I could not think of leaving the haven. The world into which I had been born had never been fully revealed for what it was until I had escaped from it. Secrecy and ugliness; greed, fear and callousness; meanness, avarice, cunning, deceit and self-worship were as close around as the nearest farmhouses. The idea of returning to that world and of entering into daily competition with other underpaid, overdriven drudges striving fruitlessly to apply a dilute coating of culture to the unresponsive surface of unwilling students had little attraction. In those eight years, as I broadened my knowledge I narrowed my field. Undoubtedly it was presumptuous to take the War of Southron Independence as my specialty when there were already so many comprehensive works on the subject and so many celebrated historians engaged with this special event. However, my choice was made not out of self-importance but fascination, and undoubtedly it was the proximity of the scene which influenced the selection of my goal, the last thirteen months of the war, from General Lee’s invasion of Pennsylvania to the capitulation at Reading. I saw the whole vast design: Gettysburg, Lancaster, the siege of Philadelphia, the disastrous Union counter-thrust in Tennessee, the evacuation of Washington, and finally the desperate effort to break out of Lee’s trap which ended at Reading. I could spend profitable years filling in the details. My monographs were published in learned Confederate and British journals—there were none in the United States—and I rejoiced when they brought attention, not so much to me as to Haggershaven. I could contribute only this notice and my physical labor; on the other hand I asked little beyond food, clothing and shelter—just books. My field trips I took on foot, often earning my keep by casual labor for farmers, paying for access to private collections of letters or documents by indexing and arranging them. The time devoted to scholarship did not alone distinguish those eight years, nor even the security of the haven. I have spoken of the simple, easy manner in which the Agatis admitted me to their friendship, but they were not the only ones with whom there grew ties of affection and understanding. With very few exceptions the fellows of Haggershaven quickly learned to shed the suspicion and aloofness, so necessary a protection elsewhere, and substitute acceptance. The result was a tranquillity I had never experienced before, so that I think of those years as set apart, a golden period, a time of perpetual warm sunshine.