At dinner Dorothy “rattled” rather than conversed, as young women are apt to do when they are embarrassed and are determined not to show their embarrassment. She seemed bent upon alternately amusing and astonishing Aunt Polly, with her grotesquely distorted descriptions of things seen and people encountered during her travels. Arthur took only so much part in the conversation as a man thinking deeply, but disposed to be polite, might. When the cloth was removed he lighted a cigar and went to the stables and barns, avowedly to inquire about matters on the plantation. When he returned, full of a carefully formed purpose to “have it out” with Dorothy, he found guests in the house who had driven to Wyanoke for supper and a late moonlight drive homeward. From that moment until the time of the guests’ departure, he was eagerly beset with questions concerning the political situation and the prospects of war. “The war is already on,” he answered, “and we are not half prepared for it. Fortunately the North is in no better case, and still more fortunately, we are to have with us the ablest soldier in America.” “Who? Beauregard?” “No, Robert E. Lee, to whom the Federal administration a little while ago offered the command of all the United States armies. He has resigned and is now in Richmond to organize our forces.” Arthur talked much, too, of the seriousness of the war, of the certainty in his mind, that it would last for years, taxing the resources of the South to the point of exhaustion. For this some of his guests called him a pessimist, and applauded the prediction of young Jeff Peyton, that “within twenty days we shall have twenty thousand men on the Potomac, and after perhaps one battle of some consequence we shall dictate terms of peace in Washington.” He added: “You must make haste to get into the service, Doctor, if you expect to see the fun.” “I do not expect to see the fun,” Arthur answered quietly. “I do not see the humorous side of slaughter. But in my judgment you, sir, will have ample time in which to wear out many uniforms as gorgeous as the one you now have on, before peace is concluded at Washington or anywhere else. An army of twenty thousand men will be looked upon as a mere detachment before this struggle is over. We shall hear the tramp of armies numbering hundreds of thousands, and their tramping will desolate Virginia fields that are now as fair as any on earth. We shall see historic mansions vanish in smoke, and thousands of happy homes made prey by the demon War. War was never yet a pastime for any but the most brutish men. It is altogether horrible; it is utterly hellish, if the ladies will pardon the term, and only fools can welcome it as a holiday pursuit. Unhappily there are many such on both sides of the Potomac.” As he paused there was a complete hush among the company for thirty seconds or so. Then Dorothy advanced to Arthur, took his hand, and said: “Thank you, Master!”