When the work of desolation had been completed in the quarter first attacked, parties of soldiers straggled off from the main body in search of further prey. Fearful was it to meet these men--their faces blackened with smoke, their hands stained with blood, fierce frowns upon their brows, and curses on their lips. The parsonage presented little attraction in its external aspect to men whose object was plunder, and they turned first to larger and more showy buildings. These were soon rifled; the noise of their ribald songs, their blasphemous oaths and drunken revelry penetrating often the chamber of death, yet scarcely awakening an emotion in the presence of the great Destroyer. At length the little gate is flung rudely open, and unsteady but heavy steps ascend from the court-yard to the house. They cross the piazza, they enter the parlor where life's gentlest courtesies and holiest affections have hitherto dwelt, the door of the room beyond is thrown open, and two men stand upon its threshold, sobered for an instant by the scene before them. There, pale, emaciated, the dim eyes closed, and the face wearing that unearthly beauty which seems the token of an adieu too fond, too tender, too sacred for human language, from the parting spirit to its loved ones, the wife and mother, speechless, senseless, yet not quite lifeless, lay propped by pillows. At her side knelt Mr. Sinclair; the pallor of deep, overpowering emotion was on his cheek, yet in his lifted eyes there was an expression of holy faith, and you might almost have fancied that a smile lay upon the lips which were breathing forth the hallowed strains of prayer--"Save and deliver us, we humbly beseech Thee, from the hands of our enemies, that we, being armed with thy defence, may be preserved evermore from all perils, to glorify Thee, who art the only giver of all victory, through the merits of thy Son, Jesus Christ our Lord--Amen."