pre-eminent.  You see I am a German at heart, and must have my world of thought and imagination, as well as the world in which men look at me with cold, hard, and even hostile eyes.  Thus far this ideal world has been peopled chiefly by the shadows of those who have lived in the past or by the characters of the great creators in poetry.  Now if my blue-eyed daughter can prove to me that she has too much heart and brain to be an ordinary society-girl like half a million of others, and will share my interest in the great thoughts and achievements of the past and the greater questions of to-day,—­if she can prove that when I have time I may enjoy a tryst with her in regions far remote from shallow, coarse, commonplace minds,—­is not my whole life enriched?  We can read some of my favorite authors together and trace their influence on the thought of the world.  We can take up history and see how to-day’s struggle is the result of the past.  I think I could soon give you an intelligent idea of the questions of the time, for which men are hourly dying.  The line of battle stretches across the continent, and so many are engaged that every few moments a man, and too often a woman from heart-break, dies that the beloved cause may triumph.  Southern girls and women, as a rule, are far more awake to the events of the time than their sisters in the North.  Such an influence on the struggle can scarcely be over-estimated.  They create a public sentiment that drives even the cowardly into the ranks, and their words and enthusiasm incite brave young men to even chivalric courage.  It is true that there are very many like them in the North, but there are also very many who restrain the men over whom they have influence,—­who are indifferent, as you have been, or in sympathy with the South,—­or who, as is true in most instances, do not yet see the necessity for self-sacrifice.  We have not truly felt the war yet, but it will sooner or later come home to every one who has a heart.  I have been in the South, and have studied the spirit of the people.  They are just as sincere and conscientious as we are, and more in earnest as yet.  Christian love and faith, there, look to Heaven for sanction with absolute sincerity, and mothers send their sons, girls their lovers, and wives their husbands, to die if need be.  For the political conspirators who have thought first and always of their ambition I have only detestation, but for the people of the South—­for the man I may meet in the ranks and kill if I can—­I have profound respect.  I should know he was wrong, I should be equally sure that he believed himself right.

“Look at the clock, my dear, and see how long I have talked to you.  Can you now doubt that you will be companionable to me?  Men down town think I am hard as a rock, but your touch of sympathy has been as potent as the stroke of Moses’ rod.  You have had an inundation of words, and the future is rosy to me with hope because you are not asleep.”