 
 tion of winning the case. I must tell you something about the 
 school moot courts, and how they are managed. They take
 
 236 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 place once a week before one of the professors, and the whole 
 school ; are tried by four students, two from the senior and 
 two from the middle class, and are about as severe an ordeal 
 for a young lawyer as I can very easily imagine. The 
 speeches are elaborated with very great care, and must re 
 quire a great deal of time in preparation. I almost shake in 
 my shoes to think of the time when I shall be put through the 
 mill. However, as I am in the middle class, I shall go on as 
 junior counsel, and shall have less than half of the responsi 
 bility of the case on my shoulders. All the school attend, and 
 take very full notes, especially of the decisions, and with good 
 reason, for the professors deliver much more elaborate opinions 
 than many judges on the bench. The club courts are entirely 
 different ; the clubs are composed of from sixteen to twenty- 
 five members, and meet also once a week for the purpose of 
 trying cases ; the members take turns in acting as judge and 
 counsel, and it is so arranged that every man has to act in one 
 or other of these capacities three or four times a term. I be 
 long to the Coke Club, which is the most recherche and select ; 
 as it has but sixteen members, and professes to require two 
 years' previous study of the law for an election to it, but they 
 made an exception to their general rule and took J. J., T., and 
 myself, without inquiring how long we had walked in the ways 
 of wickedness. I am also a member of the Berrien Club, but 
 have not yet attended any of its meetings. These clubs are 
 solely for the purpose of trying cases, and when business is 
 over, that is at 9 P. M., they disperse without making the 
 slightest kind of a row. In fact, there is no arrangement 
 in Cambridge Law School for cultivating the social ele 
 ment, and I greatly disgusted a crowd of law students the 
 other day, by remarking that all we did was to cultivate 
 the worst part of our intellectual nature. Perhaps after all 
 it is better for me that it is so, as I am rather prone to 
 go into social meetings too extensively, and to waste time 
 therein. .
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 237 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, April 7, 1859. 
 
 DEAR M., .... I have been here now nearly five 
 weeks, and think I shall be able to employ my time to suffi 
 cient purpose to repay for absence from home I had 
 
 expected to find myself very much unaccustomed to study, 
 and that it would be very hard to break myself into work 
 again, after almost two years wasted in travelling and other 
 idleness, but was pleasantly surprised by discovering that I 
 was as fond of study as ever, and could go at it with as great 
 
 a zest A year ago to-day I was wandering in the 
 
 Roman Forum, and climbing for wallflowers in the Coliseum. 
 It really seems that there is no part of the world more per 
 fectly familiar to my mind's eye than that spot, and the almost 
 daily walk I used to take to reach it. " Kennst du den 
 Weg ? " I am inclined to think you do, and that you would 
 have no objection to treading it again, nor indeed should I 
 myself feel able to refuse an invitation to take a walk with 
 you there to-day. It is a glorious day for seeing ruins, really 
 too beautiful to take for visiting galleries, but one which 
 should be spent in the open air ; so let us set off immediately for 
 the Baths of Caracalla. Which way shall we go ? Down the 
 Corso, across the Forum to the Arch of Janus and the Cloaca 
 Maxima, and then under the shadow of the Palatine Hill by 
 the Via dei Cerchi ? " Or shall we take the route over Monte 
 Cavallo, and past the Forum of Trajan to the Coliseum, and 
 thence through the Arch of Constantine, stopping to take the 
 scene of lovely quiet and perfect peace from the monastic ter 
 races of dear San Gregorio ? Then how charming to sit in 
 the long grass to-day in the Baths of Caracalla, drinking in at 
 every breath more pure draughts of true classical feeling than 
 could be obtained by years of reading in the study. And then 
 those beautiful daisies with crimson edges ! Well, we can't 
 always do just what we want to do > and I must not forget that 
 1859 is not 1858. I have troubled you with this nonsense 
 because a fit of longing after Italy suddenly came over me, 
 and I thought that you would be likely to be more lenient to
 
 238 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 absurdities of this kind than any one else. What a pity it was 
 that we could not have been in Italy at the same time. 
 
 April 18, 1859. I have been feeling pretty homesick 
 lately, and to-day is not one to make a blue man feel cheer 
 ful. It snowed in the morning, hailed at noon, and is now 
 raining in the most dreary manner. I have been feeling 
 rather unwell for some days, which has dreadfully aggravated 
 my longing for home, and my disgust for the classic shades of 
 the Harvard Law School. Indeed, I am almost tempted to 
 bid Kent and Chitty and Blackstone an eternal farewell, and 
 engage in some pursuit which is more congenial to my nat 
 ural disposition. I sometimes picture to myself the amount 
 of success which I might possibly obtain, and then I think 
 what a mere nothing it would be in the abyss of my ambition. 
 I sometimes even envy the lot of those who are condemned to 
 a life of mere manual drudgery, as being happier than that 
 which must ever be the portion of an ambitious and mediocre 
 mind. I am sometimes almost ready to withdraw from all 
 toil and strife, and give myself up to the easy occupation of a 
 reader and a scholar. It is for this reason, and for this alone, 
 that I regret my year in Europe. The pleasant thoughts 
 linked to objects there will be continually recurring, and 
 always at the very moment when I wish to fix my mind most 
 firmly on the dry details of my profession. I really think that 
 a student of law ought not to know of the existence of any 
 thing else. To him scholarship, art, literature, the pleasures 
 of society, should be a sealed book, for in them he will see 
 beauties and find delights which can never exist in his stern 
 mistress, Jurisprudence. But I now imagine that I hear you 
 saying, " Every man is born to labor and to suffer, and this is 
 at present your trial period. You do not come into this world 
 to bask in the sunshine like a butterfly, but to work like a 
 man." Yes ; but it is hard to love the good for its own sake, 
 when nothing beautiful also attracts. Giving up all my other 
 reading and study is to me, on entering the law, what the loss 
 of her flowing hair and sparkling jewels is to a novice when 
 she takes the vows at the convent altar. I had rather keep
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 239 
 
 my mind and heart fresh and bright and happy, than, when 
 arrived at a withered age, receive some miserable judgeship 
 or political reward, the price of life-long toil on the legal 
 treadmill. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, May i, 1859. 
 
 .... Your last blow was well put in, and took me just in the 
 right spot, and only a few moments before I dodged, /. e., re 
 moved hither, changing the New Haven mud for the Cambridge 
 mud, and finding a difference of at least three inches in favor 
 of the profundity of the latter. During the eight weeks that 
 I have spent here, I have seen so few sights, heard so few 
 new " loads," and indulged in so few flirtations (their entire 
 number being expressed by the formula \/ x* 4 xy -j- 4 y* 
 x-\-2y) t that I feel myself totally unable to communi 
 cate to you anything of the slightest interest. I suppose 
 that it would be proper for me to begin by giving you some 
 account of how I am situated, and what I am doing, and 
 having once fulfilled this duty, I can then give rein to my 
 fancy, and indulge in as much nonsense as I think thy highly 
 respectable disposition can stand at one dose. I arrived here 
 on the 5th of March, and became speedily established in a 
 very pleasant room (in which I wish that you were now sit 
 ting, right over forenenst me, with a cigar in your old mug), on 
 the second story of a most ancient house, which dates from 
 the Third Crusade, and inhabited by a couple of ladies who 
 probably made their appearance a few centuries later. At 
 any rate they are of the Hard-shell religious belief, and for a 
 few weeks held a prayer-meeting directly under my room, all 
 the fixins of which were extremely powerful, except the time, 
 which was weekly. This interesting devotional exercise has 
 recently dried up, thus completely refuting the statement of 
 Mr. Keats, that 
 
 " A thing of beauty is a thing forever." 1 
 I take my dinner at the Brattle House, which was formerly 
 
 1 I once heard the line so quoted, and it became a standing joke between 
 us. L. R. P.
 
 240 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 the hotel of Cambridge, but failed to remunerate, and has 
 been purchased by the Law Faculty to afford food and shel 
 ter to a large portion of our band of sucking attorneys. "To 
 what base uses may we return, Horatio ! " As for my break 
 fast and tea, I take those meals myself by myself whenever 
 Hopdance cries very clamorously, and I enjoy very highly the 
 perfect independence which it gives me. At n A. M. I go to 
 lecture, when one of the professors holds forth for two hours, 
 with a short intermission at noon. The rest of the day be 
 longs to ourselves, and a good deal of hard work is done 
 regularly, much more than I ever saw in college or anywhere 
 else. There is very little dissipation, much less than I could 
 have supposed possible among such a set of young men, and a 
 tone of earnestness and desire to accomplish something is 
 prevalent throughout the whole school. It is this, I think, 
 more than the actual instruction, which makes this institution 
 so deservedly popular. A man can study law here, if any 
 where, since it is the all-absorbing topic of interest, and forms 
 the subject of conversation and discussion among almost all 
 the students. We have two lectures a day for five days, 
 Prof. Parsons lecturing on Mondays and Thursdays, Prof. 
 Parker on Tuesdays, and Prof. Washburn on Wednesdays and 
 Fridays. Our professors are as different as they well could 
 be. Parsons, who lectures on Evidence and Kent's Commen 
 taries, is one of the raciest and jolliest old bricks you ever 
 saw; his lectures are full of anecdotes, personal and other 
 wise, and he treats law much as Prof. Silliman in his best 
 days must have treated chemistry ; any person, whether study 
 ing law or not, would be charmed with the man, whose liter 
 ary claims are almost as great as his legal ones. Prof. 
 Parker, formerly Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of New 
 Hampshire, is probably the great legal gun of the institution, 
 and contributes more than any other to give it a name and a 
 fame through the country generally ; he is a very sound and 
 reliable lawyer, but has an intensely dry manner, and his lec 
 tures on Pleading and Constitutional Law, though valuable, 
 are the least interesting ones we have. Washburn, who lee-
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 24! 
 
 tures on Real Estate, Wills, and Criminal Law, is very en 
 thusiastic about his work, and is never better pleased than 
 when the fellows go up to his room and ask him questions. 
 He makes his subject very clear by repeated and careful ex 
 planations, and I think that I obtain more benefit from his 
 lectures on Real Estate than from any other course. Once a 
 week we have a grand moot court before the whole school, 
 over which one of the Profs, presides as judge, and in which 
 four students take part, the two senior counsel being from the 
 Senior Class, and the two junior counsel from the Middle class, 
 the Junior Class not being allowed to partake on account 
 of their youth and inexperience. As there are about twenty 
 weeks in the term, each member of the Senior and Middle 
 classes has to speak about once a term. As I am a Middler, 
 I expect to go on as junior counsel before a great while. Be 
 sides this public moot court, there are some six or eight clubs, 
 of sixteen to twenty-four members each, which meet in the 
 evening, once a week, and try cases, with two counsel, and 
 one of their number as judge. This is perhaps the most im 
 proving exercise of all, since, as the number of the audience 
 is so small, there is very little temptation for a man to splurge, 
 and he just sticks to his brief, and makes a simple, straight 
 forward argument. I belong to two of these clubs, the Coke 
 and the Berrien ; the former is the crack club, and, as a gen 
 eral rule, no fellow is admitted to it until he has. studied two 
 years ; but I had the good luck to get in w.ithout this qualifi 
 cation. I tried a case in it about three weeks ago, and won 
 it ; and next week, on Monday, I shall try another, and on 
 Tuesday shall sit as judge in the Berrien Club ; so that you 
 see 1 have work enough before me. Indeed, I have been 
 trying my best to work hard, and to learn something about 
 Law, although hitherto my success has been very problemat 
 ical. I feel incessantly how unfit I am for law, and yet my 
 duty seems to point me in this direction, so there is nothing 
 for it but to dig on. 
 
 I do not wholly neglect my old divinity, literature and the 
 classics ; I have made a pretty fair beginning at " Electra," and 
 16
 
 242 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 am reading Dante with James Russell Lowell's Italian class, 
 composed chiefly of theologs and undergrads ; we recite three 
 times a week, and take two cantos at a lesson, so that we go 
 ahead swimmingly, and the class (though not I) have already 
 finished the " Purgatorio," and since I have been in it we have 
 read sixteen cantos of the " Paradiso," and eight of the " Infer 
 no." Dante is not nearly as difficult as I had supposed, for his 
 great similarity to the Latin makes it easy for one who has 
 studied that language, and the idiomatic forms are not as num 
 erous as in the modern Italian. I am really awed by the power 
 and magnificence of the poem, and think that it is superior in 
 many respects to Milton's great Epic. Mr. Lowell's explana 
 tions and illustrations are very pleasant, and his conversation 
 is charming ; so that you can easily imagine how I must enjoy 
 these recitations ; they are, in fact, my principal dissipation. 
 
 As for Hebrew, I find myself almost totally unable to do 
 anything at it, but have read a Psalm now and then, to keep 
 the letters in my memory. I enjoyed the study of it last 
 winter, very much, and should be sorry to lose it all. Prof. 
 Gibbs never introduced us much to your segholate friends, 
 bto" & Co. ; I think that his best energies were rather de 
 voted towards impressing on our youthful minds the proper 
 declension of yn^ and Tfbxp and the conjugation of Ayin 
 doubled, or 3D : also, to the proper placing of the Daghesh 
 forte, and the terrible consequences which might arise from 
 overlooking it. As for the pronunciation of the memorial 
 name n.VP, I will show you the essay which I wrote on the 
 subject, when you come on to N. H., for I think that you 
 would feel much interested if you once began to look into it ; 
 if you want to grub it out yourself, the grand fountain-head of 
 all information is Gesenius' Thesaurus, under the word, and 
 from it flow many valuable references ; for a compendious and 
 very learned discussion of the question, see Hengstenberg, 
 "Authentic des Pentateuchs," vol. i. But I have no one here 
 with whom to discuss these matters, and, indeed, I probably 
 should lose caste as a lawyer, if I betrayed my fondness for 
 these forbidden fruits ; among these semi-barbarians, e'/xis is
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 243 
 
 the supreme goddess, and neither 'A.6rjvr] with her blue eyes 
 and stockings, nor 'A^jaoSiYr; with her flirtations, can seduce 
 her votaries from the delights of the legal tread-mill. Speak 
 ing of 'Ac^poStn/ reminds me that I do not know a single 
 female in Cambridge, my hochgeehrten Hausfrauen ausgenom- 
 men, and am therefore, in an eminently safe and jolly condi 
 tion. . . . 
 
 A year ago this beautiful spring day, you and I were stand 
 ing together on the deck of the good steamer Vulcan, as she 
 dashed down the Adriatic, and Trieste faded away in the dis 
 tance, while by our side stood a venerable Form, which had 
 then not yet succumbed to the mal del mare, though soon des 
 tined to lie prostrate in his state-room, utterly reckless of all 
 mundane considerations, while you and I took duckings of the 
 waves as they dashed over the bow, and enjoyed all the fierce 
 battling of the winds and waves in that storm off the Acrocer- 
 aunian Promontory. And then our change on Monday night 
 to that funny, cramped little cabin on the Ddlmata, and our 
 cruise up the Gulf of Corinth, and that delightful week at 
 Athens, don't you wish that you could do it all over again ? 
 There must have been a splendid sunset visible this glorious 
 afternoon from the slopes of Hymettus, and the Parthenon 
 must have shone magnificently in the horizontal rays of the 
 sun ; to say nothing of the inspiring air, and the sweet perfume 
 everywhere of the thyme and scented flowers. Would it not 
 be grand to spend a month there camping out, Miltiades at 
 the head of the commissariat, the Form presiding over the 
 classical reminiscences, while you and I would devote our 
 attention to getting up small fights for our own delectation 
 and to his extreme disgust. There is a fresh and racy charm 
 about our two weeks' spree to Greece, such as attaches to no 
 other part of my travels, Switzerland coming the nearest to it; 
 and a sort of accompanying halo surrounds the heads of those 
 with whom I went there, for we have in common some delight 
 ful mutual memories. Well, probably we shall never get over 
 there again ; but if we do not, we have already garnered up 
 enough in recollection to give us many a happy hour in the 
 future.
 
 244 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, June 12, 1859. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, Cambridge was looking very pleasant 
 when I returned after the recess, and seemed to me for the 
 first time like a habitable place. Having been idle for a week 
 or so, I am doubly willing to apply myself to work. Our 
 Italian recitations have come to an end, and much as I regret 
 the closing of a series of exercises which afforded so much 
 pleasure and literary profit, I, as a law student, cannot help 
 rejoicing that so dangerous a temptation has been removed, 
 and that I shall now have at least eight hours a week more 
 for my law. Mr. Lowell proposes to give his Italian class a 
 supper, so that he can have one more good talk with them be 
 fore they break up. Such a man at Yale would be of immense 
 value in improving the general style of culture, and in weaving 
 something of the beautiful into that practical nature which I 
 think too many of the students carry away from New Haven. 
 I doubt if there be a better place in the whole country than 
 Yale, for fitting a youth for the hard, stern conflict of every-day 
 life, but I cannot help thinking that their culture would be 
 more complete and beautiful, if poetry and the modern lan 
 guages took their place in the instructions, as well as logic and 
 mathematics. We are so strong, at Yale, in the solid and the 
 useful, that we think the lighter but not less important graces 
 of too little moment. I spent part of yesterday evening at the 
 K. I always enjoy my visits there very much, it seems so like 
 old times to meet members of the Hornet's Nest who remain 
 faithful to the memory of that jolly concern. 
 
 June 30. My epistle must be very brief this afternoon. 
 We are to play our long-expected match game of ball with the 
 scientific students, and as I am captain of the field, I am very 
 much worried for fear that we may be terribly beaten ; beaten 
 we certainly shall be, for our adversaries have played a year, 
 while we have only played a month, but I hope that we shall 
 be able to make a pretty close game of it, and come out not so 
 very far behind. 
 
 A week ago last Tuesday, I went to a small affair at Prof.
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 24$ 
 
 Washburn's. There was considerable singing, in which 
 amusement there was quite a contest between the Yale and 
 Harvard songs, but our stock was so much larger that we 
 could give them song for song, and come out in the end with 
 a good surplus. I spent last Sunday with K. On Saturday 
 afternoon we had a fine drive through a most charming country. 
 I think that I never saw the face of any country which looked 
 more beautiful ; everywhere the most careful and complete 
 cultivation. It would be rather tame for a long sojourn, and 
 I think I should wish, after awhile, to change it for bolder 
 prospects, but in its peculiar way I think that it bears away the 
 palm from anything I have ever seen on this side the water. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, July 8, 1859. 
 
 . . . . I don't want to appear dilatory or unfair in the 
 matter of correspondence, but the truth of it is that I am a 
 sworn foe of short letters, and many a time I have checked an 
 impulse to sit down and let drive at you, because I have known 
 that I should be obliged, by want of time, to bite off long before 
 I had got thoroughly pumped out (there is a slight mixing of 
 metaphors in the last sentence, but never mind), and my feel 
 ings on mailing such a letter would be of the most unsatisfac 
 tory description. But now I labor under no such disadvantage, 
 for I have a good long Saturday evening before me, and unless 
 some bore comes in and eats up some of my time, we can 
 manage to have a pretty thorough chat together, and to make 
 it fair and square you shall insert a cigar between your cherry 
 lips while I do all the talking. Where to begin ? Here goes 
 first for an account of my studies. They have become more 
 legal and less literary than during the early part of the term : 
 my Italian lessons terminated about a month ago, and I have 
 knocked off from Greek entirely. Those Dante recitations I 
 shall never forget ; we had a well-informed and enthusiastic 
 class, a most charming teacher, whose main object seemed to 
 be to inspire us with that same love and appreciation of our 
 poet which he himself enjoyed, and above all the freshness and
 
 246 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 glory of the " Divine Comedy " itself, which came to me so 
 " rich and strange " that astonishment was mingled in a great 
 degree with the delight. It had not been hackneyed by daily use> 
 nor had familiarity bred contempt, as is too often the case with 
 many of the greatest poets ; we are taught to parse out of 
 Milton's "Paradise Lost," Shakespeare is as familiar in our 
 mouths as household words, we drag through Virgil at school, 
 and through Homer and Sophocles at college, and, by becoming 
 acquainted with them in such a manner, we lose that beauty 
 which they would have to us if we took them up con amore, and 
 in their original freshness ; so that you can appreciate my 
 happiness at opening up such a mine of enjoyment, when I tell 
 you that it has enlarged the sphere of my thoughts and feelings 
 in a manner which I should have believed impossible by any 
 single work. Lowell calls it a temple into which a man can 
 retire at any time, and be completely secluded from the mur 
 murs of the world outside. While I was in the class we read 
 two cantos of the " Purgatorio," seventeen of the " Inferno," and 
 the whole (thirty-three cantos) of the " Paradiso " ; I shall hope 
 to be able during the vacation to do something towards finish 
 ing the rest. I do a little German now and then, but not 
 enough to amount to anything ; I think that I shall try next 
 term to make arrangements with some of the girls here (whose 
 acquaintance I shall cultivate for that sole purpose) to read 
 German or Italian j I don't see any use in having the ferns 
 around unless we can make something out of them. Speaking 
 of ferns takes me back to N. H. and my visit there, of which 
 you express a desire to hear some account : so you may just 
 apply your " instrument for correcting for the parallax," while 
 I proceed to unfold my plain unvarnished tale. 
 
 .... The C s were as kind and friendly as ever ; not 
 
 changed, unless for the better, from what they were in the 
 pleasant old times of the "week teas." I went to a very nice 
 old folks' party there, and enjoyed it very much, as I always 
 do when I get among people of my own age ; you, being un 
 fortunately young, would doubtless have preferred the frivolity 
 of a young people's party I was very glad to have you
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 247 
 
 speak of the scene of the present war, and our own connection 
 with it last year, as I have often thought it over by myself, 
 and I have remembered that day from Geneva to Milan with 
 great pleasure. If the Sardinians have n't cut the throat of 
 that Austrian custom-house officer at Magenta, who. insisted 
 on hauling my engravings out of their case, I don't see the use 
 of having any war at all ; do you recollect my righteous indig 
 nation on that occasion, and the "curses, not loud but deep," 
 which I ejected, to the great terror and disgust of our little 
 eonductturt And then in the evening, just after sunset, when 
 we approached Milan, and saw the Duomo in the distance, 
 looking like a great white snow-bank ? How would you like 
 to be travelling there now? it must be perfectly horrible to 
 witness that beautiful country so completely devastated, and 
 the air foul with the effluvia from half-buried corpses. Pah ! 
 I see by the papers that the dead at Magenta were buried so 
 hastily that the air for miles around is poisoned by the pesti 
 lential odors ; it must be rather more unpleasant than even 
 the passport and custom-house nuisances. It would be right 
 pleasant to renew our recollections of Italy together, but my 
 favorite dream is of a tent-journey through Greece. I '11 tell 
 you how we '11 fix it ; let us hunt up some old cock of gigantic 
 purse, who has two daughters very lovely in person and mind, 
 and likewise furnished with cheerful dispositions and plenty of 
 dosh ; these charming beings we will marry forthwith, and sail 
 for the Piraeus. It would be so pleasant to throw aside He 
 brew Grammar and Law Digests, and, forgetting that we had 
 ever thought of such a thing as a profession, spend a couple of 
 happy, listless, loafing years in wandering over the mountains 
 of the mainland, and cruising among the islands of the ^Egean 
 Sea, " with the blue above and the blue below." Then, when 
 we had become sated with this Epicurean, lotus-eating life, we 
 could come back to our western homes, and return the old 
 gentleman his daughters, as we should have no further use for 
 them. Did you ever have a temptation of this kind, Pinckney ? 
 I have ; and it is the fairest and most dangerous shape in 
 which the Old Nick presents himself to me, but there is a little 
 too strong a smell of the dishonorable about it
 
 248 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, THE DEN, Sunday Evening, 
 June 19, 1859. 
 
 .... That is what a letter should be ; it ought to convey 
 to the receiver a mental picture of the physical and intellec 
 tual state of the writer, and as many little particujarities and 
 items as possible should be added, to round out the picture 
 to its proper fullness, and to supply shade and color. Now, 
 by an exercise of my imagination, and that not a very powerful 
 one, I can bring you before my mental vision ; but this exer 
 tion is wonderfully lightened by some actual description, which 
 
 sets the whole subject forward as a living reality And 
 
 now, in order to act up to my principles, I will inform you of 
 my own immediate surroundings before going further. It is a 
 delightful Sunday evening, and after having enjoyed the glow 
 ing sunset in a stroll, taken with another young reprobate of a 
 law student, I have returned to my lair in the venerable man 
 sion, and am now writing at a long table on which the formid 
 able array of law books and other rubbish leaves just room 
 enough to write. 
 
 The trees in the square in front, now full of rich foliage, 
 throw long, sharp shadows ; and in a few hours the moon 
 beams through their leaves will checker the grass below with 
 fantastic streaks, as 
 
 " When they fall 
 Through some cathedral window." 
 
 But although this topic of moon-beams is a fruitful one, and 
 doubtless of absorbing interest to a native of the sunny South, 
 like yourself, who are also a bit " frivolous " withal, yet it won't 
 do for me to pursue it, nor any other poetical subject, since 
 I can now give no time to such things, or to use a forcible 
 but vulgar expression, I have stopped " running with that ma 
 chine." The Madonna over the head of the bed, and the row 
 of plants in the window, would seem to indicate that the youth 
 ful occupant cultivated the esthetic in a small way, while the 
 grim features of a set of boxing-gloves peeping over the book 
 case, show that his admiration for literature is only surpassed 
 by his love of sparring.
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 249 
 
 Enter, my young friend, and take a chair, that comfortable 
 arm-chair with a cushion, for if I recollect right, you have a 
 most Davenportly fondness for being comfortable. Now I 
 will make you the best cup of coffee that you have tasted for 
 many a day (I have become a regular " cordon bleu " at mak 
 ing coffee), and then we will have a good talk upon New 
 Haven matters, which will of course be of greater mutual in 
 terest to us than others, for Cambridge is nothing at all to 
 you, and to me it is merely the prison to which I am tempo 
 rarily exiled. 
 
 I spent ten days at home during the last of May, and longed 
 heartily for you, for our city was looking more beautiful than 
 I had ever seen it before, or, at least it seemed so, since it was 
 three years since I had seen it in the freshness of early sum 
 mer ; " the hour of splendor in the grass, of glory in the 
 flower." And there was one friend there that I found per- 
 perfectly unaltered, except that she had beautified herself with 
 a new coat of paint, and that friend was the jolly little Una. 
 Out of six pleasant days which we had while I was at home, 
 I spent five in her sometimes alone, and sometimes with J., 
 and one or two others. Her old thwarts received me in as 
 friendly a manner as if strangers had not sat upon them, and 
 she sprang forward under the oars as if no arms but mine had 
 meddled with their handles. 
 
 When you come to New Haven this summer, I think that 
 you and I must have a row together in that small tub. Also 
 tramps, moreover strolls out Prospect Street, peradventure ex 
 cursions to the Rocks, mayhap moonlight walks on the Ave 
 nue, likewise forays to Whitneyville after water-lilies ; yea, 
 also, and lounges in Chapel Street, eating pea-nuts, as in the 
 days of Auld lang syne ; to say nothing of parties, picnics, 
 rides, tea-fights, sprees, hoe-downs, romps, and divers other 
 diversions in which we will indulge, and on Sundays, when you 
 assume the character of " the church-going belle," of which 
 Cowper speaks, I will occasionally expose myself to the dire 
 influences of Episcopacy to accompany you. 
 
 December 31. I sit down on this last day of the old year
 
 250 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 to answer your last kind letter, to tell you how much I love 
 you,*and to wish you a Happy New Year. I spent Christmas 
 up at Lowell, as I hinted in my last that I should. I went on 
 Saturday morning, and got there in time for dinner. There 
 was quite a little party of visitors, one a Miss C. from Ten 
 nessee, although a scion from one of those regular old-fash 
 ioned Presbyterian families in the South, she, L., and I, 
 managed to keep the family party from moulding pretty thor 
 oughly. On Monday we all went out skating, and had a jolly 
 time. My boot-heel came off, but I skated along just about 
 the same, my object being to have fun, and not to exhibit my 
 skill in skating. Going home from the pond there were seven 
 of us, four girls and three fellows, all packed in a small cutter. 
 We presented quite a show as we went through town, L. stand 
 ing in front driving, with his closely packed crowd behind. I 
 thought often of you at home, and that I was among strangers 
 at Christmas, but I did not allow the thought to make me too 
 blue, and was as hilarious as any of them. I came down early 
 Tuesday morning, and got to work by half-past eight o'clock. 
 I always enjoy a visit at Lowell. They are all so hospitable 
 and so desirous to make a guest feel perfectly at home. 
 
 NEW YORK, February 14, 1860. 
 357 Fourth Street. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, This is to inform you of my safe arrival 
 
 and comfortable settlement in this city I called upon 
 
 Y., who was out, and then I went down to Wall Street and saw 
 Mr. M., who received me very cordially. We had quite a talk 
 on the subject of law ; and he said that he would give me 
 something to do, as soon as I became familiar with the prac 
 tice of the courts. He seems disposed to do all in his power 
 to facilitate my progress in my profession. I then went to 
 Fourth Street and found Y., who seemed very glad to see me, 
 and ready to enter into any chumming arrangement. This 
 morning we met again, had a solemn interview with his land 
 lady, and settled the matter. The situation is good, being 
 between Lafayette Place and Broadway, only a step from the
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 2$ I 
 
 Astor Library, and conveniently removed from almost all the 
 localities I should be likely to haunt. 
 
 February 26. Those snaps that you sent down were very 
 nice, and between myself and my under-tenants, the mice, rap 
 idly disappeared. I have been much bothered by these little 
 rascals, there being a knot-hole in my pantry, which gives 
 them free egress and regress, so I finally determined to go ' 
 into a crusade and war of extermination against them, and this 
 morning got a trap, baited it with the object so dear to the 
 mural heart, toasted cheese, and have already caught four of 
 these " Wee sleekit, coorin', tim'rous beasties," as Burns calls 
 them, and hope to put an end to their entire race, I refer to 
 their family, and not their way of racing up and down the walls 
 in the night. I forgot to tell you that I went to hear Cassius 
 M. Clay, the first Wednesday that I was in town. The speech 
 was very sensible, but the delivery was very poor. I met or 
 saw a good many old friends at the meeting, which was very 
 large and respectable indeed. I expect that most of my old 
 confreres are now in the Republican ranks. Being so near 
 the Cooper Institute, we have capital opportunities for hearing 
 all the political big guns. 
 
 NEW YORK, February 19, 1860. 
 
 .... Time is passing rapidly by us, dear friend. How 
 fresh to me seemed that letter of yours of which I have spoken 
 above ! So many little incidents mentioned therein, which are 
 as clear before my mind as if they had happened yesterday, 
 and yet it is now just four years and a half since that letter 
 was written. That interval can hardly be a sad one to look 
 back upon ; we have both been developing our powers, grow 
 ing, in the truest sense of the word, passing from the epoch 
 of simple impulse to one combined of thought and impulse. 
 No, there is nothing very depressing in recalling such an al 
 most cloudless past ; but how will it be, when a period of 
 equal length has passed, and the summer of 1864 shall tit with 
 us? . . . . 
 
 Fortunately for me, there are still two kind angels left to 
 drive away the demons of loneliness and despondency, they
 
 2$2 LETTERS OF WILL f AM WHEELER. 
 
 are Literature and Music. The Astor Library is just round 
 the corner, and the Academy of Music only a few blocks off, 
 so that I shall never be left totally destitute of something con 
 genial. 
 
 March II, 1 860. 
 
 .... Your letter gave me the first news which I had had 
 of the death of Professor Goodrich. I was much shocked by 
 it, as I did not know that he had been any more ill than ordi 
 nary. I think he took a deep, personal interest in the welfare 
 of the students, and this feeling was reciprocated by them to a 
 great degree ; very many looked forward to his Bible class 
 with great anticipation, and longed for it as a time when they 
 would hear the great truths expounded to, and impressed upon 
 them, in a manner at once kind and earnest. Last night I 
 went with L. and M. to hear Dr. Storrs preach. We were well 
 repaid for our walk by the sermon, text, Ephesians iii. 17, 18, 
 19. It was divided into four heads of Christian attainment ; 
 first, the indwelling of Christ by faith ; second, the love princi 
 ple as the basis of all ; third, the infinite knowledge and com 
 prehension ; fourth, being filled with all the fullness of God. 
 Each of these points was set forth and analyzed in noble 
 language and with great fervency. Perhaps he is sometimes 
 rather wordy, but I think that he generally has some great idea 
 beneath the beautiful covering of words, pearls of thought 
 under the deep river of flowing speech. 
 
 April 19. I am aware that several of my last letters home 
 have been very short, but I have been decidedly busy recently, 
 as the examination is near at hand, and I have been trying to 
 overhaul the dusty pigeon-holes of my mental lawyer's desk, 
 and to arrange the little law I know in some kind of order, so 
 that I may be able to lay my hand on it when subjected " to the 
 question " by the examining committee next month. Our Cam 
 bridge crowd do all we can to encourage and help each other 
 on. For the purpose of impressing the "Code" more deeply 
 upon our mutual minds, we have instituted a series of private 
 examinations, of which the first one came off in my room on 
 Monday last. I was the examiner, and having prepared some
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 253 
 
 350 questions, I succeeded in boring pretty steadily for nearly 
 three hours, and in putting the other four to their wits' end to 
 answer properly. I think that we shall all pass respectable 
 examinations, and sustain the reputation hitherto possessed 
 by the Cambridge students, which has been very good. 
 
 May. 31. . . . . I had a pleasant call at the G's. the 
 other evening. It is so jolly to meet some one who knows all 
 my friends, and is familiar with all my favorite localities, with 
 whom I can talk about New Haven people, discuss East and 
 West Rock and the wild flowers which grow thereon, and even 
 touch upon literature occasionally, instead of this ceaseless 
 chit-chat about society or politics, or the last New York excite 
 ment. I met D. E. one Tuesday, and we went to Central Park 
 together. I was perfectly astonished at the amount of progress 
 that has been made there. It is the one thing that New York 
 has a right to be proud of. To be sure, it must always look 
 more or less trim and artificial, and not to be compared with a 
 bit of real untamed nature ; but we must be satisfied with 
 what we can get, and not demand the Alps in our back yard, 
 or Niagara across the street. I have my shingle up and my 
 cards out. I send you a specimen of the latter 
 
 You assault me on the subject of my suit in the Marine 
 Court. Now I must defend myself by saying that I did not 
 go there by choice, but from necessity, as my client was sued 
 and I had to go there to defend him, a catastrophe which 
 might have fallen upon W. M. Evarts, as well as upon myself. 
 I hardly fear much contamination by just rubbing against the 
 shysters, who in that place most do congregate. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 NEW YORK, April 7, 1860. 
 
 MY DEAR CHILD, A letter to you has for some time been 
 brewing within me, and I think it advisable to tap myself as 
 soon as possible, and give you the freedom of the spigot before 
 my epistolary effervescence has entirely subsided and grown 
 as flat as a mug of lager, " long drawn out." A vile and im 
 moral simile, to be sure, to use to such a sober youth as your-
 
 254 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 self, but I know that you have a strong head, as witness your 
 performances at the Sylvester Fest, December 31, 1857, at Dres 
 den ; and I don't feel alarmed lest you be upset by so slight a 
 figure of speech. In plain language, I have desired to address 
 myself to you, and to hear from you in return, and this desire was 
 rather aggravated than appeased, by what I saw of you at New 
 Haven, especially in that very pleasant call which you paid me 
 just two weeks ago this Saturday evening. That I enjoyed 
 highly, and it was that more than anything else which pre 
 vented me from calling at your room as I promised to do ; a 
 hurried stay at 102 N. C. interrupted by the inroads of Fresh 
 men, and embittered to me by the thought that I was con 
 suming your time, would have weakened the power of the 
 pleasant impression of that evening which I still retain, and 
 therefore, I say cold-bloodedly that I am glad that I did not 
 call upon you. If it could have been in the evening, it would 
 have been gang anders ; then, after the 
 " Tea, and other curious messes, 
 Which the neat-handed Pinckney dresses," 
 
 we should have had "divine talk," varying in its subject from 
 Greek poets to the girls, etc. And above all, our brilliant 
 dreams and speculations about the future, whose withdrawn 
 curtain shows you as a penniless parson, myself as a ditto 
 pettifogger ; you with a wife and nine small children, like John 
 Rogers, myself in my attic solus, no companion save my pen 
 wiper-cat, and my attendant Seu/xoViov. Not that I would cast 
 a slur on being poor, or speak of poverty disrespectfully ; no, 
 I would rather go to the other extreme and speak of wealth 
 as a crime, for here wealth is thought the only virtue, " every 
 virtue under heaven." I am speaking seriously, sadly now ; 
 pray for me, my dear friend, that I may not become tainted 
 with this cursed mercenary spirit which says, " Be rich or you 
 are not virtuous, make money or you are not respectable, and 
 reckon your success as not attained unless it comes freighted 
 with gold." Sentiments like these I hear more or less openly 
 from all people ; from strong-minded, earnest people, from re 
 fined and pious girls, from intellectual ladies, in a word, from
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 255 
 
 those whom you would expect to be the very last to harbor 
 such thoughts. I shall look to you for assistance always ; 
 scholarship, philosophy, theology, anything we can write and 
 talk about to avoid the subject of getting rich. I suppose that 
 if I had come from any other place than New Haven, the 
 contrast would not be so strong, but up there wealth weighs 
 so lightly against the imponderables, thought and cultivation, 
 and the touchstone of excellence is so different, that the shock 
 which I felt when I first began to see how universal these 
 ideas were here, was very great I amost envy you your 
 studious retirement at old Yale, and your seclusion from noise 
 and turmoil and the "strife of tongues." Do not suppose, 
 however, that I exhaust all my energies in repinings and howl- 
 ings of this description ; I intend to go ahead and do my best 
 to keep away from Blackwell's Island and Sing-Sing, and not 
 to bring a disgrace upon my family ; but still I hope that how 
 ever imperative the demands of business maybe, I may always 
 have some " calm and sure retreat," for a short time every day, 
 where peace shall reign, and the noise of business life be 
 softened by the distance, and 
 
 " Fall a soft murmur on the uninjured ear." 
 
 Does all this seem rather nonsensical to you ? Very possi 
 bly, but if a man thinks nonsense he must write nonsense, and 
 I am not ashamed that you should know any of my thoughts, 
 
 for to me they are serious and real I am not doing 
 
 much in which you would be interested ; I manage to get a 
 couple of hours for study on the Code, before going down to 
 the office in the morning ; at the office I do all sorts of small 
 jobs, keeping the register of cases, drawing easy complaints, 
 copying foreclosure suits, and when not otherwise employed, 
 cramming up the Revised Statutes. Then in the evening I pre 
 tend to study some more on the Code, but this does n't amount 
 to much, as I either go out or else get to reading something 
 else which has a less soporific effect. I find that day-time is 
 the only convenient season for cramming law. I am reading 
 Shakespeare when I take my tea, which I find very delightul ; 
 my copy suffers considerably by the arrangement, as the teacup
 
 256 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 will dribble sometimes. I have read the " Tempest," " Meas 
 ure for Measure," "Two Gentlemen of Verona," "Taming of 
 the Shrew," and " Midsummer Night's Dream," in this way, 
 which I have only adopted since I returned from New Haven, 
 
 last week. I am pretending to read Dante with my W 
 
 cousins, but as they have nothing else to do, they are too busy 
 to study up lessons, and I have to act as "pony," whenever 
 they come to a strange word or hard sentence ; of course we 
 don't get on very fast, and this very evening we made an abor 
 tive attempt to get through the Fourth Canto of the Holle ; 
 
 they are as bad on Dante as Y on Ajax, or your sweet self 
 
 on " Electra ; " I seriously think of finishing the Electra by my 
 self some of these days. Speaking of reading, literature, etc., 
 have you seen the " Marble Faun," or Mrs. Browning's last 
 book of ravings on the subject of Italy ? I think that Haw 
 thorne's work must be rather interesting for us, as he describes 
 Rome and the artists' studios just as we saw them ; he speaks 
 of Akers's studio, and his statue of the Drowned Pearl Diver ; 
 by the way, that statue is on exhibition here at the Diisseldorf, 
 and you must not fail to go and see it when you come to N. Y. ; 
 it is a splendid production. Mrs. Browning's book, from what 
 I have been able to see of it, is like most of her " Casa Guidi 
 Windows," written with plenty of animus and enthusiasm, but 
 little judgment, " full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." I 
 don't think that politics are within the sphere of poetry, and 
 this Italian matter is purely political, not exhibiting the spec 
 tacle of a nation fighting desperately for freedom, which might 
 be a legitimate subject for a little something in the lyric line. 
 Have you seen the " Cornhill Magazine ? " It is really quite 
 stunning ; there is a life of William Hogarth, of which two 
 parts have been published, which is chock-full of charming 
 literary scraps, and is, moreover, written with a power and 
 ease not surpassed by Thackeray himself; if you come across 
 it, don't fail to collar it. 
 
 I don't see much of the world of nature at present ; the 
 most interesting natural object about these parts is a very 
 shaggy donkey attached to the establishment (/'. e., fastened to
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 
 
 the cart), of a vendress of oranges, on the corner of Fourth 
 Street and the Bowery ; and frequently have I been beguiled 
 of my loose pennies, in order that I might have an opportu 
 nity of examining him more narrowly. He is a stunted beast, 
 and I should think that he had the consumption, as do almost 
 all donkeys when brought to this frightful climate of ours, were 
 it not that he is too homely and ugly to have so romantic a 
 disease. One great defect in him is that he is mute, silent as 
 the grave ; probably he has hung his harp on some Bowery 
 willow, and refuses to sing his native song in a strange land. 
 I gave him a good dig in the ribs this afternoon, XdOprj -njs 
 TrpoTTwAou, but it only elicited a vicious grin and an uneasy 
 movement of the hind legs, so I did n't push the matter. If 
 he should bray, what scenes would arise at the sound, as if .at 
 a magical invocation ! The Lungo L'Arno where that single 
 powerful animal was wont to ring our matins and chime our 
 vespers ; the Piazza Barberini with its perennial fount of song, 
 and above all, the Alban Lake, where, like the beacon lights 
 that announced the fall of Troy to Clytemnestra, one jackass 
 took up the note from another, and thence passed it in endless 
 succession ; if I might parody Shelley, I would say 
 
 " There the voluptuous jackasses 
 Are browsing through all the broad noonday," 
 
 but it is really too bad ; only just look at the passage yourself 
 in the " Prometheus Unbound," beginning " There the volup 
 tuous nightingales/' and^see if you don't think that the whole 
 of that semi-chorus would describe that scene splendidly with a 
 little alteration; besides, Shelley wrote his "Prometheus Un 
 bound," at Rome, and probably the passage was suggested by 
 some such asinine antiphonal chanting." 
 
 NEW YORK, April 30, 1860. 
 
 I lost so much time from my work by this illness, that I 
 have recently been obliged to study very hard in order to pre 
 pare myself for the examination for admission to the Bar, 
 which comes off next week Wednesday. Till then I shall be 
 fully occupied, but after that, as free as a bird (with its leg 
 17
 
 258 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 tied to a stick and its wings clipped) for the next ten years, at 
 the end of which time I shall hope to begin to have a little 
 business. My plans for the future are not only uncertain, but 
 perfectly nix. I have not the most remote idea as to whether 
 I shall set up for myself, or engage myself as a clerk for a year 
 or two, or make a partnership arrangement with some one ; 
 probably shall try to do the " clerk " for a while, as it is the 
 way in which almost all young lawyers here begin and acquire 
 a knowledge of the practice. Would n't it be a good joke if I 
 should get plucked ! The examination is very severe, and I 
 don't feel at all sure that I shall not. If I go into an office in 
 some subordinate position, I am afraid that I shall not be able 
 to get down to Annapolis this summer, for lawyers' clerks are 
 expected to disabuse their minds of such absurd ideas as summer 
 vacations, and they must sit and roast in the office while the prin 
 cipal goes to Newport and has a good time. I don't object to 
 this arrangement, of course ; young men ought to work and 
 have a hard time of it for a while, and if they must break out 
 into pitiful howling, it shows what sort of stuff they are made 
 of. Just as Carlyle says, that the most melancholy sight in 
 the world is that of a man asking for work and not getting it, 
 so I think one of the noblest sights is that of a man doing his 
 work cheerfully "a heart that at its labor sings." But you 
 can't understand this, of course, and you probably think it very 
 stupid of me to consent to stay through all the summer heat 
 in the city, but you must not shake my resolutions, since I am 
 my own worst enemy, and have already too strong a tendency 
 to flee from that which is arduous to what is tasteful and 
 pleasant : the same spirit which made me in college prefer 
 classics to mathematics. There is one bright streak of sun 
 shine on the picture of the future, and that is your projected 
 visit here next month. It was so much too good to be true 
 that I refused to believe it for a while, but now the probabilities 
 seem to be accumulating, and I have given myself leave to 
 hope a little, but not too strongly, lest I should be disap 
 pointed. When are you coming ? I have a plan that we 
 should make a foray up to New Haven together, and have a
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 259 
 
 perfectly glorious time, wandering through the sweet May 
 woods (they will be almost perfect then) and thinking of " the 
 days that are no more," or rather of the days that are yet to 
 be, for spring is the season of hope, and we will leave memory 
 to the autumn days. Or perhaps in some boat (alas ! not the 
 Una), we will rock on the waves of the bay, and the print of a 
 No. 8 boot and a No. gaiter on the sands of Morris Cove 
 shall tell where we landed to munch and crunch a frugal 
 
 lunch Speaking of the ist of May reminds me that a 
 
 Brooklyn clergyman preached, the other day, on the subject of 
 " Moving " as a means of Christian discipline ! I doubt if 
 there be any one thing which is quite as effectual for trying 
 the soul in the furnace of affliction, unless it be " house- 
 cleaning," and that can only be considered as a purifying trial 
 to the male members of the human family the female portion 
 seeing in it only occasion for triumph and fiendish joy. I am 
 here also reminded to tell you that I moved my room last 
 week, or rather moved from my room, as it was not sufficiently 
 attractive to induce me to take it with me bodily I pro 
 pose turning gardener in my leisure hours, and raising some 
 flowers in the quite extensive beds in our back yard here. I 
 can't bear the idea of letting the spring and summer pass 
 
 without flowers, and am willing to work to get them I 
 
 am so happy now the real spring feeling, which I always 
 have about this time, a desire to sing or do something to ex 
 press my pent-up feelings. I heard on Easter Sunday some 
 most delicious music at Dr. Hawkes's church, and came home 
 with the full determination of writing you a regular Easter 
 letter, but somehow was prevented.^ That is the one holy day 
 of the Episcopal Church in which I can join with all my 
 
 soul, for 
 
 " The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee, 
 My heart is at your festival, 
 The fullness of your bliss, I feel, I feel it all." 
 
 NEW YORK, June i, 1860. 
 
 DEAR , You will perceive by the inclosed cards that 
 
 I am at last married to the bride to whom I have been so
 
 26O LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 long paying my court. The fair divinity of the legal profes 
 sion has consented to be mine for life, or at least so long as I 
 shall treat her with that attention and tenderness which are 
 her just due. In return she promises to feed me, to clothe 
 me decently, and perhaps give me some reputation. 
 
 Somehow or other, though, as I talk about this goddess of 
 mine, she becomes very shadowy and unsubstantial, and now 
 I find it impossible to see her at all^ for your face has come 
 between, and Law suffers a disastrous eclipse. Well, for the 
 present, let her disappear. I am in her power only from 9 
 A. M. to 5 P. M., for at that latter hour I unclasp my hand 
 from her skinny parchment fingers and leave her alone in the 
 solitude of No. 54 Merchants' Exchange, while I make stolen 
 visits to those old friends of mine, Languages and Literature, 
 and occasionally take my pen to have a chat with some dear 
 human friend who is far away. 
 
 NEW YORK, June 3, 1860. 
 
 DEAR M., .... I must first of all thank you for your 
 very kind letter, and for the friendly wishes expressed therein 
 with reference to my entering upon my profession. Whether 
 I shall attain any degree of success in it is yet to me a very 
 dubious problem. If I can once get my enthusiasm for it 
 fairly aroused, I defy anything but poor health to prevent me 
 from fighting my way up to the first ranks. If I look upon it 
 merely as a means of gaining a living, I shall probably gain a 
 living by it and nothing more, and all my superfluous ambi 
 tion would expend itself upon such dilettante pursuits as lan 
 guages and general literature. I hope that I shall pursue the 
 former course, but must live the life which my powers and " 
 tastes dictate, still feeling that it is far better to be a really 
 good lawyer than a mere dabbler in Greek and German. . . . 
 You speak of enjoying "The Marble Faun" very highly. I 
 read it about three weeks ago, and liked some things in' it 
 very well, but thought the whole work decidedly a failure for 
 Hawthorne, although any other man might be proud of hav 
 ing written it. The general story, or plot, is unusually frag 
 mentary and pointless, even for him. He introduces mys-
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 26 1 
 
 teries which are entirely unnecessary, and which have the 
 effect of simply lumbering up the story, and nothing more. 
 His descriptions are always fine ; but can any word-painting 
 equal the picture which rises before your mind at the very 
 sound of the word " Roma." .... Hawthorne is only thor 
 oughly at home in his experiments on the American mind. 
 He does not know the English or Italian temperament well 
 enough to draw them so minutely. For this reason I think 
 that the characters of Miriam and Donatello, carefully elab 
 orated as they are, are failures The whole tradition of 
 
 the Faun seemed to me too thin a fancy to be drawn out to 
 such a length, and I think that Mr. Hawthorne must do better 
 than that book, or else let his fame rest on " The Scarlet Let 
 ter " and " The House of the Seven Gables." Excuse this 
 lengthy critique, but when I am reading books at the same time 
 with friends, I am very fond of talking them over with them. 
 
 I am very glad to hear that you have directed your " medi 
 tations " to the subject of " slippers," and I hope that that 
 will not be the whole of it, for if ever there was a case of real 
 want and destitution, it exists in "this chile." So, if you have 
 any regard for the feelings of this unhappy Decemvirate, let 
 the slippers be made the special order of the day 
 
 NEW YORK, June 19, 1860. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, It is now quite a long time since I have 
 written you anything that deserves the name of a letter. It 
 is so hot, and I have been so lazy. I want to get away very 
 much, but so long as there is anything to be done, I suppose 
 it will be good discipline for me to stay here and do it. I 
 should like to go home and make a long visit, and that is be 
 cause this is the last year that I shall have a chance to do so 
 for a long while. I went to Tarrytown on Saturday afternoon ; 
 spent a most delightful Sunday there ; heard H. preach in the 
 morning. In the afternoon the children had exercises in the 
 church. They sang several simple hymns, addresses were 
 made, and last of all Harry made a sort of farewell address, 
 as it was the last time he was to meet them in that way. Just
 
 262 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 as he finished, an old man came tottering up towards the pul 
 pit, and said he must take his young brother once more by 
 the hand. He was eighty-seven years of age. When he had 
 taken H. by the hand he poured forth his grateful thanks and 
 benedictions, mingled with many tears, and you may be sure 
 that there were few dry eyes in the church. It was such a 
 spontaneous burst of gratitude and feeling, that it seemed per 
 fectly natural, and not at all peculiar I have joined a 
 
 base ball club, as I find that I am unable to keep steadily at 
 work at the Gymnasium in this sweltering weather. I went 
 to Hunter's Point and played with the club. I played very 
 hard, and was so used up that I could hardly sit straight in 
 my chair, and have been lame ever since. My garden is do 
 ing well ; the roses have bloomed well ; my tuberoses are 
 coming up nicely ; and the gladiolas are flourishing like green 
 
 bay trees. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 NEW YORK, July 13, 1860. 
 
 MY DEAR PACK, I send you herewith a couple of books 
 of the President's which I have kept so long. There is at 
 our house also an "Antigone " in German, " fur die deutsche 
 Biihne," which J. will hand you. Don't hook these books for 
 your own private benefit, but return them to Mr. Woolsey, and 
 say to him that I should have returned them before I went to 
 Europe, had not my flitting been so very sudden that I hardly 
 had time for anything. After my return from Europe the 
 books were mislaid and overlooked, and were not turned up 
 until quite recently. This is a poor excuse, I am aware, but 
 it is the fact, and the best I have. I am, of course, very 
 sorry that I should have been so careless, especially about 
 books, as I have a theory on the subject of borrowing books 
 which differs widely from my practice on this occasion. 
 
 That "Electra" of yours does not make its appearance. I 
 fear me much that you did not spend the Fourth in getting it 
 up, but rather in some carnal amusement of the genus " bust," 
 species picnic, and have deserted our sad "HAe/cr-pa, dei/cei o-ov 
 oroAa and hair not adorned nor fit for supplication
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 263 
 
 for the society of some New Haven Chrysothemis, to whom 
 there is a large picnic basket (ir\ov<ria. Tpdire^a). Whenever 
 you will send on, this deponent will hasten to reciprocate. 
 
 NEW YORK, August 17, 1860. 
 
 Here in the dreary solitude of the office I take up my pen 
 to write to you, although I have nothing in the world to say, 
 and have not even your last letter by me to answer and refute. 
 It is for me a peculiarly difficult task to write anything but a 
 business letter down here. Instead of my own cheerful little 
 library before me, from whose shelves look genially down the 
 pleasant faces (or rather backs) of Chaucer (your gift), and 
 Spenser, and Tasso, and Kit North, and Charles Lamb, warm 
 ing up the vacant wall with kindly thoughts and inspiring 
 companionship, I have here the sheep-skin covered Reports, 
 and the Code, and the Revised Statutes, and many other ogres 
 of legal learning, who stand ready to devour any thought not 
 professional as soon as it is born. Writing under such disad 
 vantages, you must pardon all stupidity, and not allow yourself 
 to believe that " Cousin Will" has lost all his decent ideas in 
 the process of becoming a lawyer. If I really had anything to 
 tell you, I could say it as well from this heart of commerce as 
 from my own study, but when it comes to making a long letter 
 " out of nothing and all very good," as our catechism has it, it 
 is tont-a-fait une autre chose, for the very inherent practicality 
 of the Merchants' Exchange rebukes the doing of anything for 
 which some tangible result, some pocketable sum in dollars 
 and cents, cannot be shown. Once in a while I rebel against 
 these statutes of the Money King, but he is generally too much 
 for me, and if he does not break my spirit, or make me yield 
 him servile obedience, he yet succeeds in driving away all airy 
 fancies, and in recalling all wandering thoughts to the Now 
 
 and the Here Last Tuesday was my twenty-fourth 
 
 birthday, and I am now progressing in my twenty-fifth year ! 
 So much of life spent, so little done, and that little done so 
 shabbily and superficially ! And most of all, the future prom 
 ises so little more. I am at times tempted to give up all
 
 264 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 thoughts of honor and nobleness, and turn to grubbing for 
 money with the rest, and live for the passing day. You cannot 
 conceive of the utter self-abasement and self-contempt which 
 I felt on last Tuesday evening, when I took a retrospect of 
 things in general. Thinking is what I can't afford to do ; it 
 always throws me into such a state of savage unrest. But 
 when I pass down under these stormy surface waves, I find it 
 all quiet and serene with the recollection of home and mother, 
 and a few other dear friends. Yes, this is my religion, now, 
 the best I have, my sanctuary, for 
 
 " All the babble of life's angry voices 
 Dies, in hushed silence, at its peaceful door." 
 
 NEW YORK, September 14, 1860. 
 
 .... The very cold and blustering weather, which has 
 been making us all shiver, has passed away, and the days are 
 now really autumnal, though rather more like October than 
 September. In this city, September is a month of reawaken 
 ing life and activity ; the absent citizens begin to return from 
 the four winds, where they have been trying to get a little fresh 
 air during the summer, business revives again, the opera and 
 the Philharmonic tune their fiddle strings and clear their 
 throats, and life begins once more to flow as usual in the old 
 channels. It is quite noticeable, the process called hibernation 
 is exactly reversed in a large city ; here we don't hibernate, we 
 aestivate ; as the hot weather comes on, the people of passage 
 wing their way to cooler climates, while those who are too 
 poor, or too busy, to accompany them, retire to their holes and 
 relapse into a torpid state, in which they remain until the 
 middle of September. It is true that during the month of 
 aestivation the streets of New York are nearly as full as ever, 
 but not with the genuine New York dormouse ; they are ani 
 mals from farther south, fleeing from their time of aestivation. 
 I only hope that in the harvest of business which the fall 
 always brings with it, this dormouse may get a legal nut or two 
 to crack. 
 
 October 27. . . . . I enjoyed my visit at home very much
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 26$ 
 
 indeed, although the weather was so unpleasant all the time. 
 After I have been away from home about a month, I begin 
 to feel a very great restlessness, which interferes with my work 
 decidedly, and my thoughts will wander in spite of me, but af 
 ter I have spent a few days at home I come back to my work 
 refreshed and invigorated, and feeling like a legal game cock. 
 
 NEW YORK, September 22, 1860. 
 
 DEAR M. . . . . To-day I write, not because I have time 
 enough, for I have not (and I seem to myself to take this time by 
 stealth), but because this day, so bright, clear, inspiring, re 
 minds me of you and all friends in the country, who are drink 
 ing in this glorious air like draughts of wine, not the sparkling, 
 intoxicating champagne, which floats in the air of April, but 
 good old wine of autumn, generous Madeira or Sherry, which 
 strengthens as well as gladdens the heart of man. This is just 
 that delightful weather, between the heats of summer and what 
 my poet calls " the melancholy days, the saddest of the year." 
 What glorious weather for horseback-riding, and what good 
 times we could have together at H. P., galloping in trots of 
 discovery through back lanes and cross paths, and now and 
 then through a bit of wood, whose leaves are just receiving the 
 first touch from the brush of that greatest of landscape paint 
 ers, Autumn !....! intend to subscribe to the Philharmonic 
 this winter. For a student, like myself, whose days are devoted 
 to work, and whose evenings to general reading, music is the 
 safest and most enjoyable mode of refreshing and diverting the 
 mind ; society, politics, dissipation, all these bring with them 
 excitements and entanglements which do not leave the mind 
 in the best condition for quiet work ; but music exerts no such 
 disturbing force, it merely, " when soft voices die, vibrates in 
 the memory." .... 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 NEW YORK, October 14, 1860. 
 
 MY DEAR BOY, I don't owe you a letter, I am well aware, 
 as I do not apply that term to the diminutive document which
 
 266 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 I received from you two or three weeks ago, but then I hold 
 liberal opinions on the subject of correspondence, and believe 
 in writing when I feel like it, and in not writing when I don't ; 
 some people act as if corresponding was a similar affair to 
 a cash account or to matching cents : suffice it to say that this 
 morning I feel like having a talk with you, and, as I shall have 
 all the say, you can imagine that you are talking with some of 
 your lady friends. As I was filing some letters this morning, 
 I happened to look over the older ones, and I chanced upon a 
 letter from you at Berlin, written six days after T. D. and I 
 left Liverpool. It carried me back irresistibly to a point more 
 than two years ago, when I first returned home, and when you 
 were just setting out on Swiss tramps and Belgian sight-seeing. 
 You spoke of many matters which were then doubtful, but 
 which are now settled ; of meeting friends abroad who are now 
 quietly at home ; of future prospects which are now to a certain 
 extent defined. We were then both of us at the most migratory 
 and unsettled period of life, and it was very natural that changes 
 should take place ; from irresponsible, wandering, jolly Bur- 
 schen, whose sole trade was a kind of literary " Bummeln,"we 
 have subsided, you into a tutor, with " Leider, auch Theologie " 
 before you, and I into a briefless shyster " in den koniglichen, 
 kaiserlichen Grabzellen zu New York." This retrospect of 
 " two years ago " also reminds me of the old society relations 
 at N. H., and the sad feelings which I had when I came home 
 and found my place filled up ; and how absurdly I resented 
 what was only a natural sequence of the passage of time and 
 the constitution of human nature. I ought to have made use 
 of T. D.'s favorite proverb, "Blessed are they that expect 
 nothing, for they shall not be disappointed." Now, I have 
 brought down my expectations to a very low notch, and receive 
 thankfully the smallest crumbs of regard from old friends, and 
 this is undoubtedly the most sensible and philosophic view to 
 take of things, but it is impossible for me to pass the sponge 
 over my memory and not recollect how pleasant the old times 
 were, and how often, with Faust, I could have said to the passing 
 moment, " Stay, for thou art fair." One thing, I think, how-
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL .STUDY AND LIFE. 267 
 
 ever, has not changed in the past two years, .and that is my 
 regard for you, or, if it has, it has been only to grow stronger 
 and warmer from better acquaintance and more matured 
 
 opinions 
 
 I have work enough now at the office to keep me pretty 
 busy all day. Mr. M. is the attorney for this " Artisan's 
 Bank," the recent suspension of which has been talked a good 
 deal about in the papers within the last two weeks, and con 
 sequently he has spent most of his time settling its affairs, and 
 is not in the office an hour a day ; so that I have lots of work, 
 and, worse yet, of responsibility, on my hands. I shall be glad 
 enough when the affairs of the Bank are settled, and I shall 
 be no more obliged to act upon my own discretion in impor 
 tant matters. I think that I am progressing in knowledge 
 of the practice, but I cannot expect to get ahead very fast 
 when I do not give my whole mind to my profession, anymore 
 than I am doing at present. Out of office hours I am variously 
 occupied ; generally twice a week I go off to play ball with a 
 very good set of fellows ; on the other days I try to do some 
 work in my room, but with dubious success. I am reading 
 Wordsworth's " Excursion " now, and enjoy it very much ; I 
 don't see how I ever could have considered as dull and 
 heavy, a book which treats the deepest and most interesting 
 subjects in a manner at once so tender and so majestic; there 
 is something inexpressibly soothing and quieting about it, 
 which does my fidgety spirit good, and satisfies 
 
 " The universal instinct of repose, 
 The longing for confirmed tranquillity, 
 Inward and outward." 
 
 I grind away at Mommsen's " Romische Geschichte," and get 
 some good out of it, but it goes into things too deeply, and 
 views matters from a stand-point so learned and philological, 
 that it is rather above the head of my ignorance ; the style, 
 too, is involved, and makes pretty tough German to translate ; 
 I can't read it very fast. If you know of any first-rate German, 
 that reads pretty smooth and pays the time expended, I wish 
 you would let me know. Have you finished that book of
 
 268 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Schlegel that I saw on your table, and how do you like it ? I 
 spend an evening occasionally in the Cooper Institute, looking 
 over the magazines. There is a jolly article in the last " Black- 
 wood " on King Arthur and the Table Round. Do you ever 
 see the " Cornhill " ? The series of articles in it by G. A. 
 Sala, on Hogarth, is now finished ; the first two numbers were 
 very good, but I am inclined to think that the others are infe 
 rior. I hope that you will stir up some more " Electra " soon, 
 unless you are too busy, as I run a great risk of forgetting all 
 my Greek between the batches. 
 
 I went to the Prince of Wales' ball on Friday ; the account 
 whereof, behold, is it not written in the " New York Herald, " 
 so that he who runs (after a newsboy and gets a copy) may 
 read?" 
 
 To H. R. C. 
 
 NEW YORK, September 30, 1860. 
 
 DEAR HARRY, I won't waste half my first sheet in apolo 
 gies and excuses for not writing before, but will throw myself at 
 once upon the mercy of the court and plead guilty of gross 
 laziness, trusting to the clemency of the judge, and hoping that 
 he will let me know my sentence as soon as may be convenient 
 for him. It seems so natural to get hold of a sheet of foreign 
 letter paper once more, and to be talking with you about 
 foreign parts ; you who are so intimately associated in my 
 mind with sea-voyages and Alp-climbings, all of which old 
 times I live over again both in sleeping and in waking dreams, 
 to say nothing of the new imaginary expeditions which I am 
 continually projecting. But you are by this time far beyond 
 the routes of travel, walking in unknown paths, almost as far 
 as those regions which Horace speaks of as 
 
 " Quae loca fabulosus, 
 Lambit Hydaspes." 
 
 Don't laugh, now, you rascal, if my geography be pretty badly 
 out of joint, for I intend to brush up ideas and information 
 about those regions, and post myself thoroughly as to the 
 place of your abode. When you write, you must tell me all
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 269 
 
 about your voyage, and how you passed through the Straits 
 of Gibraltar, and whether you thought of me when you did, 
 and how you enjoyed your sail through the Mediterranean, 
 and how you were impressed by your first sight of Turkish 
 soil. I have of course taken the deepest interest in the events 
 which have been transpiring in Syria, and have felt very 
 anxious that the Turkish government should either effectually 
 suppress the revolters, or get itself suppressed. Did the dis 
 turbances extend much in your direction ? I have found it 
 difficult to understand clearly whether the trouble was entirely 
 confined to the Lebanon region, or whether it was a general 
 and wide-spread plot. It would seem as if the Sultan would 
 have to take his walking-ticket before long, and let the prog 
 ress of civilization and religion pursue its course. The "sick 
 man " might safely be called a dead man now, and it would 
 hardly seem to pay for the Powers of Europe to galvanize him 
 much longer. I hope that whatever occurs, you may be pre 
 served in health and strength to go on with your labors, and 
 
 may keep up a good spirit and a cheerful heart 
 
 The election is of course absorbing much of the public in 
 terest at present. Lincoln's chances seem very fair just now ; 
 the Democracy is irreconcilably split, and in this State I al 
 most doubt whether all the opposing parties, if combined, 
 would be equal to the Republicans. The news from Pennsyl 
 vania, too, is very cheering ; but that is a changeable, danger 
 ous State, and it may veer round before the election, and vote 
 the devil's ticket after all. May God speed the right, which 
 is his own cause, and give us honesty and justice in our next 
 administration. It would be hard indeed to bear if after so 
 nearly grasping the object of our efforts and desires, we should 
 again fall back into the darkness and barbarism of another 
 pro-slavery government ; the only thing we can do is to work 
 hard and hope for the best. I am glad to say that the cam 
 paign this year seems likely to be much quieter, and much 
 less disfigured by absurdities and excesses, than in the days of 
 " Fremont and Jessie." Things about New Haven are much 
 the same as ever. The old Laboratory in front of North Col-
 
 270 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 lege, formerly the President's house, has been entirely torn 
 down, and this change greatly improves the personal appear 
 ance of the colleges ; there is nothing now to interfere with 
 the grandeur of that uninterrupted line of red brick. 
 
 NEW YORK, November 11, 1860. 
 
 .... This has been a very important and exciting week ; 
 we Republicans have done the deed, and now the great ques 
 tion must be settled one way or the other, and I don't think it 
 makes much difference in which. If the Southerners simply 
 blow, and boast, and threaten for a while, and then acquiesce 
 in the inauguration of Mr. Lincoln, we shall have peace, which 
 is a good thing enough in its way, and the material interests 
 of commerce and manufactures will not be much deranged. 
 If secession does really take place, and hostilities are com 
 menced, so much the better. There will be misery and blood 
 shed for a while, and all the horrors of civil strife, but it will 
 only hasten on the great result which must sooner or later be 
 reached, only assist to throw more light on the problem which 
 must, one day be solved. And then.the country will emerge 
 from that chaos of fire and blood, fresh and free, its dross 
 purged away, and its great sin expiated. May I live to see 
 that day. 
 
 December 7. .... I began my Bible class yesterday, 
 with about thirty. As they had just received their question- 
 books, they could not answer very briskly, and I had to talk 
 pretty steadily for nearly an hour. I hope they will do their 
 share next time. I had prepared myself moderately well, by 
 about three hours' hard cramming, the night before. I find 
 that my knowledge of Hebrew stands me in good stead, and 
 explains many matters which otherwise seemed contradictory. 
 
 NEW YORK, December 23, 1860. 
 
 DEAR M., .... Since writing the above, I have been to 
 my Bible class. " Your Bible class," I hear you exclaim, 
 " Where on earth did you pick up a Bible-class ? " The way 
 it came about was this. I was calling on Dr. N., and he asked
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 2*jl 
 
 me if I was engaged in any Sunday-school. I said no, but 
 that I should like to be. He then proposed that I should 
 take charge of the Bible class connected with his church. 
 After some hesitation I said I would, and went over to the 
 church the next Sunday to spy out the land. Imagine my 
 horror on finding that the class was about thirty in number, 
 many of them older than myself! I felt badly stuck, you may 
 be sure, but the only way was to face the music. So last Sun 
 day I prepared the lesson pretty thoroughly, and found it 
 much easier work than I had supposed, but a task requiring 
 impudence, of which quality, you know, I am utterly devoid. 
 To-day I got along still better, and succeeded in getting the 
 class to discuss the lesson themselves, and not to leave the 
 talking entirely to me. Our lessons are in the Book of Judges, 
 and you may be sure that I go it strong on the historical and 
 geographical allusions and once in a while I venture upon an 
 original translation of the original tongue leaving, however, 
 the religious teachings to be drawn by the older men. I don't 
 know what effect my way of teaching may have upon the class, 
 but I know for myself that I have become deeply interested in 
 this careful study the deeper I go into it, the more closely I 
 find it to be linked with other parts of Scripture, which seemed 
 to have no connection when I read them casually 
 
 I suppose that you have heard all about Thanksgiving Day, 
 and how the "' fatal thirteen " sat down to dinner, and how we 
 drank to " absent pardners," for all grandpa's children were 
 there, but not one of their mates. Uncle R. was the star 
 performer on the occasion, in the character of the " Prodigal 
 Son," though his appearance told no tales of having been 
 nourished on husks, but rather spoke of English beef and 
 humming ale 
 
 I don't speak of politics, because everybody talks about 
 them, until I am fairly sick of the word. I don't think any 
 thing is to be apprehended from the crazy conduct of the 
 Southerners. If the U. S. calls for volunteers to put Charles 
 ton down, I think that the law would present much inferior 
 attractions to me.
 
 2/2 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 NEW YORK, January 4, 1861. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, .... I was hard at work all New 
 Year's Day, and went from the Dan of Second Place in 
 Brooklyn, to the Beersheba of Thirty-seventh Street, New 
 York, and did not get through till after ten o'clock, although 
 I made only twenty-eight calls ; but then they, especially the 
 Brooklyn ones, were generally pretty long. 
 
 I do wish that one that we love would be a little more en 
 thusiastic. I think that enthusiasm is the source of more 
 pure and exalted pleasure than almost any other earthly feel 
 ing. It quickens and sharpens the mental eye and ear; it 
 gives a zest to enjoyment ; it raises the heart at the sight of 
 God's work in nature, and fills the eyes with happy tears at 
 hearing of noble and generous deeds. Perhaps the old Greeks 
 were not so far wrong in their composition of this word, mak 
 ing it " God in us." .... 
 
 January 8. I went to a performance on Monday night 
 at Mrs. Botta's. It was a reading by Mrs. Siddons, of Eng 
 lish Ballad Poetry. The course is to continue throughout the 
 winter. Mrs. S. reads well, and has a charming appreciation 
 of the old classics. I have a card for the course, and shall go 
 now and then. 
 
 February 24, 1861. .... I got two very good views of 
 President Lincoln. I was quite disappointed at finding him a 
 much greater beauty than I had supposed. I had hoped to 
 have a real sharp poignant sensation of ugliness incarnate, to 
 see a man who deserved to receive the fabled jack-knife. He 
 looked very solemn, and I think that he had reason to be so. 
 On his passage down Broadway he looked excessively tired, and 
 did his bowing by means of a string passing down the leg of 
 his pantaloons and fastened to his collar, this string was 
 pulled by one of his suite at regular intervals, and a bow was 
 the result. 
 
 I see by the papers that he cut and ran from Harrisburg, 
 and got to Washington sooner than was expected. I think 
 that he acted right, and that he cannot take too great care of
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 273 
 
 his life, the intelligence which he received must have been 
 of a kind to justify such a step. I hope that his life may be 
 
 preserved, and that he may be inaugurated If war 
 
 comes, it will be the holiest and most righteous war the world 
 has ever seen, and will wash us with much blood from our 
 national sin. 
 
 March 29, 1861. .... If you will look through the 
 newspaper of to-day you will see that Governor Morgan has at 
 last recognized my modest merit, and granted me the appoint 
 ment of notary public. This I consider one of the most dis 
 creet and proper acts of his administration, and one for which 
 he deserves to be nominated an indefinite number of times. 
 It is a great satisfaction to me to think that my visit to Albany 
 on that dreadful January day was not all for naught. 
 
 To H. N. C. 
 
 NEW YORK, April 2, 1861. 
 
 .... Take good care of your health, Harry, and don't 
 allow yourself to think that duty demands that you should 
 overwork yourself: your duty really lies in living to make 
 your influence more extended and your experience more com 
 plete. You must not forget the means which God has pro 
 vided to help you, in pressing on too hastily to the wished- 
 for end. Don't think that I am lecturing you ; I only want 
 to remind you of the fact that even an active mind, and a 
 zealous, ardent soul, will make themselves more powerfully 
 felt in a community of men, and especially uneducated men, 
 if they are backed up, so to speak, and sustained by a vigor 
 ous, active body, whose contributions to the general stock of 
 good are promptness and facility in action, delight in God's 
 visible world, cheerfulness always. I think of you very often, 
 my dear boy, and of what you are doing, and of what items of 
 work your daily life is made up. And once in a while, per 
 haps, there steals over me a thought that I ought not to be 
 here working only for myself, and doing nothing in return for 
 all the great goodness and kindness which have been shown 
 to me. I am sorry to say that these thoughts of labor and 
 18
 
 274 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 self-sacrifice come but seldom, and are easily dissipated ; they 
 pass away and leave me as cold and selfish as before. Still 
 it is better to think, even occasionally, than not to think at 
 all. I hope that in your zeal for the spiritual welfare of the 
 heathen strangers of Persia, you do not forget that of the 
 heathen friends whom you have left at home. 
 
 You will be surprised, and I don't know whether pleased or 
 amused, to hear that I am the teacher of a large and old Bible 
 class. The way in which it came about was this : A relative 
 of mine, Dr. N., was called last year to Allen Street Presby 
 terian Church, in New York, and has been working there very 
 vigorously, roping in every one he could get hold of. He 
 asked me one day if I was engaged in any Sunday-school 
 work. I said no ; that I had been to mission-schools, and 
 that they had seemed very plentifully supplied with teachers. 
 He then asked me if I would not like to take a Bible class in 
 his Sunday-school. I, supposing that it was a class composed 
 of three or four young men, agreed to do it, and the next 
 Sunday went down to Allen Street to spy out the land, and 
 see what things looked like. Imagine my consternation on 
 finding that the Bible class consisted of all the teachers of the 
 Sabbath-school and some others, ages from forty to eighteen ; 
 that they met in the church, and made a pretty formidable 
 show of numbers! I would have fled forthwith, but was seized 
 and ruthlessly introduced to the " committee who had been 
 appointed to get a new teacher," who informed me that I had 
 been appointed teacher on Dr. N.'s recommendation, etc. I 
 thought that this was drawing it pretty strong, but I waited 
 and heard the lesson gone through with. One of the teachers 
 conducted the exercises, and made so many bulls, that I felt 
 sure that I could not do worse. So I asked for a week to 
 think it over, and took counsel. Y. was very urgent that I 
 should take it, and so I prepared the lesson for the next time, 
 and went over there. I got along very nicely, although I had 
 a class of some thirty, and became so much interested in the 
 subject of the lesson that I determined to continue, and have 
 done so ever since, which is now some four months. We use
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 2?$ 
 
 the Union Question Book, and prepare the lesson for the 
 Sunday-school of the next Sunday. Of course the first thing 
 is to properly get up the lesson for the children ; but I have 
 endeavored to go a great deal farther than that, and to get 
 some higher good out of it for ourselves. I don't know how 
 well I have succeeded with the rest, but it has given me a 
 great many ideas I never had before, and a reverent spirit and 
 mode of feeling quite new to me. We have finished Judges 
 and Ruth, and are just beginning i Samuel. I work like a 
 beaver with commentaries, Bible Dictionary, etc., and when 
 a difficult passage occurs, I frequently find a solution by 
 scratching my head for an hour or two over the Hebrew, 
 which I had studied for several months at New Haven with 
 Professor Gibbs, when I was getting up the class report, and 
 which now comes nicely into play. I take great pleasure and 
 interest in the work, and only wish that the class would do 
 the same. Some of the older men take hold well, but most 
 are either very reserved or very stupid. What do you think 
 of this undertaking ? Is it presumptuous on my part ? You 
 see I confine myself mostly to explanation of the text and 
 comparison of passages, and manage to draw out some of the 
 elders to make the practical applications. Perhaps my uncle, 
 Mr. D., about hit it, when he said that he thought it was a 
 first-rate thing for me, but that he did n't know how it might 
 be for the class. However, I honestly do my best, and shall 
 give it up whenever it seems that I am getting at all perni 
 cious. I have given you a somewhat extended account of this, 
 because I thought that what I was doing in this way would 
 interest you more if told with particularity. Please to let me 
 know, when you write to me, just what you think about it. 
 
 Saturday, April 6. .... I suppose that you listen with 
 great eagerness for political news from home. The day is 
 certainly one of great and stirring events, and it seems to me 
 inconceivable that so many Northern people can view them 
 with indifference, or at most with trembling cowardice. It 
 seems impossible to imagine how a conflict can be avoided in 
 the present state of affairs ; but, while I earnestly deprecate
 
 2/6 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 the beginning of civil war, I think that there are worse things 
 than war, and that the dominant spirit of money-getting at 
 the North is more corrupting and demoralizing. The North 
 is too much demoralized already : some through interest, 
 some through fear, and a goodly number through a desire to 
 obey law, even though it be weakly wielded. I do not sup 
 pose that I am very well fitted for a soldier, but still I have a 
 good deal of fight in me, and think that I shall never see a 
 holier cause to fight for. I shall consider it my duty at least 
 to offer myself if the general government makes a requisition 
 for volunteers. And for the result in the end there can be, I 
 think, no doubt ; so, when you hear of the troubles and dis 
 turbances here, do not be excessively anxious, for it is really 
 necessary that the country should pass through some such 
 phase of trial and suffering, and then emerge in the clear 
 light of truth and freedom. It has really tended to destroy 
 the distinctions between right and wrong, and to overthrow in 
 many minds a belief in God's government of human affairs to 
 see the system of slavery, not apologized for, but defended 
 and upheld as a sacred and divine institution. This spectacle, 
 together with that of the official robberies and treacheries at 
 Washington during the last year, and more recently at the 
 South, have made every patriotic heart sink with shame and 
 sorrow; and now nothing but blood and much grief and 
 misery and disaster will atone for our national crime. In 
 such a crisis as this, no man who is young and unfettered by 
 domestic ties has any right to withold himself. 
 
 I am working into the practice of my profession, and learn 
 quite rapidly. I hope to be able to make an honest living 
 out of it some of these days, or rather years. I am now, by 
 appointment of Governor Morgan, a notary public, which is 
 quite a help to me in a variety of ways, and also brings me in 
 somewhat of " the filthy." 
 
 Sunday, April 14. Well, it has come at last. War is 
 fairly upon us, and April 12, 1861, will be marked as the day 
 upon which began the fiercest civil war of modern times. We 
 are still in a state of the greatest uncertainty as to what has
 
 HOME AND PROFESSIONAL STUDY AND LIFE. 277 
 
 been done, but there is reason to believe that Fort Sumter 
 has been reduced by the traitors. Since the news came yes 
 terday I have hardly thought of anything else, and I am al 
 most sick with excitement and anxiety. What I most fear is 
 that the rebels may also take Washington by a coup de main, 
 which would be the climax of our disgrace. I think that the 
 North is now thoroughly roused, and that there will be a loud 
 and speedy response to any call which the States may make 
 for volunteers. Pennsylvania and New York have each voted 
 $500,000 to arm the State, and it is said that each of the 
 States will soon be called upon to furnish its quota of troops. 
 I think that if they get ahead faster in Connecticut than they 
 do here, I shall go up there and enlist. I don't know how 
 wise this course which I contemplate may be, but I can no 
 otherwise. 
 
 I hear that you are making capital progress with your 
 Syriac, or whatever the language is that you are studying. 
 Please to tell me something about it when you write, and 
 what it is like.
 
 IV. 
 
 LETTERS OF ARMY LIFE AND 
 SERVICE. 
 
 1861-64.
 
 IV. 
 
 LETTERS OF ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 
 
 April 27, 1861. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, I have not written you, because I was 
 
 so uncertain about my movements Now, however, 
 
 I am fixed, and can give an account of myself. I have 
 felt all along that it was my duty to go, and that it would 
 be disgraceful if I did not. I got a letter to Colonel Stev 
 ens, who is in command of those members of the Seventh 
 Regiment who are still in the city, and he put my name down 
 on the roll last Tuesday. All of us who are ready and 
 equipped are to start at the first opportunity. My uniform 
 will be ready to-day, and now I have only my blankets and 
 grub articles to get, and have my hair cut short. The excite 
 ment in the city the last week has been fearful ; some streets 
 are a long arbor of flags, and recruits march up and down the 
 streets to drum and fife. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 NEW YORK, May 5, 1861. 
 
 DEAR BOY, I was sorry that you were unable to stop on 
 your way through here last week, but perhaps it is best as it is, 
 for you probably would not have found me, as I was not at the 
 office, my time being divided about equally between military 
 furnishing stores and the drill-room. J. will tell you just what 
 my position is. I will only say that I have joined the recruits 
 of the Seventh, have been drilling for a week and a half, and 
 during the whole of last week was every day expecting to get
 
 282 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 orders to leave for Washington. But on Friday an order was 
 given not to send on any more troops from this Division 
 at present. This is most vexatious and disappointing, as it 
 places us in a state of extreme suspense, and I am afraid that 
 the choicest part of the scrimmage will be over before we can 
 get down there. However, they promise us that we shall cer 
 tainly go on at some time before long ; and I intend to go back 
 to my business, and drill every afternoon from 3 to 6. This 
 delay has its advantages also : the new company will be well- 
 equipped and quite decently drilled before going on, and will 
 be less likely to disgrace the regiment. 
 
 I- am sorry that you don't like the idea of my going. It 
 seems to me that I could not in decency do anything else. 
 Here I have been for years on the extreme Abolition edge of 
 the Republican party, hoping for the practical assertion, in 
 some way, of the rights and honor of the free North, and here 
 is an opportunity to realize all those hopes, to put those 
 theories into practice. Shall I be outdone in deeds by the 
 very men whom my words have condemned ? Shall the Dem 
 ocratic rag-tag and bob-tail go out to war and strike good 
 blows for the right, while we Republicans sit safely at home, 
 and say, " Oh, our lives are too precious to be risked in this 
 conflict ! " Have we a right to place an unusual value upon 
 our lives, simply because our advantages have been great ; 
 and shall culture and education deafen us to the call of honor 
 and patriotism? Whatever others may say in this strain, I 
 can only reply with Electra, 
 
 TOVTOIS tyk r)v TOIS v6/j.ots ov /Joi^Ao/tat. 1 
 
 Don't come the Chrysothemis over me at this stirring time. 
 I know that you are so situated at present that it would be 
 unwise and almost impossible for you to go ; but with me the 
 case is different : I have as yet no professional engagements 
 which cannot be easily transferred ; 1 have no family of my 
 own (wife and V^TTLO) to regret me peculiarly ; I have not even 
 one fair friend to shed a tear if I should never come back ; 
 
 1 " Not by such rules will I guide my life."
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 283 
 
 my loss would be in fact rather an advantage, as the noble 
 army of lawyers would be lessened, and a useless, selfish life 
 might be to some extent expiated by a " pro patria mori." 
 But whether I go or stay, whether I get six feet of Virginia 
 soil or a happy return, be sure that I shall love and cherish 
 you always. 
 
 THIRTY-SECOND STREET, NEW YORK, May 9, 1861. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, We are off after all, in spite of what 
 I wrote you this morning. I happened into the drill-room and 
 found that the squad were to sail at 6 p. M., in the steamer 
 Matanzas. I rushed to my room, packed up my knapsack and 
 got down to the boat by 5^ P. M. It was announced that we 
 were not to sail until 9 to-morrow morning, and as I was on 
 guard from 9 to 12 p. M., I got the pass-word, ran the guard, 
 came up here to Thirty-second Street, where I sit, the centre of 
 a crowd of sympathizing friends. Good-by, dearest mother ; 
 you can have no objection to make this little contribution to 
 the Great Cause. For myself, I cannot see how a life could 
 be more worthily given up, unless it were for God's sake, 
 though is not this God's cause ? 
 
 God bless you. Your ever-loving son. 
 
 May ii, STEAMER MATANZAS, 
 CHESAPEAKE BAY, Near the Mouth of the Potomac. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, It is now my turn to do guard duty 
 to-day, and as four hours out of the six are spent in the guard 
 room, with nothing in particular to do, I have a capital chance 
 to let you know how we have got on thus far. I got back to 
 the wharf from Thirty-second Street by 12^, passed the guard 
 safely, by means of the magic word " Gertrude," which was 
 the pass-word for the night, and managed to get some sleep 
 in spite of a tremendous racket kept up by a crowd of young 
 sters. We got off about 9 A. M., sixty-nine in number, besides 
 Mr. Tyng, in command of the force, and steamed peacefully 
 down the bay, firing a salute as we went, from our enormous 
 armament of one small gun. When off Bay Ridge we met a
 
 284 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 vessel bearing the Sardinian flag. It struck me as an excel 
 lent omen that the first flag we should see displayed on our 
 voyage should be the one under which Garibaldi achieved the 
 freedom of Italy, and I led off in three rousing cheers for Italy, 
 which were most enthusiastically returned by the crew. The 
 weather was splendid till four o'clock, when it began to drizzle, 
 and then to rain hard ; fortunately for me, my guard duty on 
 deck was over at three, p. M., and I kept dry and got a com 
 fortable sleep. Our vessel is a fast one but very narrow, and 
 rolls terribly. Almost all the men succumbed to the sweet in 
 fluences of the ocean, and even I had to cave in and cast up 
 my accounts with Neptune. When fairly in the Chesapeake, 
 we were hailed by the steamer Yankee, the same one that 
 figured in the siege of Sumter, and the burning of Norfolk. 
 She came alongside and observed us pretty closely, to see if 
 we were all right, and we threw them a sop in the shape of the 
 New York papers, of yesterday, when we separated with 
 mutual cheers. 
 
 An English ship has just passed us called the Union ; we 
 cheered that name with all our might. This I set down 
 as good omen number two. I see it stated in the news 
 papers that the Secessionists are throwing up a battery on the 
 Maryland side of the Potomac ; if so, we may have a brush 
 with them as we pass, although we are not very powerful, hav 
 ing only one miserable little cannon, for arms only horse-car 
 bines. These we shall exchange at Washington for the 
 " Minie " rifles. If we get into Washington in the course of 
 the afternoon we shall go into camp with the Seventh. This 
 whole trip has been a very comfortable one for soldiers. A 
 large number of the men, especially the younger ones, seem to 
 look upon the whole affair as a gigantic spree, and to form no 
 true conception of the serious character of the undertaking. 
 There are some pretty steady fellows along, and we have 
 singing, ad libitum. Last night we got out of the rain under 
 a jolly-boat, as it was too unpleasant to go down below, and 
 sang in good style an enormous number of songs, the chorus to 
 each being the same, viz.,
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 285 
 
 "And the star-spangled banner forever shall wave, 
 O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave." 
 
 One of the guard came in last night pretty sick with a severe 
 sore throat. As he was a mere boy, and had nothing but a 
 lounge to sleep on, I put him into my berth, wrapped him 
 warm, and rubbed his throat with arnica, and he is all right 
 this morning. He is very grateful, and I think that I shall 
 make him show his gratitude by putting himself on a short 
 allowance of oaths. Profanity has been very abundant, but I 
 think that some of us will make a combined effort and keep it 
 under somewhat. Sitting in the guard-room is dull work, I 
 can assure you. They are in decided need of reading. I find 
 plenty of reading matter in the only book I brought with me. 
 The first night out, I lighted on the 6$d and 65th Psalms, and 
 enjoyed them very much. 
 
 Sunday, May 12. We had quite a lively time last night. 
 I had gone to bed, and was sound asleep, when the sergeant 
 of the guard knocked on the state-room door with the order, 
 " To quarters." I was up in a jiffy, and dressed and equipped 
 in about five minutes, and got on deck, where the company 
 was rapidly forming in squads. We were informed that a very 
 suspicious looking vessel had borne down upon us ; that we 
 might momentarily expect to be fired into. The muskets were 
 handed to us loaded, and we stood ready, like the poor rela 
 tion in Holmes's "Autocrat," to repel boarders. A few 
 minutes passed along, and the suspicious craft changed her 
 course and stood off, whereupon we returned to our downy 
 couches. It was well to have had the experience of turning 
 out, and we were highly complimented by Captain Tyng upon 
 the promptness with which we mustered. Hurrah ! we have 
 just passed Mount Vernon, lowering our flag, tolling our bell, 
 and standing with uncovered heads. It will be a poor story 
 if we do not succeed in getting that spot out of the clutches of 
 the Secessionists. 
 
 4 p. M. Here we are at Washington at last, off the Navy 
 Yard, and 1 must finish this up soon, as the sergeant is going 
 off before long with the letters. We have had a most delight-
 
 286 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 ful voyage ; we have been fed and housed in a manner more 
 like gentlemen travellers than soldiers. It has been of very 
 little use to harden us, but perhaps we shall have all the more 
 health and freshness to begin the campaign. I expect to bunk 
 in with Tyng, Rodgers, and two or three more of the best fel 
 lows in the crowd. We shall have the nicest mess of all. Love 
 to all at home. In best of health and spirits. 
 
 CAMP CAMERON, May 14, 1861. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, .... We anchored off the Navy Yard, where 
 the Seventy-first Regiment were encamped, and had a foretaste 
 of the joys of camp life, as we saw them going their rounds. 
 Their principal occupations, at present, are to protect the Navy 
 Yard, and to guard the bridge over the Potomac, both very 
 responsible positions. In the evening, before we left the 
 steamer, we had a prayer-meeting in the cabin, commenced by 
 the first mate and a couple of the seamen of the vessel, and 
 conducted by one of our men. I made some remarks on the 
 subject of profanity and decent behavior, and announced my 
 self willing to back up what I said with my influence, both 
 moral and physical. The mate and seamen made some re 
 marks which were very impressive, they seemed so thoroughly 
 to go to the bottom of the matter, and were almost eloquent 
 in their simplicity. We lay all night at the Navy Yard. 
 Captain Tyng went to the camp to get orders from Colonel 
 Lefferts ; he returned in the evening and informed us that we 
 were to start the next morning. So at nine o'clock we got our 
 knapsacks packed, and I got my ration-box well filled with 
 grub. We then bade farewell to the steamer Matanzas and 
 its officers, and marched off in good style towards the city, 
 having borrowed a couple of drummers from the Seventy-first 
 to enliven us. A march of a mile brought us to the Capital ; 
 a couple more miles of marching brought us to Camp Cameron, 
 and up to the house where Colonel Lefferts is quartered. He 
 came out and received us very kindly, and gave the welcome 
 order to take off knapsacks and overcoats, under which we had 
 been sweating for two hours. We were then marched off to
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. ' 287 
 
 our quarters in the camp, which were in a great tent, already 
 occupied by the old members of the artillery whom we came 
 to reinforce. Here sixty mattresses were spread for us, and we 
 tumbled down on them, right glad to reach our haven at last. 
 
 Our quarters are intensely democratic and general, but 
 from the great size of the tent, it is much better ventilated and 
 more pleasant than the close small tents of the other compa 
 nies. Dinner was served at about \\ P. M., that is to say, we 
 each seized a plate and received a piece of salt junk, a potato, 
 some turnip, a chunk of bread, which soon disappeared under 
 the influence of hunger and open air exercise. Last night was 
 a night of horrors ; about n P. M. it began to rain, and I 
 was awakened by a young stream coming gently into my eye, 
 and upon arousing myself completely, I found an inch of water 
 around my head, and gentle rivulets coursing down the mat 
 tress. I managed to pull my bed out of the fierce peltings of 
 the pitiless storm, but had to go to sleep again in a very moist 
 state. When I rose, I had to travel off to the spring to wash 
 my face, but the warm sun soon dried me, and I feel splendidly 
 now. We got our arms last night, a splendid Minie rifle 
 with a sword bayonet. I can't say how long we shall stay 
 here ; possibly we may come home at the expiration of our 
 thirty days, unless there is some prospect of an active cam 
 paign. The Seventh have done and suffered enough already 
 to entitle them to an honorable reception when they come 
 home. That forced march from Annapolis to the Junction 
 has been spoken of by General Scott as one of the best on 
 record. I only wish that I had been with them from the 
 start. 
 
 May 19. Yesterday morning we had a grand parade and 
 inspection, and our company made its first appearance on 
 parade. We got safely into position, and went through the 
 manual for light infantry, at least as well as any other com 
 pany. We all breathed freer when the parade was over, and 
 we got off so nicely ; we took the whole regiment by surprise. 
 On our way back, one of the companies applauded us with 
 their muskets as we passed through their street. On Saturday
 
 288 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 night there was a meeting of singers at the band quarters, to 
 prepare for Sunday. The band had set the pieces to be 
 sung (Christmas and Autumn) to music, and we worked them 
 up in good style. After that we had some good chanting. 
 On Sunday, service was held in front of the colonel's tent, a 
 desk was placed on the lawn, draped with the American flag, 
 the band and choir had seats at the left, visitors were on the 
 stoop of the house behind, and the men lay grouped about on 
 the grass and under the trees. The sermon was directed 
 against trivial sins, the chaplain saying, that most of his audi 
 ence knew little of any other. He ought to come down and 
 spend a day or two in our tent, he would soon be convinced 
 to the contrary. At the close of the service we got small 
 Testaments and Prayer-books all round. I shall always prize 
 this little memento of the campaign. In the evening we had a 
 prayer-meeting in our tent, two or three of our company hav 
 ing previously given notice of it. The attendance was most 
 gratifying ; we had about eighty there, and kept it up for more 
 than two hours, singing ever so many hymns (I being leader), 
 and having as many as a dozen prayers and addresses, all 
 short, but most full of fervor, simplicity, and in some cases of 
 penitence. Several fine fellows took themselves severely to 
 task for not having started anything of the kind before, and 
 thanked us so very heartily that we felt doubly rewarded for 
 having set the ball rolling. There is something very striking in 
 hearing a tall, manly soldier confess his devotion to a higher 
 and nobler banner than that of his country. When we got 
 back to our tent we found all our things rained on, and the first 
 part of this letter got badly wet. 
 
 CAMP CAMERON, May 29, 1861. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, I hope my letter to J. will have alle 
 viated, as I hoped it would, any anxiety which might have been 
 excited in your minds by the crazy reports which appeared in 
 the newspapers on Saturday night. By this time you will have 
 learned that there was no engagement after all ; that the 
 Virginians fled from Alexandria without striking a blow, and
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 289 
 
 that the Seventh Regiment, after shovelling dirt for three days, 
 like so many Paddies, have marched back in safety to their 
 camp, and are as jolly as ever. They had a pretty rough time 
 of it, and suffered severely from exposure to the rain, and want 
 of provisions. The companies that stayed at home had no 
 sinecure of it either, and we were kept very hard at work all 
 the time ; in fact, I don't feel thoroughly waked up yet, after 
 two days and two nights of steady guard duty. There was a 
 grand battalion parade this morning, and Colonel Lefferts in 
 formed us that although our time had expired on the 26th, 
 that it was the desire of the government that we should re 
 main a few days longer, and he hoped the regiment would 
 be willing to do so. A unanimous cry of assent arose, and 
 we shall stay cheerfully through this week. I am not sorry to 
 go back just now, as it will give me an opportunity of return 
 ing under better auspices. It seems to me that, with a crowd 
 of good men, I could do and suffer almost anything. 
 
 NEW YORK, June 16, 1861. 
 
 "... I find that I settle down to my old life much more 
 easily than I had supposed possible. I feel lithe and active, and 
 ready to work, just that stock of renewed vigor and activity 
 of which I am always conscious after a week's vacation. And, 
 indeed, it was hardly anything more than a vacation, with a 
 double allowance of hard work, and plain, healthy fare,' which 
 made me as springy and elastic as I ever was in my life. In 
 "feet, when I went to New Haven, I found that the change was 
 too sudden from camp grub to home living, and for a couple 
 of days after I returned here, I felt very much out of sorts. 
 .... I suppose that I shall be fined for not turning out to 
 parade on the Fourth of July, but my ideas of soldiering are 
 not exactly of the militia type. 
 
 Is not Theodore Winthrop's death sad ? He left our com 
 pany a day or two before we broke up camp, to go down to 
 Fortress Monroe. His rank of major was merely a nominal 
 one, as a member of General Butler's staff. The Ninth Com 
 pany voted to go into mourning for him. 
 19
 
 2QO LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 NEW YORK, June 21, 1861. 
 
 I have just returned from marching, with a part of the regi 
 ment, as escort to poor Theodore Winthrop's body on its way 
 to New Haven to be buried. Ours, the Ninth, was one of the 
 companies detailed for the purpose, as he had been a member 
 of the Company, and we acted as special guard of honor. Our 
 men stood guard over the body Wednesday and Thursday 
 nights. At ii A. M. we started from the armory, and marched 
 up Broadway to Fourteenth Street, thence up Fifth Avenue, to 
 the New Haven Depot, with arms reversed, and at a slow 
 step. 
 
 June 30. I received a very pressing note from M. W. to 
 visit Springwood. I answered it in the same blue strain in 
 which I wrote home last. What should come in last night 
 but a letter from there containing four missives. Of course I 
 could not stand such a battery of rifled remonstrances ; the 
 notes dropped into my camp like Sawyer's projectiles, and I 
 immediately sent a flag of truce, saying that I surrendered at 
 discretion, and should come up on Monday evening, when 
 they might send down an ambulance to bring me up from the 
 station. I do not think that I shall be at home before Com 
 mencement, unless I have to come up to make arrangements 
 for the Class supper. 
 
 October 2, 1861. Very possibly I may go up the North River 
 to-morrow. I have written to Uncle William to ask him about 
 recruiting prospects in his neighborhood, but have not heard, 
 so I shall go on without waiting any longer. I have not been 
 mustered in as yet ; the Major has changed his mind, and says 
 he will be mustered in as Captain, and I as First Lieutenant of 
 the First Battery, but in order to do this we must have eighty 
 men, and we want twenty of that number. I am going into this 
 matter more heartily than ever.
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 29 1 
 
 To L. R P. 
 
 NEW HAVEN, August 15, 1861. 
 
 You see I write from New Haven ; I found New York 
 utterly unendurable, as there . was nothing to be done during 
 the day in the way of business, and then a long evening 
 yawned before me, too hot for study, and yet furnishing no 
 good loafing chances, as all my city friends are disporting 
 themselves in the country. So on Tuesday after receiving 
 from the U. S. Paymaster the sum of $15.45 "for services 
 rendered at Washington," I took the 3.15 train, and rushed 
 into the bosom of my family, where I intend to remain as 
 long as possible. So you see you will have to stop here in 
 stead of in New York Yesterday was my birthday, and 
 
 we had a rather SUO-TTOT/XOV plum-pudding for dinner. O mis 
 erable being, don't you wish you were twenty-five years old ? 
 A quarter of a century, just think of it ! .... Enough; stop 
 and see me ; I will try at any rate to be at the depot, and 
 "by head and tail" will "hale the groaning" Pinckney (see 
 Tennyson) unto my own abode. O vieni, vieni. All send re 
 gards. Yours as ever, 
 
 WM. WHEELER, Aet 25. 
 
 To L. R. P., Aet. 24. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 NEW YORK, October 2, 1861. 
 
 DEAR BOY, I send you the last heft of the " Electra," and 
 congratulate you and myself on its final completion. I have 
 enjoyed very highly the stolen moments which have been em 
 ployed upon this noble play, and if I were to be here this 
 winter, I would gladly begin the " Choephorae " or something 
 else with you, no matter how much law might frown at it. But it 
 seems that it must not be, and when I return from squelching 
 rebels I shall have forgotten all my Greek, and so another link 
 will be broken between us : it is unnecessary for me to say 
 how greatly I have enjoyed this work, and your genial and val 
 uable companionship in it.
 
 2Q2 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 You will find my translation but a sorry one, and the notes 
 especially bad ; but you will pardon it, as it has been done in 
 the midst of recruiting annoyances and artillery studies, and 
 the slaying of Clytemnestra and ^Egisthus has been queerly 
 mixed up with flying thoughts of cascables, reinforces, chases, 
 formations of battery to the right, and maneuvers of mounted 
 cannoneers, so excuse all bulls, and write me as long and as 
 jolly a letter as convenient. Can't you expel a dozen able- 
 bodied Sophomores, and send them down to me ? 
 
 HEAD-QUARTERS STURMFELS' ARTILLERY, CAMP 
 OF GEN'L BAKER, NEAR POOLESVILLE, , 
 MONTGOMERY Co., Mn., October 21, 1861. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, For the first time, for more than a week, 
 has it been practicable for me to give you any account of my 
 doings ; but I suppose that J. has told you how I was put on 
 duty, immediately upon my return from recruiting on the North 
 River, and kept so almost without cessation until Thursday, 
 when we left the city ; in fact I hardly had three hours' sleep 
 any night for a week, and several nights have been entirely 
 sleepless. It was extremely comforting to me to have J. with 
 me during those last two days, when I could not go home to 
 see you, and was too much worried to write. I was sworn in 
 on Tuesday, as second lieutenant, the Major going as captain 
 with the understanding that when the Second Battery was 
 raised I should be raised a peg. The First Lieutenant be 
 came so elated at being sworn in that he got drunk, and has 
 not been heard of since, and as the Major is not very well 
 posted on the English word of command, I have had the 
 command of the men entirely, and have had an immense 
 amount of work and responsibility thrown upon me. 
 
 On Thursday afternoon, at about 3 P. M., we got everything 
 in readiness, and went up to the quarters, and ordered the 
 men to fall in. They utterly refused to do so till they had 
 received a part of their month's pay, which had been prom 
 ised them. After some talk and expostulation, I got them 
 marched out of quarters, and on the Eighth Avenue cars, which 
 took us to Barclay St. Then we marched to Pier No. 2, and
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 293 
 
 took the Perth Amboy boat. We reached the secesh village 
 of Baltimore about 8 A. M. I stood on the platform and 
 managed the brake nearly all the way. 
 
 At Baltimore the Union Defense Committee gave us a good 
 breakfast ; then we had a dreary ride to Washington, occupy 
 ing eight hours in going forty miles. At Washington we put our 
 soldiers in barracks, and there we were visited by the Sanitary 
 Commissioners, who took several of our sick men up to their 
 home, where they were so well cared for that we took away 
 six with us the next morning. After breakfast we marched 
 out to Georgetown, where we embarked on a canal boat, on 
 the canal beside the Potomac. We voyaged on that rapid 
 vehicle, and anchored for the night about two miles from 
 Washington. We started again Sunday morning, and soon came 
 in sight of the secession pickets on the opposite side ; however 
 they did not pepper us, as that matter of picket shooting has 
 been discontinued by mutual consent. About 3 P. M. we 
 reached Edwards' Ferry, where we disembarked, and found a 
 very warlike state of affairs. Our men had two batteries in 
 position, and behind the rise of the hill were some 1500 or 
 2000 infantry and cavalry. We were marched off to Pooles- 
 ville, a distance of about four miles, and then found that Gen 
 eral Baker's camp was five miles further off. We stumbled 
 up there in the dark, and at last saw a vast array of lights, 
 marking our destination. They seemed to cover every hillside, 
 and to be without number. Soon we were among them, and 
 cordially received by General Baker. Luckily we did not have 
 to sleep in the tents that were put up for us, for the head wag 
 oner was a German, and invited the men to bunk in, in his 
 covered wagons, which were filled with straw. The Major 
 and I occupied the tent of the quartermaster of the Brigade, 
 but we were badly off for blankets, and I spent a night of 
 
 sleepless misery on account of the cold Our men have 
 
 been hard at work to-day, hewing wood and drawing water, 
 fetching rations and fixing tents, and building kitchens. I 
 have had it all to superintend. We are miserably fitted out 
 in all things.
 
 294 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 CAMP OBSERVATION 
 NEAR POOLESVILLE, MD., October 23, 1861. 
 
 DEAR Coz, Somewhat contrary to my own individual ex 
 pectations, I did get off from New York the same week that I 
 left H. P., but fortunately did not go on Tuesday, since then 
 I should have been in a melancholy state of unpreparedness, 
 and fit' only to be an officer of the rag-tag and bobtail cadets. 
 I was mustered into the U. S. service on Tuesday, and got 
 my uniform the same day. I was on duty pretty constantly 
 from the time of my return to New York until Thursday after 
 noon, when we departed, about ninety strong, by way of Amboy, 
 Elizabeth, Harrisburg, and Baltimore, to Washington, which 
 we reached after a tedious journey of twenty-six (26) hours. 
 The hills were covered with camps, but as we did not pass to 
 the southward, we saw nothing of the great army of the lower 
 Potomac, which is under the supervision of General McClellan 
 in person We are encamped on an elevated breezy sit 
 uation, so breezy in fact, that at this present moment I am ex 
 pecting, every instant, that my tent will come down on my 
 head, and close to us are encamped the four regiments of the 
 Brigade, viz. : Baxter's Philadelphia Zouaves, Owen's Irish 
 Phila. Regiment, Morehead's Twenty-eighth Pennsylvania, and 
 the First California Regiment, or rather the remains of it, as its 
 first battalion was almost entirely cut to pieces in the bloody and 
 disastrous fight at Conrad's Ferry the day before yesterday. 
 Of course you must have read an account of it in the news 
 papers, but you can form no idea of the disheartened feeling 
 which such a piece of criminal mismanagement infuses into 
 soldiers. It is pretty well understood that the troops were 
 thrown across the river with the full knowledge that they could 
 not easily be withdrawn, and with the probability that they 
 would be attacked by the enemy in force. The result is that 
 our Brigade has lost about 350 men, killed, drowned, wounded, 
 and missing, all being of the First Battalion of the First Cali 
 fornia, our crack regiment ; the Fifteenth Massachusetts has 
 also suffered dreadfully, and the Twentieth Massachusetts and
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE 295 
 
 the New York Tammany Regiment have been badly cut up. 
 Last, but not least, we have lost General Baker, and almost 
 every one of our best officers who were in action, is either 
 killed or wounded. At Edwards' Ferry I saw General Banks, 
 who had come down with a large part of his Division, and 
 was busily engaged in throwing troops across the river. I 
 very much fear that the tragedy of Conrad's Ferry may be 
 repeated on a larger scale. I can assure you, my dear Coz., 
 that we feel right in the midst of things, and I am disgusted 
 that the want of our horses and guns prevents us from taking 
 an active part. This is an entirely different thing from 
 Seventh Regiment soldiering ; it is actual, bloody war, and 
 this fact is impressed upon me very strongly by meeting 
 officers one day -in courteous society, and seeing them on 
 the next, mutilated or dead. This is emphatically a war 
 deadly to officers, and I have fully made up my mind never to 
 see any of you again. Major Sturmfels went away to-day to 
 Washington, and I am left in command of the company, so I 
 feel in quite a responsible position, as I am determined to 
 
 keep everything right and straight until his return We 
 
 have plenty of secessionists all around us, and we are obliged 
 to keep a sharp look-out, as I am convinced that all of them 
 are a set of rascals, and that they keep their co-rebels in Vir 
 ginia constantly informed of our movements. Many of them 
 in this vicinity belonged to a cavalry troop, which was raised 
 to assist the South, and although some of them have been dis 
 armed and have taken the oath of allegiance, yet I am sure 
 that they would rise and cut our throats, if they saw the enemy 
 cross the Potomac in force. In fact, while I have been writing 
 these lines, an order has come to me from Colonel Owen, com 
 manding the Brigade, to permit no person in citizen's clothes 
 to pass the lines ; this is no more than what our Company has 
 been doing before, as Major S. has European ideas of strict 
 ness and regularity in these matters. I expect, if I live, to 
 pass a tedious and painful winter ; already it is getting too 
 cold to sleep much at night, and unless we take some large 
 city and winter there, I fear that there will be a great deal of
 
 296 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 suffering. Our men as yet have no overcoats, and their blan 
 kets are of a very poor character, and insufficient to keep off 
 the winter's cold. I shall think of you often, and of L., 
 and all New York and New Haven friends, and of music and 
 study and society, and shall hope that I shall not be forgotten 
 here in camp. 
 
 CAMP OBSERVATION, MARYLAND, 
 October 30, 1861. 
 
 .... Everything is quiet in this neighborhood now. Oc 
 casionally we hear firing or cannonading from our pickets, but 
 this shooting across the river does not amount to much. Our 
 own camp lies in full view of the enemy on the other side, and 
 we can see just where their encampments are, in the hollow of 
 the hill, but they keep very shady in the day-time. They 
 might shell us if they had any long-range guns in position, but 
 I imagine that they are hardly well enough off in good ammuni 
 tion to be able to indulge in that kind of target-shooting. I 
 wish that we had our guns. If the enemy, who is said to be 
 in heavy force at Leesburg, should attempt to cross the river, 
 and there should be a general engagement, there would be 
 nothing for us but to retire to the rear with the camp followers. 
 .... Major S. has been absent from the company now for a 
 week, and during that time I have reigned supreme in our little 
 encampment, and have communicated directly with Colonel 
 Owen, the commander of the Brigade, as if I were colonel of 
 a regiment. I am sorry that the state of my foot does not 
 permit me to drill my company as dismounted cannoneers. I 
 have been found lying on my bed most of the time studying. 
 I got hold of Monday's Herald yesterday, and found in it a 
 comparatively correct account of the conflict of Ball's Bluff, 
 only it places the numbers engaged, and the loss, rather too 
 high. I was informed by the brigade surgeon that only 1200 
 were engaged in all, and of that number all but 500 had 
 already reported themselves ; so that number will cover the total 
 
 loss The weather for the last few days has been really 
 
 delicious, perfect October time, and the sunsets over the Vir 
 ginia hills are golden curtains, let down in long waves of blue
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 297 
 
 and purple, and I only wish that I were more free from bodily 
 ailment, and could enjoy more the peaceful Indian Summer. 
 When evening comes on, our little company street resounds 
 with songs. Last night we had a regular German concert, 
 many of our men being old campaigners in Faderland, and 
 very beautiful are some of the soldier songs they sing, noble 
 
 too in sentiment My oven works to a charm, the 
 
 draught is perfect ; in token of the excellence of my fire, I 
 have written the whole of this last page by its light. My only- 
 fear is that my chimney (made of beef barrels) may catch fire 
 some cold night, as this is not an uncommon catastrophe. 
 .... I should like a few sheets of blank music paper ; I 
 want to copy out the bugle calls for my bugler. 
 
 CAMP OBSERVATION, November 8, 1861. 
 
 .... Captain S. has now been absent from us two weeks 
 and a half, during which time we have heard nothing from 
 him, but supposed that he was doing for us all that was nec 
 essary to equip us for the field, and now it appears that he has 
 not even taken the preliminary step of reporting himself to the 
 head of his department, and that we are not recognized as 
 existing in the service at all, and that our men will not get 
 their pay when the paymaster comes, in spite of the pains 
 taken by the orderly and myself to have the muster and pay 
 rolls all properly made out, and sent to the Department at 
 Washington. Besides this, our requisition for overcoats has 
 not yet been responded to, and yesterday, at the instance of 
 General Burns, I made an entirely new one, on my own respon 
 sibility, which I think will bring the articles, and nothing was 
 ever more needed. I am surprised that we have not more 
 men on the sick list than we have. When half of them are 
 in the hospital, and a few frozen to death, perhaps we may 
 get what we want. Then, too, the brigade quartermaster has 
 been changed, so that it is hard to draw supplies, for either 
 officers or men, and we have to scratch hard for our grub. 
 In spite of my ankle, which is still sore and lame, so that I 
 cannot wear a boot, I have to run about all day, now to the
 
 298 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 General, and then to the Commissary, to see that we do not 
 get cheated, now to settle some dispute among the men. I 
 think it is not impossible that I may go down to Washington 
 to-day or to-morrow, to report to General Barry in person, and 
 see what can be done for us. I myself feel full of courage 
 and hope, and shall take the company into my own hands, if 
 the General thinks fit, and use my own influence to get it into 
 the field. I only wish that my foot would heal. The doctor 
 says that it is improving nicely, and if I must go to Washing 
 ton he will send me to Poolesville in an ambulance, and from 
 there I can go by stage to Washington. What a terrible gale 
 of wind, and rain storm, we had last Saturday. I wish we 
 could hear something about the Great Expedition. I have 
 prayed fervently for its success, and have lain awake on these 
 windy nights thinking about it. Robert Edwards' regiment, 
 the Forty-eighth New York, is with it ; this adds to my interest. 
 I wish I was with him. 
 
 CAMP OBSERVATION, MD., November n, 1861. 
 DEAR M., Thanks for your promptness in answering my 
 last letter. Yours was the first received after reaching this 
 camp, and I was saved a disappointment when the mail 
 
 came in, the night of that stormy Saturday It is a 
 
 showery, drizzly afternoon, and the men and I equally rejoice 
 at it, for they get off drilling, and I am at liberty to write this 
 letter, and you may be sure that I gladly embrace all such 
 opportunities, when I have them, for when we get on the 
 march there will be no time to sit quietly down and place 
 ourselves en rapport with dear friends, but a hasty, hurried 
 scratch must be sufficient to satisfy those at home of the 
 safety and health of the absent one. I am sorry that you got 
 the idea, from my last letter, that I was in poor spirits ; true 
 I then had poor accommodations and food, slept cold at night, 
 and the responsibility of taking care of the company weighed 
 upon me somewhat, yet I have never allowed myself to be de 
 pressed ; the thought of being once more armed for the cause, 
 and of having a chance this time to strike a blow, makes me
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 299 
 
 very happy and elastic ; the picture I gave you was one of 
 physical, not mental condition. Now, however, I am very much 
 more comfortable in my way of living ; I have had an oven 
 built in my tent, of large stones, with a flue running out for 
 some distance behind the tent, covered with stones and plas 
 tered with clay ; the chimney is made of two beef barrels, 
 placed one on top of the other ; the draught is generally very 
 good, except when the wind blows from the east, and early 
 in the morning my boy comes in, just after reveille, and lights 
 up a good fire, so that when I rise, I find the edge taken off 
 from the morning frost considerably. These stoves, of this 
 simple construction, are all the rage among the officers- in the 
 camps here, and they are a grand institution ; only some of 
 them are unable to get beef barrels, and build their chim 
 neys of sugar barrels, which are liable to catch fire, and cause 
 a great deal of disturbance and fun in being extinguished ; 
 the Philadelphia Fire Zouaves, the nearest regiment to us, 
 recall their former days, and run " with the machine " to 
 put out the officers' chimneys. Grub, too, has manifestly im 
 proved ; we have a man who waits on our mess who is a 
 great forager, and scours the country round for provisions, 
 wherewith to vary the daily bill of fare, of government salt 
 horse and hard biscuit. Not unsuccessful is his scouring 
 either, as that excellent leg of mutton which we had for din 
 ner yesterday, and that loud-clucking hen in the next tent 
 might testify. A rumor, too, has been blown hitherward, of 
 sundry turkeys in a farmyard not very remote, and I think it 
 highly probable that we shall celebrate the New York Thanks 
 giving day, by fleshing our teeth in a secesh gobbler. Now 
 that we have learned the ropes, we live as well as anybody in the 
 camp. It is now more than three weeks since we came here, 
 and Major S. has been absent nearly all that time, and our 
 pieces and horses have not yet been sent to us. I have ruled 
 the Company in righteousness in the meantime, have seen to 
 it that the Quartermaster and Commissary did not cheat the 
 men, have maintained their rights, and made known their 
 needs to General Burns, the new General of the Brigade, and,
 
 3OO LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 still more, I have mustered the Company for pay, and sent the 
 appropriate muster and pay rolls to the Department at Wash 
 ington ; this last was a great labor, and a sort of job entirely 
 new to me, but after about three days' solid work I made it 
 out, and now the men will get their pay, I hope very soon. 
 We expect the Major back in about a week, and I hope that he 
 will bring our full equipments with him, so that we may be in 
 condition to march across the river with this Division, if it 
 goes. I hope that we shall winter in Virginia. It is very 
 cold here, and they say that the snow lies four feet deep on 
 these hills. I am full of anxiety about the Great Expedition ; 
 my friend Rob. Edwards is with it as a lieutenant in the Forty- 
 eighth New York. I suppose that by this time you have full 
 accounts of the landing, etc. Our newspapers are few and far 
 between out here. We have pretty lively times in the evenings ; 
 the Germans of my company get together and sing very sweetly, 
 and I try to join in with them. I send you a copy of one of 
 their songs, called " Morgenroth ; " it is simple, but very 
 sweet, I think, and shows a reflection and elevation of senti 
 ment, to be found only among the Germans We are 
 
 no longer " General Baker's Brigade," but the " First Brigade 
 Corps of Observation, Camp Observation, Md." 
 
 November 19. . . . . You will be anxious to know about 
 my health, after what I wrote in my last. Well, the first dose 
 of restoring physic was that batch of letters on Sunday ; they 
 quite set me up. On Monday my trouble, which seems inter 
 mittent in its nature, came on again, and after being out for an 
 hour or so, attending to some business at the adjutant gene 
 ral's office, I was obliged to go to bed with a very bad head 
 ache. The doctor came in and said that my system required 
 to be stimulated, and prescribed quinine and whiskey. But 
 the real cordial came in another shape. About dark, one of 
 the men came in, and said a gentleman was inquiring for me. 
 Upon asking his name, Mr. W. was brought in. I jumped out 
 of bed, ran out doors in my stocking-feet, and there were Cousin 
 M. and Mr. W. in their carriage. They quickly transferred 
 themselves to my tent, and also a champagne basket full of
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 30! 
 
 various goodies ; in fact, a little magazine of provender, which 
 will make our larder rejoice till that box from home arrives. 
 The horses were taken from the carriage, and put in a rustic 
 stable, which my men had built of straw and branches ; we 
 got up a good fife in the oven, and at supper time a table, 
 completely set out for us, was brought into my tent, and I had 
 an opportunity of showing my guests that we did not starve in 
 camp. We sat and talked for a while, and then escorted 
 Cousin M. to Mrs. Fisher's, where she succeeded in getting 
 very comfortable quarters for Jhe night. Mr. W. spent the 
 night with me in my tent. He took breakfast with me, Cousin 
 M. with General Burns and the brigade surgeon. Then they 
 started for home, having given me a great deal of pleasure by 
 the visit. How kind it was for them to come so far. I hope 
 Cousin M. will not send you an exaggerated account of my 
 condition, so as to make you anxious. Mr. W. is a good Union 
 man, and up to the times. It must be a thorn in the flesh of 
 these secesh Marylanders, to have a gentleman among them 
 who takes the " Tribune " regularly, and who advocates the 
 making of Maryland a free state. 
 
 The news from the South is most cheering, and I think that 
 every one will rejoice that South Carolina should receive the 
 just reward of her iniquities, and that, too, when she thought 
 that she had removed the noise of war and tumult far away 
 from her borders. I hope that you will all have a good time on 
 Thanksgiving Day this year. I shall think of you as eating 
 turkey together, and shall try to put myself en rapport with 
 you in that respect, if such a " bird of loudest lay " can be had. 
 
 THANKSGIVING DAY, November 28. 
 
 CAMP OBSERVATION. 
 
 .... I received a very substantial epistle last night, in 
 the form of the long expected box. Everything arrived in 
 good order, except in one instance. Please to give my thanks 
 to every one for the torrent of good things poured upon me. 
 I had hoped by Thanksgiving Day to have announced myself 
 as quite recovered, but it goes very slowly, and there are steps 
 backward as well as forward. We had a rousing turkey for 
 dinner to-day, but I had to content myself chiefly with look-
 
 3<D2 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 ing at him, while the others made play at his gigantic pro 
 portions. 
 
 We are still in utter ignorance of what we shall do, but are 
 prepared to stay here for some time. General McClellan may 
 turn out to be timid and temporizing. Will not the use of the 
 Naval Expedition be thrown away, if a simultaneous advance 
 is not soon made ? 
 
 CAMP OBSERVATION, December g, 1861. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, The visit of Uncle R. and J. was 
 most kind and cheering, and brought me up quite a peg. For 
 two or three days after they left I improved, and then began to 
 settle down again. I feel well enough, generally, but am liable 
 to fall into fits of brown study, lassitude, in fact* I received, 
 on Saturday last, a telegraphic despatch from S., ordering me 
 to meet him in Washington, I suppose to make an effort to 
 fix things straight. I hope to get a pass this afternoon, and to 
 start early to-morrow morning. 
 
 WASHINGTON, December n. 
 
 I reached here last night, after a day of unmitigated torture. 
 I walked over to Poolesville early in the morning, to^take the 
 stage, and was forced to ride to Adamstown in a fearful spring- 
 less wagon, which jounced me almost to pieces, then by rail 
 to the Relay House, and so to Washington, which I reached 
 more like a dead man than anything else. I succeeded, 
 through the courtesy of an officer, in getting a room in the 
 Ebbitt House. When I went into the breakfast room, I was 
 so light-headed that I should have fallen, had I not heard a 
 voice exclaim, " Why, Mr. Wheeler ! " I looked round and 
 saw Mrs. R. She took me in the doctor's carriage to the hos 
 pital, where her son is sick. The doctor examined me, and 
 insisted on writing me a certificate of disability from duty on 
 account of weakness, and sent me down to General Williams's 
 office. My pass is to be extended to ten days. 
 
 ANNAPOLIS, December 27 ', 1861. 
 
 MY DEAR MOTHER, I write you to say that I am daily 
 improving in health and strength, and coming up rapidly, 
 under the combined influence of careful treatment and phos-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 303 
 
 phates. Anything is better than the despondent indifference 
 in which I was at camp. The only thing that worries me is, 
 that I have not yet got my new leave of absence, and my old 
 one expired several days since, so that I have been a sort of 
 deserter. A furlough was written for me, by an old army sur 
 geon, but it was drawn so incorrectly as to be of no use, and 
 was sent back. I then got a proper certificate from Dr. 
 Douglas, of the Tenth Connecticut. This went on to Colonel 
 H., but he had gone to New York, so that my application has 
 lain unattended to, and I am thinking of going directly back 
 to camp without, waiting for the leave. We had a pleasant 
 Christmas here. R. was longed and sighed for. 
 
 December 31. I suppose you have been kept informed about 
 me by letters from uncle and aunt, but I will recapitulate a 
 little. I spent the afternoon of December n in Mrs. R.'s 
 room. She made me lie down on the sofa, and tucked me up 
 warm. In the evening, the Misses W. sent their man in with 
 a tray covered with nice things, first-rate tea and toast, which 
 went right to the spot. I made a call on them later in the 
 evening, and saw Mrs. H. and Miss J. The latter I had never 
 met, but Mrs. H. I had seen long ago when I was in college. 
 At 3 P. M. I took the train for the Junction, and reached here 
 about eight o'clock. I have improved very rapidly ever since 
 I came here. If my leave does not come, I shall have to go 
 back to Camp Observation, as soon as I am fit to travel. If 
 I get right strong and well, I shall report myself for duty when 
 my leave runs out ; but, in the present disorganized state of 
 our Battery, it does no harm to the public service for me to 
 be absent. If we were ready for active operations, it would 
 be a different thing, and it would be something to be absent 
 a day longer than I could help. 
 
 WASHINGTON, January 24, 1862. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, I have finally found rest for the sole of 
 my foot, to a sufficient extent to take pen in hand and to tell 
 you how I am situated. I left New York at 7 A. M. on Tues 
 day, and after the usual tedious ride, with the pleasures of a
 
 304 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 chilly storm superadded, I reached Annapolis and received a 
 warm welcome from the friends there. I made a short call on 
 Lieutenant W., who has just returned, and had resigned some 
 time before reaching Annapolis. I really could not help feel 
 ing sorry for him, but still I hope that the government will 
 give him his due, by sending him to Fort Warren, and not 
 permit him to go South and assist them in organizing that 
 branch which they so much need a Navy. I came on here 
 on Wednesday afternoon, and, at an early hour, started for our 
 camp. Some time before I reached it, I could see a long line 
 of evergreens, worked into rustic sheds, and through them 
 flamed out numerous red blankets, showing that at least one 
 essential requisite for a battery had been obtained, and upon 
 coming into camp I found that we had about one hundred and 
 ten horses, and that we were to fetch the guns the. next day. 
 I suppose that by this evening we shall have four pieces at 
 camp. As the tents were all full, and as I was not quite ready 
 to do full duty, Captain S. gave me permission to go into 
 Washington for quarters. 
 
 We have orders to cross the river, and to join General 
 Blenker's Division, so that very possibly we may be away by 
 Monday. I see that A. R. has turned up as Captain of the 
 First Connecticut Battery. 
 
 CAMP DUNCAN, WASHINGTON, 
 January 26, 1862. 
 
 DEAR M., Sunday has brought with it a sufficient degree 
 of leisure and quiet to permit me to sit peacefully down and 
 tell you how I am, and how I found matters in the Company 
 
 after my absence from it On Wednesday I came to 
 
 Washington, and found the Company where it was two weeks 
 ago, and that it had received an increase of members, but that 
 entirely on four legs, we have now one hundred and eight 
 horses, nearly our entire quota, and shall go to the arsenal to 
 morrow to fetch our guns, they are said to be iron six-pound 
 ers, of Prussian make, warranted to burst, I suppose, at the 
 fifth discharge. Although our Captain is absent, I am not in 
 command, for a German lieutenant is promoted over me, and,
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 305 
 
 as I am not ready to resign, I must e'en submit with a good 
 grace. Besides, this lieutenant is said to be an accomplished 
 artillery officer, and I don't want to push myself above those 
 who are really my superiors. But, what is most unpleasant 
 to me of all, is, that I have to live with these men, to eat their 
 onions and drink their lager, and very rarely to hear a word of 
 musical ' English from American lips, as I am almost the sole 
 specimen of a Yankee in the Company. There are plenty of 
 Irish, it is true, and their " rich brogue," and a river of talk well 
 supplied with dam(n)s, can be heard at any time in the camp. 
 Now do not think that I make an unnecessary fuss about these 
 things, for a soldier's life has in it enough of hardship and 
 trouble, without adding the mental agony of continual uncon- 
 geniality and disagreement of modes and habits of life. I do 
 not "bate one jot of heart or hope," and I am far more de 
 termined, now, to see this war out, than I was when I first 
 entered the service. 
 
 CAMP DUNCAN, WASHINGTON, 
 January 28, 1862. 
 
 The noises and rows, which always accompany pay-day, 
 have subsided to a sufficient extent to permit me to take off 
 my sabre and pistol, with which I have been prowling through 
 the company street, " a terror to evil-doers," and although I 
 have had a very busy and fatiguing day, and it is now half- 
 past eleven, yet I feel much more like having a good talk with 
 you than like going to bed. How curious the moods of letter- 
 writing are ! They are not the same as with that faculty of 
 conversation which enables one to express himself in easy and 
 yet correct words. Conversation is more readily carried on ; 
 for then the presence of the friend stimulates and excites, 
 while the imagination must assist the letter-writer, to call up 
 the absent face, and to hear the well-known voice in reply, 
 and the laugh, often shared together at a stray flash of humor. 
 I think that if people would give way to their imaginations 
 more, when in a kindly vein, their "winged words" would be 
 more beautiful and would nestle more warmly on the hearts 
 of absent friends. I frequently feel like saying to my corres- 
 20
 
 306 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 pendents, " Be more frivolous, describe little things more 
 carefully, and don't touch upon great things, if you must, do 
 so superficially and say no more than every one else and the 
 newspapers say." 
 
 .... We, in the field, will bear the hardships of the camp, 
 and you, at home, will bear the anxiety for us, and will give us 
 your prayers ; only let the war last until the question has been 
 thoroughly decided, even if it cost the lives of all now in the 
 field, and let our institutions be founded upon a basis of real sta 
 bility, which no selfish oligarchy can shake at their pleasure. 
 
 I think that already some gleams of light are apparent in 
 the South. May the Dayspring soon visit us, and may it really 
 be a Dayspring from on high. Since I have been here, I have 
 not had a single sensation of homesickness, nor any of re 
 gret. My lot is cast in with this matter and I will see it out. 
 Courageous and patriotic words from dear and loved friends 
 like yourself, ma chere, go right to the soldier's heart, and give 
 it warmth and strength to beat with full pulses in the storm. 
 
 But upon my word, I supposed that I was going to be frivo 
 lous myself this time, and lo, I have entered into a didactic 
 oration on the first page ; please excuse me, and don't take 
 any of it to yourself, but write me just as frivolous a letter as 
 possible, in revenge for my harangue. .... I had to sleep in 
 the same room with a monster from Illinois, of the chestnut- 
 worm species (slightly roasted) of mankind ; I suppose there 
 are plenty more of the same sort there, but, though they may 
 be very decent people, they are loathsome to look at. He was 
 a peaceably disposed monster, and beyond the little singular 
 ity of going to bed in full dress (I am not so sure about the 
 boots), behaved quite creditably. I took him for a hog con 
 tractor, but he may have been a member of Congress 
 
 I was quartered in the city until Saturday, when Captain S. 
 went to New York ; since then I have occupied his tent, and 
 have done full duty. When I arrived, I found the company 
 supplied with one hundred and eight horses, nearly their full 
 complement ; and I now begin to see how intricate and exten 
 sive a matter the charge of a battery of artillery is, when the
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 307 
 
 mere cleaning, feeding, watering, and physicking of the horses 
 
 is so much of an affair We were all paid off to-day, 
 
 and I rode down to Washington with my pockets full of money- 
 letters, to send by Adams' Express for the men. I am willing 
 to take a good deal of trouble in order to do this ; since it 
 both relieves the families at home, and also removes the men 
 from temptation. I called on Miss W. and Mrs. H., dirty 
 boots and all ; but as they are fi doing " the soldier life, they 
 said, they gloried in my muddy boots. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 CAMP DUNCAN, WASHINGTON, 
 February 7, 1862. 
 
 DEAR FRIEND, It is a long time since I have written to 
 you, not, I think, since I sent you the last heft of the "Elec- 
 tra," and I feel ashamed of myself for my long silence ; but 
 yet I must plead the shadow of an excuse. Your scholarly, 
 quiet, and decorous life seems so far removed from the dirty 
 and commonplace existence of us here in camp, that hardly 
 more than a faint echo will reach your ear when I speak, and 
 you cannot be expected to take much interest in my stories of 
 drill and guard duty and muddy misery, when in any news 
 paper you can read accounts far more thrilling and exciting 
 about soldier life. People in general are, I imagine, pretty 
 well disgusted with the subject of the war, and we have to 
 content ourselves with exciting an interest for us in the family 
 circle and no farther. But I feel a very warm interest in what 
 you are doing and studying, old fellow, even in that absorbing 
 Sanskrit, although I am hardly prepared just now to under 
 take the translation of the Vedas or Hitopadega (is n't that 
 the cove's name ?) with you, after the manner of Electra. I 
 can't quite give up the old classical boys even now ; I have 
 a Leipzig " Horace " on my table, and find an occasional ode 
 
 right jolly reading for odd snatches of time My fellow 
 
 officers get letters from their wives, and read me extracts about 
 their little boys, and their naive inquiries after " father," and 
 then, when their faces soften and their eyes glisten, I know
 
 308 LETTERS Ofi WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 that my life is very barren and incomplete, and that I have a 
 
 great mystery to learn and as yet no one to teach it me 
 
 Come with me to our camp, three quarters of a mile east of 
 the Capitol, and let me introduce you to our officers. Captain 
 S , the getter-up of the Battery, with whom I tent, is a very 
 queer specimen of humanity; jolly, hasty, practical, unrelia 
 ble, philosophic, childish, and, worst of all, addicted to rising 
 at abominably early hours, and punching me in the ribs until 
 I follow his example. At any rate, an educated officer, and 
 one who seems to enjoy a pretty good reputation for experience 
 among other German officers. (You observe that this paper 
 looks a little greasy ; probably the captain has been using it 
 to enfold a Schweine-bifstek, as I constantly find that favorite 
 
 dish of his in all parts of the tent.) Next, Lieutenant M , 
 
 an officer from the General Staff of Wurtemberg, well-posted 
 in military matters, but so thoroughly attached to European 
 tactics as to be quite unfit to manage American troops ; he is 
 likewise conceited enough to shipwreck the best man that ever 
 
 lived. Then, Lieutenant Carl von L (I only give his first 
 
 name, as his intermediate names are legion, and would occupy 
 too large a part of my letter), a hohe Herrschaft, and husband 
 of the Grafinn somebody, and feels it all over, as is seen at 
 first glance. He drinks vast lager, rides pretty well, as he 
 was a cavalry officer before, knows no English, because he 
 is too lazy to learn, consequently is of very little use to us, 
 and is in all respects " ein echter Schwab." Then, Lieutenant 
 
 S , a watchmaker from New York, about forty years old, 
 
 and of rough, harsh appearance, but a real good, kind-hearted 
 fellow, entirely reliable and unpretending, and one who stands 
 up to his work like a man ; the stables are especially under 
 his care, and it makes me laugh to hear him rush out of bed 
 
 at night whenever any disturbances arise there But 
 
 then, we have such floods of German grub : Schweins-bifstek, 
 Sauerkraut, Brat und Leber-wurst, Zwiebel und Knoblauch, 
 Urisokohl, and all these washed down with plentiful potations 
 of Lager-Bier, Rheinwein, and Schnapps. Add to this that 
 the cooking is all done in our tent, and you "square the awful
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 309 
 
 product" 1 immediately; the consequence is that a strange 
 confusion of goods takes place, and, though I do not, like 
 poor Tom, have " ratsbane in my porridge and halters in my 
 pew," yet I often see a string of Wurst laid on my portfolio, 
 and poor " Horace " has a bunch of Knoblauch on his cover, 
 spite of his protest, 
 
 " Parentis olim si quis impia manu 
 
 Senile guttur fregerit, 
 Edit cicutis allium nocentius." 
 
 I think that before long I shall myself become a good Ger 
 man plain cook, and will be able, when I come home, to turn 
 you out abominations of all kinds, gentle reminders of the 
 Hotel Bellevue. This morning three of us started off before 
 sunrise for a ride and trot-practice. On our way home we 
 visited the market at Washington, and I was deputed to do 
 the marketing. We then dashed up Pennsylvania Avenue, I 
 with two fat chickens, slung one on each side of my saddle 
 bow, like John Gilpin's bottles, " to keep the balance true." 
 Alas ! my fate was as sad as his, for suddenly the connecting 
 link between the birds broke, and they plumped down deep 
 into the mud, whence they were extracted by a small boy 
 whom I hired to dive for them. (Fine chance for a parody 
 on " Wer wagt es, Rittersmann oder Knapp, zu tauchen in 
 diesen Schlund ! ") You would revel in the constant oppor 
 tunities for speaking German which are afforded here. I go 
 right in and talk, utterly regardless of mistakes. It is pretty 
 hard to make explanations of military matters in German, as 
 I had to do yesterday with an awkward squad of gunners in 
 the "school of the piece," as the technical terms are different 
 and often peculiar ; but I go fearlessly ahead. Our pieces 
 are 6-pounder 3-inch rifled guns, beauties for maneuvering, as 
 they are quite light, and I think that they will turn out well 
 in action. I already feel an affection for them, and they be 
 to me as a sweetheart, yea, as many sweethearts. We have 
 had marching orders for some time to cross the river and join 
 General Blenker's division, but the weather has been miser 
 able, and we may not go for two weeks. 
 
 1 A quotation from a sermon we heard together in Rome.
 
 3IO LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 CAMP DUNCAN, February i, 1862. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, As I understand that there is very 
 general distress among the people at the North, and as my 
 soldiers are pretty generally sending their money home, I follow 
 
 their good example, and send you by Adams' Express, 
 
 hoping that it may help to keep the wolf from the door 
 
 The thought of doing something for you, who have done so 
 much for me, dear mother, almost makes me wish that you 
 were indeed dependent on my exertions, and that I could 
 show you, by faithful labor and self-denial, that I am not un 
 grateful. This money I send home because I am afraid that 
 I may lose it here. I feel a redoubled interest in the service 
 now that we have our guns, horses, battery, wagon forge, and 
 everything complete, and, as I conduct the simpler maneuvers, 
 the more difficult ones begin to become plain to me, and I have 
 a good hope that my daily exercise and drill will constantly ex 
 plain the study of tactics which I pursued quite industriously 
 in that hillside Camp of Observation. Of course I do not ex 
 pect ever to be a really good artillery officer, in the proper 
 sense of the word, but still I may be able to do something in 
 the service, and accomplish more than if I were merely a 
 lieutenant of infantry. Yesterday I went down to the arsenal 
 with the caissons for some ammunition, and as I had hardly 
 any officers with me, I felt quite a weight of responsibility 
 upon me. I was continually apprehensive lest one of them 
 might fall into some unfathomable mud-hole, from which our 
 young, untrained horses would never be able to pull it up. 
 Then, at the railroad crossing, I was again very nervous, for on 
 the day when we brought up the pieces, the cars came along 
 close to us, and the horses of one carriage got tied up in a 
 hard knot. But no such accident happened to me, and I 
 brought my charge back all right. This getting on horseback 
 seems to put new life into me ; and although I have no horse 
 of my own, I can get along with one of the company horses 
 until the government receives some animals more worthy to 
 be straddled by officers than those now in their stables. Last
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 31 1 
 
 Thursday was pay-day, and we had a terrible time with the 
 men for two days after. I won't dilate upon the disagree 
 able subject, but only say that I almost lost my faith in human 
 nature, so many of the best and most reliable men proved 
 wholly bad and unreliable under the influence of drink. I 
 am sorry to be obliged to inform you that our living here is 
 very bad. The mess at Camp Observation was luxury com 
 pared with it. There is no system ; each picks up what he 
 can find, and then sits "silently apart gorging .himself in 
 gloom," I would not say gorging, for that presupposes an 
 amount of food not easily attainable. Captain S. is anxious 
 to get across the river to Virginia, so that we may be settled. 
 
 and have things decent and comfortable As soon as I 
 
 get comfortably quartered I shall be quite content. 
 
 CAMP HUNTER'S CHAPEL, VA., 
 GENERAL BLENKER'S DIVISION, February 23, 1862. 
 
 .... Sunday is a day of work as well as any other, but 
 we do not drill or undertake any lengthy job likely to take all 
 day. This morning I was hard at work for four hours unload 
 ing ammunition and packing it in our caissons. This was de 
 cidedly a work of necessity, for the stuff had come up from the 
 arsenal three or four days ago. and ever since then it had been 
 too wet to venture to unpack it. To-day the weather was 
 very fine, so we took advantage of it to get our precious am 
 munition stowed away, and I was handling canister, shells, 
 and case-shot, instead of going to church. I intend to take 
 my horse next Sunday and ride over to General Franklin's 
 Division to see Jo. J. and go to church with him. He is about 
 three miles and a half from here, in the Alexandria district. 
 The sight of a single friendly face would be a great treat to 
 me here, but I have to make duty take the place of friendship, 
 culture, and most other desirable things. I am now decidedly 
 the laboring oar of the concern, for domestic ties impair the 
 efficiency of two of our officers, for the wife of Lieutenant V. 
 L. is at Washington, and he goes there as often and stays as 
 long as he possibly can. The other afternoon who should
 
 312 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 appear in camp but Madame S., with three fat, flourishing 
 images of the illustrious captain. He quartered them in a 
 house near by our encampment, put himself on the sick list, 
 and has gone up there to stay with them, and left me to have 
 command of the battery. This keeps me very busy, but then 
 I can manage matters according to my own ideas of what is 
 right, and the responsibility is honorable and exciting. On 
 Washington's Birthday our Battery went out for inspection and 
 review ; but that is a long story. I feel still the same delight 
 ful state of uncertainty about my daily food ; but who cares 
 much for such trivial things when every newspaper brings 
 such delightful, reviving news of the success of our arms in 
 every quarter. I think I could have lived for a week on the 
 news of Fort Donelson alone. How you New Haven folks 
 must rejoice in the success and glory of Captain Foote, who, 
 it seems to me, stands out more prominently than any other 
 commander, as distinguished for his gallant conduct and cool 
 
 bravery Still, the great battle will yet take place in 
 
 Virginia, and we shall be ready to be in it, for our men are 
 ambitious and quite enthusiastic. Having guns and horses to 
 take care of, and duties of both interest and difficulty to per 
 form, seems to have transformed some of them from drunken 
 wretches to eager, careful workers. After all, no arm is like 
 the artillery. I never could have stood the monotony of in 
 fantry service. 
 
 CAMP HUNTER'S CHAPEL, VA., GENERAL BLENKER'S 
 
 DIVISION, February 28, 1862. 
 
 Your right kindly and " frivolous " letter, dated February ist, 
 was duly received by me at Camp Duncan, although directed 
 to General Blenker's Division, for, as you very sensibly suggest, 
 the movements of so celebrated an officer as myself are too 
 well known for my letters ever to go astray, and General 
 McClellan was, at that time, in the habit of daily calling on 
 the Washington Postmaster, and saying to him, "Lieutenant 
 Wheeler is still at Camp Duncan ; " so that it was through 
 this considerate behavior on the part of the Commander-in- 
 Chief that I was spared the agony of having your letter de-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE, 313 
 
 layed. I was much amused with the whole epistle, and thought 
 it a right jolly production for an unhappy being with head 
 ache, toothache, bad cold, etc. You can't be too frivolous in 
 a letter. One laugh at some comical idea warms the heart of 
 the reader towards the sender more than a page full of endear 
 ments, and you say in your heart, " He must indeed love me 
 if writing to me inspires him with such gladness and lightness 
 of heart." The necessary labors, accompanying the receipt 
 of our guns and ammunition, and the preparations for moving 
 out to this camp, kept me so busy at Washington, that I got 
 no chance to write you, and since we have been in Dixie my 
 time has been still more fully occupied in the arranging of our 
 new camp, and with drills, etc. And now, as I am going out on 
 picket to-morrow morning with my section, I cannot refrain 
 from writing you a few lines (perhaps the last I may write), to 
 let you know that I am well and think of you, as I may not 
 have facilities to write again soon. 
 
 We broke up at Camp Duncan on the izth of February, 
 and marched down to Washington, through Pennsylvania Av 
 enue, across the Long Bridge into Virginia, and then through 
 much mud to this camp, where the Teutonic element has 
 its head-quarters, and revels in endless streams of lager, 
 infinite plantations of sauerkraut, and strings of small but 
 seductive sausages. We selected our camp on a very fine 
 piece of elevated ground, the dryest in the neighborhood, near 
 to the main road, and with good springs of water handy. And 
 now after two weeks of steady hard work ; after building a 
 brush stable, also a kitchen, fixing up all the tents nicely and 
 comfortably with board floors, and getting generally settled 
 down, lo and behold, the order comes that the whole Division 
 must hold themselves in readiness to march at two hours' no 
 tice ; and so, all our toil will be for naught. I start for the ex 
 treme outposts to-morrow morning with my section (the first, 
 containing the first and second pieces), which is the best in 
 the Battery, and I think it very likely that the rest will fol 
 low soon ; so that you see we are likely to get a pop at your 
 friends the seceshers after all. My whole heart and soul have
 
 314 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 been wrapped up in my battery, especially since we came out 
 here. I have drilled the whole six pieces at once, and find 
 that it is the only way in which thoroughly to secure the fruits 
 of my study. We turned out on Washington's Birthday for 
 inspection and review by General Blenker. There were three 
 batteries of light artillery, sixteen pieces in all, and we ficed 
 a salute of a hundred guns. Although our horses had had 
 very little drill, I succeeded in conducting them and the men 
 through several quite difficult maneuvers, and was very much 
 relieved when I saw the horses stand the firing without run 
 ning away and tearing everything to pieces. 
 
 The thing that gives me plenty of spirit and enthusiasm is 
 that I am extremely well mounted. My horse is a beautiful 
 dark bay, with a sort of metallic reflection in his skin, has a 
 jolly little head, and is, in all points, nicely and strongly put 
 together. I call him " Barry," after the Chief of Artillery, and 
 pet him enormously. He will follow me like a dog, eats sugar 
 out of my hand, and rubs his head on my shoulder when I 
 caress him. You shall ride him too, one of these days, if you 
 will be a good girl, and not secesh too much. 
 
 CAMP HUNTER'S CHAPEL, March 9, 1862. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, .... My letters to and from home 
 are my only means of communication with the outer world. 
 I am always in camp and have not been to Washington 
 once since we have been out here. When my isolation is 
 interrupted by letters from the dear friends, I feel repaid for 
 all discomforts, and prepare myself to endure all that is en 
 durable, and in my case the unendurable has not been reached 
 yet. I think that there must be something in the free and 
 out of door life that hardens and strengthens me to bear what 
 is inharmonious and incompatible in my mental and social ex 
 istence If there is anything like a general engage 
 ment, they will need all the guns they can get, and I think 
 that our greenhorns can drive, load, and fire well enough to 
 take part. My heart is full of anxiety when I think of that 
 final struggle, not on my own account, that may come when
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 315 
 
 we go to the field, but for the almost indescribable greatness 
 of the interests at stake. A born coward ought to fight well 
 for this once, as such another opportunity will never come up in 
 
 the world's history, to inspire courage and noble daring 
 
 Where do you suppose this letter is being written ? Has it 
 any peculiar smell, like Michael's boots, for example? For I 
 am writing it in the stable, sitting on a camp-stool, in the nice 
 clean stall with my horse, General Barry ; in fact it is the pleas- 
 antest place in the camp ; for such occupation my tent is too 
 warm, this lovely spring day, but here, with the sweet branches 
 of pine and hemlock trees on every side, protecting me from 
 the wind, and with the clear blue sky all overhead, I can write 
 my letter, and yet not lose all the calm and happy influences 
 of God's light and air. The General is very inquisitive, and 
 has several times smelled and bit at my paper ; he is a regu 
 lar nibbler, and the other day walked behind me and ate up 
 half of a Herald, which I had under my, arm. He is now 
 quite lame, his foot is adorned with a fine bran poultice, which 
 I hope will bring him all right in a day or two. I sympathize 
 with him in his trouble, and pay him several visits every day, 
 with a little sugar or salt to tickle his equine palate with. 
 
 March 15, 1862. 
 
 DEAR AUNT E., ... . Perhaps my next will contain 
 something more interesting than dull descriptions of camp life 
 in this great lazy army of the Potomac. 
 
 A move is to be made very soon ; troops from all parts are 
 concentrating in this neighborhood, and even the brigade to 
 which we were attached in Maryland, General Burns's, has just 
 marched in and gone to Bailey's Cross Roads. The whole 
 Division received special notice, on last Saturday, that three 
 days' preparation would be allowed to get into perfect march 
 ing order. I think that the forward move would have been 
 
 made to-day if the weather had continued good The 
 
 winds play the very mischief with us, in our somewhat exposed 
 situation. A violent southwester, a week or so ago, proved 
 fatal to most of the tents in our encampment ; at first one Sib-
 
 316 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 ley tent broke from its moorings and collapsed, then another 
 and another, then the tent of the orderly sergeant went by the 
 board, and the fields around were whitened with official docu 
 ments of every description. Then the captain's rose and made 
 a graceful pirouette on one pole, and subsided on the ground. 
 I expected every minute to see my tent follow its example, 
 and, for the whole day, my tent- mate and I took turns in sit 
 ting on the fly, to break the force of the hurricane. I did not 
 sleep a wink, and the tent rocked like a boat on the waves ; 
 but morning found us all right. 
 
 In summer this must be a lovely place for an encampment ; 
 beautiful ranges of hills, crowned by forts bristling with can 
 non and abattis, and between them fine level spots for drill 
 and parade, with excellent streams of water all around. The 
 name of the camp is taken from a homely red wooden build 
 ing, erected by a farmer of the name of Hunter, and used as 
 a place of worship ; it has been degraded from its former high 
 use, to serve as a magazine for quartermaster's and commis 
 sary's store's. This Division is called the German Division, 
 and the officers at head-quarters have to do business in a poly 
 glot fashion. I greatly outraged the assistant adjutant general 
 by refusing to recognize a German order which was sent to 
 me, when I was in command. 
 
 Every moment is precious to us now, as we shall have to go 
 into the fight with the others, and it would be desirable for us 
 to be able to do a little more execution among the enemy than 
 our own men. I am endeavoring to interest the men in the 
 subject, as much as possible, and to call out their latent enthu 
 siasm. They take hold very much better than I could have 
 dared to expect, and there is considerable emulation among 
 the different pieces, to see which shall be best drilled and best 
 maneuvered. I rode over to General Franklin's Division to 
 see J. J., and found that he had been ill at home for some 
 weeks with a bad fever. On my way back I inquired for Fort 
 Richardson, and found that it was within a gun-shot of our en 
 campment, and that I had been three weeks so near to the 
 Fourth Connecticut, and to my friend T. T., who is the adju-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 317 
 
 tant of it. The regiment is a wonder of neatness, and was 
 pronounced by General McClellan's committee of inspection 
 to be the finest regiment in the volunteer service. How splen 
 didly Commodore Foote has borne himself. He and Lyon 
 are, to my mind, the heroes^ of the war so far. Connecticut 
 has no reason to be ashamed of her sons. 
 
 I am in excellent health and spirits, and am growing fat, in 
 spite of hard fare and poor accommodations. 
 
 FAIRFAX COURT HOUSE, VA., 
 March 19, 1862. 
 
 I have at last a moment of leisure at my command, and my 
 trunk has just come up from camp, so that I have an oppor 
 tunity to drop you a line, a baker's dozen of artillery officers 
 are sitting in the room. Our head-quarters were formerly the 
 parlor of a very decent house, and there is a perpetual clatter 
 of tongues disputing about horses, points of discipline, and 
 other military matters, while now and then a beer glass comes 
 down empty in a very emphatic manner. But I have found it 
 necessary to make myself very often deaf and callous to these 
 things, otherwise my life would be very hard to bear. My last 
 letter to J. was written from our last camp, Taylor's Cross 
 Roads, and just before I got it finished, a hurried order came 
 to march ; I thrust it into my pocket and rushed off to make 
 preparations, Captain S. being absent. In less than an hour 
 we were off on the road to Fairfax, and a heavy rain, which 
 seemed to follow us on our marches like a tutelary genius, 
 poured pitilessly down. The road was at first pretty good, 
 but became ever worse as the Division advanced, and at last 
 the mud got so deep as to give us much trouble. My section 
 went through everything without a halt, but two or three of 
 the other carriages were not so fortunate, and I had to halt 
 the column and send back teams to pull them out of the mud. 
 In consequence we were a long time on the road, and when 
 we reached this place, I was as thoroughly soaked as if I had 
 been dipped in a pond. Then we had to find quarters for men 
 and horses, especially the latter, and this was no easy matter,
 
 318 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 as the cavalry had come in before us, and horses' heads peeped 
 out of school-room windows, and the ferrule gave way to the 
 cowhide. Many of the inhabitants had fled, and their houses 
 were generally taken possession of for officers' quarters ; in 
 smaller houses were some families remaining, and some of the 
 old campaigners in our Company managed to billet themselves 
 there in very comfortable quarters, and about sixty of our men 
 took up their abode in the Court-house where " Old John 
 Brown " was tried and condemned, and immediately consti 
 tuted a court, and proceeded to reenact the scenes of Novem 
 ber, 1859. 
 
 We expected to have to march off the next day to some 
 point in advance, but the plans seem to have been changed. 
 .... The soldiers have behaved very well ; to be sure the 
 fences have suffered somewhat, when firewood was not else 
 where to be had, and a stray pig or fowl may have mysteriously 
 come to an untimely end ; but no houses have been burned, 
 and the inhabitants and their property have been treated much 
 better than rebels deserve. We have not been idle since com 
 ing here. We have had two or three very good drills, both in 
 section, battery, and battalion, and yesterday we took part in 
 a grand review of General Sumner's Corps d' Armee. At least 
 40,000 men must have been there, and they were drawn up in 
 two lines of battle, and a reserve. We were in the second line 
 of battle, and I had the honor of commanding the Battery. 
 General Sumner is a rather elderly man, with a shrewd and 
 pleasant face, a squeaky voice, and gray hair. He was enthu 
 siastically cheered as he passed along the lines. It is on oc 
 casions of this kind that I feel the want of my jolly little horse, 
 which is still at Hunter's Chapel. The animal I now ride is 
 excellent for mud work, and very sure footed, but unfit for a 
 show occasion. 
 
 I think of you very often in my mental and moral loneli 
 ness, and try to make old family and home memories supply 
 the place of present good influences.
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 319 
 
 GENERAL BLENKER'S DIVISION, SUMNER'S CORPS D'ARMEE, 
 FAIRFAX COURT HOUSE, VA., March 26, 1862. 
 
 When I wrote to you last, I was not at all in the mood for 
 it, and simply intended to throw you off a few lines as a bul 
 letin of my condition and prospects, and with the expectation 
 of soon having an opportunity to write you again, when I could 
 really commune with you in spirit, as many times before, but 
 have been so busy and active with preparations, marches, 
 bivouacs, and drills, that the favorable moment could not be 
 seized. And I had promised myself the luxury of a talk with 
 you this very rainy morning, when Captain Schirmer, com 
 manding the light artillery, ordered a court martial, and de 
 tailed me as judge advocate of it; so my pen had to deal with 
 melancholy facts of drunkenness, insubordination, and dis 
 obedience, rather than serve as interpreter of kind thoughts 
 and wishes from me to you. 
 
 But while I was deep in charges and specifications, and the 
 piles of paper around me were growing decidedly Alpine in 
 their character, one of the officers came in and handed me 
 three letters. I glanced at the beloved crow-tracks on the 
 outside, and broke one open, when the president began to 
 look impatient, and the member next to me said in German, 
 "put up your love-letters, and attend to business." So I thrust 
 them into my breast-pocket, but that one glance was enough 
 to show me that they were far more worthy to be called " love- 
 letters " than those which usually bear that name ; for one was 
 from Aunt E., one from L. R. P., and one from yourself. .... 
 After having convicted three or four unfortunates of various 
 military offenses, and sentenced them to such pleasant little 
 amusements as " Guard duty four times a week," " Hard labor 
 for a month," " Reduction to the ranks," and " Loss of pay," 
 I set myself down to a greedy devourment of my letters, all of 
 which were most kind, and made me ask myself what right a 
 poor devil of a soldier had to have such good friends, and that 
 they should continue to take such a tender interest in him. Let 
 ters like these pierce the thick rhinoceros hide of insensibility
 
 32O LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 which the soldier must wrap around himself. So, this morning 
 I was reckless enough, and thought of nothing but blood and 
 wounds and fried secessionists for breakfast; but now, I can't 
 help feeling " low " and soft, with glimpses of a home-life 
 somewhere, and a strong touch of nostalgia under the ribs ; 
 and when I go down stairs to go to bed (we go down to bed 
 here, and up-stairs to work), I know that I shall not have 
 spunk enough to kick out the fellows, who, I feel sure, are 
 lying with their dirty boots on my mattress. 
 
 We came into this pleasant village, through which the tide 
 of retreat and advance has so often ebbed and flowed, a 
 week ago, having marched here from Taylor's Cross Roads 
 in a tremendous rain-storm. The place was full of soldiers, 
 and men and horses were quartered in the court-house, in 
 churches, private houses, and wherever they could make a 
 lodgment, but only the deserted houses were taken posses 
 sion of. In cases where the inhabitants had the sense to re 
 main in their dwellings, no soldiers were forced upon them 
 against their consent. We artillery officers, some fifteen in 
 number, have a very respectable house to ourselves. It be 
 longed to a man named Jackson, who is said to be a near 
 relation of the man that shot Ellsworth. (N. B. That Jack 
 son must have a large family connection at least five hun 
 dred Jacksons have turned up in this war who were said to be 
 his relations.) It was not at all disagreeable to get a roof over 
 our heads once more, after bivouacking for a week. Sleep 
 ing in the open air is not unpleasant, when you have the blue 
 sky and stars overhead, although the ground may be hard and 
 damp, and the wind cold and stiffening, that one can stand, 
 but when it rains and soaks you through, and you have no dry 
 clothes to put on, but must act on the principle of " Every 
 man his own clothes-horse," ugh ! then the fun ceases to be 
 
 perceptible, even with my very excellent field-glass 
 
 You ask me what I think of General McClellan and the 
 " Tribune " attacks. I must say that I have lately given up 
 thinking as an occupation, but whatever ideas I may have of 
 the conduct of the General in a military point of view, as a sol-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 321 
 
 dier, I have nothing to do but to hold my tongue and do my 
 duty. At the same time you know rny opinions on the subject 
 of slavery, and that this matter will never be finally settled 
 until the root of the matter is cut up. Too much blood and 
 treasure have been expended by the North, to permit a mere 
 temporary soldering up of the affairs, to break out again 
 worse than before. 
 
 MANASSAS, March 27, 1862. 
 
 DEAR M., For nearly three weeks I have been moving 
 from one bivouac to another, except during the time that we 
 were at Fairfax Court House, and then there was such a bustle 
 and constant excitement, that letter-writing was quite out of 
 the question. Perhaps it would be better for me to give you 
 a little account of our marchings and counter-marchings, as it 
 will enable you better to follow me. On Monday, March 10, 
 we moved out of Camp Hunter's Chapel, and went as far as 
 Annandale ; then by a very bad road to Taylor's Farm, where 
 we were encamped for three days. Up to that day, we had 
 very fine weather, and the two nights which R. spent in camp 
 with me were just adapted to an amateur bivouacker, but the 
 next day set in dark and misty, and at night we had a' hard 
 rain which knocked away all traces of romance about sleeping 
 out of doors. At eleven A. M. a very sudden order came 
 to march, and we were soon on our way to Fairfax Court 
 House in as heavy a rain-storm as I want to see, unless 
 through a window-pane, and the roads being very bad, halts 
 were numerous, and we had to sit still on our horses and take 
 it. Still we were much better off than the infantry, or dough 
 boys as they are called in army parlance, and one of my men 
 told me that he saw a foot-soldier lying stark dead in the 
 woods from cold and exposure. At Fairfax Court House we 
 stayed for a week, had drills and inspections when the weather 
 permitted, and were reviewed once by General Sumner, who 
 now commands this Corps d'Armee of the Army of the 
 Potomac. It consists of three Divisions, Richardson's, Sedg- 
 wick's, and Blenker's, and counts from thirty to forty thousand 
 men. I commanded our Battery at the review, and had the 
 21
 
 322 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 honor of answering some questions put by the General. On 
 Monday last, as we were at battalion drill, we received orders 
 to march, and were off in little more than half an hour ; had 
 a splendid night march to Centreville over a first-rate road. 
 We had a very cold bivouac ; in the morning I examined the 
 fortifications, and saw the famous wooden guns, painted black, 
 which you must have read about in the papers. The earth 
 works are not very formidable in their character, but on ac 
 count of their position, at the head of a long slope, something 
 like a garden-lawn, which furnishes very little protection to 
 besiegers advancing, it would be hard to take it in front with 
 out very great loss. Early the next morning we again took 
 up our line of march, and after some hard pulling through the 
 mud came to Bull Run. It was much larger, I should think, 
 than it was last summer, quite a respectable creek, about 
 three feet deep at the point where we crossed it (Blackburn's 
 Ford, I think), and not more than fifty or sixty yards wide. I 
 sat on my horse in the middle of the stream, the water reach 
 ing just above my feet, and directed, and managed until the 
 whole of the Battery had crossed over, and as I sat there, 
 my mind would revert to that day in July last, when our 
 troops crossed it in flight, and to that dreadful Monday when 
 the news reached us at the North, arid we thought that all 
 was lost to the Republic. Then as we advanced further, 
 the beautiful blue mountains beyond Manassas showed their 
 heads, in some places covered with snow, and soon we struck 
 upon the railroad which was so serviceable to the rebels in 
 the campaign of last autumn. And so we emerged upon the 
 plateau of Manassas, a fine bit of almost level ground, with 
 woods on two sides, and mountains beyond ; an admirable 
 place for a camp, and the secessionists had improved its 
 advantages very decidedly, by building camps of log-huts, 
 in spots sheltered from wind and storm. These huts are 
 shingled, and plastered with mud, and must have been far 
 more comfortable than the tents in which we spent the winter. 
 We encamped on the further end of the plateau, and then, 
 yesterday morning, the Division moved off towards Manassas
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 323 
 
 Gap and Winchester, to effect a junction with General Banks. 
 Our Battery and the Sixty-fourth New York were left behind 
 to guard this place, an arrangement which did not please me 
 greatly, until I was assured by Captain Schirmer, who com 
 mands the Battalion, that there would be no fighting, and that 
 our horses would be much more able to do severe duty, if 
 they could get a day's rest and plenty of forage ; so I was paci 
 fied, and moved up and took possession of some of those nice 
 secesh huts to await further orders ; if there should be a battle, 
 we shall have to go right forward, and if a retreat, we will 
 have to cover it. I am sorry that I asked of you so great an 
 undertaking as I fear the getting up of that flag must be. 
 .... Even if we never carry it into battle, I shall feel most 
 deeply grateful to you for the kindly and tender interest that 
 induced you to make it, and shall look upon it as a proof of 
 the love you bear towards me, and also towards that cause 
 
 which is so mutually precious to us all I have not yet 
 
 heard it positively stated that Blenker had been removed from 
 his command. At any rate, I saw him yesterday at the head 
 of his staff, moving with the Division. I would give a good 
 deal to have Sigel for our commander, as then we should have 
 plenty of hard work and tough knocks, with a clear assurance 
 of victory at the end ; but Sigel, if he should take any com 
 mand here, would have a Corps d'Armee and not merely a 
 Division. 
 
 MANASSAS, March 30, 1862. 
 
 MY DEAR SISTER T., I received your very nice and kind 
 letter the other day, just after our arrival at this place, and 
 with it the earte-de-visite, which looked at me so truthful and 
 natural. I was at first almost startled, and could hardly 
 realize that it was not my little sister herself, who, in some 
 mysterious manner had pasted herself on a card. I am now 
 sitting in a quite comfortable shanty, one of those which the 
 " Secesh " built last winter to accommodate their troops. 
 They are quite substantial, built of logs, and plastered with 
 mud ; the roof is made of shingles, and keeps the rain out, 
 except when it rains very hard We have pretty hard
 
 324 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 times to get anything to eat, as most of the supplies have 
 gone further on. After drinking sugarless coffee for a few 
 days, we have no coffee at all, and no water fit to drink. Of 
 course, under such circumstances, the hen-roosts and barn 
 yards of the rebel folks have to suffer considerably. I have 
 now in my cap the feather of a guinea-hen, from one not a 
 thousand miles away. Of her untimely end I will say nothing, 
 except that she was extremely tough, and that I shall abstain 
 from guinea-hen in future. 
 
 PRESCOTT HOUSE, WASHINGTON, D. C., 
 April 9, 1862. 
 
 DEAR J., You will be somewhat surprised at the heading 
 of this letter, but a little wind of business has blown me here, 
 and I take advantage of a little leisure time after breakfast, 
 before assaulting the departments, to answer your very jolly 
 and refreshing letter, which I received at Warrenton Junction, 
 just as I was coming away. It was just the kind of letter that 
 I like to get, a picture of home and New Haven matters, 
 with a good dose of peppering thrown in. General observa 
 tions and reflections in a letter between intimate friends are 
 generally " nichts nutz," unless made in a way that illustrates 
 the character of the person making them. It is the neat little 
 touches thrown skillfully in, that make the home picture glow 
 with life, and make the heart of the absent member beat 
 warmly as he looks at it, the one is like the bland, unmean 
 ing allegorical pictures of the French school ; the latter like 
 the homely but delightful interiors of Teniers and Dow. I 
 had some hint of the dissipation in which N. H. was indulg 
 ing from T. D., who also spoke of you as " pars fui " thereof, 
 but I had no idea of the extent to which you had been en 
 gaged in it till I heard it from yourself. . ... To let you 
 know a little about myself. I spent nine days altogether in 
 the shanties of Manassas, and lived in plenty and prosperity, 
 drawing the necessaries of life from Uncle Sam on the one 
 hand, and on the other foraging for double rations of corn 
 and hay, and occasionally picking up stray horses, oxen,
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 325 
 
 sheep, pigs, and poultry of every kind. My horse-stealing ex 
 perience was neither very pleasant nor successful. I got two 
 old " clams " from a deserted farm-house, which got played out 
 on the very first march, and two good horses from the sheriff 
 of Prince William's County, whom I had heard to be a vile 
 secesh, but who turned out to be one of those Union men 
 who are now getting to be so plenty in the South, and I had 
 to fork over the animals or run the risk of a row with General 
 Sumner, although I needed them extremely to move my bat 
 tery. You may be sure that I felt much as Robin Hood did 
 when the sheriff of Nottinghamshire got the head start of him, 
 and made up my mind not to meddle with sheriffs in future. 
 On Thursday last our rest was broken by the arrival of a 
 troop of the' mounted rifles, to cover us on our march to War- 
 renton, and the next day General Sumner came through and 
 ordered us to depart immediately. So I set off with my de 
 tachment, being the largest one I had had command of, with 
 half the cavalry in front, the other half behind our wagons, 
 and two at my own back as garde d'honneur. We started late 
 in the day, and marched to the Jersey settlement near Bristow, 
 where we encamped for the night on the farm of Major Snow, a 
 Northern man. We took supper and breakfast with him very 
 pleasantly, and did not despoil him, except a few oats for our 
 horses, and a king-bolt for one of our wagons. The officers 
 slept on the floor of his very handsome parlor, and I napped it 
 gorgeously on the rug before the fire (more antiquo). It rained 
 in the night, and in the morning the roads were very bad, and 
 we had a journey of extreme difficulty and fatigue. We had 
 to cut roads, ford streams, and dig out the wheels of our car 
 riages with shovels from the putty-like mud. I was constantly 
 in the saddle for some fourteen hours. At last we reached 
 Warrenton Junction, the camp of the Division, and the men 
 lay down in the mud perfectly fagged out. I had to lead the 
 way myself in order to start out a wood-chopping party, and, 
 after cutting down a good sized oak, I too was not sorry to 
 succumb. Early the next morning the Division had orders to 
 march ; but Captain S. said that our horses were not fit to go,
 
 326 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 so I sent only one section with Lieutenant Singer, and was 
 ordered myself to Washington to get some new horses. I 
 started off immediately, had two days of rough travel in this 
 horrible snow-storm, and got here last night. I fear that I 
 shall not have much luck, but intend to try everything to get 
 them, as it is miserable to be so close to the enemy and yet 
 constantly impeded by the want of the means of moving. 
 
 I enclose a couple of secesh shin-plasters for J. The S. C. 
 is rather interesting. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 WASHINGTON, April 12, 1862. 
 
 .... Your very kind letter reached me safely at Manassas, 
 having ridden the stormy waves of Bull Run, and then having 
 been carried all the way out to Warrenton Junction, where 
 the rest of the Division was lying, and brought back again to 
 me. From these experiences it suffered nothing, except per 
 haps a slight stiffening from getting wet and being dried 
 again, and a faint odor of " Limburger," from being so long on 
 the person of the Division P. M. Unfortunately I have it not 
 with me, and so must answer it from recollection, and not 
 pimctuatim et seriatim. 
 
 Your account of your work shows me that you have not at 
 all taken my advice in regard to secluding yourself, but have 
 grown worse, if anything, rather than better. Far be it from 
 me to say that your time is ill-spent in making yourself a 
 thorough scholar, and in going to the sources of language for 
 a firm foundation ; but is it not a species of refined selfish 
 ness for you to give yourself wholly to this self-accomplish 
 ment ? and do you not forget that, whether as a teacher or a 
 preacher, your work is to be done, and your influence put 
 forth in the living, breathing Now, and that if your fairest life 
 is in the Past, you cannot know and appreciate the Present as 
 you should ? These scholarly pursuits are the most beautiful 
 in the world, if they are kept subordinate to the great aims of 
 duty and daily labor, and made co-workers in attaining some 
 great and noble end ; but when made an end in themselves, 
 their life is gone, and the more the mind gains of knowledge,
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 327 
 
 so much the more does the soul lose of freshness and work 
 ing power. Look at the scholarship of Dante, of Milton ; 
 deep, grand, and beautiful as it. was, how it was transfigured 
 by the heavenly light of religion and patriotism, till the stu 
 dent was quite forgotten. But this is certainly a queer ser 
 mon for a rough soldier to be preaching to a scholar, and for 
 give me if it be not applicable to you ; but it is what' I have 
 often thought you wanted, and I know that you will pardon 
 me for speaking out. The life I lead myself is just the oppo 
 site. Everything is intensely practical, just what lies before 
 our feet, and in the immediate horizon ; to keep the men and 
 horses alive and healthy ; to drill and march them well ; to 
 manage provision and forage carefully ; to be always ready for 
 anything that may occur ; to have everything about the guns 
 and equipments in perfect order ; and for us officers to ride 
 long, eat hearty, watch well, sleep sound, this is our life, 
 and a most sensual and beastly life too, if it were not for a 
 few sparks of duty and love of country, that keep the heart 
 aglow in the wildest night-storm, sustain the body through 
 fatigue and privations, and even make our rough campaigning 
 "bright, with something of an angel light." Since we came 
 into the field I have been so well in body, and so glad in 
 spirit, that I have felt almost exultant, and my feelings have 
 been just those of the cove in the " Two Voices," who 
 
 " sang the joyful paean clear," etc., q. v In my present 
 
 life, and especially in our Division, there is very little to help 
 serious thoughts. Sunday passes unobserved and often un 
 known, and there is not a single soul in the whole camp with 
 whom I can walk, talk, or sing in sympathy on that day. 
 
 ALEXANDRIA, April 29, 1862. 
 
 .... I came to Washington for the purpose of getting 
 some new horses, and after I had them all picked out, and 
 was ready to march with them to Warrenton Junction, Captain 
 S. took it into his head that it would be very dangerous for 
 us to march over the mountains to join the Division, and 
 that it would be better for the Battery to come by rail and go
 
 328 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 by way of Harper's Ferry, an idea involving much ex 
 pense to the Government. But as he insisted upon it, I had 
 to leave the horses and go out again by rail. When I 
 reached Warrenton Junction I found that one section of the 
 Battery had been sent out, with other troops, on an important 
 reconnaissance, to the Rappahannock, about ten miles off. 
 At the same time, pretty steady firing was heard in that 
 direction, and soon a message was sent, asking for ree'n- 
 forcements. A company of the Maine Cavalry started off 
 immediately, and I accompanied them. We rode and rode, 
 and at last were almost in the enemy's claws, when an orderly 
 overtook us, and told us that the reconnoitering party had 
 accomplished its object and had retired. The force we had 
 engaged consisted, in all, of about sixteen hundred infantry, two 
 hundred cavalry, and eight pieces of artillery. They regu 
 larly surprised the enemy as he was mounting guard, silenced 
 two of his forts, and blew up his magazines, but the force we 
 had was too small to permit of their crossing the river and cap 
 turing the forts, so they withdrew in good order, with very little 
 loss. On Sunday, April 20, we broke up camp, put our pieces 
 and caissons on the cars, having left Lieutenant M. with the 
 cannoneers in charge of them. I took the drivers and their 
 horses and marched to Alexandria by the road. We had two 
 days of incessant rain, and several broad and swift creeks to 
 swim, but we made a rapid march, and got to Alexandria 
 Tuesday afternoon, where we found everything all right, ex 
 cept battery wagon and forge, which were to come on the 
 next train, but which had been kept back by the destruction 
 of Bull Run bridge by the freshet. This kept us in Wash 
 ington several days ; at last they have arrived here, and I 
 have come over with horses to bring them to Washington ; to 
 morrow we are to go on to Cumberland and so to Romney. 
 
 FRANKLIN, May 15, 1862. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, .... The reason why I did not write 
 while at Washington the second time was that I was in a state 
 of chronic disgust at the way in which Battery affairs were 
 going on. I was the only officer who was willing to do duty
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 329 
 
 at the barracks where our men were quartered, and was con 
 stantly there during the day-time. We had got some new 
 horses, and as we had no proper stables, they were continually 
 running away, and causing endless trouble and anxiety. The 
 men were very hard to keep in check, and would get off into 
 the city and get drunk and neglect their duty, and then I used 
 to get the credit of all the damage they did, and all the rows 
 they kicked up. At last we got orders to go to Harper's 
 Ferry. After twenty hours of very disagreeable travelling, 
 we reached Sandy Hook, east of Harper's Ferry, and there 
 learned that the bridge had broken down, and we had no safe 
 means of getting across. So we were obliged to go to 
 work and unload our horses, which had been standing, closely 
 packed in the cars, for a day and night, and the poor things 
 showed evident marks of biting, rubbing, and other hard treat 
 ment. We waited at Sandy Hook two days for the bridge to 
 be completed. It is a lovely situation, on the Potomac, sur 
 rounded by high and abrupt hills. One of these I climbed, 
 and found on the top the Observatory which Colonel Geary 
 had built, to watch the enemy from. The view is as fine a 
 panorama as could well be imagined. On the one side the 
 long, pleasant valley of the Potomac, lying between ranges 
 of high rolling land ; on the other the abrupt bluffs, through 
 which the river forced its way in some period long gone by, 
 leaving the cloven promontories standing out, like the two 
 halves of a broken stone, fitting into each other. Off to the 
 west lay a beautiful stretch of level farm land, sleeping in the 
 warm sun of a May Sabbath, the grain fields just beginning to 
 wear a lovely green, which made a fine contrast with the 
 deep verdure of the pine and oak forests, which clothed the up 
 lands. The same afternoon we received orders to prepare to 
 march, so we packed our horses into the cars, and put all the 
 men on board, in order that we might be able to start off as 
 soon as the bridge was finished. We had to spend the night 
 in the cars, after all. Passing over the bridge was no joke, as 
 a train of coal cars which had passed just before us had caused 
 it to sink two feet, and our train consisted of more than forty
 
 330 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 cars, very heavily loaded. Very few remained in the cars 
 while crossing, but I thought it hardly fit for a soldier to 
 bother himself about such things, so I confided in the loyalty 
 and good management of the B. & O. R. R., and rode peace 
 fully over. We got to Martinsburg in the evening ; but it 
 was too late to see very much of this outpost of secesh. 
 Early the next morning we reached our place of destination, 
 New Creek, which is now the principal depot of supplies for the 
 Army of Western Virginia. There we unloaded the cars, and 
 got everything in marching trim. We, means Lieutenant D., 
 now in command of this Battery, and myself. He has been in 
 command about five weeks. He does his duty right up to the 
 handle, and it is a pleasure to work with and under such a 
 man. I do not feel at all disturbed at having him put over 
 me, as I certainly have not experience enough to fit me prop 
 erly for a Captain of Light Artillery, and used often to be 
 worried in my mind as to what I should do in doubtful cir 
 cumstances. From New Creek we marched to Burlington, re 
 mained there a day, and were joined by the First Brigade of 
 our Division, under General Stahl. The next morning we 
 marched out of Burlington for Petersburg, twenty-nine miles 
 distant ; after making fifteen miles the Brigade went into camp 
 for the night, when just as we were getting supper ready, an 
 order came on from General Fremont to hurry on all the avail 
 able cavalry and artillery to Petersburg, by forced marches, 
 so we had to harness up again and go forward, fully expect 
 ing to see the enemy by break of day. In this we were dis 
 appointed, and went into Petersburg right peacefully, about two 
 A. M. There we found General Fremont and a few troops. 
 Our absent section of two guns, which marched from Warren- 
 ton Junction early in April, came in with more Artillery. They 
 had endured all the privations and dangers of that very rough 
 march. I went down the road to meet them, and rode up with 
 the section past General Fremont, who stood on an eminence 
 receiving the troops. As soon as we had passed, I was accosted 
 most heartily by my friend S. from New York, who is on Gen 
 eral F.'s staff. I dined with him that day, and met Colonel
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 331 
 
 Albert, Chief of Staff, Fazougi, who made the great charge 
 on Springfield with the body guard, and others whose names 
 are inseparably connected with the " Hundred Days in Mis 
 souri." Early the next day the whole concern broke up at 
 Petersburg, and marched, post haste, in this direction to sup 
 port Schenck and Milroy, who were opposing, with seven 
 thousand men, a force of sixteen thousand under Jackson. 
 We made about half the distance the first day, and the next 
 were rejoicing in the prospect of a fight, as our Brigade was in 
 the advance ; but, after advancing a few miles, we learned that 
 our generals had repelled the enemy, and retreated success 
 fully, awaiting our arrival to drive the enemy back again- 
 You must pardon the uncircumstantial and somewhat careless 
 character of my letters, but my fingers have got more accus 
 tomed to the bridle rein than to s the pen, and my life is so un 
 settled that I have hardly a chance to collect my ideas before 
 it is hurly-burly, march off again, and perhaps not another op 
 portunity to sit quietly down for a week. 
 
 FRANKLIN, VA., GENERAL FREMONT'S CORPS, 
 May 23, 1862. 
 
 MY DEAREST M., All right, the flag has arrived in per 
 fect safety, and my heart is full of the warmest gratitude to 
 you, for the kind interest you take in me and my men, and 
 the noble sympathy with us in our work and suffering for the 
 cause. You will not regret one toilsome hour spent over that 
 beautiful work ; indeed, not one stitch can be looked upon as 
 taken in vain, when you think that it has filled rough common 
 place soldiers with a sort of patriotic inspiration, and now they 
 feel a sort of chivalry when they think of their flag and the 
 fair stranger who loved their aim so well as to send it to them. 
 The motto is exactly what I would have chosen if I had been 
 wise enough to think of it, " Loyal till Death ; " may we ever 
 be so, upholding the truest and noblest of laws, our Constitu 
 tion, and yet not merely with modern obedience and good- 
 citizenship, but with true old-fashioned loyalty. And for our 
 German boys the motto speaks with a friendly voice, and not 
 that of an utter stranger, " Treu bis in den Tod," is the same
 
 332 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 motto, only slightly veiled by the change of language. When 
 I first saw the flag, my heart smote me for having imposed 
 upon you a work so toilsome, elaborate, and costly, and had 
 you been almost any one else I should have been sure that it 
 had been executed with some hard feelings towards me, but I 
 know well the true and faithful love you bear our cause, and 
 that when you go into a thing you do it with a whole heart. 
 
 The presentation should have taken place that very even 
 ing, but we were disappointed about getting some " Lager " 
 or other liquid in which to drink healths to you and the ban 
 ner, so I had it nicely fixed on the staff of the guide-flag, and 
 it marched at our head to this place closely veiled, and so the 
 company have not seen it yet, for, on account of almost inces- 
 saat rains and other contretemps, it has been impossible to 
 find a day proper for such afesta. But it shall be presented 
 very soon with appropriate ceremonies, and then you shall 
 hear both from me, and the jolly little standard-bearer, whom 
 I have mentally selected for the honor. I hope that Mr. T. 
 will in reality carry out his promise of getting us a staff from 
 Mount Vernon, as that would make the whole matter very 
 complete 
 
 I opine that the day of retreating in this region has for us 
 gone by. A depot will be established here for forage and 
 provisions, and forts are being built to protect them ; we shall 
 then press on to Staunton, repair the railroad, and from that 
 point ever on and on. At present we are tied hand and foot 
 by our want of food for ourselves and our horses ; we are 
 seventy miles from the nearest depot, and everything must 
 be brought by teams, and cross swollen rivers. You will He 
 shocked to hear that, for four days, some of the infantry regi 
 ments had not even hard bread, and some of the men were 
 so hungry that they paid two dollars for an ordinary loaf of 
 bread. This very day, while writing this, I have seen a crowd 
 buying large ginger cakes at a dollar a piece. Our Battery 
 has been better off than most other corps, but unless provis 
 ions come to-day, I expect that we shall all go hungry to bed. 
 Our Division has had it pretty hard ever since we marched
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 333 
 
 out, having been without tents for two months and a half, and 
 we feel pretty well posted as far as exposure goes, but this 
 starving is another phase of soldier life to which we must also 
 accustom ourselves. For myself, I am in pretty good health, 
 and fortunately have not much appetite, so I don't mind 
 much. We lie in the very heart of the mountains, and our 
 marches are often through right picturesque country ; the chief 
 drawback is that it rains almost every day, and when it does 
 not rain, it is very hot, and then we have a thunder-storm in 
 the afternoon. 
 
 General Fremont's head-quarters are quite near us ; I have 
 several acquaintances on his staff, and have received much 
 
 politeness from them You must tell L. that this letter 
 
 is for her, too, and that my thanks are equally hers for her 
 interest and assistance. The work seems to go on nobly both 
 in Virginia and further south ; I had hardly hoped last fall 
 that we should make such rapid progress. Just a year ago I 
 was in camp at Washington, but it was queer soldiering com 
 pared with this. Now we have the genuine article, all but the 
 fighting, and God grant that we may have that too one of 
 
 these days 
 
 FRANKLIN, VA., May 25, 1862. 
 
 DEAR J I saw in the " Tribune," yesterday, a speech 
 
 by Parson Brownlow in which he speaks of the miserable con 
 dition of the Union men of East Tennessee, and the confi 
 dence that he felt in speedy succor from Fremont's Corps. I 
 fear that he trusts in a broken reed, for, at present, that army 
 corps (not so very strong either) has its hands full enough 
 with Jackson's force, and it is in a somewhat desperate con 
 dition, being unable to go either back or forward, and stand 
 ing a fair chance of starving if they continue to lie here. 
 There is no depot of provisions here, and in fact none within 
 seventy miles, and there are plenty of bushwhackers between 
 here and New Creek to cut off our trains. All the infantry 
 regiments, until yesterday, were without bread or crackers, 
 coffee or sugar, for four days, and many of the poor fellows 
 came over to us and begged for a piece of cracker to satisfy
 
 334 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 their hunger. We were better off, and by careful manage 
 ment succeeded in holding out until yesterday afternoon, when 
 the train arrived, with thirty barrels of crackers for 15,000 
 men ! Even that was attacked on the road by guerillas, and 
 three or four of the covering party shot. Our poor horses 
 fare worse ; they have not had a proper feed for twelve days, 
 and not four rations of grain in all that time. They manage 
 to keep themselves alive by nibbling a little grass, but that 
 gives no strength. We send out wagons every day into the 
 surrounding country, but the country is so poor, as a grain 
 raising district, that they come back with the poorest mockery 
 of a few ears of corn. I am afraid that our men do not con 
 fine themselves to the legitimate object for which they are 
 sent out, for various articles make their appearance which not 
 even the largest stretching could bring under the head of 
 forage. My own quarters became adorned the other day 
 with a set of blue cups, plates, and saucers ; a large milk pan 
 and a coffee mill turned up yesterday, and I strongly suspect 
 that the very comfortable bench on which I write, was once 
 the ornament of some Methodist or Presbyterian house of 
 worship. Sitting on this bench is the nearest approach I 
 have made to going to church for some months. M. W.'s 
 banner reached me in safety. I have not presented it because 
 no beer has been attainable. The banner is really exquisite, 
 the richest and most elaborate one I ever saw : on one side 
 a wreath of oak and laurel, with crossed cannon and U. S. in 
 side ; on the other, a magnificent eagle, with a scroll and Ex 
 celsior on it in his mouth ; underneath the motto in German 
 characters, " Loyal till Death," above the number 13. The 
 Generals of the Division have seen it, and pronounced it 
 superb. I am afraid it was a very borous and expensive un 
 dertaking, but the effort is fully appreciated. 
 
 THE BATTLE OF CROSS KEYS, 
 
 MOUNT JACKSON, VA., June 12, 1862 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, After the passage of about ten days 
 I write you from the same place from which I wrote to J., but
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 335 
 
 you must not think that this interval of time has been spent 
 in rest here. On the contrary, we have made forced marches 
 in the direction of Staunton, have fought a battle, and have 
 made a rapid retreat, and reached this place at about noon 
 to-day, a thoroughly used up set both of men and horses. 
 However, I managed to snatch a little sleep this afternoon, 
 and feel quite wide-awake this evening, so I eagerly seize this 
 opportunity to let you hear from me, not knowing what the 
 morrow may bring forth, nor how suddenly we may have to 
 
 march again Be sure that I shall take good care of 
 
 my health, and shall not expose my life except when duty 
 demands it, and if I fall in the performance of that duty, you 
 will know that it so pleased the Director of all events, and 
 will not sorrow unduly at my dying in the noblest way, and 
 for the highest and best cause. You will wish to know some 
 thing about our recent movements. About eight days ago the 
 pontoon bridge over the Shenandoah at this point was fin 
 ished, and our army moved across and marched rapidly after 
 Jackson, who was still but a short distance in advance of us. 
 If we could have saved the bridge and if the rains had not 
 raised the river too high to prevent our immediately rebuild 
 ing it, we should have caught this prince of bushwhackers, 
 together with the train and prisoners which he took from 
 Banks. But the elements seemed completely against us, and 
 we lost him by about a day. The second day's march brought 
 us to Harrisonburg. Here we shod our horses, and got every 
 thing in readiness for the approaching fight. On Saturday 
 night our cavalry made an attack on the Rebs, but were met 
 by a much larger force than they had expected, and were driven 
 back with loss. On Sunday we marched out in full force to 
 beat up his quarters ; the women gazed at us, as we marched 
 through the town, their eyes streaming with tears, for it was 
 their own husbands and sons and brothers that we were to 
 meet in mortal combat. By 10 A. M. the heavy thunder of 
 the cannon showed that the work had commenced, and that 
 our advance was engaged, and soon the rolling fire of mus 
 ketry told us that it had come to closer quarters. General
 
 336 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Schenk's Ohio Brigade had the extreme right wing ; then 
 came General Milroy's Virginia, then our First Brigade in the 
 centre, then the Third Brigade, and lastly our Brigade, the Sec 
 ond, on the left wing ; this was our position in the afternoon. 
 Our right wing pushed their left wing back ; in the centre the 
 fire was very hot, and Blenker's own regiment, the Eighth 
 New York, suffered dreadfully, being exposed to a galling fire 
 from a whole brigade under cover, while they stood out in a 
 wheat field ; still they maintained their ground gallantly and 
 were well supported by Schirmer's Battery, which did great 
 execution. On the left the Third Brigade was just going to 
 charge the enemy, and were aching for the encounter, when 
 they were withdrawn and we were ordered up at double quick 
 to support them. We had got into a piece of meadow among 
 the woods, and were about to clear the woods and turn the 
 enemy's flank, when our Brigade was also withdrawn, not hav 
 ing fired a shot. Our Battery had no orders to retire, so we 
 stood still while the infantry drew to the rear. For a little 
 while we were in great peril, we were between the fire of 
 one of our own batteries and the enemy's infantry, still our 
 men were very cool and collected, and only wanted a chance 
 to do something. Towards night the firing ceased, and we 
 encamped on the border of the battle-field, our Battery cover 
 ing the left wing from the top of a high hill. The enemy 
 sloped during the darkness, and in the morning was " non est 
 inventus," so we, who were in the extreme advance, lost the 
 chance of distinguishing ourselves. It was a pretty equal 
 fight. Our loss in killed and wounded must have been six 
 hundred. That of the enemy could not have been less than 
 one thousand, as our artillery cut some of his regiments up 
 badly. Had our two brigades, which hardly fired a shot, been 
 allowed to go into the fight, the result would have probably 
 been far different, and our victory would have been thorough 
 and complete. Still it cannot be denied that this Jackson is 
 a man of decided genius, and that very few in our army are 
 fit to compete with him. Thus on Tuesday he fought our 
 army and prevented our further advance, in the night he
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 337 
 
 crossed the bridge, which he burned after him to prevent us 
 from following, and, having received reinforcements under 
 Longstreet, beat back Shields who was advancing on the 
 other side of the river. On Tuesday his combined force re 
 turned against us, now treble our number, and we were forced 
 to retreat. Our Brigade was the rear-guard, and I had the 
 honor to cover the extreme rear with my section. The road - 
 was about the worst I ever saw. When I had got about six 
 miles I found several of our heavy caissons almost hopelessly 
 bemired ; the captain told me to send my section on, and gave 
 me the pleasant task of fetching on those caissons. It was 
 an awful job, as you may imagine. As the horses had had 
 no feed for two days, they were very weak ; but I persevered, 
 and marched through Harrisonburg at three in the morning, 
 with everything safe and sound. A rest until 8 A. M., and then 
 we marched again, luckily on a good road, or our poor horses 
 would have fallen dead ; here we hope for rest and feed and 
 food and reinforcements : it is also said that General Sigel 
 is to take command of the Corps. If he does, I feel the most 
 perfect confidence that we shall end this doubtful campaign 
 with brilliant victories. I will not harrow up your sensibilities 
 by speaking of the horrors of the battlefield. It was bad 
 enough to have seen them without repeating. I had an op 
 portunity, during a halt, of tending a whole barnfull of our 
 wounded soldiers, some of them with three bullets in them ; 
 one poor fellow pierced by seven, and yet not seriously in 
 jured. They all agreed in the statement that they had been 
 very kindly treated by most of the enemy among whom they 
 fell, a few acting barbarously, but the most with tender and 
 delicate humanity. This makes me feel more kindly to our 
 erring brothers than before. Would that we could join hands 
 and be friends once more. I am in excellent health, but have 
 not known what it was to be dry. At night I have flung my 
 self down by the nearest fire without blankets and have slept 
 sweetly, regardless of deep mud or pouring rain. I love you 
 all as much as ever, if I am a shabby, muddy soldier, worn 
 
 22
 
 338 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 out with hard work, and unable, from sheer fatigue, to write 
 you an interesting or satisfactory letter. 
 
 GENERAL FREMONT'S CORPS D'ARMEE. 
 MOUNT JACKSON, VA., June 15, 1862. 
 
 .... As usual, my first thought on reading your letter, and 
 the pleasant accounts of social life and family life which it con 
 tained, was, How strange all this is ! And can it be possible 
 that I shall ever again be civilized, and take my place again 
 among old friends and dear relations, who have never had 
 this primitive nomadic life to live. But in one point I can 
 sympathize with you thoroughly, and that is in love for out 
 door life, and for the fresh, young, bride-like earth, dressed in 
 the robe of this loveliest of seasons. I find great difficulty 
 sometimes in realizing that anything is awry or at war here 
 in this beautiful valley where all is so green and fair and 
 bright. For many days we had almost incessant rain, and life 
 on the march was not highly agreeable, especially as at night 
 we had to lie down in mud or water. But now the rainy sea 
 son seems to have come to an end, and the summer has fairly 
 set in, with wild flowers in the woods, and fragrant clover in 
 the fields, and beautiful starry skies at night, so that it is a 
 pleasure to lie out of doors night and day, and feel with the 
 German poet, " How art thou still so fair, thou wide, wide 
 world ! " A nomadic, gypsy sort of life it is, even the luxury 
 of a tent being only allowed when we camp for several days, 
 as at the present time. 
 
 .... I should have greatly enjoyed being with you at the 
 Easter festival, to see the flowers and hear the anthem, and 
 join with all my heart in the service of the day. I spent Eas 
 ter Sunday at Catlett's Station in a pouring rain, putting the 
 Battery on the cars, to be taken to Washington, and on Pente 
 cost Sunday we were fighting all day at Cross Keys. In fact 
 Sunday is very seldom a day of rest with us, and it often 
 comes and goes without our being aware of it. When peace 
 comes again, I shall appreciate Sunday more than ever.
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 339 
 
 CAMP IN THE BLUE RIDGE, PAGE Co., 
 July 23, 1862. 
 
 MY DEAR AUNTIE, .... If I could succeed in looking 
 upon this whole campaign as a sort of summer excursion or 
 jaunt, nothing could be more pleasant and enjoyable. I have 
 seen some of the finest scenery in the country, and that in 
 sunshine and storm, at midnight and at sunrise, have lived 
 always in the open air and in perfect health, spite of privations 
 and exposure to rain and dew ; have had the additional spice 
 of a little danger occasionally, and the sensation of a bold, 
 free life, and yet there has always been something which came 
 in to spoil my enjoyment ; it may have been the rough and 
 reckless men we have under Us, but more than this was the 
 feeling that we were invaders, laying waste a fair and bloom 
 ing country, and that our opponents were men fighting to save 
 their firesides and their homesteads. It is by no means agree 
 able to deprive farmers of their grain and hay, and to carry off 
 favorite horses amid the tears and supplications of the women 
 folk ; and you can yourself imagine how hard it was when we 
 came back from Cross Keys, to see in Harrisonburg and New 
 Market the women dressed in black and weeping as if their 
 hearts would break. I cannot help mentally transferring the 
 whole trouble to the Northern country, and thinking how I 
 should feel if the " Louisiana Tigers," or some such notorious 
 corps, should have a chance to march through Connecticut. 
 Indeed I am sometimes in danger of forgetting the real reason 
 and object of the war, because my mind is constantly occu 
 pied with the superficial losses and miseries which are daily 
 before my eyes, but which " endure but for a moment," and 
 which, when we succeed, will bring for us " a more exceeding 
 weight of glory," in a preserved Constitution and established 
 laws. Just at present our prospects are not as good as they 
 were, and unless the North responds promptly to the Presi 
 dent's call for more troops, it is not 'unlikely that the Union 
 men now in Virginia may be crushed and driven back by mere 
 weight of numbers. The size of our army has been greatly
 
 340 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 overrated, all the men in hospital, in garrison, and in camps 
 in the Northern states having been counted to swell the num 
 ber, while the Southern force has been correspondingly under 
 rated This is a superb region as far as scenery 
 
 goes. Right above us is a ridge crowned by a natural fortress, 
 with towers and bastions as complete as can be, undoubtedly 
 one of the highest points in Virginia. On every side there 
 roll off beautiful deep valleys, full of orchards, and farm 
 houses, and fields of grain ; and on the higher slopes are 
 countless blackberry pastures, just like those in which my soul 
 used to delight among the Catskills. Children seem to be 
 the greatest wealth of this region ; the soil is not first-rate and 
 farming has scanty products, but you can hardly see a house 
 which does not swarm with children of all ages, from the little 
 lisping toddler to the dark-eyed boy of sixteen, not quite 
 old enough " to go with Jackson." If animosities are trans 
 mitted to the next generation we shall have a good crop of 
 
 rebels in this region I think of you all at home a 
 
 great deal, especially just this week, Commencement, when 
 the old college friends are coming together at New Haven, 
 and another class goes away from its classic home. 
 
 CAMP AT SPERRYVILLE, VA., NEAR MIDDLETOWN, 
 GEN. SIGEL'S CORPS, July 29, 1862. 
 
 .... As we are lying quiet here, enjoying both rest and 
 fine weather, I cannot resist the temptation of answering your 
 last most kind letter, as I do not know how soon the orderly 
 may come dashing up with orders for us to be ready to march 
 in two hours. The last installment of letters was a very pleas 
 ant one to me, only my pleasure was considerably diminished 
 by the news that J. was also coming out to fight, and that in 
 the Infantry. The fatigues, exposures, and dangers of that 
 branch of the service are so great that I am very anxious lest 
 he should find himself unable to bear them, and what would 
 you all do at home if anything should happen to him ? I think 
 that when you all have only two boys, and no one else to lean 
 upon, the most self-sacrificing patriotism could not call upon
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 341 
 
 you to let us both go. I have spoken more at length in my 
 letter to him, but I suppose that he has too decidedly put his 
 
 hand to the plough to think of turning back The 
 
 North must hurry up and send down those three hundred 
 thousand new recruits, or else the rebels may succeed in mak 
 ing a dash at our broken and reduced columns, forcing their 
 way through and perhaps seriously menacing Washington and 
 
 Baltimore If our armies in Virginia are defeated, 
 
 the apathetic people of the North may have the satisfaction of 
 seeing the reckless Southerners in their streets, and the farmers 
 in rich New York may see their grain taken to feed the cav 
 alry of Ashby and Hampton. I should greatly dislike to hear 
 of their camping on the green at New Haven, and cutting 
 
 down the elms to make their fires Strange to say the 
 
 premonition I expressed on the first page has come true. 
 An order came a few minures ago for us to be ready to march 
 at 6 A. M., to-morrow morning, with one day's rations, probably 
 to support our advance posts, which have been attacked and 
 driven back. It is nearly midnight, but there is a stir of men 
 dressing rations, and a light at the fires where they are cooking 
 them. I must close this letter now in order to take a little 
 sleep, before the toils of to-morrow. Think of me as healthy 
 and hearty, and as loving you all with all my heart. 
 
 CAMP NEAR RAPIDAN RIVER, CULPEPPER Co., VA., 
 August 17, 1862. 
 
 DEAR GRANDFATHER, .... Just now we are having a 
 quite unexpected rest. I had supposed that, after our long 
 sojourn at Thornton's Gap and Sperryville, we would go right 
 on when once started, and not stop until we should be abso 
 lutely compelled to do so, but there seems recently to have 
 been a change in the war policy, and McClellan is retiring 
 from Richmond, apparently to concentrate upon us here, as 
 
 Burnside has already done I suppose that you have 
 
 already seen full accounts in the papers of the battle of 
 Slaughter Mountain, as it is called, and properly so, for it was 
 a slaughter of General Banks' troops, and nothing else. We were
 
 342 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 stirred up at Sperryville with orders to march forthwith, and 
 at 6 P. M. we were in readiness, but did not get off before 10 
 p. M. We marched all night and all the next day, through ex 
 cessive heat and dust. As we approached Culpepper Court 
 House, we heard very heavy cannonading and musketry fire, 
 but did not push on to the battlefield, because it was already 
 too late to do any good, and the troops were excessively fa 
 tigued. The next day we arrived, early in the morning, at the 
 field, having marched again in the night, and found that Gen 
 eral Banks had substantially maintained his position, but that his 
 troops had suffered dreadfully from a contest with such over 
 whelming numbers as had been poured upon them. Had they 
 retreated to Culpepper Court House, they would have met the 
 advance brigades of our Corps, and the enemy, if he had 
 dared to follow, would have been thoroughly whipped. The 
 loss of life that occurred in so short a time is almost unpar 
 alleled in the history of war, and it must have been one of 
 the hottest engagements of the campaign. I see that the 
 Fifth Connecticut suffered severely, and that my friend E. B., 
 Major in that regiment, was wounded and taken prisoner. I 
 wish that we had been pushed more rapidly forward, in spite 
 of heat and fatigue, and then should doubtless have suc 
 ceeded in sparing many valuable lives to the country. Sun 
 day, the day after the battle, was excessively hot, and very 
 little was done beyond scouting and skirmishing. Monday 
 was devoted to bringing off the wounded and burying the 
 dead, hostilities having been suspended for that purpose. Our 
 men and the rebels mingled freely together on the battlefield, 
 and conversed ; many found old friends and school fellows, 
 and even relatives, in the opposing forces. The piles of dead 
 men and horses, in all possible forms of mutilation, made a 
 horrible sight, and it was not until late in the evening that the 
 dead soldiers were all interred. I think that General Pope's 
 official account is quite fair and impartial, and that the rebels 
 lost the most, though not perhaps very much. We lay near 
 the battlefield, and then marched a few miles to this place, 
 a couple of miles from the Rapidan River, in the midst of a
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 343 
 
 beautiful country, which rolls and undulates like the waves of 
 
 the sea, and is finely wooded with superb oak forests 
 
 I am much disturbed at J.'s move in the recruiting line. I do 
 not think that the most ardent patriotism could demand more 
 than one from our family, and when both are gone who will 
 look after mother and the girls, to say nothing of you and 
 Aunt E. ? It is a thing that may easily happen, that neither 
 of us will ever come back. I think that very few of the army 
 now in the field will ever see their homes again ; the new con 
 scripts will win the glory of finishing the war, and will carry 
 home our banners in triumph. But the work must and will go 
 on in spite of all temporary considerations and family ties, 
 and the sooner the good people of the North come to see and 
 
 acknowledge this, the better I sometimes find myself 
 
 indulging in most unpatriotic wishes that I was under the dear 
 old elms once more, if only for a little space. I am only pretty 
 well ; but I take the best care of myself that I can, and hope 
 soon to be better. 
 
 CAMP NEAR RAPIDAN RIVER, CULPEPPER Co., VA., 
 August 17, 1862. 
 
 .... Your letter was such a nice, kind, jolly one, that it 
 put me immediately into the writing vein ; and besides my 
 opportunities for writing are so few and so widely separated 
 just at present, and the chances of continued life and ability to 
 talk to you are so uncertain, that I have adopted the principle 
 of writing whenever I feel like it, without any regard for retrib 
 utive justice. And especially should I dislike to go down to 
 Hades with your letter unanswered on my hands ; my ghostly 
 form would be continually revisiting " the glimpses of the 
 moon," and vainly endeavoring, with a phantom hand, to in 
 dite a shadowy epistle to one, still most substantially in the 
 flesh. All that you told me about New Haven, the Commence 
 ment festivities, the boating party, etc., was intensely interest 
 ing to me, in spite of the frightful aggravation I experienced 
 inwardly at being unable to be there with you and help you. 
 
 Oh, for an oar in my hands once more, a crowd of the old
 
 344 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 sort following my stroke, and a few ladies, also of the old- 
 fashioned sort, to make a good, solid boat-load worth the 
 pulling of Atlanta, Thulia, and Una men ? Just one pull 
 with such surroundings to South End, a lazy day spent in 
 pleasant talk, and watching the long sun-lit ripple rolling in 
 from the Sound ; a moon-lit row back to the dear old city, 
 with plenty of songs, and the next day you may put me, like 
 Uriah the Hittite, in the forefront of the battle, and let me 
 take my chance 
 
 You interested me very deeply with what you said about 
 what you had seen and heard in the hospitals. I shall be 
 curious to hear from you some of those stories, write them 
 down, if you think there is any danger of your forgetting 
 them. And, my dear child, I felt so very grateful to you for 
 the interest you felt in our poor, wounded boys ; it is the cup 
 of cold water to the disciples and supporters of our great cause, 
 and it shall by no means lose its reward 
 
 I have had some queer times foraging in this part of the 
 country. The soldiers interpret General Pope's order " to 
 subsist on the country they pass through," in the most liberal 
 manner, and I have had the pleasure of knocking several such 
 extensive raids on the head, and driving off these self-made 
 " quartermasters " and " commissaries of subsistence." At 
 one house I interfered in favor of a sheep, some bee-hives, 
 and the potato-patch, and was rewarded by being invited into 
 the house, where I met the prettiest girl I have seen in Vir 
 ginia, a real stunner, with light brown hair and perfect 
 features, and an arm like the Venus of the capitol. I grieve 
 to say that I was quite enthralled by this she-rebel, and ihe 
 next night, being out foraging for hay, I stayed to supper, and 
 came home so late that I found a party just saddling to go out 
 and rescue me from the bush-whackers. The captain gave me 
 three days on guard, but I think that it was worth it on the 
 whole. Then, to cap the climax, being sent down to Culpep- 
 per after stores, I stopped there yesterday morning on my way 
 back and took breakfast. If we have occasion to retreat, I 
 shall manage to get wounded near that house, and have " sweet
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 345 
 
 Maud Muller " (I don't know her real name), take care of me. 
 Joking apart, I have nothing in the present to interest me, and 
 nothing in the future to hope for, except an honorable ending 
 for myself, and the full success of the cause. My immediate 
 surroundings and associations are very, very hard to endure, 
 but I shall hold on, praying at least for health, if not for hap 
 piness 
 
 I picked up a letter on the battle field the other day, from 
 a young married lady in Georgia to her two brothers in the 
 army, and it might have been from you, so pleasant and naive 
 was the style. She chatted about her little baby, and how it 
 resembled its young uncles, etc., and my heart smote me when 
 I thought that perhaps their life-blood had soaked the very 
 ground where I stood. 
 
 CAMP NEAR FORT ETHAN ALLEN, 
 September 14, 1862. 
 
 DEAR Coz, .... It is extremely aggravating to me to 
 think that I shall not be able to be present at your wedding, 
 but if I am there, it must be either as a cripple or an invalid, 
 for my battery is my plighted bride, " until death do us part," 
 or until peace do see us once more an united land. To tell 
 the truth, I have not the slightest idea that I shall ever see 
 any of you again, and I endeavor always to banish from my 
 mind the pleasant picture of a reunion with the family at New 
 Haven, for when I dwell on it too much, it makes a feeling of 
 regret sometimes arise, and that always interferes with duty ; 
 no, I prefer to accept the belief that I must fall, and if I 
 should survive, it would be so far a pleasant disappointment. 
 The days are looking very dark now, our arms are meeting re 
 verses in every direction, and it requires no prophet to an 
 nounce that many toilsome marches must be made, and many 
 more battles fought, and thousands of brave men yet fall, be 
 fore this quarrel shall be settled on the permanent and right 
 eous footing that we seek. 
 
 I will not trouble you with any account of how we marched 
 down to the Rapidan, and then how we marched back again ; 
 how we shot at the rebels across the narrow Rappahannock,
 
 346 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 like boys fighting across a handkerchief, and how the artillery 
 of our Corps held the many fords of that river against the over 
 whelming numbers of the enemy ; then how we marched in 
 post haste to Manassas, when we found that the wily Jackson 
 had got in Pope's rear, and was threatening his communica 
 tions ; how our Corps bore the brunt of the battle all day 
 Friday, and covered the repulsed left wing on Saturday night, 
 and were ready to renew the fight the next morning, had we 
 not been ordered away ; how we marched back, full of wrath 
 at leaving a field that we had twice won, and were still able 
 to hold, and took our gloomy march to Centreville, Fairfax, 
 Vienna, and at last came under the shelter of the forts on 
 Georgetown Heights, where we now are ; all this is not pleas 
 ant to repeat, but as an offset, I can assure you, that it was all 
 done without haste or panic, and that " Battery No. 13 " stood 
 gallantly by its flag, served its guns under the hottest fire, 
 with coolness and skill, and finally, in spite of loss of men and 
 horses, brought them all off the field, not without words of 
 praise and commendation from our idolized Sigel. We had 
 it the toughest on Friday afternoon, when we were sent by 
 General Sigel to hold a hill from which several of our batter 
 ies had already been driven ; here three rebel batteries of 
 excellent guns, and finely served, rained shot and shell upon 
 us ; a section of a regular battery by our side was silenced and 
 compelled to retire, and then the whole fire was concentrated 
 upon us. I can assure you that I had no idea of ever coming 
 alive out of that inferno. 
 
 J.'s regiment is in Washington learning drill and discipline ; 
 last week he was on guard at the Long Bridge with his com 
 pany. I knew that he was there, and determined to see if he 
 would know me after our long separation, so I pulled my 
 hat down over my eyes, rode up and gave him my pass, as if I 
 would go over the bridge. He looked at it, said it was all 
 right, and was just about to pass me, when he gave one look 
 at me, and then sprang forward like a mad creature. It was 
 a happy meeting, and we spent the afternoon together. His 
 regiment makes a fine appearance, and I think that he will 
 become a first-class officer. May he be spared to the end !
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 347 
 
 Written immediately after the second battle of Bull Run. 
 
 HEAD-QUARTERS 13x11 N. Y. BATTERY,. 
 NEAR CHAIN BRIDGE, VA., September 5, 1862. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, I take the first opportunity offering 
 itself to give you intelligence of my entire safety and welfare, 
 if it be only a few lines. I was in the hottest of the fight all 
 day Friday, and all the afternoon of Saturday, and exposed 
 myself considerably to keep our boys up to the scratch, but 
 got nothing except a slight scrape on the top of the head from 
 a piece of a shell, and a bruise on the cheek from a canister 
 ball ; both of these little wounds are almost quite well, and 
 almost without medical assistance, and I sincerely recognize 
 the protecting hand of God in my preservation. The Battery 
 did right gallantly, though I say it that should not, and were 
 highly praised by General Sigel. As soon as I get the chance 
 I will write again. This must suffice for the present. 
 
 Very much love to all. 
 
 ACCOUNT OF THE SECOND BATTLE OF BULL RUN. 
 
 CAMP NEAR FORT ETHAN ALLEN, VA., 
 September 10, 1862. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, Your welcome letter has just come to 
 hand, giving me assurance that you had got my hastily-penned 
 note, and were relieved from all immediate and harassing 
 anxiety on my account. I did the best I could to communi 
 cate with you, but on account of our being so constantly on 
 the move, officers always in the saddle, and horses in the har 
 ness, it was impossible to call the next five minutes our own ; 
 so I could only send you a pair of words. I think you can 
 hardly fail to be interested in my experiences for the last three 
 weeks. My last letter to N. H. was written to A. from the 
 banks of the Rapidan, and in that I remember I spoke of the 
 speedy advance of our forces in the direction of Gordonsville ; 
 how ignorant I was of the state of affairs was proved by the fact 
 that the very next evening we had orders to be ready to march 
 to the rear in an hour, and before the sun went down our long,
 
 348 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 slow-moving trains were drawing off in the direction of Culpep- 
 per Court House. Our Corps, which had the post of honor in 
 the rear, drew out into the road, and lay there all that night, 
 and a good part of the next day, waiting until the enormous 
 trains and the Corps in front of us should have reached the po 
 sitions assigned to them. We passed through the foul region 
 of Slaughter Mountain, with great offense to eye and nose ; the 
 men had all been buried, but the pile of slaughtered horses 
 still showed where batteries had stood in the hottest fire. We 
 passed through Culpepper that afternoon, and, by dint of 
 steady marching, came to the Rappahannock in the night. 
 Here we took up a position to cover the passage of the river, 
 and stood to our guns until about noon the next day, when 
 we, too, passed over, and the bridge was burned behind us. 
 Thence on from Jeffersonville to White Sulphur Springs, the 
 Saratoga of the South ; but the place of the summer loungers 
 in the streets was filled with soldiers, and the sick men lay in 
 the great hotels which had, two years before, been so full of 
 "dances and delight." Here we hoped for a day's rest, so 
 much needed by both men and horses, but we were allowed 
 only one good sleep, and then off again, after breakfast, to the 
 Rappahannock, along whose banks a fierce, long-range artillery 
 duel was to be kept up for about a week. The first day our 
 four rifled guns came into action, my six-pounders being kept in 
 reserve as too short range. One of our gunners made a splen 
 did shot that day, at over a mile, and dismounted a secesh 
 gun, but this feat was ascribed in the papers to Captain Schir- 
 mer's Battery, as have half a dozen things that our Battery has 
 done. The only loss that our artillery sustained that day \vas 
 Captain Buell, commanding the reserve artillery, and just the 
 man that we could worst afford to lose. A shell passed 
 through his horse, wounding him in both legs, and then the 
 horse fell on him, and caused internal injuries, of which he 
 died that same evening. He was really a charming fellow, 
 quiet, gentle, yet firm and active ; his whole Battery loved him 
 to devotion, and I enjoyed his society greatly, ever since we 
 came under his command at Sperryville. For the next two
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 349 
 
 days we had plenty of marching, but little fighting. The next 
 day we were separated from the reserve artillery, and sent to 
 General Milroy's, and ever since we have been connected with 
 this king of the bush-whackers. We have not had occasion to 
 complain that we have been neglected, in getting our full 
 ration of fighting. In fact, before we had been with him two 
 hours he had the rifled guns in full operation on a hill, while 
 I crept forward with my two pieces towards a hill well in the 
 advance. We were well covered by our own pieces until we 
 reached the brow of the hill, and came into battery in an apple 
 orchard ; we drove the enemy's cavalry out of the woods, but 
 could not do much to the enemy's battery, which was too long 
 range for us, and their balls and shells tipped the trees about 
 us in a lively manner. The chief of artillery saw that we did 
 not reach them, and ordered us down the hill again ; pretty 
 soon Sigel came along and saw my section standing idle, and 
 inquired the reason ; upon hearing that Captain Schirmer had 
 sent me back, he said, "Take your section up on the hill 
 again and fire away ; " so up I went to a part of the hill more 
 directly in front of the enemy's batteries. Instead of stopping 
 on the summit, I had my guns run down the easy slope to 
 wards the enemy, by hand, and thus advanced until I was 
 several hundred yards in front of our line, and had brought 
 the hostile batteries completely within my range ; then we 
 went to work, and, by keeping sharp look-out, succeeded in 
 shutting up every gun which the Rebs planted in front of us. 
 Once they ran a gun well up before a bank and masked it, so 
 that it fired three times before I could exactly find it ; when I 
 did, I laid my two guns right for the muzzle, and it assumed 
 a dignified silence. By afternoon our Brigade moved further 
 on, and we had no more work of importance till the evening 
 before Friday's battle. Then we shelled the woods where the 
 enemy lay, just at nightfall, and the shells with their burning 
 fuses made a beautiful firework. That night each cannoneer 
 slept at his post by the gun, and we all snoozed soundly, for 
 we knew that we should have plenty to do the next day, and 
 having seen Jackson's handiwork at Manassas, were right
 
 35O LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 anxious to go on and catch the old Valley Fox, whom we had 
 been so long hunting. Alas, it turned out too much like the 
 story of the man who caught the Tartar. Up early, placed 
 our Battery in a commanding position, and engaged a hostile 
 battery for an hour or two, until we drove them away, and then 
 advanced to their position. (N. B. This credited in the news 
 papers to Schirmer's Battery.) Beyond was a high ridge, on 
 which the enemy had many batteries planted, and a large part 
 of his force concentrated to attack this. Milroy now advanced 
 with his Brigade, and our Battery alone, being only supported 
 by long range fire from batteries on the ridge we had left. He 
 entered a piece of open ground, behind the woods which shel 
 tered him from the batteries on the hill, and throwing skir 
 mishers and a regiment into the woods on the right, tried to 
 carry the railroad embankment in his front. The Battery was 
 not placed in position, but just stood close behind the infantry 
 in column, utterly useless, and itself in danger. After a sharp 
 fight in the woods, our men had to retire, when suddenly a 
 couple of rebel brigades came swarming over the railroad em 
 bankment, and our Brigade had to beat a hasty retreat. We 
 did not move until the enemy were pretty near, and then we 
 went back through the opening, the bullets flying in great 
 abundance. Just as my second piece had passed the opening, 
 a shot brought down one of the pole horses, and stopped us 
 short; my first thought was, "The piece is lost ;" my next, 
 ".It shall be sold dear," and I sprang down, and with the as 
 sistance of one man, unlimbered it. I seized the rammer, and 
 we had one shot fired before the other officers knew that we 
 were in danger. The other cannoneers came up, but I held 
 on to the rammer, and did Number One in pretty lively style. 
 The other pieces came into battery on a hill behind us, and 
 opened fire ; then the batteries above us began to operate at 
 short range, and between shells, canister, and musketry fire, 
 we had it hot enough. But we soon drove the infantry back 
 to the embankment, and gave our infantry a chance to halt 
 and reform. A reserve horse had been brought up with har 
 ness, and was hitched in under the hottest fire ; when all was
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 351 
 
 ready, I had the piece limbered up, and followed the rest of 
 the Battery to the opening in the fence. Just at the opening, 
 the reserve horse was shot two or three times, and I had to 
 cut him out of the harness and carry the branch myself for 
 some distance. While acting as Number One, I was struck on 
 the cheek by a canister shot and thought I was hurt, but it 
 swelled two days and then passed off. A splinter of shell 
 struck me on the head, cutting three little holes, and burying 
 itself next the bone. This grew very sore, and the doctor, after 
 taking out a piece of my felt hat, which was driven in also, 
 tried to extract the metal, but could not do it. However, I 
 have poulticed it, and it has healed up entirely. (This exploit 
 of ours, which saved the Brigade, is attributed in the news 
 papers to Hampton's Pittsburg Battery. I don't care a cent 
 for newspaper praise, but it comes hard for the men to have 
 others steal their well-earned laurels.) In the afternoon we 
 were sent to an important position, from which the rebels had 
 already driven two or three of our batteries. They had got 
 the range exactly, and threw every shell right among us. How 
 ever, we held the position until our ammunition was exhausted. 
 The fire was really infernal, and we lost several men killed or 
 badly wounded, and many horses. I was astonished to find 
 that the idea of danger was so little present with me, even in 
 the hottest of the fire : but I suppose that it was because I 
 kept myself occupied and worked hard at my duty. A shell 
 struck the piece I was working, and ploughed a great furrow 
 down it ; but I hardly noticed it at the time. In fact, I think 
 that the extreme front is the safest as well as the most honor 
 able place. I have seen many a man knocked over by these 
 bounding shots, when he thought he was all safe in the rear. 
 We are hoping soon to get into Washington to refit, as we 
 have lost many horses, and want some of our guns mended. 
 In our General (Sigel) we have the most entire confidence, 
 and his corps will follow him anywhere. I suppose you have 
 heard from J. about our meeting at the end of the Long Bridge. 
 It was truly a delight, and a joy inexpressible to me, after 
 these many months, during which I have seen no friendly face,
 
 352 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 grasped no friendly hand. I felt proud of the old fellow, look 
 ing so neat in his fatigue uniform, and doing his duty in so 
 prompt and business-like manner. He seems to have a fine 
 company. What a startling contrast they would make, if 
 ranged alongside of my poor travel-worn, battle-weary raga 
 muffins. I need rest greatly, and to recruit my health. I 
 would rather stand by my post, and trust to time and rest to 
 heal me, than to go into hospital. I am afraid this egotistical 
 letter may have wearied you. 
 
 CAMP NEAR FORT DE KALB, September 19, 1862. 
 DEAR GRANDFATHER, Your very kind letter reached me 
 a few days ago in the first regular camp we occupied after the 
 battle, and it was very welcome to me, both as showing the 
 kindly interest you cherish in me and my welfare, and also 
 because it informed me that you were freed from anxiety on 
 my account. I have written to mother, giving an account of 
 our retreat from the Rapidan and also of the battle on Friday, 
 
 in which we largely participated I was as thoroughly 
 
 used up on Friday night as I ever recollect being in my life, 
 for I had some severe hard work all day, as a cannoneer, and 
 then the cessation from the excitement of battle caused a sud 
 den reaction which produced both mental and physical fatigue. 
 However, I managed to sleep pretty well, on ground which we 
 had won from the enemy in the morning, and at break of day 
 proceeded to hunt up the ammunition train and to replenish our 
 exhausted boxes. Then we marched out of camp, and pro 
 ceeded to the Stone Hospital, of which you will have seen fre 
 quent mention made in the newspapers. Here we lay in reserve, 
 waiting for the moment when the eye of our sagacious leader, 
 General Sigel, should see where to push us forward with most 
 effect in the line of battle. Past us filed the long line,s of the 
 corps of McClellan's army, comparatively fresh after a rest of a 
 few days, and who had not been engaged on the previous day. 
 Some of the regiments, as for example the Brooklyn Four 
 teenth, the New York Fifth, (Duryea Zouaves), looked quite 
 full, but the bran new uniforms, and fresh unburned faces
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 353 
 
 showed that the ranks wasted by battle and disease, had been 
 to a great degree filled up with recruits, men as yet untried. 
 I saw quite a number of friends among these regiments, 
 among them Col. Wm. Wainwright, formerly Major of the 
 Twenty-ninth New York, with which we were long brigaded. 
 By the Hospital we lay, listening to the roar of the cannon and 
 the sharp rattle of the musketry, and watching the course of 
 the battle, which began with greatest intensity on the right 
 of the centre, and gradually worked round towards the left 
 wing, where the rebels got some batteries in position, and thus 
 established a cross fire on our troops. Just about this time, 
 when our troops in the centre were falling back, and the hills 
 and fields to the rear were covered with stragglers and attend 
 ants on the wounded, our Brigade, General Milroy's, was ordered 
 to the left wing, and we went joyfully onward, hoping to do 
 our share to redeem the battle, which seemed in danger of 
 being lost. At the same time, a fresh body of troops had gone 
 up to the centre, and I there saw a bayonet charge made, by 
 at least a whole brigade, which I shall never forget. Steadily 
 the long line marched on, the banners rising and falling as 
 they passed over the undulating ridges, but still going steadily 
 forward, under a murderous fire from both infantry and artil 
 lery. The enemy fall back, and take refuge in a wood, where 
 they are reinforced and make a stand, still our men pass 
 on, and it seems as if the opposing lines were within touching 
 distance. At last our line staggers under the infernal fire 
 bearing upon it ; the wounded are seen first brought to the 
 rear, and finally our men retire a short distance, and resign a 
 part of the ground they had so gallantly won. Now our Brig 
 ade marches up on the left, and plunges into the woods to clear 
 them ; our Battery takes up a position on the open ground, 
 and proceeds to shell the woods, over the heads of our own 
 men. As we advance nearer to the woods, we improve our 
 range, the fire becomes hotter, and the rebel sharp-shooters 
 creep up as close as they can, and pick off our cannoneers. 
 The noise of fighting in the woods comes closer, and it be 
 comes evident that the enemy are driving our men back, so I 
 23
 
 354 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 take one six-pounder and go, through a shower of bullets, to 
 that part of the woods where our men are just emerging, 
 closely followed up. We come into position, wait until our 
 own men are well out of the way and the gray jackets are 
 already beginning to swarm out, when we let go a few rounds 
 of canister at one hundred yards' distance, and back they go 
 again in a great hurry. We then retire with the retiring in 
 fantry, but only about fifty yards, and then again unlimber and 
 fire, until a fresh regiment comes up and enters the woods. I 
 then rejoin the Battery and we take position on a hill and wait 
 for orders ; no orders come, and night comes on, and all is 
 quiet, except occasionally a few volleys from the extreme left, 
 which General Reno is holding, and nothing whatever is seen of 
 panic or disturbance on the battlefield, which we now hold. 
 .... At last an aid from General Sigel comes up and orders 
 us to Centreville, and we proceed thither in perfect order. 
 Of the panic we saw little or nothing, as it occurred mostly in 
 the rear among the stragglers, teamsters, and ambulance driv 
 ers. Why we retreated I cannot say, but I feel sure that 
 we would not have done so if Sigel had been in Pope's place. 
 Of what has since happened you know more than I. I have 
 been miserable in health since the battle, caused by cold and 
 exposure ; but cannot take time to rest, as one officer is 
 wounded, and one is on detached service. We are now being 
 
 repaired and refitted I have seen J. and his regiment ; 
 
 they are quartered near Washington's Monument. He makes a 
 fine looking officer, and bears himself well among his men. 
 You must miss him greatly in New Haven. May he never 
 know the hardships and perils which I have gone through the 
 past summer. I can hardly venture to hope that we shall 
 both ever be reunited with you at home. For myself, I thirst 
 for active service, and am miserable when lying in camp, as at 
 present. 
 
 CENTREVILLE, VA., September 28, 1862. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, Your letter, dated September 23, 
 reached me late last night at Fairfax, to which place I had 
 made a night march from Fort Ethan Allen, where I had been
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 355 
 
 detached on picket for a week I am, in truth, a very 
 
 unsightly object to look upon ; I wear the same jacket and the 
 same vest that I did when we marched out of camp last Feb 
 ruary, and they bear spots acquired in half the counties of 
 Virginia ; still I cannot cast them away without a feeling of 
 regret, thinking on how many a cold night march they have 
 kept me warm, how often soaked by the May showers and 
 dryed again, how often brushed up to make a martial appear 
 ance when passing triumphantly through secesh towns, and 
 how often carelessly rolled together to make a pillow for my 
 bed on the ground before the bivouac fire ; indeed, so many 
 of my best thoughts and most ardent labors are associated 
 with those weather-beaten garments and faded epaulets, that 
 I cannot believe they look so badly as my friends say ; and 
 yesterday I went quite coolly in them to drive with General 
 Abercrombie, and after dinner did the agreeable to a couple of 
 fair damsels visiting Fort Ethan Allen. My week on picket 
 was every way a pleasant one, except that I was sick part of 
 the time, having got badly chilled on one of those cold nights, 
 
 as I had no tent and had to sleep under a tarpaulin 
 
 Then one of my Corporals, a nice young Englishman, took 
 his blankets and fixed up my shanty to keep the cold out, and 
 built me a good bed, so that I managed to keep warm and did 
 not get any worse ; still, I lay in bed for three days in much 
 pain, and my bones all felt very sore. Joseph S. and young 
 A. from the class of '63, both on General Abercrombie's staff, 
 were unremitting in their attentions, brought me doctors, and 
 books to read, and looked after the material wants of my men, 
 and were in general so kind that I felt quite sorry yesterday 
 afternoon when the order came for me to rejoin the Battery 
 at Fairfax ; and General Abercrombie, too, did n't want to let 
 me go away from his command, but was obliged to, as Gen 
 eral Heintzelman countersigned General Sigel's order to that 
 effect. We packed up and got off about dark, and a pretty 
 tough march of some fourteen miles brought us to the Court 
 House by midnight it was a hard pull for me, as I could not 
 sit my horse, got chilled again, and did not sleep when I en-
 
 356 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 sconced myself within my tent ; and worst of all, the Battery 
 was ordered on to Centreville early the next morning. But I 
 have succeeded in getting here more comfortably than I had 
 expected, and shall lie quiet and take all possible care of my 
 self, as I have no idea of becoming useless for the Fall Cam 
 paign. I thirst for active service, and hope that we shall soon 
 get a chance to take part in a decisive battle in favor of the 
 Union cause ; the mere thought of Bull Run (and the battle 
 field lies even now stretched out before my eyes as I write), 
 Harper's Ferry, Mumfordsville, makes me sick ; why, Colonel 
 D'Utassy with the Garibaldi Guard, from our old Division, 
 could have held the fort alone for twenty-four hours, and been 
 rescued. The rebels are welcome to my somewhat attenuated 
 length of five feet ten, but not with any vitality in it. I have 
 read General Milroy's report, and it is in many respects true, 
 but still a picture of the General's excited state of mind, and 
 it is evident that he hardly knew half the time what he was 
 about. A braver man never lived ; he seems to drink in ex 
 citement and intoxication from the sound of the bullets, and 
 to be perfectly happy when in the very tempest of battle, but 
 he knows nothing about the object of artillery or the way to 
 use it, and I am heartily glad that we are to have nothing more 
 to do with him. General Sigel's report is soon to appear, and 
 then I hope that our Battery will be spoken of more scientifi 
 cally and judiciously. I see that I have been unusually egotis 
 tical in this letter, but do not believe, dearest mother, that my 
 thoughts are not with you on this calm, beautiful Sabbath 
 afternoon ; I feel quiet and very happy, and picture you to 
 myself as you go down to church among the falling elm leaves, 
 and sit in your pew with J. and T., but no raven head of hair 
 at the end ; I pray ever most fervently that I may be allowed 
 to meet the dangers of battle alone, and that he may be spared 
 
 them. You cannot well lose us both To me this 
 
 contest and cause are the same that the quest of the Holy 
 Grail was to Sir Galahad. 
 
 " To me is given 
 Such hope, I know not fear."
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 357 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 CENTREVILLE, VA., September 30, 1862. 
 
 I feel a little inclined to grumble because you confined your 
 self to one small sheet, and passed over many topics of inter 
 est with a bare mention which aggravated me very much, just 
 as with a child to whom one is showing pictures in a book and 
 passes over the prettiest with a turn of the leaf. But you 
 must do better next time, and expand more on those little 
 matters which constitute the filling-in touches of life ; if nec 
 essary, have a pigeon-hole in your desk, labelled, " Wheeler- 
 isch Memoranda/' and lay in these hints from day to day for 
 
 future letters I will not weary you by expanding on 
 
 the subject of the battle of Bull Run, as it has already been set 
 
 forth at full length in the newspapers What surprised 
 
 me greatly was that so very faint an idea of danger was in my 
 mind at the very hottest of the fight ; I was so thoroughly oc 
 cupied with working my pieces to the best advantage, that I 
 hardly noticed the bullets whistling and shells exploding 
 around, and even some of the most revolting sights of blood 
 shed and death seemed to me very natural under the peculiar 
 circumstances. I have also observed the truth of Horace's 
 
 assertion, 
 
 " Mors et fugacem persequitur virum, 
 Nee parcit imbellis juventae 
 Poplitibus timidoque tergo," 
 
 for nothing was more usual than for a shell to strike in the 
 Battery, cut a furrow alongside my foot, and then making a 
 high ricochet in the air, come down several hundred feet to the 
 rear, and cut some cowardly skedaddler right in two, a fate 
 which he would probably have escaped if he had stood up to 
 his work. Well, our men retired, but, I am convinced, wholly 
 without sufficient cause ; indeed, I believe that if Sigel had 
 not had positive orders he would have held the field all night, 
 which in fact he did do until late in the evening. And for our 
 Corps and our Battery I have the consoling consciousness that 
 we did our duty fully, and obeyed the order to withdraw with
 
 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 the greatest reluctance. There is a radical defect in the for 
 mation of our Army ; its regiments, brigades, divisions, and 
 corps, especially the latter, are too small to be thoroughly ser 
 viceable and manageable, and there are too many officers of 
 high rank, each possessing a sort of half-cut independence ; 
 these corps are not much larger than divisions eight months 
 ago, the divisions have sunk to brigades, and many brigades 
 cannot show a full regiment of fighting men. Now what 
 could Sigel do with his handful of men, perhaps twelve 
 thousand in all ? What he did do is pretty generally 
 known ; what he might have done if he had had a full corps 
 of twenty-five thousand to thirty thousand men is aggravat 
 ing to think of. And now, newspapers are inquiring " What 
 is Sigel doing? " What can be expected of him, with a small 
 corps that suffered far more than any other in the late fight 
 (and yet did not lose a gun or a flag), with his best brigade 
 (Milroy's) detached and sent to Western Virginia ? He has 
 now some five thousand men, a superb command with which 
 to fall upon the enemy's rear and cut him off, as seems to be 
 demanded by many ! How can the government expect to 
 succeed while they ignore the men who mean fight, and give 
 everything to softly warriors like McClellan, who are afraid to 
 hit the enemy too hard ? But the chief cause of the present 
 deadness in affairs is the neglect of the Governors of States 
 to forward their quotas ; six hundred thousand men look very 
 big on paper, but so long as they are not raised they do us 
 very little good in practice. New York State alone owes yet 
 forty thousand men, and the day of drafting will be delayed 
 until the time for autumn fighting is past, until the roads here 
 become again unfathomable, and the secesh call out their last 
 resources, and gather strength for next year's struggle ; so we 
 are always a month or two behind, and the enthusiasm and 
 spirit of our troops evaporates, under this system of timidity 
 and delay. A section of our Battery has just returned from an 
 expedition with the cavalry, in the direction of Warrenton, 
 and report that the cavalry captured there, and in the neigh 
 borhood, some sixteen hundred secesh ; how true this is I
 
 AH MY LIFE AND SERVICE. 359 
 
 cannot tell. I should have commanded the section on the 
 expedition myself, if I had been well enough to stand the 
 march, for as senior Lieutenant I have always the right to de 
 mand the privilege of being detailed, and it is customary for 
 me to do that sort of work with my section from the left wing. 
 But I am now very much better than I have been. 
 
 CENTREVII.LE, October 9, 1862. 
 
 MY DEAREST MOTHER, I answer your most welcome letter 
 with expedition, in order to quiet any anxiety on my account, 
 and also to reassure you as to the probability of my being 
 engaged in any actual fighting when you are assisting at M. 
 W.'s wedding. I was very miserable when I first came here, 
 my complaint having been greatly aggravated by long continu 
 ance and want of rest and care. By lying quiet in my tent, 
 and the almost magical effect of the pills which you sent, 
 I soon began to improve, and now am as well as ever, and 
 have an appetite like a wolf whenever I do a little extra work. 
 We were paid off on the ist, and the Captain went off on the 
 zd, which was pretty hard on me, as I was thus left to stem 
 the tide of drunkenness and quarrelling almost entirely alone. 
 However, the boys behaved much better than could have been 
 expected, when they had been four months without pay, sent 
 home a great deal to their families, and paid off their debts 
 exemplarily. There was of course noise, and fighting, and 
 trouble, but less than ever before on pay-day. 
 
 On Sunday I started off with a picked party and a loaded 
 wagon, to turn in a lot of old horses and useless harness to 
 the Quartermaster in Washington. It was extremely doubt 
 ful whether we should succeed in getting all of the old crea 
 tures over the twenty-five miles, but by starting on Sunday 
 afternoon, and going that night to Falls Church, resting there 
 and going on the next morning, we arrived at Washington 
 Corral with our full freight of condemned horse-flesh. 
 
 I was in the city a day and a half, ordered a neat uniform, 
 and had a carte-de-visite taken of my head and shoulders, 
 which I think will be good. Then I came out by the Long
 
 360 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Bridge, and found Company G, Fifteenth Connecticut Volun 
 teers, on guard on the Virginia side. Lieutenants G. and F. 
 were there, but the Captain was in camp, so I rode on to 
 Camp Chase, and found the respected fraternal about a mile 
 from where we lay last winter, at Hunter's Chapel. I sent 
 my men on to Fairfax, and took off my things, to stay to tea. 
 I saw a nice dress parade, enjoyed an excellent cup of the 
 home English Breakfast, and then we talked together till it 
 was quite late, and he got for me the countersign, and then 
 I had a splendid ride under the full autumn moon, and 
 through the soft airs of Indian summer, back to Centreville, 
 
 which I reached at i A. M 
 
 J. was looking very well indeed, and seems to enter into 
 the spirit of his work admirably, especially in his longing for 
 active service, which there does not seem any very great prob 
 ability of his getting in the Fifteenth C. V. Nor am I sorry 
 for this. I am a much greater coward about him than myself, 
 as I have seen how numerous the casualities among the 
 officers of an infantry regiment are, especially among those 
 that expose and distinguish themselves. I am very much 
 afraid that we shall lose our General of the Eleventh Army 
 Corps. It is stated positively that he has tendered his resig 
 nation, and as the Government does not seem prepared to give 
 him satisfaction they can hardly avoid accepting it 
 
 FAIRFAX, VA., October 30, 1862. 
 
 .... I thought of you all a great deal on the i5th, and 
 took pleasure in calling up the familiar faces of every one pres 
 ent at the family assemblage at Springwood. On that same 
 day I was starting out with my section on a reconnaissance to 
 Chantilly with the cavalry. I was so weak, that I could hardly 
 sit in my saddle, and my toes trembled in the stirrups, but I 
 had already missed two such expeditions (being on my back 
 in bed) and thought that the excitement might do me good. 
 
 We went out on the road towards Aldie and Middleburg, 
 came into battery on a commanding hill, and the cavalry 
 went ahead to scour the country. We remained there that
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 361 
 
 afternoon, watching the skirts of the distant woods for any 
 traces of rebel cavalry, and then bivouacked under the open 
 sky by our fires. The night was cold and frosty, and I could 
 hardly say that I was fairly asleep all night ; but it did me a 
 great deal of good, and when the next day we were relieved, 
 and went into camp, I felt fifty per cent, better. The same 
 evening Captain Johnson's Battery arrived at Centreville to 
 relieve us, and the next morning we bade adieu cheerfully to 
 the exposed and dusty wind hills of that region, and marched 
 to Fairfax Court House, where we are now encamped on the 
 northeast side of the town, in a well sheltered spot on the 
 edge of a wood, and on exactly the same place where the 
 Battery stood when being reviewed by General Sumner last 
 March. This does n't look as if we had made much progress 
 since then, and we have slipped down three stairs for two we 
 have got up. But I have great faith in the army which is 
 now coming into the field, and also in the firm determination 
 of the people and the President, to treat the war as a serious 
 matter. The rebels have been serious ever since last spring, 
 
 and we see the results For myself, I am not satisfied 
 
 at sitting down now, and allowing these golden days to slip 
 
 away unimproved I am as comfortably fixed as if we 
 
 were to stay here for months. I have a nice army cot, which 
 folds up, a writing table, a neat little stove, with a first-rate 
 brick chimney on the outside, (put up by a mason in my sec 
 tion from bricks brought from a ruined house near by), and 
 good boards over a good part of my tent floor. I made my 
 calculation that if we stayed ten days, I should get the worth 
 of my money, and if longer it would be so much gain. When 
 we do make winter quarters I intend to make myself thor 
 oughly comfortable if it be any way possible. The two Divis 
 ions of our Corps went a few days ago, and indulged a sham 
 battle, skirmishers thrown forward, battalions deployed, ar 
 tillery placed in position, and pushed forward from height 
 to height, and bayonet charges made by full regimental line. 
 We maneuvered with Steinwehr's Division, which is mostly 
 composed of new regiments. The fresh troops did remarka-
 
 362 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 bly, especially the Twenty-sixth Wisconsin and Thirty-third 
 Massachusetts. 
 
 CENTREVILLE, VA., October 9, 1862. 
 
 MY DEAR M., .... I can assure you that the regrets 
 which I had experienced before at being unable to be with 
 you in " the dreadful hour," were deepened and made more 
 poignant by the array of attractions you present to call me 
 thither, and by the warm-hearted steadiness with which you 
 insist that I must be there. So pleasant a child of hope it is 
 too hard to stifle with one inexorable word, " impossible ;" and 
 yet that word must be written ; and, to show you wherein that 
 impossibility consists, I inclose a copy of " General Orders 
 No. 28," from the head-quarters of our Corps, and what our 
 General sees fit to order, that I must obey without grumbling 
 or discontent. Or, perhaps, we could represent the affair as 
 " urgent official business ; but then the rub would be to state 
 it in the application in such a way as to make it seem so to 
 the powers that be. I think that the only resort left will be 
 for you to make a direct application to the President, and sup 
 port it by all the influence of our powerful and illustrious 
 family. Surely, if you and L. and R. should unite in making 
 up a Round Robin to the Executive, I am sure that the stony 
 hearted Abe would relent at the sight of so much beauty and 
 worth in tears, and he would immediately dispatch the Fif 
 teenth Connecticut Volunteers to bring me my leave of ab 
 sence for ten days, with, however, this important condition, 
 that I should not fail to bring him (ye said Abraham) a hunk 
 of the cake. 
 
 No, there is no help for it ; and I will not further aggravate 
 myself by thinking of my own misfortune in losing so pleasant 
 a family reunion. I will rather think of you and your happi 
 ness, 's resignation under affliction, of the talks gotten up 
 
 by our mothers and aunts and uncles, of the harmless fun per 
 petrated by the " young fry," in all of these, except of 
 course the last, I shall be with you in spirit, and you can im 
 agine my old jacket and shoulder-straps as lending variety to 
 the toilettes of the guests actually present This
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SEX VICE. 363 
 
 golden Indian-summer time is just the season for marching 
 and fighting, and I chafe at our present inaction. Why don't 
 they send us on troops enough to move with, or, if we have 
 troops enough already, why don't we " pitch in ? " There are 
 mysteries about the conduct of this war that puzzle and al 
 most disgust me, but I manage to keep my faith in " some 
 thing" alive, although I can hardly say what that " something " 
 is. At present it is mostly confined to the sturdy determina 
 tion of the people of the North to bring the war to a just and 
 honorable termination. 
 
 The 1 5th October is an anniversary for me too, as on that 
 day I was mustered into service, and shall then have been a 
 United States soldier just one year. May the first anniver 
 sary of your wedding day see the country reposing in perfect 
 peace. 
 
 GAINESVILLE, VA., November 6, 1862. 
 
 Your last most welcome letter reached me the day after I wrote 
 to you, and must have passed mine on the way. I can hardly 
 undertake to respond to you in a worthy manner, for it is late 
 at night, and my toes are very cold, besides, we are to march 
 to-morrow morning, and if I expect to rise betimes I must see 
 that I turn in before long. The dreams of winter quarters at 
 Fairfax, in which many of the men indulged, were all dissi 
 pated on the first of the month by an order to march early on 
 the morning of the next day : which order pleased me hugely, 
 and I set to work and put the ammunition of the whole Bat 
 tery in general, and of my section in particular, in tip-top 
 order. The next morning, at the appointed hour, we were 
 all packed up, and horses hitched in, but could not move, as 
 the road was occupied by General Heintzelman's corps, on its 
 way to Centreville. By noon we got off, and reached this 
 place. Our road lay exactly across that part of the battle 
 field where we had struggled so hard on Friday the 29th, and, 
 strange to say, we stopped at noon on the very hill on which 
 our Battery had stood for two hours in the afternoon in the 
 most infernal fire. This gave us an opportunity to examine 
 the locality with some care. On the back slope of the hill
 
 364 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 were some ten or fifteen graves of our men, among them that 
 of young Hutchinson of my section, whose poor mother I had 
 the pleasure of consoling with a letter, giving an account of 
 his gallant bearing, and his glorious but almost painless death. 
 .... Many of our poor horses were lying on the slope, 
 shriveled to skin and bone, and the meadow beyond was 
 sown broadcast with missiles of every pattern and calibre. I 
 then rode over to the valley where M. came so near leading 
 us in to our destruction, and I saw my two pole horses, one 
 on the hillock where we first unlimbered and fired, the other 
 by the opening of the fence leading into the road, where I 
 played his part for a number of dangerous rods. The space 
 near the railroad embankment, where M.'s men had been 
 driven back, and where the rebels had in their turn been 
 forced back by our canister, was covered with graves poorly 
 dug, and scantily covering the miserable forms within. I 
 was very much depressed by the whole sight, but not shaken 
 in my old resolution to see the end of the matter, or be like 
 these poor men. Some of our men, who were on the hill oc 
 cupied by the rebel batteries which annoyed us so, state that 
 the graves were in great long trenches, and that the dead 
 horses fairly covered the hillside, showing that the enemy had 
 not passed unscathed through that Gehenna of balls. 
 
 In the afternoon we came through to this place, which is a 
 small village of a few houses on the slopes of the Bull Run 
 Ridge. The Manassas Gap Railroad is completed to this 
 place and beyond. The locomotive has a friendly and civil 
 ized appearance, and our boys always cheer it. General Sigel 
 arrived here in person to-day, and to-morrow we are to ad. 
 vance, probably to Warrenton, and no one knows what may 
 happen. 
 
 I am very well indeed, don't mind sleeping out of doors 
 these cold nights, but prefer a bed in a warm tent decidedly. 
 I am fully prepared to stand a fair share of hardship for the 
 next month.
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 365 
 
 CHANTILLY, VA., November 25, 1862. 
 
 DEAR AUNT E., .... Our Corps has, by the new 
 arrangements and division of the Army of the Potomac into 
 four parts, come into the Reserve, and thus we are lying at 
 present in a disagreeable state of " betweenity," neither hav 
 ing the comfort of winter quarters nor the compensating ex 
 citement of active operations in the field. I am hoping that 
 Jackson, who is said to be still at Bunker Hill and Charles- 
 town, may make a dash in this direction, in the hope of get 
 ting to Washington in the rear of the main army, now down on 
 the Rappahannock. But I think that would be a little too 
 hardy for the Shenandoah Valley Fox. 
 
 I do not wish to triumph over the fallen, but I must say 
 that I consider the removal of McClellan as just and neces 
 sary. He has been tried, and found wanting in those qual 
 ities of swiftness, energy, and ready talent which are abso 
 lutely needful in a leader who would successfully combat the 
 genius of Lee, the dash of Stuart, the daring rapidity of Jack 
 son. Whatever else we may say of the rebels, we must also 
 confess that they have managed to pick out their best men, 
 and have put them at the head of their army. The material 
 of the bulk of their army is certainly inferior to the mass of 
 ours, and our artillery is much the best, while we allow only 
 a slight superiority to their cavalry. But material is nothing 
 so long as it is not rightly moulded and put to use. With the 
 prospect of victory when advancing and impunity when re 
 treating, the dirty, half naked, ill-fed white trash of the South 
 ern army will march twenty miles a day, and fight days on 
 empty stomachs ; and, with the enthusiasm inspired by such 
 leaders, our boys would do and suffer as much and more. I 
 have had an opportunity to see it proved, that officers who are 
 willing to expose themselves, and lead their men on intelli 
 gently, will never lack support. The material of our Battery, 
 for example, is by no means first-rate, and they do for the 
 most part answer to the description of " hirelings ; " but I 
 doubt if there are many places so hot that they would not follow
 
 366 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 their officers into with cheerfulness. In fact, so all-important 
 are the virtues of courage and firmness out here, that one has 
 a tendency to forget that any other virtues are worth practic 
 ing ; but I have succeeded in keeping alive one more, Faith, 
 faith in the soundness of Northern hearts, and in the hon 
 esty of the President ; faith in the approval of the Ruler 
 above, and in the consequent success of our cause. In regard 
 to religious matters, I have thought at times that I had grown 
 entirely callous ; but when I have heard a piece of hymn- 
 music, or read a few tender lines of admonition from mother, 
 or ridden out in the pleasant autumn afternoon among the 
 woods and thought ; or listened to our colored servants sing 
 ing some old camp-meeting tune, in a minor and melancholy 
 key, by their fires at night, I have felt that it was not so. I 
 suppose that Thanksgiving Day will be the day after to-mor 
 row in New Haven, and I deeply regret, as ever, that I cannot 
 be home upon that day. It is the festival above all others 
 which I have always been accustomed to spend at home, and 
 now I am again absent. I know that you will remember J. 
 and myself when you sit around that family table, and you 
 may be sure that we will be thinking of you. I have cause for 
 gratitude that this year I am in excellent health, while on last 
 Thanksgiving Day I was so sick that I had merely to look at 
 the gigantic turkey, but could not touch it. I have already 
 projected a foraging expedition for to-morrow, to procure a 
 gobbler to be sacrificed to St. Thanksgiving, and it will go 
 hard with any secesh farmer who refuses to hand him over 
 for a reasonable compensation in greenbacks. We have been 
 going into geese pretty extensively lately, as our cook gets 
 them up in a most palatable manner. The other day I rode 
 several miles with two live ganders slung one on each side of 
 my saddle like holsters I have a first-rate darkey, re 
 joicing in the name of Glenmore. He has been with me 
 nearly four months, and has kept my horses in first-rate con 
 dition. He is a ludicrous object, having a nose like the pyr 
 amid of Cheops, with orifices in it like the secondary craters 
 of Vesuvius. He is a great favorite with most of the men,
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 367 
 
 who call him Chocolate, and he has the jolliest and most in 
 fectious laugh you ever heard. I feel quite attached to him, 
 and should be very sorry to lose him 
 
 CHANTILLY, VA., December 9, 1862. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, Your letter, dated December 2, was 
 duly received, and gladdened my heart in the midst of this 
 bleak wintry weather like a breath of spring, and I take ad 
 vantage of this pleasant sunny morning, when it is possible for 
 me to inhabit my tent, to answer you. In the first place, that 
 turkey, with the fixings, etc., for which the collective mouths 
 of our officers' mess have been so long watering, and which 
 was to be the Phoenix, or pattern bird, of our cook-house, to 
 wards which all future poultry was to strive, and whose virtues 
 should be emulated by geese and chickens yet unhatched, this 
 noble animal, I say, with all his seductive surroundings, is by 
 this time very unpleasant both to look at and to taste of, and 
 indeed it would be too much to expect of him that he should 
 remain more than two weeks on the way, and yet preserve his 
 original sweetness ; in other words, the box has not yet ar 
 rived. But although I could not eat the turkey, I thought of 
 you all day long, as in church, but in a pew which had two 
 vacant seats ; then the Thanksgiving dinner, at which I 
 know that J. and I were missed ; and still more in the pleasant, 
 quiet evening, when you gat together and talked. I think that 
 never before in my life had I personally so many reasons for 
 being thankful ; a year ago this day I was setting out for 
 Washington, doubtful whether I should ever reach it, and with 
 my whole system thoroughly on the verge of dissolution ; for 
 my recovery, I have, next to God, to thank Uncle R. and Aunt 
 H. : then I am very thankful for having been able to see you 
 and my other friends once more, and to strengthen my heart 
 with the assurance of your love and sympathy ; then brought 
 through the hardships and exposures of the march and the 
 camp, and the dangers of the battlefield, I find myself now in 
 perfect health, and with a frame to some extent inured to bear 
 everything that may occur in an ordinary campaign. If I were
 
 368 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 not deeply thankful, I should be indeed ungrateful. The cause 
 of the country, it is true, has experienced no such improvement 
 in the last year, but still we hope ever for a happy and right 
 eous ending, in spite of the mutterings and threats of some 
 members of the Democratic party at the North, and the un 
 friendly attitude of France. 
 
 About what I said on the subject of being awakened to 
 religious thoughts by passing circumstances. I think that you 
 must have received a very incorrect idea, and one which I 
 would not wish you to entertain. The state of the case is 
 this : as a general rule, the chaplains here in the field either 
 wholly neglect their duty, or else so perform it, that they might 
 far better have remained in their tents, and others are talkers 
 who are utterly without any conceptions beyond their pay and 
 their position : now, I have been brought up to consider religion 
 and its exercises and meditations as something serious and 
 awful, and since I have thought at all, I have thought that in 
 this matter a man must be sincere and honest above all things, 
 so if I pray, I cannot avoid placing my whole being in a posi 
 tion of the greatest humility before Him to whom the prayer 
 is offered, and at the same time the greatest earnestness and 
 eagerness in demanding help. But an attendance at church 
 which is merely habitual, a reading of the Bible which is 
 merely mechanical, and a way of praying regularly, but with 
 the mouth alone, these things blunt the religious sense, and 
 satisfy a man's soul with what is really nothing. For these 
 reasons I will not attend the ministrations of chaplains which 
 do not edify me ; but whatever I do say on this subject you 
 can thoroughly believe. 
 
 I have heard nothing from J. directly for a month and a 
 half, and feel very much worried by hearing that he is ill. I 
 have written to him since we came here, but have received no 
 answer. If he gets well over this trouble, and gets nicely 
 toughened up, it will have been a great advantage to him. I 
 should have gone in to see him, but my duty here has been 
 quite constant, and it would have been hard to get away. 
 
 The weather has been very trying most of the time since we
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 369 
 
 came here. About seven days ago we had a furious wind 
 storm, that lasted three days and nights, and ended in snow, 
 which fell to the depth of eight inches. It was utterly impos 
 sible to keep warm in my tent, and the only way was to lie 
 and take it. It was especially hard upon our poor horses, 
 which seemed to lose in two days all that they had gained by 
 three weeks' good feed and care. Yesterday my section went 
 to work and built a nice evergreen stable, big enough to hold 
 all our horses (thirty-three), and more too ; my little mare 
 Jenny has the warmest corner of it, and it is entirely protected 
 from the wind. In former years, about this time or a little 
 later, I have also worked in evergreens ; but then it was to 
 deck churches, or to fix and trim Christmas trees for the young 
 ones. I think that our present work for our poor, irrational, 
 dumb beasts is just as pleasant, and as much a labor of love 
 as the other. And now, just as we have the job completed, 
 comes an order to be ready to march at a moment's notice. 
 You can imagine that those who have built log huts, and got 
 themselves nicely fixed, are not 'very amiable at the prospect 
 of moving. I feel very glad of it, and hope that we may yet 
 do something before the roads become impassable. I should 
 greatly enjoy a few days at home this winter, but it does n't 
 look much like it just now, and the orders are very strict that 
 no one receives a leave of absence on doctor's certificates, un 
 less it is absolutely necessary for the preservation of life or 
 health ; and I am glad to say that I am not a candidate for 
 any such certificate. Captain D. is encouraging a nascent 
 rheumatism, which he thinks will bring him home at Christmas 
 as it did last July ; but I unfortunately have no pet malady 
 which appears so conveniently. If a month or so later we 
 take up winter quarters, the matter will doubtless be different, 
 and in that hope I live, for I so long earnestly after you and 
 the girls. 
 
 I received a charming letter from Uncle W. the other day ; 
 
 so long as the folks at home write such patriotic, hopeful, 
 
 cheering letters, they may be sure that their representatives in 
 
 the field will fight well. The violets in your letter were de- 
 
 24
 
 3/O LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 licious, and the whole of it was as fragrant and sweet to the 
 smell outwardly as to the heart within. 
 
 STAFFORD COURT HOUSE, VA., December 20, 1862. 
 Your last kind letter, date December 15, came to hand this 
 morning, and filled me with thankfulness, in hearing that you 
 were all well at home, and also relieved me to some extent 
 from the excessive anxiety I have felt about J. for the last 
 fortnight. I have not heard from him directly now for nearly 
 two months. I was afraid that he might be so rash and un 
 wise as to march with his regiment, to scenes of hardship and 
 exposure which he was totally unfit to encounter ; so you can 
 imagine how glad I felt to hear that he was still at Washing 
 ton, and was contemplating a further trip to Annapolis, which 
 we can now call the " Convalescent Hospital " for our family, 
 as well as the army in general. Judging from my own expe 
 rience, I think that he could hardly be in a better place than 
 there, with Aunt H. to nurse him, Uncle R. to judiciously su 
 pervise and starve him, and A. to amuse and couster him up 
 as soon as he came down-stairs. Still it must have been ex 
 tremely trying for him to have to lie still while his regiment 
 marched off to active service, though I do not really know 
 where the Fifteenth Connecticut went to, or what battle they 
 were engaged in. As for our Corps, we have had a very rough 
 time of it indeed. We marched from Chantilly by the way 
 of Fairfax C. H. and Fairfax House ; came to the Occoquan 
 River. Up to this point our main trouble was the slippery con 
 dition of the roads, on which our horses were frequently fall 
 ing, with great danger both to man and beast. But this was 
 decidedly a minor evil, compared with what came later. A 
 succession of warm days thawed the frozen ground, and for 
 five or six hard marches we struggled over hills and lakes of 
 mud, and through ravines of putty-like soil, such as can be 
 seen in perfection only in Eastern Virginia. At the passage 
 of the Occoquan we found some fine forts, one above the other, 
 like a terrace, which if defended would have been very costly 
 to take ; but they were deserted, and there were no signs of
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 371 
 
 their having been recently occupied. On Sunday we were at 
 Dumfries, near Quantico Creek, and then we had three days of 
 the toughest sort of work to reach the high ground on the left 
 bank of the Rappahannock, near Falmouth. There we learned 
 that the attack had been made without us, and had failed, and 
 as there was danger that the enemy might throw himself on 
 our line of communications, and cut off Burnside's supplies, 
 we were moved back to this important place, to guard the rail 
 road, and our whole Corps is now assembled here. In some 
 respects the march was more trying than that of last May 
 and June from Franklin to Harrisonburg. It is true we 
 we did not have the night marches or the thunder showers, but 
 then we had mud ad infinitum, eight days' marching without 
 rest, scarcity of provisions, winter nights, and the depressing 
 thought that we could not march as fast as the infantry 
 through the mud, and that we must sometimes call upon them 
 to help us to extricate our bemired wagons. Several times was 
 I indebted for a lift to the stout hands of the Fairfield County 
 boys of the Seventeenth Connecticut Volunteers, Colonel 
 Noble, who were for several days in the same brigade with us. 
 What was worst of all was, that when we got to Falmouth, we 
 came the day after the fair, and had no fight at all, and had 
 to take our caissons back as full as we brought them. Still it 
 was very acceptable to get a rest here. Bivouacking in the mid 
 dle of December is no fun, and we should have suffered most 
 severely if the weather had not been unusually mild. At 
 Dumfries, the team wagons were left behind without my know 
 ing it, and so I came off without any blankets, except one on 
 my saddle, and I had to make fatigue and a good fire supply 
 the place of them. In fact, one night I was so used up that I 
 slept in my jacket, without blanket or fire, and felt no ill ef 
 fects. One night, however, I caught it, it was the night be 
 fore we marched to Falmouth. When we lay down around 
 the fire, the stars were shining brightly, and all was serene. 
 Towards morning I woke up and found the rain dashing in 
 torrents in my face, a cold, driving winter rain, still I was 
 too tired to seek a shelter, even if there was any to be found,
 
 372 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 and went to sleep again. Unluckily I lay in a too level place, 
 and when I awoke in the morning I was the " Gentleman of 
 the Lake," and soaked to the skin all down my back. To add 
 to this, by noon it cleared off bright and cold, and the pier 
 cing winds made me shiver in my wet clothes. I hardly 
 thought I should get to camp. However, I arrived there safe, 
 and slept dry that night, and by the next evening got the chill 
 out of my bones. But you must not be at all disturbed on my 
 account, when I tell you these things; fatigue and exercise 
 are potent antidotes to cold and exposure. I am twice as 
 buoyant, and hopeful, and happy, on a hard march, as when 
 vegetating in camp. One goes through almost as much on a 
 hunting tramp or a skating party, and who would complain of 
 a little extra privation with our motives before us ? I hope you 
 do not feel discouraged at Burnside's partial failure. I con 
 tinue full of hope till all is gone. This letter must be your 
 Christmas box from me ; very, very Happy Christmas and 
 Happy New Year to you, dearest mother. 
 
 STAFFORD COURT HOUSE, VA., 
 Christmas Eve, 1862. 
 
 It is Christmas Eve, when " Peace on earth and good will 
 toward men " is the text, and although nothing is said of good 
 will toward women, yet I suppose that they are included, and 
 so will pardon your long silence to-me-ward, and will do my 
 best to spend this evening with you in thought and spirit, at 
 least, if not in person, as in very many happy years in the 
 past 
 
 Nothing among us here indicates the time. The country is 
 too poor to furnish us with a turkey to diversify our pork and 
 crackers, even if we had the money to purchase one, and we 
 are even without a glass of wine for toasts, as several of our 
 sutlers have been captured on the road. I determined, how 
 ever, to do the best in my power, so I went out into the woods, 
 and got a most beautiful little holly-tree, with splendid leaves, 
 and full of berries, which we planted at the foot of the flag 
 staff. There are a pair of symbols for you ! Above, the em-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 373 
 
 blem of equality, free thought, free speech, justice to all men ; 
 below, the emblem of respect for what is old and reverend, the 
 ornament of this great festival of faith and religion. No free 
 dom can be dangerous that is so rooted and grounded. 
 
 And while I am speaking of this, I would further say, that 
 there are very many now fighting in this army, who have ap- 
 parently lost sight of all early training, and have given up 
 all religious habits, and who seem to think of nothing but 
 their military duties ; that is, you see, at first, only the flag, 
 but if you could search deep down you would find the holly 
 tree there too. 
 
 .... It is beginning to rain, which is a very improper 
 proceeding for the weather on Christmas Eve. I am officer 
 of the day, and when I make my midnight round by the 
 stable, I shall have a fine chance to verify the Catholic 
 legend that at midnight, on Christmas, all "beasts of the 
 stall " go on their knees. I have seen plenty of horses do 
 that in the day-time and irrespective of church festivals. 
 
 I need not tell you that we had a tough time of it, march 
 ing down here, as the newspapers all speak, " ad nauseam/' 
 of the mud and other hindrances. The roughest part of it all 
 was to hear Burnside's cannon when we had only reached 
 Dumfries, and were, still, two long days' march from the 
 scene of conflict. It was also vile in the extreme to reach 
 Falmouth, after seven days' incessant marching, and then 
 to have to turn round and march straight back again. 
 This being on the outskirts of battles, hearing the guns, and 
 meeting the ambulances filled with wounded, I have had 
 enough of, and I long for the excitement of another good hot 
 artillery fire, like that on Friday afternoon at Bull Run. I 
 almost long (I am almost ashamed to confess it) for my quie 
 tus ; not that I despair of our success ultimately, or have any 
 doubts of its completeness, but why should I live when so 
 many better men are falling. Then, too, my anxiety for the 
 cause, and my restiveness under my uncongenial surroundings, 
 would be forever quiet. A real good, honorable death might 
 perhaps give some brightness to a dull and useless life. Do
 
 3/4 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 you think that I am too sad and gloomy ? But what else can 
 you expect of a man who is about to wash down with cold 
 water a Christmas dinner of bean-soup and crackers ? 
 
 STAFFORD COURT HOUSE, VA., 
 
 December 29, 1862. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, Your letter, dated December 24, 
 came safely to hand with the inclosed draft, which I was glad 
 
 to dispose of to our sutler for something less It is 
 
 very lucky for me that he did not attempt to follow us in our 
 march from Fairfax out here, as he would probably have been 
 captured at Dumfries with the rest, and my things would 
 have shared his fate, and fallen into the hands of the rebel 
 cavalry. A new way of sending things to camp is by mail ! 
 I know one regiment in our Corps which receives three pair of 
 boots at least by every mail, and some of the regiments with 
 Burnside had their Christmas turkeys sent on in this way. If 
 you could send me one it would be a regular treat on our 
 mess-table, where we have the unvarying round of crackers and 
 coffee for breakfast, soup and meat for dinner (with potatoes 
 when we can get them), and coffee and crackers for supper. 
 Bread is not to be obtained anywhere, as the sutlers find that 
 it pays better not to bring out anything but whiskey and to 
 bacco Christmas Day passed off very drearily; the 
 
 day before I went out and got a little holly-tree, which I 
 planted at the foot of the flag-staff, where it looked very pretty, 
 and quite lighted up the place 
 
 I had a pleasant call from young H. of the class of 1859, 
 and Captain Wm. L. of the Seventy-ninth New York, " the 
 Highlanders," who have been in almost every hard fight since 
 the first Bull Run, except the Peninsular battles, a rough ex 
 perience for such a slight, delicate boy, but in spite of it he 
 looked well, and bright, and hopeful. When J. comes back 
 from camp I intend to make a day of it down in Burnside's 
 army, and to refresh myself with a sight of the cheerful, un- 
 desponding spirit which prevails there, in spite of all their 
 reverses.
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 375 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 CHANTILLY, VA., December 30, 1862. 
 
 .... And even now you must not allow yourself to fall into 
 the error of supposing that I have anything particular to say : 
 I only palm off my worthless goods on you, in the hope that 
 you will think rather of the writer than of the written, and 
 send me back a letter telling of yourself, of New Haven and 
 my family, of mutual friends, and their sayings and doings, 
 and dispatches from that dear old student world from which I 
 am now sometime an unwilling exile. You can really form 
 no idea of the peculiar feelings I have towards that college 
 time, and everything connected with it ; classmates, friends 
 in other classes, our lady friends of the period. " Hornet's 
 Nest," and even such actual and living realities as my mother 
 and the rest of the family, our house, the elm trees, all partake 
 of a certain vague and shadowy beauty and excellence ; it is 
 my " Lost Bower." It is true the loafer within me says, " Re 
 call that vanished time, dwell again in that Bower," but the 
 worker says, " No, you have much more real duty to perform 
 than that ; " and so, although I cannot boast of much energy 
 or success in action, I have yet a little too much of the earnest 
 man in me to settle down into scholarly idleness. Still I love 
 to hear about the old times, and the old friends, and you 
 cannot interest me more than when you tell me all the New 
 Haven gossip, what mischief T. D. is about, and the last joke 
 
 indulged in by B Of our late movements I have but 
 
 little to say, except that between November 2 and November 
 19 we made a circumbendibus from Fairfax Court House, 
 through Centreville, Painesville, and Aldie, round to this 
 place, which is only six miles from " the point or place of be 
 ginning." At Aldie we had a superb place for winter quar 
 ters ; our pieces in fine position, plenty of food, forage, and 
 game in the neighborhood, and pretty girls sown broadcast 
 over the land, whose charms were rendered still more piquant 
 by their attitude of fierce but harmless defiance. In fact we
 
 3/6 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 had arranged ourselves nicely for a long stay ; had plundered 
 the church and schoolhouse of their stores, and even carried 
 off the superb gilt candelabra with a marble bottom, from the 
 pulpit, as likewise the preacher's chair ; my Captain (who 
 alone was the sacrilegious perpetrator) remarking pithily 
 about this last article, that it was a real benevolence to the 
 poor people to remove it, since the parson would not preach 
 so long if he had to stand up all the time ; or at any rate, as I 
 suggested, he would have to effect " a change of base " a la 
 McClellan. As if to punish us for our evil deeds, Burnside 
 did change his base, and Sigel's Corps having been put in the 
 reserve, he moved his head-quarters to Fairfax Court House, 
 and we moved to Chantilly. Why. they put Sigel in the re 
 serve I can't imagine, unless it were that they were afraid of 
 a dash in the rear from Jackson, and considered our Flying 
 Dutchman the only man fit to look after him. I don't know 
 what our Corps amounts to now, as we have a large number of 
 new regiments which are perfectly untried, and which don't 
 promise much ; but the old crowd, which fought at the Rap- 
 pahannock and Bull Run, were as compact and serviceable 
 a little body of men as you could find in the army. Even 
 here, we accomplish more than the Grand Army before 
 Fredericksburg. You will undoubtedly have read in the 
 papers about General Stahl's reconnoisance to Berryville 
 and its results ; it was a most successful affair, and our men 
 behaved excellently, using their sabres only, and gave the 
 enemy " tiichtige Hiebe." The prisoners were not a bad look 
 ing lot, and kept their pluck up finely, considering the circum 
 stances ; the Pennsylvania colts, stolen by Stuart and now 
 recaptured, made a truly beautiful show. 
 
 The brigade we are now attached to, the first of the First 
 Division, commanded by Colonel von Gilson of the De Kalb 
 Regiment, and a first-rate soldier to boot, is much more jolly 
 and sociable than any we have before been connected with ; 
 and every few nights we, the artillery officers, get a solemn 
 order to " report ourselves at such or such a regiment, where 
 there is Bier; cheese and bread will also be furnished; gen-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 377 
 
 tlemen will bring their own cigars, or pipes empty." The 
 Forty-fifth New York is the jolliest, and has moreover a stun 
 ning Sing-Verein, which it is a delight to hear. Still, the 
 German, when he gets jolly, is somewhat beastly, and you hear 
 far more coarseness than with any crowd of young Americans; 
 I infinitely prefer the quiet supper with a chosen crowd, as we 
 have had them together, and then a sensible chat over the 
 apples and Madeira until the small hours. My Captain is a 
 regular character ; he is about forty-five years old, is as gray 
 as a badger, and has a queer, thin profile ; he has a way of 
 putting himself in a passion, which would be terrifying to the 
 uninitiated, but which has come to serve me only with amuse 
 ment. He cannot speak English at all, and is not disposed 
 to learn it, so we have to communicate entirely in German, 
 and this has been of very great service to me, as he speaks 
 very correctly, I might almost say classically, and often cor 
 rects me when I make a mistake. But, whatever his faults 
 and failings may be, he has one virtue which outweighs them 
 all : he is truthful and reliable, and is one of those men who 
 believe in keeping a promise, even when lightly made, at every 
 risk. You can imagine that with such a man I have no trouble 
 in getting along well. 
 
 To H. A. Y. 
 
 STAFFORD COURT HOUSE, VA., 
 January 15, 1863. 
 
 I have been very much troubled to hear of your ill-health, 
 so long continued and so severe, and have often wished that 
 I could give you of my own superabundance, for I have most 
 of the time been so healthy as to get extremely restless and 
 uncomfortable when lying in camp, and felt never better than 
 when marching all day and sleeping soundly in a mudhole. 
 I had to go through a toughening process at first, it is true, 
 and J. is undergoing the same now ; but after that is over, 
 it seems as if some steel had been imparted to the constitu 
 tion. I hope most earnestly that you may become so restored 
 as to be able to work once more with all vigor on your chosen
 
 378 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 way ; but if it should not be so, you must not grieve overmuch 
 at this enforced inactivity, remembering, that " God does not 
 need either man's work, or his own gifts " ; and that " they also 
 serve who only stand and wait"; this last thought has com 
 forted me more than once when I have heard the noise of 
 battle at the front, and we were standing in impatient idleness 
 in the reserve. My dear boy, in every battle in life there 
 must be a reserve, and he who directs these battles will know 
 when to bring it into action. 
 
 I have travelled the upper half of Virginia pretty thoroughly 
 since last spring ; under Fremont, we starved in Franklin, 
 marched down the Shenandoah Valley, fought at Cross Keys, 
 and came back to Winchester ; then, under Sigel, we explored 
 the Suray Valley, crossed the Blue Ridge again, went via* 
 Culpepper and Cedar Mountain to the Rapidan ; then, under 
 Pope (Sigel being still our corps commander), we made a 
 good retreat across the Rappahannock, fought a week up and 
 down its banks, then two days' hard work at Bull Run, where 
 our Corps did and suffered pretty much all that was done and 
 suffered, except the skedaddling ; and since then we have been 
 moving about Fairfax, Aldie, Chantilly, etc., until we came 
 down here to support Burnside, and, fortunately, arrived too 
 late to be victimized at that slaughter by Fredericksburg. 
 Such is a hasty outline of my movements ; a large part of 
 the time has been spent among the mountains of the Alle- 
 ghany and Blue Ridge, healthy, free, and glorious, where we 
 foraged, and went fishing, blackberrying, and cherry-picking, 
 and where at times it seemed more like a charming summer 
 picnic " long drawn out " than anything else ; the want that I 
 have experienced most has been of that which your wife places 
 as second in her list of ' temporal blessings,' viz., friends ; 
 and for months I have gone without seeing a single face which 
 was really dear to me, and without meeting a single person 
 with whom I could talk about anything more deeply interest 
 ing than duty and the probability of our catching Jackson. 
 Indeed, at times, I have become very much depressed by this 
 want of intercourse and sympathy, and nothing but the out-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 379 
 
 door life, spent in the saddle, and the healthy excitement of 
 the march and the bivouac, has saved me from being very 
 miserable. It is when we are lying quiet in camp for some 
 weeks that a man gets to feel how hard this life is to bear; no 
 books, no friends to exchange thoughts with, no flowers, no 
 gentle woman's society, no music except when the Brigade Band 
 gives us the " S. S. B.," or when some poor boy is laid in the 
 stranger earth of Virginia to the solemn chords of Pleyel's 
 Hymn, And this last consolation we all have, that if our 
 soldier-life is very hard, it 'is also short, and our death is hon 
 orable, and we ask of the passer-by, not like Archytas the 
 " pulvis ter injectus," but rather three simple words of praise 
 and kindness. 
 
 I enjoy the artillery service very much ; it is the only arm in 
 which intelligence is needed in every rank, and an officer of 
 artillery has really a fine wide field for study. I have in my 
 own section fine young sergeants and corporals, whom it is a 
 pleasure to bring forward and perfect in the elements of our 
 branch, and who fully answer the description which Victor 
 Hugo gives of the sergeant of artillery, in the fifth volume of 
 his " Les Miserables " : " Of fair complexion, with a very mild 
 face, and the intelligent air peculiar to that predestined and 
 formidable arm." I regret very much that I did not get with 
 our Battery the chance which that " Captain Wheeler " did at 
 West Point, to distinguish himself, although, even when all is 
 done, a corps gets no praise unless it has a newspaper cor 
 respondent in tow, who is stuffed and flattered and deceived. 
 At Bull Run no less than three splendid feats achieved by our 
 Battery were ascribed to others by newspapers, while the dry 
 details of General Milroy's report did us justice ; but the 
 romance is always read by more than the history. 
 
 January 18, 1863. 
 
 .... Yesterday we received positive orders to stand 
 ready to march this morning at break of day, and had made 
 all our preparations to do so ; but last night the order was 
 countermanded, and so we have a quiet Sabbath after all
 
 380 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 The idea of marching and having something to do put me in 
 good spirits, and I have strong hopes that this time we shall 
 accomplish something. What we want is a good fair contest 
 of army against army, followed by a decisive victory. If we 
 obtain this, I don't care much whether I live to see the results 
 of it or not. The day for any individual to distinguish him 
 self by single acts of daring has gone by, and the utmost de 
 votion and bravery are now merely a part of every man's daily 
 duty. It is now no compliment to say " brave officer," " brave 
 soldier," but it is a disgrace to have anything else said. You 
 will not, of course, think of sending anything edible to me by 
 mail, especially as we are about to march. The fact is, we 
 lived too well at Chantilly, and when we came here on hard 
 tack we felt the change, though I am now quite reconciled to it. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 BROOKS' STATION, VA., February 22, 1863. 
 
 MY DEAR BOY, The era extending from the second of 
 February (date of your last letter), to February 22 (date 
 above), is a very much smaller one than that from December 
 3 (date of my last letter), to February 2, and this would per 
 haps be, to a right mind, convincing of the fact that you did 
 not yet deserve to hear from me ; but when I reflect what an 
 unpleasant state of affairs it would bring about if we should 
 all get what we deserve, I think it better not to introduce this 
 principle, and prefer to go it after the G. R., and write 
 promptly to others as I would have others write promptly to 
 me. It is true, I doubt very much if I shall receive my re 
 ward directly from you, but the grand principle of compensa 
 tion must be obeyed, and doubtless the recompense will be 
 manifested in an extra and unexpected epistle from my cousin 
 A., or perhaps another pleasant little reminder from the Phila 
 delphia doves, who are not only " harmless," but Ys 
 
 I was not a little interested in your account of the Philolog 
 ical Society, and your paper on the Prometheus question. I 
 should greatly enjoy looking in upon one of your meetings, 
 and sitting in reverence at the feet of some of those distin-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 381 
 
 guished philologs while they enlightened the world on " An 
 aphora and Chiasmus," or similar important topics. The 
 truth is, I have not the patience nor the industry to pursue 
 these inquiries into the dryer recesses of language ; I prefer 
 to take the results of others' labor, as furnished in grammars, 
 etc., and then to read the classics for the thoughts they con 
 tain, as a part of the general treasure of Thought contained 
 in books, whether ancient or modern. That careful industry 
 by means of which a student so thoroughly elaborates a lan 
 guage as to make the ring of its words and the turning of its 
 verses as familiar to him as his own tongue, that capacity of 
 becoming a Greek with Sophocles, and a Roman with Horace, 
 is given, it seems to me, to a very chosen few, and can hardly 
 be sought as an object by any but the professional student. 
 You and I may become excellent German scholars, but 
 Goethe's " Der Fischer " will never sound to us as perfect as 
 to German ears, and however enthusiastic we may be for 
 Dante's " il tremolar della marina," and the avapiOpov ye'Xao-fia, 
 which are sweet to us because half translated into the univer 
 sal language of similar sound which is shared alike by all, still 
 it is not like English to our ears, not like Shakespeare's " Full 
 fathom five thy father lies," or Byron's " Tremulous silver of 
 Euphrates' waves." But your essay on the subordinate part 
 played by Zeus in the " Prometheus " was something higher 
 than mere scholarship, and I should like very much to see the 
 whole paper, rather than the few hints of it which you gave 
 me. Did it occur to you to look at Shelley's " Prometheus 
 Unbound," in connection with your work, or do you despise 
 the moderns entirely ? I think it is his finest work, and well 
 worth studying for the exquisite melody of many passages ; he 
 seems to adopt the view which you combat, and makes Jove 
 bear all the odium of having inflicted an unjust punishment 
 upon the suffering Reformer (for Prometheus is certainly the 
 original of that species, the first Protestant), and also to get the 
 worst in arguments with him, and to be blackguarded unmerci 
 fully, while behind all rises a dim shape called " Demogorgon," 
 who is evidently the chief cook and bottle-washer, and who in-
 
 382 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 dulges in certain prophecies of Delphic obscurity and gener 
 alizes worse than the " Declaration of Independence " accord 
 ing to Choate. It seems to me that the question narrows it 
 self down to this : injustice had been done to Prometheus, if 
 not by the mere fact of punishment, then certainly by the 
 manner of it, and the unseemly taunts with which it was ac 
 companied. Now we can look upon Zeus, either as a form of 
 the Supreme Being, or as an executor and prime minister of 
 the orders of Fate ; that he is not the former, appears every 
 where in ^Eschylus, and it would certainly be impiety to impute 
 injustice to the Supreme Being. That he is the latter, appears 
 to me in " Prometheus " just as much as anywhere else, and 
 his subjection to some higher power is shown by his terror 
 about the mysterious marriage which he was to contract, and 
 which was to be his ruin. All this he would have known and 
 prevented if he had not been a deity "zweiter classe." The 
 whole, in fact, illustrates the " Responsibility of Prime Minis 
 ters," leaving no trace of wrong upon the character of the 
 
 mysterious king upon the throne behind With regard 
 
 to the state of the country, I think it is not by any means so 
 unfavorable as many of our friends at home seem to suppose ; 
 we have made great advances in our opinions upon many sub 
 jects, such as drafting, arming of the negroes, etc., and I hope 
 to see the campaign carried on in the spring with a vigorous 
 policy and to a successful issue. The army will obey every 
 properly issued and communicated order from head-quarters ; 
 so long as the President and the Secretary of War are all 
 right, Congress may blow, legislatures may resolve, and knots 
 of rebel sympathizers may make a show of resistance, but it 
 will amount to nothing ; if violent resistance be made to the 
 enforcement of the draft, we can easily spare a couple of vet 
 eran regiments who would enjoy nothing more than to drag 
 out concealed rebels and stay-at-homes, and make them bear 
 their share of the burden. In fact, I should have no objections 
 myself to be sent to New York with my section ; there is a fine 
 position for artillery on Broadway below Canal street, com 
 manding the street as high as Eleventh, and the balls would
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 383 
 
 ricochet splendidly on the hard pavement. No ; the army may 
 as a mass have dim ideas of principles and rights, but they do 
 know that they have been working and fighting in this cause, 
 and they do not propose to give up and own themselves 
 thrashed, just because their friends at the North are unwilling 
 to make some slight sacrifices also. I believe in the North's 
 being made to feel the war, which she has not yet done as a 
 nation, and to really offer up something to win this great, 
 almost infinite good. Among the articles in the stupid Atlan 
 tic Monthly of this month, is one entitled, " The Law of 
 Costs," which has some good ideas, though uncouthly and ob 
 scurely worked up. The more we undertake to do this mat 
 ter cheaply, the longer it will remain to be done. The guns 
 are even now echoing from hill to hill, and across the fields of 
 snow, as the batteries are firing salutes in honor of Washing 
 ton's birthday. I hope that the next anniversary will see this 
 question nearer a happy solution. 
 
 BROOKS' STATION, VA., March 14, 1863. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, I had hoped to be in New Haven by 
 this time to-day, and to have spent one Sunday with you at 
 home, after my fourteen months' absence. My application for 
 a leave has not yet been heard from. I think it not unlikely 
 that the pleasant weather of the last two or three days has 
 suggested ideas of marching, and that in consequence, no more 
 furloughs will be granted. Perhaps this is for the best, after 
 all. If I should go home, the parting would be most painful, 
 the crust of insensibility and of absorption in my duty would 
 be cast off, I should be like a soft-shell crab, who had cast 
 his shell prematurely, and had come out of his retreat tender 
 and shivering among his hard-shell companions. 
 
 I thought that I had been constant enough in duty to de 
 serve so much consideration, and had looked upon my fur 
 lough as sure to come in a day or two You must not 
 
 look upon me as if I were only a first lieutenant of infantry, 
 for our service is so interesting, and at the same time so valu 
 able, that I would not exchange places with a field officer of
 
 384 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 infantry. Perhaps I may get my battery one of these days ; 
 if I should not, you must not think that I am by any means 
 thrown away. I came by accident into this Company, and 
 have now done my duty for eighteen months without much 
 cessation, and if promotion should come to me I would accept 
 it, but I would not seek it. 
 
 [The leave of absence having been sent, he was at home 
 
 for a few days.] 
 
 BROOKS' STATION, VA., March 30, 1863. 
 
 .... I am once more back again in camp, settled clown to 
 my old work, and am able to look back on my hurried visit 
 home ; although everything passed so rapidly as to make the 
 whole seem like a dream, hardly more vivid than many dreams 
 of home which I have had in camp and bivouac, yet there was 
 an inexpressible satisfaction in meeting you all face to face 
 once more, before entering upon the distractions and occupa 
 tions of the spring campaign. .r 
 
 [After a few days spent in New York, he went to Annapolis 
 for a day, and then on to Washington.] 
 
 I left the Ebbitt House at Washington on Thursday, for 
 the 8 A. M. boat. By 3 p. M. I was at Brooks' Station, the 
 Captain having come to the cars to meet me, while in the back 
 ground stood Glenmore with the horses, and I felt that I was 
 once more in the traces, and must buckle down to work. The 
 next morning an accident happened which might have resulted 
 seriously, if it had occurred in the night time, and as it was, 
 it came near destroying all our worldly goods. Shortly after 
 breakfast, as I was talking with the Captain, I heard a great 
 shouting and yelling, by our quarters, and looking round I 
 saw the tent occupied by Lieutenant Carlisle and myself in a 
 blaze. In a moment, a half a dozen men were cutting at the 
 tent ropes, pulling up the pegs, and tearing away the tent, to 
 get the burning mass away from our beds, and trunks, and 
 clothes ; in this we succeeded entirely, but I burned the fin 
 gers of my left hand considerably. We immediately set to 
 work to get a new house over our heads ; men were sent off to 
 cut trees, and horses to drag them, and by night a stately edi-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 385 
 
 fice of logs had arisen, and by spreading a fly on top, we made 
 a shelter for our goods from the rain, which was beginning to 
 fall. The next day the house had its chinks stopped with 
 chips, and plastered with mud ; a mason from my section took 
 the contract for building the chimney, which, with a foundation 
 of stone, and a continuation of brick, would shame that of 
 many a farmer's house in Virginia. A nice frame door of 
 canvas stretched on boards was made. We moved into our 
 new residence last night, and found it far more roomy and 
 airy than the tent had been ; roof twice as high, and a nice, 
 open fire-place, which gives out far more heat than the old 
 stove had done, so that we do not repine at all at the confla 
 gration. I shall not be sorry to get on the move soon. Our 
 present camping-ground was excellent for winter, but it is too 
 low and marshy for spring, and will be unhealthy before long. 
 Since I began to write this letter, I have been called off to 
 look .after one of my corporals, who had been taken suddenly 
 ill. I brought him to the Division hospital, where the doctor 
 told me it was congestive fever, and kept him there. 
 
 BROOKS' STATION, VA., April 11, 1863. 
 
 Here we are still lying, lapped in inactivity, waiting for fine 
 weather and roads practicable for artillery-carriages and team 
 wagons, and in the meantime fretting our very hearts out with 
 ennui and spring restlessness, which can find no outlet nor 
 object upon which to exert itself. But I know that you will 
 be kind and considerate enough to make allowances for the 
 stupefying influences of idleness and winter quarters, and will 
 not refuse to accept a commonplace letter, made up out of 
 nothing, just as you would one setting forth the " moving ac 
 cidents " of march and bivouac, and picket and foraging, and 
 " hair-breadth 'scapes in the imminent deadly breach." The 
 actors now are languid officers wearing new uniforms, drink 
 ing wine and making visits; lazy men with decent jackets, 
 clean buttons, and washed faces ; horses fat, guns polished, 
 carriages painted, harness cleaned ; the epoch of reviews, in 
 spections, ladies in camp, soft bread, commissary whiskey, and 
 25
 
 386 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 furloughs to New York. I wave a bit of paper containing the 
 magic words, " March-orders," and, presto ! change. You 
 see, on a spring evening, our Battery coming into camp, after 
 a long day's march, and I can imagine that you ask, " Are 
 those dirty creatures on horseback the same with those fine 
 officers whom we saw last winter? Are those wild and ragged 
 animals those well-clad soldiers ? And what made them ex 
 change their horses for these meagre brutes?" You then see, 
 further, how, after a most scanty meal, both on the part of 
 men and beasts, they all lie down on the bare ground, and 
 sleep most soundly, perhaps in mud and rain, until the bugle 
 blows the reveille at sunrise, and then again to the road ; or 
 perhaps they " take position," and have a fight. And yet, 
 strange as it may seem, the latter kind of life, with all its pri 
 vations, is infinitely superior to the former, comfortable as it 
 may be ; for one who has youth and health, and an animating 
 principle of action within, it is full of zest and interest, and I 
 do not know when I have felt a more joyous elevation of 
 spirits, than when riding through Virginia oak woods, on 
 some lovely summer morning, a good horse under me, the 
 music of birds above, and below, the creaking of caissons, and 
 the ringing of "jingling bridle-reins," and the inspiring pros 
 pect of a conflict with an enemy a few miles ahead. 
 
 My first day in camp was celebrated by the burning down 
 of my tent, from which I had great difficulty in rescuing my 
 clothes and books. Some of my friends hinted that I had got 
 my house insured when I was at New York, and had then set 
 it on fire to get the insurance, but, probable as this hypothesis 
 might seem, I am myself inclined to think it became ignited 
 from a spark falling upon the canvas, which was already as 
 dry as tinder. However, I did not repine at my loss, but set 
 the men of my section to work, house-building, immediately. 
 
 So now we have a shanty, put up in two days, far more 
 comfortable than a tent, and have so far had two weeks enjoy 
 ment of it ; next winter I intend to put up such a house as 
 soon as we go into winter-quarters. Perhaps you think that 
 I am mistaken in saying " next winter," as if I had no doubt
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 387 
 
 of our still being in the field ; I reply that I can hardly hope 
 for such decided successes, before that time, as to permit of a 
 reduction of the army, and my maxim is to be provided for 
 the worst, and above all things not to under-estimate our 
 enemies. It will take all the men we can bring into the field, 
 and all the energy those men possess, to make a decided im 
 pression on the rebels this year ; I believe in not being ele 
 vated or thrown off our guard by success, and not unduly de 
 pressed by the want of it, but to keep steadily on at our work, 
 until it is finished. And even then it will be better to be joy 
 ful, than boastful or triumphant ; this war will bring one ad 
 vantage at least, if it cures us of these disgusting qualities. 
 
 President Lincoln reviewed our Corps yesterday, and I, for 
 one, did not feel ashamed of our old Eleventh Corps, and I 
 doubt if the President has seen, in the whole Army of the 
 Potomac, a hardier or more soldierly looking set of men. He 
 rode past on a splendid black horse, followed by his two little 
 boys, on ponies, and then came an enormous and splendid 
 cortege of at least two hundred officers 
 
 The weather, after great changefulness, many an unseason 
 able snow and rain storm, has at last apparently settled down 
 fine, the roads are rapidly drying up, and we may look for 
 marching orders shortly now. The air is delightfully soft and 
 mild, and the grass is sprouting. I send you a little sprig of 
 trailing arbutus from near our camp ; it does not grow here 
 in the same profusion as in Western Virginia, where I used 
 to pluck it in long streamers, and twist it round my hat. 
 
 BATTLE OF CHANCELLORSVILLK. 
 
 BROOKS' STATION, May 14, 1863. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, Since we came back to this camp, I 
 have been very much occupied with reports, inventories, and 
 other matters which are necessarily attendant upon a great 
 battle, and so I just dispatched you a line on the 6th. I have 
 felt very much depressed in spirits, and hardly equal to hav 
 ing a good talk, even with you. But I have to-day received 
 your letter, dated May 5, and I feel impelled to let you know
 
 388 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 all about it at once, that you and the friends at home, who are 
 the only ones whose opinion I care much for, may not be led 
 by newspaper stories or prejudiced reports, to do injustice to 
 our Corps, whose misdeeds are now in every one's mouth, and 
 upon whom is cast the entire weight of blame, that belongs in 
 higher quarters. 
 
 I do not know that I can do better than tell you about the 
 whole affair from the beginning of the march on, as you may 
 take an interest in what is already beginning to be historic. 
 The first " eight days rations," which we draw in the expecta 
 tion of making our attempt, about the middle of April, were 
 quietly consumed in camp, as a series of violent storms 
 swelled the streams, and made moving impracticable, but on 
 Sunday, April 26, we received a renewal of the same order, 
 which was speedily complied with, and soon after came the 
 order of march, which was to begin at 5^ o'clock the next 
 morning. At about midnight who should turn up but our 
 Paymaster, and as the rolls were all signed, he made a quick 
 job of it, and paid the Battery off in just thirteen minutes ; 
 this added to the excitement of breaking up winter-quarters, 
 drove away sleep from the camp, and the hum of conversation 
 and laughter was heard until the bugle blew reveille, and we 
 prepared to bid farewell to our pleasant winter-quarters, little 
 thinking that in ten days more we should be re-occupying 
 them again, broken but not beaten. Everything was packed 
 up, six days forage was fastened on the pieces and caissons, 
 and on the off horses, shelter-tents were distributed among 
 the men, while our comfortable wall tents and stately Sibleys 
 were left standing, for the benefit of the Hospital Department, 
 a branch of the service destined in a few days to surpass all 
 others in importance. Our march was at first rather slow, as 
 the Second and Third Divisions, which lay more towards the 
 front, had first to get their unwieldy lengths in motion. Every 
 thing not absolutely necessary had been curtailed ; one am 
 bulance accompanied each brigade, but not a team-wagon was 
 to be seen in the whole line of march, the trains being all in 
 the rear, and arranged in the order in which they were likely
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 389 
 
 to be used, viz : ammunition, ambulances, supplies. Every 
 man had eight days rations and sixty rounds of ammunition, 
 and thus provided, we could afford to have our teams in the 
 rear and to move on in light marching rig. 
 
 The first day we reached Hartwood church, a distance of 
 about fifteen miles \ but even this march, though not a long 
 one, tried the infantry very much, as they were soft from the 
 long idleness of winter-quarters, and their haversacks and 
 cartridge-boxes were unusually heavy. 
 
 At different points on the road we were joined by the Twelfth 
 Corps, General Slocum, and the Fifth Corps, General Meade, 
 which fell in behind us. The next day we reached Kelly's 
 Ford early in the afternoon, and went into camp, preserving 
 the utmost silence, all orders being given by word of mouth 
 without drum-beat or bugle signal, and the men were not per 
 mitted to show themselves on the bank. The value of these 
 precautions was shown by the fact that we took the enemy 
 entirely by surprise ; a detachment from Steinwehr's Division 
 crossed the river, drove the enemy out of the rifle pits, and 
 occupied the opposite shore, and then, with great dispatch and 
 success, the engineers laid down the pontoons, and, under 
 cover of night, our whole Corps passed the river and gained 
 the heights about half a mile back. This was a pretty hard 
 job for the artillery, as they sent us no guide to take us through 
 the level swamp lying between the river and the hill ; and we 
 floundered about in mud and mire until nearly daybreak ; two 
 hours sleep, on a plank taken from a fence, and a wash in a 
 dirty pool, quite refreshed me, and by six o'clock we stood in 
 readiness to renew our march, now upon the south side of the 
 Rappahannock. The Twelfth Corps crossed at daybreak, and 
 filed past us, taking the advance, and the Fifth Corps followed 
 us in the rear. We marched steadily on, the roads were good 
 and we were in high spirits, and everything looked well. 
 Before long we struck upon the Fredericksburg plank-road, 
 and when approaching the ford over the Rapidan, at Germania 
 Mills, the artillery of our Corps was ordered to pass through 
 the infantry of the Twelfth Corps at double-quick, so as to
 
 390 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 take position and drive away any hostile artillery that might 
 dispute the passage. While trotting over this road, which was 
 a good deal worn and full of ruts, we had a chapter of dis 
 agreeable accidents ; a caisson, in the first section, broke in 
 the middle from a sudden jolt, and two men sitting on the 
 rear box were thrown violently to the ground and seriously 
 injured, one having his ribs broken and his hip put out 
 Almost at the same time a man was jolted off from a cais 
 son, in the second section, and the wheel passed over his leg, 
 cracking the bone. I had ordered my drivers not to go quite 
 so rapidly and had no trouble. Our arrival at Germania 
 Mills, on the Rapidan, was so sudden that a body of rebel 
 infantry and cavalry had scant time to get across the river 
 and escape, while a company of pioneers and engineers, who 
 were engaged in building a large bridge over the river, and 
 had all the timbers ready collected and shaped for that pur 
 pose, were made prisoners, to the number of about eighty 
 men. It would seem from the building of this bridge, that 
 Lee had the intention of making much the same movement 
 that we were making, going to one of the upper fords of 
 the Rappahannock in order to cross and flank us, and thus 
 we had anticipated him in his own maneuver. Our own en 
 gineers took hold of the bridge timber, and laid down enough 
 of the string pieces to enable the infantry to pass over dry 
 shod ; in the meantime the artillery had to ford the river, 
 which was no small undertaking, as the stream was deep, the 
 current very swift, and the bottom full of large stones. A line 
 of cavalry, standing over their girths in water, showed where 
 we were to pass ; but the violence of the current was so great, 
 and the footing so uncertain, that I felt almost sure that some 
 carriage would be swept away ; but nothing of the kind hap 
 pened, and, as our ammunition chests were pretty water-tight, 
 we managed to "keep our powder dry." I did not succeed 
 in doing the same by my own person, as my horse had to 
 swim once, which necessitated a very wet seat to me ; and the 
 Captain's horse went headforemost into a hole from which I 
 never expected to see him emerge. There were some ludi-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE 391 
 
 crous incidents ; one of the pack-mules, loaded on each side 
 with a box of rifle cartridges, walked deliberately off the string 
 piece into the river, saying, probably, with Hamlet, " Who 
 would fardels bear," etc. ; once in, a few desperate plunges 
 freed him from his burden and he swam ashore and rushed 
 off friskily, switching his tail as joyously as if he had not just 
 been a four-legged caisson, the slave of an ordnance officer. 
 When the Eleventh and Twelfth Corps were all safely over 
 the (Fifth Corps had crossed at another point) the bridge was 
 destroyed and our guns were planted along the banks to pre 
 vent the enemy from coming up in our rear from the direction 
 of Culpepper or Gordonsville, and disturbing our peaceful 
 slumbers, which we enjoyed that night in a pouring rain. 
 The next da}', April 30, we continued our line of march on 
 the Fredericksburg plank-road, passed through the small vil 
 lage of Wilderness, and advanced nearly to Chancellorsville, 
 where General Hooker had his head-quarters. General How 
 ard established his head-quarters near the intersection of the 
 Orange Court House road, or Plank Road, with another road 
 running about northwest ; and our Division head-quarters was 
 at a farm-house upon the last-mentioned road, about half a 
 mile from the intersection. Close by this farm-house our Bat 
 tery went into camp, and General McLean's Brigade lay all 
 around us, the Seventeenth Connecticut to our right, the Fifty- 
 fifth, Twenty-fifth, Seventy-fifth, and One Hundred and Seventh 
 Ohio behind us, and to the left of us. The point of attack 
 indicated to us was the front, viz., towards the Plank Road, 
 which came converging from the southwest, and upon which, 
 the theory seemed to be, the rebels were sure to make their 
 attack ; the idea did not seem to occur to the generals that 
 the enemy might go a little further to the west and northwest, 
 and attack our right wing on the flank and rear. Friday, May 
 i, came, and the infantry commenced entrenching themselves 
 in the road, front as before to the Plank Road, by digging rifle 
 pits and banking the earth up on the fence, securing it with 
 fence rail and strong pegs. In the evening there was consid 
 erable firing to the left, with some musketry ; we sent off our
 
 392 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 first section, with Colonel Gilsa's Brigade, to take position on 
 the extreme right and protect the flank ; a very good precau 
 tion against an enemy of moderate force, but not much against 
 forty thousand men. 
 
 The next morning we received an order from General 
 Howard to carefully measure the distance from our Battery 
 to a clear elevated spot in front, near the Plank Road, on 
 which it was apprehended the rebels might endeavor to place 
 a battery and shell our position, and we were told that " we 
 would find it of the greatest importance to have an accurate 
 knowledge of the distance," thus showing that still the attack 
 was expected in front, and a heavy flank attack not dreamed 
 of. In the meantime Jackson was silently massing his army 
 in front of the First Brigade, and on its flank, and yet with 
 such perfect secrecy and skill that the miserable scouts we 
 sent out reported three or four hundred dismounted cavalry, 
 and nothing more. Lieutenant Bohn, thinking that dis 
 mounted cavalry were getting too numerous, threw a couple 
 of shrapnels among them but was ordered by General Devens 
 to stop, as he was " shooting our own men." About this time 
 General Hooker rode down through our lines, seemed well 
 satisfied with the state of affairs, and returned ; and yet at the 
 very moment when he cast his approving glance over the right 
 wing, the enemy's swarms were closing in upon it, unseen but 
 sure, and there was not a single cavalry vidette to bring us 
 certain information of this deadly snare. Frequent intelli 
 gence was sent both to Howard's and Hooker's head-quar 
 ters announcing the heavy massing of the enemy on the right, 
 and yet no reinforcements were sent, and no orders to retire 
 to a more favorable position. Perhaps they thought that our 
 weak Divisions, of about 4,000 each, were going separately to 
 withstand the sudden onset of ten times their number, and that 
 in a position most unfavorable, and where the intrenchments, 
 built against the front, were nothing but a weakness when 
 taken in flank. Noon came, no information of an attack, and 
 still we kept our guns trained on the clear spot in front. At 
 3 P. M., all was still ; suddenly the silence was broken by the
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE, 393 
 
 shots of skirmishers, then sharp volleys of musketry with 
 rapid firing of canister from the right, where Lieutenant Bohn 
 was with his section, and almost at the same moment our Bat 
 tery was enfiladed from the right by the enemy's shells which 
 fell and burst with most fatal effect. The first shell struck 
 two pole horses in Lieutenant Carlisle's section, then burst, and 
 one piece cut in two the pole of my first piece, while another 
 went on and killed a lead horse on the second. The next 
 two shells were almost equally destructive. We endeavored 
 to place our pieces in the new direction, but before we could do 
 so, the First Brigade came, forced back on McLean's, bring 
 ing Bonn's section with it, and it was impossible to fire for 
 fear of killing our own men, who blocked up the road. So 
 we had nothing for it, but to retire to the first hill, where we 
 could take position and accomplish something. I limbered 
 up my first piece with the limber of the caisson and then got 
 both my pieces off safe, retiring quietly. I was just about to 
 mount my horse when the attack began, and gave him to a 
 cannoneer to hold while I unlimbered the caisson. While he 
 was holding him a bullet hit the poor little Frank on the 
 haunch and he broke away and ran past the Battery which 
 was now moving on ahead, giving the Captain and the men 
 the idea that I had been shot from his back. Well I got my 
 piece off all right and followed on foot ; as I came a couple 
 of rods further where, through a depression in the ground, the 
 pieces had passed from the field into the road, I found Lieu 
 tenant Carlisle with his whole section in a sorry plight, all 
 the horses on one gun had been shot, and all but the pole 
 horse on the other, together with two or three of the drivers, 
 and in a fit of desperation C. had ordered his men to unlim- 
 ber and fire canister. But the depression was so deep that no 
 sight could be got of the enemy who were on the plain above- 
 I took hold of the third piece and tried to help run it up the 
 bank, but we could not do it. I then sprang to the other gun 
 and told Carlisle that the only possible safety was to cut out 
 the dead horses, limber up the gun and take it off with the 
 pole horse alone. It had been great folly to unlimber then,
 
 394 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 in the first place, and though he was brave as a lion the pre 
 dicament rather puzzled him, as well it might. The sergeant 
 cut out the lead and middle horses, and the corporal raised 
 the trail to limber up the gun when a shot struck him, and he 
 dropped the trail on my toes, at the same moment the rebs 
 rushed over the hill and poured a volley into us at very close 
 range, severely wounding poor Carlisle in three places. I 
 don't see how I escaped. I suppose I owed it to the fact that 
 I was on foot. I then made rapid tracks to catch my sec 
 tion ; the first hill was full of artillery in position, and firing, 
 and our Battery had found no room to take position, and so was 
 compelled to go further back. At the Third Division breast 
 works I amused myself in rallying our infantry, but they could 
 not be held. 
 
 The vehemence, energy, and desperation with which the 
 rebels came on was really superb, and the numbers were so 
 overwhelming that a brigade or division line of battle made 
 no show at all, but was immediately flanked and enveloped on 
 both wings. The Third Division, commanded by the cele 
 brated Republican orator Schurz, did worst of all ; it vanished 
 like the dust of the balance at the first assault, and gave no sup 
 port to McLean's gallant Brigade which did its best to keep 
 back the tide of gray backs, but in vain, and Steinwehr's First 
 Brigade was too weak to stand up against the refluent wave 
 of Schurz's runaways. I don't tell you anything now from 
 hearsay, but what I saw with my own eyes, for as I knew that 
 my section was not in position on this hill, and was in safety 
 on this road, I felt some curiosity to see how the thing went 
 and so I took it pretty easy, keeping as near the enemy's front 
 and our rear as I conveniently could. 
 
 All at once I heard my name called, and saw at my side 
 Major Fineauff of the One Hundred and Fifty-third Pennsyl 
 vania Regiment, of whom you have heard me speak as my 
 fellow student at Berlin, one of my few friends out here on 
 the field. He had been on General Devens' staff, and -was 
 wounded in the leg, or rather lamed and severely contused. 
 I lugged him along for some distance, resisting his frequent
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 395 
 
 requests to me to lay him down and leave him. I gave him 
 a drink of whiskey which gave him life, and at last had the 
 satisfaction of leaving him with a party of his own regiment 
 who brought him safely off. Arrived at the foot of the hill 
 leading to the plateau on which General Hooker's head-quar 
 ters stood, /. e., the village of Chancellorsville, I found the 
 Twelfth Corps hastening to our relief, and across the crest of 
 the hill a large number of batteries, mostly brass twelve 
 pounders, medium range, placed in position, while most of the 
 rifled long range guns had been sent further to the rear. I 
 spent some time in searching for our Battery, but without 
 success, and then went back to the hill and served as can 
 noneer in Dilger's Battery of our Corps, during the whole of 
 the fierce attack of the rebels that ensued. It was queer that 
 the officer in whose section I served, had within a fortnight 
 been a trembling candidate before a board of examination of 
 which I had been secretary, and where I had put him through 
 with all sorts of questions. At the foot of the hill was a wood, 
 which was held partly by the rebs, and partly by the Twelfth 
 Corps \ the enemy made several attempts to drive our men out, 
 and the steady roll of musketry was really appalling. Once 
 they succeeded, but then the batteries on the hill opening drove 
 them back with great loss, and our men retook their position. 
 The next (Sunday) morning I found my section in the right, in 
 the new line, with the First Corps, General Reynolds. The rest 
 of the Battery was at the United States Ford, to which place 
 most of the long range artillery was sent, as being of little use 
 in such close hand to hand bush fighting. Here I was ordered 
 to report to General Reynolds with two guns of Schirmer's 
 Battery and my own section. General Reynolds sent me to 
 General Wadsworth, who commanded one of his Divisions, and 
 he placed me in a fine position, above his Division, who were 
 splendidly intrenched, and I got the regiment which covered 
 me to throw up a breastwork before my gun, high enough to 
 cover the bodies of the gunners. While reporting to General 
 Wadsworth I had the pleasure of meeting young Carrington 
 of the Class of 1859, who was on his staff. There were ten
 
 3Q6 LE7'TERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 pieces of us all together on this hill, and I longed for an at 
 tack, as we had capital infantry with us, and could have re 
 pulsed almost anything. But nothing did turn up then, and 
 towards evening I was ordered down to the United States 
 Ford, where we lay for a day and a half, and then, on the 
 5th, crossed the river in a dense fog, and marched back to our 
 old camp, arriving here in a rain and hail storm which was 
 the most extensive one I ever saw. The hailstones being 
 in some instances, actually larger than hen's eggs, and knock 
 ing men off their horses. So, here we are, after an absence of 
 eight days, in the old camp again, having lost two guns, three 
 caissons, twenty-five horses, one officer, and thirteen men, 
 having not had the smallest chance to accomplish anything 
 valuable. In fact there was far too much artillery in that 
 fight, and too many rifled guns which were of no use at all. 
 If a battery was not very well supported by infantry, it might 
 be taken in one desperate rush, as there was no good oppor 
 tunity to retire. With regard to the conduct of the Eleventh 
 Corps, I have heard some say that they would not fight be 
 cause they did not have Sigel \ this is absurd, and yet allow 
 ance must be made for the great influence on the men, 
 produced by their losing the man on whom they leaned unre 
 servedly, and whom they would follow to the death, and get 
 ting in his place a person unknown, peculiarly uncongenial to 
 the German mind, and considered by them as a parson in uni 
 form. But any Corps so scattered, and strung along an ex 
 tended line, could not have failed to be overwhelmed by the 
 force brought so suddenly against it ; and a most steadfast 
 bearing to the enemy would have brought with it annihila 
 tion, without staying their progress ; would have doubled the 
 lists of killed and wounded without having been of benefit. 
 I know that the regiments by our Battery, viz., McLean's Brig 
 ade, fought as well as men can fight, and only fell back when 
 further fighting was madness. The fact lies in this nut-shell. 
 General Hooker allowed General Howard to scatter his corps 
 along too great a line, and then allowed the Corps thus scat 
 tered to be flanked, and now it seems to be the fashion to
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 397 
 
 throw the blame of this mismanagement upon the conduct 
 of the Corps, which seems to me most unjust. Well ! enough 
 of this vindication ; if any of my friends ask what I have to 
 say about the " flight," " panic," etc., of the Eleventh Corps, 
 you can show them this. Both of my horses were hit, 
 but neither severely. Jenny got a spent ball right on the 
 side of her nose, but the wound is now entirely healed. 
 Frank got a ball on his haunch, but the wound was improving 
 finely, when, what should he do the other night but commit 
 suicide, by hanging himself in his halter ; in the morning he 
 was quite dead. He was a beauty and a fine trotter. I felt 
 miserably about it. My poor darkey boy took it so much to 
 heart, that, after burying him with many tears, he could not 
 bear to stay any longer about the place and decamped, which 
 was even more painful to me than losing the horse, as I had 
 taken much interest in him and was really fond of him. We 
 were afraid that we might lose Lieutenant Carlisle ; he was 
 shot in the arm, the leg, and the side. What troubled him 
 the most was the loss of his section, and when he became de 
 lirious he was crying cannoneers to do this and that and not 
 to desert the gun. He is better now and has been sent off to 
 Washington with a fair prospect of recovery. Most of our 
 wounded are doing well except the Corporal who was shot at 
 my side ; he will probably lose his leg. As to the whole affair 
 I do not feel discouraged. I am sure that the enemy received 
 greater loss than he inflicted, and that he cannot stand 
 many such blows, while we on the contrary seem, like An 
 taeus, to gather strength from our falls. The death of Stone 
 wall Jackson is a great misfortune to the rebels, but I do not 
 feel like exulting over the grave of such a brave, wise, and en 
 ergetic antagonist " peace be to his ashes." You must make 
 this long letter do for sometime now, as I have a great deal of 
 writing to do. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 BROOKS' STATION, May 19, 1863. 
 
 MY DEAR FRIEND, Although I have several debts to pay 
 that are older than yours, and you stand by no means near
 
 398 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 the top of my list, yet your last letter dated April 23, but 
 which I did not receive until about May 9, came to me so 
 pleasantly upon my return to this camp, breathing so much 
 quiet, and peace, and happiness, after my hard marching, and 
 bloody fighting, that I feel peculiarly impelled to send you a 
 few words in reply ; and these words shall be, if you please, 
 not at all about the war and the late battle, but mere chat and 
 friendly talk. If you would like to hear about our march to 
 Kelly's Ford, our passage of the Rappahannock, and then of 
 the Rapidan, the battle at Chancellorsville on Saturday 
 with an explanation of how the misfortune of our Corps oc 
 curred, I would rather have you ask my mother to read you 
 that part of my last letter to her, than write it all over again 
 myself. Suffice it to say, that I stayed with another officer's 
 section in the face of the enemy, and tried to help it to get off 
 until I was the only man on the spot unhurt, two corporals 
 being shot down at my side, and the officer receiving three 
 bullets ; I probably escaped by being on foot, and did not 
 think it my duty to stay behind to rally the infantry, that not 
 being a branch of my business. I hate to brag, or to talk 
 about what I did, but it becomes necessary sometimes, when 
 the corps to which one belongs is charged by the newspapers 
 with having indulged in a universal panic and flight. I only 
 know that if I had one of the reporters for those sheets in my 
 tent for a brief half hour alone, one of us two would have a 
 badly punched head. But enough of this. 
 
 Your letter treating of music, and pictures, and children, 
 was to me indeed " humanizing," and I could not help asking 
 myself how it was that my nature had not become more bru- 
 talized by my life of" murder and rapine," as the " Richmond 
 Enquirer " would call it, but on the contrary, became as sensi 
 tive as ever upon your mention of those tender and beautiful 
 objects ; I think that when a certain love for them has become 
 a part of a man's nature, the absence of them, and the want 
 of a cultivation of the corresponding tastes, does not really 
 diminish this love, but rather, other ruder tastes are etched 
 away by the influence of time and use, leaving these in bolder
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 399 
 
 relief. I don't know whether this be correct metaphysics, but 
 it is true as far as I am concerned. What you tell me of this 
 book of " Mendelssohn's Letters," interested me much, and if 
 you really can part with the book, without hope of ever seeing 
 it again, I should be much obliged to you for sending it to me. 
 By my hand lies a very jolly little book entitled " Reisehu- 
 moresken ; auf einer Wanderung durch die Schweiz und Ob- 
 eritalien," which has to us here a peculiar interest from its 
 being an only memento of a very gallant officer, Captain von 
 Mensel, of General McLean's staff, with whom I had a pleas 
 ant talk half an hour before the sudden attack, in which he 
 disappeared mysteriously, just like Ed. Blake at Cedar Moun 
 tain, and we cannot learn whether he was buried promiscu 
 ously on the field, or whether he perished in that burning hos 
 pital. These genial little books of travel are to me very 
 delightful, and it requires very little imagination for one to 
 place himself in an Italian vettura, or on the bow of one of 
 those ridiculous little " Dampfers," on a Swiss lake, and to 
 listen to the homely humor of the German, the gabble of Eng 
 lish girls, and the ignorant impudence of their companions. 
 
 I sometimes like to take a retrospect of the years that are 
 just past, and never more than just at this time, and in this 
 month ; in 1857, I was a week out of New York on the 
 Australia ; in 1858, I had just left you and The Form, at 
 Athens, and had gone to Naples ; in 1859, 1 was gnashing my 
 
 teeth over a certain ; in 1860, I was being admitted to 
 
 the bar ; in 1861, I was sporting a gray jacket at Washington ; 
 in 1862, I was supporting a starving officer's mess at Frank 
 lin, Virginia, among the mountains, with the fruits of my angle. 
 And, after this "roaming with a hungry heart," I also share 
 Ulysses' determination, " to strive, to seek, to find, and not to 
 yield ; " every defeat of ours puts the end farther off, but 
 makes our work more sure and thorough, and the final peace 
 more deep and noble ; the longer we work upon the laying of 
 our foundation stones, the more pains we take with the selec 
 tion of our site and the nature of the ground we build on, the 
 more beautiful and lasting will be our edifice, which we can
 
 4OO LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 then entrust to the religion of coming centuries to complete, 
 and it will shine from its rocky base to the pilgrims of the 
 future, as the Parthenon did to us five years ago, beautiful, 
 golden, when we sailed up to the Piraeus. And yet home, 
 friends, genial society, books, music, all these are so delightful, 
 that I do not dare to think of them much ; the only way is to 
 keep the nose steadily down on the grindstone of duty, and 
 then you don't bother about anything else. I like to hear 
 from you very much, for you have such a straight-forward way 
 of going at things that I feel perfect confidence in all your ut 
 terances, and take them all as gospel, feeling at times almost 
 willing to " lay my sweet hands in yours, and trust to you." 
 
 What comes hard for me to stand just now, is going to the 
 hospitals ; I am not exactly right well, and the sight of so 
 much suffering among gallant boys who never wavered on the 
 field, is often too much for me ; and yet I try to go, for our 
 poor fellows feel pleased when their officers come in often and 
 inquire about them. The other day I went to see a corporal 
 of our Battery, one of the two shot down at my side ; he was 
 on the field and in the enemy's hands several days before be 
 ing sent over, and his wounds had been neglected. He was a 
 very fine-looking young Irishman, with a good organization 
 and deep susceptibility to both pain and pleasure ; one of his 
 wounds had affected the nerves, and the pain came in great 
 wrenches and spasms that made him gnash his teeth and beat 
 his feet on the bed in agony. I became so sick that I could 
 hardly get to the door. The other corporal, who was hit with 
 in half a foot from me, received a bad shot in the foot, and 
 came so exhausted to the hospital, that the doctor would not 
 take his leg off; to-day they have given him up, as mortifica 
 tion has set in. When I see these things, I am perfectly as 
 tounded at the capacity of delicate ladies, like Miss S. W. 
 and my Cousin A., to go through the scenes with composure, 
 and yet to be benign and helpful at the same time. I never 
 appreciated before the greatness of the service and the sacri 
 fice. But still these acts of devotion and self-sacrifice are not 
 without their stimulus and reward, too ; I have never seen
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 401 
 
 anything that went more to my heart than this ; after I had 
 sat down by the bed of a poor mangled hero from the ranks, 
 had spoken to him words of praise for his conduct, sympathy 
 for his pain, and offered to do what I could for him, to see his 
 eyes watch me as I left the tent, and to hear his grateful 
 "Thank you for your kindness, Lieutenant." I intend to try 
 to overcome the prejudices of my sensitive Wheeler nose, and 
 
 to do something more in this way Think of me 
 
 as in pretty good health, and remembering you with constant 
 affection. 
 
 To H. N. C. 
 
 HEAD-QUARTERS I3TH N. Y. BATTERY, 
 BROOKS' STATION, May 21, 1863. 
 
 The immediate toils of battle are over ; the wounded are 
 either agonizing and dying with their painful and mortifying 
 wounds in the field hospitals, or where their hits were slight, 
 are hopping around on sticks and crutches, and looking 
 eagerly forward to the time when they shall be sufficiently re 
 stored to exchange the half-rations of the hospital for the full 
 fare of the camp ; and the uninjured, having fairly rested 
 themselves from fatigue and excitement, are beginning to feel 
 ennui and fatigue much more severely than from the hardest 
 march, and to wish that Hooker would hurry up again and 
 make another " reconnoisance in force" across the Rappahan- 
 nock, but this time with fuller results. I hope that you have 
 not allowed yourself to be so prejudiced by the newspapers, 
 against our Corps, the Eleventh, as not to be willing to hear a 
 word of explanation. One very great disadvantage under which 
 we labored was, that shortly before the march, our well-trusted 
 Sigel was replaced in the command of the Corps by General 
 Howard, a stranger, and one in whom we had no confidence ; 
 and still further, our Division commander, McLean, who was 
 greatly beloved by his troops, was superseded by Devens, also 
 an utter stranger, and one who brought with him mostly a new 
 and inexperienced staff. The disposition of the Corps in the 
 line of battle at Chancellorsville was also very faulty, it being 
 stretched out over a long line, a mile away from the Twelfth 
 26
 
 402 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Corps, and connected with it only by a few pickets. Then 
 there was no cavalry to scout on the flank, and the conse 
 quence was, that while we were expecting patiently an attack 
 from the front, the wily Jackson had massed his forces on our 
 right, and even thrown part of them into our rear, thus com 
 pletely enveloping our Division, and exposing the men, some 
 of whom were raw troops, to a fire on three sides at once. 
 The enemy's attack was in great force and most fierce, his men 
 advancing steadily at a rapid walk, loading and firing as they 
 came, and our First Brigade narrowly escaped being taken 
 prisoners en masse. There was no " coign of vantage," no ad 
 vantageous position, at which to make a stand, as the breast 
 works and rifle pits had all been constructed with reference to 
 an attack from the front, and consequently were enfiladed by 
 an attack from the right. In fact, we had no chance ; and the 
 men who, at Bull Run, under Sigel, kept the heights of 
 Groveton for a long summer's day, against the desperate as 
 saults of Longstreet's whole army, finally driving him back, 
 and who came the next day to the rescue of the fugitive and 
 demoralized army of the Peninsula, would not rally under a 
 general whose arrangements had proved so futile and decep 
 tive, and to rally under whom would have been to meet re 
 peated defeat and disgrace, without profit. I am sorry to say, 
 that General Howard, on his first coming to the Corps, made 
 himself conspicuous by his zeal in promoting religious obser 
 vances, and in showing his respect for the Sabbath, to say noth 
 ing of a somewhat ostentatious display of personal piety, and 
 now his religious character has to bear the burden of his mili 
 tary errors, and it is said pretty generally, and that with jus 
 tice, that he obeyed only the last half of the command, 
 " Watch and pray." Don't suppose now, that I look at this 
 in a flippant way at all ; I think that no characters are more 
 admirable than those of men like Havelock, Hedley Vicars, 
 or our own Commodore Foote, who, being once soldiers, did 
 their duty and their work as such with all their might, and yet 
 were none the less thoughtful, earnest, and pious men. But 
 with regard to our General, I feel very much as Cromwell did
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 403 
 
 about that cavalry officer who began to pray aloud in his saddle 
 just as the Ironsides were about to charge at Marston Moor. 
 I hope that he will be removed from command before we go 
 into fight again, for hardly a man in the Corps has the slight 
 est confidence in his ability or capacity, and if he is to lead 
 
 us, the greatest disasters may be expected In this 
 
 fearfully hot weather which we are having just now, I often 
 sigh for the mountains of Western Virginia, in which we were 
 campaigning a year ago, and at times my thoughts go still 
 farther back, to the deck of the old Australia, six years ago ; 
 do you remember, at about this date we had got well free from 
 the storms and head-winds of the Gulf Stream, and were mak 
 ing good time before a fine southwest wind, and after the hot 
 day was over, doubly enjoying the cool evening walk on deck, 
 and many a homesick talk about the friends who had been for 
 a fortnight under the western horizon. That summer and au 
 tumn which we spent together, and during which we learned 
 to know and love each other better than before, has always 
 had to my mind and memory a peculiarly rosy and pleasant 
 hue, and I look forward to no greater pleasure than that of 
 sitting down with you at some future day, and, armed with our 
 respective diaries as books of reference and suggestion, wan 
 dering through the Louvre once more, visiting Belgium and the 
 Rhine, and clambering over Switzerland with our Alpenstocks. 
 This has all been brought very freshly before my mind by a 
 jolly little German book which I have been reading, called 
 " Reisehumoresken," a vacation ramble through Upper Italy 
 and Switzerland. The author, who was formerly correspond 
 ent of the " Cologne Gazette," is a keener observer of pecul 
 iarities and eccentricities in his fellow-travellers, than of the 
 marvels of nature, or rather, he seems to restrain the expres 
 sion of his enthusiasm on this latter point, leaving it to be in 
 ferred more from hints than from glowing descriptions, but 
 still, what he says about the Monte Rosa region, which occu 
 pies almost half of a volume, made me feel more regretful 
 than ever that we did not diverge from the Rhone Valley 
 when at Leuk, and take in this superb mountain. If I recollect
 
 404 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 right, we had a battle royal on the subject, but it was finally 
 decided to abide by the original plan, unchangeable as the 
 laws of the Medes, which we had laid down with remorseless 
 pencil on Keller's map, in the fourth story of Meurice's. It 
 is rather aggravating to think of those delightful days, out 
 here where there is no genial society, nothing to read, and 
 where we vibrate from the stagnation and ennui of camp, to 
 the absorbing care and fatigue of the march, and the excite 
 ment of the battle ; in this too 
 
 " A sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering happier things." 
 
 For this reason I was glad that my furlough did not allow me 
 to remain longer at home, and thus get used to comfort and 
 to find the presence of friends a necessity. As it was, my visit 
 was so fleeting and short, that it seemed just as unreal as 
 some visits home which I have made in my sleep and from 
 which I have been summarily recalled by the sound of the 
 reveille bugle. I am in for steady work now until we go 
 again into winter-quarters, that is, if my life be spared so long, 
 and if I do not before that time receive some disabling wound. 
 I am, of course, not insensible of the very great disadvantage, 
 to a professional man, of losing several years at the very com 
 mencement of his career, of breaking away from his books and 
 papers to the rough and demoralizing life of a soldier, and 
 you may be sure that I would not do it if I did not consider 
 myself called to it by the voice of most sacred and imperative 
 duty. It astonishes me that any young man in the north, who 
 has his health and is bound by no family ties, can fail to feel 
 the same. It is a great work which will be done, and then 
 how shameful for a man to have to tell his children in after 
 years, " I looked on, while others braved the dangers and 
 wrought the deliverance." And yet, at the same time, I show 
 my own weakness and inconsistency, by my anxiety about my 
 brother, J. who is with General Peck at Suffolk, and whom I 
 would give my life to see safely at home again ; I don't be 
 lieve that my mother worries as much about him as I do.
 
 ARMY LIFE -AND SERVICE. 405 
 
 BROOKS' STATION, May 31, 1863. 
 
 . . . . There have been important changes in the Bat 
 tery since I last wrote you. Captain D. has sent in his resig 
 nation and General Howard, the next day, sent for me to re 
 port to him personally. I did so, and he received me very 
 kindly, asked me how long I had served with the Battery, 
 whether I had ever commanded it. whether I could drill it, 
 etc., and how we did in the late battle, and then dismissed 
 me, apparently well enough satisfied, for the Captain's resigna 
 tion was returned the same evening approved accompanied 
 by a pass to Washington and the next morning my nomina 
 tion as Captain, by the Chief of Artillery, went on to Gover 
 nor Seymour at Albany, so that, unless something unusual 
 happens, I shall before long receive my commission, and shall 
 then have the Battery in which I have so long served, for my 
 very own. You will believe me when I say, that while I feel 
 very glad at the prospect of receiving this promotion, this feel 
 ing is decidedly overbalanced by the hope of making the Bat 
 tery more useful and efficient, more capable of doing some 
 thing for the general cause. And this I believe that I can do. 
 The captain of a battery has a very independent position, 
 and it lies with him almost entirely whether his battery is a 
 good and serviceable one or not. 
 
 .... Please tell J. when you write that it is not impossi 
 ble that, in a few days, he will not have to lower his rank by 
 writing to me as Lieutenant any more. 
 
 BOONESBOROUGH, MD., July 9, 1863. 
 
 I eagerly take the first breathing moment to drop you a sin 
 gle line, to let you know that after all our fatiguing marches 
 and hard fighting I am still preserved for more service, and 
 am also in most excellent health. We have had unparalleled 
 hard work, marches daily of twenty to thirty miles, and are all 
 pretty well worn out. I won't attempt just now to tell you 
 anything about the battle of Gettysburg, except to say that 
 my Battery was hotly in action on all three days of the fight, 
 and did very good service. We were most of the time on
 
 406 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Cemetery Hill. On the ist, when poor Reynolds pushed us 
 all forward so rashly, we were in the extreme advance, and I 
 had one piece shot all to pieces, and when we fell back I was 
 obliged to leave it, but on the 5th, when we took possession 
 of the battle-field, I went out and got it and tinkered it up and 
 brought it off. Besides this I picked up an abandoned twelve- 
 pounder gun, belonging to the Third Corps, and thus came out 
 of the affair with five guns, while I went in with only four. Since 
 the battle we have been marching day and night, last night's 
 was about the first sleep I have had for a week. Worse yet, 
 it has rained incessantly, and I have hardly known what it 
 was to be dry. The battle was a splendid success ; all talk 
 about it being a drawn battle is absurd ; prisoners were taken 
 by the thousand and the rebel loss was fearful. 
 
 But I have no time to write more ; my pieces are in the 
 advance, in position, and we look for work. 
 
 I write sitting on a cracker-box on a caisson. 
 
 BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG. 
 
 WARRENTON JUNCTION, July 26, 1863. 
 
 DEAR GRANDFATHER AND AUNT, You at home will I think 
 begin to wonder where I am, and why I have not written home 
 before, but if you had known how hard we have been at work 
 and how constantly we have been marching, your wonder would 
 change into surprise and thankfulness that I have not been used 
 up entirely and that I am still able to do duty. As I am indebted 
 to you both for letters, I take this opportunity to write you a 
 double-barreled one, not knowing when I may have access to 
 pen and ink with enough of quiet leisure to compose my ideas. 
 From Boonesborough I dropped a line to mother, informing her 
 of my safety up to that point, but was not able to give her any 
 account of our doings and sufferings during the days of the bat 
 tle of Gettysburg. I will now give you some description of 
 those scenes from my point of view. After we had been quite 
 refreshed by our halt in the pleasant camp on Goose Creek, 
 and had, most luckily for us, got our horses into condition 
 again, we marched, on June 25, to Edwards' Ferry, and the
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 407 
 
 next morning crossed the river on our pontoons, and marched 
 up through Poolesville and past our old Camp Observation, 
 where I had had my first real experience of a soldier's life. 
 The streets of Poolesville were full of people, almost all of 
 them wearing the real old secesh scowl, and I did not see a 
 single United States flag displayed. The artillery took a 
 road for itself that day, in order not to be encumbered by the 
 infantry, and we made a march of about thirty miles to reach 
 Jefferson City, where we camped in long wet grass, exposed 
 to a heavy rain storm. The next morning my Battery marched 
 with one brigade to Burkettsville, which lies at the foot of 
 South Mountain, and was the scene of the battle of that name 
 in last September, at which the heroic General Reno lost his 
 life. Here we lived on the fat of the land, which is always one 
 of the perquisites and advantages of going off with an independ 
 ent force. The army had neither eaten out the country, nor 
 raised the prices extravagantly, consequently spring chicken, 
 fresh bread, milk, and butter were the order of the day. This 
 pleasant state of affairs lasted only a day and we had to rejoin 
 the Eleventh at Middletown, from which we marched, the same 
 afternoon, for Frederick City. Both at Middletown, and along 
 the road, were numerous instances of enthusiastic and out 
 spoken patriotism, which went right to our hearts, and made us 
 feel full of fight ; here a party of young girls and children stood 
 and waved handkerchiefs and tiny flags ; there a hotel or public 
 building displayed a good expanse of red, white, and blue 
 bunting; there a good old lady stood at her door with her 
 servants, and dispensed cups of cold water to every thirsty 
 soldier, while the gray-haired husband stood by her side, his 
 eyes half filled with patriotic and sympathizing tears, and 
 " Good luck to you boys, God bless you." Our whole march 
 in the fertile and beautiful county of Frederick was delightful ; 
 indeed its prosperity and richness, the "peace on earth and 
 good will toward men " that reigned there, seemed to us all 
 to be a type of our bountiful and happy Union, while the dev 
 astated crops, the deserted homesteads, the bitter and hostile 
 faces of Virginia which we had just left behind us, repre-
 
 408 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 sented, not less truthfully, the hideous and destructive nature 
 of Secession, as well as its results. The spirits of the whole 
 army were superb. When we passed through the towns flags 
 were displayed, music struck up, cheers rang along the column 
 of march and when camp was made, after a toilsome march, 
 singing was heard from the quarters of the weary, footsore 
 soldiers. 
 
 We passed through Frederick after nightfall, and did not 
 see the place ; the next day we marched to Emmettsburg and 
 rested there, preparatory to the approaching conflict. Early 
 on the ist of July we started for Gettysburg, about eleven 
 miles distant. I was ordered to report with my Battery to 
 General Steinwehr's Division, and thus got ahead of the other 
 batteries, which were in reserve with the First Division. We 
 were marching along, thinking of anything but an approach 
 ing fight, when suddenly one of General Howard's aids came 
 galloping up and ordered me forward at double-quick. The 
 roads were very stony, and my wheels were in very bad con 
 dition, but ahead I went ; the gun-carriages rattling and 
 bouncing in the air ; feed, rations, kettles and everything else 
 breaking loose from the caissons, the cannoneers running 
 with all their might to keep up, for the road was so very rough, 
 that I was afraid to have them mount, for fear of the repetition 
 of the accident which befell us while trotting to Chancellors- 
 ville. For at least four miles the race continued, and I brought 
 my whole Battery safely into position on the right of Gettys 
 burg, but luckily did not have to fire immediatejy ; my breath 
 less cannoneers made their appearance one by one, and soon 
 each detachment was full. On the left, and in front of the 
 town, there was brisk fighting going on. Reynolds (who was 
 in command of our Corps and his own, the First) had pushed 
 his men forward through the town, and was most rashly trying 
 to drive a much superior enemy from the opposite heights. 
 After passing through the town, we came into a hollow, con 
 sisting of farms, orchards, and ploughed land, completely 
 commanded both by the Gettysburg heights and by those in 
 the hands of the enemy, and it seemed to be fated that who-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 409 
 
 ever ventured into that hollow was sure to be defeated. We 
 tried it the first day, and Johnny Rebs the second and third 
 days. Captain Dilger's Battery of our Corps was in front of 
 the town, hammering away at a secesh battery on the heights ; 
 but, as he had only smooth bores, he was no match for his 
 opponent and was getting cut up badly, so I was ordered for 
 ward to help him. I limbered up and went through the town 
 at a trot, the ladies waving their handkerchiefs, and giving us 
 all possible cheer and encouragement. I came into battery 
 on Dilger's right, and soon showed the enemy that they had 
 a three-inch rifled battery to contend with, and they had to shut 
 up entirely. At about the same time the First Corps, which 
 was on our left, succeeded in driving the enemy along the 
 slope of the hill, and we scared them well as they ran. At 
 this moment everything looked auspicious, and Captain Dilger 
 told me that he would move his Battery, under cover of mine, 
 about five hundred yards further forward, in order to give his 
 guns better play, and then that I should follow him and sup 
 port him. This he did, and as soon as he got into position 
 a dreadful fire was opened upon him, and I had the chief 
 benefit of this as I moved up after him ; all the shots fired 
 too high for him fell into my Battery ; one struck a driver of 
 a gun and swept him and his two horses right away ; strange 
 to say, while both horses were killed, the driver only lost a 
 leg ! As we came near the place where we were to take posi 
 tion, we came suddenly on a very substantial fence which 
 the men could not tear down, and we had to wait, under a 
 very heavy fire, until axes could be brought from the cais 
 sons and a hole hewed through the fence. While waiting 
 here, I saw an infantry man's leg taken off by a shot, and 
 whirled like a stone through the air, until it came against 
 a caisson with a loud whack. When we got into position we 
 were again too much for the opposing battery, and were getting 
 along finely, when suddenly, on our right, there issued from 
 the base of the hill two great gray clouds, which moved stead 
 ily forward towards the infantry of our Corps. At the same 
 time the advance of the First Corps along the face of the hill
 
 4IO LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 was checked, and they were driven back. A fierce infantry 
 fight began on our right ; our men held a small wood, near 
 the poor-house, with determination, and I turned one section 
 of my Battery to the right and fired canister into the columns 
 of the rebels, taking aim at their red battle-flags, which we 
 knew only too well after the fight at Chancellorsville. This 
 lasted for awhile, but the enemy had massed their infantry too 
 heavily for us, and after losing tremendously our men had to 
 withdraw. We held our position until the rebs had got almost 
 in our rear, when we withdrew with our batteries to another 
 position on the road, where we fired a few more canisters and 
 then retired into the town. While crossing the fields, one of 
 my guns was dismounted by a shot, and, after making the 
 greatest efforts to get it off, I was obliged to leave it on the 
 ground ; but on the 5th of July, when we took possession of 
 the entire field of battle, I went down with my blacksmith, 
 mended the carriage, and brought the gun off in triumph. 
 We did not get into the town a minute too soon, as the enemy 
 were there almost as soon as we were, and shot some of our 
 men in the street. We passed through the town and took 
 position on Cemetery Hill, which is a high bluff above the 
 town, at the termination of its principal street. There was 
 a lively musketry fight in the lower part of the town, which 
 ended in the enemy's getting possession of several cross streets 
 below, while our men held on to the upper part ; and during 
 the whole of the next two days there was a constant skirmish 
 ing from doors and windows. From the tops of some of the 
 houses the rebs managed to get an aim at Cemetery Hill and 
 picked off many a man from the batteries there. The sun 
 went down on the ist July, leaving us where we were in 
 the morning ; that is, having gained the Gettysburg heights 
 and having been repulsed in an attempt to gain the other 
 heights ; while General Reynolds had fallen a victim to his 
 own rash attempt, and both Corps had been very seriously 
 cut up. During the night our much needed reinforcements 
 came up ; the Second and Third Corps on our left and the 
 Twelfth on our right, and we took a good night's rest, prepar-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 41 1 
 
 atory to the next day's work. The next morning there was 
 brisk skirmishing all along the front, but only desultory shots 
 from the artillery. At about two o'clock in the afternoon the 
 artillery of the Second Corps became hotly engaged on the 
 left, and our boys all stood on tiptoe to watch the contest. 
 Just then General Howard rode along and said, " Never mind 
 the left, boys ; look out for your own front " ; and sure enough, 
 a few minutes afterward, we saw puffs of smoke, which we 
 knew well enough arose from the hills opposite to us, then 
 the boom of the guns and the bursting of the shells among 
 us. They soon got an answer from us ; we had nine three- 
 inch rifled guns in a row there, from Hall's Second Maine 
 Battery, Wiedrick's Battery, and mine. Beside these, there 
 were the brass guns of Dilger's Ohio Battery, and " G " of the 
 Fourth Regulars, although they were of more service at close 
 quarters. We did not fire very rapidly, but every shot was 
 .aimed with deliberation and judgment, as my corporals were 
 cool and skillful. The result was that in half an hour the 
 enemy's fire slackened, as they had to move their batteries 
 to get out of our fire. Soon they opened again, more fiercely 
 than ever ; but we quickly got their new range, and punished 
 them severely. They placed one battery of very long range 
 on our right flank, and completely enfiladed us ; luckily for us 
 they did not get the range for some time. A twenty-pounder 
 Parrott battery was brought up from the Reserve, and this 
 kept them very quiet. By 4^ p. M. my ammunition was ex 
 hausted, and Major Osborne, our new Chief of Artillery, 
 relieved my Battery with another, and sent mine back to re 
 plenish ; at the same time he asked me to remain with him 
 and assist him in his very arduous duties, as he had charge of 
 all the batteries on Cemetery Hill, and his regular adjutant 
 was completely used up. This exactly suited me, as my blood 
 was up, and I did not like the idea of going back with my 
 Battery. Until nightfall I was hardly out of fire once, and I 
 was raised to the highest pitch of excitement ; the danger was 
 so great and so constant that, at last, it took away the sense 
 of danger. I placed several batteries on the hill, under the
 
 412 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Major's orders, and at length I went back to the Artillery 
 Reserve to bring up a supply of ammunition. While pro 
 ceeding down the Taneytown road I was a witness of the 
 tremendous attack upon the Third Corps, and of their break 
 ing and fleeing, after a fierce conflict. As this Corps held 
 our extreme left wing at that time, my first thought was that 
 all was lost, and that the enemy would push through to the 
 Baltimore Pike and cut off the three Corps at the front ; but 
 I had underrated General Meade's capacity of husbanding 
 his reserves and massing his forces. Hardly had the broken 
 fragments of the Third Corps crossed the pike when the firing 
 was renewed in the woods, and on the crest of the hill, whqre 
 the whole Fifth Corps had been thrown in to reinforce the 
 left wing, and a few minutes later, as if to make assurance 
 doubly sure, I met the First Division of the Twelfth Corps 
 going at double-quick for one of the cross-roads from the 
 right to the left wing ; and in case this should not prove 
 enough, I saw a little further back, among the woods, the 
 dark masses of the Sixth Corps, the strongest corps in the 
 army, waiting to be moved to any point. However, the dose 
 administered by the Fifth Corps proved sufficient. Our line 
 of battle was almost in the shape of a horseshoe, with the 
 reserves on the inside, and these had to march only a short 
 distance in order to reinforce any point threatened. I went 
 back to the Major, and hardly had I got there when the enemy 
 made a most desperate attack upon our extreme right, where 
 a portion of the Twelfth Corps was intrenched. This fight 
 continued a good part of the night, and was renewed at day 
 light ; but the point having been well reinforced, the enemy 
 was repulsed with terrible loss. Late at night, I went down 
 the Baltimore road, to the camp of the Artillery Reserve, to 
 see that my Battery was put in shape for work early the next 
 morning. Our Chief of Artillery, and all of us who com 
 manded batteries, felt a little pride in keeping Cemetery Hill 
 manned by Eleventh Corps Batteries as constantly as pos 
 sible, although there were thirty batteries which had not fired 
 a shot. I had a great hunt for ammunition, and even then
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERWCE. 413 
 
 did not find what I wanted, or what suited my guns ; but I 
 managed to get about fifty rounds apiece, (I should have had 
 two hundred), and went back to the hill again. As on the 
 previous day, it was brisk skirmishing along the front, some 
 hard fighting in the town, and desultory artillery firing ; but 
 at about i P. M. Lee's one hundred pieces (I believe that he 
 had more in position), opened all at once, and, as far as noise 
 went, it was the most terrible cannonade that I ever witnessed, 
 and the air was literally alive with flying projectiles, from the 
 six-pound solid shot, which looks like a cricket ball, to the 
 long Whitworth rifled shot, which has probably given rise to 
 the story of the rebs firing railroad iron. My pieces stood 
 in a peculiarly bad place, as they were at the foot of the hill, 
 and got the fire from all three sides ; but the enemy's artillery 
 practice was not as good as it used to be, and the situation 
 was not as deadly and dangerous as on Friday afternoon at 
 Bull Run, or on Sunday morning at Chancellorsville. In this 
 place I lost some horses but no men. The fire was still at 
 its height, when a request came from General Hunt, Chief of 
 Artillery, to Major Osborne to send him a battery for General 
 Webb of the Second Corps, who feared an infantry attack. 
 The Major handed me the order and off I went to the hill 
 where the Second Corps was, just above General Meade's 
 head-quarters, and reported to General Hancock, who showed 
 me the position I was to take. As I came up and unlimbered 
 on this crest, the rebels were within four hundred yards and 
 were making a charge across our front upon a battery which 
 stood at my right. Luckily for us, they did not see us until 
 we had got into position, and had poured a couple of rounds 
 of canister over the heads of our own infantry, who were lying 
 behind a stone fence in front of us. Then they turned their 
 attention somewhat to us and a battery of theirs opened very 
 fiercely upon us, and made things very hot ; but we paid no 
 attention to their battery, and just kept the canister going into 
 them. Once a double round of canister struck close to their 
 flag, and I saw a dozen of them drop, and the whole column 
 wavered and halted ; but the standard-bearer waved his flag
 
 414 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 and they moved on again, but in a weary and spiritless man 
 ner. Just at this moment what should the infantry in front 
 of us do but get up and leave ! The Battery seemed lost, but 
 I got hold of some of them, told them not to let the Eleventh 
 Corps' boys laugh at them, and in this way, first a squad, and 
 then the whole regiment, was rallied and got back to the fence 
 again, and about every reb who came up on to that hill was 
 either killed, wounded, or captured. We then went back to 
 our Corps and soon the fighting for the night was over. I 
 went over a part of the battle-field that night, and did what 
 I could to make the wounded comfortable ; but very soon this 
 seemed a hopeless undertaking ; our wounded were removed 
 in ambulances as fast as possible, but the rebel wounded, who 
 were almost all of them in our hands, received extremely little 
 attention, and lay scattered over the field in groups of twenty, 
 fifty, or even a hundred, trying to help each other a little. 
 Our men could not help it ; most of them were too much 
 worn out to raise a hand, and the regular Ambulance Corps 
 could not begin to attend to our own wounded boys. I was 
 glad to do a little something for them, even if it were only 
 to turn them on their side, and give them a glass of water. 
 Utterly as I detest a living active rebel, as soon as he becomes 
 wounded and a prisoner I don't perceive any difference in my 
 feelings towards him and towards one of our own wounded 
 heroes. I suppose this is very heterodox, but I can't help it. 
 I found a Colonel of a Mississippi Regiment shot through the 
 breast, a man of stately bearing, and a soldier of his regi 
 ment told me that he was Judge of the Supreme Court of 
 that State. Now here was a man, evidently one of the real 
 old original Secesh ; but I forgot that, took him into a barn, 
 made him a straw bed, fixed a pillow for him, got him a cup 
 of coffee, and ignored the fact that he gave me no word of 
 thanks or farewell when I left him. The scenes of the battle 
 field were very rough, and I will not trouble you with any 
 description of them ; I will only mention a rencontre which 
 I had with General Meade on Friday afternoon. I was with 
 my Battery at the foot of the hill, waiting for orders and expect-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 415 
 
 ing to be called upon to relieve one of our Corps batteries, 
 when an elderly Major General with spectacles, looking a good 
 deal like a Yale Professor, rode up and asked me if I had 
 a full supply of ammunition. I told him that I had as full a 
 supply as I could get on the field, having been to the ammu 
 nition train with an order from Major Osborne, but without 
 success : whereupon he got excited and said, "You must have 
 ammunition ; the country can't wait for Major Osborne or any 
 other man ; go immediately to the Artillery Reserve and order 
 General Tyler to send up a wagon load." Now I might have 
 told him that there was not a round of three-inch ammunition 
 left with the Artillery Reserve, as I had been there myself 
 shortly before ; but something in his face warned me against 
 answering back ; so I put spurs to my horse, and got round 
 the corner of a wood, where I stayed until he had left the prem 
 ises and then came back, to learn that it was General Meade 
 himself. And so the battle closed. We had repulsed the 
 enemy at every point, with very great loss, had taken an 
 immense number of prisoners (I saw several thousand with 
 my own eyes, besides the wounded ones), and had remained in 
 possession of the field, to say nothing of pursuing the enemy 
 from the 5th until this day. I am sure that the importance 
 and decisiveness of the victory cannot well be overrated. I 
 have no time to tell you of our forced march back to Emmetts- 
 burg, Middletown, Boonesborough, and Hagerstown. The 
 enemy's crossing under our noses, at Williamsport and Falling 
 Waters, was a masterly maneuver, but I do not think that Meade 
 is at all to blame for it. Our marches since then have been 
 severe, and the men are getting sick with bilious fever on all 
 sides. Thus far I have borne up splendidly and have not 
 been off duty for an hour. I hope and pray that I may con 
 tinue ,as well. Major Osborne has forwarded a new demand 
 for my commission to Governor Seymour, and accompanied 
 the request with expressions of approbation, both toward me 
 and the Battery, which have made me feel very proud. I have 
 enjoyed the Major's society greatly. He is a gentleman and 
 a soldier, a most energetic and gallant man, and he contrib-
 
 41 6 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 uted greatly, by the management of his artillery, in restoring 
 their lost prestige so brilliantly to the Eleventh Corps. I am 
 now entirely without officers. I have applied for a commis 
 sion for Henry Miller, my Orderly Sergeant. I hope in a 
 month or two to get everything fixed up in good shape and 
 
 to get two more guns The time may vary a few months, 
 
 a few years, or even a few decades, but the job will be settled 
 and that all right too. I am, in this matter, like St. Paul's 
 Charity, ready to bear, believe, hope, and endure all things 
 for the cause, knowing that if we do so, we also, like Charity, 
 shall never fail. This has been a most egotistical letter, but 
 I know you want to hear about me, and not about the army 
 in general or anybody else. 
 
 CATLETT'S STATION, VA., August 4, 1863. 
 
 .... If we rest here for some weeks, as there is talk 
 of our doing, I hope to get track of Sunday again, and at 
 least to have some music. There is a good piano and melo- 
 deon at Mr. Catlett's, where General Howard has his head 
 quarters, and as I have been introduced to Mrs. Catlett, a lady 
 of intelligence and refinement, I shall go up there pretty soon 
 and try to beat up a crowd to sing, out of the General's staff. 
 .... I spent a pleasant Sunday, about two weeks ago, 
 near Waterford, just after we crossed the Potomac. The artil 
 lery made a very early march and got into camp by n A. M. 
 Somehow, I got into a farm-house, close by my quarters, which 
 was a regular fine old homestead, belonging to an old gentle 
 man named Pierpoint, and he had a pleasant wife and three 
 pretty daughters. There I spent pretty much the whole of the 
 day, tried to get the girls to sing with me out of the " Carmina 
 Sacra," had a good dinner, and successfully resisted all efforts 
 of both General Steinwehr and Schurz, to get me out of the 
 house. I never saw such perfect idyllic simplicity as pre 
 vailed in the family. They belonged to the Society of Friends, 
 and one of the girls who had been as far as Alexandria, and 
 had once seen dancing, was looked upon with wonder by the 
 rest. The youngest, however, who was a little mischief, after
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 417 
 
 T. U. style, declared loudly that if she got a chance she would 
 dance, too ; she did n't believe it was so very wicked. I did 
 not bother my head much about the trouble in New York ; I 
 only wished that they would send me with my Battery to the 
 city for a couple of weeks, to enforce the draft. I would much 
 rather fire canister into those drunken Irish rowdies, than into 
 the secesh brethren, who, although deluded, are worth all the 
 
 Paddies that ever had a brogue I try to do my duty 
 
 fully, and then look to results, not heeding if the material 
 is used up in the process. My own life I reckon no dearer 
 than the rest, if I can win the end. You see, dearest mother, 
 this war has become the religion of very many of our lives, 
 and those of us who think, and who did not enter the service 
 for gain or military distinction, have come more and more to 
 identify this cause for which we are fighting, with all of good 
 and religion in our previous lives, and so it must be if we are 
 to win the victory. We must have an impulse, made of patri 
 otic fire and a deeper feeling, which takes its rise in the think 
 ing soul. If we have this, then we can bear our standards 
 and our military pride high up, for they will have a foundation. 
 I am and have been in good health, almost without intermis 
 sion, even when so many were falling sick about me, but I 
 think that that putrid swamp would have done for me, too, as 
 well as for the others. Did you hear whether R. E. came safe 
 out of that attack on Fort Wagner ? I saw that his regiment 
 was badly cut up. 
 
 CATLETT'S STATION, August 9, 1863. 
 
 Indeed, when I allow myself to think of the quiet delights 
 of home, the libraries, music, the refining and humanizing 
 influence of dear friends glorious Sabbath evenings like 
 this, not spent in seeing horses groomed, or in repacking am 
 munition, but in singing " Tallis," and " Solitude," and " Be- 
 merton " with you, and mother, and the girls, and Aunt E., 
 with my hand clasped in somebody's, I can assure you that a 
 half feeling of regret, and a whole feeling of longing, comes 
 over me, so that it requires a really painful effort to repress it, 
 and to reach forward to those things that are before, even if I 
 27
 
 41 8 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 do not forget those things that are behind. Sunday evening 
 is my regular time for this sort of Lot's-wife longings and 
 lockings back, partly because the vacant time allows them, and 
 the day suggests them, and partly because the duties of the 
 next day will cure any undue homesickness. Now we are to 
 have a big drill to-morrow morning at 5 A. M., and I rely upon 
 that to do away with the evil effects of my this evening im 
 agining myself sitting by mother, and listening to you singing 
 " When gathering clouds." .... 
 
 You will be shocked at hearing that I indulged in another 
 of our favorite menagerie " loads " in the heat of the battle at 
 Gettysburg. It was on the first day, when General Reynolds 
 pushed us through the town, and made an offensive (more to 
 us than to the enemy) attack upon a superior force in a supe 
 rior position. My Battery and another were in the extreme 
 advance, and were fighting hotly with some rebel batteries, 
 when the rebels massed their forces, threw out three heavy 
 columns, and very soon drove our infantry back, and envel 
 oped the batteries in a dangerous manner. I did not wait for 
 this state of affairs, but immediately left the rebel batteries 
 the whole talk, and began to try to break the rebel columns 
 with canister. The captain of the other battery, Captain D., 
 would not believe that they were not our own men at first, 
 although their blood-red battle-flags were plain enough in sight, 
 and at last he asked me, " Wheeler, which are the rebels and 
 which are our men ? " Whereupon I retorted upon him with 
 the same answer as that with which the showman so triumph 
 antly crushed the " little boy." "You pays your money and 
 you takes your choice." Somehow or other I felt a joyous 
 exaltation, a perfect indifference to circumstances, through the 
 whole of that three days' fight, and have seldom enjoyed three 
 days more in my life 
 
 When I was in Maryland, I did not cease to admire the 
 beauty of the county of Frederick. I really think that there 
 is hardly a piece of ground in the country, equal to that roll 
 ing land just east of the slopes of South Mountain. The 
 fields so undulating and yet so fertile, with charming buildings
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 419 
 
 nestled out of the way in so many hollows, the stretches of 
 golden wheat, bending under the blessing of the sunlight, and 
 the soft, delicious, purple-blue of the mountains, ever near at 
 hand, which seemed, like many plain, generous people in daily 
 life, to say, " We are not very high above you, and don't pre 
 tend to anything great, but we watch over you constantly, and 
 we send down pure perennial streams of water to cheer and 
 bless your fields and meadows." 
 
 CATLETT'S STATION, September 5, 1863. 
 
 I am beginning to emerge in some degree from the state of 
 torpor and indifference in which I have been lying for nearly 
 a month past, and to feel some interest in what surrounds me. 
 I don't know what has been the matter with me. I have been 
 fully able to do my duty, have drilled my Battery every day to 
 their hearts' content, have sat on court martials, boards of 
 examination and survey, and have felt lively enough as long as 
 I had any excitement, but when this had passed by I was all 
 down again, my appetite was (and is) most capricious, and, 
 above all, a feeling of unconquerable lassitude, which I could 
 only shake off when some matter of great and pressing im 
 portance came along You will be able to form some 
 
 idea of my state of apathy, when I tell you the news of R. 
 E.'s death, which reached me first through your letter, failed 
 to move me as I should have expected. I know that I felt it 
 most deeply, but I could not shed a single tear. I could only 
 feel a desire to avenge him, and think that such a noble, glo 
 rious death was well suited to his gallant, enthusiastic nature, 
 and a fit - close to his generous, self-sacrificing life. I can 
 not help looking at it as a soldier ; we have death so con 
 stantly before our eyes that it loses its terrors, and the question 
 with us is not so much whether we shall die or not, but how 
 we shall die and among what surroundings. And the highest, 
 most desirable type of death for the infantry officer, is that 
 met on the enemy's ramparts, with the colors in his hand. It 
 is true, a life of devotion and usefulness is suddenly closed, 
 the hearts of friends are torn with anguish, because they will
 
 42O LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 never see his flashing eye and active form again, and because 
 that home will always be desolate ; but was not the event or 
 dered by a higher power, who said " I will take this beautiful 
 soul to me now in its bloom of youth, and he shall be spared 
 the evil days to come." And if in this struggle death is to 
 come to me, may it come as it did to Young Crosby, " among 
 my guns in battery," and successfully resisting a hostile attack, 
 dying of a mortal stroke, 
 
 " What time the foemen's ranks are broke." 
 
 Dear J., from whom I received a most affectionate and 
 cheering letter yesterday, warmed my heart by speaking of R. 
 in such a kind, appreciative way. He expressed what I wanted 
 to express, only my heart was too full, and my frame of mind 
 too gloomy, for me to find the proper utterance. My daily 
 prayer now is, that it may not happen to my brother. I really 
 believe that I am much less unselfish and patriotic than you 
 are, for I think more of his safety than of the service he is 
 doing the country, and wish it were possible that he could be 
 safe home again. I know, dear mother, that you will not be 
 wearied by this expression of my affection for him, as it is 
 only a proof of my love for you, for that you know is the great 
 est of all. J. seems in splendid trim and spirits, and to be en 
 joying his staff life very much. I am glad that he has a place 
 where he can keep himself clean and comfortable, and have 
 decent associates. For myself, and I have seen considerable of 
 all arms of the service, I prefer my own position to any other. 
 I like to have the command of men, and to say, like the cen 
 turion, " Go ! and he goeth ; " and then as Captain of a Bat 
 tery, I am as independent and as comfortable as a Brigadier. 
 We were reviewed by General Howard the other day, and he 
 praised my horses very highly. We did not get a chance to 
 drill before him, which was a disappointment to me, as it is 
 pretty generally acknowledged that my men are the best in the 
 Corps at the manual of the piece. I have made several 
 small raids out into the country around here, and have got ac 
 quainted with several families in the neighborhood of Green-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 421 
 
 wich. Last Sunday, Lieutenant Mickle (who is a noble, 
 Christian fellow) and I went out to old Rev. Mr. Balch's, a 
 Presbyterian clergyman, and spent the evening. The family 
 consists of the old gentleman and his wife, his son, and two 
 daughters, all grown, and are of the real old-fashioned Presby 
 terian sort, keeping Sunday like the C.'s. The old gentleman 
 is a graduate of Princeton College and Seminary, and talks 
 about the churches in Cedar Street, and Wall Street, and Drs. 
 Romeyn and Mason, in a way that would interest you very 
 much. He seems to be a sort of chronicle of the last fifty 
 years, and says things that are really quite striking and inter 
 esting, such as, " I was present in the Senate when Josiah 
 Quincy began this whole matter, and spoke the first word of 
 secession." From this you can perceive that he is a rebel of 
 the most virulent type, and his two daughters are just as bad. 
 But after the political discussion had waged for some time, we 
 opened the piano, and we had some of the old hymns after the 
 old style, "Ariel," "Greenland's Icy Mountain," "Italian hymn," 
 etc., which did me good, and then we stayed with them to even 
 ing worship. He expects to preach to-morrow, and Lieutenant 
 M. and I are going to lend a hand at the singing, and to stay to 
 dinner. It is strange that opinions and sentiments about the 
 war can be so violent one moment, and the next, all the dis 
 putants have their heads close together about one hymn book, 
 or are kneeling at one family altar. Religion is the only thing 
 that can lend any humanizing influence to this war. These good 
 people are instant in good works, and, after giving a soldier a 
 good dinner, they will put some nice, simple little book into his 
 hand, which, for sheer politeness, he will not be able to re 
 fuse. Just at this moment one of the men is singing some 
 hymn about the " Lion and the Lamb," to a rough, sailor 
 melody. 
 
 CATLETT'S STATION, September 2$, 1863. 
 
 .... I really shall have to make a formal defense of 
 myself for visiting in the families of natives of this region, as 
 you seem to think that I am failing in devotion and loyalty 
 to the cause in which I am engaged. Now I think that you
 
 422 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 look at the thing in too theoretical a light, and this is owing to 
 your distance from the scene of operations. I know you too 
 well not to be sure that, in spite of your thorough patriotism 
 and hatred of all that is hostile to our cause, you would yet be 
 the first to help the wounded and destitute, even though reb 
 els, and to feel sorry for families desolated and ruined, even in 
 Virginia. For myself, while I will yield to no man in the ob 
 stinacy of the fight and the endurance of the march, still, 
 when a man is wounded or a prisoner, when a woman is lonely 
 and distressed, they rise in my view from the position of reb 
 els to that of our common humanity, and as men and women, 
 I treat them with kindness, though rebels. And do not think 
 for a moment that I sympathize with these people in any of 
 their ideas, or that I allow them to suppose that I am anything 
 but an extreme Emancipationist, determined on seeing the end 
 of the secession movement and of slavery, provided it is 
 granted me to live so long. We talk about books and persons, 
 sing, play games, eat melons and peaches, and in the course 
 of the evening we usually manage to treat them to the " Star 
 Spangled Banner," and a few more of the national airs, which 
 ought to do a secessionist's ears a great deal of good. (Strange 
 to say, since writing the above, a circular from General How 
 ard has come in, in which he observes that it has come to his 
 knowledge that officers in the Corps, and especially the artil 
 lery officers, are in the habit of visiting at the houses of rebel 
 secessionists, and recommending that it be stopped : quite an 
 argument in your favor, but I will not back down from what I 
 have just said.) 
 
 Lieutenant Carlisle returned about a week ago, quite well, 
 though not very strong, but able to fill my place. When ab 
 sent yesterday, my First Sergeant, Harry Muller, now pro 
 moted to a Second Lieutenancy, came back from New York 
 to be mustered in as an officer, so that I have no longer the 
 whole concern on my hands, and feel much less anxiety. He 
 used to attend on me at Camp Observation, and took such 
 good care of me when I was sick there. He has passed 
 through the successive grades of corporal, sergeant, and or-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 423 
 
 derly sergeant, and after distinguishing himself in several 
 battles, has now arrived at an officer's rank, which he well de 
 serves. The defects of education (which he is daily overcom 
 ing, as he is thirsty to learn) are greatly overbalanced by his 
 real manliness and stamina, his fidelity, willingness, and pluck ; 
 if I tell him to take his section into a position and keep it 
 there till I relieve him, he will do so" if not a single man comes 
 out alive, and that is the kind of officer I want to have under 
 me. We had a superb review of the corps artillery here last 
 Saturday, before General Hunt, Chief of Artillery of the Army 
 of the Potomac ; all the fine batteries were drawn up in a 
 single line by your humble servant as Major Osborne had 
 charged me with the duty of forming them for review, and I 
 can assure you that the muzzles of the guns were in a bee-line 
 from right to left. General Hunt told the Major that the artil 
 lery was as good as any in the army, and the horses were the 
 best he had seen. He spoke with particular praise of my 
 Battery horses. My school is in a flourishing condition ; the 
 boys built a table and desk, with forms, out of split logs, and 
 set it up under the shade of the trees, and every day at 2 p. M. 
 the schoolmaster, an old corporal whom I detailed for the 
 purpose, fetches the spelling-books and the writing materials, 
 and sets his classes their lessons. You would be pleased to 
 see the eagerness with which men from twenty to forty years 
 of age seize upon this opportunity for repairing the defects of 
 their early education, and the progress which they all make is 
 most encouraging. The attendance is not compulsory, but 
 the schoolmaster has more than he can attend to. I can as 
 sure you it does me good to see that patient row, sitting at the 
 rough table which they themselves had hewn out of the hard 
 oaks of the forest, rough, wild boys, many of them, but every 
 eye softened and brightened by the feeling that they were 
 learning something higher and better than card playing or 
 whiskey drinking. Certainly, Victor Hugo was right when he 
 said, " that what was necessary to purify and cleanse the sub 
 terranean abysses of the lowest class, was Light ; " and this pu 
 rification is greater in proportion to the nature of the light ad-
 
 424 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 mitted, the greatest is obtained when " the entrance of Thy 
 Word giveth light." 
 
 I am hoping that very few of the men, if any, will have to 
 call upon the officers to sign their names for them on the next 
 pay-roll. 
 
 NASHVILLE, TENN., October 8, 1863. 
 
 MY DEAREST MOTHER, I suppose that you have gleaned 
 from the papers some information about the flitting of the 
 Eleventh and Twelfth Corps from the Army of the Potomac. 
 Nothing could have been more sudden than our departure 
 from Catlett's Station, or more at variance with the arrange 
 ments which were being made there. Orders had been given 
 to the Corps to take a strong position on Cedar Run, to cover 
 the railroad, and several strong forts were ordered to be built, 
 defending the post, in a large semicircle, from the Cedar Run 
 bridge through General Howard's head-quarters round to the 
 station. These forts were to be constructed with care and 
 elaboration, and were to bear the names of Eleventh Corps 
 heroes who fell at Chancellorsville and Gettysburg. The 
 construction of Fort Dessauer, which covered the railroad 
 bridge and was the most important point of all, was intrusted, 
 said the order, to the Thirteenth New York Battery, arid the 
 Twenty-seventh Pennsylvania Regiment, under supervision of 
 Captain Wheeler. I had got my digging parties hard at work, 
 and the bastions and platforms for my guns had already begun 
 to rise, when suddenly we were ordered to suspend operations, 
 lay in rations for a month, and have everything packed up, 
 and the same evening saw my guns put on the cars, and my 
 horses marching off towards Alexandria. We made a very stiff 
 march, leaving Catlett's Station at midnight, and arriving at 
 Alexandria at three o'clock the next day, a distance of forty- 
 five miles. The guns of all the batteries were sent on im 
 mediately, over the Baltimore and Ohio railroad, and each 
 battery commander followed with his horses, as fast as he 
 could get them loaded into the horse-cars. I will not weary 
 you with a detailed account of our most fatiguing journey. Suf 
 fice it to say that both men and animals were more distressed
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 425 
 
 and pulled down by it than by the severest forced march. I en 
 joyed the scenery of the Baltimore and Ohio railroad exceed 
 ingly, and rode on top of the cars all the way, while crossing 
 the mountains. We passed through the superb region from 
 Piedmont to Grafton in the splendor of a delicious autumn, 
 which showed all the gorgeous coloring of the infinite 
 stretches, and under the mysterious lights and shadows of 
 a perfect moonlight autumn night. The few inhabitants 
 seemed intensely Union, and confident of being able to 
 guard the mountain passes leading to Wheeling with very 
 little aid from Government. At Benwood we struck the 
 Ohio river and crossed to Bellaire. Here another shipment 
 was necessary, and a day of misery was spent in accomplish 
 ing it. My horses went out in the first train, together with 
 those of Captain Dilger, whom I found a pleasant compan 
 ion. We passed through Zanesville and Columbus, Ohio, 
 and at daybreak found ourselves at Richmond, Indiana. 
 Here began a perfect ovation. The good Quakers, by whom 
 the town is mostly settled, took our poor hungry boys into 
 their houses and gave them breakfast, and many a kind word 
 of cheer. At every town in Indiana, great crowds of ladies 
 came to the cars, with baskets of bread and cake and pie, 
 cold meats and chickens, sourkrout for the Dutchmen, and 
 doughnuts for the Yankees; and pressed it upon the men, 
 without distinction of rank, in the most charming manner. 
 Our reception at Centreville and Cambridge City beat every 
 thing in this line. Besides the articles mentioned above, the 
 ladies gave us clean handkerchiefs and towels and pieces of 
 soap, most welcome gifts to men whose eyes were half blinded, 
 and whose faces and hands were grimy, with the dust of a week's 
 railroad journey. I am sure that they will not fight the worse, 
 for having seen how dear the cause is to "the best and most 
 beautiful in the land. At Indianapolis we reshipped again 
 for Jeffersonville. where we crossed the Ohio again to Louis 
 ville, Kentucky. I was delighted with Louisville, which is 
 certainly one of the finest cities in the country, and indulged 
 in a glorious bath, etc., which will always be fresh in my mem-
 
 426 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 ory ; and at the St. Charles Restaurant I built up the inner 
 man with some first class grub. Once more we put our poor 
 nags into the cars, and came on to this place, where we seem 
 at present to be at a dead-lock, as our namesake, General 
 Wheeler, the rebel, has been burning the bridges on the road 
 to Chattanooga, like a naughty man, and we can obtain no 
 transportation by rail. Very possibly we shall have to take 
 a bare-back ride over the mountains to Rosecranz,- as our 
 guns, harness, saddles, and baggage have gone on before us, 
 and are probably, by this time, with the Army of the Cumber 
 land. My baggage now, consists of my sabre and overcoat, 
 and I don't know whether I shall ever see the rest of my traps 
 again. Nashville is a dirty, disagreeable place. I am now 
 staying at the Continental, as I want rest. 
 
 STEVENSON, ALA., October 20, 1863. 
 
 I send you another bulletin to report progress, since I wrote 
 you at Nashville. I do not pretend, in these short notes, to 
 give you any clear idea of what I have been doing and seeing 
 on this tedious and yet hurried march, but try merely to let you 
 know that I had got thus far, and that my health was yet pre 
 served. Perhaps I may get an opportunity to write more at 
 length, when the long winter days come, and I have more 
 comfortable quarters, and my own writing materials. Well, 
 we had a week's rest at Nashville, where we were waiting for 
 the quartermasters to get their trains fixed up ; and a misera 
 ble week it was. The hotel afforded no decent accommoda 
 tion, although charging enormous prices ; the city was filthy. 
 and the specimens which we saw of the men and officers of 
 the Army of the Cumberland did not make me feel very proud 
 of our new associations. The expedition, consisting of about 
 four hundred team wagons, one battery of artillery, all the artil 
 lery horses of the Corps, the officers' horses, a regiment of in 
 fantry of the Twelfth Corps, and a large number of stragglers, 
 were to leave Nashville on Saturday morning, and Major Os- 
 borne wanted me to take charge of the artillery, and go as 
 second in command of the train ; but I declined, both on ac-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 427 
 
 count of feeling so unwell, and also because I did not wish to 
 go before two senior captains, and suggested that Captain 
 Dilger should have the command, which suggestion the major 
 followed. However, as an attack on the train was expected 
 from Wheeler's Cavalry, I did not like to leave the expedition, 
 and told the Major that I would go along and give any aid I 
 could in case of such an attack. The train was not ready to 
 start on Saturday, because many of the teams were to be com 
 posed of green, unbroken mules, running loose in the corral, 
 and it took a long time to get them caught, harnessed, and 
 hitched in, and even then an immense amount of persuasion 
 had to be applied before they could be got to move on. It 
 was a most ludicrous sight, and numbers of people rode out 
 from Nashville expressly to see it. The " Norway rabbits " 
 would stand straight up, and paw furiously, and jump over 
 wagon poles and chuck their darkey drivers in the most alarm 
 ing manner, and then, as f by agreement, would all lift up 
 their voices in a most pitiful hee-haw. On Monday morning 
 most of the teams were in marching order, and we started off 
 on the Franklin Pike, I having charge of the rear-guard. We 
 marched fifteen miles to Lavergne through pitiless rain, halt 
 ing for hours to get refractory mules subdued and to repair 
 broken wagons and harness, and came into park in a mud- 
 hole after nightfall. The officers in the advance had been dis 
 creet enough to hunt up good quarters on their arrival, and I 
 found Colonel Long, the commander, and the artillery officers 
 comfortably ensconced in the parlor of a very fine house, mak 
 ing themselves agreeable to the ladies of the house, and list 
 ening to the superb singing of the daughter, Miss Ellen Har 
 ris, who gave Union songs, and secesh airs, darkey melodies 
 and opera morceaux with equal facility. I went into the bed 
 room where there was a fine blazing fire, and dried myself a 
 little, and then joined the party in the other room, where I 
 spent a very pleasant evening. Miss H. was a very hand 
 some girl with magnificent eyes and decidedly the quickest 
 and sharpest young lady I ever saw in my life ; a little too 
 much like a flash of lightning. I slept that night before the
 
 428 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 fire in the spare-room, and felt much better, in the morning, 
 than when I left Nashville, as then I felt hardly fit to mount 
 my horse. Rough marching and field work bring one to 
 health quicker than any medicine. We marched that day to 
 Murfreesborough, passing over the bloody battle-field of Stone 
 River, fought on the last day of 1862. The trees were filled 
 with bullets sometimes as high up as sixty feet, and the trunks 
 in some cases were bored through with shells. We saw a 
 monument of stone, partly finished, which is being raised 
 over the dead of General Hazen's Brigade, who are all buried 
 in one sad inclosure. The fortifications at Murfreesborough 
 are the finest field-works that I have seen anywhere. Here, 
 as elsewhere, we reap the fruits of the engineering labors of 
 the rebels. This place is guarded by some of the Twelfth 
 Massachusetts. We went to bed thoroughly wet, and it rained 
 all that night and all the next day, upon which we had a most 
 fatiguing march to Shelbyville. I was half dead when we got 
 there, and was glad to rush out of the rain into the nearest 
 house where there was a light ; it proved to have been de 
 serted by its owner, and was occupied by some refugees. We 
 halted at Shelbyville to await the arrival of the train ; it is a 
 pretty thrifty looking place and known as the " Yankee town," 
 two-thirds of the inhabitants being Unionists. In the after 
 noon, having dried ourselves and brushed off the Tennessee 
 mud, Lieutenant Mickle and I went out to study the natives. 
 We first went and bought a turkey, and left him to be roasted ; 
 then we got up a pretext for calling at the house of Mr. Bob 
 Matthews, the head secesh in the place, whose three daugh 
 ters were keeping house alone, the old man having thought it 
 better to leave for Southern parts. You see we were pretty 
 well posted on the Virginia rebs, and wanted to know if the 
 Tennessee variety resembled it. We had a very pleasant 
 call, and then went to Mr. Cowan's for our turkey. Mr. C. 
 took us into his parlor, before a delightful fire in an open 
 grate, and had some of the most agreeable conversation that 
 I have had since I left home. Mr. C. is a canny Scotch 
 Irishman, and thoroughly understands the whole question of
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 429 
 
 the war, and is a strong Union man in his judgment, but does 
 not believe in ruining himself by any premature demonstra 
 tions. He suffered enough the other day, when Wheeler's 
 Cavalry entered the town and carried off about all the goods 
 from his store, besides plundering the town. It was a prema 
 ture union meeting that drew down the rebel vengeance on 
 the place. We stayed to supper, and Mrs. C., a pleasant, 
 motherly lady, the very counterpart of Mrs. I. W., gave us 
 some most excellent tea and muffins, which went just to the 
 right spot. The next day was more propitious and we 
 marched to Tullahoma moving the wagon train behind us, 
 and thus being able to advance with greater speed. That 
 evening at Tullahoma was most superb, like the most perfect 
 weather of our Indian summer. The next day we marched 
 through Deckerd, over Elk River to Cowan, at the foot of the 
 Cumberland mountains. The rain set in again, continued all 
 night, and in the morning we were half soaked before we be 
 gan the ascent of that most rough and rugged of mountains. 
 
 It was worse than the Alleghanies or the Blue Ridge, as 
 the road consisted merely of slabs of smooth rock, sometimes 
 standing on end, and deep gullies between them. I hardly 
 expected that we could get over at all, but we had all the bat 
 teries at the summit before noon, and by two P. M. were at 
 Tantallon Station, at the base of the principal ridge. There 
 we found the pickets of our own Corps, and felt somewhat at 
 home. 
 
 We left the Battery, Captain Wiedrichs, at Tantallon, to be 
 brought on by its own horses, and pushed on twenty-five 
 miles further, to this place. We reached it after dark ; in the 
 morning we discovered that Lieutenant Muller, with my four 
 guns, and the cannoneers, were in the fort, and we made all 
 speed to join them, leaving the others to go on to Bridgeport. 
 I was very glad to get my men all together again, and to find 
 that every one was well. I expect to march to Bridgeport 
 with my guns to-morrow. ' I myself am greatly in need of rest, 
 and when I got here yesterday it seemed as if I had a heavy 
 weight on my brain and could not keep still, sitting or lying.
 
 43O LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 I am better to-day, and hope to escape any serious illness, if 
 I can only get this cold out of my bones. 
 
 LOOKOUT VALLEY, TENN., 
 November 8, 1863. 
 
 MY DEAREST MOTHER, .... This is Sunday, and yet 
 you would hardly call it a day of quiet or leisure. I have to 
 day commenced building two forts, on two separate hills, using 
 for that purpose all my cannoneers and fifty infantry men, not 
 being able to escape by the plea that it was Sunday, which I 
 artfully put in. So that, with fort building, working hard on 
 our horses to keep them in condition, and being in readiness 
 to get up and move house at a moment's notice, you may im 
 agine that my thoughts are not in that serene and unruffled 
 state that I would have them for a Sunday talk with my dear 
 
 mother The service here is not like that in Virginia, 
 
 and here the war has few, very few, of the softening features 
 which it there possesses. The country is exhausted beyond 
 conception, and so defective are the means of transportation 
 that the army has to struggle with the citizen for his mouthful 
 of corn. The people of this region are, many of them, on 
 the very border of starvation, and swarms are fleeing from it 
 to the happier North, their children in their hand or following 
 in a mournful train behind, their few household effects in a 
 broken wagon, drawn by a miserable horse, and upon their 
 faces a strong, fixed looked of despair, which it makes me sick 
 to think of. And indeed I do not allow myself to reflect upon 
 the necessary and collateral accompaniments of this war, as 
 it would make me too miserable. Thanks to this expedition 
 of General Hooker, the whole army is now moderately well 
 provisioned, and yesterday our men got whole rations for the 
 first time since we came here, having had half and even quar 
 ter rations before. Bragg's army must be in a most deplora 
 ble condition ; deserters are coming into our lines continually, 
 by squads, and even by companies, who declare that they could 
 not stand it any longer, with no blankets to cover them and 
 with nothing but a small ration of parched corn to eat. Thev
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 431 
 
 also say that if it were not supposed by most of their troops 
 that they would be forced into our ranks if they should come 
 over, the army could not be held together. The nights lately 
 have been intensely cold, so that under several blankets my 
 feet have been like ice. If we suffer this with our complete 
 clothing and camp equipage, what must be the state of the 
 thinly-clad rebels. Speaking of clothing, you must have 
 laughed at my ill-luck with regard to my baggage, and my 
 apparelless condition. I am not at all uncomfortable, as I 
 have an excellent pair of artillery pants, a government shirt, 
 socks, boots, and drawers, but my appearance is not stylish. 
 I shall fight against ennui this winter and shall look to my 
 friends to help me, both by writing me long letters and send 
 ing me anything readable. My Catlett's-station school under 
 the oak is suspended for the present, as my cannoneers are 
 all fort building, and my drivers are out foraging for their 
 horses nearly every day ; but if we make any permanent win 
 ter-quarters I shall try to get a log school-house built and set 
 it running again, if I can raise the necessary stationery. 
 
 LOOKOUT VALLEY, NEAR CHATTANOOGA, TENN., 
 November 12, 1863. 
 
 .... Here the infantry throw up rifle-pits and build cor 
 duroy roads, while the artillery have to construct their own 
 forts as well as defend them, and besides this go foraging for 
 their horses outside the pickets, at the imminent risk of being 
 tickled by the guerrillas' rifles ; and all these duties have been 
 You will laugh when I tell you that, one day, your poor cousin, 
 whose appetite is famous for its power of renewing itself three 
 performed, until a day or two ago, on quarter and half rations, 
 times daily, was obliged to satisfy said appetite by making his 
 faithful steed divide his scanty dinner with his master, and by 
 dining sumptuously off a handful of " maize au naturel." 
 
 Don't think that I am at all bothered by these little incon 
 veniences. I am in good health, lively spirits, am eager for 
 something to do, and ready for anything that may turn up ; and, 
 if you could be transported here by magic for an hour or so, I
 
 432 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 don't think that you would consider me particularly "mouldy." 
 The fact is, the longer I am engaged in this war, and the more 
 I see of the South, and the more I learn of the plans, views, 
 and principles of our adversaries, the more am I contented 
 with my own course in joining the army ; and now I do as 
 a matter of the most positive duty, what I undertook, partly 
 from a spirit of restlessness and love of action. 
 
 I have felt the deepest pity for the miserable condition of 
 the poor whites of the South, and I think that, at the hands 
 of the so-called chivalry, a heavier reckoning will be demanded 
 for these people, than for their black bondsmen. That, in the 
 aggregate, the condition of the negro has been improved, and 
 his moral and intellectual faculties developed, by his connec 
 tion with the white man, cannot, I think., be denied. But 
 what has the dominant class done for the poor white in their 
 midst? They have closed the doors of industry upon him, 
 their own brother, thus keeping him poor ; they have refused 
 him education, thus keeping him ignorant ; and they have 
 encouraged him in all the vices that spring from idleness, 
 thus ruining body, mind, and soul, and all this, in order to 
 keep him as a tool for their political and, now, for their mili 
 tary purposes. They have been fatally successful on this 
 point, and have so thoroughly committed their fellows, by the 
 actual facts of war and invasion, that, in very many cases, the 
 poor whites, alive as they now are to the game that has been 
 played with them, have yet had their combativeness aroused, 
 and like all men are ashamed to back out or own up whipped. 
 Here, at the foot of Lookout Mountain, our pickets converse 
 daily with those of the enemy, and sad stories are related of 
 privation and suffering in their ranks. These bear their fruit 
 in the numerous squads of deserters which come into our lines, 
 at the rate of over a hundred a day. No army could stand 
 such bleeding as that very long. I met a band of about forty 
 to-day, headed by an officer, and asked them where they were 
 going. " Home," they replied ; " this is our last march in the 
 army." And others said, "If our whole Brigade only knew 
 that you would neither imprison us, nor conscript us into your
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 433 
 
 army, they could not be held together a week." Just think of 
 a half a pint of corn-meal per day, and nothing else, not even 
 fresh meat, and a thin cotton jacket and pants, without 
 overcoat or blanket to keep off the cold of these frosty nights ! 
 Human nature cannot endure these things, unless sustained 
 by the conviction of performing a sacred duty, or being actu 
 ated by noble principles ; and these they have not, to sustain 
 or actuate them. It is the dread of being shot or hung that 
 is the cohesive power of the Southern army. Only to-night, 
 I heard a sad story, from a young man, of how his brother 
 attempted to make a Union speech in the midst of his regi 
 ment, and succeeded, by dint of great spunk and a drawn 
 
 revolver, in doing so, but was afterwards hung for it 
 
 My cry this winter will be for " something to read," and if you 
 have any nice book that you don't want any more, just mail it 
 out here to me, " among the gloomy hills of darkness " referred 
 to in the Monthly Concert Hymn. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 LOOKOUT VALLEY, TENN., 
 November 19, 1863. 
 
 My intentions were most certainly virtuous with regard to 
 your first letter (written from Long Branch during that mystic 
 period in which you were a year younger than myself, but I 
 grieve to say, displaying very little of that old-fashioned rever 
 ence once paid to superior age), but in this instance old Dr. 
 Young's " Procrastination," usually the thief of time, de 
 scended to petty larceny, and gouged you out of a letter. Suf 
 fice it to say, that in the midst of our gay and festive times at 
 Catlett's Station, the place we had chosen after the toils of 
 battle to repose our wearied virtue, while we were eating and 
 drinking, building forts, and entering into boarded tents to 
 dwell, and warming our hands at cunningly-devised fireplaces, 
 suddenly the order arrived to pull up stakes and depart, and 
 when we got time to breath again we were under the shadow 
 of Lookout Mountain, with plenty of rations and sutler's goods 
 dealt out to us daily, provided we could make an eatable dish 
 28
 
 434 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 out of a 20-pound Parrot shell, or could substitute Whitworth's 
 shrapnel for canned pineapples. And by the first mail that 
 came to our hands in this place, I received another letter from 
 you, dated New Haven, September 26, which had, indeed, as 
 you said, wandered after me, but with better success than you 
 
 had feared It is so pleasant, after a long time in 
 
 which I have hardly had an inducement to think, a time spent 
 in giving orders and laying down rules of discipline, in caring 
 for bodily comfort and speculating on military events, in crack 
 ing small jokes and discussing horses and generals, to meet 
 such a one as yourself, though only on paper, and to pass with 
 him at once into that other world, so beloved by me, of thought, 
 and truth, and principle, and remembered happiness, which is 
 all summed up in the words "Yale," " New Haven." 
 
 " Soul-like were those days of yore 
 Let us walk in soul once more ; " 
 
 and, indeed, you will think that I have got paper enough for a 
 pretty long walk, but there is absolutely no other to be had, 
 and I rummaged Chattanooga yesterday, for this very Zweck, 
 and was unable to raise a single sheet of the orthodox rec 
 tangular equilateral style I should undoubtedly 
 
 have been doing my duty to my country if I had come out as 
 private in this Battery instead of lieutenant, and to-day I could 
 do my duty up to the handle as a cannoneer ; but when I can 
 fill the place of captain, and get a chance to, I will do so ; 
 and if to-morrow I should receive the offer of any higher pro 
 motion, and thought that I could do the business of the place, 
 I would not hesitate to accept it. " The tools to them that 
 can use them j" given a certain amount of brains, industry, 
 zeal, and right principle, to make it of the most use to the 
 
 world and the right cause I shall greatly envy 
 
 you in your reading of "GEdipus Rex." I never read it, but 
 went rapidly through the " CEdipus at Colonus," which I 
 thought a story fully equal in pathos to King Lear, and in 
 
 some parts not dissimilarly managed For practical 
 
 wrestling and pushing in the every-day world, both of thought
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 435 
 
 and of action, Yale gives as good training as any college ; but 
 what inkling has a ) r oung Yale graduate of the beautiful world 
 of literature, unless perchance he has neglected his studies. 
 
 and lived in one of the libraries during his course 
 
 By the way, speaking of labor and study, there is a rather dis 
 agreeable article in the October " Atlantic," called " Life with 
 out Principle," some sentences in which I believe that I wrote 
 myself, though I don't recollect ever publishing them. Espe 
 cially the following : " I foresee that if my wants should be 
 much increased, the labor required to supply them would be 
 come a drudgery. If I should sell both my forenoons and 
 afternoons to society, as most appear to do, I am sure that, for 
 me, there would be nothing left worth living for." I am al 
 ready speculating what occupation will give me, when I return 
 home, after supporting me simply on the food-and-shelter plan, 
 the most time free to be employed as I wish, whether for self- 
 improvement or that of others. But I am rather anticipating 
 a subject which I might better discuss six months hence, when 
 I shall have turned it over more. 
 
 You ask me for more minute experiences of my life as a 
 soldier ; these are hard to give, for very few of them are any 
 thing more than commonplace, and even the incidents of battle 
 do not touch much more than the physical nature. The near 
 approach of a battle can never be known with certainty ; we 
 are sometimes precipitated into an action which a few hours 
 before we had not expected ; and again, sometimes when we 
 are all cocked and primed, and have screwed our courage to 
 the fighting point, we are balked of our little muss; this last 
 produces a sensation similar to that of going up one stair too 
 many in the dark, and is altogether disgusting. We are march 
 ing quietly on, when suddenly we hear a cannonade a few 
 miles off; this makes us all feel uneasy, as we would prefer to 
 be either in the midst of the affair or else entirely absent. 
 Then we get an order to pass the infantry in front and get to 
 the field as quickly as possible ; the rapid movement creates 
 a certain physical excitement, which must be good for charg 
 ing infantry, but is not the thing for artillery. At Gettysburg,
 
 436 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 when I trotted through the town with my Battery, to the front, 
 saluted on all sides by ladies' smiles and good wishes, waving 
 handkerchiefs and banners, I felt highly elated and excited, 
 but this mostly passed away when we got to work. Every 
 man, however brave, must feel unpleasantly when the shells 
 begin to fall into the Battery before it is unlimbered, but as 
 soon as the guns are "in battery," and the work has begun, 
 this unpleasant sensation passes away, although more or less 
 excitement is still felt, chiefly physical, I think, and which 
 arises partly from the sense of bodily danger and of continual 
 escape from it, and partly from the necessity of keeping all 
 the senses on the qui vive to prevent the enemy from taking 
 an advantage, by bringing out an enfilading battery, or by 
 pushing forward suddenly a column of infantry to make a 
 charge ; I have felt greater mental excitement at the crisis of 
 a game of chess played with an equal opponent. I speak this 
 of an artillery fight on the level and in the open, subject to 
 infantry and cavalry charges, as well as to the fire of hostile 
 batteries ; an artillery duel, from commanding and' secure posi 
 tions, is a different and much less exciting thing. An old sol 
 dier gets to be indifferent to danger so long as it does not 
 affect him, but still he cannot help rejoicing continually that so 
 many shots pass him by. As regards sleeping on the night 
 before a battle, I don't think that the prospect of an Arma 
 geddon on the morrow, would keep me awake ; it is not like a 
 duel, you know, where a man centralizes and absorbs every 
 feeling in himself, but here every man knows that it is his 
 duty, and that he must do it, and the stronger his body is the 
 better he can do that duty, and so he "puts in a big ration of 
 sleep." On the night before July zd, at Gettysburg, Major 
 O., our Chief of Artillery, slept under my blankets with me, 
 between two of my guns in battery on the crest of Cemetery 
 Hill, and I don't think that either of us could accuse the other 
 of either snoring or kicking. 
 
 So, you want me to violate the articles of war by pitching 
 into my military superiors, do you ? Well, I don't care if I do 
 a little, seeing it 's you. I rather like General Meade ; he
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 437 
 
 fought the battle of Gettysburg superbly, and I think that he 
 did all that he could in the pursuit of Lee to Williamsport 
 Just think, in spite of all his losses, Lee was fully equal to us 
 in numbers ; his excellent position at Gettysburg enabled him 
 to get a day's start of us on his retreat, and thus to reach 
 Williamsport first, where again his position was such as to 
 prevent a successful reconnoissance, and it was impossible for 
 Meade to know that the whole Rebel Army was not lying be 
 hind those rifle pits. It would have been the height of rash 
 ness for him to have attacked an army of equal strength in a 
 strong position, and thereby to have lost all the advantages of 
 the success at Gettysburg. I think that his course was just 
 such a one as Washington would have pursued ; subsequent 
 events have showed, and will show still more plainly, his ca 
 pacity as a General. There was undoubtedly an immense 
 amount of mismanagement about the battle of Chickamauga ; 
 the men fought well, but were not well handled. I can't ex 
 actly find out how much Rosecrans was to blame, and don't 
 like to think that he was to blame at all ; McCook did cer 
 tainly show great want of conduct, and had no control over 
 his troops. General Thomas won a reputation at that battle 
 by mere good luck, as his corps was heavily reinforced by 
 forces from others, and no great generalship was required to 
 drive Longstreet back, only some stubborn fighting ; he is not 
 considered of very heavy calibre. Granger is highly thought 
 of and is a terror to the secesh. General Hooker is a splen 
 did soldier, and is enthusiastically admired by his small force 
 from the Army of the Potomac ; there is a superabundant vi 
 tality about him which affects all who come near him, and 
 makes one almost believe in some subtle magnetic or electric 
 influence. On the march, he is continually among the troops, 
 has always a friendly nod for the men and a kind word for the 
 officers, and is to be seen at the toughest spots with advice 
 and encouragement. He has such a fine physique, and seems 
 to take such a pride and delight in soldiering, that it is a right 
 pleasant event in a day's experience, to pass his head-quarters, 
 and see him standing in front of his tent by the fire with his
 
 438 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 hands behind his back, his regular position. Grant I have 
 seen two or three times, but not near enough to get any idea 
 of his character from his phiz ; he is said to be restless, full 
 of energy and excitability, a steam-engine in pantaloons ; he 
 is in every respect boss of this Western shanty, de jure as well 
 as de facto. Of General Howard, our Corps Commander, I 
 don't care about speaking, except to say that he is a good and 
 brave man, and a gentleman, but more adapted to the church 
 than to the army. 
 
 Since writing most of the above, a day has passed, and it is 
 now the evening of the 2oth, and my Battery is under imme 
 diate marching orders " at a moment's notice ; " General Sher 
 man's troops have come in, and I think that we are going to 
 have a row to-morrow. I am glad that I am to be at the front 
 
 of it, and hope that we shall wallop them thoroughly 
 
 I have written you a long letter, my dear boy, but you won't 
 mind if you are as fond of long letters as I am. Very much 
 love to the Form ; persuade him that this letter is to him 
 also, and make him answer it. 
 
 BRIDGEPORT, ALABAMA, January 5, 1864. 
 
 .... From the effects of the battles at Chattanooga, and 
 the ensuing forced march to Knoxville and back, I have 
 hardly recovered yet, even bodily, although it is now nearly a 
 fortnight since I rolled into my bed here, after a twenty-mile 
 gallop, quite used up. 
 
 You must not lose track of me because I am so far off; in 
 this army we experience lack of everything which we used to 
 have so abundantly in the Army of the Potomac ; but while 
 we can stand being docked of our nice little supplies and 
 winter comforts, we cannot stand being put on half rations of 
 letters, and we shall get entirely uncivilized in this howling 
 wilderness of Hoosiers, Buckeyes, Suckers, and Wolverines, 
 unless you give us occasional glimpses of our dear Eastern 
 home, and tell us that we are not entirely forgotten there. 
 
 .... My Battery has reenlisted under the Veteran Vol 
 unteer arrangement, and goes in for three years more, from
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 439 
 
 the ist of January, 1864 ; this movement was almost unani 
 mous, almost every man reenlisting, and that when their feet 
 were still bleeding and their bones still aching from the ex 
 posures and fatigues of the Knoxville march. We shall be 
 mustered in, in a day or two, and then the Battery will proba 
 bly go to New York on a thirty-day's furlough and to recruit. I 
 shall not accompany them if I can possibly help it, as I could 
 hardly bear the journey, and my health is greatly in need of 
 a little rest ; besides, I have a perfect horror of recruiting, 
 and all its accompaniments. So now I am in for it until 1867, 
 
 unless the world comes to an end in 1865, according to 
 
 and Dr. Cummings, or some kindly shell or bullet gives me 
 earlier relief. Don't think, from this, that I am low-spirited, 
 or " down on my luck ; " I am only half heart-broken about 
 the state of the country now, and the state it must be in for a 
 long time to come. The end and object of the war are most 
 righteous and proper, and its final results will, after the lapse 
 of years, be beneficial to all parties, and will aid the plan of 
 Providence in teaching and elevating the nation, but all that 
 does not shut my eyes to the terrible miseries which daily 
 come to my notice. " Battle, murder, and sudden death," 
 I can stand well enough ; but the disruption of families, the 
 destruction of homesteads, the closing of school-houses and 
 churches, the starving of the people by subsisting large armies 
 on the country, the emigration of hundreds of houseless wan 
 derers, who, not long ago, were prosperous farmers, the disre 
 gard of all civil claims, and the treading down of the "Com 
 mon Law " under the heel of the " Army Regulations, " all 
 this must be piteously painful to any one who calls himself a 
 citizen of the United States ; and equally so to me, although 
 I have been often compelled to commit, in the line of duly, 
 
 what I should once have called great outrages 
 
 The country around Athens, Sweetwater, and Mouse Creek 
 was a farmer's paradise ; it looked lovely even in the middle 
 of December, with its broad corn-lands and wheat fields, 
 sugar-cane and cotton plant, and warm, delicious sun-light 
 over all, undisturbed by winds or storms, like the island
 
 44O LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 valley of the Avilion, " deep-meadowed, happy, fair with or 
 chard-lawns ;" the very names, Sweetwater, Mouse Creek, 
 speak of everything plentiful and quiet and cozy. Many 
 pleasant Union demonstrations were made along the route ; 
 in some places really superb national flags, which the ladies 
 had wrought with their own hands, and kept hidden from 
 rebel eyes by many a cunning device, were given to the winds, 
 and were accompanied by waving of handkerchiefs and by 
 hearty greeting, to which the passing troops responded with 
 roaring cheers. In some places the women jumped up and 
 down with joy, and shouted " Hurrah for our side," which told 
 a tale of the time when the other side had been uppermost, 
 and those good people had suffered. 
 
 Sometimes this display of patriotism was prompted by 
 mixed motives, as thus ; the Battery was passing a house, at 
 the door of which stood a woman, and on the opposite side of 
 the road was walking a fat rooster ; already a cannoneer had 
 marked him for his own, and was a la David drawing a fatal 
 bead on him with a "smooth pebble from the brook," when the 
 old lady perceived the imminent danger of the bird, and deter 
 mined to make a diversion in his favor ; waving her hand, she 
 exclaimed, as the swallow-tailed U. S. guidon was just pass 
 ing, " Hurrah for that dear old flag ! it does my eyes good to 
 see it again." The diversion was successful, at least as far as 
 we were concerned, and I am sure that the carcass of that 
 rooster did not adorn the camp-kettles of the Thirteenth New 
 York Battery. 
 
 BRIDGEPORT, ALA., January 17, 1864. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER, .... I am particular anxious to get 
 hold of those missing letters, which must suffice to me, this 
 year, for Christmas and New Year's gifts, with their kind 
 wishes and salutations. J.'s letter was a very delightful one, 
 and made me feel quite homesick, and a longing desire that 
 we might have met together at New Haven during that season. 
 
 What will you say to my coming home for a while ? My 
 Battery have reenlisted in superb style, only two remaining 
 out who had a chance to go into the arrangement, and the
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 441 
 
 Thirteenth New York Battery has now been mustered into 
 the service as a Veteran Volunteer Organization, "to serve 
 for three years or during the war, unless sooner discharged, 
 from January i, 1864." Probably we shall start in a few days 
 for New York, to give the men their thirty day's furlough in 
 their State, and perhaps to recruit a little. I had not thought 
 of continuing in the service longer than next fall, and conse 
 quently did not urge the men at all to reenlist. I simply 
 stated the conditions, the bounty, the furlough, and read the 
 order relating to such cases, and then said I would take the 
 names of such as desired to enrol themselves for three years 
 more of hardship and hard-tack. But they all asked me if I 
 was going to remain with them, and made my promise to stay a 
 sort of condition precedent to their reenlisting, so that I felt that 
 if the gaining of these men for the service depended upon me, 
 I had no right to selfishly consult my own feelings, and so gave 
 the desired promise never to leave nor forsake them, and this 
 promise I propose to keep, unless disabled in some way. It 
 was not without a struggle that I gave up my dreams of home 
 and friends, intellectual leisure and books, music and conge 
 nial society, all of which would be mine next October, when 
 my time was out, and I could hang my sabre up as a relic, 
 over my bookcase, feeling that the three years' hard work gave 
 me a certain title to rest awhile ; but if this is not to be I may 
 as well make up my mind to go without it, and for my per 
 sonal wants and disappointments console myself with the in 
 creasing brightness of the national prospects, and the ap 
 proaching probability of ultimate and entire success. We are 
 going to give the rebs a queer stirring up down here, next 
 spring. Knoxville and Chattanooga will both be thoroughly 
 fortified and amply provisioned, so that we shall not have to 
 depend upon the long line of railroad to Nashville for supplies, 
 and will be able to make a formidable advance from either 
 point, without endangering our communications. I think that 
 in the next campaign the rebels will be obliged to abandon 
 either Virginia or Georgia. If Lee concentrates his whole 
 army against us, we are ready for him. We have been hav-
 
 442 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 ing terrible cold weather here ; ten degrees below zero is not 
 exactly comfortable in a tent. I am quite comfortable in my 
 quarters, have a good fire-place, nice floor and good bed. I 
 hope to be in New Haven by the middle of February, that is 
 if you can tolerate the sight of soldiers away from their posts. 
 
 BRIDGEPORT, ALA., March 27, 1864. 
 
 In the midst of busy working and preparation, I take a few 
 minutes to tell you of my safe arrival with my men in our Ala 
 bama home, after a pleasant journey from New York of a little 
 more than six days. On Sunday I bade adieu to my New 
 York friends, and Monday morning went to the Park Barracks, 
 where I found most of my delinquents, and packed them on 
 the Fort Schuyler steamer. I went, in the afternoon, to Fort 
 Schuyler from Williams' Bridge in a wagon. We were doomed 
 to wait for orders till Wednesday afternoon. A small tug took 
 us to 3ist Street, and we went to Albany by 7 p. M. train. On 
 Thursday evening we were in Buffalo, Friday morning in Cleve 
 land, and at i P. M. in Columbus. Here Lieutenant M. and I 
 got out to take dinner, twenty minutes being advertised for 
 that purpose, when we had the pleasure of seeing the train go 
 off without us. So here were seven hours to be disposed of; 
 when we had exhausted about every mode of slaughtering that 
 most precious of earthly things, I had the good luck to 
 stumble upon Henry Chittenden, who was most cordial, and 
 took us both to his house, where we had supper and passed a 
 very pleasant evening. We had a dreary night ride, and 
 reached Cincinnati just before daybreak, where I found that 
 trusty watch dog, the Orderly Sergeant, had got all his flock 
 snugly gathered together in the barracks of the Sanitary Com 
 mission, and there the fourscore were snoring as if on a wager. 
 I was right glad that my transportation to Louisville was by 
 water. The men had only a deck passage, and had to stow 
 themselves among the bales of merchandise, to keep warm. 
 M. and I got a nice state-room, and I had a glorious nap, 
 which was only interrupted by our arrival at Louisville on 
 Sunday morning. An afternoon train took us on towards
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 443 
 
 Nashville, which we reached Monday morning. We found 
 the place more horrible than ever ; the dirt more abundant, 
 and the dust flying in blinding clouds. The city was full of 
 troops, waiting for transportation to the front, but was just be 
 ginning to be depleted, as an order had come for all infantry 
 regiments to march out to Chattanooga. Owing to this we 
 got shipped for Bridgeport on Tuesday afternoon ; if we had 
 had to wait for the whole of those 13,000 troops to be shipped, 
 we might have stayed there a month. A ride of sixteen hours 
 brought us safely to Bridgeport, with no other accident than 
 being run into by the train behind us, and having our car 
 pretty well smashed, though no one was hurt. We found nine 
 inches of snow at Bridgeport, and through this we tramped from 
 the depot to our camp; we passed over a little hill and came 
 in sight of our old winter quarters, upon which the men broke 
 out into loud and joyful cheers. But what especially pleased me 
 was the sight of a row of beautiful, bright, brass, light twelve- 
 pounders, or Napoleon guns, and as I ran my eyes along and 
 counted, lo ! there were six ! I can assure you that I felt very 
 ing in this respect. I was conducted to the stables, where 
 much delighted at having the Battery restored to its old foot- 
 nearly a hundred splendid horses were standing. It would 
 do your eyes good to see how splendidly I have got them 
 matched ; hardly a single pair would disgrace a private car 
 riage. It was the pleasantest thing of all, next to getting 
 home, this getting back. The air is delicious, the snow is all 
 gone, to-day has been a perfect Sunday, and I have been most 
 happy in riding with M. across the river to call upon a Union 
 family from the North, and having some first-rate church music 
 together. On my return I have read in my new old Bible, 1 
 and thought of you all at home. I ought to have said that I 
 found my box all right, and it wanned my heart to see all the 
 nice things which home love had sent. I am very busy get 
 ting rid of my old guns, and fitting up the new ones. To-mor 
 row morning I am to move across the river, into a work at the 
 
 1 One given him by his grandfather to replace one lost with his luggage, 
 given by him when six years old.
 
 444 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 head of the bridge over the Tennessee, where I shall probably 
 remain until the spring movement takes place. The corps 
 which are to be put in most actively are the Eleventh, Twelfth, 
 Fourteenth, and a Division of the Fourth Corps. The bat 
 teries will be fitted up in superb style, and will be expected to 
 do the lion's share of the work. I am Chief of Artillery of the 
 Third Division. My command is over twelve guns. I feel 
 very happy at being at my work again, and am full of hope 
 and courage, for the spring and summer campaign. I have 
 enough to read for a good while, and hope to scare up some 
 antagonists at chess. Have made good use of my little 
 gun already, have had some nice messes of quails and 
 pigeons. I will write again as soon as we are settled in our 
 new camp. 
 
 BRIDGEPORT, ALA., April i, 1864. 
 
 . . . . I will not say that I felt as glad to see camp as 
 I did to see New York ; gladness does not express it at all ; 
 it was, rather, a quiet feeling of satisfaction and contentment, 
 a happiness in being back at my work again, different in kind, 
 but not inferior in degree, to the delight I felt in looking across 
 the Jersey Flats, and seeing the spires of Trinity and St. 
 John's. And it was very pleasant to feel this sense of con 
 tentment at coming back to the Army, and friends at home 
 must not look upon it as evincing any want of affection for 
 them, or any neglect of home ; a man must do with his might 
 what his hand findeth to do, and my job, at present, is to make 
 my Battery efficient in the time of preparation, and active in 
 the day of action ; and to do this work well, all skill and 
 thought and enthusiasm should be employed, and so I thank 
 God that I am willing to leave New Haven, the opera, phil 
 harmonics, etc., for the "good time coming," whenever that 
 may be. And yet it is right pleasant, when my officers have 
 retired to their tents, to sit before the big fire-place in my rude 
 quarters, and think over my thirty days at home, and recall so 
 many dear faces, and the affection and kindness shown me by 
 every one. It is the remembrance of such acts, and the words 
 of approval and encouragement with which they are accom-
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 445 
 
 panied, that spirit a man up, and keep his heart warm and 
 strong in his rough work. And I am sure that the harder and 
 more sincerely a man does his duty, the more closely he loves 
 
 and cherishes the remembrance of his friends No 
 
 man of taste cares for vulgar fame, but the thought of having 
 the eyes he loves best smile approval, will nerve him up to 
 anything. ..." 
 
 I found upon my arrival at Bridgeport, that I was already in 
 possession of six fine brass guns, of the kind known as light 
 twelve-pounders, or Napoleon guns ; they had been turned 
 over by Battery F, of the Fourth United States Regulars, and 
 are the same guns which young Frank Crosby commanded at 
 Chancellorsville, and by which he fell. May I never have a 
 worse fate / . . . . 
 
 Every day scores of the inhabitants, chiefly women, pass the 
 camp on their way to procure supplies from the Commissaries, 
 and I am sure that you never saw such creatures in your life, 
 so ragged, dirty, and woe-begone, such spiritless faces, and 
 drooping, slouching figures ; they are hardly worthy of being 
 classed as Caucasians, but more nearly realize the idea of 
 some intensely inferior race, the Papuans, or Australian In 
 dians, or the Diggers. And I do not believe that the war has 
 reduced them to this ; it is the normal condition of the " poor 
 white trash." Nothing that I have ever heard or .seen of the 
 injustice and injury done by slavery to the blacks, ever made 
 my blood boil so with indignation, as this spectacle of white 
 men, the same flesh and blood as ourselves, offshoots, perhaps, 
 of the same families that dispense such elegant hospitality in 
 Virginia and South Carolina, to see these, I say, brought lower 
 than the slave, and all by that same system of slavery that 
 says, "we will not have the white man to work," and thus de 
 nying them the power of acquiring worldly prosperity, and at 
 the same time, causing mind and body to rust in miserable in 
 action. The slave who works, thus becomes the physical and 
 mental superior of the white who does not, and the slave-hold 
 ers have little or nothing to fear from their degraded white 
 brethren. There seems little chance of elevating these people
 
 446 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER, 
 
 for a generation to come ; we shall have to settle this country 
 with Northern men, and then I am sure that Bridgeport, at the 
 junction of two great railroads, on a most noble river, the cen 
 tre of a region rich in coal, and iron, and saltpetre, and 
 marble, and corn-lands, will one day be a splendid city ; under 
 the hand of Southern enterprise it had grown to a place of 
 four houses ! 
 
 HEAD-QUARTERS OF 13x11 N. Y. BATTERY, 
 BRIDGEPORT, ALA., April 21, 1864. 
 
 DEAREST MOTHER, .... We have been in a regu 
 lar fever of excitement here for a couple of weeks past, about 
 the consolidation of these two Corps, the Eleventh and 
 Twelfth. Lookout Valley was the Mecca to which all curious 
 officers made their pilgrimages, and every last arrival from 
 that classic locality had to undergo a regular cross-examina 
 tion as to the latest news, how Old Jose looked, what he said, 
 and who were to have the new Divisions. The work is at last 
 completed, and the new organization is announced ; the Gen 
 erals of Division in the Twelfth Corps all retain their places, 
 while those of the Eleventh Corps have to take a back seat. 
 The German element is played out, and in everything except 
 name, the Eleventh Corps is put with the Twelfth, our Divi 
 sions and even Brigades being broken up and distributed to the 
 various Divisions, and even in name the Twelfth Corps will 
 retain its identity ; the number of the new Corps is the 
 Twentieth. 
 
 It is rather hard for an officer like myself, who has been 
 with the Corps from the very first, and has shared its hard 
 ships and dangers, its good report of second Bull Run, Get 
 tysburg, and Mission Ridge, and its evil report of Chancellors- 
 ville, to see the identity of the Corps merged into that of a 
 rival Corps; but orders are orders, and I consider nothing un 
 bearable that comes from the proper authority. 
 
 The new Corps is going to be magnificently equipped, and 
 commanded by a man who is more like old Stonewall Jack 
 son, than any man in our army ; we shall have a force of over 
 30,000 men in one mass ; 25,000 of them for active service in
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 447 
 
 the field, the remainder to guard the railroad, and if Fighting 
 Joe does not make an impression on rebeldom, with this force, 
 I shall be most grievously mistaken. It is a heart-stirring feel 
 ing, to belong to an army composed of such troops, so su 
 perbly equipped, and likely to have such a proud history. The 
 Divisions of the new Corps are to be commanded as follows : 
 First, General Williams; Second, General Geary; Third, Gen 
 eral Rousseau : Fourth, General Butterfield ; the artillery is 
 assigned to Divisions, two batteries to each Division ; my Bat 
 tery and Knapp's Pennsylvania Battery, a splendid volunteer 
 battery, belong to General Geary's Division, and I am the 
 Division Chief of Artillery- I have as fine a lot of horses as 
 you would wish to see, and the other Battery has a supply 
 equally fine, and when a few little deficiencies of equipment 
 shall be supplied, and the spring movement takes place, I 
 think that the Second Division will let itself be heard from. 
 Major Reynolds, our chief of artillery, is an excellent officer, 
 and very particular and critical. Lieutenant Mickle is his ad 
 jutant, and I am very glad that he remains connected with the 
 artillery ; he is a most cheerful and fine spirited fellow, and it 
 does me good to meet him. I am afraid that I have bored 
 you somewhat with my long account of the organizing of this 
 army, but I want you to know just what I am about, and what 
 my surroundings are. In every social point of view, the 
 change is one for the better. I shall now be thrown among 
 full-blooded Americans, and those mostly of the New York 
 or New England type. I had a very pleasant introduction to 
 some of my new comrades the other evening ; Colonel Ireland, 
 who commands a brigade in General Geary's Division, gave a 
 reception at his head-quarters at Stevenson, and F. S., who is an 
 intimate friend of the Colonel's, asked me to go down there 
 with him. Then we took the evening train at Bridgeport, and 
 jolted down to Stevenson by 7.30 P. M. We were among the 
 first arrivals, and I was very glad to have an opportunity of 
 making the acquaintance of Mrs. Ireland. She is a very in 
 timate friend of Captain S.'s wife, and his introduction was 
 sufficient to insure me a cordial reception. The rooms were
 
 448 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 draped with flags of the regiments of the Brigade, and fes 
 tooned with evergreen stars and loops, and ornaments of all 
 kinds and shapes, formed from swords, bayonets, and sashes, 
 lighted up the walls splendidly. In the hall hung the musket, 
 knapsack, and accoutrements of a soldier, taken, the Colonel 
 said, at hap-hazard from the ranks of a regiment. The mus 
 ket shone like silver, not a speck of dust was on the equip 
 ments, and the knapsack, fully packed with overcoat and 
 blanket, was a very neat and symmetrical object. Soon the 
 guests began to arrive ; a great many elegantly-dressed offi 
 cers, and a very few ladies ; it would make the eyes of a city 
 belle snap to see the number of gentlemen that pounced upon 
 each individual lady. The jolliest of the ladies was a Mrs. 
 W., wife of Captain W. of the One Hundred and Forty- 
 ninth New York, bearing certain proofs in his phiz of belong 
 ing to that noble race that bled at Concord. I took Mrs. W. 
 in to supper, which, by the way, was a regular success for the 
 field, as being substantial as well as elegant. The officers 
 present danced with each other very gracefully, and treated 
 me with great consideration, when they learned that I was as 
 signed to their Division. The ladies from the country, who 
 had been hunted up for this occasion, were a queer lot ; one or 
 two of them were said to be great heiresses, but of a different 
 style from Northern girls whether heiresses or not. They did 
 not know how to dance, to walk, to talk, or to appear at ease ; 
 and they seemed to look upon the fun and good hits made by 
 the really smart officers, as very undignified ; they actually be 
 haved as if they had never seen a gentleman before in their 
 lives. I never want to hear any one say anything in favor of- 
 Southern ladies, about their charming ways, and their graceful 
 languor, give me rather the poorest New England school- 
 marm, the force of language can no further go. S. and I 
 came home at the respectable hours of 4^ A. M., having had a 
 very nice time. I like him better, the more I see of him. He 
 is just as good as he can be ; I like to hear him talk about his 
 wife and children (he has four, three boys and a girl), in whom 
 he is completely wrapped up; it really makes me feel quite a
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 449 
 
 hankering after domesticity. I only hope that this new or 
 ganization may not compel him to be assigned away from this 
 Corps. Very many thanks to Mr. B. for his picture, and to 
 Mr. D. for his, which I found in the box. 
 
 PEA VINE CHURCH, GA., 
 May 6, 1864. 
 
 MY DEAREST MOTHER, My doubt and anxiety about J. 
 were brought to a painful certainty by your letter, which 
 reached me just .as we were marching from Bridgeport to the 
 front, and filled me with very great sadness. I have always 
 been very anxious about him, ever since he entered the service, 
 and now perhaps almost the very worst of all is realized, a Rich 
 mond prison ; I cannot bear to think of him as having fallen. 
 It will be with the greatest and most painful anxiety that I 
 shall hear further news from him ; whether he is wounded or 
 not, and, if a prisoner, what his prospects of keeping up health 
 
 and spirits until exchanged But I cannot give way 
 
 to feelings in this matter, as- 1 have my own duties to attend 
 to, and the perpetual consciousness of great sorrow such as 
 this, would entirely incapacitate me from performing them in 
 a proper manner ; so I cherish hope as much as I can, and 
 rely upon the thought of J.'s energy and tact, which will en 
 able him to alleviate some of the miseries of imprisonment, 
 and to obtain for him release at the earliest possible day. I 
 cannot help sympathizing with the mortification which his 
 proud spirit must have felt, at being obliged to surrender after 
 his almost first engagement, 1 but according to all accounts, the 
 resistance made was most honorable and gallant, and General 
 Wessells would have been to blame if he had not surrendered, 
 when there was no more hope of receiving reinforcements. 
 You must not allow yourself to grieve too much, my dearest 
 mother, over this sad disaster ; we cannot do our duty in these 
 stormy times, without many risks and sacrifices, and when J. 
 and I came out into the field, we had no idea of avoiding our 
 fair share of these dangers, and we are eternally grateful to 
 
 1 His brother was taken prisoner at Plymouth. 
 29
 
 450 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 you for your encouragement, and your sympathy in our plans 
 and views of the right course to be pursued, so that we could 
 go onward with everything in our favor, sense of duty, patri 
 otism, and the cheering voice of those dearest to us. And so, 
 no loss or sacrifice ought to be regretted, or unduly sorrowed 
 over, when viewed in the light which Right and the splendid 
 Future throw over the conflict. I shall not cease hoping that 
 we shall once more meet under the family roof, and in the 
 meantime I shall ask that strength may be given him to en 
 dure privation ; and courage and cheerfulness to buoy his 
 mind up in the dreariness of imprisonment. How can I com 
 municate with him now ? Shall I send my letter to you to be 
 forwarded to him. 
 
 You will wish to know what brought me down into this re 
 gion ; on Monday night we received orders to move early the 
 next morning, and so, on Tuesday, May 4, we broke up our 
 camp at East Bridgeport, tore ourselves away from our com 
 fortable quarters, and the delights of Tennessee River fish, 
 and marched to Shellmound. The next day, after a most piti 
 less march up the valley, we crossed Lookout Mountain after 
 nightfall, very completely done up, and joined the other Brig 
 ade of our Division, formerly the First Brigade, Second Di 
 vision, Eleventh Corps. From this point, the southern base 
 of Lookout, our Division marched, the next morning, through 
 Russville, towards Ringgold, leaving that place to the left and 
 marching towards a place called La Fayette. This morning 
 we marched half a dozen miles further towards that place, but 
 have now halted for a rest, and also to allow of the complete 
 concentration of our Corps. It will form a most magnificent 
 line, almost as close as a line of battle, and containing 
 nearly a hundred thousand men. If the rebs can make a 
 stand against this force, they are smarter and stronger than I 
 think them. I am quite delighted with my commanding offi 
 cer, General Geary ; he has great consideration for the Artil 
 lery, and tries to help it along as much as he can. He is very 
 polite to me personally, and I feel quite at home in this strange 
 Division already. The two batteries under my command, as
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 451 
 
 Division Chief of Artillery, are in fine order, and I shall be 
 much disappointed if I do not do good service with them. It 
 is impossible to say what the enemy propose to do. For my 
 own part, I would rather have them stand and fight it out 
 here, as I think that we are far enough from our supplies 
 already. I do not allow myself to be over sanguine, in matters 
 which are so vitally interesting to us all, and yet I should be 
 greatly disappointed if we did not achieve some very decided 
 success in the approaching battle. The country is hilly and 
 undulating, and has been cultivated, but we see very few in 
 habitants ; have not been able to forage much yet, and my 
 fare is simple bacon, hard tack, and coffee ; but the promised 
 land can't be very far ahead, and there must be chickens there. 
 I am very well indeed, and am getting my campaign tan on. 
 If we have a fight here, look in the newspapers for accounts 
 of Geary's Division, Twentieth Corps, and you will know 
 where I have been at work. Let me know about J. as soon as 
 you get any information, and how he is to be addressed. 
 
 NEAR RESACA, GA., May 14, 1864. 
 
 It seems a rather queer thing to be writing from a battlefield, 
 and during a battle, but such is really the case. Not far from 
 where I am sitting, the hostile batteries are fiercely playing on 
 each other, and the infantry are beginning to tackle each 
 other quite seriously ; but as our Corps is in reserve, we don't 
 trouble ourselves unduly about what Macpherson, or Logan, 
 or Schofield, may be doing, and patiently await our turn to be 
 called into the grand melee. The campaign has been a queer 
 one, the object of it having been to amuse the enemy in front, 
 and keep him at Dalton, while the bulk of the army should 
 march along the range of hills within which Dalton lies, cross 
 the ridge by one of the Gaps, cut the enemy from his commu 
 nications, and take him in the rear. How far this plan has 
 
 1 He never succeeded in communicating with his brother, who heard 
 rumors of W.'s death when at Macon, from prisoners who were brought 
 in, confirmed when he was at Savannah, in a letter received by a friend in 
 S. from friends at the North.
 
 452 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 succeeded I am as yet unable to inform you. It should have 
 succeeded perfectly. The three principal Gaps in this range 
 are, first, at Buzzard's Roost, next Mill Creek Gap ; some 
 ten miles further to the south, Snake Creek Gap. Buzzard's 
 Roost, strongly fortified, was threatened by two Divisions of 
 our Corps, while Geary marched against Mill Creek Gap. 
 This is a very steep mountain pass, thickly wooded on all 
 sides, and commanded on the crest by breastworks, in which 
 a large force was posted. The Second Brigade of the Divis 
 ion was formed in the first line, and the First Brigade in the 
 second, and an attempt was made to scale the mountain and 
 take the pass, as was done at Lookout. But though the men 
 did their best, scrambling from rock to rock, and pulling them 
 selves up by trees and bushes, yet as fast as they showed their 
 heads above the rocky parapets at the crest, an unseen foe 
 picked them off, and even those who were but slightly wounded 
 were in great danger of breaking their necks or limbs by falling 
 from the rocky ledges. At times, small parties would succeed 
 in reaching the summit, only to find themselves confronted 
 by a strong breastwork, over which peeped the rifles of a foe. 
 It was impossible to aid our men much with the artillery. 
 However, I placed the rifled battery under my command in 
 position, and threw some shells into the Gap, with what effect 
 it was impossible to discover. The fight was kept up until 
 night-fall, when our men retired down the mountain, pro 
 tected by the artillery from being pursued, and camped just 
 in front of the Gap ; so that if the enemy would not let us 
 over, we could be prepared to do the same by them. In this 
 affair our Division lost about three hundred and fifty killed, 
 wounded, and missing ; but it was not labor in vain, as the 
 attention of the enemy was thereby drawn to this Gap, and 
 General Macpherson, with the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Corps, 
 crossed the mountain at Snake Creek Gap almost without op 
 position ; but I believe that he failed in thoroughly cutting the 
 railroad communications at Resaca, and thus it is to be feared 
 that the bulk of the enemy have slipped away to Atlanta, leav 
 ing only a rear guard before us. Since I have been writing
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 453 
 
 this, the infantry firing has become much more heavy, and 
 there is reason to hope that we are to have a chance at their 
 main army. We lay for three days at Mill Creek Gap, and it 
 rained frightfully and changed from extreme heat to severely 
 chilly weather, which made us all a little ill. We marched on 
 the nth, passed through Snake Creek Gap, closely followed 
 by the Eleventh and Twenty-third Corps, and yesterday be 
 gan a lively skirmishing with the rebels, who are evidently on 
 the retreat, their object being to get safely off to Atlanta, 
 and ours to cut them off, and make them fight. The result I 
 cannot announce. I can only say that General Howard with 
 the Fourth Corps took Dal ton yesterday, and will be to-day 
 on the enemy's rear, and that thus far everything looks well. 
 Our hearts have been cheered by the glorious news from the 
 Army of the Potomac ; we all rejoice in their triumphs just as if 
 we still belonged to that grand army. I only hope that we may 
 be able to show some similar good service in the public cause. 
 I continue in the same state of miserable uncertainty about 
 my brother's fate. I am sure that you will let me know as 
 soon as you hear anything. I wish that the present move 
 ments in Virginia might result in the release or escape of all 
 our prisoners. Do not fail to write me soon, and let me know 
 all you can learn about him and about all at home. Thus far 
 this has not been a very severe campaign for either men or 
 animals. I have kept my horses in pretty good condition, 
 and my men have been well supplied with rations. For my 
 self, in my capacity of Division Chief of Artillery, I held on to 
 my ambulance for head-quarters, but fear greatly that it may 
 be taken for general use in case of a big fight It is very 
 convenient as a dry and comfortable sleeping place, and I am 
 now writing this letter from the driver's seat. Now I have 
 written you a stupid letter, but one can't get up much on the 
 edge of a battlefield, when in momentary expectation of being 
 ordered in. Be sure that if we are I shall do my duty as I 
 best know how.
 
 454 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 CAMP NEAR CASSVILLE, GA. 
 May 20, 1864. 
 
 MY DEAR AUNT, A day of rest at last, after so many 
 spent in marching and fighting, enables me to answer your 
 very kind letter, and to send assurances of my health and 
 safety up to this date, to all the friends at home. 
 
 Your letter was a great relief, containing the information of 
 J.'s comparative safety, even though he be a prisoner. Although 
 I am not of a very sanguine temperament, yet I am very con 
 fident that his energy and tact will bring him safe through the 
 horrors of even a Richmond prison, and that he will return 
 again, alive and hearty. At any rate this is the view I must take ; 
 any more gloomy view of things would make me too wretched 
 to perform my duty properly. When I wrote last to mother, 
 we were lying in reserve, awaiting orders to move forward. 
 In less than half an hour after that letter was mailed, our 
 Corps began to move down toward the left, to form a junction 
 with the Fourth Corps, under General Howard, against whom 
 the rebels were massing heavily. I rode with General Geary 
 in the advance of the Division, and reached the scene of con 
 flict just in time to witness the most fortunate arrival of our 
 men, who turned the enemy back, just as they were about to 
 flank General Howard. A brigade of the First Division of 
 our Corps took the Indiana Battery out of the very clutches 
 of the rebs, as the covering infantry of the Fourth Corps had 
 run away from it, and it was manfully holding its ground with 
 out support. This ended the fighting of the i4th May. The 
 batteries of the Division marched to the left in the night, a 
 most tedious and intricate march, requiring about eight hours 
 to make five miles, and arriving in camp at 4.30 A. M. after a 
 sleepless night. The next morning, Sunday, the i5th, the 
 real fighting commenced. The enemy were intrenched on a 
 line running almost north and south, parallel to, and covering 
 the railroad ; the country is very hilly and thickly wooded, 
 admirably adapted to bushwhacking, but utterly unfit for ex 
 tended movements in line, or for artillery operations. The
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 455 
 
 rebel defenses consisted of rifle-pits and fence-rail breast 
 works at all points, and on the summits of the ridges were 
 earthworks, and quite elaborate embrasured forts. The flanks 
 were protected against any serious demonstration by the tan 
 gled character of the country. My rble was of course not a 
 very important one, but I placed the whole of the Thirteenth 
 New York Battery in the best positions I could find, their brass 
 guns being the only ones that could be used in such a country. 
 
 The assistance they gave did not amount to very much, but 
 it would have been important in case our men had suffered any 
 decided repulse. 
 
 The day was spent in assaults upon the enemy's position, 
 points being gained and then lost again, but ground gradually 
 gained until about four p. M. when General Hooker made an 
 attack with his whole Corps, and took several of the forti 
 fied knobs ; this decided the contest, and after making a mid 
 night onslaught, to deceive us, and cover their retreat, the 
 enemy decamped, and abandoned Resaca, moving directly 
 south, both on the railroad and by roads running parallel to 
 it. A similar mode of pursuit was adopted ; Sherman did 
 not give the enemy any head start, but pushed on at day 
 break the next morning, moving the Fourth and Fourteenth 
 Corps directly through Resaca, Macpherson's troops west, and 
 our Corps east of the railroad, where we made a great circuit 
 for the purpose of flanking Calhoun, and crossed the Cone- 
 sauga River, but brought up against the Coosawatchee River, 
 as we had neither pontoon bridge nor boats. In the night of 
 the i6th we hunted up a couple of old ferry-boats, put them 
 end for end, planked and secured them, and crossed the 
 whole Corps the next morning, and marched to Calhoun, 
 which the enemy had been obliged to leave. You see that 
 General Sherman's plan of march is to move armies in paral 
 lel lines, but having them converge and concentrate at all 
 important points. Thus, for example, we see the other Di 
 visions of our Corps in the morning, lose them during the day, 
 and meet again at night. This was also the style of marching 
 we pursued in going to Knoxville. On the igth General
 
 456 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 Howard had quite a sharp fight with the rebs, but outfought 
 them and pushed on. The other Corps continued the flank 
 march, and the advance of our army is at Kingston, the junc 
 tion of the branch railroad to Rome, thus cutting off that im 
 portant place and compelling its abandonment. We are at Cass- 
 ville, east of Kingston, in the beautiful valley of the Etowah, 
 enjoying supremely a few hours' rest after our hard marches. 
 The country is very lovely and well cultivated, as far as it is 
 cleared; but immense tracts in this section are still covered 
 with heavy timber, chiefly oak and nut-wood. The inhabit 
 ants have generally vamosed, the male ones almost without 
 exception, and have taken with them their two legged prop 
 erty, evidently looking upon that as too portable to be left to 
 the Yanks. Thus far the campaign has been a severe one on 
 both men and horses, as far as fatigue and work are con 
 cerned, but supplies have come up with great regularity, and 
 we have not been compelled to forage on the country, though 
 I think that we shall come to that soon. Our Corps lost 
 heavily in the battle of the i5th, the entire loss being about 
 two thousand. What the loss of the whole army is I do not 
 know, but should think that five thousand ought to cover it. 
 We have taken a number of prisoners, and about twenty guns. 
 Several of my friends were killed or wounded. Lieutenant- 
 colonel Lloyd of the One Hundred and Nineteenth New York, 
 was killed, and the Adjutant of the One Hundred and Thirty- 
 fourth New York wounded in the head. While passing from 
 one of my batteries to the other, I got by mistake into a cross 
 fire, and found it very hot for a few minutes, and got a smart 
 slap on the arm from a spent ball. Still all our fighting here 
 has been mere child's play compared with that in Virginia. If 
 we could only get a fair chance, on a fair field, we would give 
 you a victory to record not much inferior to those of the Army 
 of the Potomac. I do not like to see all the work being done 
 by others when we are ready and willing to do our share. If 
 the work goes on through the summer as it has begun, I shall 
 be able to leave the service at the expiration of my term with 
 a clear conscience.
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 457 
 
 We are in pretty light marching order, as all wagons 
 containing officers' baggage have been sent to Ringgold, un 
 loaded, and sent again to the front with forage. I have seen 
 my old friend Captain S. once or twice on this march. He 
 is now Division Quartermaster in the Fourteenth Corps. I 
 take great interest in everything, even the smallest detail, from 
 New Haven, and your letters are sure to entertain me. 
 
 To L. R. P. 
 
 CASSVILLE, GA., May 22, 1864. 
 
 MY Dt-AR BOY, As to-day is a real "day of rest," unlike 
 the last two Sundays, which were spent in fighting, and as 
 letter-writing is not only permitted but also encouraged by 
 General Sherman, in a very spicy circular issued yesterday, 
 in which he gave the press correspondents a gorgeous rap 
 over the knuckles, and as to-morrow we resume our line of 
 march for Atlanta, with the prospect of a very sound bellyful 
 of hard work and hard fighting before we reach that interest 
 ing spot, I think that I will try to start with as clean a record 
 as possible with my correspondents, and your letter dated 
 April 27 is very noisy and clamorous in its demands to be 
 attended to, so that after reflecting for some time whether I 
 had better take the bantling up and spank it thoroughly or 
 administer a soothing dose of paregoric, I have decided upon 
 the latter course. I desire, in the first place, to object to a 
 statement of yours to the effect that you were not in my debt; 
 if you were not, you certainly ought to be, for I spread myself 
 on an epistle to you shortly before I left Bridgeport, and really 
 I cannot be held responsible for the bulls of Uncle Sam's 
 Brieftragers ; you must write me whenever you feel like it and 
 the gadfly of Sanskrit remits his exertions for a season, with 
 out revolving the question of who wrote last, or casting up our 
 epistolary accounts to see where the balance lies, and I am 
 sure that you will be good and kind enough o do so. I love 
 to read your letters ; you can't talk too much " shop " for me ; 
 some other people talk about marriages, and removals, and 
 fairs, and concerts, and similar pomps and vanities of this
 
 458 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 wicked world, and seem to think I have not retained civili 
 zation enough to care for culture or scholarship ; while you 
 pay me the compliment of taking it for granted that I have 
 not, in a couple of hard, rough years, thrown off my love for 
 those beautiful studies. I don't care how deep you go into 
 questions, or how dark and abstruse they may seem to me ; it 
 is like looking into the dusky alcove of a superb library ; you 
 know that there are treasures there, and that when your eyes 
 become accustomed to that solemn light, you can find them. 
 As for your proposition to get up a translation in the way you 
 spoke of, it was most kind of you to be willing to ask me 
 with my dim ideas of grammar and roots, to go with you in 
 such an undertaking ; but perhaps some of these days, when 
 I shall have emerged from the nomadic state, I may take you 
 at your word ; though even in literature and aesthetics I should 
 require a considerable amount of refreshing and posting. 
 
 Did it ever occur to you to place Shakespeare beside any 
 one of the three great Greek dramatists ? I was thinking 
 about it only to-day, and carried out the thought to some 
 length, although it was an unsatisfactory business without the 
 text of any of them at hand. Has it been done already ; and 
 if so, how and by whom ? I should really like at some time 
 to put down some of my ideas on this point. I do not think 
 that the study of Tennyson would help a man much in work 
 ing up Sophocles ; he is, I think, eminently unclassic, except, 
 perhaps, in his beautiful rhythm : he might have written fine 
 Greek lines at the University, but his ideas are not Greek. 
 There is no modern production to be compared with the 
 "Hermann and Dorothea'' of Goethe in its classic beauty ; I, 
 read it once more when I was at home, and was more charmed 
 than ever. Tennyson is essentially a writer of the Romance 
 school, strongly tinged and influenced by the liberal Chris 
 tianity of the Broad Church ; a man who has deeply studied 
 the best models, and has profited vastly by the study ; he has 
 caught the rhythm and melody of the Greeks, but not their 
 power. " Ulysses " is a modern picture on an ancient subject, 
 and the superb lines in it, as well as the whole casting, are
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 459 
 
 from Dante. " Morte d'Arthur " is only a translation of the 
 old legend into sonorous verse, containing a few lines almost 
 literal from Homer, and a passage on prayer which reminds 
 me always of that about the Amu'. 1 For my part, I should as 
 soon look to a star to explain the source of light in the sun, as 
 study Tennyson preparatory to pitching into Sophocles. 
 
 I propose, one of these days, when we commence that trans 
 lation together, to begin also another job with you, namely, 
 a literary course based on the classics and beginning with 
 Dante (your nose having been previously kept on the Italian 
 grindstone long enough to post you on the original), then 
 Shakespeare, a little of Milton, Rabelais, Cervantes, and Sir 
 Thomas Browne. I am also desirous of knowing something 
 for myself of those bugbears of our youth, Voltaire, Rousseau, 
 Diderot, and Helvetius ; if I read these with you, it would do 
 me no harm, you know. 
 
 But enough of books ; you will want to know where I am 
 at this present writing. We are about half a mile from the 
 pretty village of Cassville, county seat of Cass County, Georgia, 
 which is really quite charming for a Southern town, and con 
 tains several churches, a college (which has for some time 
 been used as a hospital), and a Ladies' Seminary : this last 
 affair was occupied up to the last moment by the fair school 
 girls, who at last fled with great precipitation, leaving many 
 of their clothes and toilet articles a prey to the Yankee in 
 vader ; even sweet little notes were picked up, wherein gallant 
 young reb officers expressed their thanks for bouquets of 
 flowers, and "sich like." The valley of the Etowah is very 
 beautiful, and in Northern hands would be a paradise ; it 
 seems too bad for this lovely country to be ravaged by war, 
 
 1 The passage from Tennyson is, 
 
 " For what are men better than sheep or goat 
 That nourish a blind life within the brain, 
 If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer 
 Both for themselves, and those who call them friend ? 
 For so the whole round earth is every way 
 Bound by gold chains about the feet of God."
 
 460 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 but the people would not be warned, and now they are reaping 
 the fruits of their folly. Every house is either entirely de 
 serted, or else occupied only by a few women and children ; 
 a man at home is a curiosity. Our Division Head-quarters is 
 in a fine house out of town, where I love to go and loaf, and 
 look at the roses, and scent the honeysuckles and jessamines 
 that run all over the porch and up the trees, and make me 
 think of that arbor at the hotel in Athens, six years ago this 
 month. I won't bother you with any account of our fight at 
 Resaca ; we whipped the rebs well, and most of the fighting 
 was done by our Corps, though the Batteries did not have 
 a great deal to do. We have all been indignant at General 
 McPherson for not cutting the enemy off as early as May loth ; 
 he had the chance, and might have done it. If Hooker had 
 been in his place, we might have captured the whole of John 
 ston's army ; as it was, we only forced him to make a clean 
 and orderly retreat, and to-morrow we start to break our heads 
 against Atlanta or any intervening obstacles. I hope that the 
 blows struck may be heavy and incessant; then, perhaps, we 
 may settle all the heads of this Hydra. 
 
 INTRENCHMENTS ON THE BATTLEFIELD, 
 NEAR DALLAS, GA., May 30, 1864. 
 
 I can't say exactly how the epistolary account stands be 
 tween us, but am inclined to think that I am quite decidedly 
 your debtor, and so here goes for a few words, although the 
 first line of works, not more than two hundred yards from the 
 enemy's position, where bullets are constantly flying within 
 a few yards of my paper, is not exactly the best place for a- 
 quiet and thoughtful chat. But we have been lying here for 
 four days now, and are getting accustomed to the steady whiz 
 of the bullets, to say nothing of the occasional boom of a 
 rebel shell, and the idea of writing you a letter under fire is 
 rather amusing than otherwise, so I snatch a scrap of my rap 
 idly diminishing stock of paper, borrow the finest pen in the 
 crowd, and try to see how much I can work in on a little 
 space. I do not need to tell you that I have been preserved
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 461 
 
 safe and sound through the fight at Rocky-faced Ridge, the 
 battle at Resaca, and the action of the 25th at this place. 
 Suffice it to say, that they were bloody affairs for our Corps 
 and Division ; the losses of the Twentieth Corps since we left 
 Bridgeport amounting to nearly five thousand. The action of 
 Wednesday last was a curious one. We had left the fertile 
 valley of the Etowah, and had entered the woody and moun 
 tainous country on the western part of the Altoona ridge, 
 hoping to be able to anticipate the enemy in reaching one of 
 the gaps, and to compel him to give battle in the compara 
 tively level country before Altoona. On Wednesday morning 
 we pushed forward from Burnt Hickory to Pumpkin Vine 
 Creek, repaired the bridge which the pickets had half burned, 
 and crossed our Division over, the other Divisions being on 
 other roads. After marching a couple of miles, we met the 
 enemy in force and attacked him fiercely, driving his force 
 back. It was very lucky for us that we did so, as we learned 
 from prisoners that Johnston's whole army was before us, and 
 nothing but our anxiety had prevented the whole Division from 
 being taken or cut to pieces. The other Divisions were sent 
 for and came up at double-quick, when Hooker hurled them 
 upon the enemy with his customary impetuosity, and drove 
 them back about a mile and a half, storming one of their best 
 positions, that which we are now holding; and I sincerely 
 believe that nothing but the coming on of a most thick dark 
 ness prevented him from driving them headlong from their 
 stronghold. Our loss was heavy ; about two thousand. Gen 
 eral Howard, General Palmer, and General Schofield arrived 
 with their Corps the next day, and we took up a line opposite 
 to that of the enemy, and since then the Vicksburg tactics of 
 fighting from trenches have been adopted, a most tedious 
 and vexatious way of fighting, I think, and one calculated to 
 demoralize an army of spirit. Here we have been for four 
 days in dirty trenches, without taking off our clothes, and 
 started up every few hours by an attack either real or sham. 
 Last night the rebs made a serious attempt to drive us out, 
 and we awaked from our first sleep at about IIP. M. to hear
 
 462 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 a most ferocious fire from .their line which had advanced to 
 within one hundred yards of our works. My men sprang to 
 their guns and treated them to a few doses of canister that 
 soon drove them back, and their officers could not get them 
 out again. Our works alone saved us from destruction. I 
 anticipate a still rougher assault to-night, but they won't get 
 the Thirteenth New York Battery without pretty hard work. 
 This whole campaign is going to be a severe and deadly one, 
 and I don't much expect to come out of it all right ; and it is 
 for this very reason that I write you under these very peculiar 
 circumstances to assure you once more of my unaltered esteem 
 and love for you, which .have now continued the same from 
 childhood up. My dearest brother is a prisoner, and you 
 must join with me in prayers and hopes that he may have 
 strength to bear, with patience and cheerfulness, the severe 
 trial of personal confinement and mental inactivity. May he 
 be restored to his home, without suffering any shock either to 
 his health or spirits. I feel at times almost desperate when 
 I think of the still distant termination of the war, and of the 
 blood and treasure that must yet be expended before truth 
 and justice shall prevail ; but I think that a man is less mis 
 erable when actively engaged in the war, than when an anxious 
 watcher and spectator at home. Perhaps the poor fellows 
 who fell the other evening, and whose graves are at my feet 
 as I write, are the happiest and most enviable of all. You 
 must not think that I am downhearted ; but the constant 
 strain of lying here under fire, and witnessing the constant 
 slaughter going on, on the skirmish line, while the air is heavy 
 and polluted with the smell of dead men and horses yet un- 
 buried, does not tend to make a man's fancy bright or his 
 spirits high. I almost envy the lot of the men of the Army of 
 the Potomac. They have the heavy fighting and also the 
 greater and fairer wreaths of laurel. I am afraid that the 
 country will ask Sherman what he has been doing all this 
 time, while his brother in arms has been doing so much. 
 Rumors are prevalent that our Corps is to be relieved from 
 this trench-work, and is to be employed on a flank movement.
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 463 
 
 I earnestly hope that it may be the case, as I am about used 
 up. I hope that my next letter home may be from Atlanta, 
 though perhaps that is a little too sanguine ; only, if with 
 our force we don't put the rebs through here, we ought to be 
 ashamed of ourselves. 
 
 But I must close, as it is growing dark, and there is every 
 prospect of a lively affair to-night. If this letter is duly sent, 
 you may take it for granted that I got through all right. Now, 
 my dearest cousin, write me soon, and at length, and give me 
 good words which shall make my heart feel warm and strong 
 in this distant land and rough life. 
 
 THE LAST LETTER RECEIVED BY ME. T. D. W. 
 
 CAMP NEAR ACWORTH, GA., 
 June 8, 1864. 
 
 MY DEAREST MOTHER, .... I think that I have not 
 written home directly since we were at Cassville, though I 
 sent off a short epistle to Annie from our trenches, written 
 under a heavy fire ; but this was more for the oddity of the 
 thing, and I know that it was a very absurd letter. We have 
 had a very hard and fatiguing fortnight of it since leaving 
 Cassville ; we started on May 23, marched through the rich 
 arid beautiful valley of the Etovvah, which is worthy of being 
 possessed and worked by free people, crossed the Etowah on 
 pontoons, and massed our forces on its south bank. The 
 next day we pushed cautiously ahead, through a town called 
 Stilesborough, where large quantities of cotton had been de 
 stroyed the day before, then began to leave the rich and 
 fertile valley, and to enter the oak forests and barren districts 
 of the eastern Altoona ridge, until we camped in a" place 
 bearing the euphonious name of Burnt Hickory. On Wednes 
 day we marched through the mountains by parallel roads, 
 toward a creek called Pumpkin Vine Creek ; our Division 
 being considerably in the advance, the other Divisions making 
 flank demonstrations towards Dallas. At Pumpkin Vine Creek 
 we found the bridge half burned by the rebel cavalry ; but it
 
 464 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 was soon repaired, and our Division began to cross, and to 
 pass into a ridgy wooded country, where, about two miles 
 from the creek, we found the enemy in force, and attacked 
 him with our first Brigade, driving his forces back quite a 
 distance. Here very large forces of the rebels could be seen 
 coming up, and their artillery was being planted. To our 
 dismay, we learned from prisoners, that nearly the whole of 
 the rebel army was in our front, both Hood and Hardee being 
 present with their Corps. Nothing but our first brisk attack 
 had saved us ; the enemy supposed that our whole army must 
 also be there ; a determined advance on their part would have 
 cut Geary's whole Division in pieces before it could have re 
 treated. We made our preparations for a vigorous defense ; 
 I took my batteries back across the creek, and placed them 
 in strong positions, to cover the crossing, and the Divisions 
 of Williams and Butterfield, and General Howard's Corps, 
 were ordered up on double quick. You can imagine our 
 anxiety until they arrived ; but the critical moment went by, 
 the rebels did not improve their golden time, and as soon as 
 General Hooker had got his three lines of battle, General 
 Williams' Division forming the first two lines, General Butter- 
 field's the third, while our Division, which had been all day 
 long skirmishing and holding the enemy in check, formed the 
 reserve, I followed the first line of battle with a section of 
 my Battery, ready to place it in position as soon as a position 
 could be found, which was too rare in that heavily wooded 
 country. I had a fine opportunity of observing General 
 Hooker, who rode close behind the first line, and encouraged 
 the men immensely by his cool and easy bearing and his 
 cheering words. Perhaps he exposes himself too much, but 
 he gets more fight out of his men than any officer I ever saw. 
 The men went into the fight superbly ; the rebels were driven 
 steadily back, and back, until they reached a strongly fortified 
 position that they had prepared ; here they made a stand and 
 checked our advance, and the fighting became very severe. 
 The second line relieved the first, and the third the second ; 
 rebel batteries poured shell and canister into our ranks, and
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 465 
 
 yet they pushed on. Just before dark our Division was sent 
 in, and with two good hours for work would have carried the 
 rebel position ; but a pitchy darkness came on, and the fight 
 ing on both sides ceased almost instantaneously, and both 
 sides began to intrench the positions in which they were rest 
 ing. We had not won everything, but we had gained the 
 crossing of Pumpkin Vine Creek, a serious obstacle, and had 
 pushed the enemy back two miles by determined fighting, and 
 had even gained a footing on the crest of his position. The 
 next day was spent in strengthening the works thrown up on 
 the night of the 25th. At daybreak on Wednesday, the 2yth, 
 the three brass batteries of the Corps were placed in position 
 in these works. 
 
 Here we remained six days without relief, under a burning 
 sun, constantly under fire, with the rebel works less than two 
 hundred yards distant from us, and their sharp-shooters often 
 stealing up to within one hundred and fifty yards, and sending 
 their bullets into our embrasures with disagreeable sharpness 
 and precision. Fortunately their advanced works were in a 
 hollow, and so they overshot our breastworks as a general 
 rule ; but sometimes an enterprising reb would climb a tree 
 and get a very fair view of us, as we took our ease on the 
 sharp stones behind our works, and then we would find it 
 convenient to huddle up pretty close into the trenches. Night 
 was the worst time of all ; the short distance between the 
 lines made a rush possible, at any time, from the enemy's 
 works to ours ; and then the Fourth Corps, which occupied 
 the works to our left, had a nervous way of getting up a false 
 alarm about three times in the course of the night, and making 
 us tumble up to our posts, thus completely breaking our rest 
 and depriving us of sleep. On Sunday night the rebs under 
 took to see if they could oust us, and came up to within fifty 
 yards of our works in a very threatening manner ; but we were 
 wide awake, and after a hot little fight of about half an hour, 
 they got back to their works very rapidly, and their officers 
 could not get them out to make another assault. We must 
 have mowed them pretty badly, as we fired twenty-four rounds 
 30
 
 466 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 of canister into them at short range. Pretty business for Sun 
 day night, was it not ? We were at last relieved in the trenches 
 by some of the Fifteenth Corps, General Logan's, and moved 
 off to the left of the army. The exposure and wearing excite 
 ment had made us all more or less unwell. I came off better 
 than most of the others, and a dose of opium broke up a 
 severe attack of dysentery that had begun to come on. Since 
 then there has been more or less fighting, mostly to our ad 
 vantage. We now hold the railroad to Altoona: our next 
 point is Marietta, then the passage of the Chattahooche 
 River, and then onward to Atlanta. We march probably to 
 the river to-morrow morning, and it is impossible to say when 
 a general engagement may come on. When it does, we are 
 confident of success, and especially that the Twentieth Corps 
 will have plenty to do and will do it well. Our Corps has 
 done almost all the fighting in this campaign, and has sus 
 tained a very large proportion of the losses. I think that the 
 entire loss of our Corps since we left Bridgeport must be 
 rather over than under five thousand. Our battles have 
 seemed small and pigmy-like beside those in Virginia, still 
 
 we are not idle and are making progress The climate 
 
 suits me as well as, or better than Virginia. In the morning 
 and evening the air is full of the delicious perfume from the 
 blossoms of the wild grape and the hawthorn, from thyme and 
 other sweet grasses. The smell of these last make me think 
 of Athens and Mount Hymettus. Think of me as well and 
 strong, and doing the best I can, and always longing to hear 
 from my dearest mother. 
 
 Your ever loving son, 
 
 WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 The following letter to Professor Henry H. Hadley will 
 serve to introduce, and add to the interest of, the next and 
 final letter of this collection, as coming from the soldier to 
 whom reference is herein made.
 
 ARMY LIFE AND SERVICE. 467 
 
 HEAD-QUARTERS THIRTEENTH NEW YORK BATTERY, 
 BRIDGEPORT, ALA., April 14, 1864. 
 
 MY DEAR MR. HADLEY, Your kind note, in reference to 
 Mr. Lee, whom you caused to enlist for my Battery, has been 
 duly received, and permit me to thank you most sincerely for 
 the interest you have taken in my command. The acquisition 
 of a single good man is right acceptable, and the Spring is 
 just the time when we need all our available force at the front. 
 I think that I shall be able to make it comfortable for this 
 new recruit, physically at least ; the moral and religious ad 
 vantages of a Battery are not very great, but I think that the 
 general tone, and the sense of self-respect, are much higher 
 than in the Infantry. He will, at least, have an opportunity 
 of doing and enduring in the cause. My Battery has never 
 been in the reserve, and this spring it will probably have 
 a prominent part to play, as it belongs to General Hooker's 
 new Corps, the Twentieth, which will doubtless be pushed into 
 the thickest of all the fights. If I survive the campaign, I 
 shall hope to thank you in person for your kindness and 
 thoughtfulness in my behalf. 
 
 IN FIELD, June 23, 1864. 
 CAMP NEAR MARIETTA. 
 PROFESSOR HADLEY : 
 
 My dear Sir, The painful intelligence I have to com 
 municate, of Captain Wheeler's death, you will receive through 
 other sources before this reaches you. The envelope which 
 I send, you will observe, has his frank, which I obtained yes 
 terday morning, there being no stamps to be procured in the 
 Battery. When I went to him he was sitting in the ambulance 
 writing, unconscious as I was, .no doubt, of the fate that so 
 soon awaited him. I will give the circumstances of his death 
 as near as I am informed. At noon, yesterday, the 22d. we 
 had orders to advance to a new position in front, the enemy 
 having fallen back about a mile for fear of a flank movement. 
 Captain Wheeler, being acting Chief of Artillery for the 
 Division, took Knapp's Pennsylvania Battery forward, while
 
 468 LETTERS OF WILLIAM WHEELER. 
 
 we remained where we were. Shortly after, or while they were 
 getting the Battery in position, the enemy made two or three 
 charges, evidently with a view of capturing it, as we had no 
 breastworks. They were repulsed and driven back, however, 
 every time, by the fire of the infantry and the artillery. It 
 was while they were making one of these charges, as Captain 
 Wheeler stood partly behind a tree, making observations and 
 giving orders, that a ball from a sharp-shooter struck him in 
 the left breast, piercing him through the heart, from the effects 
 
 of which he died almost instantly His death created 
 
 a deep and solemn impression in the Battery, and a general 
 
 expression of regret was manifested by all 
 
 Most sincerely yours, 
 
 FRANK M. LEE.
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
 Los Angeles 
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