WHERE BEAUTY BLENDS 165 _Old Gardens, at Old Mansions, Where Bloom Flowers from Long Ago_ CHURCH AND SCHOOL 173 _How They Grew in the New World; Pathways to the Light_ THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND 181 _First in Virginia, the Church of England Has the Longest History_ THE 250TH BIRTHDAY 188 _Fredericksburg Celebrates an Anniversary_ APPENDIX 199 FREDERICKSBURG _A Preface_ Fredericksburg sprawls at the foot of the hills where the scented summer winds sweep over it out of the valley of brawling waters above. The grass grows lush in the meadows and tangles in the hills that almost surround it. In spring the flowers streak the lowlands, climb on the slopes, and along the ridges; and Autumn makes fair colors in the trees, shading them in blood crimson, weathered bronze, and the yellow of sunsets. Over its shadowed streets hangs the haze of history. It is not rich nor proud, because it has not sought; it is quiet and content, because it has sacrificed. It gave its energy to the Revolution. It gave its heart to the Confederacy; and, once when it was thundered at by guns, and red flames twisted in its crumbling homes, it gave its soul and all it possessed to the South. It never abated its loyalty nor cried out its sorrows. In Fredericksburg, and on the battlefields near it, almost thirty thousand men lay on the last couch in the shadowy forests and--we think--heard Her voice calling and comforting them. To the wounded, the Old Town gave its best, not visioning the color of their uniforms, nursing them back to life: And, broken and twisted and in poverty, it began to rebuild itself and gather up the shattered ideals of its dead past. Out of its heart has grown simple kindness; out of its soul simple faith. As I look out over the streets, (I knew them well when Lee and Jackson and Stuart, Lincoln and Grant and Hancock knew them too), they shimmer in the Autumn sun. Over them, as has ever seemed to me, hangs an old and haunting beauty. There may not be as great men here as long ago, but here are their descendants and the descendants of others like them. And he who comes among them will find loyal hearts and warm hand-clasps. Ah, I know the old town. My bare feet ran along its unpaved walks and passed the cabins many a time in slavery days. I knew it in the Civil War and reconstruction days, and on and on till now: And it has not failed its duty.